I am still trying to account for Kerry's current stance as chief promoter of this new war. After all, he first came to national notice for his opposition to the Viet Nam War. True, he was not a draft resister but, like so many veterans, he was unwilling to remain silent after he learned what that war really was about. When he enlisted in 1966 antiwar opposition had already begun but it was still limited mostly to the Left and pacifist groups. Even Daniel Ellsberg did not understand how criminal the war was in 66. This is why I never faulted Kerry for not taking a stand while still at Harvard nor for enlisting. (I supported Goldwater in 64 myself)
I remember how impressed I was in 1971 by his testimony in Congress and by his leadership in the Winter Soldier investigations. (The documentary film Winter Soldier is well worth viewing) His Senate career was also exemplary, as in his lead role in the BCCI investigation.
But clearly, he began to change by the time of the Iraq War, which he definitely supported. When he ran for president in 2004, I was disappointed by his failure to clearly attack the war, opting for a more "nuanced" approach. In his campaign he studiously avoided citing what I had thought to be his proudest moments, when he had opposed the war in which he fought, and instead tried to sound as conservative as he reasonably could. This is why, in my view, he was so easy to paint as a flip-flopper.
Perhaps the explanation for his current bellicosity is simply that he cannot escape his class, his membership in the top 0.001% of the earth's population. He came from a wealthy background on his mother's side, the Forbes family. But it was his marriage to Theresa Heinz in 1995 that made him far and away the wealthiest member of either House. His own assets are estimated at $167 million by Roll Call,a little above Darryl Issa's, but if his wife's assets are included, the couple's net worth is somewhere over a billion dollars.
Even if he does not acknowledge it even to himself, the grossly disproportionate wealth of the billionaire class to which he and his wife belong is sustained only by the arbitrary use of armed force. This class abhors any disorder that might upset the extreme inequities which make their privileged lives possible. Thus, Kerry's support for war may be as rational as that of the Saudi and Qatari billionaires. Even if this particular war may not seem to threaten global class structure, any weakening of US military dominance certainly would.
Billionaires cannot afford to be pacifists.