Tag Archives: Pacifism

Commentary

Ron Paul’s isolationist foreign policy views echo Neville Chamberlain

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From Doug Ross at Director Blue, 10 fun facts about Ron Paul.

Here’s fact #7:

And so I asked Congressman Paul: if he were President of the United States during World War II, and as president he knew what we now know about the Holocaust, but the Third Reich presented no threat to the U.S., would he have sent American troops to Nazi Germany purely as a moral imperative to save the Jews?

And the Congressman answered:

“No, I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t risk American lives to do that. If someone wants to do that on their own because they want to do that, well, that’s fine, but I wouldn’t do that.”

Paul then looked at me, and I politely thanked him for his time. He smiled at me again and nodded his head, and many of his young followers were also smiling, and nodding their heads in agreement. Clearly, I was the only one in the room who was disturbed by his response.

When I first presented the story of Paul’s comments about the Holocaust to major news media outlets two years ago, they were so stunned they were afraid to publish my story, and as a result it has remained unpublished until now.

I went to great lengths afterwards to learn more about the basis for Paul’s comments. I spoke to Eric Dondero, a former senior aide for Paul, in February 2010. Dondero is quoted in a Weekly Standard article today about Paul’s isolationist beliefs.

When I called Dondero again this morning, and told him I was finally going forward with the story, he told me that Paul had made similar comments to him.

“He told me numerous times it was not worth it to intervene to save the Jews in World War II,” Dondero said. “I don’t think that’s because he’s an antisemite. It’s because he’s an extreme isolationist and he’s trying to be 100% principled–he doesn’t think there’s any reason to intervene for human rights or any other reason anywhere on the planet.”

Calls to Rep. Paul’s congressional office and campaign office last week and this morning were not returned.

It’s not just the Holocaust, either. It’s the wholesale abandonment of the United Kingdom to conquest by Nazi Germany. And it’s not just the United Kingdom. It’s the complete takeover of the Asia-Pacific theater, and Australia, and New Zealand, by Imperial Japan. That’s what Ron Paul would have let happen.

Historians will tell you that Hitler could have been contained if Western leaders had responded militarily when he broke the Locarno treaties by remilitarizing the Rhineland in 1936. Do you think that Ron Paul would have gone to war in 1936 to stop Hitler – when he was still relatively weak? The Polyanna isolationism of Ron Paul is exactly what causes world wars. People like Ron Paul ignore aggressors when they make small invasions and then in a few years we have a world war on our hands. Ron Paul is a warmonger – his naive isolationism gets us into world wars by emboldening and coddling tyrants with a naive stick-your-head-in-the-sand foreign policy. Ron Paul doesn’t know anything about the threat of terrorism – his foreign policy is based on economics theories authored by people who died before nuclear weapons were invented. You can’t trust someone who makes foreign policy using theories, but who is ignorant of the real dangers we face.

“Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it”
– George Santayana 

It’s not a surprise to me that Ron Paul is popular with young people who don’t understand military history and the threat of terrorism. They don’t know who Neville Chamberlain was, or they would recognize Ron Paul as the second coming of Neville Chamberlain.

Thomas Sowell explains what causes wars

Let’s take a look at the lessons of history and find out what really causes wars.

Here’s an article from Townhall.

Excerpt:

On the international scene, trying to assuage aggressors’ feelings and look at the world from their point of view has had an even more catastrophic track record. A typical sample of this kind of thinking can be found in a speech to the British Parliament by Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain in 1938: “It has always seemed to me that in dealing with foreign countries we do not give ourselves a chance of success unless we try to understand their mentality, which is not always the same as our own, and it really is astonishing to contemplate how the identically same facts are regarded from two different angles.”

Like our former ambassador from the Carter era, Chamberlain sought to “remove the causes of strife or war.” He wanted “a general settlement of the grievances of the world without war.” In other words, the British prime minister approached Hitler with the attitude of someone negotiating a labor contract, where each side gives a little and everything gets worked out in the end. What Chamberlain did not understand was that all his concessions simply led to new demands from Hitler — and contempt for him by Hitler.

What Winston Churchill understood at the time, and Chamberlain did not, was that Hitler was driven by what Churchill called “currents of hatred so intense as to sear the souls of those who swim upon them.” That was also what drove the men who drove the planes into the World Trade Center.

Pacifists of the 20th century had a lot of blood on their hands for weakening the Western democracies in the face of rising belligerence and military might in aggressor nations like Nazi Germany and imperial Japan. In Britain during the 1930s, Labor Party members of Parliament voted repeatedly against military spending, while Hitler built up the most powerful military machine in Europe. Students at leading British universities signed pledges to refuse to fight in the event of war.

All of this encouraged the Nazis and the Japanese toward war against countries that they knew had greater military potential than their own. Military potential only counts when there is the will to develop it and use it, and the fortitude to continue with a bloody war when it comes. This is what they did not believe the West had. And it was Western pacifists who led them to that belief.

Then as now, pacifism was a “statement” about one’s ideals that paid little attention to actual consequences. At a Labor Party rally where Britain was being urged to disarm “as an example to others,” economist Roy Harrod asked one of the pacifists: “You think our example will cause Hitler and Mussolini to disarm?”

The reply was: “Oh, Roy, have you lost all your idealism?” In other words, the issue was about making a “statement” — that is, posturing on the edge of a volcano, with World War II threatening to erupt at any time. When disarmament advocate George Bernard Shaw was asked what Britons should do if the Nazis crossed the channel into Britain, the playwright replied, “Welcome them as tourists.”

Most people think that Thomas Sowell is a libertarian, but he isn’t a full libertarian. He just reports the evidence. If the evidence is pro-war, then he’s pro-war. Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher called this view “peace through strength”. There is only one reason why evil people do not attack – because they think that good people have the firepower to make them pay dearly for their aggression, and – and this is very important – the will to use it. We need to be wary of people like Ron Paul who minimize patriotism and heroism, and charge proponents of military power with “imperialism”.

Here’s an article that explains it more.

Excerpt:

In France, after the First World War, the teachers’ unions launched a systematic purge of textbooks, in order to promote internationalism and pacifism.

Books that depicted the courage and self-sacrifice of soldiers who had defended France against the German invaders were called “bellicose” books to be banished from the schools.

Textbook publishers caved in to the power of the teachers’ unions, rather than lose a large market for their books. History books were sharply revised to conform to internationalism and pacifism.

The once epic story of the French soldiers’ heroic defense against the German invaders at Verdun, despite the massive casualties suffered by the French, was now transformed into a story of horrible suffering by all soldiers at Verdun— French and German alike.

In short, soldiers once depicted as national heroes were now depicted as victims— and just like victims in other nations’ armies.

[…]France, where pacifism and internationalism were strongest, became a classic example of how much it can matter.

During the First World War, France fought on against the German invaders for four long years, despite having more of its soldiers killed than all the American soldiers killed in all the wars in the history of the United States, put together.

But during the Second World War, France collapsed after just six weeks of fighting and surrendered to Nazi Germany.

At the bitter moment of defeat the head of the French teachers’ union was told, “You are partially responsible for the defeat.”

Charles de Gaulle, Francois Mauriac, and other Frenchmen blamed a lack of national will or general moral decay, for the sudden and humiliating collapse of France in 1940.

At the outset of the invasion, both German and French generals assessed French military forces as more likely to gain victory, and virtually no one expected France to collapse like a house of cards — except Adolf Hitler, who had studied French society instead of French military forces.

Did patriotism matter? It mattered more than superior French tanks and planes.

Everybody wants peace. Everyone – on both sides of the issue. But it is not weakness but strength that deters wars. Strength, and the will to defeat evil.

Podcasts

What does the Bible say about capital punishment?

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Note: This post has a twin post which talks about the evidence against capital punishment from science.

First, let’s take a look at what the Bible says in general about capital punishment, using this lecture featuring eminent theologian Wayne Grudem.

About Wayne Grudem:

Grudem holds a BA from Harvard University, a Master of Divinity from Westminster Theological Seminary, and a PhD from the University of Cambridge. In 2001, Grudem became Research Professor of Bible and Theology at Phoenix Seminary. Prior to that, he had taught for 20 years at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, where he was chairman of the department of Biblical and Systematic Theology.

Grudem served on the committee overseeing the English Standard Version translation of the Bible, and in 1999 he was the president of the Evangelical Theological Society. He is a co-founder and past president of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. He is the author of, among other books, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine, which advocates a Calvinistic soteriology, the verbal plenary inspiration and inerrancy of the Bible, the body-soul dichotomy in the nature of man, and the complementarian (rather than egalitarian) view of gender equality.

The MP3 file is here.

A PDF sermon outline is here.

Topics:

  • what kinds of crimes might require CP?
  • what did God say to Noah about CP?
  • what does it mean that man is made in the image of God?
  • is CP just about taking revenge?
  • what does CP say about the value of human life?
  • does CP apply to animals, too?
  • could the statements supporting CP be understood as symbolic?
  • one purpose of CP is to protecting the public
  • another purpose of CP is to deter further wrongdoing
  • but the Biblical purpose of CP is to achieve justice by retribution
  • does the Pope make a good argument against CP?
  • what is the role of civil government in achieving retribution?
  • do people in Heaven who are sinless desire God to judge sinners?
  • should crimes involving property alone be subject to CP?
  • is the Mosaic law relevant for deciding which crimes are capital today?
  • should violent crimes where no one dies be subject to CP?
  • is CP widespread in the world? why or why not?
  • what are some objections to CP from the Bible?
  • how do you respond to those objections to CP?
  • should civil government also turn the other cheek for all crimes?
  • what is the “whole life ethic” and is it Biblical?
  • what do academic studies show about the deterrence effect of CP?
  • how often have innocent people been executed in the USA?
  • should there be a higher burden of proof for CP convictions?

You can find more talks by Wayne Grudem here.

What about the woman caught in adultery?

Some people like to bring up the woman caught in adultery as proof that Jesus opposed capital punishment. But that passage of the Bible was added much later after the canon was decided.

Daniel B. Wallace is an eminent New Testament scholar who also teaches at Dallas Theological Seminary, an extremely conservative seminary.

About Dr. Wallace:

Dr. Daniel B. Wallace

  • Professor of New Testament Studies
  • B.A., Biola University, 1975; Th.M., Dallas Theological Seminary, 1979; Ph.D., 1995.

Dr. Wallace influences students across the country through his textbook on intermediate Greek grammar. It is used in more than two-thirds of the nation’s schools that teach that subject. He is the senior New Testament editor of the NET Bible and coeditor of the NET-Nestle Greek-English diglot. Recently his scholarship has shifted from syntactical and text-critical issues to more specific work in John, Mark, and nascent Christology. However he still works extensively in textual criticism, and has founded The Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts, an institute with an initial purpose to preserve Scripture by taking digital photographs of all known Greek New Testament manuscripts. His postdoctoral work includes work on Greek grammar at Tyndale House in Cambridge and textual criticism studies at the Institut für Neutestamentliche Textforschung in Münster.

And Dr. Wallace writes about the passage in John on Bible.org.

Excerpt:

One hundred and forty years ago, conservative biblical scholar and Dean of Canterbury, Henry Alford, advocated a new translation to replace the King James Bible. One of his reasons was the inferior textual basis of the KJV. Alford argued that “a translator of Holy Scripture must be…ready to sacrifice the choicest text, and the plainest proof of doctrine, if the words are not those of what he is constrained in his conscience to receive as God’s testimony.” He was speaking about the Trinitarian formula found in the KJV rendering of 1 John 5:7–8. Twenty years later, two Cambridge scholars came to the firm conclusion that John 7:53–8:11 also was not part of the original text of scripture. But Westcott and Hort’s view has not had nearly the impact that Alford’s did.

For a long time, biblical scholars have recognized the poor textual credentials of the story of the woman caught in adultery (John 7:53–8:11). The evidence against its authenticity is overwhelming: The earliest manuscripts with substantial portions of John’s Gospel (P66 and P75) lack these verses. They skip from John 7:52 to 8:12. The oldest large codices of the Bible also lack these verses: codex Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, both from the fourth century, are normally considered to be the most important biblical manuscripts of the NT extant today. Neither of them has these verses. Codex Alexandrinus, from the fifth century, lacks several leaves in the middle of John. But because of the consistency of the letter size, width of lines, and lines per page, the evidence is conclusive that this manuscript also lacked the pericope adulterae. Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus, also from the fifth century, apparently lacked these verses as well (it is similar to Alexandrinus in that some leaves are missing). The earliest extant manuscript to have these verses is codex Bezae, an eccentric text once in the possession of Theodore Beza. He gave this manuscript to the University of Cambridge in 1581 as a gift, telling the school that he was confident that the scholars there would be able to figure out its significance. He washed his hands of the document. Bezae is indeed the most eccentric NT manuscript extant today, yet it is the chief representative of the Western text-type (the text-form that became dominant in Rome and the Latin West).

When P66, P75, Sinaiticus, and Vaticanus agree, their combined testimony is overwhelmingly strong that a particular reading is not authentic. But it is not only the early Greek manuscripts that lack this text. The great majority of Greek manuscripts through the first eight centuries lack this pericope. And except for Bezae (or codex D), virtually all of the most important Greek witnesses through the first eight centuries do not have the verses. Of the three most important early versions of the New Testament (Coptic, Latin, Syriac), two of them lack the story in their earliest and best witnesses. The Latin alone has the story in its best early witnesses.

[…]It is an important point to note that although the story of the woman caught in adultery is found in most of our printed Bibles today, the evidence suggests that the majority of Bibles during the first eight centuries of the Christian faith did not contain the story. Externally, most scholars would say that the evidence for it not being an authentic part of John’s Gospel is rock solid.But textual criticism is not based on external evidence alone; there is also the internal evidence to consider. This is comprised of two parts: intrinsic evidence has to do with what an author is likely to have written; transcriptional evidence has to do with how and why a scribe would have changed the text.

Intrinsically, the vocabulary, syntax, and style look far more like Luke than they do John. There is almost nothing in these twelve verses that has a Johannine flavor. And transcriptionally, scribes were almost always prone to add material rather than omit it—especially a big block of text such as this, rich in its description of Jesus’ mercy. One of the remarkable things about this passage, in fact, is that it is found in multiple locations. Most manuscripts that have it place it in its now traditional location: between John 7:52 and 8:12. But an entire family of manuscripts has the passage at the end of Luke 21, while another family places it at the end of John’s Gospel. Other manuscripts place it at the end of Luke or in various places in John 7.

The pericope adulterae has all the earmarks of a pericope that was looking for a home. It took up permanent residence, in the ninth century, in the middle of the fourth gospel.

As this debate between Peter Williams and Bart Ehrman shows, there are only TWO disputed passages in the entire NT that are theologically significant. The long ending of Mark and this adultery passage. A good case can be made for the long ending of Mark, but it’s best not to assume it in a debate. The adultery passage is practically impossible to defend as authentic. Dr. Wallace talks about both passages in this Parchment & Pen article. Wallace has also debated Bart Ehrman in the Greer-Heard Forum. What that debate showed is that the New Testament text is actually quite reliable except for those two passages, but it’s important to be honest about the two places that are not well supported.

News

Ron Paul in Iowa debate: Iran should be allowed to develop nuclear bomb

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The best clip from the Thursday night Republican primary debate.

From NewsMax.

Excerpt:

Iran should be allowed to have a nuclear bomb, Republican candidate Ron Paul suggested during Thursday’s presidential debate.

The maverick Texas Congressman also said it was time to stop the half-century old embargo on Cuba and all troops should be brought home.

His comments brought scorn from rival candidates. Michele Bachmann said she would do everything in her power to prevent Iran becoming nuclear.

Rick Santorum said “Iran is not Iceland, Ron. “It’s been at war with us since 1979.

“Anyone who suggests Iran is not a threat to this country is not seeing the world very clearly.”

Paul said it is natural for Iran to want a bomb as it is surrounded by countries such as India, Pakistan and Israel which all have one and with China, the United States and Russia all involved in the region. He said the U.S. should not get involved in the country’s internal affairs.

Consider this recent article on Iran’s weapons development, from Investors Business Daily.

Excerpt:

Tehran’s navy deploys ships to the Atlantic capable of launching long-range missiles. This is not a joke. This is a dress rehearsal for the day an EMP attack ends our way of life.

‘Is it possible for us to witness a world without America and Zionism?” Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad asked at “The World Without Zionism” Tehran conference in 2005. “But you had best know that this slogan and this goal are attainable, and surely can be achieved.” He added that Iran had a “war preparation plan” for, as he put it, “the destruction of Anglo-Saxon civilization.”

Electromagnetic pulse, or EMP, is not a subject familiar to most Americans. But it’s quite familiar to the Iranian military.

It’s been practicing for the day when an Iranian missile tipped with a nuclear warhead lifts off from a vessel parked in international waters off our shores, the warhead detonating high above the American heartland, sending electromagnetic waves rippling across the American landscape, frying every electronic circuit within range.

In a July 18 statement, Rear Adm. Habibollah Sayyari said the Iranian navy plans on deploying warships in the Atlantic Ocean as part of a program to ply international waters.

Two days later, another Iranian rear admiral, Seyed Mahmoud Mousavi, revealed for the first time that his navy has equipped a number of its logistic vessels and units with long-range missiles.

The squadron will be equipped with the Nur missile, which is based on China’s long-range Silkworm C-802 anti-ship cruise missile and has a 125-mile range and 365-pound warhead.

It is not these ships and their missiles that threaten us, but what comes later as they use these forays to gain experience operating far from Iranian shores.

A simple Scud missile, with a nuclear warhead, could be fired from an inconspicuous freighter in international waters off our coast and detonated high over the U.S.

It would wreak devastation on America’s technological, electrical and transportation infrastructure. Masked as a terrorist attack, Iran would have plausible deniability of any responsibility.

Iran has practiced launching and detonating Scuds in midflight, launched from ships in the Caspian Sea. It’s also tested high-altitude explosions of its Shahab-3 ballistic missile, a test consistent with an EMP attack.

The warhead need not be of a staggeringly high yield — nor must the missile have an intercontinental range.

“One nightmare scenario posed,” according to Peter Vincent Pry, an expert on EMP who sits on a congressional panel looking into the threat of such a weapon, “was a ship-launched EMP attack against the U.S. by Iran, as this would eliminate the need for Iran to develop an ICBM to deliver a nuclear warhead against the U.S. and could be executed clandestinely, taking the U.S. by surprise.”

Iran has previously called for Israel, our ally, to be “wiped off the map“.

Excerpt:

Leaders around the world on Thursday condemned a call by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that Israel be “wiped off the map,” and a top Iranian official said that mass demonstrations in his country on Friday would rebuff the rising criticism from abroad.

“I have never come across a situation of the president of a country saying they want to . . . wipe out another country,” British Prime Minister Tony Blair said at a summit outside London of the 25 leaders of the European Union’s member states.

Blair said Ahmadinejad’s comment was “completely and totally unacceptable.”

In a joint statement, the E.U. leaders “condemned in the strongest terms” the Iranian president’s call, saying it “will cause concern about Iran’s role in the region and its future intentions.” President Jacques Chirac of France told reporters that Ahmadinejad risked Iran “being left on the outside of other nations.”

Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, in Israel, called the Iranian president’s statement “unacceptable.”

The statement was widely reported in the Arab world; leaders there reacted for the most part with silence. Most Arab countries have no diplomatic relations with Israel. But the Palestinian negotiator, Saeb Erekat, said, according to the Associated Press: “We have recognized the state of Israel and we are pursuing a peace process with Israel, and . . . we do not accept the statements of the president of Iran. This is unacceptable.”

U.S. and European leaders have grown increasingly worried about the bellicose attitude of Iran at a time when it is pursuing a nuclear program that they have said may be intended to produce a nuclear weapon.

Iran is also sharing weapons technology with North Korea.

Is Ron Paul right to want to let Iran have nuclear weapons and long-range missiles? Does he understand modern weapon systems? Is he aware of the threats that Achmadinejad has made to Israel and the United States? Is he aware of Iran’s military interference in Iraq? Does he understand how Iran influences Syria, which is now imitating Iran in shooting innocent people in the streets? Is he letting facts influence his ideology?