By Bruce Mitchell
Buffalo, NY – The word "war" appears but 6 times within the body of the Constitution. In all but one instance, the word concerns acts prohibited during wartime. The lone exception is in Article 1, Section 8, Clause 11: "Congress shall have the power to declare war..." Congress alone is entrusted with this fearsome power.
James Madison, the Father of The Constitution, wrote: "Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few." We may now add extraordinary rendition, torture, secret tribunals, wiretaps, and concentration camps to Madison's list.
Congress last issued a declaration of war in the immediate aftermath of Pearl Harbor. When one considers the bellicose nature of US foreign policy over the last seven decades, one must reconcile two very distinct conclusions: the constitutional authority to wage war has been irreparably perverted, corrupted, and compromised; and, a long-ago declaration of war has assumed a longevity that its authors never imagined.
Perhaps we've been at war since December 8th, 1941. This would lend credence to President Bush's assertion that he is "a wartime president." Furthermore, it exculpates the President for the countless extraordinary and extra-legal measures that have been enacted under the guise of "national security" and the ill-defined "War on Terror."
Our massive weapons programs, siphoning secret amounts from the national treasury, grow exponentially even as our enemies become less and less sophisticated. Our military strategists, feeling pressure from all sides and growing impatient, have chosen to selectively wage wars against a series of woefully weaker, third world nations.
In his splendid book, Queen Victoria's Little Wars, Byron Farwell writes about the British Empire's military escapades in Africa and Asia during the latter half of the 19th century: "...troops were engaged in almost constant combat. It was the price of empire, of world leadership and of national pride - and it was paid, usually, without qualms or regrets or very much thought." Will future historians refer to Bush's jingoism in a similar manner?
The excesses of the last half-century have all been perpetuated in the names of liberty and freedom. Presidents from Truman through Bush II have waged their clandestine wars with impunity and arrogance from Korea and Viet Nam through Nicaragua, Panama, Somalia, and Kosovo, all the way to Afghanistan and Iraq. We've established and bolstered numerous puppet dictatorships, deposed popularly elected governments, and embraced ruthless tyrants when it served the purposes of powerful men.
And although there were extended combat-free periods, we've maintained a massive military, developed garrisons throughout the world, and expended trillions of dollars, all at the expense and long-term well-being of our nation. It is now time for the Congress to reclaim their Constitutional authority and to reassert their responsibility for waging war.
The diversion and dedication of limited national resources, both economical and intellectual, towards a ceaseless war effort has allowed poverty, illiteracy, and intolerance to grow. Nearly 50 million of our fellow citizens fail to have adequate health protection. With cancer a much graver threat to our population than Iraq, the expenditure of countless billions on instruments and institutions of death, is obscene and bereft of any moral underpinnings.
Please, as a nation, let us declare peace and truly commit our lives, our efforts and our national resources towards justice, freedom, understanding and liberty throughout the world. Lest we forget, the pen is ultimately mightier than the sword.
Listener-Commentator Bruce Mitchell is a school counselor and coach in Hamburg.
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