“Politics is war without bloodshed while war is politics with bloodshed.” – Mao Zedong
Politics is war. Because just like war, politics is the contention for power, even if in the former it is by means of arms and the latter, through non-violent schemes and strategy and notwithstanding that war is essentially waged over the control of territory but politics is pursued for the control of the people who occupy coveted land.
The difference between politics and war is blurred by the cross application of the modus operandi of one to the other. For, even though war is armed conflict, it entails the employment of violence according to out-of-the-trench strategy, to realise similar objectives that are achieved through politics. So, their ultimate results make civil and armed contentions further indistinguishable.
War is the engagement in violent hostilities between parties over territory but victory also secures the control of the people and other resources of captured land, which winning in politics also confers. Electoral victory secures the power to wage war, the outcome of which can lead to more political success or sudden failure for those given the mandate.
The generally held notion that war is do-or-die but politics is not, does not apply to all cases and thus fails to be a rationale for distinguishing war from politics. This is in the sense that seizing power even through politics can in many instances be a perilous quest, especially if it has to be taken from sit-tight ruthless despots, whose obsession with retaining control precludes all civilized means of engagement, thus leaving no option but force.
This is more so in corrupted democratic environments, where electoral processes are so rigged as to render the rule of law and due process ineffective and inapplicable. In these environments, total obedience to the rules guiding the process only spells certain defeat, especially for the contending side against whom the irregularities are usually contrived. Thus, the possibility of victory can only be by matching the opponent, ploy by ploy, subterfuge by subterfuge, without limit.
When breach of the law becomes the norm among contending parties, the moral status of action is only determined by motive. The objective for which power is sought, particularly if perceived to be progressive and thus supported by the masses, becomes the justification for any choice of action. The adage “set a thief to catch a thief” becomes operational in this context.
Victory is never attained by the naivety of insisting on what is right, when the adversary’s actions are without check and defy all sense of propriety. The rational course of action is to adopt similar strategies to those of the opposition, especially when they have proved through experience to lead to victory.
In war and in politics, the aftermath of contest is created by the victor, who has the prerogative to sustain the status quo or replace it by enacting a new order. Thus, the victorious contender, having opposed the previous state of affairs, can institute change that may eliminate from the system, the improprieties that the struggle for power had made exigent. On the other hand, change, however desirable, cannot come from the defeated. Neither can an existing order, no matter how ideal, be protected by a party vanquished.
It should follow then, that the end, if it is positive, justifies the means, even if the means is not desirable. A military or political campaign consists of a combination of actions that may be deemed virtuous or ignoble, dispassionately employed as different times and situations made necessary, without prejudice to heir moral values, so long as the ultimate objective of the campaign is righteous.
So, abstaining from a certain set of actions in the interest of principle, only by so doing to concede supremacy to unrighteous forces is a tacit abetment of their agenda.
Shekara is a media practitioner based in Sokoto
