People and War

People and War. Boris Gulko

The first man on Earth Adam fought with no one. He was alone. But the next generation already had two people – and Cain killed Abel. Since then, the wars didn’t end, they just replaced one another.

The earliest known signs of war were discovered in Nataruke near Lake Turkana in Kenya. Blades, piercing bones, broken skulls – total of 27 skeletons. The massacre occurred about 10 thousand years ago, a period known as the agricultural revolution, when people started to cultivate the land. Military historian Azar Gat and evolutionary psychologist Stephen Pinker argue that wars existed previously as well.

The question is ambiguous: how much involvement in wars - the killing of enemy soldiers -- corresponds to the spiritual structure of people. Surprising research materials,   which became the basis of the series, were shot by the "National Geographic" magazine. Polls conducted in 1947 among American veterans of the Second World War from infantry units revealed that during real battles less than 25% of soldiers and officers shot the enemy. And only 2% deliberately aimed at people. The situation is similar in the Air Force: more than 50% of enemy planes were shot down only by 1% of the American pilots.

Approximately 25% of the soldiers and officers experienced temporary paralysis of the hand or index finger, precisely those that are needed for shooting. Left-handed soldiers experienced the paralysis of the left arm. In the archives of the Reich, documents were found that the same ailment was experienced by the German soldiers. On the Eastern Front, about 25% of the troops constantly experienced the "freeze" of the hand or finger needed for shooting.

It turned out that in those types of fights where the enemy is perceived as a human and a person (infantry battles, fighter aircraft fights), almost all the damage caused to the enemy is committed by only 2% of the personnel, and the remaining 98% are not capable of killing.

It is important to note that this is a case of "war of governments". The bitterness and belligerence is a lot higher in civil wars, when the enemy is not an anonymous foreigner, but hateful fellow citizens. The motivation of participants in civil wars and the cruelty of these wars is incomparably higher. In Russia "in that unique Civil[A1] ",  about which Okudzhava[A2]  sang, about 10.5 million people were killed by their fellow citizens, and two million after the war had to leave the country. The historian Leonid Mlechin expressed the opinion that in view of such losses of its best people, Russia was already doomed to severe degradation that occurred in the 20th century.

Psychologists have suggested that 2% of effective fighters, which the National Geographic studies says are psychopaths. Often, these guys even before entering the army had problems with their psyche.

But it is the actions of these fighters that determine the effectiveness of the armed forces. This conclusion has now determined the policy of preferential recruitment to the American army of people with psychopathic tendencies. Now they are not 2% of fighters of impact units, as in the Second World War, but 60-70%. Such a selection is possible, of course, only for a mercenary army.

Such selection is useful not only for the army, but also for civil society in getting rid of those members who are more inclined to aggression. Historians noted the strange inconsistency of Spain's dictator Francisco Franco. He is the only leader of the country of continental Europe, who stood during the Second World War before the demon Fuehrer and did not allow German troops through his territory to Gibraltar, which probably had a decisive influence on the outcome of the war (my old essay "One nose is worth it"). But later Franco willingly sent the volunteer "Blue Division" of selected fighters, which enabled him to win the Civil War, to the Eastern Front, where these heroes in their majority ended their earthly existence. In Spain, these guys, rushing into battle, would threaten the reconciliation process.

TANAH tells us about guys that are fit and not fit for war. In the Book of Judges, the amazing victory of the army of the Jewish commander Gideon over the Midianites is described: "And the Lord said to Gideon: There are too many people with you, that I deliver the Midianites into their hands, so that Israel would not pride himself in me, saying:" My hand saved me." So, cry out in the ears of the people and say: "Whoever is fearful and timid, let him return early in the morning from Mount Gilead." And twenty-two thousand returned from the people, and ten thousand remained. And the Lord said to Gideon: there are still many people ... And said the Lord to Gideon: three hundred ... I will save you and deliver the Midianites into your hands, and let all the people go, each to his place "( Book of Judges (7: 2-13).) Less than 1% of the militia was sufficient to win.

Characteristic, how these 300 winners were selected: "And the Lord said to Gideon: Whosoever shall water (from the stream) with his tongue, as a dog heaves, you will put it especially, and anyone who kneels to drink" (7: 6). The candidate for the army was to show a tendency to behave like an animal.

Several generations after Gideon, "when the Ammonites were at war with Israel, the elders of Gilead went to take Iftah from the land of Tov. And they said to Iftah: go, and be our leader, and we shall fight against the Ammonites "(11: 5-6). Iftah, the son of a harlot, was the ataman of the bandits, a dashing fellow. Of course, he won the war. What distinguished the Jewish robber from his colleagues in the craft: before the fighting, Iftah turned to the Ammonites with a message that demonstrated his good knowledge of the Torah and history.

The Torah commands the selection of special fighters into the army: "He who built a new house and did not renew it, let him go and return to his house so that he does not die in battle, and the other has not renewed it; And he who planted the vineyard and did not use it, let him go and return to his house, so that he does not die in the battle, and the other does not use it; And whoever got engaged with his wife and did not take it, let him go and return to his house, so that he does not die in the battle, and the other does not take it. And the officers will say to the people, and they will say, "He who is fearful and cowardly, let him go and return to his house, lest he make his brothers' timid heart as his heart." (Deuteronomy 20: 5-8). Commentators explain that the mention of a new house, a vineyard and a wife are made to give people unsuitable for war a worthy excuse to leave the army.

Wars with an external enemy can unite the nation. The American writer of the early twentieth century, Randolph Bourne on this occasion sneered: "The war brings health to the state. It automatically sets in the whole society the dynamics of irresistible forces of uniformity, assiduous cooperation with the government in conjunction with the obedience of minorities and individuals who otherwise would not have this feeling of the herd. "An example of the use of war for the unity of the people around a common goal, even if already long achieved, is the consecration of Russian victory over Germany in the war of 1941-45. The farther in time that war is, the greater the role in national self-consciousness trying to give it power. Despite the scale of the national catastrophe in that war, which took away, as recognized only now, 42 million of its inhabitants, (the losing Germany, which fought on two fronts, lost less than 5.5 million people), Russia still won. In the past half century, we have seen the creation of a people that unite only the humiliating defeats that the Arab nation carried from the Jews in three great wars. Even the name for the Arabs who form this new nation - the "Palestinians" - was chosen by outsiders - somewhere in the bowels of the KGB.

At the same time, the absence of wars dissolves the feeling of unity of the people. Western Europeans, after two continental slaughters of the twentieth century and half a century of peace have lost the will to exist. They abandoned the national states and formed an amorphous European Union, and now they willingly mix with the numerous migrants from Asia and Africa that save Europe from its demographic degeneration, which is also indicative of the reluctance of peoples to continue to exist.

In Israel, because of the constant threats of hostile neighbors, the army service is nationwide and volunteers are recruited into combat units. At the same time, thanks to the technical equipment of the army, the main damage to the enemy is caused by weapons that do not require direct contact with them. It seems that in recent conflicts, the Israeli army spends more effort to avoid losses among hostile populations, announcing bombing targets in advance, rather than destroying the enemy.

The modern problem of armies - whether women should serve in it - has recently become in Israel the subject of a conflict between Defense Minister Lieberman and the head of the military yeshiva, Rabbi Levinshtein. Women are much less suitable for violence than men - in a peaceful life they commit only 5% of violent crimes. A clear example: any American will be alarmed to find a black guy walking behind him in a deserted place, but won’t feel the same threat from a black woman.

But, perhaps, the situation with the Jews is not quite the same.  The femininity of Jewish men is described in the famous book by Otto Weininger: "Character and Gender." TANAKH tells a lot about the belligerence of the Jewish women.  For example: the prophetess Deborah sent the commander Barak to the war with the chief of the Canaanites, Sisra. "And Barak said to her: if you go with me, then I will go, and if you do not go with me, I will not go. And she said: I am ready to go with you, but your glory will not be yours in this way, by which you are going, for the Lord will deliver Sisra into the hands of the woman "(Judges 4: 8-9). And indeed: Sisra fled after the rout and hid in the tent of Yaile, the wife of Havar. "When he fell asleep tired" (according to some commentators - Yaile seven times seduced him), ...Yaile took a  stake from the tent and took the hammer in her hand, and went to him quietly, and stabbed him in the head with the stake, and he died" (4:21). Nowhere in the TANAKH have I seen such a detailed and colorful description of the murder.

In the Book of Esther there is a striking episode: after the day of the war, on Adar 13,   whose anniversary we celebrate in Purim, "The King said to Queen Esther:" The Jews killed five hundred people and the ten sons of Haman in the fortress of Shushan; What did they do in other areas of the kingdom!... Say, what kind of desire do you have? And it will be fulfilled ... And Esther said: "If the king wishes, let the Jews who are in Shushan be allowed to act tomorrow according to the decree of this day"; ... Also on the fourteenth day of the Adar, the Jews gathered in Shushan, and killed three hundred people in Shushan ... "(9: 12-15). Therefore, to this day, Purim is celebrated in Jerusalem, which has walls like the ancient Shushan, 14 Adar, marking the belligerence of Queen Esther.

The question arises: what about the proportionality of the answer - after all, could the enemies of the Jews change their minds in a day? It seems that the proportionality of the answer is a male quality.

Here is some modern history: On September 6, 1972 Arab terrorists killed 11 Israeli athletes during the Olympics in Munich. On the orders of Prime Minister Golda Meir, almost all the organizers of this crime were liquidated by the Israeli special services.

On March 2, 2016, Sergeant Elor Azariah shot and killed a wounded terrorist, that is, he did exactly what was done on the orders of Golda Meir Israeli agents with the organizers of the terrorist attack in Munich. All the chiefs of Azariah, the men, starting with the Minister of Defense, betrayed the sergeant and insisted on a military trial over him.

It is important to bear in mind that terrorists violate all laws of war and peace. They kill civilians, therefore they drop out of the legal field of society and are not protected by any international conventions. The terrorist who committed the attack rejects basic human morality, thus he loses the right to live. The hands raised by the terrorist mean no more than picking his nose, and should not serve as a defense.

But, of course, those in power can change this approach. It’s a misfortune for a terrorist if his fate is in the hands of a woman like Golda Meir, and not a liberal politician. 

                                                                        Translated by Alla Axelrod. May 9, 2017