Give war a chance
By By Craig Ziemba / guest columnist
Feb. 2, 2003
Craig Ziemba is a pilot who lives in Meridian.
As our military prepares for war with Iraq, it's been interesting to watch the growth of the peace movement at home and abroad. The signs and sentiments of the anti-war movement hearken back to an earlier age (minus the cool music):
Wouldn't it be great if they were right?
I can't judge the motives of anti-war protesters, human shield volunteers, and others who oppose war, but it doesn't take a doctorate in history to know that their logic is at odds with reality.
It'd be wonderful if tyrants like Pol Pot, Idi Amin, and Saddam Hussein would respond to reasonable, peaceful negotiations, but they won't. It'd be great if all the world's leaders were committed to democracy and human rights, but they aren't. All the wishing, singing, and marching in the world won't change that.
It's too bad. I like to imagine John Lennon's world where all the people live in harmony. It really would be great if they threw a war and nobody came. But what happens to our dream world if we lay down our arms and the other side shows up packing heat? Is peace at any cost worth risking our families and our freedoms?
War is crue
No one wants a war. It's cruel, senseless and causes untold human suffering. War is hell, and the only justification for it is when the alternative is worse. Allowing Saddam Hussein to continue to build chemical, nuclear and biological weapons in order to preserve peace today would lead to another Holocaust tomorrow. Carefully managed violence now will prevent indiscriminate slaughter later.
In a way, war is like chemotherapy. It's horrible and painful, but sometimes it's the only way to rid the body of a disease that's worse. One of history's sad ironies is that the only way to have peace is to prepare for war. I wish there were some other way, but there isn't.
Peace activists don't understand history. Their empathy and compassion for human misery is admirable, but their willingness to appease dictators in order to preserve the peace is nave, dangerous, and ends up causing more suffering in the long run.
By appeasing Germany in the 1930s, Neville Chamberlain and the rest of pacifist Europe set the stage for the bloodiest decade in history. The bloodshed continued until military "warmongers" like Eisenhower and McArthur brought about peace.
Dire predictions
Before we went to war in Afghanistan, the Left made dire predictions of quagmire and genocide and demanded that we deal with al-Queda and their Taliban hosts diplomatically through the United Nations. One year later, the Taliban was gone, Afghan girls were learning to read in school, and our military is helping to rebuild a society that had known decades of war and oppression.
There were no massive casualties among our troops or the civilian population, and it's safe to say that the Afghani people are far better off today than they were before the U.S. invasion.
Reason only works with people who are reasonable. Dictators don't care about the opinions of their own people, much less the world because they don't have to. The only language they understand is brute force.
I hope my son never has to leave his family for six months at a time or spend Christmas in a combat zone. But I also hope when duty calls he loves his country and his freedom enough to answer.
Craig Ziemba can be heard on WMOX-AM 1010 this Monday from 7:15 a.m.-9 a.m.
