Child’s common sense reponse to war “complication”
5 January 2009
My son, Sean, turned 5 on the 30 December 2008. On the 31 December 2008, I was watching a program on Al Jazeera International entitled Revisiting My Lai Massacre. I have heard about My Lai Massacre but this was the first time I was watching a documentary about it. In deed this particular documentary was a special one. The program brought one of the US soldiers who has taken part in the massacre to My Lai village in Vietnam for the first time and confronted him with a victim/survivor. It was an intense program.
When I was watching this program, Sean came and curled on my lap. The he started asking endless questions about the program I was watching. I was telling him in the simplest possible manner that “that soldier has killed some people in that village a long time ago.” Then Sean told me, “I hate war and I don’t like war.” I told him, “neither do I Sean, but there are many wars going on in this world and many innocent people, including children die.” I could feel the confusion and disgust in this child’s face. He then asked me, “why did that soldier kill those people.” I told Sean, “he is telling that he was following orders from his commander.” Sean followed up immediately, “what is an ‘order’?” I then simplified my explanation, “his commander has asked him to do that.” Then Sean told me immediately, “but, papa, he should think.” I was surprised to hear this response. I asked Sean, “what do you mean?” Sean explained, he should think before he killed those people. I was surprised and felt also happy about my son’s comment. I told him, “yes, Sean, in deed he should have thought before he acted.”
Later in the program, an attorney who has handled similar cases was interviewed. And surprisingly, his response basically was what Sean has told me about 5 minutes back. The attorney explained that when a soldier receive an order, the soldier need to know whether it is a legal order or an illegal order. An order to kill innocent and unarmed civilians, including women and children, is an illegal order. If the soldiers thought and acted legally, then they should not have followed the order of their superiors.
This comment reminded me of a story my father has told me. My father was soldier with Sri Lanka Army for 22 years until he retired in 1978. This incident took place in late 1950s when my father was a young soldier. This incident was related to a protest. There was a protest or a riot and movement of rioters/protesters were stopped by an army cordon. There was a face off and a distance about 100 meters between two parties on a main road. Army has put up a banner stating, “if you move forward you will be shot at.” As I remember, this was related to 1958 Riots during which Tamil civilians were violently attacked and killed by Sinhalese mobs. The group concerned here was a Sinhalese rioters or rather a mob. After much damage has been done and many lives lost, Army was trying to control the situation. There was a state of emergency in effect. During the stand off, a prominent Sinhala politician and a Member of the Parliament named C. P. De Silva, who was the Leader of the House from 19 April 1956 – 05 December 1959, was seen to be talking to the mob, possibly trying to pacify the crowd and persuading them to disperse. The army could see the politician. My father was leading the group of soldiers. They were lying on the ground pointing their guns at the mob. Guns were automatic weapons, loaded. There was no movement from the mob at that time towards the army cordon. My father could see the politician talking to the mob. But then suddenly there was an order from the captain in charge of that battalion to open fire. My father was supposed to lead the group to fire at the mob. But my father knew that this order was not right. In fact he knew, that if they opened fire, the politician will be one the first to fall. He later told me that there was conspiracy to get rid of this politician at that time. And the this moment was a convenient way to accomplish that. My father did not fire at the first command thus no others behind him did not fire as well. Then the command was repeated more loudly. I remember my father saying there war urgency and force in the second command to fire. He did not fire still and so did not the others. Then the command was repeated for the third time and that time the Captain who gave the command kicked my fathers boot from behind to urge him to lead the firing. He still did not obey the order. Then they saw the crowd or the mob slowly dispersing and retreating. It was obvious at that time that there was no need to fire at them. That was the end of the incident. Later an internal military inquiry was held and my father was questioned to as to why he did not obey a direct order from his commanding officer. My father, rather cleverly, did not explain the actual reasons, which is his conscience did not allow him to fire are a group that does not make any threat to them and that he also realised the possibility of the prominent politician was targeted during that circumstances. Rather, he explained that he did not fire because he thought that it was too much of a distance that the crowd on the other side could not read the working clearly on the warning banner hoisted by the Army. He was not reprimanded. Recently when the prominent politician passed away my father related this story that should he has fired that day, this prominent politician has long gone.