PRIDE

The December Bulletin was the finest I remember in the more than 55 years I have been reading it. It made me proud to be a Swarthmorean.

The magazine reflected an institution that is committed to rigorous examination of the most difficult and complex issues facing the country today, unafraid to present and explore what may be generally unpopular viewpoints for dealing with them and dedicated to the College’s Quaker heritage. It was well planned, stimulating to read, and visually attractive.

All who participated in its preparation have done the College and everyone associated with it a major service.

WALTER SCHEIBER ’44
Bethesda, Md.

HIJACKING CIVILIZATION

I would like to commend the editors of the Bulletin for attempting to put together a balanced set of views on terrorism and pacifism. I hope that at Swarthmore, people choose to engage opposing viewpoints rather than talk past one another or impugn others’ motives.

It might be helpful to imagine yourself as a passenger on one of the hijacked planes on Sept. 11. It seems difficult to make a case for pacifism under such circumstances; the passengers had little to lose and much to gain by fighting the hijackers.

One could argue that terrorists are trying to hijack our civilization. We may have more time than the Sept. 11 passengers did to consider our response, but the case for fighting back looks pretty compelling.

ARNOLD KLING ’75
Silver Spring, Md.

SHOCKED BUT NOT SURPRISED

I am writing in gratitude for the December Bulletin, which I read almost cover to cover. Of course, I was shocked by—but surprised by only the scale of—the attacks of Sept. 11. I was not surprised by the chauvinism and belligerence of the official public responses in the United States.

The diverse but generally thoughtful views expressed in the Bulletin were most welcome. From outside the United States, it is not always easy to recognize that there is debate over official U.S. policy. I continue to treasure the respectful intellectual rigor and the tolerance of diversity I experienced at Swarthmore. I am relieved to see it continuing to flourish. This reminder helps me to separate my abhorrence of U.S. public policy from my admiration of the principles of democracy and free speech for which the United States continues to be a fine model.

BERTHA FUCHSMAN SMALL ’72
Ste.-Anne-de-Bellevue, Quebec

DADDY’S WAR?

The December Bulletin was timely and thought provoking. I learned a lot, agreed and disagreed with the authors, but appreciated the effort of each.

Two statements provoked me, both in the interview with Professor of Economics Mark Kuperberg: “Even pacifists have to pick their fights.” No, pacifists do not have to “pick their fights.” Pacifists are opposed

to all war and armed hostility. They might change their minds and then no longer be pacifists, but they do not pick their fights.

I also found Kuperberg’s statement, “This is not your daddy’s Vietnam War,” to be patronizing if not insulting. He was directing his remark to Swarthmore students who oppose the Afghan conflict and whose parents might have opposed the Vietnam War. Ergo, instead of thinking for themselves, these students are only emulating their daddies. Ouch!

Of course, there are those of us whose daddies were not alive during the Vietnam War who not only opposed that war but are opposed to the Afghan war as well. Who are we emulating?

JESSICA HEIMBACH RAYMOND ’56
Cheyney, Pa.

FAILURE OF INTELLIGENCE AND IMAGINATION

Thompson Bradley (“Toward a New Foreign Policy,” December Bulletin) asserts that the attacks of Sept. 11 were “a crime, not an act of war.” “War,” he writes, “is the very crudest of responses and reflects the utter failure of imagination and intelligence in foreign policy.”

Bradley reverses the proper order of these terms. In politics, intelligence is prior to imagination. Intelligence discerns how things stand, and imagination envisions ways to do something about it. So how do things stand with respect to foreign policy?

This question invites us to ponder the basic facts of human existence. On the one hand, philosophers from Plato to Hobbes have taught that war is a direct consequence of human nature because man is a depraved and violent animal. This is also one of the first things we are taught in the Book of Genesis. Human beings are created, sin against God, are expelled from Eden, and commit murder. One inevitable consequence of this depravity is that human beings band together in communities for the purpose of pillaging others or for the purpose of self-protection—often for both. And as soon as one organized group of human beings appears on the scene, the large-scale violence that we call war becomes possible. All others must thereupon band together to meet violence with violence. They must do this or risk being destroyed.

As a Marxist, Bradley implies that it is wrong to attribute evil to human beings because the word “evil” implies the existence of an indelible badness in at least some of us. Criminal violence, therefore, does not follow from human nature but is caused by defects in the organization of society. Violent aggression—including terrorism—can be explained by some social grievance, and every social grievance is, at least in principle, correctable. This is why Bradley insists that the terrorist attacks were merely a crime; having convinced others of this point, he can then insist that we change the conditions that produced this “crime.” Bradley and his fellow utopians thus hold out hope that we can create a new Eden by reorganizing society.

Which of these two teachings is correct? I submit that the philosophical and biblical tradition got it right, and that it is Bradley’s response—one that has been echoed by far too many in the academy—that reflects a failure of intelligence and imagination. The most fundamental task of the nation-state is to protect its members by waging war when necessary against outside aggressors. The state that is unable or unwilling to do this will soon cease to exist. And as John Stuart Mill said, “War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing worth a war, is worse.”

JACOB HOWLAND ’80
Tulsa, Okla.

OBJECTIVITY IMPOSSIBLE

The Swarthmore I graduated from was quite different from the one in which faculty member Farha Ghannam teaches a course on Middle Eastern cultures while publicly linking Muslim attacks on America to double standards in U.S. foreign policy. Her statement in the article “Peace, Politics, and Justice” that “the solution ultimately lies in changing U.S. policies in the Middle East” is as dangerous as it is flawed.

Prior to 1967, all controversial territories that Palestinians decry as the root of their uprising were fully under Muslim control. Yet simply because it provided a safe haven for Jews, Israel was attacked by every Middle Eastern Muslim nation that had an army. Israel’s painful offer of the same territories in return for a permanent peace was met with Palestinian terrorism aimed at murdering any living Jew—suicide missions for which some 70 percent of Palestinian civilians proclaimed their support. Perhaps there would be a form of “peace” if the Jews, whose roots to the land go back 3,000 years, were pushed into the sea as Arafat has proposed.

The Middle East is no more the cause of Bin Laden terrorism than the crusaders from a millennium ago, even if Palestinians did celebrate the World Trade Center attacks. America’s mistakes in pre–Sept. 11 Afghanistan related to backing down from moral principles for the sake of political/ globalization strategies. We have learned our lesson the hard way. I hope we will not make the same mistake (as Ms. Ghannam seems to wish) in the Middle East, where Israel is our only honest ally.

Because I cherish my alma mater, I am deeply saddened to imagine the current student climate where a faculty member teaches a subject about which she cannot possibly be an objective educator. What evaluation might I obtain in Ms. Ghannam’s class? Worse yet, what lessons would be espoused as “moral”?

DAVID FISHER ’79
Boston

Miguel Díaz-Barriga, associate professor and acting chair of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, replies: “In her teaching, Professor Ghannam fosters considered and vigorous debate that questions ideological conformism. In the spirit of the educational mission of Swarthmore, this debate includes discussion of U.S. policy. The College’s mission is excellently served by Professor Ghannam, and Swarthmore is fortunate that she has chosen to join the faculty.”

HERITAGE OF PEACE

Thank you for the “War and Peace” issue. Patriotic pacifists have had a rough time lately, and it helps to be reminded of our rich heritage.

My Swarthmore roommate, the late Sue Nason, worked in the Peace Collection and frequently brought back tidbits of pacifist history. She and I were fascinated by the elderly pacifist-suffragist ladies residing near the campus in the 1950s, looking exactly like our own black-clad grandmothers, wearing hats and gloves on all public appearances. She reported that many of them had demonstrated and some had been jailed for acts of civil disobedience. At that time, the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom was on the infamous “Attorney General’s List” of allegedly communist-affiliated organizations.

I feel grief and rage at the loss of so many civilians who were simply doing their jobs on Sept. 11. However, I wonder how bombing impoverished civilians in Afghan-istan fits in with making the world safe for democracy.

MARY BOYCE GELFMAN ’57
Ridgefield, Conn.

WRITE TO US

The Bulletin welcomes letters concerning the contents of the magazine or issues relating to the College. Address your letters to: Editor, Swarthmore College Bulletin, 500 College Ave., Swarthmore PA 19081-1390, or send by e-mail to bulletin@swarthmore.edu.