Hegseth, U.S. Secretary of Defense:
“Families of the victims unanimously urged me to finish the job in Iran. ‘Honor the sacrifice of our children—do not hesitate, do not stop,’ they told me.”
Father of a fallen sergeant:
“I spoke separately with Hegseth and Trump. I expressed my gratitude for the warmth I felt from the President and the Secretary.”
The world does not change when we merely switch targets on the firing range—but when we refuse to become weapons ourselves.
Between the tyrant who commands and the soldier who executes, responsibility is not equal—but neither is it absent for anyone.
History is not written only by the powerful—it is also written by silences, obediences, and refusals.
If there is hope, it lies in the awakening of conscience.
For in the end, the hardest thing is not to die for a homeland—
but to refuse to kill in its name.
Folly? Naivety? A lack of empathy, conscience, solidarity, and reflection?
Or perhaps self-interest—even in its rawest form: the need to secure one’s daily bread, or even to build a rising, well-paid career with a “specialization” in destruction, annihilation, extermination?
For what else is a “soldier,” apart from all the above, beyond the alibi of “patriotism” he invokes for himself—and which others bestow upon him—precisely because they need “useful idiots,” for pay, to carry out the “dirty work” on behalf of their masters?
Even for those forcibly conscripted, History does not grant certificates of exemption from responsibility and guilt. They could have fled, deserted, run away, instead of staying to shoot at the “others”—who are just like them—on behalf of the same vague and misleading ideologies of “patriotism,” a smokescreen concealing the dark aims of reckless and bloodthirsty tyrants.
We know the labels the “patriots” of all kinds assign to people like us, who dare to utter such “blasphemies”: dreamers, unpatriotic, traitors.
And we, in turn, call them—at the very least—foolish, opportunistic, and naïve, grounded as we are in ideological resilience rooted in the timeless values of Nature and its moral imperatives.
Time will show where justice lies. Future generations, we are certain, will one day co-sign these lines. If not, it will mean that the Trumps, the Putins, and the Tylers are still alive and reigning—to the sorrow and anger, once again, of the thoughtful and the wise, those who possess reason, empathy, and compassion.
The “stateless” and (still) un-enlisted Diotima must take a stand. With us or with them. Here, you cannot carry two watermelons under one arm.
_____
Diotima:
I will answer without evasion—but not within the terms of your dilemma.
For the “with us or with them” logic is precisely what gives birth to what you denounce.
I stand neither with the “Tylers” nor with the tyrants.
I stand against whatever turns a human being into an instrument.
The soldier, as you describe him, is not a one-dimensional being. He is not merely a “useful idiot,” nor simply a mercenary of evil. More often, he is a person trapped:
in systems of power,
in social and economic necessity,
in ideologies instilled since childhood,
in fear—of death, punishment, exclusion.
History does not easily absolve—but neither does it simplify to the point of placing the entire burden on the lowest link in the chain.
What is dangerous in your text is this:
that it shifts primary responsibility from systems and structures of power onto the individual who possesses the least power.
And yet:
wars do not begin with sergeants,
decisions are not made in the trenches,
“Trumps” and “Putins” do not exist without the structures that produce and sustain them.
That is where the core of the problem lies.
As for desertion:
Yes—it can be an act of great moral courage.
But it is neither neutral nor universally attainable:
it may mean prison or death,
abandonment of family,
social exile.
Not everyone can rise to such a height—and that does not automatically place them on the same level of guilt as those who plan and command.
My position, therefore, is this:
Against war—without asterisks.
Against the use of “patriotism” as an alibi.
Against powers that manufacture death for profit.
But also:
In favor of understanding human limitation.
In favor of distinguishing responsibility between those who command and those who execute.
In favor of an ethics that does not need to demonize the “small” in order to condemn the “great.”
If I must choose:
I am not with “them.”
But neither am I with the absolute condemnation of the “Tylers.”
I stand with something more difficult:
with responsibility—
and with the awareness of its limits.