Part 1

Militarism

by Hugh M. Lewis

Militarism consists of a theory based on two assumptions. The first maintains that the human is a potentially rational being who is seeking a better civilization through peace. The second assumption is that war is irrational: initiated after a breakdown of open inter-human communication; after a neglect of mutual understanding; after a misconception of enemy intentions and of acceptable alternatives. In war everyone loses; there is no net profit. It is product of a social disease afflicting civilization called militarism. This forms the rudimentary basis of a theory on the evolution of militarism.

The modern human might well be characterized as an intelligent individual capable of alleviating pain and suffering, as a person who puts a high value on life especially on the lives of other humans. Yet this same character has created the potential means for unleashing an unlimited amount of destruction. Civilization has come to symbolize the expressions of such humanitarian values as peace and progress; yet the history of civilization has been afflicted by the recurrent phenomena of war. This disease has served to negate all that civilization has come to symbolize.

How rational is it to have two groups of nations--each camp united by a common ideology--opposing each other with the threat of war, each camp threatening weapons potentially capable of exterminating the whole human species? This is not to say that such an occurrence of total extinction will happen; nor is it a prediction of Armageddon or a forecast of doomsday. This is only to say that it might conceivably happen. It is to answer that the situation is basically an irrational one; one that common sense and better judgment would have to admit shouldn't exist; furthermore, it is to seek the source of the underlying irrationality; the origin of that attitude of men to condone making councils of war and which allows whole societies to inflict pain, death and destruction on potentially friendly and mutually productive neighbors. It is to maintain that this basic irrationality is counterproductive to humanity's long range interests. Finally it is to hold that the problem of militarism is fundamentally a moral issue. Pain and death would mean nothing without the element of human valuation. The morality of this issue can be proven by the millions of past victims of war; its contemporary importance can be attested to by the billions of its potential victims.

Many justifications might be proffered for war and aggression. These may be for the defense or propagation of ideology, of political sovereignty or of rights and freedoms of people. Many economic, political, social or human nature freedoms may be cited for causes for war. All these answers are in part true but they fail to confront the central problem--the irrationality of war.

It may be said to be natural for the human to be selfish and that he has a natural predisposition for aggression. It may be argued that war, prejudice and human suffering are reflective of or primitive state; rooted in our adaptive abilities which insured survival in a primitive world untouched by civilization. Indeed the motivation behind mankind to wage global holocaust is deeply rooted in the same aggressive behavior that allows a man to kill for food or self defense. It is basically the same motivation behind the aggression in sports competition, in verbal disputes and in intraspecies sexual competition. This basic aggression is instinctive and natural; it is natural and necessary for form. I hold the source of irrationality to not be natural aggression, but rather the superimposition on top of this motivation an unnatural synthetic social instinct which is quite irrational and counterproductive. It is the unnatural extension of aggression beyond its natural limits in the form of socially acquired instinct.

Military Dimensions