To further the started discussion about wars, and their accompanying atrocities and their very relevance to today’s complex realities on one hand and the confused emerging humanity measures, I would like to recommend a documentary movie that I had watched recently: The Fog of War. Documentaries are usually straight forward in stating their positions, and have the power of picture manipulation; however, they leave us with a bunch of intercrossing questions and concerns.
The Fog of War was released in December 2003 to tell the life of Robert McNamara, U.S. Secretary of Defense 1961-8, through the use of archival material, and mainly, an interview with McNamara himself. The term "fog of war" refers to the uncertainty that descends over a battlefield once fighting begins. The movie won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature for 2003, due to, I guess, its powerful message and the deep lessons that McNamara learned, and presented in detain in the movie, from his experience:
*Empathize with your enemy.
*Rationality will not save us.
*There's something beyond one's self.
*Maximize efficiency.
*Proportionality should be a guideline in war.
*Get the data.
*Belief and seeing are both often wrong.
*Be prepared to reexamine your reasoning.
*In order to do good, you may have to engage in evil.
*Never say never.
*You can't change human nature.
Further points are added to the DVD released later. Reflecting upon the following points will hopefully enrich the open discussions.
Robert McNamara’s Ten Lessons:
1. The human race will not eliminate war in this century, but we can reduce the brutality of war – the level of killing – by adhering to the principles of “proportionality”.
2. The indefinite combination of human fallibility and nuclear weapon will lead to the destruction of nations.
3. We are the most powerful nation in the world – economically, politically and militarily – and we are likely to remain so for decades ahead. But we are not omniscient. If we cannot persuade other nations with similar interests and similar values of the merits o our proposed use of that power, we should not proceed unilaterally except in the unlikely requirement to defend directly the continental U.S., Alaska and Hawaii.
4. Moral principles are often ambiguous guides to foreign policy and defense policy, but surely we can agree that we should establish as a major goal of U.S. foreign policy and, indeed, of foreign policies across the globe: the avoidance in this century of the carnage – 160 million dead – caused by conflict in the 20th century.
5. We, the richest nation in the world, have failed in our responsibility to our own poor and to the disadvantaged across the world to help them advance their welfare in the most fundamental terms of nutrition, literacy, health and employment.
6. Corporate executives must recognize there is no contradiction between a soft hear and a hard head. Of course, they have responsibilities to stockholders, but they also have responsibilities to their employees, their customers and to society as a whole.
7. President Kennedy believed a primary responsibility of a president – indeed “the” primary responsibility pf a president – is to keep the nation out of war, if at all possible.
8. War is a blunt instrument by which to settle disputes between or within nations, and economic sanctions are rarely effective. Therefore, we should build a system of Jurisprudence based on the International Court – that the U.S. has refused to support – which would hold individuals responsible for crimes against humanity.
9. If we are to deal effectively with terrorists across the globe, we must develop a sense of empathy – I don’t mean “sympathy”, but rather “understanding” – to counter their attacks on us and the Western World.
10. One of the greatest dangers we face today is the risk that terrorists will obtain access to weapons of mass destruction as a result of the breakdown of the Non-Proliferation Regime. We in the U.S. are contributing to that breakdown.
The Fog of War was released in December 2003 to tell the life of Robert McNamara, U.S. Secretary of Defense 1961-8, through the use of archival material, and mainly, an interview with McNamara himself. The term "fog of war" refers to the uncertainty that descends over a battlefield once fighting begins. The movie won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature for 2003, due to, I guess, its powerful message and the deep lessons that McNamara learned, and presented in detain in the movie, from his experience:
*Empathize with your enemy.
*Rationality will not save us.
*There's something beyond one's self.
*Maximize efficiency.
*Proportionality should be a guideline in war.
*Get the data.
*Belief and seeing are both often wrong.
*Be prepared to reexamine your reasoning.
*In order to do good, you may have to engage in evil.
*Never say never.
*You can't change human nature.
Further points are added to the DVD released later. Reflecting upon the following points will hopefully enrich the open discussions.
Robert McNamara’s Ten Lessons:
1. The human race will not eliminate war in this century, but we can reduce the brutality of war – the level of killing – by adhering to the principles of “proportionality”.
2. The indefinite combination of human fallibility and nuclear weapon will lead to the destruction of nations.
3. We are the most powerful nation in the world – economically, politically and militarily – and we are likely to remain so for decades ahead. But we are not omniscient. If we cannot persuade other nations with similar interests and similar values of the merits o our proposed use of that power, we should not proceed unilaterally except in the unlikely requirement to defend directly the continental U.S., Alaska and Hawaii.
4. Moral principles are often ambiguous guides to foreign policy and defense policy, but surely we can agree that we should establish as a major goal of U.S. foreign policy and, indeed, of foreign policies across the globe: the avoidance in this century of the carnage – 160 million dead – caused by conflict in the 20th century.
5. We, the richest nation in the world, have failed in our responsibility to our own poor and to the disadvantaged across the world to help them advance their welfare in the most fundamental terms of nutrition, literacy, health and employment.
6. Corporate executives must recognize there is no contradiction between a soft hear and a hard head. Of course, they have responsibilities to stockholders, but they also have responsibilities to their employees, their customers and to society as a whole.
7. President Kennedy believed a primary responsibility of a president – indeed “the” primary responsibility pf a president – is to keep the nation out of war, if at all possible.
8. War is a blunt instrument by which to settle disputes between or within nations, and economic sanctions are rarely effective. Therefore, we should build a system of Jurisprudence based on the International Court – that the U.S. has refused to support – which would hold individuals responsible for crimes against humanity.
9. If we are to deal effectively with terrorists across the globe, we must develop a sense of empathy – I don’t mean “sympathy”, but rather “understanding” – to counter their attacks on us and the Western World.
10. One of the greatest dangers we face today is the risk that terrorists will obtain access to weapons of mass destruction as a result of the breakdown of the Non-Proliferation Regime. We in the U.S. are contributing to that breakdown.
Tallal
