Stardate 20040517.0902

(Captain's log): Just what I don't need in my email:

Would you say that being an american perhaps shadows your thoughts about the US? I've read quite a few of your postings which are very interesting, but when it comes to talking about US I seem to notice a somewhat defencive attitude.

Ofcourse one feels for ones country but great thinkers don't let that affect the thoughts. Was the war against Iraq justified or was it a signal of what the US have come to be?

Best wishes
Andreas, from the country that gave the world Hans Blix

(Ahem...)

I make no bones about being partisan for my country. I also feel no shame whatever because of it.

I absolutely disagree that "great thinkers don't let that affect the thoughts". I would say exactly the opposite: someone who refuses to let love-of-country affect their thoughts is a moral cripple irrespective of their intellectual prowess.

I can look dispassionately at the situation, and I have done so repeatedly. But I will never forget which nation I love and support.

Was the war against Iraq "justified"? That depends on who is setting the criteria for "justification". There is no consensus on what would be needed for "justification" and there never will be any consensus. Nor is there any need for consensus

I thought it was justified a year before it happened, and I still do. And I don't particularly care if someone else doesn't think it was justified.

If you 'd like to see my reasons why I think it was justified, they're summarized here.

 

Then we have to agree on disagreeing. For me it's about collecting facts, being open-minded and getting the strings together. In that I don't let the general ideas and solutions presented by my country affect me, although I ofcourse feel for the culture and the way of living. If it would turn out that Sweden did or does something wrong I would agree with that. And in that way I can say that Sweden sucked during the WW2, and in another example that our intelligence agency is a joke.

I read [your overview], and sure most of the things you bring up is true, in a smaller point of view. I can't agree on that the inspections were a joke though. I see a UN and inspectors claiming they've looked over and over again but without finding anything, while I at the same time see a George Bush yelling about weapons of massdestruction and a world threat and that we have to act the same month to this gigantic terror. And then there is a war against all agreements and a year later there's still nothing to be found.

Anyway, I prefer looking on it at a broader perspective: who put Saddam in his position, how was/is Iraq affiliated with al qaida, why hasn't Osama been found, and possibly most interesting: how come US is so convinced about this war when the rest of the world disagree? Shouldn't that make you wonder? Okay, Tony Blair was pro war but he's not going to last long on his position, since the people in England disapproved.

Yes, it sometimes makes me wonder, but not about what you think it should.

It makes me wonder when "the rest of the world" totally lost its moral compass. Or if it ever really had one.

"The world" is not unanimous in opposition to the war. The claim that "the rest of the world disagrees" is a lie.

But even if it were true, it would not matter. We Americans have a saying: "It's more important what you stand for than who you stand with." I do not rely upon peer opinion to decide what is right and what is wrong. I make those decisions for myself, and even if I discover that every other human alive chose differently, that doesn't mean I was wrong.

You have repackaged "Ask yourself why they hate you" with your rhetorical question. That was always a stupid question, because the unspoken text of it was, "If 'they' hate you, doesn't it mean you should hate yourself?"

No, it does not.

If the rest of the world disagrees with the US on this war, shouldn't that make me wonder about whether we are right to go to war?

No, it should not.

I do not consider that kind of thinking to be "nuanced" or "sophisticated". I consider it to be a demonstration of decadence and moral decay. I am not a simple man or a simple thinker, but there are some kinds of situations where the answer is simple, and in such cases if someone still tries to find a more complex nuanced answer it shows that he has no backbone.

There comes a time in every man's life when he has to choose sides. I have chosen my side. I am comfortable with my decision. I do not think everyone on my side is a saint, but I know that those on the other side are much, much worse.

Sometimes a man with too broad a perspective reveals himself as having no real perspective at all. A man who tries too hard to see every side may be a man who is trying to avoid choosing any side. A man who tries too hard to seek a deeper truth may be trying to hide from the truth he already knows.

That is not a sign of intellectual sophistication and "great thinking". It is a demonstration of moral degeneracy and cowardice.

If you truly think that America is no better than the terrorists, then go watch the video of Nicholas Berg's brutal murder. After you've listened to his horrible screams as he died, and after you've watched his killers wave his bloody head in front of the camera, get back to me and explain to me why I and my nation are responsible for Berg's death, and why the man who wielded the knife is not.

Update 20040518: Jan comments.

Update: Steve Rider comments.

Update: Catfish comments. (In my own defense, may I cite this? Or this?)

Update 20040519: Brian Tiemann comments.

Update: Keith Devens has an interesting interchange with a commenter from Europe about this post. I think that Mark's comments are far more revealing than he realizes, given his eagerness to dismiss me as a close-minded religious zealot. That's because for a lot of sophisticated, nuanced Europeans today, the phrase "close-minded religious zealot" is triply redundant. And that's because a lot of Europeans have adopted the idea that strong American support for the war can only be explained as being due to the large percentage of Americans who are "close-minded religious zealots".

Update 20040520: Urthshu comments.

Update: Baldilocks is more pithy than I am.