avoiding war
i was doing some thinking (after hacking the constitution) on the problem of peace. it’s been stated often (and perhaps not sufficiently questioned), that democracies don’t go to war with democracies. i thought of a simple reason for this, and it comes down to the idea that war is a negative-sum game. even the most limited, most restrained wars involve the death of people, the destruction of property, and the expense of operating a war machine.
how is it that democracies avoid playing these negative-sum games? well, in general, they are constituted to involve a deliberative process somewhere along the path to war. if you have a deliberative process, where people actually look at the costs of war, in all its forms, it’s not easy to make the case. and if both sides of the potential war are having trouble making the case to go to war, (perhaps because they both have this deliberative process checking the machinery of war) then it’s really hard to get enthusiastic enough to actually engage in war.
i suppose that reasonable deliberation generally avoids negative-sum situations.
it seems, more and more often, we don’t have a functional deliberative process in america. we have the short-term economic and re-election interests of a small group of individuals. this, of course turns a negative-sum big picture into a positive-sum small picture in the only place it matters – congress.
in modern war (at least as far as the united states is concerned), the cost of running the kind of overwhelming war machine that ensures “minimal” loss of life (particularly on the part of the united states) and “minimal” destruction is amazing. perspective matters too – if you’re in the building that gets bombed, that “minimal” damage looks pretty “maximal.”
since running the war machine is “just dollars” it’s easier to spread the blame around enough that nobody actually has to take responsibility. it gets harder when you have to account for the deaths of constituents and destruction of their property. this time around, the costs and bodies are adding up faster than congress expected, and this little war is dragging on into a new election cycle. maybe they’ll wake up.
the message: war isn’t cheap or fast. ever. don’t write blank checks.
as usual, someone did it better than i. sadly, they did it 200 years ago. i’d like to [re-]introduce you to immanuel kant.