We’re often told that wars are fought for “freedom.” But when a wealthy nation fights a war against a poor (if often resource-rich) nation halfway around the globe, among the goals is not actually to prevent that poor nation from taking over the wealthy one, after which it might restrict people’s rights and liberties. The fears used to build support for the wars don’t involve such an incredible scenario at all; rather the threat is depicted as one to safety, not liberty. And, of course, the actual risk to those living in the war is primarily one of safety.
What happens, predictably and consistently, in nations of all sorts waging wars is just the reverse of wars protecting freedoms. War is what provides the concept of the enemy, and the enemy is the excuse for government secrecy, and for the erosion of rights. War brings the militarization of the police, warrantless surveillance, drones in the skies, lawless imprisonment, torture, assassinations, the denial of a lawyer, the denial of access to information on the government, restrictions on the right to assemble and protest, restrictions on journalism, persecution of whistleblowers. We often try to address each of these symptoms separately, which is all to the good, but the underlying illness is war.
The nature of war, as fought between valued and devalued people, often facilitates the erosion of liberties by taking them away first from devalued people and only later — once the idea has been more normalized — from everyone else. What starts with lawless searches and imprisonments of suspicious looking foreigners is expanded to include nonviolent activists and conscientious journalists and eventually anyone else.
Militarism erodes not just particular rights but the very basis of self-governance, by demanding that the public defer to those who claim they know better what to do on the basis of information that must be kept secret, as well as by conditioning the public to expect government officials to tell outrageous lies. War not only shifts power to the government and the few, and away from the people, but it also shifts power to a president or prime minister and away from a legislature or judiciary. Militarism erodes not just government but the very idea of laws, as compliance with laws against war and against various aspects of war are routinely violated with impunity.
Not only do wars not advance freedoms, but wars are also not created by foreigners who “hate you for your freedom.” The underlying motivation for anti-U.S. violence from nations where the U.S. funds and arms dictators, or maintains a large troop presence, or imposes deadly economic sanctions, or bombs houses, or occupies towns, or buzzes drones overhead … is those actions. Many nations that lead the world in civil liberties and all variety of freedoms do not make themselves targets for violence; only those that wage war do.
Recent Articles:
