[Peace-discuss] Be careful what you assume…

[Morton K. Brussel]

I believe that Wolff's article came about because of recent hagiographical articles about Eisenhower as a man of peace and against militarism. He wanted to provide an antidote, which he did effectively. People forget history and need to be reminded.  I knew of Eisenhower's history, and yet I used his words  in a recent letter to the N-G hoping for the effect that you mention. 

--mkb

On Jan 20, 2011, at 11:28 AM, Robert Naiman wrote:

> I would guess that most people who cite Eisenhower's speech cite it
> not as evidence that Eisenhower was a wonderful human being, but
> rather because the fact that *Eisenhower* said it gives it greater
> weight. So it's almost the opposite. I suppose that it could be argued
> that the citing has some residual effect of making people feel more
> positively about Eisenhower. But, seeing as he is long dead, any
> social harm caused by this seems minimal. If you could shut down one
> foreign base, cancel one weapons system at a cost of inadvertently
> discouraging people from hating Eisenhower as much as they're supposed
> to, it seems like a small price to pay.
> 
> There are a lot of arenas where someone's usefulness as an authority
> is almost inversely proportional to one's opinion of their intrinsic
> moral worth. Some pacifist denounces the war in Afghanistan: great.
> George Will and Ann Coulter denounce it: now you got something. If I
> point out that Ann Coulter has denounced the war in Afghanistan, am I
> guilty of Ann Coulter-promotion?
> 
> On Thu, Jan 20, 2011 at 9:49 AM, Morton K. Brussel <mkb3 at mac.com> wrote:
>> I too have used Eisenhower's words in hopes that they be taken literally
>> from someone who understood the perils of militarism, but Wolff explains why
>> to do this is to give a false image of Eisenhower.
>> 
>> Eisenhower's "warnings about military overreach were couched, it's usually
>> forgotten, in passages insisting on the need for a military of unprecedented
>> size." The famous final warning about the military-industrial complex is the
>> best example: It was immediately followed by words that are typically
>> ignored: "We recognize the imperative need for this development [of the
>> complex].... Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action" because the
>> communist threat "promises to be of indefinite duration."
>> 
>>  http://www.truth-out.org/how-one-paragraph-a-single-speech-has-skewed-eisenhower-record66953
>> 
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>> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Robert Naiman
> Policy Director
> Just Foreign Policy
> www.justforeignpolicy.org
> naiman at justforeignpolicy.org