Driving to Boston on the day Putin started a war, I had to turn off the radio, and couldn’t bring myself to listen to inane sports talk or soothing music. NPR worldwide was speaking to a woman in her 30s in a Ukrainian city near the Russian border. She stoically recounted the loud explosions nearby, her talk with her nine-year-old daughter (the middle of three children), and the reality of city residents preparing to fight professional soldiers with whatever weapons they had.
The reporter thought the interview was over after she promised to keep the woman’s family and all of Ukraine “in our thoughts” as events unfolded. But the woman stayed on the line and finished through tears, “Our life goes on, until we die, or we save ourselves.”
Our illusions evaporated, our insular American bubble burst when Russia launched missiles and thundered in with massive tanks, hoping to “decapitate” the democratically-elected government. No longer just a “threat,” Putin became an aggressive, modern Stalin, unrestrained by a moral code, seeking power and wealth through unprovoked attacks. He is no better than a mugger on the street, a violent home-invader, a first-degree murderer who we would choose to lock away forever or execute without remorse.
About fifty years ago, the terms “hawks” and “doves” were popular: they distinguished people who believed in military actions to address international problems from those who believed in nonviolent possibilities. These positions crystallized around the Vietnam War and other perceived communist threats.
For many young men, it was convenient and a bit self-serving to become a “dove:” being forced into the military to fight a hellish war (is there any other kind?) in jungles 8,000 miles away to rescue American-backed governments and corporations brought motivation to thousands of young ”peaceniks.” A “hawkish” stance was a hard sell if it was your own physical and mental health at risk.
Some, including my older brother, registered as “conscientious objectors” who were opposed to all wars on religious or moral grounds. As my draft period approached, I wrestled with my response. Could I actually claim to be against all wars? Our father had served in World War II along with most of his generation, including many other male role models in our family, community, and American society. Would I actually refuse to fight if I saw Germany slaughtering people in Europe and Japan sending thousands of Americans to the burning graveyard that was Pearl Harbor? I didn’t think so then, and don’t today. (I was rescued from having to make that momentous decision by a quirk of timing and blind luck: in the first draft lottery, my birthday was drawn 197th with only the first 120 projected as probable draftees.)
Nonviolence is attractive to me in theory. I regard Gandhi, Mandela, and King Jr. as giants among humanity, able to face prison, physical violence, and death while retaining their belief in the long-term success of peace over war, love over hate.
But I wouldn’t know what to say to the young woman in Ukraine, as she faces missiles, shells, and bullets that will tear her to shreds as she tries to protect her children and her life. Is the Christian and Buddhist belief in salvation or reincarnation after death sufficient? WWJ (What Would Jesus) or B(Buddha) do? I fear they would turn the other cheek, and very possibly end up dead if they were near the front lines in Ukraine, but would receive just rewards in the afterlife.
Would I support all-out war that could endanger the entire world (remember the nuclear arms race phrase “mutually assured destruction,” aptly acronymed MAD) to save her, and indirectly, our own American lives and freedoms, from a rampaging madman? We’ve seen the costs of wars over decades and centuries: the loss of life and culture is a dead certainty and beyond comprehension — there are no winners in war, only those who have lost less than others.
It’s at times like these that I realize one of the (many) reasons I’ve never aspired to a position of great power or envied those who did: their choices can kill or save thousands, even millions, of people. I can only hope they are braver, stronger, and more wise than I am.
Destruction and death are assured in the current conflict: they are already happening and will continue. We need a world leader who is exceptionally adept at manipulating the levers of power, or in reaching the hearts of the most hawkish, to limit the damage.
Allen Woods is a freelance writer, author of the Revolutionary-era crime novel “The Sword and Scabbard,” and Greenfield resident. His column appears regularly on a Saturday. Comments are welcome here or at awoods2846@gmail.com.