Could World War II have been won by Britain and the United States if the two countries did not have it in them to firebomb Dresden and nuke Hiroshima and Nagasaki? ~John Podhoretz, New York Post
Via Rod Dreher
Since the acts Mr. Podhoretz cites are remarkable for being 1) massive war crimes and 2) entirely irrelevant to the outcome of the war, I would like to think that he is joking. However, he is in deadly earnest. In his view, these hideous crimes are proof of the mettle of past Western governments in war, compared to the irresolution of today’s Western powers. Had he wanted to make a more serious point that large-scale modern warfare inflicts incidental casualties on civilian populations that are sometimes entirely unavoidable, he could have done so without running straight to the most heinous Anglo-American crimes of the ‘Good War’, but I suspect that it is all the same to him.
The firebombing of Dresden (like the firebombing of Tokyo) was a singular act of spite, a demonstration of contempt for the lives of German civilians. Its aim, to punish the population to get at the government and break their will to fight, was as surely a terrorist aim as ever there has been or will be. Americans can take some consolation that it was the RAF and not our Air Force that did the ugly deed. The nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki became “necessary” only because of FDR’s demand for unconditional surrender; there had been opportunities for a negotiated peace as early as 1944, had Washington been interested in negotiating a surrender. For a serious Christian and far more conservative view of the immorality of the bombing of civilian populations, see Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn’s comments on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Leftism Revisited or his novel Black Banners written under the pseudonym Francis Stuart Campbell. The barbaric logic of total war ruled out negotiation, and the same barbaric thinking justified the incineration of tens upon tens of thousands of innocents; that the second target, Nagasaki, also happened to be the cradle of Japanese Christianity only drives home just how barbaric these acts were. If the ideas of civilised warfare and war crimes mean anything, they apply to all belligerents. Defending one set of far more minor, but still serious, excesses by referring to the past war crimes of the Allies is pitiful. It is, however, an effective rhetorical bludgeoning tool: don’t judge Israel, because your governments have done far worse. It is not a real argument for the rightness or justifiability of what Israel has been doing to the Lebanese population, but an argument that because Israel’s cause against Hizbullah is good her means, like those of the Allies, are automatically justified as well. That is a profound error.
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July 26th, 2006 at 7:04 am
Roach
I completely agree. I wrote some time ago the following words:
think in times of peace and reflection we can admit that even in an existential struggle certain actions should not be undertaken, and one such is the indiscriminate bombing of civilians under the aegis of modern, “total war.” This does not mean that the Nazi regime had any standing to complain, of course, nor the vast legions of Nazi supporters within that regime did not deserve their fate. That said, simply because we were on the right side of that war does not mean that there were no horrors or excesses that were objectively wrong and should not have been undertaken.
There is no need to adopt a consequentialist morality that says for any good goal any means may be pursued. The distinction between civilians and combatants is an essential Western concept. It’s the basis for our condemnation of terrorism. It’s regrettable that the strategic bombing of WWII did much to erase that distinction in our own behavior.
The Japan case is somewhat different, as the objective impact of the bombing was to end the war and save countless American and Japanese lives, in contrast to the gratuitous firebombings of German cities in late 1944 and early 1945. It should still trouble conservatives, however, who recognize that there are values that transcend our own nation’s interests, such as the distinction between civilians and combatants, a distinction worth risk ultimately to our own forces and, perhaps, our own survival.
July 26th, 2006 at 1:00 pm
MDCLXVI
Yes, very bad examples, but we have lost a certain amount of mettle. Do you think that the difference between society of then and now explaining why they could do things which we won’t, is that we’re more moral? The only example I can think of is killing animals. My grandpa goes deer hunting. I would never. I just can’t look the deer in the eye and then kill it. But I’m not more moral I would eat the meat after all.
Also, that America went for total surrender is interesting. It’s a better example of what Podhoretz is talking about. Today we’d jumped at the first opportunity of a end to a war, even if that meant giving in a little bit to immoral demands. (Not that I think it’s that simple that Japan was immoral.)
Another example is hostage taking. I imagine years ago the people would have been able to deal with the deaths of hundreds of hostages at the hands of terrorists with whom they refused to negotiate. Today, there’re are plenty of people who would want to give in and just hand over the money.
July 26th, 2006 at 1:40 pm
Daniel Larison
Thanks for your comments. I was actually expecting more criticism or skepticism on this one, but I’m pleased that this meets with your agreement.
I do think there has been a certain weakening of nerve today when it comes to anything dangerous or threatening, and this comes from our ever-greater pursuit of security in all things. Perhaps this is a function of the “feminisation” of our society, perhaps it is a function of technological advances and the habits of convenience and safety that eliminate a large part of risk from ordinary life. On the other hand, there is a fairly sane reason behind this trend when it comes to conflict, which is the horror of millions upon millions being killed for the benefit or this or that government.
Losing a callousness towards the taking of life on a large scale seems to me to be a small measure of moral progress, but becoming so enamoured of life itself that you balk at taking necessary action against, say, hostage-takers for fear that it may backfire is to respect life less by being less willing to protect it. There is probably a softening that has resulted from an indulgent and relatively easy lifestyle, and this kind of lifestyle makes solidarity with the soldiers even harder, as the ongoing sacrifices and dedication of men at war are an embarrassment to a people so self-absorbed that their biggest worry is how high gas prices are, and so on. The continuation of these small wars is the worst for this sort of thing, because we all know that we continue to live our lives basically unchanged while men are dying for…well, it’s not at all clear to me what they’re dying for.
The irony of democratic wars is that if the mobilisation of the society is total and the casualties are high, antiwar sentiment may materialise but will be driven from the field of respectable opinion. Governments, especially in WWI, might have wanted to make peace but simply could not defy the nationalist, democratic frenzy into which the general population had been thrown–only victory could make the deaths of millions seem meaningful. Democracies are the most persistent in war once they have committed many lives to a cause.
Wars of choice are the worst for democracies, especially those with professional armies, however, because the public sees the casualties (typically lower than in the large-scale mass wars) and perceives two things: they are contributing nothing to the war effort in which these men are dying, which makes them unsure that they should continue to support a war to which they have given nothing, and the numbers are small enough that the losses become personalised in a way that the mass casualty lists do not allow. This does sap domestic morale–this is only heightened in the age of constant news coverage, etc. During wars of choice, antiwar sentiment always has a chance to win the day because there are always nagging doubts in the minds of the people about whether the war of choice was really worthwhile. The longer it drags on, instead of steadfastness and endurance until victory (however it is defined) you have fatigue and a desire to end the war that simply could not happen if millions are in uniform committed to the effort.