The Psalmist praised God because “He teacheth my hands to war.” But we assume the Psalmist was praising God for such instruction in waging war for a righteous cause.

It was while I was writing about the necessity of romance for promoting war it occurred to me that I hadn’t thought about Bobby Keillor for quite some time. He was a year older than me, but we were very close friends in high school and we often went hunting and fishing together here in the Kern River Valley before the dam was built. The last time I ever saw Bobby he came by the cabin and told me he had been drafted for the Korean War. He was positively ecstatic about it and I shared his enthusiasm, telling him how envious I was of his going into the Army and how I wished I was going with him, hating the fact that I was missing all the excitement by my being only one year younger than him.

Both Bobby and I were raised in the atmosphere of WWII, a time when the whole of America was immersed in the romance of war, especially children. We were dressed in those “cute” diminutive uniforms of soldiers and sailors, our comics and funny papers were filled with the romance of the heroism of glorious conflict against the Axis Powers. Why, it wasn’t just Hollywood screen stars, but even Bugs Bunny and other cartoon characters were caught up in the excitement and romance of war, the glory of battle against our foes.

America cannot win any war without romanticizing it. There must be the “glory” of war in order to attract an entire nation to a cause, the word glory being without meaning apart from romance. It was the romantic ideas of glory and excitement of war that so attracted those like Bobby and me to becoming soldiers. We were too young for the glory of WWII, but Korea was the chance to actually live the glory and excitement we had missed as children. And that we had missed something glorious and exciting, of that we had no doubt.

We humans are born with innate curiosity; we are genetically wired it seems to be a questioning species. But it would be many years after seeing Bobby that one last time before I began to seriously question why he and I were so excited about the prospect of becoming soldiers and going into battle? Certainly men would seem to be war lovers, but why? We know video games about flowers can’t compete with the games enabling players to knock planes out of the sky and kill any number of the “enemy” and blow things up. There is this seeming propensity to violence that makes such video games successful even as with Hollywood portrayals of violence. We know those that excel in sports while in school are far more exalted than the bookworms, than those that excel in academic achievement. It’s as though the schools were determined to make physical prowess the prime indicator of success; but success by what definition?

No amount of reading of “Johnny Got His Gun” will dissuade those like Bobby; he and I would never believe there was not something glorious about war, something we were willing to chase after like some illusive fantasy, something we believed would only be realized by facing some enemy gun in hand. It was the romance of the whole idea of war, just like the fantasies of “Shane” and so many other films; we were the good guys wanting to do battle in a righteous cause against the bad guys. Ah, the romance of it all. We trained while playing cops and robbers, cowboys and Indians, and during WWII we trained with cap guns and slingshots against the Axis foes. People like Bobby and me were well-trained as children for the “real thing” when it came along. War was opportunity knocking to fulfill all the fantasies of heroic battles learned in childhood. The bottom line: Peace is boring; war is exciting. And human beings are easily bored.

It won’t do; what with all the talk about gang violence for example, just what is being offered that will take the place of the excitement of having a gun in your hand, terrorizing and shooting people? It’s a violent world, and America is a violent nation. We have had an unending stream of violence being taught children from our very beginnings as a nation; and during my own considerable years there hasn’t been any peace but only unrelenting wars.

You may be familiar with the SciFi stories of extraterrestrials being wary of our earth, of keeping a close eye on our technological advances, especially nuclear capabilities; that flying saucers may only be a means of keeping tabs on us earthlings. But it is a story steeped in the most ancient mythologies; certainly the Greeks and Romans made much of our being a warring species, and as such determined to kill each other for one reason or another.

I really like Gore Vidal’s “Lincoln.” When Lincoln and his wife are visiting a frontline of battle, there is Mrs. Lincoln shouting for someone to give her a gun so she could shoot back! I suffer no romantic delusions about the distaff side despite the fact men make wars while women attempt to make homes, and given the right circumstances the momma bear may do more than just fight for her cubs.

For so many years I thoroughly enjoyed the raw power of a gun in my hands. I loved shooting, and I loved making things blow up with dynamite. I enjoyed playing football but enjoyed boxing even more. Putting on those gloves and trying to knock your opponent unconscious! I loved it! And so did the other guys. The sheer romance of it all; the thrill of it all! Nothing like it; it makes for people willing to risk their lives in exploration of the unknown. Without that romantic risk Columbus would never have set sail; without that no one would want to fly a fighter aircraft or be strapped in atop a rocket and be blasted into space.

The philosophical conundrum has always been there to confront; how to make the very things that seem determined to make our species extinct work for our preservation, how to make peace as attractive as war? Even now the Muslim enemies of civilization know they have the advantage by being able to romanticize their wars against the “infidels.” But the civilized nations of the world have nothing the equivalent to counter the threat of Islam.

Money is no substitute for romance. It’s a hard sell trying to romanticize money. Neither Bobby nor I would have “joined up” for money; neither of us was willing to go to war just to protect corporate interests. There had to be some romantic ideal to make war attractive to us. Both Sam Clemens and Harper Lee knew there had to be romantic ideals involved to make sense of the games children play; the kinds of games that would translate into the ideals of adulthood that would continue to be dictated by the romance of those ideals even as Henry Thoreau interpreted them by claiming children play at life better than adults live it.

It’s a memorable scene from “Lawrence of Arabia” when he claims the best of the fighters will not come for money; they will come for him. Lawrence cut quite the romantic figure; but his peculiar genius knew how to make that romance work to his ends; the Founding Fathers, Theodore Roosevelt, all romantics that knew the power of romance, were moved themselves by that power in their own lives.

Most people would choose to live peaceably if they were allowed to do so, if the jobs and security for families were there to assure a future for their children. But America no longer offers those jobs and security for families, a future for the children of America. On the contrary, the leadership of America has sold out and betrayed our nation for profits. This leaves the door wide open for any that will make war a romantic option; it leaves the door wide open for gangs to recruit members, for crime and violence of every description. And the present leadership of America offers nothing that would make peace an attractive alternative to war. Nor do we see anyone on the horizon that would do so, but we do know all politicians lie to get elected and lie to stay elected.

There is a vacuum of leadership in America, and we are ready for a “strong man” to take the helm. Since peace does not appear to be an option, it can’t be a woman because no woman praises God for teaching their hands to war. It will take a man that can make the romantic case for war; that can appeal to those like Bobby and me thirsting for the glory of battle. Let such a man appear and there will be no want of volunteers. But peace is not an alternative; it never has been. It is always a case of good vs. evil, and the two will always be in conflict. Both can be romanticized, but Western Civilization has some catching up to do for us to entertain any notion the civilized will prevail over the barbarians whether in America or elsewhere.