Just two days ago, Pope Francis published a tweet so inane, the spirit moved me to write this blog post. Francis wrote:
Do we really want peace? Then let’s ban all weapons so we don’t have to live in fear of war.
The pontiff formerly known as Bergoglio is a lazy communicator, and the previous tweet confirms it. We do not know whether he literally means all weapons, to include edged weapons, all firearms, or something more nuanced. From context, I think he advocates the banning of all weapons of war, as in warplanes, warships, tanks and the like; perhaps going all the way to a ban on semiautomatic rifles.
As Bill Clinton said at the sorority house; where to start? Francis is so wrong in so many ways it becomes a bit of a challenge to organize a rebuttal. But instead of showing all the way in which such silliness is wrong, I’ll show instead that the very premise of the tweet is wrong: weapons of war are not a curse, but a blessing. The development of weapons of war has made possible our current era of peace.
We live in the most peaceful era in human history. You may not know it by reading the news, but it is true; rates of interpersonal violence almost everywhere; war is less likely than ever; slavery is at an all-time low. Weapons have made personal and collective security possible. The development of advance weaponry made it possible in at least three ways:
First, weapons allow the weak to fight the strong. Readers of the blog will be familiar with the history of David and Goliath, in which David the youth defeated a terrifying, seasoned warrior by the simple expedient of placing a slingshot right in his noggin’. Had a sling ban been in place, no more David, as Goliath crushes his windpipe with his bare hands. Facetiousness aside, weapons are a great equalizer, and an even better deterrent for those who would prey on the weak.
Second, weapons, especially firearms, allowed settled societies to defend themselves against marauding horse archers. During most of human history, mobile troops, first charioteers and then horseman, dominated the battlefield. The apex of that domination was the Mongol Empire, which controlled the Eurasian steppes through the mobility and firepower of its mounted archers. The development of firearms slowly eroded those advantages, allowing settled civilization to prevail. We don’t live in fear of marauding horsemen anymore, and we owe that peace of mind to the much-maligned firearms.
Third, modern weapons of war have made war for plundering almost obsolete. Nations and non-state groups still wage war for a number of reasons–religion, the personal prestige of politicians, honor, the search for safety, and others. What no longer makes much sense is trying to plunder your neighbor. Whatever you spend in war would almost always be more than whatever you manage to steal. Using modern weapons is hideously expensive, while the neighbor can make it even more expensive by using weapons of his own. War no longer pays, and the development of weapons of war has a lot to do with that. The last war for profit was the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1991, and we know how that turned out.
Francis is wrong. Human actors may use weapons to create fear in others, but it is not the existence of weapons that creates fear of war. It is rather their absence we ought to fear.
