An internationally represented cabal propagates in security matters a dangerous assumption. The Left, the Greens, the “Alternaives” and their Do Gooder brigades share a catching project. For the careless observer of public affairs the tale can be attractive as it spreads tainted news that entice to inaction. According to the thesis, in the modern world the national means of self-defense have become superfluous. This speculation proclaims that the sources of peril directed against advanced and democratic societies are actually fantasies. Our apparent foes are men of good will whose position is negotiable. Their occasional radicalism is the outgrowth of misunderstandings that rational discourse can overcome. Otherwise, such groups, if reduced to the essence of their agenda, signal the stirrings of forces that peaceniks imagine represents a substance that corresponds to their own core tenets. The captains of this intellectual Titanic claim to know that there are no icebergs, meaning politically unmanageable conflicts in the world. At the same time, it is contended that the power of international organizations creates an environment in which physical defenses have become superfluous. Allegedly, these organs act in the name of the “international community” whose raised eyebrows make redundant the instruments of national power designed for the protection of sovereignty.

In some ways, the shying away from even contemplating the resort to retaliatory and defensive actions is astounding. The circles that tell us that there are no threats and that should, nevertheless, such arise they can be dealt with without resorting to national means of power, exhibit a peculiar attitude toward violence. If examined, the parts of the program turn out to go in their inconsistency beyond a simple failure to fit together. In fact, the components stand in contradiction. They do so in a way that raises doubts regarding the ability of their propagators to operate within the boundaries set by logic and experience.

Let us examine the aforementioned “components” of the philosophy. Weapons are, ipso facto, “bad”. Therefore, even the children’s firearms replicas are beyond the pale. So should be the axes of play stone age men and the knives of those “indigenous” peoples whose accustomed name PC forbids you to use. Presumably, American Indians have used peace pipes to clobber each other over the head when, while still among themselves, they fought their tribal wars. According to the concept, armies are always instruments of subjugation. An exception is made in the case of the “Armies of National Liberation”. You also learn that serving in an army, especially when a spoiled kid’s time is asked for by society, is involuntary servitude. Resisting that by moving to the country next door is, therefore, an act of courage and signals high moral standards. Extra bonus points are assigned if a Che Guevara T-shirt is worn during the moral action in support of non-violence. At the same time, all is well when, far away and only involving others, ideologically related minds organize units of collective production for which the barefooted are obligated to volunteer. Resisting that indicates retrograde attitudes. The organs of internal security rightfully discipline those exhibiting such undesirable traits.

The asymmetric evaluation of strategies involving applied might is apparent. Essentially, the use of force is anathema when practiced by democratic entities. At the same time, violence practiced by approved –that is Socialist- movements if of third world providence, is in order. This applies especially when force exerted by armies, paramilitaries or terrorism, even piracy, is used against advanced political and economic systems. Here distorted traces of the old concept of “just war” creep into the picture. Third World collectivism is “just” as long as its punch is directed against the “West”. Force in this instance is an expression of the understandable refusal to copy submissively the model of successful societies. Considerations rooted in extrapolations from the colonial era that ended after WW2 contribute to the benign judgment.

Odd is, at least by the standards of logic, but an expected quality if you grasp the agenda of the self imposed rejection of violence that questions resistance even in self-defense. Well, it is so at least in those instances when it protects politically-economically advanced systems against their enemies. It appears that the right to attack is granted to some, while the privilege to resist is denied to others. Once the advocated reaction to domestic criminality is considered, the inconsistency of the “double think” of “newspeak” attains 3-D quality. When criminality is encountered, the advocated rejection of violence is ignored. Criminality, which by definition involves the use of force against the law-abiding victim, is ascribed to be a reflection of the injustice of the “system”. That being the fiction, the criminal is defended by an understanding that signals a predisposition for approval. Being here a possibly clumsy revolt against inequity, criminality is classified as an act of the corrective self-defense of the “exploited” and the “excluded”. Once converted into a reaction to abuse, confronting offenders with retaliatory measures is, according to PC, inappropriate. That being so, criminal acts are met with the kind of sensitivity that makes counter measures morally questionable. This maneuver makes the otherwise rejected violence inherent in crime into a misdirected moral action.  Accordingly, the ethical categorization of violence depends on who engages in it and who the victim happens to be.

Returning to the interstate level, the dogma does more than to deny the existence of global threats. In case they materialize, there is a miracle remedy to cope with the denied perils. Protection, once order breaks down and security is threatened, is to be entrusted to international action. The sources of succor range from the UN down to regional organizations and they all emphasize the power world public opinion. If you review the last decades then you are likely to conclude that correlating with the level of the danger, international organizations are mainly suited to supply you with C-rations and bandages but not with the intervention, your community is likely to need. As for world public opinion, it is suffering from a paralyzing but comfort-bringing case of amnesia. Moreover, the more violent the stubborn butcher, the more the undaunted advocates of non-violence will counsel letting bygones be bygones. Concurrently, they will also suggest that “normal” relations and the world community’s embrace will civilize the brute. At any rate, ostracism will have negative consequences. “Disrespect” and sanctions will pull the rug from under “their liberals”.

Excuses abound to ignore what cannot be defeated by sprinkling holy water upon it.  The ace among them will be reminders that the means to retaliate are missing. In case that the incessant calls for unilateral disarmament have been heeded, this will objectively be the case. Furthermore,  there will be reminders sung to the same tune that even verbal chidings will provoke aggressiveness and impulsive reactions released by the impostor’s needlessly hurt pride.

The ongoing Libyan case –that is belated operations against a member of the UN’s Human Rights Council! - does not invalidate the foregoing. Not even if there is out there a Gaddafi Human Rights prize that some liked to accept –money has no odor. To be able to act against the Leader, the UN had to be forced. Primarily, the world organization had to be compelled not to do not what it needed to undertake, but to make it to refrain from actually preventing measures against the Clown of Tripoli. This, after international terrorism, after the nurturing of terrorists abroad, after Lockerbie, after the shooting of a police woman in London, following the “case of the Bulgarian nurses” and hostage taking to retaliate for police action against an out of control son in Geneva. Furthermore, ask yourself, what would the sanctions have been worth had the armies of France, Britain and the US been reduced to honor guards providing Elgar’s “pomp and circumstance” at receptions as the naives wish them to become.

In conclusion, the world has been and is a violent place. The weaker the potential victims, the more brutal it will become. Therefore, the national security you enjoy is, once the going gets tough, to a significant extent a reflection of the national means at your country’s disposal. Even allies will help you only according to what you are able to do for yourself. Security, when it counts, is not earned by being charitable and by being predictably nice. Nor will resolved incantations of the majority of some global forum that signal disapproval of what is being done to you, be able to rescue you.