The Chicken or the Egg?

And so, who is at fault for starting the latest chapter in the Great Conflagration of modern history, the ongoing conflict between Israel and Everybody Else? Assessing blame entails weighing opinion of who wronged whom, who stole whose sheep, who killed whose neighbor with little definitive answer.

Intelligent people, however, can assess the nature of war and its relationship to government and those opposed to that government. Let us look to a work that influenced our foundation in the United States, Englishman John Locke's Second Treatise of Government, chapter 3: "I should have the right to destroy that which threatens me with destruction: for, by the fundamental law of nature, man being preserved as much as possible, when all cannot be preserved, the safety of the innocent is to be preferred: and one may may destroy a man who makes war upon him, or has discovered an enmity to his being, for the same reason that he may kill a wolf or a lion; because such men are not under the ties of the commonlaw of reason, have no other rule, but that of force and violence, and so may be treated as beasts of prey... And hence it is, that he who attempts to get another into his absolute power, does thereby put himself into a state of war war with him."

Locke's work defines the two rival forces as adhering to reason or not. Let us use that criteria for assessing blame. Hezbollah is a stateless enemy, an organization, elected by no one, whose confessed purpose is to destroy the government and people of Israel. The Israeli government, a fairly elected democratic government, has the stated purpose to protect its citizens. Hezbollah touts the doctrine of "force and violence", and in Locke's definition, therefore, it subscribes to the law of the jungle, the unreasonable kingdom where the stronger animal consumes the weaker. Israel, by contrast, has the stated aim of destroying Hezbollah in order to protect its citizens. A government not willing to do so would be disfunctional and corrupt. But the Israeli government does not have an expressed policy of destroying other internationally recognized nations. If it did, Syria, Iran, Iraq, and Egypt would cease to be. Thus, since the Israeli government was elected by people in their employment of reason, the law of the jungle cannot be applied to judge Israel's aggression in the latest conflict. Finally, Hezbollah's attempt to destroy Israel is an effort to subjugate the Jews to the absolute power of the terrorist organization. Israel has no choice but to respond.

Charles Krauthammer condemns the moral righteousness of those lambasting the Israelis for their "disproportionate" response (see Link below). He argues that, true, the Israelis have killed civilians, but their military has tried to minimize these losses while fighting a regime that employs Lebanese civilians as human shields. Hezbollah lobs missiles into the centers of Israeli cities. Could the lines be more distinct?

Everybody Else sits back from their isolated democracies and sternly warns the Israelis to cease their unfair military campaign. These democracies, however, do not live in the fear of a neighbor's expressed wish to obliterate it from the face of the Earth. Should we take a moment to remember the Cold War, with the Soviet Bear licking its chops to devour all of Western Europe? Should we not remember that military support from the United States prevented enslavement of the Western Europeans to the horrors of totalitarianism? Israel and the United States have the single choice to persevere. To do any less would be uncivilized.

The Allegory of Contrary Thinking

Investment barons, combat commanders, genuinely effective politicians, and market- dominating CEOs all stess the importance of thinking like a contrarion. They use the cliche about thinking and a box, but it has become so commonplace, I cannot publish it here on this page. Constantly, we, as the hapless, ignorant sheep that we are, hear the necessity to change our convention, embrace change, to break the limitations of our feeble minds in order to lead successfully. Some of those espousing this thinking have tidy gimmicks to demonstrate how unconventional thinking solves problems.

But how do we condition our minds to think unconventionally? I can look at some diagram that requires an unorthodox solution, and either solve it, or in most cases, not solve it because my mind does not bend. The gurus want us to think differently, but the gurus do not tell us how. I learn nothing from the diagram and cheap seminar tricks.

Only a philosopher can help. Plato's Republic details the dialogue of Socrates and two of his students in their quest to understand the world around them. And let us be clear: investing, war fighting, voting in Congress, selling products in the market, the functions of the conventional and unconventional leader, are about understanding people and environment. Socrates carries the students through the Allegory of the Cave to condition them how to think of people and environment. Forgive the brief paraphrase: if you chained a baby to a wall in the cave at birth so that the baby could only see straight ahead, and if that baby grew up with other babies in the same awful predicament, and if men, standing near a fire and casting shadows on the wall of the cave, moved to and fro behind the babies, the chained prisoner babies, who can only see the shadows on the wall, would believe those shadows to be real figures moving. The prisoners could see each other, so they would know that the shadows were different than they, but nonetheless, they would believe those shadows to be living, moving forms of life. The babies would grow into maturity believing these shadows are true.

So Socrates asks what would happen if one of the prisoners was released, so that he could "stand up, turn his neck around, to walk and look up toward the light, and who, moreover, in doing all this in pain, and because he is dazzled, is unable to make out those things whose shadows he saw before. What do you suppose he would say if someone were to tell him before he'd seen silly nothings... while now he sees more correctly?" (515c, translated by Allan Bloom). Here is the essence of contrary thinking: the truth surrounds you, but it is only in craning the neck backwards that the new thinking can occur. The pain of turning your head is the pain of breaking your conventional thought.

The changed prisoner, after intial confusion and bewilderment, uses his reason to understand that the shadows were not true at all. Now he understands a new, more correct world around him. His fellow prisoners have yet to be freed, so he must return to the darkeness to tell them, and what, do you suppose, might be their reaction? After all, those shadow images had been all the babies had ever known!

The freed prisoner, the leader, now knows right not by perception but by absolute. His enlightenment originated from looking around to find a truth, an absolute, not relative one. Now he must show his fellow prisoners the shadows for them to understand.

A Shout Out to Machiavelli and Sowell

We see the Israelis and Hezbollah pitted again in fierce conflict. Appeals for peace ring from shiny desk to shiny desk across Europe and the halls of the United Nations. At risk, besides the obvious regional/global war that could ensue, is the nascent "democracy" of Lebanon and how Israel, an established democracy, could destroy it.

Niccolo Machiavelli addressed this issue of incipient democratic government in Discouses on Livy. When speaking of citizens who attempt democratizing, he states, "they will never order themselves without danger, because enough men never agree to a new law that looks to a new order in a city unless they are shown by a necessity a reason to do it. Since this necessity cannot come without danger, it is an easy thing for a republic to be ruined before it can be led to a perfection of order" (translated by Mansfield and Tarcov). AHA! Machiavelli argues that any republic must face monumental challenges at its birth; it must wrangle and wrestle, it must spit and bleed and sweat. And yes, many of its citizens must die. Baby Republic, born screaming from chaos and tyranny, cannot delay this adversity and survive.

Some may argue that this quotation casts blame directly on Israel for wanting to destroy Lebanon. However, Israel wants nothing more than a true democratic republic to its north. But Israel cannot exist if this democracy allows terrorists to act with impunity.

Thus, as Thomas Sowell demonstrates in his column, "A 'Cycle' of Nonsense," (see link below) the peace process, orchestrated via the rhetoric of United Nations and the chief appeasers of the world, cannot occur through words. If the Lebanese want democracy, they will have to squeeze it from the lifeblood of the terrorists who want nothing to do with democracy. If the Europeans and Americans want democracy in the Middle East, they must stomach the brutality.

In 2000, the Israelis vacated southern Lebanon after 18 years of occupation. In the interim, the various cease-fires and peace plans have unravelled. Now, the Israeli army awaits the final command to return. The Lebanese government appeals to the world because they can neither stop the terrorists, nor can they stop the Israelis.

The Roman republic of which Machiavelli details, the United States, and the other European democracies suffered enourmous pain until they "could be led to a perfection of order." Until the citizens decide to stop the terrorists that are the real enemies of democracy, the Lebanese cannot live in freedom.

A Failed Vision

I have heard the refrain time and again from parents, "I just want my kid to be happy." Of course, who would not want any child to be happy, regardless of which child belongs to which parent? But a flaw exists in the logic that many parents use to define happiness. For them, parents often define "happiness" as a vague sense of success predicated on where that child attends college, high school, and if you believe Ruth Marcus in yesterday's Washington Post, summer camp. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/18/AR2006071801375.html)

These parents, bent on some social formula that equates success to college attendance and, therefore, "happiness", drive their children in the exact opposite direction. As they fill the schedule of their child's life, they isolate him or her from people, environment, and the joys of childhood. Because parents are leaders of their children, these parents suffer from failed vision.

I wonder if business organizations suffer from failed vision from this same phenomenon. Do leaders create a vague goal? Do leaders create a goal that contradicts a stated aim? The parent proudly proclaims, "I want my child to be happy," yet that parent acts and demands in such a way that only misery occurs. Do leaders believe their vision?

"Unto the Breach, We Happy Few!"

And so you ask, "why 'unto the breach' ? Why 'we happy few' ? " William Shakespeare's Henry V's awakening as a leader occurs in these two statements. My interest in leadership begins here.

The first quotation, spoken at the gates of Harfleur during the raging seige of the city, incites his men to carry the day through stubborn refusal to cower. Persistence. The leader recognizes the adversity ahead, and when his charges refuse to continue to overcome the obstacle, he instills in them confidence with his words. Leadership.

The second, spoken in the hours before the great battle with French forces at Agincourt, bonds Henry to his men. He creates a world where their lot is one of unique comraderie, one of shared experience. Henry, the leader, participates as much as his followers, and he rejoices in their shared toil. Fellowship.