Presidents and War
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If we look at primary documents from Presidents who are asking to use force or threaten to use force against foreign powers, we see that with respect to the rhetoric of war, not a thing has changed over the past century. The primary reasons or justifications given by Bush, Johnson, Roosevelt and Wilson are so similar that whole paragraphs could be interchanged among them without differing from the originals. George Orwell warned against the empty rhetoric and meaningless phrases of political oratory, especially in times of war, in his famous essay Politics and the English Language. In these documents we see that all of the presidents use such phrases. Justification for the use of force or for threatening the use of force revolves around four central principles in all four documents. These principles are as follows:The to bring peace to America and other nations The characterization of the enemy as “evil” If we look at Woodrow Wilson’s war message of 1917, we see that he makes an appeal to democracy and freedom, “A steadfast concert for peace can never be maintained except by a partnership of democratic nations” (4). Wilson argues that Germany’s warfare is a threat to “mankind” and that without American involvement the peace and security of the world is in jeopardy. The goal of Wilson’s reason for involving America in war is very similar to the obj
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is means that any nation that does not have the same perception or values is NOT enlightened. Here we see the portrayal of the enemy as something inferior to democratic peoples, especially American people. Roosevelt makes this point more strongly when he argues, “A great free people owes it to itself and to all mankind not to sink into helplessness before the powers of evil” (2). We also see that once more this is a war for all of mankind, not just an American war.
We see almost exactly the same sentiments and justifications used by President Johnson and Bush Jr. in their war documents. In the Gulf of Tonkin Incident Johnson argues how vital it is to American interests to continue “the struggle for peace and security in Southeast Asia” (1). Peace and security of Southeast Asia is important, but we see Johnson fall back on another popular concept used by those before and after him in similar documents, peace: “Our Government is united in its determination to take all necessary measures in support of freedom and in defense of peace in southeast Asia” (1). President Johnson’s final words of the document are “Its mission is peace”, when, in actuality of course; its mission is military combat (2).
Thus far we have seen presid
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Approximate Word count = 1267
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page)
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