TruthNews Commentary, November 11, 2003

Robert Kurpiel, a cadet at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, sent an e-mail seeking help in making college students around the country aware of the annual "Academy Assembly." The Academy Assembly is a forum to promote academic discussion of important issues among student delegates. This year, the theme is "America's Challenges in an Unstable World: Balancing Security with Liberty."

This would seem to be a perfectly reasonable topic to discuss in an academic forum, but one Professor Peter N. Kirstein of Saint Xavier University in Chicago disagreed. After carefully considering the invitation, he sent the following dispassionate reply to Cadet Kurpiel:

You are a disgrace to this country and I am furious you would even think I would support you and your aggressive baby killing tactics of collateral damage. Help you recruit. Who, top guns to reign (sic) death and destruction upon nonwhite peoples throughout the world? Are you serious sir? Resign your commission and serve your country with honour (sic).

No war, no air force cowards who bomb countries with AAA, without possibility of retaliation. You are worse than the snipers. You are imperialists who are turning the whole damn world against us. September 11 can be blamed in part for what you and your cohorts have done to Palestinians, the VC, the Serbs, a retreating army at Basra.

You are unworthy of my support.

It is not completely surprising to see the level of discourse that university professors have sunk to. Even if we disregard Kurstein’s typos ("top guns to reign death" instead of "top guns to rain death") and the factual errors (AAA stands for anti-aircraft artillery, and is used to shoot at aircraft, not dropped from aircraft), his response still consists of screaming insults at a student who sent him a perfectly polite invitation. Perhaps this is the way Kirstein treats his own students, although he claims on his website, "I encourage all students to participate in class and to express their opinions and viewpoints. I do not seek intellectual compliance but open, critical inquiry."

Kirstein later apologized for his tirade with the following missive:

My e-mail, while motivated from a pacifist perspective, was not professional in tone and totally at variance with my usual interaction with students and colleagues. I am opposed to war and the use of violence in resolving international conflicts while understanding many believe it is appropriate as a last resort. I believe pacifism is a noble calling and should be part of the national dialogue concerning war, peace, and justice. I recognize individuals who serve in the military deserve respect both for their service and their viewpoints.

Pacifism has a long and honorable history in this country, and we will not disparage individuals for holding to that belief, although we disagree with the fundamental premise. However, what Kirstein seems to have forgotten is that it is not the soldiers who send a country to war but the politicians. General Douglas MacArthur, in a speech to the cadets of West Point in 1962, explained that the military profession "…does not mean that you are warmongers. On the contrary, the soldier above all other people prays for peace, for he must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war. But always in our ears ring the ominous words of Plato, that wisest of all philosophers: ‘Only the dead have seen the end of war.’"

Kirstein, if he’s truly a pacifist, should save his tirades for the politicians who take us to war – people like Woodrow Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and Bill Clinton.

But more importantly, the pacificist seems to think that peace is more important than freedom. War is repugnant, but slavery is worse. As Edmund Burke said, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." Evil men will always be willing to resort to violence to attain evil goals – whether to rob the local 7-Eleven or to rule the world. If good men are unwilling to oppose evil, the world would be ruled by Hitlers and Stalins, and crime would run rampant in the streets.

Finally in response to Kirstein’s accusations, perhaps Dennis O'Brien has said it best:

It is the soldier, not the reporter who has given us the freedom of the press. It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us the freedom of speech. It is the soldier, not the campus organizer, who gives us the freedom to demonstrate. It is the soldier who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag, and whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protester to burn the flag.