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'Surrender as Defense'
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11234 |
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BOOK WORLD
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| Issue
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5 / 1986 |
2,402 Words |
| Author
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Philip Gold
Philip Gold is senior fellow at the Seattle-based Discovery
Institute and a frequent contributor to the Washington Times.
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NATIONAL SECURITY THROUGH CIVILIAN-BASED DEFENSE
Gene Sharp
Omaha: Association for Transarmament Studies, 1985
93 p.p., $4.95 paper
MAKING EUROPE UNCONQUERABLE
The Potential of Civilian-Based Deterence and Defense
Gene Sharp
Cambridge: Ballinger, 1985
252 pp., $14.95 paper
Professor Gene Sharp is neither doctrinaire pacifist nor a left-wing screamer. He has written significant books, in the past. The issues he addresses now are real and his proposals are grounded in elements of truth. But, in the end, I found it impossible to avoid the conclusion that Sharp is building intellectual cathedrals on sand. And, in the end, I found Professor Sharp's concept of a shift from military to nonmilitary national defense not much more than a form of neo-Hobbesianism--not quite "better red than dead," but something perilously close to it.
In both of his books, Sharp advocates something called "transarmament"--a shift from military to nonmilitary national defense--for example, a new concept of defense based not upon organized technological violence but upon massive civilian nonviolent resistance. According to Professor Sharp, this strategy can be implemented only over a period of decades, and only after entire populations have received extensive training in the tactics and techniques of nonviolent resistance. Further, Professor Sharp suggests that these techniques can also serve as a complement to traditional defense, although he clearly prefers a complete ultimate transition. (The governments of Sweden and France are reportedly looking into the potential of nonviolent techniques in support of military defense.) Eschewing pacifist intent (although genuflecting to pacifist ideals), he argues that, in the contemporary world, "transarmament" could conceivably work at least as well as military deterrence and defense, and at considerably less cost and risk.
Professor Sharp's contention is based upon two truths. First, given present and probable military and political realities, increases in traditional defense capabilities do not automatically yield commensurate increases in security. They may, in fact, actually jeopardize it. This phenomenon is most obvious at the nuclear level, where quantitative increases
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