Laumer

I am currently reading a book called "Worlds of the Imperium" by Keith Laumer. Mr Laumer was an officer in the United States Air Force and a diplomat with the U.S. Foreign Service. He was also an exceptionally talented author, writing mainly science fiction.  This story was written in 1962 while he was serving his second stint in the Air Force.  Laumer was a strong believer in American exceptionalism. Much like Heinlein, he sometimes used his fiction to express his disgust with the growing anti-American movement of the 1960s and '70s.  This quote is so good I just had to share it:

“Civilized man has a responsibility. His is not the privilege of abdicating the position he holds as leader in the world. His culture represents the best achievements so far made by man in his long climb up from primordial beginnings. We have inherited the fruits of the struggle to master hostile nature, to conquer disease, to harness natural forces; we are less than true men if we allow these achievements to be lost, to leave vast areas to the ancient enemy, ignorance; or worst of all, to lose by default our hard-won position, to retreat before the savage, the backward in the name of enlightened social ideas. We have a duty to perform; not to narrow nationalistic policies, not to false ideas of superiority based on religions, social position, untenable racial theories, skin color; but to mankind, that all shall benefit from the real superiority of our western culture, which is bringing man up off his knees."

The man certainly did have a way with words.

There are, of course, two ways to read that. The first, which will be the immediate knee-jerk reaction of leftists and other forms of social parasite, is that it's nothing more than an apologia for Western colonialism. But I do not believe that was Laumer's meaning. As a military man and diplomat, he was exposed extensively to the cultures of the Third World. So was I. And I can tell you that there is nothing noble in the savage. Invariably, the people who think it is evil to bring Western culture and techology to the dark and backward regions of the planet have never actually been to those regions. I don't mean on a tour, I mean living there, on the ground, day-to-day. It's not fun and it's not an experience anyone wants to repeat once done.

I believe Laumer's intent was to show that Western civilization in general -- and America in particular -- has done more for humanity as a whole than any civilization in human history. You can quibble over the relative merits of colonialism until you're blue in the face, but the childish guilt and sophistic handwringing which characterizes such psuedo-academic nonsense is a luxury you'd not have living in the majority of places on the planet.

Note that we are not talking about nation-building here. There is a subtle but important difference. The flawed concept behind nation-building is that you can "gift" the wonders of Western civilization upon a people without materially changing their culture. It is the naive belief that culture is not tied to social achievement. That is why it has failed everywhere it has been tried. Of course the recipient culture will change; it must in order to grow. The barbarism and stalled social development is what was holding it back in the first place. Growth requires fundamental change; that is a law of nature. Handing a barbarian a constitution and a generator doesn't transform him into a self-reliant and civilized man any more than dressing a boy in a dress makes him a girl; it just confuses him -- in both cases.

There is nothing noble in letting savages continue to live short and brutish lives if we have the ability to uplift them. If that changes their culture, such is a small price to pay. Unlike liberals, I don't want to study savages in an uncontaminated natural environment. They are people, not insects. Treating them like a social science experiment is both arrogant and cruel -- something liberals and academics have never been able to understand about themselves.

Laumer's works are nearly all available in Kindle and Audible formats here. My favorite are the "Bolo" stories, but they are all excellent.