What should Methodists think about the arms trade?
My friend John on Facebook rather than his blog (where I hope he posts soon) has expressed concern at the recent statement by local Methodists in Brough following job losses among staff at weapons manufacturer BAE. Another friend, Robert, recently wrote an impassioned post about the arms fair in London that led to some challenging exchanges.
I must say that I share John's surprise to see the local statement on the national Methodist website.
Our local church issued a similar statement after the deaths during the riots in Birmingham and it was not accorded a similar status, despite being supplied to the website owners. This suggests - by accident I hope - a greater concern at national level for job losses in an Anglo-Saxon community than the deaths of three Asian born men in the inner city.
Nevertheless the statement does show a local church responding to a problem that affects its own members and the community in which it serves in this case the massive job losses amongst those employed in the defence industry.
When I was younger there was no problem for me with the arms trade. I was against war, a committed pacifist and therefore the use of force and the production of arms was wrong. Previously I have described the process and events by which I moved from that position.
Once you accept that force is an option then you have to accept that armaments are needed. Romantic ideas of poorly equipped guerrilla movements overthrowing superior force are great as fairy tales but when confronting someone with a gun the most effective response is a bigger gun. And so begins the arms race.
The first responsibility of any state is that it should be able to protect its population. This means that it must be able to make or procure weapons. Making weapons has always been at the cutting edge of technology whether it was making swords or computer controlled drones. So there is a legitimate market in weapons.
It is our lot here in the UK to have developed a technical base which is able to produce some of the most sought after weaponry in the world. That same technical base can produce some of the most advanced medical equipment. That is the wonder of living in an advanced industrial society.
So should we somehow say that making weapons is so wrong that we are not prepared to support our own industries? That somehow we are not appalled that thousands of highly skilled jobs are being lost? That sizable investments are going to be lost?
I think this is a discussion worth having. I find it difficult. My tentative conclusion is that making the weapons is not the issue, its the destination and the deployment. That owes more to creating an ethical foreign policy than opposing the arms trade/defence industries.
Methodists in a previous generation would have joined this discussion with great gusto. Sadly I don't believe that is the case today.
My friend John on Facebook rather than his blog (where I hope he posts soon) has expressed concern at the recent statement by local Methodists in Brough following job losses among staff at weapons manufacturer BAE. Another friend, Robert, recently wrote an impassioned post about the arms fair in London that led to some challenging exchanges.
I must say that I share John's surprise to see the local statement on the national Methodist website.
Our local church issued a similar statement after the deaths during the riots in Birmingham and it was not accorded a similar status, despite being supplied to the website owners. This suggests - by accident I hope - a greater concern at national level for job losses in an Anglo-Saxon community than the deaths of three Asian born men in the inner city.
Nevertheless the statement does show a local church responding to a problem that affects its own members and the community in which it serves in this case the massive job losses amongst those employed in the defence industry.
When I was younger there was no problem for me with the arms trade. I was against war, a committed pacifist and therefore the use of force and the production of arms was wrong. Previously I have described the process and events by which I moved from that position.
Once you accept that force is an option then you have to accept that armaments are needed. Romantic ideas of poorly equipped guerrilla movements overthrowing superior force are great as fairy tales but when confronting someone with a gun the most effective response is a bigger gun. And so begins the arms race.
The first responsibility of any state is that it should be able to protect its population. This means that it must be able to make or procure weapons. Making weapons has always been at the cutting edge of technology whether it was making swords or computer controlled drones. So there is a legitimate market in weapons.
It is our lot here in the UK to have developed a technical base which is able to produce some of the most sought after weaponry in the world. That same technical base can produce some of the most advanced medical equipment. That is the wonder of living in an advanced industrial society.
So should we somehow say that making weapons is so wrong that we are not prepared to support our own industries? That somehow we are not appalled that thousands of highly skilled jobs are being lost? That sizable investments are going to be lost?
I think this is a discussion worth having. I find it difficult. My tentative conclusion is that making the weapons is not the issue, its the destination and the deployment. That owes more to creating an ethical foreign policy than opposing the arms trade/defence industries.
Methodists in a previous generation would have joined this discussion with great gusto. Sadly I don't believe that is the case today.
