Deadly cost of appeasing

The truly and deliberately evil men are a very small minority; it is the appeaser who unleashes them on mankind." –Ayn Rand

Ayn Rand had it right. Look at the recent record:

Obama: ISIS, Russia-Crimea.

Trump: No wars.

Biden: Ukraine, Hamas-Iran.

Obama, Biden: Appeasers. Delusional.

Almost a decade ago, in October 2014, when the United States and Iraq were in the throes of trying to stop the barbaric, savage ISIS caliphate from taking over Iraq and beyond, Craig Biddle, founder and editor of The Objectivist Standard, a periodical that explains the world according to Rand’s Objectivist philosophy, penned a commentary on the five primary causes of war and five causes of peace.  

Relevant then, Biddle’s causes of war and peace are just as relevant today as Israel undertakes its retaliation against Hamas. 

Causes of War:

• Statism
• Collectivism
• Altruism
• Mysticism
• Evasion

Causes of Peace:

• Capitalism
• Individualism
• Egoism
• Rationality
• Honesty

With our chief appeaser in the White House today, Evasion is paramount.

Wrote Biddle: 

“The most fundamental psychological cause of war is Evasion — the refusal to face relevant facts, the act of pretending that reality is other than it is.

“(I)n the 1930s, European leaders evaded the explicitly stated intentions and clear advances of the Nazis. Rather than eliminate these avowedly racist murderers who openly sought world domination when the Europeans easily could have, they permitted the Nazis to strengthen and expand for years on end, thereby eventually necessitating a massive war to end the nightmare.

“Similarly, today, U.S. leaders evade the explicitly stated aims and clear advances of the Islamic regimes that sponsor terrorism … 

“U.S. leaders pretend that ‘Islam means peace,’ when in fact it means submission … They pretend that we can fruitfully negotiate with the Iranian regime, whose ultimate goal — as stated in its written constitution — is to force everyone on the planet to submit to Allah, and whose leaders call regularly for ‘Death to America’ … and the annihilation of Israel and the Jews. 

“When a nation evades such facts about its enemies, that nation eventually will either fight a larger and more costly war than it would have had to fight if it had faced reality from the beginning — or submit to its enemies. 

“It is either-or.”

In contrast to Evasion as a cause of war, Honesty is a cause of peace. Wrote Biddle:

“The most fundamental psychological cause of peace is Honesty: the refusal to pretend that facts are other than they are.

“(W)hen an enemy of America quotes his religious scripture to the effect that his ‘God’ commands him to convert or kill unbelievers; when that same enemy founds a nation with a constitution stating that it intends to make everyone on the planet submit to his God; when that same enemy issues textbooks to its grade-school students ‘teaching’ them that to be noble they must engage in jihad and kill infidels; when that same enemy materially and spiritually sponsors terrorist groups that murder many thousands of Americans (and now Israelis) in the name of this godly mission; when that same enemy pursues nuclear weapons while chanting ‘Death to America’ and on and on, honesty requires that Americans and their leaders acknowledge this enemy as an enemy that must be eliminated unequivocally and immediately.

“For the United States instead to ‘negotiate’ with the leaders of the enemy regimes and to sit with them at the U.N. and thus treat them as deserving of anything other than torture (for information) and death (for good riddance) is an act of dishonesty. It is an act of pretending that reality is other than it is.

“Insofar as a country and its leaders are honest about who their enemies are, what motivates them and what must be done to eliminate them, the country will be able to employ its resources in the best way possible toward achieving and maintaining peace.

“Insofar as a country and its leaders pretend that the facts of the matter are other than they are, they will pay the price for their evasions. Reality cannot be fooled.”

As Rand and Biddle have so aptly explained, Ukraine and Israel are under siege in large part because of our appeasing presidents and their ignorance of evasion versus honesty.

For this, the world is paying a costly, deadly price.

Hamas attacks give Israel the right to obliterate

Inevitably, as Israel retaliates to the Hamas-Hezbollah-Iranian attacks, there will be U.S. and world politicians and TV media windbags demanding that Israel stop the destruction of Gaza and Lebanon; stop the killing of innocent Palestinians; and that Israel submit to a cease-fire and peace settlement. 

You watch. In the coming days there will be world outrage from the anti-Semitic abettors over Israel’s retaliation to the sadistic, satanic attacks of the Hamas-Hezbollah-Iranian terrorists.

But such outrage will be wrong. Totally, completely, indisputably wrong.

Israel is not responsible for any of the deaths of Hamas or Hezbollah militants, of the Hamas or Hezbollah sympathizers or of the Palestinian or Arab civilians in Gaza or Lebanon.

Every death in Gaza or Lebanon is on the hands of the terrorist leaders. Not Israel.

When the terrorists fired their first rockets and gunshots in Israel last weekend, the terrorist leaders had made a conscious decision. They were proclaiming they care far more about their irrational mysticism and fanaticism in “Allah” and far more about their delusions of victimhood (caused by their statist, authoritarian regimes) than they care about the lives and well being of their own families, neighbors, women, elderly and children.

They made the conscious decision they are willing to and OK with bringing death upon their innocent countrymen and citizens.

In its self-defense, then, Israel has the moral right to defend itself and destroy its aggressors. 

Indeed, to be victorious in war and secure its freedom from annihilation and becoming slaves of its enemies, Israel has the right to use enough force to break the will of its enemies and destroy its enemies’ war machinery and infrastructure. And this, inevitably, leads to and necessitates the killing of civilians.

To obtain victory against an aggressor, the free nation often must cripple production of weapons, and in the process that takes the lives of civilians. “This is what the U.S. did in World War II when it dropped fire bombs on Dresden and Hamburg and atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki,” wrote Onkar Ghate at the Ayn Rand Institute in a commentary dubbed “Innocents at War?”

“These bombings were moral acts. The destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, for instance, precipitated Japan’s surrender and so achieved victory with no further U.S. casualties. 

“In that context, to sacrifice the lives of hundreds of thousands of U.S. soldiers in a ground attack on Japan would have been morally monstrous.”

Hamas and Hezbollah’s bombings are immoral acts. Israel has every right to obliterate its enemies, regardless of the collateral damage. It has the moral right and responsibility to put its people’s lives ahead of any others.

When you hear outrage pointed at Israel, remember where the true evil lies.