Do we know what we don't know?

I made a comment the other day in a discussion of Jonathan Chait's and David Corn's writings about the "anti-violence" "anti-war" left:

David and his commenters are rightly labeled as "anti-violence". It's the killing and the dying they hate (and rightfully so; only a psychopath wants to see people dead). The problem is simply that it isn't this simple.

Earlier in the month, Iraqi blogger Ali at Free Iraq commented about the role of not just the war in his own country but the fight going on in Lebanon. His comments shed great light on a fundamental difference between people who view the conflict as necessary and those who want nothing to do with it: As horrible as it may seem I do wish the war between Israel and Hezbollah goes on and on, that it spreads to involve Iran and Syria. I feel terrible for the losses among the innocents, Lebanese and Israeli, but I think that this is the only way for them, and us to finally have some peace.

The “anti-war” in the west cannot see any good coming out of war, and how can they when some of them probably haven’t heard a gun shot probably in 10 years if not more! It seems to me that although most of them are intelligent and honest people, they still don’t understand the way we live, here in Iraq, there in Lebanon or Syria. They can’t understand that peace for us, the one we used to live in and the one the Lebanese used to live in, the Syrians and Iranians is not even close to what it is to them and therefore war for us is not even close to what it is for them.

Peace isn't peace unless it's meaningful and real. Stopping the killing is a good thing, but it isn't the only thing.