IRVING LOUIS HOROWITZ
267
something less than social science and something more than mere specu–
lation, perhaps a prosaic ordering of Arendt's materials is necessary.
Overlooking her contempt for the "modern debunking 'sciences' psychol–
ogy and sociology," I shall state her position in proposition form and offer
possible lines of disagreement and further inquiry.
War and revolution have violence as their common denominator.
Conflict derives from fratricidal instincts, and political organization has its
roots in crime. Crucial to revolution in the modern age is the concurrence
of the idea of freedom and the experience of new social beginnings, of
apocalypse.
Revolution gains a new significance as war, its partner in violence,
becomes an implausible way to effect social change. Total annihilation has
transformed the character of the
mili
tary from protector of
civitas
into a
futile avenger. Even prior to the nuclear age, wars had become politically,
though not yet physically, a matter of national survival because of the
widespread fear that the vanquished power would suffer the subjugation of
its political organization. Nontechnological factors in warfare have been
eliminated so that the results of war may be calculated in advance with per–
fect precision. Foreknowledge of victory and defeat may well end a war
that need never explode into reality. If we are to survive, this cannot
become a century of warfare, but it most certainly will become a century
of total revolutions. The universal goal of war is revolution. But even
without the possibility of limited agreements, revolution will come to
define the character of the modern uses of violence and the present
impulse toward freedom and liberty.
Revolution in the modern age has been concerned with two distinct
drives: liberation (absence of restraint and increase in social mobili ty) and
freedom (political level of life). While liberation is consonant with various
forms of government, freedom is possible only through a republican form
of government, which explains why the American, French, and Russian
revolutions all adopted this form of rule.
The two fundamental models of revolution are the American and
French revolutions-though only the French Revolution became the basic
model for Marxism. The American Revolution adhered to the original
purpose of revolution-realizing freedom-while the French Revolution
abdicated freedom in the name of historical necessity. The American
Revolution was at one and the same time profoundly political and anti–
historical and, no less, anti political and quite historical.
The French revol utionary model, which penetrated the ideological
and organizational aspects of the Russian Revolution, was concerned with
the social question-with problems of exploitation, mass alienation, and
poverty. It was inspired by the idea of compassion but ended in a mindless
