On bin Laden’s execution

I felt some ambivalence at first.

Not about the fact that our military killed him – that clearly had to be done. Someone who thinks it’s a good idea to blow up innocent people he’s never met, just to give the finger to a country he doesn’t like, is dangerously insane. And I’m certainly not shedding any tears for the guy. He pulled the strings of an organization that destroyed many innocent people, and destroyed part of my hometown. He told people that these murders were a holy mission – a blasphemy so huge I’m amazed he wasn’t struck by lightning decades ago. (Clearly, God the merciful, the compassionate is more patient than I am). And while bin Laden sent people to kill and die for him, he didn’t have the balls to put his own life on the line – hid behind a woman in the end, to try and manipulate the SEALs into holding their fire. Certainly, this is someone who couldn’t be allowed to continue breathing, and I’m glad he’s gone.

I can hardly even think of this as the necessary killing of a fellow human. He’d already killed everything about himself that was human. Compassion, honor, love, courage, even the basic idea that human life is valuable… he’d systematically uprooted all these things from himself. What the SEALs shot was all that was left - a clever, malicious animal. It’s horrible to say this, but it’s as if his soul was already in Hell decades before his body joined it. The sooner such an existence is ended, the better.

No, it’s not the fact that our military executed bin Laden that I was ambivalent about. I was ambivalent about our response.

Certainly, we have a right to be relieved, and we have a right to feel satisfied that we did something that had to be done. But all-night parties to celebrate his death did look a little too much like the kind of thing his followers were doing 10 years ago in September.

And it’s not that I worry about how the Muslim world will see us. Certainly it’s not good that young, angry Muslims who’ve heard the guy’s rhetoric are watching us celebrate his death, and comparing it to how the terrorists celebrated the fall of the Towers. But: The sane Muslims already understand that the guy was crazy and needed to be removed, and understand why we’re glad he’s gone – many of them are probably glad too, since he’s no longer around to give decent Muslims a bad name. The ones on the fringe that want to find reasons to believe that he was right about us… they’d find reasons even if we declared a national day of prayer for his soul. The people who will treat him as a martyr would have done so even if he’d died in bed from kidney failure.

My only concern about celebrating is this: We ought to be better than what we’re fighting against. If we’re celebrating because we won and someone else lost, that’s a problem. If we’re celebrating because we are more efficient killers than our enemies, that’s a problem. If we’re celebrating revenge, that’s a problem.

But if we’re celebrating because we see this as a step closer to the day that the killing will stop – what’s not to celebrate?

Myself, the thing that makes me want to celebrate is this thought: In 1945, Germany was an enemy, bankrupt, and run by madmen. After the madmen were killed, Germany became an ally, prosperous, and run by sane people. There are still neo-Nazis, but they no longer get to speak or act on Germany’s behalf – the decent, sane people do.* I want to celebrate the hope that the same thing can happen for Iraq and Afghanistan over the next 50 years, now that their insane leaders have been destroyed and the decent, sane people will have a chance. Imagine our grandchildren going backpacking through the Middle East, and finding it a safe and welcoming place. It seems far-fetched right now. But then, our grandparents never would have expected American teenagers to be doing this in Germany.

I think we can and should express joy and relief that we’re a little bit safer now. I think we can and should celebrate that a long and costly battle, which we were unwillingly dragged into, is a tiny step closer to being over. I think we can and should treat his death the way we would treat the execution of any other sociopathic killer – as a necessary act, the sad culmination of the sad fact that there’s no other possible way to prevent this particular criminal from committing any more crimes. And perhaps Christians may even hold the hope that in the last moments of bin Ladin’s life, there was a second’s remorse, a moment when he had enough humanity to be sorry, maybe even enough time to repent. (They’d be better Christians than I am… but I hope there are Christians like that somewhere out there.)

I did start off feeling that dancing in the streets was going too far. We were horrified by this behavior when it was the other side doing it – is it okay now just because it’s us doing it? But thinking it over, I don’t think that those people were dancing for the same reason that jihadists danced when the Towers fell. The jihadists danced because they were glad that enemies died. Those college kids on the lawn of the White House danced because they were glad that a threat to their own safety, and the safety of their loved ones, has been removed. There’s a difference.
So really, I don’t think anyone needs to feel guilty about celebrating. Hatemongering, that’s something that needs to stop, no matter who does it. But celebrating a step towards ending a war – celebrating a step towards peace – that’s nothing to be ashamed of.

Even so, I really love this about our country: We may be the only people on earth who would even bother to ask ourselves whether it’s okay to celebrate killing an enemy. We as a society are asking the question, because it’s more important to us to be good people than it is to win. God bless America for that.


*As decent and sane as politicians get, anyway...

Copyright John M. Munzer