Are All Conscientious Objectors and Anti-Abortionists Religious?

When World War II broke out, most men felt the urge to enlist in the military, but some now argue that the traditional sense of patriotism, built upon blind trust, might not fit future wars.  The old model presumed a country under attack.  Defending family and way of life was seemingly built right into the natural order, as all creatures know.

       The US has always had a spirit of isolationism, based in part on the oceans that reduce the likelihood of direct attack.  During the World Wars, Americans suffered no bombed out cities from enemy warplanes or assaults from foreign troops.  Even so, the prevailing military wisdom said it was best to be preemptive, to confront evil overseas and before it could grow.

       These days the anti-war movement seems to be associated with religious pacifists and those with leftist politics.  The same seems true of anti-abortion positions, with religious and political conservatives leading the defense against killing unborn babies in the womb.

       In contrast, John H. Abbott refused to fight in WWII, but aligned himself with no religion or political orientation.  His interview with Studs Terkel in “The Good War”  reveals a conscientious objector who objected even to being called an objector because that sounded negative when the personal authority of morality and conscience was really positive and affirmative.

      He went to prison when the US government told him that he’d have to don a uniform and then participate in killing people in places like Germany and Japan that were merely abstractions, not real threats.  Unlike the dominant isolationists in America before the wars, he didn’t just change overnight because Pearl Harbor was attacked (graphic), perhaps preferring to try more diplomacy before millions more would die.

      Abbott wasn’t a pacifist in the traditional sense, but would fight if personally attacked, including an invasion of the homeland.  Even in bars, he didn’t hide being classified a conscientious objector (which he didn’t ask for) but would fight to defend himself.  He didn’t want to kill anyone, but abhorred being sucked into a big government war machine.  For him, being part of an organized religion wasn’t that much different if that’s what pacifists were all about.

      He refused to support the war effort even indirectly by serving as a noncombatant or working in the armaments industry.  In prison, he told the warden that “If your interested in reforming me or rehabilitating me or changing me, you must explain to me why you got these guys in here who have been convicted of murder and why you’ve got me in here, too, because I refused to murder people.”   Abbott felt that he didn’t deserve to be in prison and, therefore, shouldn’t be forced to work like forced laborers elsewhere.

                When Terkel asks Abbott about Hitler?  Abbot responds “What about Hitler.  He was one person.  They were all doing what Hitler said.  What do all prisoners do?  They do what the warden says.  The only power Hitler had was the power the people gave him.  I felt the whole world had gone absolutely mad, crazy. They were in love with war.”

       Seen as spreading dangerous ideas in prison, Abbott was kept in solitary confinement:  “I really got to know how it was to face four walls every day: a bed, a toilet, a washbasin, a little table, a forty-watt light on all the time.  Windows painted over.  I would touch them to feel what the weather was like.”

      Even wars are changing.  The WW2 model of fighting to win and hold ground has given way to limited skirmishes, with shifting enemies, and with rules of engagement that may not even seek to protect those in uniform.  Aren’t police officers and teachers becoming more impotent than ever, perhaps to be sandwiched vulnerably between politicians and mobs on the one hand, and administrators and students on the other?

      Abbott raises moral issues that shouldn’t be sloganeered away too quickly.  Will parents want to send sons and daughters off to fight under the aegis of the United Nations?  To protect business interests?  When incompetent or obsolete military leaders are in charge? When politicians with no military experience are making decisions about going to war?