Duty

What led me to write the "The Divide" post below (and also "Good Men, Good Intentions") is a surpisingly civil discussion e-mail discussion I'm having with a war supporter at the Libertarian Republicans group.

One thing that didn't occur to me when writing "The Divide," because I thought it disappeared at the Nuremburg trials, was "My country, right or wrong." It was said that even if I think the war on Iraq is unjust and unconstitutional, I have a duty to back my country in a time of war. History will judge whether the President's actions were right or wrong.

What can one say to that? How evil or insane can one's own government become before one is morally justified in resisting it? We're supposed to send our young ones to die, and poison Iraq's cities with uranium-tipped shells, because we follow orders and let history judge the President?

Does not history also judge the people who "went along" when their leaders destroyed their own constititons and became aggressors abroad?

Nobody ever has a "duty" to ones country. You have a duty to your conscience, to your values, to the things you love. That may or may not involve serving one's country in some capacity. Certainly, when the country is in actual danger, and the enemy is capable of surrounding the capital, one would probably not want to obstruct the decisions of leaders just because you disagree with them. But when "defeat" means ending the occupation of a tiny harmless country that never did pose a threat to us, I am inclined to believe that hoping for that defeat, that getting out of Iraq as quickly as possible, will save more American lives and help our country more than would continuing the war.

Obeying the conscience does more good for the country than obeying its leaders.