"... I think we can safely say that officers tend to be more pragmatic than theoretical. Or as General Sam Koster said as Superintendent of the United States Military Academy, following his involvement in the My Lai incident, "... we are interested in the doer, not the thinker." (p. 8)So basically they wanted to shut off what they thought of as extraneous deliberating about issues. They wanted just their leaders to be able to look at the maps or models or whatever consider the terrain, the tactic options, the psychology of the enemy and run with it. Period. What else might there be? Well, besides international law, which they also apparently overlooked along with ethics (e.g., civilian rights, anyone?)
Okay, so I have nothing to add to the My Lai massacre scrutiny other than renewed horror for the people who died there (along with other such civilian who died in Afghanastan more recently, for example), but what I'm wanting to bring out here is the sort of way of thinking and if there is any glimmer of it that might have affecting the way of thinking in the Vienna mission. I think that in a way it did.
In the Vienna mission, of course the work was not military in nature but about spiritual warfare in nature in a sense. The Vienna mission was fighting against the atheistic interests of the regimes where the mission worked, albeit in a subterfuge sort of way, by attempting to undermine the atheistic dictatorship (of the few, oligarchy - presidium). A lot of commentators, if not most, credit religious groups (usually the focus is on indigenous groups, I believe, though), with having a significant role in the fall of Communism in the former East Bloc. I just thought I might bring that to your attention, as well as maybe the mission that I'd worked for earlier that received money from the CIA for their short wave radio work into the USSR.
But the mission was composed primarily of theologians (Th.M. and higher) which would, it seems to me, lead one to think that they would, in contrast to the officers mentioned in the text, tend to be more theoretical than pragmatic. I'm sure this must have been so in general. But it appears that when it came to socialization and security and the mission forced everyone to be more like the generals.
I think it was like that part of ones life was compartmentalized. These rules just applied to security, but security issues were more or less a constant concern, although there were different rules for different contexts and you had to know how to act when and it absolutely had to look natural like it was yours and not put upon you. For one thing, that would look suspicious.
So everyone across the board had to deal with that, I think, but because everyone's situation was different what would be expected of a person would be different from the next person, although I think there were probably close similarities for people in similar positions.
Therefore, as soon as the full-time worker was confronted with the security socialization, the person would have to choose to put aside theoretical thinking (using the words of the text) and be pragmatic and just accept the mission's demands on him/her without judgment. I couldn't do that.
The thing with me is that putting things in my way that look like things to make me break down are insulting so that just made me dig in my heals. That was so insulting to my intelligence I can't tell you. They treated me like an idiot. Then when they basically threated me with "this is what we can do to you, so you'd better straighten up or you're really going to be a mess," which is how I read their sending me home to the U.S. and why I was scared to death of them after that. How could I submit to them after they did that to me? So the only other alternative I could think of was to hide my true thoughts, which one thing they wanted me to be able to do anyway, just not in the way I used it.
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"What do you make of this statement by Senator Grassley on whistle-blowing: "Waste occurs by no accident. The federal system rewards it, and those who seek to stop it are flattened." (p. 14)That's not to different from the Vienna mission. Christian missions teach the Bible. Seminaries teach future church leaders. If these people and organizations are living compromised lives in a systemic way, as a way of life, don't you think there's going to be an impact? The students eventually are going to be able to see and learn from these actions and it's going to affect the others, so you'll have them affected by the way the missionaries cut corners.
Why not just go all out and try to live a true life of faith? I have a hard time picturing the apostles living lives of deception for the gospel's sake. I've spoken on this so many times that I'm not going to go into a full discussion of it here. But the thing is that in the Vienna mission flattened is putting it mildly if we're talking about the Vienna mission, because they would be more inclined to use psychology like the Soviets did on Chriistians. I'm talking about the late 1980s, because I have no idea what they're like now. And if you think it's just me I do know there were other people besides myself and that the socialization process was like that too. As far as I knew psychology was the main tool they used, although social pressure was another to try to gain conformity.
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"I realize you can make a case for amore relativistic view of war. Admiral Lord John Fisher once exclaimed: "The humanizing of War! You might as well talk of humanizing of Hell! And General Maxwell Taylor, in his article, "A Do-It-Yourself Professional Code for the Military," says that an officer shouldn't be greatly concerned about what is a just or unjust war." (p. 15)This feels pretty much like how the Vienna mission felt about how they performed their ministry. The thing about relativism here for me is that I had already by this point thought through my view of culture and decided that I wasn't a cultural relativist, except in the sort of traditional things that didn't otherwise conflict with my values (like taking your shoes off at the front door, etc.). On the other hand, I didn't believe that American culture was necessarily best, per se. I believed that the Bible was the gold standard by which culture should be judged and outside of that there was room for personal preference or personal conscience even (in which the Bible says that going against one's conscience in such situations is sin Rom. 14, esp. verse 23).
So I came to Vienna primed already with a strong view on cultural relativism (I really, honestly was prepared in all these things because I had taken my preparations for missions seriously, despite how humiliatingly I was treated there in Vienna - and the USA with the mission). But it seems now in hindsight that the Vienna mission maybe really did have a relativistic view of the logistics of East European ministry (or maybe just ministry in closed countries). Maybe they thought that was an area open for conscience. But the thing is that conscience isn't that wide open; it is subject to the principles of Scripture. (We don't really call them "laws" like in the Old Testament.) It's not a free for all, go out and do whatever you want type of a situation. Conscience is based on the principles in Scripture (and the theologians at the Vienna mission should have known those better than I did) and then where those left off, had gaps or the like, then there was room for freedom of conscience.
So that means that the ministry logistics should NOT have operated under relativistic terms, unless all the undergirding Scriptural basics had first been met, and my contention is that they had not been, primarily because of the wholesale sell out to a life style of deception to where it ingrained every aspect of who they were. Not to mention how other things like use of psychology then came under the service of the protection of this security system.
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Continuing with this discussion about General Maxwell Taylor..."He sees no need for the military professional to have any outside help, including the field of ethics. For him, the "self-evident truth" is this: "that which favors mission success is right or good and that which works to the contrary is wrong or bad." Based on that formula, if we win the war, therre is no problem. If we lose, then Taylor says, "following the precedent of Nuremburg" you can expect to be charged with "crime and aggression." (p. 15)So basically this is to say that "might makes right," right? Sounds a bit like the old schoolyard bully, doesn't it? Well, in this regard, it could be the mission and me, now couldn't it? Of course the mission is somewhere in the vicinity of a million times stronger than me, especially now that I'm weak and disabled, although at this stage in my life I have the advantage of more experience and schooling than I did all those years ago. Still, it hardly makes a match to tens of theologians, now does it? And who knows how much money and how much public and how many churches backing them? So it's clearly a case of might makes right.
But, is might the basis on which you prefer to make decisions? If so, then send out the bullies. Send out infantry men. Meanwhile, make sure your supporters know the truth. I'm just one person, but here I stand I can do no other.
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"However, a less cynical reading of Nuremberg is that the International Military Tribunal reflected international morality. It means that the defense "I was only following orders" will not wash in the face of war crimes." (p. 16)Okay so nothing can really compare to My Lai or what happened in Hitler's concentration camps, but I'm trying to use these articles to learn something regarding my Vienna mission experience. Those two tragedies were horrific and I want to acknowledge that before going on, so don't get me wrong there, okay? Millions died there in awful tragedies. I've actually been to a few of the concentration camps and had an internship at the Holocaust Museum in Wasington, D.C., so I really do apreciate these things, honestly. So please don't take me wrong.
The thing about this as applied to the Vienna mission is that once people in the mission become socialized and then actually participate in the activities, such as take a few mission trips (for the theologians) they have then bought into the system and then it's too "costly" for them to either opt out or not follow orders, even in things they might otherwise not feel completely comfortable with. So over time they become more and more sort of desensytized to these things, probably through a variety of means depending on the individual and the situation and the issue. And the next thing you know they are the system; They're an integral part of it, and not just a member in training. Sure they'll continue to learn new things, but they all do partly because the context of their work changes from time to time if nothing else.
So in this process the only options really are to obey or not to obey. Near the beginning of your tenure with the mission I think they tolerate a certain amount of disobedience, but I think they consider certain parameters, such as the attitude, how often one disobeys, if a security breach is involved, etc. I think they realize that the new recruit has to adjust to the situation, so they allow for whatever they expect that person might need for adjusting.
So this security system is virtually unknown to the new person. They do not really know what's behind it. They just trust the mission leadership. If they had any qualms, including any qualms that what the mission was asking of them ran against their concept of biblical teaching, they just shrugged their shoulders and said "I was just following orders." Everything they learned in seminary and their own studies may have been flushed down the toilet by way of ethical backbone. They might have been able to stand up to a Communist but not to a mission leader whom they disagreed with. So they went against their conscience maybe even and sinned. But then eventually their conscience changed and it wasn't sin any more. Sort of like watching enough killing on TV and it doesn't bother you any more (not that you'd necessarily do it though).
So why did everyone shun me to the person and child before I left Vienna? "I was only following orders"
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"So we have come full circle. The military cannot close itself off to society, it cannot have a private morality exempt from outside scrutiny, accountability or oversight. Which leads me into my conclusion: only a unified system of ethics will do, one which will serve to uphold high standards in war or peace; up or down and in all parts of the military system; and reflecting the best of civilization's values." (p. 16)How much more the Vienna mission needs this, and I have said this before too, so it bears repeating. This is accountability!!
I feared that the private morality of the Vienna mission was something that I did not like and I don't even want to speculate here what it might have been but I was afraid it might not have been something church-y. I hope not, though. But you can't blame me for thinking like that since there were already two military chaplains on staff and one of the most influential missions involved in the multi-mission effort took money from the CIA, and the fact that my parents were treated special and I had unique problems and my dad was a program manager in Boeing's SDI program. And they way they treated me...
But then, maybe the problem really harks back to the problem with American churches, because American churches really could care less about what the missions do and maybe they're so politicized anyway themselves that the Vienna mission is just a reflection of the American churches anyway. In this case I have to run back to Scripture and Jacques Ellul. I have to remind you that Judas Iscariot was the disciple most interested in politics. He was obsessed with it, whereas the others may have had some interest, but not like him. And Jesus had to correct the others even to set them on the right course that we are about spiritual things.
Ethics. You actually need ethics to be able to do ethics ethically, because you can sort of use ethics or make a show of doing ethics so that your're not really doing ethics ethically. I don't believe the Vienna mission is capable (or at least was capable of - in the late 1980s) using ethics ethically in some of these issues. I've discussed here. And I'm just one person against many so at this point especially you know it's not going to be just, especially with my health. I'm not making a cop out, I'm just stating a fact because I know that I could have done a lot better on these posts even a year ago before I had the migraine, for example.
