War is over rated....war is to be human....war is for the insecure because they can not compete on a level field..so they kill and conquer by force.....it does not take a brain to kill.....
This question was debated when I was in seminary. Reinhold Niebuhr, a theologian, started out as a pacifist during World War II. Later, he advocated war as the only way to deal with Hitler. You can google his writings on this at
Love and justice: selections from ... - Google Books. Pages 169-171 give you his thoughts on the consequences of defeating Hitler or chatting with Hitler. He sided on defeating Hitler as the only way to end with a just peace.
Another theologian, Deitrich Bonhoeffer, actually plotted to kill Hitler:
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a Christian pastor and theologian, was executed for contributing to a plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler and resisting Germany's Nazi regime in other ways. By age 30 he had pastored German-speaking Protestant congregations in Spain and England, taught theology at Berlin University, and been silenced as a professor for teaching Christian non-cooperation with the totalitarian government. He later managed to hire on as a German intelligence agent but was arrested in 1943 for using the office to rescue Jews, recruit foreign support for the resistance and keep pastors of the anti-Nazi, underground Confessing Church out of the military. Among thousands implicated in Claus von Stauffenberg's failed 1944 attempt on Hitler's life, he was hanged in a concentration camp in Flossenbuerg three weeks before Hitler died.
Secondly, how do folks in this photo essay end up with more freedom?
The Least Free Places on Earth | Foreign Policy. I don't think chatting (diplomacy) is going to get the job done. Perhaps in some cases but not in most. So, what is left? Submission, torture, rape, poverty. If you live in one of these places and don't like submission, torture, rape, and poverty, what do you have left as a means to a better life? You most likely have to kick butt.
Malcolm Gladwell recently wrote a piece in the New Yorker about David and Goliath. See:
gladwell dot com - in the air. Fascinating read about how those who take on David's role, small against large, win more often than not. He cites the story of Lawrence of Arabia, who took on a much larger force. Then he tells the story of a girl's basketball team that made it to the finals. A skinny immigrant from India who had never played basketball coached this team. He observed several things about the way most teams play basketball and devised a plan to defeat better, taller teams. Part of his strategy was an all out full court press for the entire game. No other team had been coached on how to deal with a full court press for the whole game. His team won and won and won against bigger, more agile teams. Seems as if that's the current plan in Afghanistan, take the whole field, lots of little groups of marines, holding their own. Same principles, different fields of battle. Full court press. Maybe that skinny Indian can apply his genius to help those folks in those countries sorely lacking in freedom find a way to get more freedom. Great stuff. Could be applicable to how the folks in those countries that have little freedom could overthrow the madmen who hold them hostage. Seems as if that's the current plan in Afghanistan, take the whole field, lots of little groups of marines, holding their own, constantly moving the bad guys out of their sphere of influence.
Moreover, you might want to read, listen to, or see Charlie Wilson's War. It is a story about a Texas Democrat who nearly single-handedly funded the Afghan Mujahideen against the much better equipped and manned Russian military when they were trying to take over Afghanistan. It's a fascinating story of how Muslim Pakistan, Muslim Afghanistan, and one lone congressman from Texas and his high brow female consort took on the Russian Army. David vs. Goliath with the help of a few Stinger missiles.
In short, sometimes you have to employ the full court press. You have to move the bad guys out by whatever means available to you. If he has guns, you might have to use guns. If you don't have guns, you need to find your Charlie Wilson to get the guns for you. You got to do what you got to do.
