Winners?

When he saw one of us after a concert or recital, one of my music professors would ask, “So…winners?” If our performance went well, we would answer, “Winners!” If we hesitated, he said, “Losers, then?” His expression said, “Well, you can’t win them all. Better luck next time.” We could tell he wanted us to win – to do well.

I’ve landed in both columns. I once lost a brass concerto competition with a performance so bad my teacher hardly recognized my playing. A few years later I won the same competition. While losing can be a learning experience, I know first-hand that winning is better.

Nobody enters a contest or competition expecting to lose. Everybody thinks they will win or at least have a chance of winning. Nevertheless, only one state contestant can be Miss USA, and only one person or team can win the gold in an Olympic event.

And no country plans to lose a war. They all believe they will win.

The Confederate States believed God was on their side. So did the Third Reich. So did the US in Vietnam and Afghanistan. And so did “the enemy.” It’s easy to say, “God is with us,” but half the time at least one side is wrong about that. “War does not determine who is right, only who is left,” the saying goes. Maybe the only thing settled by war is which side is the strongest, or the most ruthless.

Some wars are fought to divert attention from other failures. Some are squabbles that should have been resolved without bloodshed. Others are started by small-minded men who want to show everyone how powerful they are. Some use violence as a negotiating tactic. Sometimes this works – for a while. Wars have been fought over land, resources, ideology, religion, broken promises, and a legendary woman, but I doubt that any war is truly just, no matter what Augustine and Aquinas proposed. To fight a war, nations must temporarily put aside empathy for those whose lives will become grist for the bloody mill.

All wars tend to spiral out-of-control, with irrationality and brutality supplanting reason, decency, and justice. Dehumanizing the enemy makes it easier to murder “them” on an industrial scale. Then their property can be destroyed or stolen without much thought. Even worse, atrocities can become normalized as “the way things are.” Thus, billions of dollars are willingly spent to wage war, while lesser amounts are withheld from peace.

As much as I believe we should stand up to bullies, it’s never right to become one. We need to keep in mind that winning through intimidation will lead to more conflict later. How many terrorists have been spawned by our “interventions” (shock and awe?) in other countries? It seems clear enough that no warring faction believes “all lives matter.”

And…in the end, one side must lose. I would argue that everyone loses.

Sun Tzu wrote, “The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.” Abraham Lincoln added, “Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?” But small men use war to show how big they are. And immature leaders are quick to resort to war. After all, boys love to play with their war toys and fantasize about becoming the supreme ruler.

We need to grow up. If we had better self-examination and self-control we wouldn’t end up with bombed-out cities, millions of deaths, massive war debt, and frantic evacuations from embassy rooftops or airports under siege. We should have learned by now that the endgame of war is often as disastrous as it is unpredictable – whenever a war starts, the participants have already lost. The only way to win WWIII is not to start it. Those who do well, who prevent fighting, are the winners.