It is a warblog, with
all the expert analysis of those other blogs written by former military
officers. But it also carries a strong Christian overlay, illustrated
perhaps by his posting
Why the US Cannot Retaliate against Iraq if Iraq Uses Weapons of Mass
Destruction (which is not to say that the other bloggers aren’t also
deeply concerned with ethical issues).
A typical day – this
Sunday – saw him: comment on the Oscars; draw an analogy between the murder
of US POWs in Iraq and the 1944 Malmedy Massacre of dozens of US POWs by
German soldiers; expose what he says is the hoax that Iraq has received
electronic jamming equipment that could throw US planes and bombs off
course; and say a prayer for soldiers killed that day. Indeed, prayers are
prominent among his recent military analysis.
Of course,
his views will not be to the taste of every Christian.
The American impulse
toward fair play is good, on the whole. But there is a crucial difference
between fair play on the ball field and conducting just war. Last fall, just
after the campaign in
Afghanistan began, I
was at a dinner where another guest commented that it "wasn't fair" for US
pilots to fly with impunity above Taliban positions, dropping bombs. I bit
my tongue. Later, another guest said that the bombing "wouldn't intimidate"
the Taliban.
I dived in. "We're not
trying to intimidate them," I said.
"Then why are we
bombing them?" came the question.
"To kill them," I
answered. There was a long silence at the table. The concept seemed not to
have occurred to them. With only a couple of exceptions, the others were
university graduate-school students.
Historian T. R.
Fehrenbach wrote, "Americans will not face what war is all about until they
have their teeth kicked in." One would think that 9/11 was a brutally hard
kick, but I think there are large segments of Americans who still don't
understand what this war is all about. Maybe I'm wrong. I hope I am, but I
fear I'm not.
A glance at his “best
of” index gives some idea of the scope of his writings. Here are a few
examples:
-
The
coming American Holy War
-
Why
war objectors lack strategic vision
-
Western Law, Islamic Law and the Ordering of Society
-
Is Christianity more user-friendly than Islam?
-
Precision Weapons, Abject Defeat, and Reshaping Societies
One puzzle. Why is his
blog called One Hand Clapping? It brings forth reminders – to me, at least,
with my lengthy experiences in Zen Buddhism – of the most famous of all
Zen
koan (riddles used to upset the rational thinking of Zen novices):
What is the Sound of
One Hand Clapping?
March 25th, 2003
