War as art.

Well, my definition of war is  state organized violence, no matter against whom - their own people or some others. So, all genocides are war against a group of people. If one is leave all genocides out of the definition, then acts like 9-11 was not a war, and US is not supposed to fight a war on terror, because then terrorism is not really a war. In other words, I disagree with wiki's definition,  and I gave mine instead. It doesn't matter if Hitler didn't declare war on the Jews officially, this what he ordered was a war on them; in the same way the political cleansings that Stalin initiated are to be defined.

I don't consider Picasso's art art either, under my definition for art art is beautiful, not disturbing. But even the most disturbing art is not going to burn one alive, or kill him in some other way, when war does. So, in any way, they are incomparable. Also, the study of art is not a necessity for a human society, because no nation will die if they don't produce art; but if a nation doesn't know how to conduct a war, they will be wiped out very fast. The study of war is a grave necessity, not fun, like art is.

You cannot talk about war and not take into account that it takes away lives, and modern wars take more civilian lives that military ones, so the civilians that are supposed to be protected are the ones who pay the price for the decisions that military people, whose choice was to become warriors, make. War is not anymore 2 professional armies against one another, it's far more than that. Now, don't make me to go and find data on all civilian victims in the recent wars, to prove that, it's should be obvious.

You seem to divorce the reality of war, and it's cost, from itself. War is not only what generals do studying maps and deciding how to organize an attack - it's killed civilians and destroyed towns, villages, fields and countries, blowing up water and sewer supplies, etc in order to make one of the sides, or both, not able to support itself, taking away all the produce from the civilians for the needs of the military, so in the end not the professional military pay the cost, but the civilians. I don't see any awe in that, only morbidity, and a very unjust one, because the innocents pay. This is kinda hard to be seen in US, since it haven't been invaded for while, but 9-11 must show a small part what is for countries that are invaded and the war is going on their territory - I see nothing awesome in it.

I'm not trying to say that war is beautiful merely that it is in its own way a art form. I've met many soldiers from Vietnam and I agree that what happened to them is terrible. This doesn't change the fact that war can be defined as a art. Nowhere in any definition of art does it say that a art has to be beautiful.

So I've thought of a new way of asking this. Answer me this. Is sword fighting/fencing an art when one is striving to perfect it,or what about martial arts the word art is literally in the name and are these not the physical aspects of war? what about the mental part of war are shogi, go, and chess not an art when one strives to perfect them and what are those game but tactics put into game form(more shogi and go then chess)? And if you agree on those two accounts what do you get when you combine the physical aspects of battle and tactics other then war?

Originally posted by d' artagnan Nowhere in any definition of art does it say that a art has to be beautiful.

Not true, here is the definirtion of art:
"...1.the quality, production, expression, or realm, according to aesthetic principles, of what is beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance.

Edited by Don Quixote - 23-Apr-2012 at 23:30

Well, war is personal, don't you think? People are not pawns, they have relatives, who died or are to die in wars, so I cannot look at those people as at some unanimate objects to be moved left and right. For everyone who is involved in war it's a very personal story, no matter if one is taking, or giving, winning or losing, killing or dying.

In any case, if you personally want to see war as an art, I cannot forbid you to do so, it's your choice; my choice is not to see it as an art, so I cannot possibly be convinced in it.

I would gladly put that chair in my living room.

Thank you for the info on the Vietnam war, lirelou. What do you mean by "personnel" - soldiers or other "personnel"? I know that whoever volunteered got a choice where to join, and many got into doing electrical work, etc, but I don't know about the soldiers.
Here some data: Total draftees (1965-73) 1,728,344.
Draftees accounted for 30,4% of the casualties.  I didn't say that all Vietnam vets were draftees, btw. As for the rich kids - AFAIK, whoever was in college didn't get drafted, no? Who had the biggest chance to afford college - poor kids or rich ones?

What I said was that the Vietnam vets got top be abused when they came home because people pulled away their support for the war, not that all the vets were draftees. This didn't happen in WWII - whoever came back, draftees or not, was welcomed as the heroes they were, and got to be called "the greatest generation" - this didn't happen to the Nam vets. So, my argument was that the last were doubly victimized; if you disagree with that statement I'm not going to force it on you.

Now, about my defining genocide as a war against the people in one's state, what don't you like? In Cambodia, it was s civil war that ended with a genocide, what is wrong in that?
Here, an opinion by a sociologist:
"...Thus, my approach to genocide, informed by social theory, understands it as a fundamentally illegitimate variant of warfare - directed against civilian social groups as such rather than armed enemies - that most often takes place in contexts of more generalized, more conventional warfare. While it is true that genocide, once unleashed, often requires anti-genocidal military action to halt it, it follows that more profound policies to prevent and inhibit genocide must be closely linked with policies to reduce the possibilities of war in global society...." http://www.massviolence.org/war-and-genocide-a-sociological-approach?artpage=3-4

Again, I don't require you, or anyone else for that matter, to accept my opinion. But then, how do you define genocide? Just killing of people? Then what is the difference between that and modern warfare, with all the civilian casualties that is carries? The only one difference that I see is that somehow war is glorified, hence many genocides are done and excused as the part of a "war effort" - the Armenian Genocide is one of those. In fact, every genocide I know of, happened as a part of a war, and under the pretext of a war.

And your example with Hitler shows exactly what I'm talking about - Hitler was on a war, and had he triumphed, he wouldn't stop with the Jews, because his war was in order to gain "elbow space" - hence exterminate peoples to gain it. Every war has 2 parts - an offensive one /in the case Hitler against the others/ and defensive one - /the others against Hitler/. The part that started it was a crime, the part that defended against it is not a crime,  but a necessity, it was done to stop the crime. Now, if you equate the both parts, then everyone at any point can go and start a war with no ethical scruples. Especially after so many people glorify war as an "art" - what better advertisement than that.


Edited by Don Quixote - 25-Apr-2012 at 03:06

Good point, myzel. If we look ate the text or the work http://www.online-literature.com/suntzu/artofwar/7/ , it indeed talks about "factors" and "principles" far more frequently rather that of "art"; it would be nice if a Chinese member comes here to enlighten us about the correct translation.  It's a great work, btw, I have a supreme respect for it.

Edited by Don Quixote - 25-Apr-2012 at 18:06

I agree with you, lirelou, for all but the post-modern wars. Tell me, did the people killed in Hiroshimna and Nagasaki, or the ones killed in 9-11 have the opportunity to fight back? No, they were exterminated, pure and simple, anihilated, no less dead than the dead in any genocide. Then, the20,000 German  POW that were killed by the Russians, and the Italian POW killed by Tito, could they fight back? How about the victims of the rape of Nanking, 300 000 civilians, did they get a chance to fight back? No, they couldn't, none of those I mentioned, and those are only several examples.

Look at the numbers of the casualties in 20th century - only in WW1 between 13 mln civilians were killed, against 15 mln military - that's almost the same number - what is that? Do you want to add all the victims on the 20 century wars, and compare it with the death toll pf the genocides in the same time-frame -here is a link for that http://necrometrics.com/20c5m.htm - sorry, dead is dead, and wars kill as many civilians as genocides did, what's the difference?

That's why I'm saying that modern wars target civilians, and as such, they are genocides as well as wars. In classic wars there were military person against military person - since WWI there had been military against civilians. Besides, all modern genocides, the Holocaust, the Armenian one, the Russian Golodomor and the political cleansings, the Cambodian one, the Tutsi one, the Bosnian ethnic cleansing - were waged during a war and as part of such.

I don't try to present a genocide as something casual, on the opposite, I try to show that modern wars are not less genocidal than a genocide is, because it targets civilians. I may not mind war as much if it targets only militarily trained people, because they have the means and opportunity to fight back, and for most of human history they were more or less volunteering for putting their lives on the line; civilians do not.

I don't see whit what a modern war is more honorable than genocide, as some people like to glorify it. Somehow to kill a human being in  a genocide is a shame, to kill the same in a war is "awesome"? Sure...I'm not going to take a denumanising position only so I don't affront someone's vanity - there is no glory in war, only pain, suffering and death; there is no more glory in war than there is in a genocide!

Again, I keep my opinion, you keep yours; and mine is "modern wars are genocides".


Edited by Don Quixote - 25-Apr-2012 at 23:25

Don Q, please. Did the U.S. go on the repeat Hiroshima and Nagasaki in ever major city and town in Japan? No, they did not. That Japanese surrendered, and the killing stopped. 9/11? Again, please. We are entering a "Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman" definition of genocide that cheapens the term to the absurd and makes reasonabel discourse impossible. As the caterpillar said to Alice: Words mean exactly what I mean them to mean, nothing more, nothing less.

Btw, Raphael Lemkin, the very person that coined the word "genocide" defined genocide as "war of state against nation", "or "a war against people" - hence a type of war. Does this make all wars genocides - no, defensive wars are not genocides; but this makes genocide a war.

"...Genocide is the antithesis of the Rousseau-Portalis Doctrine, which may be regarded as implicit in the Hague Regulations. This doctrine holds that war is directed against sovereigns and armies, not against subjects and civilians. In its modern application in civilized society, the doctrine means that war is conducted against states and armed forces and not against populations. It required a long period of evolution in civilized society to mark the way from wars of extermination, ⁽³⁾ which occurred in ancient times and in the Middle Ages, to the conception of wars as being essentially limited to activities against armies and states. In the present war, however, genocide is widely practiced by the German occupant. Germany could not accept the Rousseau-Portalis Doctrine: first, because Germany is waging a total war; and secondly, because, according to the doctrine of National Socialism, the nation, not the state, is the predominant factor. ⁽⁴⁾ In this German conception the nation provides the biological element for the state. Consequently, in enforcing the New Order, the Germans prepared, waged, and continued a war [p.81] not merely against states and their armies ⁽⁵⁾ but against peoples. ..." http://www.preventgenocide.org/lemkin/AxisRule1944-1.htm

So, unless you accuse him in Alice-in-Wonderland type of defining words, there is no need to present an opinion as a ridiculous one only because it differs from yours. After all, the word is his, and he put this meaning in it, not I. One may call genocide an "extreme war", or "illegal war" - it's a war nevertheless.



Edited by Don Quixote - 26-Apr-2012 at 02:18