[SOC] Toward A Kinder, Gentler Patriotism

[Lloyd Lachow]

Toward A Kinder, Gentler Patriotism
April 17, 2003 
Howard Zinn 

At some point soon, the United States will declare a
military victory in Iraq. As a patriot, I will not
celebrate. I will mourn the dead - the American GIs,
and also the Iraqi dead, of which there will be many,
many more. I will mourn the Iraqi children who may not
die, but who will be blinded, crippled, disfigured or
traumatized, like the bombed children of Afghanistan
who, as reported by American visitors, lost their
power of speech.

We will get precise figures for the American dead, but
not for the Iraqis. Recall Colin Powell after the
first Persian Gulf War in 1991, when he reported the
"small" number of U.S. dead, and when asked about the
Iraqi dead, Powell replied: "That is really not a
matter I am terribly interested in."

As a patriot contemplating the dead GIs, should I
comfort myself (as, understandably, their families do)
with the thought: "They died for their country"? But I
would be lying to myself. Those who die in this war
will not die for their country. They will die for
their government.

The distinction between dying for your country and
dying for your government is crucial in understanding
what I believe to be the definition of patriotism in a
democracy. According to the Declaration of
Independence - the fundamental document of democracy -
governments are artificial creations, established by
the people, "deriving their just powers from the
consent of the governed" and charged by the people to
ensure the equal right of all to "life, liberty and
the pursuit of happiness." Furthermore, as the
Declaration says, "Whenever any form of government
becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of
the people to alter or abolish it."

When a government recklessly expends the lives of its
young for crass motives of profit and power, always
claiming that its motives are pure and moral
("Operation Just Cause" was the invasion of Panama and
"Operation Iraqi Freedom" in the present instance), it
is violating its promise to the country. It is the
country that is primary - the people, the ideals of
the sanctity of human life and the promotion of
liberty. War is almost always a breaking of those
promises. It does not enable the pursuit of happiness,
but brings despair and grief.

Mark Twain, having been called a "traitor" for
criticizing the U.S. invasion of the Philippines,
derided what he called "monarchical patriotism." He
said: "The gospel of the monarchical patriotism is:
`The king can do no wrong.' We have adopted it with
all its servility, with an unimportant change in the
wording: `Our country, right or wrong!' We have thrown
away the most valuable asset we had: the individual's
right to oppose both flag and country when he believed
them to be in the wrong. We have thrown it away; and
with it all that was really respectable about that
grotesque and laughable word, Patriotism."

If patriotism in the best sense is loyalty to the
principles of democracy, then who was the true
patriot: Theodore Roosevelt, who applauded a massacre
by American soldiers of 600 Filipino men, women and
children on a remote Philippine island, or Mark Twain,
who denounced it?

With the war in Iraq won, shall we revel in American
military power and - against the history of modern
empires - insist that the American empire will be
beneficent?

The American record does not justify confidence in its
boast that it will bring democracy to Iraq. It will be
painful to acknowledge that our troops in Iraq were
fighting not for democracy but for the expansion of
the American empire, for the greed of the oil cartels,
for the political ambitions of the president. And when
they come home, they will find that their veterans'
benefits have been cut to pay for the machines of war.
They will find the military budget growing at the
expense of health, education and the needs of
children. The Bush budget even proposes cutting the
number of free school lunches.

I suggest that patriotic Americans might act on behalf
of a different vision. Do we want to be feared for our
military might or respected for our dedication to
human rights? With the war in Iraq over, we need to
ask what kind of a country will we be. Is it important
that we be a military superpower? Is it not exactly
that that makes us a target for terrorism? Perhaps we
could become instead a humanitarian superpower.

Should we not redefine patriotism? We need to expand
it beyond that narrow nationalism which has caused so
much death and suffering. If national boundaries
should not be obstacles to trade - we call it
globalization - should they also not be obstacles to
compassion and generosity?

Should we not begin to consider all children,
everywhere, as our own? In that case, war, which in
our time is always an assault on children, would be
unacceptable as a solution to the problems of the
world. Human ingenuity would have to search for other
ways.

Tom Paine used the word "patriot" to describe the
rebels resisting imperial rule. He also enlarged the
idea of patriotism when he said: "My country is the
world. My countrymen are mankind."

Howard Zinn is a professor emeritus at Boston
University and author of "The People's History of the
United States" (2001, Perennial). He wrote this for
Newsday. 


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