However, adoption of either a giant space-research program, a comprehensive
social-welfare program, or a master program of eugenic control would provide
motivation for limited technologies.
GENERAL CONCLUSIONS
It is apparent, from the foregoing, that no program or combination of programs
yet proposed for a transition to peace has remotely approached meeting the
comprehensive functional requirements of a world without war. Although one
projected system for filling the economic function of war seems promising,
similar optimism cannot be expressed in the equally essential political and
sociological areas. The other major nonmilitary functions of war---ecological,
cultural, scientific---raise very different problems, but it is least possible that
detailed programming of substitutes in these areas is not prerequisite to
transition. More important, it is not enough to develop adequate but separate
surrogates for the major war functions; they must be fully compatible and in no
degree self-canceling.
Until such a unified program is developed, at least hypothetically, it is
impossible for this or any other group to furnish meaningful answers to the
questions originally presented to us. When asked how best to prepare for the
advent of peace, we must first reply, as strongly as we can, that the war system
cannot responsibly be allowed to disappear until 1) we know exactly what it is
we plan to put in its place, and 2) we are certain, beyond reasonable doubt, that
these substitute institutions will serve their purposes in terms of the survival and
stability of society. It will then be time enough to develop methods for
effectuating the transition; procedural programming must follow, not precede,
substantive solutions.
Such solutions, if indeed they exist, will not be arrived at without a
revolutionary revision of the modes of thought heretofore considered
appropriate to peace research. That we have examined the fundamental
questions involved from a dispassionate, value-free point of view should not
imply that we do not appreciate the intellectual and emotional difficulties that
must be overcome on all decision-making levels before these questions are
generally acknowledged by others for what they are. They reflect, on an
intellectual level, traditional emotional resistance to new (more lethal and thus
more "shocking") forms of weaponry. The understated comment of then-
Senator Hubert Humphrey on the publication of ON THERMONUCLEAR WAR
is still very much to the point: "New Thoughts, particularly those which appear
to contradict current assumptions, are always painful for the mind to
contemplate."
social-welfare program, or a master program of eugenic control would provide
motivation for limited technologies.
GENERAL CONCLUSIONS
It is apparent, from the foregoing, that no program or combination of programs
yet proposed for a transition to peace has remotely approached meeting the
comprehensive functional requirements of a world without war. Although one
projected system for filling the economic function of war seems promising,
similar optimism cannot be expressed in the equally essential political and
sociological areas. The other major nonmilitary functions of war---ecological,
cultural, scientific---raise very different problems, but it is least possible that
detailed programming of substitutes in these areas is not prerequisite to
transition. More important, it is not enough to develop adequate but separate
surrogates for the major war functions; they must be fully compatible and in no
degree self-canceling.
Until such a unified program is developed, at least hypothetically, it is
impossible for this or any other group to furnish meaningful answers to the
questions originally presented to us. When asked how best to prepare for the
advent of peace, we must first reply, as strongly as we can, that the war system
cannot responsibly be allowed to disappear until 1) we know exactly what it is
we plan to put in its place, and 2) we are certain, beyond reasonable doubt, that
these substitute institutions will serve their purposes in terms of the survival and
stability of society. It will then be time enough to develop methods for
effectuating the transition; procedural programming must follow, not precede,
substantive solutions.
Such solutions, if indeed they exist, will not be arrived at without a
revolutionary revision of the modes of thought heretofore considered
appropriate to peace research. That we have examined the fundamental
questions involved from a dispassionate, value-free point of view should not
imply that we do not appreciate the intellectual and emotional difficulties that
must be overcome on all decision-making levels before these questions are
generally acknowledged by others for what they are. They reflect, on an
intellectual level, traditional emotional resistance to new (more lethal and thus
more "shocking") forms of weaponry. The understated comment of then-
Senator Hubert Humphrey on the publication of ON THERMONUCLEAR WAR
is still very much to the point: "New Thoughts, particularly those which appear
to contradict current assumptions, are always painful for the mind to
contemplate."
