This is another Facebook essay, captured for posterity.

TL:DR; I have found myself thinking that the lyrics between P/G and T4E were … less satisfying than the other eras of Rush, and I don’t know WHY. I have suppositions, and analyzing the lyrics from a technical perspective yields little… but this is something that I was thinking about “Manhattan Project.” Short version: I think Peart didn’t bother presenting why the project existed well at all, and chose the easy path of “I don’t like that it existed,” even though it’s written well and is performed masterfully.

I was thinking this morning about a song by Rush (yes, I am a nerd), and a related conclusion is that pacifism is a LOT easier when you’re on the side that has a better chance of winning any given conflict.

The song was “Manhattan Project,” from “Power Windows,” and I find that lyrically it’s one of the weaker Rush albums, although the music tends to be pure fire from that period, if it’s your thing. (That was the beginning of Rush’s real “synth era” and relied very heavily on technology.) Like another song from the album, “Territories,” it lacks understanding and empathy, instead choosing populist’s approach of “bombs are bad, how tragic that we used the technology to kill,” although that’s a poor paraphrase.

It’s really written more like a ballad than “Territories” is, and I think it bothers me less because of that; it’s really trying to characterize the process rather than criticize it, but some of the characterization is overly simple, saying that the project was trying to “build the best big stick” to “turn the winning trick,” regardless of the impact such a drastic increase in power would have.

But is that really fair to the motivations of the project? It really isn’t; when you’re faced with existential threats (which is how the Axis presented itself, and how the Allies perceived the Axis, regardless of what hindsight would say about either one), what is the right response?

Pacifists would say to find some way to coexist, I suppose, at best; true pacifists say that they’re willing to die for their cause, I suppose? (I haven’t been able to verify this; when pressed, they seem to place the responsibility of their survival on people who don’t share their views. Apparently, it’s okay for someone unidentified to carry the gun, although it’s wrong to do so? And they get offended when you press the issue, so … I’m guessing, honestly.)

But being willing to surrender, with coexistence the best outcome, is no way to survive. In game theory, that’s a losing proposition, with the best possible outcome a short survival.

Why? Because nobody would have any reason to choose your pacifist strategy over a more aggressive one; the aggressive strategy can’t lose to your strategy, because you’re unwilling to fight back. The only ways an aggressive strategy can lose are:

  • From internal causes, as support for aggression wanes (the best outcome for the pacifists, and probably the one they rely on most), and creates a “soft coup” or peaceful transfer of power; in my experience, this has happened extraordinarily rarely, although oddly enough it’s happened in the United States
  • From internal causes, as power shifts (i.e., they suffer a coup, as one aggressive party falls to another aggressive party)
  • From external causes, as another aggressive state fights back and overpowers them

Note the lack of “from external causes, as peace and flowers fill the air and cause the aggressors to just stop, because why wouldn’t they?” - that’s a fine dream, but I’m unaware of it occurring in history, ever. The other three happen; even the least of them has happened in history (and in recent history, too!) but that’s a recent phenomenon.

In most cases throughout mankind’s record of itself, aggression has fallen only to more aggression, applied with greater force in some way: overwhelming power, or better strategy at war. That’s how you guarantee a win, because hoping the other side collapses before you lose is heavily reliant on the will of your opponent; if they have a will to win, you’re dead unless you fight back better than they do.

The Manhattan Project existed under that framework: we were in a war, we had a possibility for an overwhelming weapon against which our opponents could not defend except by developing their own similar weapon (and we concentrated efforts to prevent them from doing so). The scientists weren’t just sitting around, going, “Hey, Bill - wouldn’t it be neat to spend a significant portion of our GDP on something that goes, like, KABLOOEY, except bigger? … and the sunsets! They’d be awesome!”

And that’s what I think “Manhattan Project” presents - the scientists as shortsighted and warlike gnomes, tinkering about to create a tool without thinking about the possible consequences. (The portrayal of Paul Tibbets, Jr., flying away from Hiroshima, is well-done in the song, in my opinion.) There may have been some such people - in particular those who betrayed the US to share weapon information with the USSR - but even they may have been motivated by some sense of ethics, to create a counterbalance against overwhelming US power.

In the end, the Manhattan Project may have upended the notion of world power, creating a set of superpowers who may or may not have held the wisdom to use such power well… but to characterize the enactors trivially demeans both the author and the listeners.