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SF-LIT  November 1996

SF-LIT November 1996

Subject:

Re: Heinlein & war

From:

Umberto Rossi <[log in to unmask]>

Reply-To:

Science Fiction and Fantasy Listserv <[log in to unmask]>

Date:

Sat, 16 Nov 1996 11:28:59 +0100

Content-Type:

text/plain

Parts/Attachments:

Parts/Attachments

text/plain (155 lines)

At 11.49 15/11/96 -0500, you wrote:
>You brought up some interesting points. But I like RAH's society as presented
>in Starship Troopers. I don't agree with some points he makes, but many of
>his ideas are very good. I think his idea of an army is different from
>today's, but our idea of an army today is different from hundreds of years
>ago. As military technology continues to advance, so will the structure of
>the military.

There is something which is constant.  Basically the members of a modern
army, expecially the fighting units (and even more so in elite corps, be
they the USMC, the Italian Folgore Brigade, the Legion Etrangere, or the
British Gurkhas), have at least one very important element in common with
the oldest armies:  the link between the members of a military unit are much
stronger than the link between them and the community they should defend.
All the structure of the MI in ST is based on the idea that you have a very
strong corps spirit, an elite spirit.  That is described very well by
Heinlein, notwithstanding the fact that military life in ST is sugared (no
chickenshit in MI, can we believe it?  all perfect, good, reasonable guys?
no psychopats, nerds, sadists, pusher-uppers, etc?  the perfect
community?--but let's temporarily accept it).
What I cannot accept is the hiding of a fundamental contradiction in every
discourse about war--and this is a very old contradiction, because you can
find it even in the most ancient myths iof our Indogermanic forefathers and
mothers (be they Celts, Germans, Latins, Aryans, Greeks):  those who fight
(warriors, soldiers, Starship Troopers) are the professionals of violence
and destruction--of death.  Their competence is dangerous for the community
they belong to, because they can use violence against the enemies of their
society, but also against their own society.  Once you join an armed
corps--be it the USMC or the Sicilian Mafia--and you fight, and you are
endowed with the right to use violence and to kill, you become something
different (do you remeber the insistence in Full Metal Jacket--a clever film
indeed--on the word "killer"?).  And a very strong bond ties you to your
companions, stronger, alas!, than the bond uniting you to your country.
Usually you spend just a part of your life in an Army, but the MI depicted
by Heinlein is mostly made up by professionals (at the beginning of the
story Rico joins for a limited period, the war begins and he decides to
remain for a longer time, and there are reasons to think he will remain in
the MI even after the war--if that war will ever end).

Now here is the trouble with Heinlein's treatment of this question.
Heinlein says that his army is made up by the most responsible individuals
of the human race, those who put the common interest of humanity well before
their own.  Ok.  That should imply a stronger bond with civil society.  But
in all the novel a strong stress is placed on the elite spirit.  You cannot
help feeling that all the talking about the defence of those who stay at
home is pure talk, and that what is really important is the small fighting
unit, the company Rico and his friends (even his father) belong to.
But that simply means the rule of the military over the whole society.  An
the main concern of the soldiers is war.  And what those responsible
individuals always do thoughout the novel is putting the army (and the war)
well before everything else.
So you see, you have what you always had in the history of Western
civilization (and I am afraid that other civilizations are much similar to
ours, when it comes to war and warriors).

>As for your personal opinion that anything set in the far future is set there
>to avoid political/social responsibility, I agree in some cases, but not in
>all. Who ever said that SF has to be set in a certain period of the future to
>be true SF? I think that it is as realistic to extrapolate 500 years from now
>as it is to write about 50 years from now.  Many of my SF novel attempts are
>set up to 400 years from now.

Well, I too said that *sometime* the purpose of the faraway time/space
location is a political de-responsabilisation.  And I never said that Sf has
to be set in certain period of the future to be true SF.  Orwell's
masterpiece is set in 1984, i.e. in the past (not our past), but it is very
good SF.  Cordwainer Smith Instrumentality stories are set nobody-knows-when
in the future, and that's a wonderful example of SF.
What I said is:  if you want to defend Heinlein's army by saying "it is an
army of a far future, you cannot compare it with the armies of our past and
present", I'll have to answer "Heinlein is defending war, and a society
which is totally based on war, and his political proposal is aimed to 1959
US, not to some society far in the future;  since he proposes a certain
description of what an army is like, or should be like, let me answer (to
Heinlein and to you) that armies are not like that, and can never be like that".

>I agree that Starship Troopers is one of RAH's most politicized novels, but I
>think that a function of SF is not just to write about technology in the
>future, or how we react to it, but to write about what society will be like
>in the future,

I agree with you.  And I never said that SF must write about technology in
the future.  As for good Sf on the theme of war, what about James
Tiptree/Alice Sheldon story "Yanqui Doodle"?

>and Heinlein does that. Yes, TANSTAAFL is a recurring theme,
>but it's true.

Well, this is a bit too strong.  True?  I think you had a free lunch (more
than one) when you were, say, 6;  and many other persons did.  The TANSTAAFL
ideology has a defect:  Heinlein tries to turn it into something absolute
and objective.  That's because he derives it from social Darwinism, and
social darwinism always tries to present itself as a scientific theory of
society (i.e. something you have to accept because it has scientific bases).
But societies, communities, and the human world do not really work that way.
And social Darwinism is a fiction like may other social theories.

>And I don't agree that Starship Troopers was influenced by the
>Vietnam War. ST was actually published in 1959, which was several years after
>Dien Bien Phu (1955) but I believe shortly before America began to get
>involved in the war. Several of Heinlein's works in the 1960's were
>influenced by the Vietnam War (Glory Road, among others), but ST was
>published before we really began to get involved.

Ok, my fault (blush).  But the novel expresses a Cold War mentality.

>As for The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, you bring up an excellent point. I had
>never really thought much about it, but the central cell of four did tend to
>control the entire revolution. But almost all loonies supported the movement
>towards revolution. Someone had to control the revolution (leadership by
>committee rarely works well) and Manny, Wyoh, the Prof and Mycroft Holmes
>(Adam Selene) were in the best position to lead the revolution. Sure, they
>were never elected, but when did they have a chance to be? They were an underg
>round movement for the most part at the beginning of the revolution.

In the novel the anti-democratic structure of the revolutionary movement
works because the real leader is a machine (who has no human defects) and
the other 3 leaders are good and selfless persons.  What usually happens
when a revolution is led in that way (like in Russia) is that at the
beginning you have a leader (or a group of leaders) whose methods are not
democratic (Lenin) but who at least believes in a certain idea of common
good, but then some less respectable guy comes out (Josef Djugasvili, aka
Stalin) who simply wants to forget the fact that he, like all men and women,
has to die;  and he tries to forget that unpleasant truth by killing a lot
of people in very unpleasant ways.  (And I suspect that at least Manny was
tempted by the idea of becoming the Dictator of the Moon;  anyway, he
expresses a deep loathing of democratic institutions after the revolutions
takes a turn he disproves of)

>I'm also enjoying this thread, for although I do not agree with much of what
>you and others say, they always make me think, and through the SF-LIT list, I
>think a lot more about what I read. As a French philosopher said during the
>French Revolution, "I do not agree with a thing you say, but I will defend to
>the death your right to say it".

Was he Diderot?

>-Ben Bjostad
>"Then you shall know the truth, and the truth will set you free"-John 8:32
>(NIV)
>

Didn't St. John also write something like "men loved darkness rather than
light"?

And now a last remark:  SF-LIT should not be devoted to spcific authors
(remember the List Nazi is listening to what we say).  Heinlein is a very
interesting theme, but what about widening our perspective, that is,
suggesting other writers/titles connected with the theme of Sf & (future)
war?  Heinlein supporters could propose works of other authors with similar
ideas, and Heinlein critics could indicate some anti-heinleinan works (I
proposed Tiptree/Sheldon's Yanqui Doodle, but there must be much more than
just that).
Umberto Rossi

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