Adam

Treasure 1-123 Initiation 4-27 “’there could be women and children aboard that plane.’ ‘the facts don’t spell tragedy. She’s still in the air. If the //polar explorer// is the only hope of rescue in this part of the sea, why no distress call, no attempt to signal us with his landing lights, no sign of preparations to ditch? You’re a flyer, you tell me why the pilot hasn’t circled the ship if he’s in trouble.’ ‘could be he’s trying for land.’ ‘begging the captian’s pardon,’ interrupted the watch officer, ‘I forgot to mention the landing flaps were down.’ ‘damn the compassion, full steam ahead,’ Pitt said coldly. ‘this isn’t war, captain, we’re talking about a mission of mercy. I wouldn’t want it on my conscience if a hundred people died because I failed to act.the navy can well afford the feul it takes to navigate.’”pg 61 This exchange happens after the ship that the men were arguing on, owned by the National Underwater and Marine Agency and sent to locate a sunken Russian submarine, completes its mission. It was critical, however, that the Russians didn’t learn where their own sub was. To trick the Soviet surveillance satellites, the polar explorer had been continuing the grid search pattern it was using before finding the Russian sub. That was when the crew saw the disabled plane, hijacked by terrorists, fly right over the ship. I chose this quote because it forced a difficult choice on the officers of the polar explorer. Turning back to help any survivors of the crash would make the Russians think they had found what they were looking for, then it wouldn’t be long before they found it too. Would they secure their advantage over Russia by continuing the mock search, at the expense of hundreds of lives? This story is set during the Cold war, so any advantage the Americans could get was extremely valuable. Or would they ignore politics and save as many innocent people as they could? They weren't even sure the plane was going to crash, or if there would be survivors, so was that worth it? The Americans were lucky enough to have a helicopter, and didn’t have to make that choice. But if they had had to choose, what is the right thing to do? Is it better to do whatever is best for your country, no matter what? No matter who or how many must suffer for it? Especially if the ones who suffer are unwilling? And if not, then at what point is it worth forcing people to take one for their team? How great must a cause be to be worth dying for? These are hard for me to answer without getting religion involved. But God or no God, I believe that if the ones who must suffer are willing to do so for the sake of their country, then there is no problem with allowing them to do so. If the victims are unwilling, though, it becomes more difficult. In that case, the only two reasons I would force or allow them to suffer are if the advantage gained is certain and critical for the survival or victory of the nation, or if the people's suffering was very insignificant compared with the magnitude of struggle that required them to make sacrifices. For example, if the people didn’t want to pay 5% more tax but doing so would somehow solve all the problems in the Middle East, it is worth forcing them to. But aside from those two conditions, I say there is never a time when a nation is more important than even a select group of the people in it. The theme I have been discussing ties in nicely with __Farewell to Manzanar__. Unfortunately for the Japanese Americans, FDR disagreed with what I said above. He thought it was worth debilitating, if temporarily, the lives of thousands to better ensure his nation’s welfare. Anyway, regardless of the outcomes of Pitt and Knight’s decision and Roosevelt’s, they both had to choose between their country and innocent people.
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