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"good reasons" for not offering the help they couldhave given.No Cooperation with Mass KillersIn each case, there was a "reasonable" argumentwhy Hitler could not be opposed more openly becauseof what it would have "cost" to do so: America andEngland needed their full resources for the war effortand did not want to "waste" one soldier or one bombon missions that weren't critical to the war effort; theInternational Red Cross was concerned not to be barredby Hitler from rendering its important services to otherpeople in need in the various countries of Europe thatHitler occupied; and the Zionists were concerned beforethe outbreak of the war about getting out as manyZionist Jews as they could from Germany and Europe,and wanted the cooperation of the Nazi officials forthis purpose.To fight genocide, one has to have a convictionthat, at nopointin history and despite any selfinterest,one mustnever cooperate with any form ofmass killing,genocidal massacre, or genocide.It is interesting that in personal situations ofmurder, most people would not hesitate to choose theprinciple that murder must be opposed even if it coststhem something. Would you agree to be paid off toremain silent about the murder of your neighbor?Would you agree to "forget" a murder that you sawin your community in order to protect yourself fromthe retaliations of the murderer against yourself andyour family?Somehow when the patterns of murder are larger,involving thousands and millions of people, it is easierto persuade people to watch out for their own interestsand to avoid the risks of intervention.The Record of GovernmentsIs Very PoorThe record of governments on genocide is often,if not virtually always, very poor. At the level ofinternational governinent, following the sincere hopesof much of humankind in creating the UN and inpassage of the United Nations Convention on Genocidein the wake of World War II, the real record, asdescribed by Professor Leo Kuper of UCLA in ThePrevention of Genocide, ' is a sorry one of indifference,cynicism, impotence, and most outrageous manipulationsby member nations. Thus, former AmnestyAmerica President David Hawk has done intrepidresearch on the genocide in Cambodia and created aCambodia Documentation Commission which undertookto prepare a legal brief to bring charges against thegovernment of Cambodia before the World Court infulfillment of the procedures of the UN GenocideConvention. After several years of arduous work inpreparing the necessary legal materials, the Commissionfound that it could enlist no country in the world whichwas a member state of the United Nations to formallybring the charges. 'There are two reasons why even governments ofdemocratic societies do so poorly. The first is that,insofar as a government itself is a perpetrator ofgenocide, its reflex reaction is to defend itself fromscrutiny and criticism, and therefore correction becomesunlikely. In the case of totalitarian governments, theintention of the government from the outset will be todeceive everyone including its own people and suppressprotest and opposition to its genocidal policy.The second major obstacle is that the overwhelmingconsideration of governments is, always, one ofpragmatic self-interest and realism, which, of course,is what we mean by Realpolitik. This situation is notunlike that of major tobacco companies that go onpromoting their products in the face of the overwhelmingscientific evidence that smoking brings death tomillions of people.Governments have been known to rationalize theirpolicies of "playing ball" with other genocidal nationson the basis of every possible consideration: businessneeds, protection of one's own nationals, even the ideathat maintaining a presence in the genocidal countrywill make it more possible to moderate the genocidalpolicy sometime in the future! Almost invariably, thetruth is that underlying these policies of collaborationwith a genocidal nation we will find a) a value systemthat places cynical realism and ambition above anyconsideration of genuine ethical or spiritual commitmentsto other peoples' lives, and b) indifference, ifnot contempt, for the minority that is being victimized.Ugly Behaviors in the Bastions of DemocracyIn this essay, I use examples particularly from thetwo countries in which I am privileged to be at homeand about which I care deeply. Both are proudlycommitted to the deepest democratic values: one is thegreatest power on earth today, the United States; theother is a struggling tiny nation built on the ashes ofthe most severe instance of genocide in human history,Israel. The ugly behaviors and values that surface evenin these outstanding bastions of democracy teach usthat the evolutionary challenge for people and nationsto commit themselves to genuine protection of allhuman life is a huge task that basically is still farbeyond our Earth-civilization.150 GENOCIDE