Tag: Libya

Signs of the times (Stories of engagement)

Posted on by kathiemm

[Note from Kathie Malley-Morrison: Today in our series of portraits of moral engagement, we introduce Dean Hammer, a clinical psychologist and peace activist, who shares with us excerpts from his essay “Beyond War: A Time for Revolutionary Hope,” presented to the Leverett Peace Commission Lecture Series #2—March 4, 2011.]

Ploughshares Eight
Ploughshares Eight (Image used with permission)

The framework for my reflections is constructed from Dr. Martin Luther King’s Speech delivered at Riverside Church in April, 1967 (a year before his assassination).

Dr. King’s speech was entitled, Beyond Viet Nam: A Time To Break Silence. This vintage oratory occurred during a time of awful blood-letting, much like our current times.

In his wonderful cadence, Dr. King exhorted the audience by stating, “A time comes when silence is betrayal….A new spirit is rising among us… These are revolutionary times.  All over the globe men (and women) are revolting against old systems of exploitation and oppression, and out of the wounds of a frail world, new systems of justice and equality are being born…We in the West must support these revolutions.”

While I was a student at Yale Divinity School during the 1970s, I had the very good fortune of meeting Daniel and Philip Berrigan, two radical Catholic peace activists.  These notorious trouble-makers became my mentors and called me into the pathway from Yale to jail.

In Sept. 1980, I joined them and five other friends in a peace witness that came to be known as the Plowshares Eight.  We entered a plant owned by General Electric where components of nuclear weapons were being built.  With household hammers, we disarmed the nuclear nosecone for Mark 12A intercontinental ballistic missiles—beginning a series of over 90 Plowshares actions in the U.S., Europe, and Australia during the past thirty years and leading to time spent in federal prison for my efforts.

From the streets of Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Libya—and yes, Madison Wisconsin– we can hear the drum beat of revolution.  We have our work cut out for us to understand the signs of the times and to join this dramatic movement of liberation and justice-making.

Dean Hammer

Using war to stop or undo harm (Just war, part 5)

Posted on by kathiemm

[Note from Kathie Malley-Morrison: Today we once again welcome guest contributor Dr. Michael Corgan, for his ongoing series on just war.]

Animated image comparing two columns of dots
Animation by Sbyrnes321; in public domain. From Wikimedia Commons.

The idea of proportionality is one of the more comprehensive notions in both the international laws governing war and in just war theory. Proportionality applies both to the resort to war and the conduct of a war, however justly or legally entered into.

In terms of international law, the only just or legal cause for war is self-defense against aggression. But the UN Charter in particular countenances not just the repulsion of aggression and punishment for its having been used. In just war theory, proportionality places no such requirements on those repelling aggression. War can stop or undo the harm but not be an excuse for vengeance or aggrandizement.

Instead, proportionality in just war theory implies that only war can correct the wrong suffered. The wrong to be corrected must be grave. Insults to national pride or need to maintain reputation are insufficient reasons to use war. So, too, for example would be economic harm that does not materially destroy a national economy.

Weighing scale
Image in public domain

War, even a just war, always involves the loss of innocent life and destruction of things that are simply too near the battle area. The inevitability of this so-called  “collateral damage” means that war is necessarily a blunt instrument. This reality undergirds the just war notion of proportionality.

Consider the current conflict in Libya. In your opinion, would war be justified according to the just war principle of proportionality?

Michael T. Corgan, Associate Chair and Associate Professor of International Relations, Boston University

Libya: A “just” war? (Just war, part 4)

Posted on by kathiemm
Benghazi, Libya
Benghazi, Libya. Photo by Dennixo, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike 3.0 Unported (from Wikimedia Commons)

[Note from Kathie Malley-Morrison: Today we once again welcome guest contributor Dr. Michael Corgan, for his ongoing series on just war.]

How does the war in Libya, for such it is, measure up to the principles of just war?

First impressions are that it is just, so far. War was “declared” by competent authority; the U.N. Security Council Resolution and France, at least, had recognized the Benghazi rebels as a legitimate government. Qaddafi’s threat to hunt down enemies in their closets, apparent shelling of civilian areas, and promises to show no mercy indicates war was a necessary means when other dire warnings had failed. So far only military targets seem have been hit by the anti-Qaddafi forces which satisfies proportionality.

However a couple of serious questions remain. First, what sort of peace will be had? It’s not a just war until a just peace has been instituted. Lincoln’s “malice toward none, with charity for all” was prescient in this regard.

An even more troubling question is “Why don’t all the same (essentially Western) conditions apply to Bahrain?” The anti-demonstrator crackdown there has been as nasty as Qaddafi’s. And the Saudis have pitched in to help authorities suppress the demonstrations. Both Libya and Bahrain have oil but Bahrain has a U.S. Naval base.

If the Libyan war is just, then what are the same participants doing about Bahrain? This Bahrain inaction undercuts the “justness” of the Libyan action.

Michael T. Corgan, Ph.D., Associate Chair and Associate Professor of International Relations, Boston University

Remembering Nagasaki, 1945

Posted on by kathiemm

World War I was not the war to end all wars; neither did the dropping of a second U.S. atom bomb at Nagasaki, Japan bring lasting peace to the world.

origami peace cranes
Origami peace cranes

Since August 9, 1945, and the end of World War II, the U. S. has committed troops to more than 100 armed conflicts around the world—in widely dispersed areas such as China, Korea, Palestine, Lebanon, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, the Dominican Republic, the Congo (Zaire), El Salvador, Libya, Grenada, Honduras, Chad, the Persian Gulf, Panama, Colombia, the Philippines, Afghanistan, and Iraq.

Many of these armed interventions provoked controversy and protest among American citizens; others barely reached public awareness. The goals were always lofty; the results frequently horrendous; the true motives often highly suspect.

Although the U.S. has used armed force with increasing frequency to achieve a wide range of goals across the globe since World War II, the actual number of armed conflicts occurring each year has declined rather steadily in recent decades—from around 164 in 1982 to 40 in 2000 and only 28 in 2008.

The consistent decline in armed conflicts is one basis for optimism concerning the possibility of world peace. Despite the involvement of the United States in ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, there is good evidence that increasing numbers of people around the world can see alternatives to violence as a means of resolving conflicts.

Public support for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars is declining even as funding continues. What will it take to get the country’s leadership to listen to the voice of the people who oppose these wars?

Future blogs will discuss the kinds of thinking people bring to their judgments concerning the legitimacy—and illegitimacy–of a government’s use of armed aggression and alternatives to that aggression.

Kathie Malley-Morrison, Professor of Psychology