War, Mark Twain.

Not much has changed in 100 years.

Mark Twain's take, circa 1903, on the Spanish-American War:

"   Statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting blame upon the nation that is attacked,   and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will   diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them; and thus   he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God   for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception."

  - "Chronicle of Young Satan", Mark Twain

Lessons of the selling of The Spanish-American War are instructive.  I enjoyed greatly Walter Karp's book about 1898, an earlier war of choice.   (Which ones were not wars of choice?)

UPDATE: The new Latin teacher at our school, brandishing a copy of Herodutus' Histories (the book that describes the gold dust hoarding giant ants of India!) echoed my thoughts from above, saying "They're all wars of choice, aren't they?"   Is there something to be said for making kids study the classics?  Maybe.  They sure give a detached perspective, allowing you to question even the fundamentals.  It sure blew the mind of this child of 20th Century America to read Herodutus holding forth on whether it was best to rule via Democracy or Oligarchy or Monarchy and hear Democracy come in third/last.  For some reason I never read that concept in my local paper.

Comments

[peggy]

Have you read Mark Twain's essay Sitting In Darkness? It is a continuation of this thought you bring up and makes for excellent (and extraordinary) reading.
p.s. great expo on the US OPEN experience, really enjoyable...

[Steve]

Was Twain commenting about the Spanish-American War or the infamous "Philippine Insurrection" which followed it, in which we fought a Philippine liberation movement that had actually helped us drive the Spanish out of the islands? It was the Philippine war that prompted Carl Schurz to say (and I'm qouoting from memory here), "My country, right or wrong: when right, to be kept right; when wrong, to be put right."