War is Evil. Veteran Air Force B-52 Commander Explains Why - Vince Lewis

If I could put it in my own, uh, military terminology, the commander says, "There's the enemy, there's the direction of fight." But a different commander, Jesus Christ, comes along and says, "No, that's not the battle. The battle's over here. You're fighting a carnal war over here, but we're fighting a spiritual war. So I'm fighting the wrong war with the wrong weapons, looking for the wrong objectives."

Vince Lewis, welcome to the Anabaptist Perspectives podcast. Thank you, Reagan. So you had a career in the Air Force for 24 years. Uh, you had top-level security clearance, you did multiple combat tours. You were not raised in the Anabaptist world, and the topic of non-resistance, I think, was a was a bit of a challenge for you as you were joining this, um, this way of doing things. You know, you're—so you're coming from an environment that is, um, unfamiliar, I think, to a lot of us within the Anabaptist world. And for us, when it comes to something like non-resistance, it can be more theory sometimes than reality. And that's what we want to get into today in this episode.

But before we jump into non-resistance specifically, is there more context you want to lay for us, um, as we as we get into the topic? Well, coming from that background, uh, it's really ingrained in you. This—this is the way of life, tradition, uh, personal experience, training, uh, of course.

The way you're taught, uh, instructed to think, uh, all those things are are making you a professional, especially in the pilot core, where, as we say, the whole Air Force that I was in is there for the pilots, the maintenance guys, even the bakers and the cooks in the kitchen, all over the base. Everybody's there for this handful of pilots. And so you really get this, uh, big ego, uh, and they just keep feeding that, and you're just ready. You're—you've got this killer instinct that I'm ready to go when I'm called, and I have this so ingrained in me that I'm not going to question these things. I'm going to go into this with my full force, with the training I've had, and just, uh, expend everything I know in a particular objective, uh, with no holds barred.

So I don't say you don't think, but you have a basis for your thinking that's going to probably give you known outcomes to what someone asks you to do or tells you to do. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that was the piece that, as we were going back and forth, getting ready for these interviews, this, um, like you were really in this world for a while. Like you were a commander of a B-52 bomber, for example, a nuclear-capable, uh, aircraft during the Cold War, um, and all of those things. And again, it's easy to think of non-resistance as, well, that's kind of a theory out there. Well, we, you know, we don't go to war and, you know, this, that.

Okay. But in this, we want to dig deeper because you didn't just wake up one day and be like, "Oh, I guess I'm—I don't really want to do this military thing anymore." I'm sure this was quite a process for you. So that's what we want to want to get some of that, uh, some of those pieces that that had you change your belief system on this. So let's start with definitions. When we say something like non-resistance, what are we even talking about? So first, what is it? But then what is it not as well? Okay. When—let's turn that around the other way if we could. Okay. What it's not is it's not peaceful living, just a life of ease and nobody's bothering me and, uh, I'm just happy as a clam the way I am.

And it's also, uh, the 1970s really pushed in what was called, uh, the Love Generation and the Peace Movement. There was a lot of, uh, a lot of demonstrations going on. And so you had a huge non-resistance saying, "I'm not—I'm not going to cooperate with the government, whatever they tell me to do. I'm a rebellious one. I want to let you know what I feel. And if even if my peace movement gets violent, I'm going to claim that that I'm a peacenick or or whatever the the current, uh, label is for people." Um, so it's kind of an ingrained contradiction of itself is that people using violence to bring about a a peace movement. But on the other hand, we have to say, "What does God's word say?"

We start there. Because we're not trying to win an argument and win over people with, "I can out-debate you and therefore come to a logical conclusion and and convince you that that you believe the same way." And so I have to have more than just feelings. I I can't say, "Well, in a church environment, I believe this way because my parents didn't know." This has to be your belief, not your mom and dad's beliefs, not your church's belief, but it has to be yours. And the military uses that same principle. Fighting and combat, that has to be you. That's your environment, that's your basis for thinking, and you go into that thinking you're doing good.

And that is a problem there in, uh, in your your taught retaliation in every way and form. I'm going to outthink the enemy. I've got larger weapons. I've got better tactics. I have better trained troops. And might makes right is the concept. America is is the the big gorilla in the room, uh, ready to, uh, make the world right for our cause.

But the other but, uh, other people see it differently. And maybe we'll go into that a little, how the how the different worldviews affect, uh, what we're talking about. Mm-hmm. So that's some pieces of, like, what it isn't, like what non-resistance isn't. Um, could you give us a definition of what is non-resistance? And then I'm going to add a piece there too. What do you see as the current thinking on the topic of non-resistance within the Anabaptist community? Kind of put bring that into this as well. Yeah. Um, first of all, non-resistance, and and we look at scripture for that, first of all, that's obedience to God. And and we're just not cherry-picking a couple of scriptures out of the Bible as our source, but we actually have a whole, uh, compendium of scripture that that agrees and builds a structure, not one or two.

But we want to see this concept throughout scripture. So I've really got some truth that, uh, is supporting my position. So first of all, it's belief in God. Um, it's also, uh, conscientious objection. That word, uh, conscientious means deep thinking, or, um, con means with, go with science. So I I reached this, uh, thought through deliberate thinking, and it's not just my father's religion. So I have decided this on my own to conscientiously object. And one of the things that I the beauties that I think comes out of this is what we call alternative service, where you're actually, uh, hurricanes, tornadoes, uh, natural disasters, and other similar things, hospital support, those things are incredibly good.

And I think there's universal agreement on that. So I say, rather than going out and killing people, uh, I'm going to do this alternative service, which we call it. And I think you would find pretty universal agreement within the Anabaptist community without taking they see they see the logic, the truth behind that, but you're not walking them through this argument to get them to believe that. It's just obvious you go in a hospital and help someone you're doing good. You know, you kill them. Now that's quite that's a whole different question. Uh, so yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Okay. So we're laying some groundwork on on non-resistance. I'm going to, uh, throw in, uh, an interesting question for you here.

Why do you find it so difficult to promote the principle of non-resistance? Uh, excellent question because it involves, uh, it could involve a complex answer, but, uh, the military that I was coming from or am coming from, uh, that became a culture. So within the Anabaptist community, also there is a culture, but now we have this other culture. As long as we don't get involved in another culture, it's not impacting us so much. But now we're seeing, uh, people sometimes using computers they didn't in ways they didn't use, watching YouTube videos, maybe not watching full-length movies, but the stuff is out there to view. Uh, a totally new thing in the last 20 years in particular, uh, that's increasing is social media, where you're just bombarded with information, sometimes without choice and sometimes without rationalization to where, uh, there's people that are deliberately, uh, putting that forth.

You get, uh, children's toys that are that are war-related. You get games where, you know, you're just bopping the other enemy and knocking them into eternity and those sorts of things and bashing everything that comes after you. And so that starts bleeding into the Anabaptist community, as it always has, but not with the intensity that we see today with electronics, with games, with others. And so the the Anabaptist, you can't plug your ears for that. It's there, and you've got to consciously deal with it. Or especially the young people who may not be established in in this, they're more vulnerable to this. Looking for recognition and acceptance was a common goal of all of us.

They want that acceptance too. I've even, uh, uh, know of, uh, secondhand, really, uh, uh, a couple of friends, uh, know of Anabaptists that have concealed carry permits, uh, to carry, uh, a handgun concealed. I don't think you've ever seen anything like that before, but what caused them to to bring that? You look at the number of, of, uh, gun sales in America. It's just exploded. There's there's videos that give you the the belief that, uh, this handgun, this is power. You know, you feel the weight of that, and it feels good. And and someday somebody, you're going to need this thing. Well, no, you're not going to need it because when you look at statistics, the people even that carry concealed weapons, and I used to carry a concealed weapon, you know, they never end up using it, but they always have this mindset that there's this threat out there that means I may use this weapon.

And where did that mindset come from? They didn't get it from within the Anabaptist community. Did you see how it's bleeding in and affecting, uh, especially the vulnerable youth? Yeah, I think that's one that's kind of blown my mind. I've started hearing about that in the last couple of years. It's like, yeah, like men and young guys or whatever, going and getting their concealed carry, uh, you know, or keeping a loaded handgun in their truck well, just in case, you never know. And I'm like, what what are you going to use that for exactly? Well, you know, and then you just kind of smile and, you know, and I'm like, wait a minute, you know, I thought you're part of a church that doesn't believe in killing people.

I mean, that seems pretty clear to me. Well, you know, and just this kind of thing. And I just can't really get my head around that. And I think you're you're on to something there that it didn't come from inside the churches necessarily. I mean, it has to be culture influencing coming in. Right. Right. So you get to a position, and and we may go into this looking at some of the, uh, scriptural support. I say either you've got three avenues in general. Uh, either don't believe the Bible, you make your own interpretation and and pick out favorite scriptures. So you're making your own interpretation, or you believe the Bible. Mm-hmm. And and since I believe it, and I know you do too, it's not just established on some, uh, you know, ethereal beliefs, but it's actually built on a on a book that is so intertwined, uh, and a book, there isn't anything like it on earth that you can go in and find multiple agreeing scriptures on non-resistance, for example, and you're pulling from a a book where it's it's, uh, the entire Bible, 66 books.

And the amazing thing is every one of those 66 books agrees with the other 65 books in an intertwined, uh, message. It's very difficult to defeat that if you're willing to look at it and study it. Even on your own, you're going to find some of these things. Mm-hmm. So that gets me to the next question I had then, because obviously you took a huge leap from where where you used to be, you know, as commander, uh, of the B-52 and and a bunch of other stuff you did in the Air Force to this belief system. Now you were an officer, and I can imagine being an Air Force officer, if you read something like, you know, turn the other cheek or love your enemies, um, I can imagine that wasn't very easy for you to accept while you were in the Air Force.

You had talked to me about that. Yeah, you're you're getting down to a very, uh, serious point in my life, a pivotal point where I either had to, uh, turn away from it, uh, just passively agree with it or buy into it. My wife will will tell you that I examine everything. I want to know where its boundaries, its definitions are. I want to research a concept, uh, deeply, almost like a mathematical concept. I want to know what's behind this thing. And then once I do, I buy into it. So I faced a real problem with this. It's a very difficult problem. You've got 40 years of Department of Defense and active duty military and and even a couple of years as a cadet.

All that, two-thirds of my adult life is absorbing this. And now, uh, I'm accustomed to, uh, you know, if if you tell me to turn the other cheek, I said, well, if you slap me, I'm slapping you back twice as hard because that retaliation, get back at the bad guy or the guy that's oppressing you. So retaliate and and you're faced with that. And so that commonly used term, uh, of retaliation versus, uh, non-resistance is that's just a contradiction. So I needed something to really buy, I won't say buy into that, that's cheap, uh, term perhaps, but, uh, really grab this concept to where it's part of me. So, uh, through a set of circumstances, I I met a a a man who's who's an Anabaptist like I am.

And, uh, it was kind of by accident. I was looking for somebody else, and he could tell I was I was kind of down. And he says, what's going on? I said, well, uh, I was supposed to find, uh, uh, Kenneth, and he was going to talk to him about non-resistance, but Kenneth isn't here. He had some kind of a medical problem. They they took him and and Todd, Todd Boone, um, said, well, what did you what did you want to talk to him about? I said, about non-resistance. I said, you know, I can't get past this point. Uh, we're looking at membership. We really like what we see scripturally, uh, with fellowship, with the with the family concept of of a community working together for a common, uh, purpose.

And yet I'm up against this wall. And really, it was a wall. And so Todd says, well, sit down, let's go through some things. And I, in my words, I believe that God, through the Holy Spirit, was guiding Todd into something. So the first thing he picked was a concept, uh, that isn't talked about much in in a lot of Christians, maybe even haven't heard of, that is, uh, based on scripture, uh, uh, captured by Colossians 1:13. He's translated, meaning God has translated me out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God's dear Son. So wait a minute, you know what I'm saying? There's two kingdoms. There's a kingdom of darkness. I know there's a devil and I know there's God, but God has set up two kingdoms.

And it when you begin to look at scripture through that, uh, in particular in the New Testament, uh, in Romans 8:1, for the law of the Spirit of life has made me free from the law of sin and death. So there's governing laws within, and that's just one example of this dual kingdom concept. So I went into that and and and it was really enforced by the scripture that said, we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, the rulers of the darkness of this world and spiritual wickedness in high places. And that scripture, uh, basically says to me, if I could put it in my own, uh, military terminology, the commander says, there's the enemy, there's the direction of fight.

But a different commander, Jesus Christ, comes along and said, no, that's not the battle. The battle's over here. You're fighting a carnal war over here, but we're fighting a spiritual war. And I see that now we've got two kingdoms that are really opposed to each other. One's going to end up with God. One's going to end up in the kingdom of darkness, which is, you know, it based on, uh, demonic, uh, the devil himself and all that rebellious concept ending up in different eternities. And so, um, we say even the weapons of our warfare are not carnal. And I've flown, uh, B-52s in particular with nuclear weapons on board thinking this is the ultimate weapon.

And yet scripture says the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, meaning earthly, but mighty. They're mighty, mightier than those things. So I'm fighting the wrong war with the wrong weapons, looking for the wrong objectives. And Todd went through this and other scriptures too, uh, too many to to bring in here, but it said, wow, this is not how I was raised. I was raised, all my toys had to do with military. When I built plastic airplane models, they weren't models of of airlines. They were models of combat aircraft. And so you're just feeding on this stuff and it and it just becomes part of you. Uh, patriotism was a wonderful thing. And and military people were just edified throughout society, as they still are today.

And they were the heroes of the day. They rescued us from evil as as we saw. And our approach, if you look at it from American perspective, is we're always right and the enemy is the guy that's always wrong. Mm-hmm. But I'd say from a world perspective, what then is the enemy's view of us? The enemy's going to think they're right and we're the ones that are wrong. So you have this, uh, natural opposition of who's right and who's wrong. And you get into, uh, doctrines that'll support that belief, making, hey, it's all right to go to war. And and some of those things maybe we can get into. I don't know if you want to discuss those now, but, uh, well, I I was going to say, you know, you talk about, um, scripture and supporting non-resistance and all of these things, but I'm I'm sure there are people listening or or whatever that would very much disagree with this.

Like, what do you say to those people that dispute what you're saying here as far as this is the case of scripture? Um, yeah, dig dig into a little bit of that because I'm sure you had to wrestle with that too. I'm I'm sure you heard the argument. So, oh no, this is the right thing to do. You know, the war machine, whatever is the right thing to do. Yeah, talk to me about that. So if my beliefs are are based on on God and God's morality, then you have to know what he says. And so if I'm dealing with someone that has no knowledge of the Bible, I have to take a different approach to them.

The starting point is totally different. If I'm talking to, uh, a believer in Jesus Christ, what we call a Christian, a true Christian, I've got a basis, a common basis to now go into scripture and show them particular passages. But a totally non-Christian is not going to buy into this thing because, uh, you know, this country is about patriotism. And I'll tell you, uh, even the churches in America, uh, support patriotism. On, uh, Memorial Day, I've gone into conservative Christian churches, even, uh, the guys, the veterans, put on your uniform from when you were in the service. And we'll have a ceremony where we're bringing the American flag up the center aisle and posting it on the on the stand with the Christian flag on one side and the American flag on the other side.

And we might even stand there and say, I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States and to the republic for which it stands. You could tell I've been through this a few times and might even sing, uh, some songs from, uh, those things, the national anthem, uh, songs like that, patriotic songs. And so the two are so intertwined that even if the person is a Christian, they're going to have a problem with that because their churches talk like that. But you ask the church people, they don't usually face the dual kingdom. They don't usually face questioning that. And so you come from a whole different, uh, decision-making basis you've got to overcome. They have their culture.

And I had to make my transition out of that culture into what I know to be scriptural culture. And I can prove it. And I have support. And I don't have to question it because it's not my opinion. It's God's opinion, which comes to me through my belief. I believe in Jesus Christ. I believe in the scriptures that God brought us through the Holy Spirit, inspiring, uh, great writers of the world, uh, over the thousands of years, writing a common theme with a common message pointing to just one God. And so you have a, uh, a different basis of thinking that I'm coming from. So, yeah, it's, uh, it's a lot to overcome in some cases where that's the way we grew up.

And so, uh, that you're overcoming. When I was talking to your your wife yesterday, uh, she mentioned how y'all were at a Christian conference and how you were sitting there just like, oh, really, you know, things were starting to click. And, um, something to the effect of the Bible is like, uh, is almost like a flight manual or something, you know, like this is God's instructions on how we should live and, um, things. Do you want to get into that example? We have some of your old flight manuals here. And I'm I'm curious because I think that's relevant to what you've been saying about the scriptural support of these things. How does that affect how we live and and so forth?

Yeah, you want to get into that a bit? Yeah. Uh, yeah, I do. I I brought these for that specific purpose. Uh, there's three of the four different aircraft I flew have. I brought their flight crew checklist. It's called the abbreviated flight crew checklist. And they're all common throughout every, uh, airplane in the Air Force. They have, uh, these black bordered pages like this that are, um, have a little E and a border. Those are emergency procedures. And this is what you had to know. Even to the point, uh, these are supported by, uh, volumes of things, some of which we carried around in a big heavy bag. But it comes down to this. And this even has things that had to be memorized.

And and it's like scripture. Uh, and and you would look at a big airplane. Here's a one from a B-52G, a massive airplane that I flew has that same thing, the hatched pages. And these had to be ready because when the emergency arose, you don't get out these big manuals to start paging through them. And where is that thing, that procedure on how to put out an engine fire? Now, this thing came out of you. It was second nature. And and that's God's word. You have this, uh, not just, uh, well, let me go look it up and I'll get back with you. At least the the initial top level, it comes out of you.

And so you have that same, uh, pillars and that similar structure. I've got a pillar that supports my belief, just like I've got, uh, volumes of books that bring it down to this. When I'm operating, uh, that aircraft and I have an emergency, these things better come out of me. And I was thrown in simulators, uh, tested with this. Sometimes you would get these no-notice on the spot, uh, questions from the commander. Hey, Vince, uh, tell me what you would do in this situation. Even to the point when we were students, they would maybe walk up to you, a commander says, you know, I want to ask you a question. Do you know that the emergency procedures for, uh, canopy blows off in flight or, uh, emergency, uh, blow down in the landing gear, which don't come come down when you when you go to land and you run into that emergency?

He was expecting you to know that, and that was part of your job, uh, just like a mechanic knows how to take apart a carburetor on a car or various parts of it. I had to know how to do this so much that it just came out of me naturally. Hmm. That goes back to when Peter is writing in the New Testament and says, um, be ready to give an answer. Or basically, it's the sense of, yeah, you should know what you believe and like understand it and be able to explain it to someone else when people ask you questions so that you can give them, here's the reason for the hope that's in you, as he writes.

And there's other things in that passage. Seems like that's that's a what you're getting at here. Right. Yeah. Right. Uh, be ready always, it says. And, uh, and it's nice if you got a Bible with you and you got someone that is patiently, uh, uh, dialoguing with you with an open mind, listening to what you have. But there's those people, uh, almost say there's running on the into on the street that'll challenge you. Uh, they may see the way you're dressed or my wife wears a cap, a head covering all the time. And people will ask her, well, what is that for? And why do you believe in that? And what's that symbolize? And I'm expected to at least have, you know, we don't all wear beards, but people will quickly pick up on you're not like everybody else.

So I expect you to be able to walk them through that. And like I said, it's it's got to be ingrained in you. Uh, the hope that's within me, the hope in Jesus Christ. So I'm going to pivot a bit because when we're talking about non-resistance, um, one thing people seem to default to a lot is hypothetical scenarios or, um, you know, they'll give these challenges of, well, but what about this? What about that? Um, and so far you've been saying, hey, this is how you came to this belief. Here's some scripture. Here's here's the framework. But then people will be like, well, yeah, but let me try to poke a hole in that by giving this situation.

Yeah. Talk me through those. Because that's a that's a different type of approach you're going to have. That's a common, uh, attack against this theology in in a by taking a common situation and making it a question, which is almost, uh, getting down to a yes-no question. And I would say anytime you see a yes-no an either-or question, either you choose this path or this path. It's like saying, uh, I don't want to sound too crude, but have you stopped kicking your dog yet? Well, there's no right answer to that question. Either way, uh, you're wrong or you're or guilty. So someone presents a scenario, uh, the most the most I've ever heard of, either to me or others, is, uh, someone kicks in your front door and starts attacking your wife.

What are you going to do? Yeah. And my first question is, um, is this a scenario you actually know of, or is this something you've just made up? And my first answer, uh, which I certainly I'm not going to have time to give in a real situation, but in this hypothetical situation, it's going to have to be, well, what does the Bible say?

And and let's even take what the Bible says and put it in practical application because I know you're trying to trap me with these either-or questions, which undeniably it keeps the person acting the asking the question. It keeps them in control of the discussion. So you're already, uh, at a disadvantage. Mm-hmm. And and, um, oh, you just go on and on that, uh, these are not, uh, logical questions. They're actually illogical if you look at them objectively. And they're a trap. And they're trying to get you to agree with them. And what are they after ultimately? Not just disproving you, but to disparage God through you and through winning an argument with you. And and you go, you know, I don't know what to say.

You know, what am I? Well, maybe I'll have to, uh, maybe I have to agree with you. Yeah. Some of these some of these things. But there's a lot of things that you could do. And if I could just take a moment to go into some of those. Yeah. Yeah. I'd I'd like you to do that because this is first thing typically when my, you know, uh, militaristic friends or whatever, um, you find out, oh, you you don't believe in war. Well, then what about this? And they'll use some example from whatever. And it it can shut down the conversation pretty quick because it's like, well, oh boy, you know, so if you go down that street, yeah, you do end up in a corner someplace.

But like you said, there I'm thinking of one scenario that happened to me. It was like the situation he was outlining based on a past experience I had was so ridiculously illogical that it was just, I mean, there there's no way that would ever happen. But it was he he just kept pushing it in a certain way to try to get me to say, oh yeah, that's right. Non-resistance wouldn't work in that situation or whatever. It's like, well, the reality is that's just that would never happen in real life. It's just totally ridiculous situation. So what are alternatives when people do bring these kinds of things up and say, well, you believe in non-resistance? Well, what about this?

What are some alternative responses you can give them? Well, uh, I might start first with saying all these situations are different and you put me in a situation like this. I don't know all the information there. You just said there's an attacker and a victim. Well, is it day? Is it night? Is there a policeman standing behind you? Or, uh, are you out in a farm environment? Or are there houses all around you where, uh, you know that this guy's not going to maybe risk too much? But initially, uh, my first thought is to flee the environment. Uh, run away. Uh, I've told my wife is if somebody were to do something, you know, here's the door to get out and here's where you're going to go.

Uh, I'm running, uh, away from the situation in a in a way to react that. So another thing is somebody in a situation like that is usually after something. There's no, uh, purpose to them in just coming, kicking in the door and beating up someone and, and, uh, they're after something. Uh, maybe your wallet, maybe you've got money, uh, somewhere in the house. I say, give it to them. Your life is not worth your wallet, men, or your purse, women. And and that money you may have stashed in a drawer somewhere, let them have it. Mm-hmm. And and yet, uh, you may get through satisfaction through that. You may have to go beyond that. Not only what are you looking for, but offer them something else.

Uh, you know, my wife's sick. You're really, uh, doing something wrong. How about how about we, you know, uh, is there what are you after here? Uh, and and not maybe that clean a think of it. You're trying to say, is there something else you're really after? What can I give you to solve your basic need? So I'm presenting him with an alternative. And maybe too, I would jump in between the attacker and the victim. So he's attacking me instead of someone weaker than I am and to protect them. And this way, I'm not attacking him with resistance the way he's attacking me or or someone that I love. Uh, I'm blocking what he's doing just standing there, giving the other person protection or a chance to flee while I'm engaging the enemy, almost like a military thing where I'm I'm doing a strategic withdrawal, uh, to avoid, uh, to get out of the range of your, uh, horrible guns.

I'm getting back from the threat, really. And if we look at, uh, many others that, uh, we say, if I think this through, I know what I'm going to do, but like an emergency procedure. But if I wait for the situation to arise, I may not know what to do. In fact, in some situations, the answer to a question like that is, I don't know. I don't know what I would do. The the body in all of us has a natural reflex action. Somebody throws a ball at you or a rock, you you just unconsciously put your hand up to block that. That's an instinct in your body. You didn't get that instinct by deciding on that, but it's a natural instinct.

And, you know, you may flinch, you may trigger some emotion in the attacker by flinching, but there are things we're just not sure what we're going to do. But in general, what's the real environment? What's the truth of this situation? And taking some of these other alternatives. And, you know, I have to admit, it may not work.

There are times where it's going to break down. You're not going to succeed, but there are alternatives other than attack the attacker or get killed. Those aren't the alternatives. So, yeah, complex, uh, question answered to a simple question, you might say. But it's really real because I think in the conversations I've had, at least that tends to be the one challenge that for people. It's like, well, what what but what about if I get attacked or something? And that can be a real struggle point. Yeah, I think you had a had a had a good piece there, but like it may not always like quote unquote work or it might, um, these things are messy and, uh, but still have to come back to what is the flight manual, so to speak.

Like what does scripture tell us? Like what does Jesus want us to do? Um, you know, bring it back to that. Okay, so we were just talking about really zoomed in on hypothetical situations and in, you know, in our individual lives. I want to zoom it out now really wide. Um, history is full of a lot of famous warriors. You know, what are some thoughts that they've had about war? You know, people that have experienced this, you know, led armies, et cetera. Give us some quotes. I know you've done some digging on this. Uh, yeah, tell us about some of that. I took some notes that, uh, really I I was prepared to give some of these.

And and let me let me draw on some of these specifically because in a few cases, the quotes are really, uh, lengthy and well thought out by some members of history that I think everyone looks on. Um, there was a British writer called the Sidney Smith. He said, "God is forgotten in war. Every principle of Christianity is trampled upon." I think if you look at that closely, yeah, it is. And I've had experience in war. I've actually, uh, looking at my past, and and we didn't go into that, but I've dropped bombs that killed people. And and they didn't just kill enemy soldiers. They killed non-combatants or, uh, civilians. Um, let's personalize this. There were babies.

There were somebody's, um, aunt or uncle or grandfather. There was maybe an invalid or something. Uh, I'm sorry, that's that's just part of war. And, uh, they shouldn't have been there in the first place. Uh, too bad for them. The mindset is we're killing enemy soldiers for the cause of good. And, uh, that's my mindset. And I may even joke about some of this. After dropping bombs on a particular target, I remember many situations we turned back to the home base. And I would say something like, "I wonder what they're having for dinner at the officers' club." And yet those bombs are still on the way down, uh, for a number of seconds in in the time of fall.

And you see the contradiction of what's happening for real on the ground as a 750-pound bomb is just obliterating a certain radius. And I'm telling you, killing grass and trees and animals and people, no doubt, and destruction just raining within that. Yet I have no conscience towards that because I'm winning the war for good and they're the bad guys. And so deal with that and and and take care of them so we lose more of them than we lose. And that's that mindset. So you look at some of these things. A numbing to the effects almost, right? That's exactly right. You're flying at what, 20,000 feet and it's just a bunch of jungle down there.

Yeah. You know? And and in reality, wow, the concept is the the the end justifies the means. So the end objective is victory. How I get there doesn't matter. Where, in fact, it ought to be the other way around. The means of getting there justifies the end. So that I don't just see this concept that there's there's no morality when you're going at the enemy because, uh, and you know, I hate to admit it, but clear evidence that we've done some of the same things to the enemy that he's done to us. You mean like the military, the American military machine, essentially?

Mm-hmm. And there's there's clear evidence. And you see some of that in in a lot of famous quotes. And yeah, continue on that. Yeah. So this is, uh, uh, William Tecumseh Sherman. Uh, he was the one of the main generals in the Civil War. And he was given orders to take out a particular route from the South in the Civil War. And that was between Atlanta and and, um, and Savannah. And it was called Sherman's March to the Sea.

And he used a concept called scorched earth, where you have the enemy in front of you and you're knocking them out, you're killing them. But as you pass through his territory, you're obliterating everything behind you. His, maybe even the people, women, children, the infirm, those behind you. You're burning their houses, you're burning their crops, you're killing their, um, cows and their their horses, the chickens, you name it. And that's called scorched earth. There's nothing usable. And Sherman did this. And the Library of Congress contains documents, two letters from Lincoln that told Sherman to do that. Let me tell you what he says after all this career that he's had. He says, "I confess without shame that I am tired and sick of war.

It is only those who have neither heard a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded. It is only they who cry for more blood, who cry for more vengeance and more desolation." And he ends up with this famous little three-word concept that that I've heard so many times, "War is hell."

And here's a man that went through all this. He gets to the conclusion. He looks back on what he did to the tens of thousands of people, the most costly war in our history, about 610,000 men of our own country killed in that war. And he looks back on those this with those words. Napoleon, famous historical figure, uh, French, uh, the Emperor of France, he says, "The more I study war, the more I study the world, the more I am convinced of the inability of brute force to create anything durable." And here he was, a master of brute force. And he's admitting, uh, in his summation, you know, when you put it all together, uh, we're really, um, unable to reach our objective.

And we say, uh, we could maybe go into some, uh, combat theory and, um, things of that nature. And he he basically says, "Taking everything that I have and looking at all the kinds of warfare I've been, there is no way to bring about any durable objective. War begets war," as it would look back on history. One war doesn't solve anything. We've we've looked at the war to end all wars. You know, that was real, that was World War I. And what did World War II, uh, follow? Ten years later than World War I, here's World War II, right back doing the same thing with some of the same enemies, using a more cruel tactics and everything since this is it.

Uh, we get through this and and Hitler and all his armies are done for and we will be victorious, um, marching through Europe, uh, proclaiming our might and our right and that's it. But then you look at the wars that follow, the regional wars, all the wars of areas surrounding that. It's estimated, for example, 20 million people, uh, mostly civilians, about two to one ratio, sometimes three to one ratio of civilians over military combatants died through things like forced migrations, direct, uh, killing by the weapons intended for soldiers that actually, uh, actually brought into or spilled over into the the homes and the and the civilian communities and took a lot of them out to forced migration, starvation, sickness and disease, and and all those things that some of our people even did.

Uh, you you get angry at a soldier and just, uh, summarily shoot him. I'm so angry at this guy. Uh, I'm not going to let him just be hauled off into a prisoner of war camp. I'm going to take care of this guy right now. They did that to us. And many times we had angry men that saw their buddy next to them, uh, shot. And I'm just going to get you in anger and just summarily shoot the man and take out his life because of anger and the venom that's within us to retaliate, to deal with that. And we have names for these people. I won't even repeat and derogatory names, ugly names, because that's how we envision these guys, almost as as venomous snakes ready to attack us.

And and we've got to deal with those guys in any way we can. So we take them out. Let me hear, uh, British Duke of Wellington. He was he was Napoleon's arch enemy. He said, "War is the most detestable thing. If you had seen but one day of war, you would pray God that you might never see another." And and so here's the men that led the armies that did these things. And then they're coming to the end. And in summation, they're saying, "This isn't what I thought it was. War is hell," like like Tecumseh said. And, uh, these are guys that are proving those concepts in reality.

That's kind of wild. I mean, you have Napoleon and Wellington both saying that. If if I'm remembering my history right, those were the two that fought at the Battle of Waterloo. Right. Um, and they both come away from their military career saying things like that. That's kind of that makes you think. It does. You know, I mean, Napoleon is is regarded as one of the greatest, perhaps the greatest general of of all time. And he gets to the end of all this and says, "Didn't really accomplish much." Right. Which is kind of mind-blowing to me. You know, and if anybody would be qualified to to make a declaration like that, it seems like someone like him would have seen enough to know.

Yeah, wow. Okay, so so I'm going to bring this back down to you and and your life. What is the personal benefit to a stand on non-resistance? Well, first of all, um, I'm pleasing God because I'm following his word. There is joy that comes through pleasing God and knowing that you're doing and knowing that you're doing an alternative service.