Response to FOG AGAIN:
Dear Editor:
Again, I find myself responding to a reader, El Sellers, who has pointed out errors and shortcomings in two recent letters of mine. This is good; other readers will benefit from such criticisms and responses.
In one letter, I asked how to find the Truth within media. In answering this question, I employed the “Socratic Method,” which invites the reader to discover the answer by posing questions. This approach failed in the “clarity” category, in Mr. Seller’s opinion.
In my letter, the answer for how to find TRUTH was, “demand the same level of reality that is required in a courtroom.” Since this was in the form of a question (Socratic), it may have been confusing. To remove that confusion, I state here, “The best way devised by civilization to find TRUTH is our Justice system, where evidence and proof are required, and can be challenged.” If a media report does not have this level of proof and evidence, then it should be viewed extremely skeptically.
My letter about war casualties also received criticism. In way of an historical “correction,” Mr. Sellers suggests that it was Tojo and the military who vowed the Japanese would fight to the last man, were the Japanese mainland to be invaded, and not Emperor Hirohito.
The reader further suggests Hirohito’s position was merely a “religious and symbolic one.” The important FACT here is that it was Hirohito alone who could propose and accept an unconditional surrender, and he did so on August 14, 1945. Tojo — in reality rather than symbolically — had to go along with his Emperor’s decision.
Another historic “correction” was to specify that the bombs dropped on Japan were uranium and plutonium (they were atomic bombs).
While interesting, this distinction changes nothing, nor does the suggestion that there was no “inventory” of atomic bombs (this information was top secret at the time, and subject to rapid wartime change).
Then Mr. Sellers puts forward a “TRUTH”: “Truth: war’s object is VICTORY with minimal loss of American lives.” The reader “corrects” my assertion that the objective of war is to defeat the enemy with minimal loss of civilian life.
I consulted the Department of Defense “LAW OF WAR” official Manual (found online), and in subsection 2.3 found this:
“Humanity may be defined as the principle that forbids the infliction of suffering, injury, or destruction unnecessary to accomplish a legitimate military purpose.” And, “… the principle of humanity has been viewed as the source of the civilian population’s immunity from being made the object of attack … there is no military purpose served by attacking them.”
And then in subsection 2.4 found this:
“[The principle of proportionality] creates obligations to refrain from attacks in which the expected harm incidental to such attacks would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated to be gained and to take feasible precautions in planning and conducting attacks to reduce the risk of harm to civilians and other persons and objects …”
Victory as a goal is a given, as is the protection as best as possible of our soldiers. But those are not the ONLY considerations military planners of War must consider. I will stand corrected if the reader can point out where he finds this “truth” as HE states it, that ONLY “victory” and “minimal loss of American lives” are to be considered in war.
Jeff Harrison
Buffalo, Texas
