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Below please find a Memorial Day blog I just posed to
"effectivedefense.org". Comments welcomed. <br>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in" align="CENTER"><font style="font-size:
16pt" size="4"><b>Honoring Our Dead</b></font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in" align="CENTER">Spencer Graves<a
class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote1anc"
href="#sdfootnote1sym"><sup>1</sup></a></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="text-indent: 0.29in; margin-bottom: 0in">While visiting a
small town in Austria, I was startled to see a life-size statue of
a young man in a World War II German army helmet. I was raised in
Kansas in the shadow of an uncle who didn't return from that war,
and my visceral reaction was clearly different from that of my
Austrian hosts: To me, that helmet represented Nazi tyranny
including the holocaust. Many Austrians have a different
interpretation, e.g., resistance to foreign invasion. </p>
<p style="text-indent: 0.29in; margin-bottom: 0in">Similarly, there
are active controversies in the US today over Confederate
monuments.<a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote2anc"
href="#sdfootnote2sym"><sup>2</sup></a> To African-Americans and
"damn Yankees" like me, such monuments symbolize slavery. To
Southerners, they more likely embody resentment over the
depredations and humiliations of the war and the Reconstruction
period that followed.<a class="sdfootnoteanc"
name="sdfootnote3anc" href="#sdfootnote3sym"><sup>3</sup></a></p>
<p style="text-indent: 0.29in; margin-bottom: 0in">I'm concerned,
however, that we not use the memory of fallen soldiers to glorify
and promote further use of violence, especially in situations
where research suggests that there may be more effective means of
achieving reasonable objectives in conflict situations. For
example, recent research into the effectiveness of alternative
reactions to injustice and depredations in the twentieth century
determined that 26% of the violent change efforts as opposed to
53% of the nonviolent campaigns achieved some measure of success.
Moreover, the nonviolent changes efforts produced on average
substantially greater increases in freedom and democracy. The
successes of both violent and nonviolent campaigns were achieved
in large part through defections among the establishment. This
helps explain why nonviolence tends on average to be more
effective, because people are more likely to defect if the
challengers are nonviolent.<a class="sdfootnoteanc"
name="sdfootnote4anc" href="#sdfootnote4sym"><sup>4</sup></a> </p>
<p style="text-indent: 0.29in; margin-bottom: 0in">Similar research
into the use of air power has indicated that tactical air support
of ground troops has been useful, but strategic bombing has on
average been a waste of resources. One example is the London
Blitz, which solidified the support of the British public behind
their government to the detriment of Hitler, who ordered the
Blitz.<a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote5anc"
href="#sdfootnote5sym"><sup>5</sup></a> </p>
<p style="text-indent: 0.29in; margin-bottom: 0in">A more current
example is use of drones by the US in Pakistan, which is allegedly
"critical" to US operations in that region. Pakistan has disagreed
vehemently, demanding that the US stop using drones in its air
space. This Pakistani response suggests that US drone use there
has done for the US what the Blitz did for Hitler.<a
class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote6anc"
href="#sdfootnote6sym"><sup>6</sup></a> </p>
<p style="text-indent: 0.29in; margin-bottom: 0in">The memory of
those who made the supreme sacrifice should motivate us to seek
and support more careful research into the long-term impact of
alternative responses to threats and attack. </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">Copyright 2012 under the Creative
Commons Attribution, Share-Alike license. </p>
<div id="sdfootnote1">
<p class="sdfootnote"><a class="sdfootnotesym"
name="sdfootnote1sym" href="#sdfootnote1anc">1</a>Wikipedia,
"Memorial Day", "Armistice Day", accessed 2012-05-29. </p>
</div>
<div id="sdfootnote2">
<p class="sdfootnote"><a class="sdfootnotesym"
name="sdfootnote2sym" href="#sdfootnote2anc">2</a>Mitch Carr,
"Reidsville protesters want confederate statue back",
MyFOX8.com, May 23, 2012, "<a
href="http://myfox8.com/2012/05/23/reidsville-protesters-want-confederate-statue-back/">http://myfox8.com/2012/05/23/reidsville-protesters-want-confederate-statue-back/</a>
", accessed 2012-05-28. </p>
</div>
<div id="sdfootnote3">
<p class="sdfootnote"><a class="sdfootnotesym"
name="sdfootnote3sym" href="#sdfootnote3anc">3</a>The
resentment of the Southern whites following the American War
between the States seems consistent with the role-reversal
theory of Roger D. Petersen, <i>Understanding Ethnic Violence:
Fear, Hatred, and Resentment in Twentieth-Century Eastern
Europe</i><span style="font-style: normal">, Cambridge U. Pr.,
2002. </span> </p>
</div>
<div id="sdfootnote4">
<p class="sdfootnote"><a class="sdfootnotesym"
name="sdfootnote4sym" href="#sdfootnote4anc">4</a>Erica
Chenoweth and Maria J. Stephan, <i>Why Civil Resistance Works</i><span
style="font-style: normal">, Columbia U. Pr., 2011. </span> </p>
</div>
<div id="sdfootnote5">
<p class="sdfootnote"><a class="sdfootnotesym"
name="sdfootnote5sym" href="#sdfootnote5anc">5</a>Robert A.
Pape, <i>Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War</i>,
Cornell U. Pr., 1996. M. Horowitz and D. Reiter, “When Does
Aerial Bombing Work? Quantitative Empirical Tests, 1917-1999”,
Journal of Conflict Resolution, 45: 147-173, 2001. </p>
</div>
<div id="sdfootnote6">
<p class="sdfootnote"><a class="sdfootnotesym"
name="sdfootnote6sym" href="#sdfootnote6anc">6</a>Indira A.R.
Lakshmanan, "Pakistan Ends Drone Strikes In Blow To U.S. War On
Terror", Bloomberg, 2012-03-13 02:22:18Z. <a
href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-13/pakistan-tells-white-house-to-stop-drone-missions-after-disputes-fray-ties.html">http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-13/pakistan-tells-white-house-to-stop-drone-missions-after-disputes-fray-ties.html</a>,
accessed 2012-05-28. </p>
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<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Spencer Graves, PE, PhD
President and Chief Technology Officer
Structure Inspection and Monitoring, Inc.
751 Emerson Ct.
San José, CA 95126
ph: 408-655-4567
web: <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="http://www.structuremonitoring.com">www.structuremonitoring.com</a>
</pre>
<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Spencer Graves, PE, PhD
President and Chief Technology Officer
Structure Inspection and Monitoring, Inc.
751 Emerson Ct.
San José, CA 95126
ph: 408-655-4567
web: <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="http://www.structuremonitoring.com">www.structuremonitoring.com</a>
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