Satyagraha: Non-Violent Resistance and the Search for Truth

September 11, 1906.
Mahatma Gandhi speaks to 3000 Indians in Johannesburg, South Africa. Gandhi would later recognize the significance, stating; " The principle called Satyagraha came into being before that name was invented. Indeed when it was born, I myself could not say what it was."
This day was the conception of a powerful new idea.
Non-violent resistance would soon be employed to free 300 million Indians from British colonial rule and give hope to millions of repressed peoples around the world. Satyagraha would later be used by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to confront segregation in America and by Nelson Mandela in his struggle to end apartheid in South Africa.
In searching for the truth behind his own subjugation, Gandhi had found a way to use his suffering against his enemies. The process of loving one's enemy can be a difficult and profound exercise in understanding one's own true motivations. Through suffering and non-violent resistance a person may not find the truth they seek, but through war, one can only cloud the truth and forge hatred betwixt peoples and nations.
Further advances of non-violent resistance continue to change the policies and practices of governments everywhere, except in the United States. For the first time in American history, non-violent protests preempted a war. Unlike the Vietnam conflict which raged for nearly 6 years before peace movements gained traction, non-violent protests began months in advance of the war in Iraq. This resistance was met with armies of riot police and thousands of detentions and arrests. The war began as scheduled. Nothing was changed.
Has everyone forgotten that, throughout history, it has been popular movements, not leaders, that have been the catalyst for change? It was as though after the resistance to the Iraq war was squelched, people felt helpless and embarrassed. But, these feelings of ineptitude can be projected outwardly, through Satyagraha, to defeat violence. One's enemies can be made to look over-bearing and repressive if the suffering and subjugation become too great. Once that threshold is reached, the love for your enemy can be used to make him look boorish and uncouth.
As the "war on terror" turns 5 it might serve us well to also remember the 100th birthday of Satyagraha, the search for truth through non-violent resistance. Fear has always been the enemy of truth, but without fear, we are free to ask questions, even if the answers may not be to our liking. Fear of an idea (terror) has led us down the path of complacency and only by resisting that idea can we come to realize the truth; there is no war, only the fear of war.
Vinoba Bhave, one of Gandhi's successors said, " These days absence of war is regarded as peace. But peace really connotes absence of fear. There would be peace only when no part of the world is afraid of or exploited by any other part."