This began as a comment, but I think it's worthy enough of discussion to merit its own diary. We'll see.
Responding to the recent "Pacifism" diary, I have to say that while it is a beautifully done and moving post, I'm afraid I don't see it in quite the way the author does. I agree completely about the difference between aggression, self-defense and intervention... but I also recognize that our minds are not the primary drivers of our behavior, much as we might like to think otherwise.
More below the flip
We are pack predators. That's our genetic legacy, and we cannot overcome it. Certainly, those who have seen war are sickened by it--except for those so completely destroyed by it that they begin to like it, to fetishize it. But nonetheless, those who are oppressed, or poorer than their neighbor, or instilled with some ideology of moral superiority (often conflated with real or supposed victimhood) are going to go violent. It's how we're built. If it weren't, thousands of years of Buddhism would have made Japan the most peaceful nation on Earth. Instead, they became an expansionist military dictatorship until an awakening experience involving nuclear physics began to change their culture around...and even today, they fall into the greatest and most inevitable of human evils, the "I'm better than everybody else" fallacy, which is shared by pretty much every identifiable social group on the planet.
So...yes. War: awful. But just being "against it" doesn't mean anything. The people who drive us toward it claim to be against it. Does it really matter that after all their killing, Butler or Eisenhower or MacArthur disclaim war?
I go back to economics. If you really want to reduce conflict, you have to make sure that there aren't large populations with legitimate grievances. That means that American quality of life has to plummet. Say goodbye to your computer, and hello to life at a Cuban standard of living.
I'm up for it. I'm up for spreading the wealth.
But are you? Are you willing to be a pacifist if it COSTS you?