"Lord of the Rings": lessons in disarmament

"One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them. One Ring to bring them all And in the Darkness bind them In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie."

Many of you by now have seen the movie, "Lord of the Rings." You may even have read the books. Both the film and the books were released during world wars.

Tolkein makes clear that his story is "without any allegorical significance or contemporary political reference whatsoever." The Dark Lord's dominion is not the rise of fascism. Saruman is neither collaborationist nor "appeasement" strategist. The ruffians who take over the Shire after the War, imposing authoritarian control over the economy "for fair distribution," do not represent Stalinist expansion into Eastern Europe. The One Ring is not nuclear power. However, Tolkein notes, "I much prefer history, true or feigned, with its varied applicability to the thought and experience of the readers." Tolkein's war story has lessons that can be applied to many wars, yet its outcome turns military tradition on its head. Think about it: a loose coalition of poorly armed rabble shows down the Forces of Evil, using the power of disarmament.

The Dark Lord Sauron's magical Ring controls the Elven Rings (the forces of creativity and healing), the Dwarves' Rings (the forces of avarice and craftsmanship) and the Rings "for Mortal Men doomed to die" (representing the self-destructive lust for power). Such a Ring would seem to be the ultimate weapon, yet when it falls into the hands of the resistance, the wizard Gandalf, who serves as their spiritual guide, advises them not to use it. He warns that to use the Ring would lower them to the level of their oppressors, corrupt their minds with power-lust, sow dissension among them, and reduce them to small-time flunkies for the Forces of Evil. Sounds like something Martin Luther King might say.

Instead, Gandalf urges allied bands of resistance fighters to distract the Dark Lord while the diminutive hero, Frodo, takes the Ring to be destroyed -- thus breaking the spirit of military imperialism throughout the world. It seems like a suicide mission, but Gandalf urges, "We must walk open-eyed into that trap, with courage, but small hope for ourselves. For it may well prove that we ourselves shall perish utterly. But this, I deem, is our duty. And better so than to perish nonetheless--as we surely shall, if we sit here--and know as we die that no new age shall be." Sounds like advice from Gandhi, urging Indians to confront the British armies armed only with love, saying, "We will not submit to this great wrong, not merely because it will destroy us, but because it is destroying you as well."

Gandalf warns of the resistance's military inadequacy, saying, "We cannot achieve victory by arms," echoing the earlier advice of Elrond the Elf, who sends Frodo out to destroy the Ring, saying, "The road must be trod, but it will be very hard. And neither strength nor wisdom will carry us far upon it. This quest may be attempted by the weak with as much hope as the strong. Yet such is oft the course of deeds that move the wheels of the world: small hands do them because they must, while the eyes of the great are elsewhere."

Such words apply to the Catholic-based "people power" that ousted Ferdinand Marcos in 1986, averting a blood bath by interposing their singing, praying bodies between armed tanks and a rebel group of reform-minded military officers. Such words apply to the organizers of boycotts and strikes to bring about democracy in South Africa and Burma. Such words describe the teenage graffiti artists and media activists who led the nonviolent resistance movement that forced Slobodan Milosovic from power in 1999 and 2000. Or the Kabyl youth occupying buildings in Algeria. Or the tree-sitters in Ecuador's Mindo Cloudforest. Or the middle-class banging pots and pans at the Casa Rosada in Argentina. Or the turtles and teamsters in the streets of Seattle. Or... and on and on and on.

The wizard Saruman, whose lust for knowledge has caused him to use the tools of the Enemy and become corrupted by them, argues in favor of collaboration with Sauron, saying,

"A new Power is rising. Against it, the old allies and policies will not avail us at all. [But] we may join with that Power. As the Power grows, its proved friends will also grow; and the Wise, such as you and I, may with patience come at last to direct its courses, to control it. We can bide our time, we can keep our thoughts in our hearts, deploring maybe evils done by the way, but approving the ultimate purpose: Knowledge. Rule. Order: all the things we have so far striven in vain to accomplish. There need not be, there would not be, any real change in our designs, only in our means."

'The ends justify the means.' How many times, throughout history, have we heard this argument to justify repression and slaughter? Gandalf refuses, choosing the path of insecurity and vulnerability, with the aim of ultimately destroying his Sauron's hold over the hearts and minds of the armies that do Sauron's dirty work. This echoes Gandhi's injunction,

"It is open to the great powers to take up nonviolence any day and cover themselves with glory and earn the eternal gratitude of posterity. If they or any of them can shed the fear of destruction, if they disarm themselves, they will automatically help the rest to regain their sanity. If the mad race for armaments continues, it is bound to result in a slaughter such as has never occurred in history. If there is a victor left, the very victory will be a living death for the nation that emerges victorious."

The same spirit runs through the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, the Ban on Biological and Chemical Weapons, and the International Ban on Landmines: there is no security that can be bought with the use of weapons of mass destruction. Only by choosing the "vulnerability" of disarmament can a people be secure -- secure in integrity, if not immediately in physical safety.

Frodo takes this lesson further and throws away his sword, declaring, "I'll bear no weapon, fair or foul. Let them take me, if they will!" When Sauron is deposed, Saruman leads a band of ruffians to take over Frodo's hometown ("the Shire"); a peasant rebellion ousts the ruffians, but Frodo allows them and Saruman to leave in peace, saying, "It is useless to meet revenge with revenge: it will heal nothing." Reminds me of George Lakey's essay, "Nonviolence as the Sword that Heals." (http://www.nonviolence.org)

Most applicable, perhaps, is Tolkein's emphasis on redemption. Time and again, Tolkein's protagonists are confronted with characters that seem thoroughly evil. Yet Gandalf reminds them that even the Dark Lord "is himself but a servant or emissary." When Frodo returns home to find that Lotho, a small-time mob boss, has instituted a rule of thuggery, Frodo laments, "Lotho never meant things to come to this pass. He has been a wicked fool, but he's caught now. The ruffians are on top, gathering, robbing, and bullying, and running or ruining things as they like, in his name. And not in his name even for very much longer. He's a prisoner in [his own palace] now, I expect, and very frightened." Those who seize power through military coercion get tangled up themselves in the webs of coercion they have helped to weave.

Gandalf argues that even the most corrupt may be reformed or at least play some constructive role in history, saying, "Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgment. For even the very wise cannot see all ends." To destroy the world's 'evildoers' would not destroy evil.

Sam, Frodo's companion, wrestles with the dilemma of waging war while respecting the humanity of one's enemies; Tolkein writes, "It was Sam's first view of a battle of Men against Men, and he did not like it much. He was glad that he could not see the dead [man's] face. He wondered what the man's name was and where he came from; and if he was really evil of heart, or what lies and threats had led him on the long march from his home; and if he would not really rather have stayed there in peace." The resistance turns this belief in redemption to their military advantage by inviting the armies they conquer to disarm and leave in peace, or to join forces with them voluntarily, thereby saving their strength and averting bloodshed on all sides.

The story of the War of the Rings leaves believers in disarmament with several dilemmas. Unlike fantasy, the real world is not divisible into simple sides of "good" and "evil." The real world does not allow traditions of military imperialism to dissolve with the disarming of a single weapon. Furthermore, the world's weapons are not ours to destroy. Even if all weapons of mass destruction were sought out and destroyed, market demand would soon drive the production of new ones. As we have seen in the Occupied Territories of Israel, in Northern Ireland, and around the world, those who do not have weapons throw stones.

True disarmament comes about first through taking up the stronger weapon of soul-force. Soul force exists in everybody to some extent, and can be developed through long hours of practice, soul searching and training; it's much more than simply filling the jails.

Yet this is not enough. True disarmament offers alternatives; when Frodo urges a nonviolent revolution to take back the Shire from Saruman's ruffians, his companion scoffs, "You won't rescue the Shire just be being shocked and sad." Frodo reluctantly allows his companion to foment a peasants' rebellion, and the Shire is liberated--costing the lives of 70 ruffians and 19 villagers.

So what alternative, then, can antiwar activists offer to those who fear for their lives and livelihoods? World War Two taught us that fascism cannot be 'appeased,' and turning a blind eye to civilian slaughter may corrupt our own hearts, as it did Saruman's. And while Gandhi advocated "gaining life by losing it," most people in the world support the right to self-defense. It is not ours to impose martyrdom on the rest of the world; we must find new ways of self-defense. How can we fight fire with water, rather than with more fire?

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