(An edited version of the essay below was published on 6th March 2022 as the lead letter in the Economist magazine. It deeply saddens me that I have had to write such words)
I find it reassuring that, from my experience, the vast majority of humanity has already chosen not to make war, but chosen a peaceful co-existence with their fellow sapiens. The major problem, highlighted by tensions over Ukraine, is how those peaceful people get rid of the minority of people who choose to use force and violence to increase their power and status. How do you control someone who points a gun in your face?.
The direction of humanity will be decided if it can stop such people. But how?
If a tyrant gets elected, by making popular promises of short term gain for their electorate, you may think that using the law to expose their corruption or illegal activity will bring them to heel. But the law and constitutions are human constructs, which can be changed to suit those in power, and judges can be manipulated with rewards and bribes.
You could try protests on the streets, but these don’t seem to work. Leaders will just send in the police as in Hong Kong and Belarus or tanks as in Tiananmen Square.
Will spreading the truth about those in power control their behaviour? No chance, as speaking out will get you branded as a terrorist trying to cause harm to society. Arrest and a long term in jail will follow, which silences you and deters others.
Perhaps people should vote for different people at the next election, but it will probably be too late by then, as the opposition has been locked up and voting rigged so that real change is impossible.
Perhaps feminism can exert soft power over powerful men? Well this has never happened in the past and would need a massive show of girl power to work.
Don’t look to religion for help either, religious
leaders have never done anything in the past, as they are too
intermeshed with the elites, to want the status quo to change. They think
some supernatural, made up force will sort it all out
anyway. After 2000 years where has religion got us?
Will the freedoms and anarchy of the internet promote free speech and enable the people to co ordinate and rise up against the oppressors? Well not if it is constantly monitored and controlled by those in power. Once in power the elite who have no shame to use force are proving very hard if not impossible to shift by their own people.
So international help is needed from other peaceful countries imposing sanctions, but this is a long game, and if you look at North Korea seems to have no end. Also Sanctions only have the effect of harming the peaceful majority of people rather than the uncaring leadership, who continue to live in isolation, luxury and delusion. I’m sure Mr Putin knows that Russia will be worst off economically if he invades Ukraine, but I doubt if he cares. He will still be in power, living in luxury and wealth, convinced that his world view is correct. As long as his army obeys him, nothing can stop him, and his army is currently busy a long way away from Moscow, dealing with other matters. No the uncomfortable and inconvenient truth is, that the only way to stop dictators is by an internal coup (which will probably just replace one dictator with another) or by meeting violence with violence ie threatening war.
After all, wasn’t the modern version of democracy
born from war during the French revolution, American war of independence
and the English Civil war? And what happened to the first democracy in
Greece when the Spartan's and Macedonian's turned up? Historians go quiet on that one. Democracy is not the default setting for human societies.
If the free world wants to stop Putin and protect the fledgling democracy in Ukraine, it will have to threaten to meet force with force and treat Ukraine as if it is already a Full member of Nato with all it’s implications of possible imminent nuclear war. I’m sure that everyone reading this will find this statement shocking, but what other way is there? Many in the past have fought for freedom, is our time to stand up for what we value fast approaching?
Hitler was elected by a free and fair election , and if Trump had had an organised paramilitary wing he could at this very moment be the first dictator of the USA. The destiny of humanity is most definitely in all of our hands. The Question is not what to choose but how to act.
