The conscientious objector had a better case in almost all other wars than he has in this one. The modern pre-Hitler war had a superficial course something like this: The victor occupied the vanquished country, made a peace treaty, collected an indemnity, then withdrew to his own country with what loot he could carry. A part of the vanquished country might be annexed to the victor. The defeated nation smarted under the humiliation but in time the population resumed its ordinary life, and within a few years a stranger could hardly find signs of any change as a result of the loss of the war. A pacifist might argue that under these circumstances it would pay not to resist since the loss by fighting would be greater than the loss by nonresistance, considerable though that might be. This is not that kind of war. Hitler does not intend to restore the sovereignty of the nations he conquers. All Hitler’s wars are more or less Carthaginian. For as long as Hitler remains the master, his vanquished will be slave states, with their citizens chained to the Nazi machine, their women degraded, their religion persecuted, their schools closed, their books burned, and all this will continue until Hitler is overcome by force. It is not a choice between greater or lesser evils. It is a choice between life and death, for those who physically survive under the Hitler tyranny are condemned to a living death, as the Poles can testify.
Most of the great pacifist leaders have been converted by their observation of Hitler. Albert Einstein was thought of as the world’s greatest pacifist, but he abandoned the doctrine of non-violence after only a few months spent under the Hitler regime before he escaped to America. On his way here Einstein passed through Belgium and in an interview published in a Brussels newspaper declared: “If I were a young Belgian today, I would not refuse military service.” From a man who all his life had been a militant pacifist, taking part in world campaigns against war, this statement ought to persuade any young man. Britain’s leading pacifist, Bertrand Russell, has likewise been persuaded to give up his “isolationism” and to advocate that we give up ours, because the airplane, annihilating distances, has made it impossible for any nation “to secure peace for itself by isolation.” But Hitler is more persuasive, it seems to me.
Hitler writes that the Germans “will give what many blinded pacifists hope to get by moaning and crying,” namely, “a peace, supported not by the palm branches of tearful pacifist professional female mourners, but founded by the victorious sword of a people of overlords which puts the world into the service of a higher culture.” And again he wrote: “Indeed the pacifist-humane idea is perhaps quite good whenever the man of the highest standard has previously conquered and subjected the world to a degree that makes him the only master of this globe.” That is surely clear enough to convince the most conscientious objector that if everyone refused to fight Hitler he would conquer the world, and as President Conant of Harvard says, men would have no more freedom than horses have now. It is not pleasant to have to agree with Hitler, but one must admit he defined the conscientious objector correctly when he declared the healthy, unspoiled boy would willingly give his life for his country and thus “obeys the deeper necessity of the preservation of the species, if necessary at the expense of the individual,” while the pacifist egotistically puts his interest ahead of the nation. The charge of cowardice is easy to make, and I for one shall not make it. I prefer to think of most conscientious objectors as men who have not thought the problem through. After all, one of them was named Sergeant York.
Q. Why don’t we have a department in our Army to tell the soldiers why they are in uniform?
A. We have a morale section in the Army but it cannot operate effectively until we are at war. It is forbidden to discuss “politics” with the soldiers and it would be “politics” now to explain that they are in uniform to fight the Germans. Yet nothing could be more valuable for our war effort than to have qualified men visit each army camp, and after a series of public lectures on America and the war, conduct a question-and-answer period, followed by individual conferences with soldiers interested enough to ask for them. Officers would probably benefit as much from such instruction as the men.
One of the most useful departments of the German Army is its morale section which teaches a recruit above all things to be proud to be a soldier, and that it is the highest honor for him to be permitted to fight for his country. It is my impression that we would have to be even more elementary than that. Some American youths need to have it explained that from time immemorial the young men of a family, a tribe, or a nation have been by nature required to be its physical defenders; that the old men, women, and children have other duties to perform, but the young men are the only ones strong enough to go out and fight. Statements as simple as that are necessary after our last twenty years of pacifism and materialism. Too many times young men have asked me why they should fight for a society they do not approve, a society which does not provide them with good jobs and a comfortable life. The answer is that if they do not understand now, Hitler will provide a sufficient explanation later, as the pacifist students of the University of Paris found out when the Germans occupied their city and shot a score of them as a lesson.
Hitler will make it plain that this is no class war. Hitler will make it clear that it is a simple tribal war of a brute soldier-state bent upon the subjugation of all other states and peoples, good, bad, or indifferent, and of all classes. The English have learned this is no class war and every kind of Englishman, rich and poor alike, are united now in one great fighting tribe. Our youth could learn from the example of the youth of conquered Europe that if they do not successfully defend their country, imperfect though it may be, they will be conquered and cast into slavery.
It would be useful to point out that this generation of American youth is alive and enjoying the privileges of this country because other young men years ago and centuries ago fought and defeated the enemies of America. It would clear up many a young soldier’s difficulties if he were given an explanation in the simplest language of the origins and issues of the war. Many of them hardly know the bare facts of who is fighting whom. The American soldier has a right to be given the overwhelming evidence that Germany intends to destroy the American form of life, and subjugate us if she can; and that just now while Britain and Russia are absorbing so much German energy is the best time for us to defend ourselves by the only method of defense that has ever succeeded, by attack; by striking with all the power we possess at the enemy while he is still far from our shores. The American soldier should understand that much as we may wish for it, there is little hope that Britain and Russia alone could defeat the mighty German war machine, built as it was during the nine years while we slept. He should understand that this means we must fight in Europe, help destroy the German Air Force, invade the continent, and finally occupy Germany; that this will require every available resource of muscle and money and brain and blood and several more years of war, but that the reward for this immense payment is the immense reward of freedom. The American soldier has a right to have outlined to him the kind of world Hitler would make if he won; and the kind of world we hope to make if we win. This is the ABC of war, and it is what our soldiers desperately need, but it is unlikely that they will get it until we go to war.
It takes a great deal of re-education to counter the last two decades of intellectual rule by our “Irresponsibles,”—professors, writers, artists, and scholars who debunked our past history and every ideal, taught that man’s economic life is all that matters, that soldiers are suckers, that we fought the last war for J. P. Morgan, and so on until bewildered American boys exclaimed: “My country owes me a living; I owe it nothing.” Yet that is not youth’s natural way. Hitler won the German youth not by offering them fun or comfort or material reward; he appealed to them to sacrifice themselves for their Fatherland, and they responded joyously, “like demons,” as Colonel Schieffer said. Nobody can persuade me that our American youth would not respond even more joyously to an honest appeal, but the appeal has to be clear, simple, ringing as the notes of a bugle in the morning. Let the cynics and the selfish jibe, but American youth will eventually respond to the call of President Roosevelt for the Four Freedoms, not just for themselves, but for all the world.
Q. But weren’t we suckers in the last war?