Discussion Board: "Student Perspectives on Issues of War & Peace"
Joshua Schlachet
This thread will serve as our discussion board for the theme "Student Views on Issues of War & Peace / Nuclear Weapons,"
which will be the topic for our Boston JP event. Please feel free to
post your own opinions about the subject and respond to those of
others. We hope to post comments from the speakers and/or streaming
video once the event takes place. In the meantime, let the conversation
begin!
Josh Schlachet, 59th & 60th
is what happens when you blog in the middle of the night!
Apologies,
JP
Koji JIMBA
安川 瑛美
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第61回日米学生会議(2009年7月28日~8月21日)
於 東京－函館－長野－京都
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財団法人国際教育振興会主催
第61回日米学生会議実行委員
選考 / 予算 / 長野サイト担当
慶應義塾大学 文学部 ４年
安川 瑛美
Mobile:070-6427-1678
E-mail:e-yas...@jasc-japan.com
Web: http://www.jasc-japan.com/
Blog: http://ameblo.jp/jasc61/
Joshua Schlachet
"The person who prays for peace must not hide even a needle, for a person who possesses weapons is not qualified to pray for peace." --Dr. Takashi Nagai, Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum
First off, I am sorry it took me so long to respond to this tread, but I hope others will chime in as well. Thanks Hiromichi for raising the important and timely issue of the conscription system and military existence more generally. I do agree that there is a deep hypocrisy in allowing only a small portion of the population to fight our wars for an entire country on a volunteer basis, especially because of the disproportionately large numbers of minorities and the economically underprivileged in the modern American military. This is both a domestic economic issue in the sense that the continued underfunding of social programs has made the military (including its offers to pay for a college education during or after service) an attractive option for those without adequate means of their own, and a military issue in the sense that these individuals bleed and die for the sake of those who have the wealth and status to choose not to participate.
However, I see three issues with the argument that we must return to conscription system as opposed to abandoning the military system entirely. First, idea that conscription will solve this inequality assumes that unwillingness to serve in the military is due to an aversion to personal sacrifice rather than an aversion to the necessity of military sacrifice as a concept. I do not believe that maintaining (or in this case expanding) the tools of warfare is an effective path to peace. The idea that these tools can be used as diplomatic bargaining chips is also troubling because it results in the continued global investment in military technology in order to remain politically relevant on the international scene. This not only causes military build-up in the countries involved but also increased the worldwide availability of slightly out-of-date equipment to other nations and non-state actors. In other words, the presence of an army breeds the presence of more and better equipped armies, which does not translate into global peace. On a personal note, I would never serve in any military under any circumstance, and this is due to my lack of belief in in the military as a tool for peace and the preservation of freedom. Politically, I would feel un-free in a country that required me to undermine my principles for the sake of a state entity with which I disagree, especially something as serious as taking someone else's life.
Second, unless we aspire to actively wage war, the notion of military for the sake of protection and/or balance of power is framed under the idea of national protection, which relies on the current balance of national interest. If these interest were to change, then so too would the effectiveness of a military's presence as a deterrent. Put more bluntly, armed forces are designed to fight, kill and die when necessary rather than provide safety symbolically, and we as nations thus must only have armed forces if we are willing to use them. By extension, we as individuals must only join the military if we see conflict as a viable avenue towards global peace (defined as balance of power). To take this a step farther, if by stable balance of power we mean the absence of conflict, then the achievement of the absence of conflict using conflict is oxymoronic and therefore not a viable measure of peace.
Third, on a purely logistic level, conscription would likely create an army of unwilling participants, both those ideologically opposed to war and those who simply don't want to stand in front of a bullet. I hope that someone with more experience/knowledge on this matter will comment on this third point, so I will stop it there.
All that said, Hiromichi is absolutely right that I do not have a plan to offer in response, at least not one that would be well received by international relations specialists. However, I do believe that peace has the potential to be both its own cause and its own result. This would not, of course, be the kind of 'uneven' peace that we are now used to in which the size and strength of a nations' military (or the military umbrella that protects it, in the case of Japan) largely determines its ability to be free and safe. Thanks for listening, and I'm looking forward to hearing what everyone else thinks. Sorry I'm not up to the task of translating this into Japanese.
In JASC Spirit,
Josh Schlachet