The Price of Peace

One of the first things I learned in life was that everything has a price. Any endeavor has its inherent risks and inaction can be fraught with peril as well, as sometimes doing nothing is worse than doing something.

We all know war has its price, and a terrible one it is. It is a shame one cannot demonstrate in any real quantifiable manner the price of inaction until well after the inaction becomes perilous on its own.

Europe and the world had to wait for Hitler to actually go one step too far before it was obvious that the small problem of a fascist dictator in Germany in the early 1930's had grown to a worldwide conflagration by the late 1930's.

The middle years of 1930's when something could have been done had come and gone. Before the world could correct their inaction's ramifications, 60,000,000 people would die. I think we can all agree that was one very expensive peace from 1933 to September, 1939.

And now we stand at a very similar crossroads. The difference this time is that instead of inaction, it's our actions for which many are expressing their anger and disagreement. This is truly one of those damned if you do, damned if you don't enigmas, where the price of action is a heavy one, but is it cheaper than the price of peace?

The two camps break down along political and ideological boundaries and we cannot seem to find consensus on what price we are willing to pay for our security, if we are paying it in the right and proper place and most especially, if now is the time we should be paying it.

Obviously, I fall in on the "Kill 'em all, let God sort 'em out," side of the fence, and the sooner the better, whereas the other camp argues for world consensus' and every machination imaginable of multi-lateral goings on, negotiation, possible sanctions, UN mandates, hollow threats and vagaries, hand wringing and all the rest.