Choose Hope And
Change The World
by David Krieger*, September 28, 2002
Earth Charter
Summit, San Francisco
We are gathered to consider one of the most visionary
documents of our time, the Earth Charter. Before we focus our
attention on this great document, though, I need to say something
about the drums of war and war itself.
I wrote this poem in 1971, more than thirty years
ago during another war, but unfortunately it is again appropriate
today. Listen carefully and you can hear the steady beating of
the drums of war coming from Washington.
THE DRUMS
They’re beating on the drums again,
the drums, the drums.
They’re calling out the young men again,
young men, young men.
They’re training them to kill again,
with knives and guns,
with tanks and bombs.
They’re sending them away again,
across the ocean
by ship, by plane.
They’re acting up at home again,
the mothers, the mothers.
They don’t want their sons to go again
to die, to die.
And now they’re coming home again
in caskets wrapped in flags
with shrapnel in their backs,
with heroin in their veins.
And now they’re coming home again
with snickers on their lips,
with medals on their chests.
They’re blowing on the bugles now.
They’re beating on the drums,
the drums, the drums.
War is not an abstract. War kills people, particularly the innocent;
war rips families apart, destroys cities and wastes our resources
– including our most precious resource of all, our children.
The political leaders of the most powerful nation
that the world has ever known are beating on the drums of war,
as they pursue perpetual war against terrorism, against the Taliban
and now against Iraq. These men, flush with power, seek “regime
change” in Iraq. They have decided that it is time that
Saddam must go, regardless of the cost in lives of Iraqi civilians
and of young Americans who will be sent to fight and die.
If the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld team has its way, we
Americans will see the face of Saddam on every Iraqi man, woman
and child. They will become our targets, the “collateral
damage” of the bombs we drop from 30,000 feet. They will
serve as both the enemy and those we liberate with our bombs.
They will be the victims of our arrogance. Their deaths and injuries
will be the cause of the next cadres of terrorists who rise up
after we have injured and killed their loved ones and destroyed
their homes and families. The new terrorists who are created by
this war will make us the victims of the hubris of our political
leaders.
Today’s American military force is an army
of volunteers, composed primarily of young people who are seeking
the opportunity to get ahead. They are promised a college education,
something they generally could not otherwise afford, for serving
in the military. They are not told when they sign up that they
may have to fight and die on a far-away desert before their dreams
of a college education could be fulfilled. These are the young
people who will be sent to die because they lacked good economic
alternatives.
I would like to offer just one simple suggestion
that could put an end to this war and perhaps all war: Let those
who seek to send others to fight in wars, go themselves. Isn’t
that the essence of leadership – to lead the way.
I’m tired of leadership of the “do
as I say, not as I do” variety. Unfortunately, that has
become the principal form of leadership in Washington –
and it is bipartisan. This style of leadership also applies to
weapons of mass destruction. Our government doesn’t want
Saddam to have even one nuclear weapon, but it plans to retain
thousands for itself in perpetuity. Our government provided the
materials for biological weapons to Iraq over many years, and
now our government has sabotaged the verification protocol of
the Biological Weapons Convention that the nations of the world,
including our closest allies, were eager to implement.
If Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld said they were ready
to go off to fight Saddam Hussein, I would at least believe that
they had a modicum of integrity for being willing to put their
own lives on the line for what they believed in. Instead, they
want to send someone else’s sons and daughters off to fight
and die.
And what about Congress? Do you think that those
who vote for war will be willing to go or to send their sons and
daughters? Of course not. They believe in sending others to fight
and die so that their own patriotism will not be questioned.
But why should we judge their patriotism by their
willingness to send others to war? What is wrong with us, citizens
of a democracy? How did we become so complacent, so willing to
let politicians dictate the lives and deaths of our young people
without being willing to put their own lives or even their careers
on the line?
Hermann Goering, the Nazi Head of the Luftwaffe,
said this about war in a conversation with a prison psychologist
during the Nuremberg Trials:
Why of course the people don’t want war.
Why should some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a
war when the best he can get out of it is to come back to his
farm in one piece? Naturally the common people don’t want
war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in
Germany. That is understood.
But after all, it is the leaders of the country
who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag
the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship,
or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship.
Voice or no voice the people can always be brought
to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do
is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists
for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It
works the same in any country.
The human future stands on soft and precarious
ground. Looking ahead, one path leads to war and devastation.
Another path, far more hopeful, is the path of peace. But it must
be an active, energetic and organized peace. We cannot wait for
peace to come to us. We must choose peace and commit ourselves
to attaining peace by our actions. A starting point for doing
so is saying NO to war.
Daisaku Ikeda has said, “Nothing is more
precious than peace…. Peace is the most basic starting point
for the advancement of humankind.”
The drums of war are beating. Which will it be:
Peace or war? We have choices. We can act.
The Earth Charter is a blueprint for peace. It
represents the hopes and dreams of millions of people for our
common future. It is built upon an understanding of our shared
humanity and our inextricable link with the web of all life. It
is premised on our shared responsibility for passing the world
on intact to the next generation and the next and the next. We
must not be the generation that breaks faith with life and with
the future.
Never before in human history has the danger to
our survival been greater. Today we live in a world in which nations
are pitted against nations, in which wars are commonplace, in
which overwhelmingly the victims of wars are civilians, and in
which terrorists strike out at innocent civilians. All of this
must change if we are to survive, if we are to flourish, and if
we are to realize our full potential as human beings.
The Earth Charter is a call to action. It is a
call to each of us to rise to our full potential as human beings
and to play our part in changing the world. Without our actions,
the Earth Charter is only a flowery document – words upon
a piece of paper. It is up to us, by our actions, to breathe life
into this vision of global decency.
Each of us is more special than we can possibly
imagine. We are, in fact, miracles of creation. Each of us is
entirely unique. There has never been anyone quite like you –
with your combination of interests and talents, knowledge and
appreciations -- in the entire history of the universe. But beyond
our magnificent uniqueness and our diversity, we all share a common
humanity.
We have been endowed with gifts that we often fail
to realize or to use.
We have the gift of thought and reflection, allowing
us to grapple with the world’s problems and to find creative
solutions, such as the Earth Charter itself.
We have the gift of memory, making it possible
for us to learn from our mistakes and those of others.
We have the gift of voice and language, enabling
us to communicate and to make our voices heard.
We have the gift of conscience, enabling us to
determine for ourselves right from wrong.
We have the gift of creativity, allowing us to
add to the world’s already enormous store of beauty through
arts and literature, philosophies and religions, sciences and
engineering, and day-to-day problem solving.
We have the gift of love, making it possible to
share closely with others the incredible gift of life in all its
richness and beauty as well as in its sorrow and suffering.
We have the gift of empathy, allowing us to understand
another’s hurt and sorrow and to reach out with compassion
and love.
We have the gift of mobility, making it possible
for us to go where we are needed.
We have the gift to make and use tools, enabling
us to extend our powers dramatically. Our tools have taken us
into outer space, where our astronauts and cosmonauts have looked
back on our beautiful, blue planet, so alone in the universe,
so precious in its nurturing of life.
And our tools have given us the power to destroy
ourselves. That is the essence of the Nuclear Age. We can no longer
be assured that the continuous flow of life, at least human life,
will continue.
Our tools are dual-purpose because we are dual-purpose,
creatures capable of both good and evil.
And we must choose. Choice itself is another of
our great gifts as human beings. We each have the power of choice
that we manifest each day of our lives by every act we make and
decision we take.
I believe that we are more powerful than our tools,
including our most terrible weapons of mass destruction. We have
the power to control these tools and to eliminate them. But we
must exercise that power or our tools may eliminate us.
As the Earth Charter tells us, the choice is ours:
“We stand at a critical moment in Earth’s history,
a time when humanity must choose its future.”
That choice can be made by our apathy, complacency
and ignorance. That is the choice of abandoning our humanity by
default. That is the choice of abandoning our human responsibility.
It is the choice of those who would sleepwalk through the greatest
challenges of our time, perhaps of any time.
That choice can be made by giving over our power
to leaders who would lead us into war and greed and selfishness.
That is the choice of abandoning our democratic responsibilities
and playing the role of lemmings rushing over a cliff to our demise.
Or our choice can be made by standing on our own
two feet, by embracing others, by our compassion, our creativity
and our commitment to changing the world.
To choose the path of life and decency will not
be easy. In fact, it will require every ounce of courage that
we have. We will have to learn to believe in ourselves and to
empower ourselves to be a force for peace, even against great
odds.
We will have to stand firm and confident in the
power of right and decency against entrenched and powerful institutions
that would have us be complacent consumers rather than active
peacemakers.
At the dawn of the Nuclear Age, just days after
the first atomic weapon was dropped on the city of Hiroshima,
Albert Camus, the great French writer said, “Before the
terrifying prospects now available to humanity, we see even more
clearly that peace is the only battle worth waging. This is no
longer a prayer but a demand to be made by all peoples to their
governments – a demand to choose definitively between hell
and reason.”
Let us stand with Camus and choose Peace, because
it is necessary. Let us stand with Camus and demand that our governments
choose reason.
War no longer has a place on our planet, and we
must stop preparing for war. We must stop squandering our resources
on tools of destruction. We must demand that the $850 billion
now spent on the world’s military forces be spent instead
on meeting human needs. If human needs are met and principles
of justice among all peoples are adhered to, there will be no
need for war, and the need for defense will atrophy.
Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “One day we
must come to see that peace is not the distant goal we seek, but
the means to that goal.”
Let us stand with Martin Luther King, Jr. and choose
Peace because it is a wiser course of action, respectful of human
life. Let us join him in his dream for justice and dignity for
all. Let us stand with him in his conviction that peace and nonviolence
are not only the ends we seek, but also the means to attain those
ends.
Eleanor Roosevelt said, “The future belongs
to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.”
Let us stand with Eleanor Roosevelt and believe
firmly in the beauty of our dreams. Let us believe deeply that
the vision of the Earth Charter is not only right and necessary,
but also possible. It is not an idle dream, but a vision of a
world that must be built by our actions.
Pablo Casals, the great master of the cello, said,
“The love of country is a splendid thing. But why should
love stop at the border?”
Let us stand with Pablo Casals, and choose to be
citizens of the world. Let us erase the borders in our minds and
replace them with an all-embracing love for humanity. Let us work
to create a world in which every person, no matter where he or
she is born, is able to live with dignity and full human rights
as set forth in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Jacques Cousteau, who explored and shared the beauty
of the oceans and who lived with a deep commitment to future generations,
said, “The time has come when speaking is not enough, applauding
is not enough. We have to act.”
Let us stand with Jacques Cousteau and commit ourselves
to action – to action that will change the world, even if
it is done one person and one decision at a time.
The Dalai Lama has reminded us that we must never
give up. He has written:
No matter what is going on
Never give up
Develop the heart
Too much energy in your country
Is spent developing the mind
Instead of the heart
Be compassionate
Not just to your friends
But to everyone
Be compassionate
Work for peace
In your heart and in the world
Work for peace
And I say again
Never give up
No matter what is going on around you
Never give up
Let us stand with the Dalai Lama, who has spoken
so passionately for peace and nonviolence, and pledge to never
give up our struggle for a more decent and peaceful world, a world
we can be proud to pass on to the next generation.
I would like to ask each of you to take three steps
today to build a peaceful world and make the Earth Charter the
reality we live by.
First, say NO to nuclear weapons – all nuclear
weapons – no matter who possesses them. You can go to the
Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s web site at www.wagingpeace.org
and sign our Appeal to End the Nuclear Weapons Threat to Humanity
and All Life. While you are at the web site, you can sign up to
receive our Sunflower e-newsletter that will keep you informed
monthly about the latest developments in working for a nuclear
weapons-free world.
Second, say NO to war. Write to the President and
to your Congressional representatives today, and tell them that
war against Iraq is an unacceptable solution and that they must
find peaceful means through the United Nations and international
law to end our impasse with Iraq so that innocent Iraqis and Americans
will not be killed and more terrorists will not be created. Send
more letters to your newspapers and talk about this with your
friends. You can find a sample letter and contact information
at the Waging Peace web site.
Third, say YES to Peace and Choose Hope. Put aside
complacency and despair and choose Hope as the basis for all of
your actions from this day forward. Not frivolous hope, but hope
that is rooted in courage, compassion and commitment. Stand up
for peace, for human dignity and for future generations in all
you say and do.
The Earth Charter states, “As never before
in history, common destiny beckons us to seek a new beginning.”
Let us begin.
With hope as our foundation, with the Earth Charter
as our guide, with each other for support, I am confident that
together we will change the world.
*David Krieger is President
of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. His most recent book is Choose
Hope, Your Role in Waging Peace in the Nuclear Age.
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