Better angels...

To whom can the following quote be attributed? Some words have been omitted or changed so as not to give away the correct answer, but the context has been left intact:

"This is an enemy without conscience, and they cannot be appeased. If we're not fighting and destroying this enemy… they would not be idle. They would be plotting and killing… across the world and within our own borders. By fighting these [murderous thugs]… [you] are defeating a direct threat to [our] people. Against this adversary there is only one effective response: We will never back down, we will never give in, and we will never accept anything less than complete victory."

Was the speaker:

A) Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda leader
B) Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, President of Iran
C) Ariel Sharon, former Prime Minister of Israel
D) Ahmed Yassin, late founder of Hamas
E) Fidel Castro, dictator of Cuba
F) Saddam Hussein, former dictator of Iraq
G) Sheikh Hasan Nasrallah, leader of Hezbollah
H) Yasir Arafat, late leader of the PLO
I) Vladimir Putin, President of Russia
J) Kim Jong il, dictator of North Korea
K) Adolph Hitler, former dictator of Northern Europe
L) Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States
M) None of the above

Now, the point of this exercise is not for anyone to actually guess the correct answer. In fact, many of you who are good with historical trivia won’t even have to guess. The point, obviously, is that this quote could reasonably be attributed to any one of these people.

To be honest, I find this fact chilling. Ten of the dozen men listed have at one time or another been portrayed as heartless villains (with one of those ten almost universally reviled) while the remaining two have oft been celebrated as heroes. And yet all twelve of them could be said to share the very same rhetoric. Isn’t there something wrong with that?

I suppose one might argue that the rhetoric is perfectly fine so long as it is truly directed toward "an enemy without conscience". FDR, for example, could surely be justified in delivering these words in regard to Hitler and the Third Reich.

Or could he? The clear aim of a quote such as this is to cast the enemy in inhuman terms. To have those among the enemy be perceived as monsters rather than as people. Wouldn’t it be better to point out that our enemy is, in fact, every bit as human as we are? That while our enemy is a vile criminal who must be stopped we should take caution in our zeal not to become like him? That while we act as the agent of justice we must take care to learn the lessons of compassion that might have prevented the need for war? That if we justify our acts with hate for "them" rather than with love for our cause then our violence is no nobler than theirs?

If FDR had ever said anything like the above quote during World War II, would he not have been marginalizing the Germans in the same way that Hitler marginalized the Jews?

When you strip away the dogmatic, sectarian, and nationalistic propaganda in the rhetoric of war you’re left with the stark realization that things like religion and liberty don’t really have anything to do with the deadly malice we recklessly hurl at one another. When each side accuses the other of being soulless devils, both sides are wrong.

The so-called "necessity of war" is a sign of failure not just on the part of the one who started it. The necessity of war indicates that the entire system is out of whack. We have all done something terribly wrong. And it shouldn’t be any wonder that more war doesn’t fix it.

To see the quote as it was actually said and find out who said it, click here.