Slate's Bizbox
fighting words: A wartime lexicon.

Pious NonsenseThe unholy "Christian" case against war.

By Christopher Hitchens
Posted Monday, March 10, 2003, at 5:30 PM ET

An awful realization has been dawning upon the Bush White House. Christianity is a religion of peace. From every pulpit, an appalling ecumenicism is preached, which calls for "more time" at best and for a "hands-off Saddam" line at worst. The papal envoy to Iraq, Cardinal Etchegaray, has told us that Saddam Hussein "is doing everything to avoid war." With the addition only of a qualifying "this" as its penultimate word, that statement would actually have the merit of being true. I think we can all agree that Saddam likes the status quo to be undisturbed by any violence that is not his own.

However, the strongly implied corollary was that "war," if it should come, would be a strictly American responsibility. How else to interpret the remarks of Cardinal Solano, secretary of state to the Vatican, who recently bleated: "We want to say to America: Is it worth it to you? Won't you have, afterwards, decades of hostility in the Islamic world?" This solicitude for the feelings of pro-Saddam Muslims—of whom the leading faction is constituted by al-Qaida—is new for Holy Mother Church. More recently, the pope himself met with Tariq Aziz, who has for many years been the Christian (actually Chaldean Catholic) face of an openly national-socialist party. On these and other grounds, Aziz had a friendly audience with his holiness before going to pose as a pacifist in St. Francis' old praying-ground at Assisi. Tariq Aziz's son was recently sentenced to 20 years in an Iraqi jail by Saddam Hussein—an effective means of reminding Saddam's suave envoy who is boss. (He does that all the time, by the way.) The Holy Father really ought to have asked to hear Aziz's confession. But perhaps he couldn't spare the time for such an arduous undertaking.

One wonders what it would take for the Vatican to condemn Saddam's regime. Baathism consecrates an entire country to the worship of a single human being. Its dictator has mosques named after himself. I'm not the expert on piety, but isn't there something blasphemous about this from an Islamic as well as a Christian viewpoint? I suppose if Saddam came out for partial-birth abortions or the ordination of women or the acceptance of the homosexual lifestyle he might be hit with a condemnation of some sort. (Until recently, one might have argued that his abuse of children would get him in hot water with the Vatican, too. But even that expectation now seems vain.)

In one way, the church's "peace at any price" policy is a historical improvement. The last instance I can find of Rome supporting a war was when it blessed Gen. Franco's invasion of Spain, at the head of an army of Muslim mercenaries who were armed and trained by Hitler and Mussolini. And everybody knows of the crusades, which were launched against Christian heretics as well as against Muslims and (invariably) the Jews. But one wonders how the theory of "just war," largely evolved by Catholic intellectuals such as Augustine and Aquinas, ever managed to endorse the use of force. As applied these days, it appears to commit everybody but Saddam Hussein to an absolute renunciation of violence.

You could see this paradox demonstrated last Sabbath morn on the New York Times op-ed page, by Jimmy Carter: peanut czar, home-builder, Nobel laureate, and Baptist big mouth. Reviewing "just-war" precepts, our former president considered the obligation of weaponry to discriminate between combatants and noncombatants. He then asserted:

Extensive aerial bombardment, even with precise accuracy, inevitably results in "collateral damage." General Tommy R. Franks, commander of American forces in the Persian Gulf, has expressed concern about many of the military targets being near hospitals, schools, mosques and private homes.

Where to begin? Under that condition, there are no circumstances in which a military intervention in Iraq could be justified. Someone could get killed. Then again, a man so deeply committed to Habitat for Humanity might ask what kind of habitat this is, where civilians are used as human shields and weapons of poison and disease are concealed under places of worship. Last time, Saddam even seized hundreds of foreign nationals in Kuwait and prepared to put them between retribution and himself. (The funniest news of the past week, incidentally, was the decision of the "human shield" volunteer activists to run away from Iraq. Most of them obviously didn't have the guts for it, but some of them, one hopes, had finally worked out what it was they were really shielding.)

Carter announced himself as "a Christian and as a president who was severely provoked by international crises." More accurate would have been "who provoked several severe international crises." It was the Carter administration that green-lighted, and later armed and aided, Saddam Hussein's distinctly unilateral invasion of Iran in 1979, an invasion that cost about a million and a half casualties, many of them civilian. I don't recall Carter being "provoked" by that at all. Incidentally, he describes the present American posture as "substantially unilateral," a piece of casuistry that wouldn't disgrace Cardinal Etchegaray himself.

Speaking of casuistry, Carter helpfully added that "American efforts to tie Iraq to the 9/11 terrorist attacks have been unconvincing." This might be narrowly true, with respect of the planning of the last attacks and given the use of the weak word "unconvincing." But the same day's New York Times carried a report with persuasive evidence of a substantial number of Bin-Ladenists on Iraqi soil. It's as hard to get into Iraq as it is to get out, and no Baathist official would make such a safe-haven decision without referring it to the leader.

As a member of Atheists for Regime Change, a small but resilient outfit, I can't say that any of this pious euphemism, illogic, and moral cowardice distresses me. It shows yet again that there is a fixed gulf between religion and ethics. I hope it's borne in mind by the president, next time he wants to make a speech implying that God is on the side of the United States (and its godless Constitution). The leading experts in the supernatural, including also the Archbishop of Canterbury, many rabbis, most imams, and Bush's own "United Methodists" appear to agree that this is not so. The Almighty seems, if anything, to have smiled on Saddam Hussein for a quarter of a century. If we want to assure ourselves of a true "coalition of the willing," we might consider making a pact with the devil.

******

[Update on Turkey as an ally, Tuesday, March 11: In a column last week about the cynicism of Turkish policy toward northern Iraq, I left a loose end dangling. The Turkish leadership makes play of the fact that there is a "Turkic" minority—usually known as the Turkmen—living in Iraqi Kurdistan. This claim is true, though the numbers and proportions are sometimes exaggerated, and the Turkmen have as much claim to recognition as any other of the numerous Iraqi minorities. However, the claim of Mother Turkey to be their protector and defender should be viewed—especially in the light of its rather recent and opportunistic assertion—with the utmost suspicion.

It was on the pretext of a Turkish minority that Ankara seized more than a third of the territory of Cyprus during the course of two invasions in the summer of 1974. (The minority, in contrast to this undisguised land-grab, was 18 percent of the population.) This aggression, with its mass expulsion of Greek Cypriots, annexation of territory, importation of settlers, and theft of property, has been repeatedly and overwhelmingly condemned by the United Nations. As I pointed out, and as can be easily verified, the majority of Turkish Cypriots are now themselves in rebellion against the colonial conditions created by the occupier. So, there should be no confusion at all about the rights of the Turkmen and the imperial ambitions of the Turkish state. Those who care about a "northern front" for regime change demand instead that weapons be given to the Kurdish guerrilla and militia organizations, which have demonstrated an ability to fight Saddam and are quite ready to defend their autonomy against Turkish arrogance at the same time. In both causes and both cases, they ought to be supported. Might it not be nice if France and the European Union and others issued a strong denunciation in advance of any Turkish unilateralism? Here, too, is a cause that a serious "peace" movement might take up.]

Print This ArticlePRINTDiscuss this in The FrayDISCUSSEmail to a FriendE-MAIL
Share on FacebookPost to MySpace!Share with MixxDigg ThisShare with RedditShare with del.icio.usShare with FurlShare with Ma.gnolia.comShare with SphereShare with Stumble Upon
Christopher Hitchens is a columnist for Vanity Fair.
Join the Fray: our reader discussion forum
What did you think of this article?
POST A MESSAGE | READ MESSAGES

Notes From The Fray Editor:

There are far more excellent posts than we have room for. In addition to what's below, check out the debate on Carter's legacy between baltimore-aureole and Tiresias beginning here and Betty_The_Crow's guide to the Hitchens funhouse here.


Remarks From The Fray:

Although I'm usually partial to Hitchens' work on Iraq, today's entry is the kind of shrill boorishness all too common amongst evangelizing atheists of a certain stripe. In particular, Hitchens suffers from the atheist's easy ignorance of Christian philosophy.

The "bleating" Catholic fathers of Hitchens' screed are simply remaining true to their faith, and consistent to the current Pope's theory of a disordered human society. In his Evangelium Vitae (1995), John Paul II flatly states that Man is "confronted by an even larger reality, which can be described as a veritable structure of sin. ... This culture is actively fostered by powerful cultural, economic and political currents which encourage an idea of society excessively concerned with efficiency."

Countervailing this "culture of death," he notes, is an increasing unwillingness to resort to force. "Among the signs of hope we should also count the spread, at many levels of public opinion, of a new sensitivity ever more opposed to war as an instrument for the resolution of conflicts between peoples, and increasingly oriented to finding effective but "non-violent" means to counter the armed aggressor."

While Hitchens was -- let us be plain -- reveling in open admiration of the Soviet Union, the future Pope slowly levered open cracks in the foundation of faith in the Communist experiment. It is that experience that shaped, perhaps more than anything, the Pope's view on the use of force. In Centesimus Annus (1991), he excoriates "the idea that the effort to destroy the enemy, confrontation and war itself are factors of progress and historical advancement," and argues that "that the fall of [the Soviet] empire was accomplished almost everywhere by means of peaceful protest, using only the weapons of truth and justice."

In a world of torn relationships and constant violence, war can only beget war; in the view of the Church, only by breaking that cycle of violence can peace be attained. We may deride this as an overly optimistic view, but the Pope would point to the downfall of the Soviet Union as history speaking on his behalf. Seventy-five years may be a long time to us, but to the kingdom of God? The merest flicker of flame.

What muddles Hitchens' argument beyond comprehension is his evident desire for the Pope to convene a new Crusade, to "condemn Saddam's regime [for] blasphem[y]." Evidently Hitchens' "Atheists for Regime Change" would ally itself with an Urban II, if he will only "urg[e] the princes of the land and their subjects to free the churches of the East." Unlike the damnable consistency of the Pope and the Church, Hitchens adopts an angelic adaptability to the means of like-ended allies.

Do I agree with the Pope's view? No, though I find much in it to sympathize with. But I believe that the noble sentiments of Christian justice often surpass our reach. As the fault lies, not in our stars, but in ourselves, so too must the remedy. Thus, I can't countenance a philosophy that argues patient suffering in the now -- for Kurds or Kosovars alike -- in exchange for a reward of freedom in the future.

Nonetheless, more than ten years after, I still find the Holy Father's words in Centesimus Annus worth reading:

I myself, on the occasion of the recent tragic war in the Persian Gulf, repeated the cry: "Never again war!". No, never again war, which destroys the lives of innocent people, teaches how to kill, throws into upheaval even the lives of those who do the killing and leaves behind a trail of resentment and hatred, thus making it all the more difficult to find a just solution of the very problems which provoked the war. Just as the time has finally come when in individual States a system of private vendetta and reprisal has given way to the rule of law, so too a similar step forward is now urgently needed in the international community. Furthermore, it must not be forgotten that at the root of war there are usually real and serious grievances: injustices suffered, legitimate aspirations frustrated, poverty, and the exploitation of multitudes of desperate people who see no real possibility of improving their lot by peaceful means.

-- WatchfulBabbler

(To reply, click here.)


Isn't running commentary from Christopher Hitchens about Christian attitudes a little like running commentary from the current Grand Wizard about the NAACP? I mean, though his knowledge may be secondhand and some of his piece may touch on other subjects we know that the bulk of it is intended to denounce Those Kind of People, basically because they are Those Kind of People.

Slate can get plenty of that kind of thing just by filling the "Fighting Words" feature with excerpts from the Fray. It would be cheaper, and though Fray posters that specialize in denouncing Those Kind of People tend to be vulgar, unskilled in the use of the written word and maybe even a little stupid everyone would understand that they were doing the best they could. Hitchens by contrast is just phoning it in.

-- Zathras

(To reply, click here.)


I think Hitchens is really opposed to invasion and is deliberately putting his worst foot forward. His clever tactic is designed to infuriate all Christians other than the Southern Baptists (of course, Carter is one of those, isn't he) to the point that they oppose military action even if they support it just to show that atheist so and so a thing or too. Nice move, Hitch. Go for it!

-- JackD

(To reply, click here.)


A thoughtful person would at least attempt to address the arguments laid out in Carter's op-ed. But because to do so would probably cost him his "argument," Hitchens instead resorts to ad hominem and anti-Catholic attacks. Is the fact that pedophilia is rampant in the priesthood really relevant to the question of whether or not the coming war is a just one?

If he wishes his argument to have any intellectual weight, Hitchens cannot ignore the fact that, in any moral international order, peaceful means must be exhausted before military action. Similarly, when force ultimately is deemed necessary, does he believe that questions of proportionality are irrelevant?

As a fellow atheist, I generally discount any arguments based on divine insight. However, I will take the painstaking logic of an Aquinas over the scattershot, emotional, logically irrelevant appeals of Hitchens any day. Does he really feel Richard Perle is a person with more moral authority than Jimmy Carter?

-- brewmn

(To reply, click here.)

(3/11)