Does the United States Have a Moral Obligation to Stop Acts of Genocide from Occurring?

The book, No Real and Present danger by Bruce Russet presents an interesting perspective that American war involvement in World War Two was not necessary. Although critics are quick to dismiss his book, he does present some valid arguments in his defense. However, the main argument that I have with his book is his quick dismissal of human rights and the moral obligation of countries, especially the world leader in the United States, to completely ignore genocidal acts that occur in the world. While it is understood that the life of an American is more valuable that the life of a citizen from another country, protecting a group of people who are facing complete elimination is enough cause to involve oneself in the war.

While moral obligations may not be part of Realist philosophy, it is an obligation that Western powers have nevertheless. Over six million Jews died in the concentration camps along with four more million which included handicapped, gypsies, gays and others. Had the United States not stepped in when it did and ended the war and freed the people from the concentration camps, historians have no doubt that Hitler would have made sure that every single Jewish person was eliminated from Europe.

Author Russett provides the statistic that only twenty percent of the European jewry were left in Europe when the concentration camps were ended. However, is the value of every human life not worth saving? Hitler's hatred of the Jews was so strong that he sacrificed the movement of soldiers by train so that he could pack more Jewish people onto those trains to bring to the death camps to be slaughtered by oven or gas chamber. The American jewry were up in arms when they first heard about these death camps and tried to bring this issue up with the U.S. government. Still the U.S. held out until the very last possible moment. Furthermore, in the talk of genocide, why does Russett leave out any mention of the Japanese rape of Nanking in China? Chinese people were mercilessly raped, beaten and murdered at the hands of the Japanese while the world watched and turned a blind eye.