Tuesday, November 03, 2015

"Therefore his sisters sent unto him, saying" - Love, Freedom, Dictatorship and Wars

 Around Tokyo




Love, Freedom, Dictatorship and Wars


Love needs freedom.  Without liberty no true love is possible.

Accordingly, despotic states should be defeated and dictatorship should be abolished.  Accordingly, old despotic leaders in Libya, Egypt, Iraq, and Afghanistan were drove out of power.  Peoples in those countries obtained some freedom as well as inevitably and sadly bloody tragedies.

In Syria, its half broken government is still somewhat functioning based on support from Russia and Iran, both of which are half despotic states.

In China, there is no sign of immediate fall of the Chinese Communist Party.  As long as its economy is sustained at a certain level, Chinese people seem to dream of being rich rather than being free.

Another issue is that usually a despotic government is only destroyed through a civil war or a foreign war.  Costs for freedom are always very high.

Anyway as the United Nations are still under strong influences of the two despotic nations, Russia and China, the world cannot be completely free from the enemy of freedom, dictatorship.

However, when one nation is competing with another nation that is much stronger, the former needs strong unity of its people to fight out a war against the latter.  Even if the weak nation has a democratic system in its society to some extent, it would restrict the movement toward expansion of democracy and freedom and introduce stern control of its society and industry.  In some case, such a nation might adopt militarism to mobilize all the resources it has toward the war against the strong nation.

This situation was once observed in Japan.

From the abolition of its national isolation and the start of Westernization in the middle of the 19th century, Japan had to face strong foreign powers invading Asia.  Japanese had introduced various systems from Europe and America to become one of major military powers before WWII.  It also introduced democracy to some extent, but to fight out or prepare for wars against Russians, the US, the UK, etc., the then Japanese leaders had to rely on an authoritarian frame of mind.  They must have thought if all the Japanese had become dedicated soldiers, there should have been a chance to win wars against Russians and Western powers who had more advanced industrial power.

In this context, the Japanese militarism in the period of WWII might be justified to some degree.

But, the Empire of Japan had the most advanced and mightiest military forces in Asia before WWII.  If the Empire had made war against other Asian nations, the above justification could not be sustained.  The issue of the war between the Empire of Japan and China in WWII should be reviewed also in light of this paradigm, though, against the background concerning conflicts between Japanese and Western powers.

However, the Japanese people obtained freedom after WWII, which the Chinese people cannot enjoy even today.

Now, in the Islamic world, this issue involves another factor religion.  Religion makes people free from fear and evil, if it is true religion.  But, if the religion Islam is weaker than Christianity and Judaism and Muslims feel fear and evil caused by Western powers and Israelis, can it be justified that Muslims opt to have despotic governments to fight out Christians and Judaists while sacrificing some freedom?

If so, as long as there are stronger Christian Western powers and Israel suppressing or abusing Islamic nations, they might be allowed to have authoritarian regimes in Libya, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, etc.  It might be necessary for Muslims so as not to be put under control of Christians and Judaists.

But can they eventually realize free society like Japan after WWII?



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Joh 11:3 Therefore his sisters sent unto him, saying, Lord, behold, he whom thou lovest is sick.
Joh 11:4 When Jesus heard that, he said, This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby.