Aretae

The virtue of excellence

Monday, May 28, 2012

Memorial Day

The primary virtue of the young man is Courage.  It is beautiful to see the portrait of the courageous young man, and as long as history records (and it is suspected much much longer), the primary avenue with which to demonstrate courage has been in going to war.  Memorial Day is best liked as a tribute to the virtue of courage as exemplified by young men going to war...and as a tribute to those who have lost their lives in demonstrating said virtue.  I honor these young men, and particularly their courage, but also their ability to work together to solve hard problems against determined opposition.

On the other hand, waging wars of aggression upon other countries is not among my list of proper functions of government.  The last war that we collectively engaged in defensively was (arguably) Japan in the pacific in the 1940s.  Before that, 1812 was the last defensive war for the Union*.  While the men demonstrate courage, I cannot say that our political leaders are lily-white, pure, or otherwise even good.  And the wars, skirmishes, and police actions we collectively engage in are quite far from obviously in the best interests of the people of this country.

I therefore respect mightily the courage of the young men, and now women serving in the military.  And I regret mightily their decision to harness their courage to the evil aims of the government.  But this is Memorial Day, and the order of the day is the remembering of the dead men who demonstrated courage, and died for their demonstration.  And there is good reason to remember their sacrifice.  In memoriam.



*the confederacy's last defensive war was 1865


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10 comments:

AC said...

Even the war against Japan was only instigated by the clearly antagonistic position of the US, most obviously its oil embargo. The conflict would likely have been unnecessary if the US took a noninterventionist foreign policy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Events_leading_to_the_attack_on_Pearl_Harbor#Background_to_conflict

May 28, 2012 at 12:22 PM
Aretae said...

AC,

Arguably in parens was meant to call out the US bellicosity towards Japan in the early 40s. I removed a sentence on the topic before posting. Indeed, I think that calling Pearl Harbor an attack, rather than a response is pretty fishy.

May 28, 2012 at 5:38 PM
Ken said...

That's a deft and mature slicing of the issue. Concur.

May 29, 2012 at 6:59 AM
Anonymous said...

1812 was a defensive war? Who knew!

You can argue the rights and wrongs of the grievances, but what is quite clear is that the USA declared war on Britain, invaded Canada, and was the aggressor for the first 2 years of the war.

May 29, 2012 at 11:35 AM
Aretae said...

Just like it's hardly fair to call WWII pacific a defensive war, as USA had intentionally provoled Japan into firing the first shot...so too do the same standards apply to 1812.

May 29, 2012 at 1:13 PM
Borepatch said...

Well said.

May 29, 2012 at 5:16 PM
Goober said...

One wonders if there is ever a just reason for going to war in defense of others, too.

Granted, the war against Germany in WWII was not defensive in the strictest sense of the term for the United States, itself. Germany was not a threat and likely would not have been if we'd taken a non-interventionist stance.

That being said, I'm of the opinion that the war against Germany was a just one to a point*, specifically because it was a war in defense of other innocents. Just because Americans were not being fed into the ovens does not mean that it was unjust or wrong for us to step in and stop the nazis from feeding other folks into the ovens. I'd gladly volunteer for that duty.

I take a strict stance of non-aggression, with the exceptions of self defense or defense of another innocent. My life is not in danger from a man who is stabbing a woman on the street, but you an bet your buns I'd kill him to get him to stop doing it, and I think that I'd be wholly justified in doing so.

As I've said before, you must take government actions and boil them down to individual actions to see if they are just actions (because the individual is all that matters). The question becomes: "Is it just for Smith to kill Jones in an attempt to keep him from throwing innocent man Davis into the gas chamber?" The answer to me is absolutey, yes. Therefore, I think that our war in Germany was just.

*The point where it stopped being just was the draft. Slavery is always wrong. If you can't find enough volunteers to fight your war, you shouldn't be fighting it.

June 1, 2012 at 2:31 PM
Aretae said...

Goober,

I have little to add to what you said. I agree to 80%. Caveat #2...taxation. Tough call.

June 1, 2012 at 7:12 PM
Goober said...

I know that this has gotten old and this comment will likely never be seen by anyone, but I thought long and hard on AC's comment above about the US provoking the attack on Pearl Harbor and therefore making the Pacific War a non-defensive war.

I refer to my previous post about a just war also being one fought in defense of innocents. If the Rape of Nanking was not enough for the US to impose sanctions against the evil Japanese Empire justly, then I wonder what it would take for such an action to become just.

I would not sell anything to a country that did what Japan did to the Chinese. If that makes me a belligerent that deserves to be attacked by the Japanese, then I will choose to be attacked every time. The war in the pacific was a defensive one. Japan brought the embargo on themselves.

June 6, 2012 at 4:31 PM
Aretae said...

Goober,

I get all the emails, so I will see it even if others don't.

Just war? I can't talk extensively about the ordering of events in Asia in the 1930s....but 10 minutes of research says Nanking occurred first.

Unfortunately, the rape of Nanking was not well known...just like the US didn't enter WWII against Germany to save the jews.

I'm HUGE on justice ex ante vs. ex post. Before the fact...the invasion of Iraq was nearly justified, because the evidence suggested the existence of WMD etc... Ex Post...not so much. Under real conditions of uncertainty, I think now that the decision was bad...but nowhere near as bad as it once was. And justice against the victims of Saddam was certainly a fair reason as well.

In both Germany and Japan, the WWII atrocities were enough to justify a just war. However, the atrocities were unknown at the beginning of the war...and so epistemelogically, it is only ex post that the war was justifiable. Ex Ante, it was unprovoked.

June 6, 2012 at 7:34 PM

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