Reflections on who our actual enemies are
By Lilia Sinaga
So many people when asked about their greatest wish, they said they wish for eternal world peace. Well, sorry to slap them to wake up; their wish will never be fulfilled. God, Himself said in His Holy Book that enmity, disaccord, conflict, or huge differences on earth will never cease until the end of life’s existence. If we do a little research on the history of wars we will find out that there was only a short period of time when the world didn’t see a war. 92% of the past 3,421 years of civilization were spent engaging in wars.
It seems inevitable since we love to glorify the victory, great generals, warlords, valiant warriors and knights in our encyclopedia and history books. War is often regarded as honorable and noble and viewed as a contest between nations, a chance to compete and be declared the victor.
So, since war is destined in our fate and ingrained in our nature, what can we do? The only thing we can do is to accept the possibility and get prepared to anticipate its happening. Being aware that enemy/war are always marching at our gate is necessary for our elite as well as the ordinary citizens. Prepper mentality is always good either at the national or household level.
The high chance of war is actually a good time for everybody to reflect on whether the war declared by our politicians is a good war or a wily war. Dying in a good war will make us martyrs while dying in a wily war will only send us directly to hell. It seems now we need to reconsider the validity of the saying; “Right or wrong my country” when the status of war was declared by some clique on the upper echelons. We also need to seriously re-evaluate the usage of the word patriotism like it’s a holy word while war is actually a cyclical itch in human history. We can decide not to participate in a war decided by opportunistic leaders without resorting to becoming the fifth column.
On the other hand, we have to acknowledge the veracity of the old adage: Peace can only be enjoyed by those who are always prepared for war. Unfortunately, most of us have a memory span shorter than those of the goldfish. If we are endowed with a few decades of regional peace most of us will automatically assume that war is only the fairytale of our grandfathers.
If peace seems like an eternal reality then some of us will take it easy to disunite the unity and cohesion of the nation or community. How can one disunite the unity and cohesion of the nation and community? It’s so easy to do. Let’s see some examples. It’s easy to give tax holidays to companies and industries. It’s easy to create laws and regulations where huge fines and financial penalties are given away to small offences and minor breaches. It’s easy to defend big companies and enterprises against class actions or minority groups. It’s easy to deceive and exploit the general mass simply by intimidating or arresting a few leading individuals.
On a side note, the recurrence of war might be connected with the existence of Yin and Yang energy in the universe. Yin and Yang which literally means “dark and light” (negative and positive) is a concept of dualism, describing how opposite or contrary forces may actually be complementary, interconnected, and interdependent in the natural world, and how they may give rise to each other as they interrelate to one another. Or maybe the event of war is actually the way our nature keeps its balance. Like protea plants that can thrive only after a forest fire. In mythology we have the Phoenix bird for comparison for those who need destruction for re-emergence.
Anyhow since war is so high in probability to happen anytime we can actually use it to our advantage by reshaping our perspective and attitude. We can create an open and heart to heart discussion with our government, addressing topics such as: Can we stop the frenzy of spending big budgets on ostentatious buildings, monuments, skyscrapers, etc that will instigate jealousy of other nations?
Usually, those fancy buildings are the first target for destruction in a war and this act tells a lot about the human psyche as a whole. Or we can say to the government: Don’t you know if a war happens the first thing the rich and the industrialists do is to escape from the country? So stop giving them the privilege to exploit the working class, stop that unfair minimum wage where a month’s salary is only enough for food until next month’s paycheck; because if a war happens it’s poor and working-class who will fight the war, to face and endure the war consequences. Or maybe it’s about time we re-evaluate the land ownership system in our country because if a war happens the land is usually defended by those who have small land or no land at all.
It is very sad if war is meant as a chance to show off bravery, manliness, supremacy and power. But it’s more pathetic if a war is launched out of boredom and lack of entertainment. The boredom phenomenon on a mass scale is actually a real thing. Many warlords attacked other nations not because they saw them as a threat but simply because their itchy soldiers needed something to do. The history books recorded a lot of ridiculous and unnecessary wars, so now we don’t need to be spontaneously excited or agitated when war is looming. Preparation is always good, but panicking is useless and counterproductive in any situation.
Well, since we know that war/enemy is a common pattern in human history, we need to reflect on who our actual enemy is. To whom should we give our allegiance? How do we know if a certain cause is worth fighting for or not? What shall we do or what precautions shall we make if we want to avoid involvement in a war? In this modern and volatile era, we need to contemplate this uneasy topic and we indeed need to anticipate the probabilities and to review our perspective and our way of life.
Lilia Sinaga, is a 54 years old woman from Indonesia, born in Pematang Siantar and works as a writer and contributor.