In an ironic twist of fate, U.S. President Barack Obama joined the likes of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., General George Marshall, Mother Theresa and former South African President Nelson Mandela in accepting a Nobel Peace Prize Thursday in Oslo, Norway, just days after he announced a decision to escalate the war in Afghanistan.
The mission of the prize, to award someone that has done the “most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses,” as instructed in Albert Nobel’s will, is at odds with Obama’s decision to send 30,000 more troops into a war that has already dragged on for eight years.
In accepting the award, he attempted to reconcile simultaneously being a wartime president and a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize by laying out the case for “just war.”
"I face the world as it is, and cannot stand idle in the face of threats to the American people," Obama said. "For make no mistake: Evil does exist in the world. A nonviolent movement could not have halted Hitler's armies. Negotiations cannot convince Al Qaeda's leaders to lay down their arms. To say that force is sometimes necessary is not a call to cynicism - it is a recognition of history; the imperfections of man and the limits of reason."
Obama spent much of his speech justifying his decision to send more American forces into Afghanistan, but also acknowledged the brutal reality of war.
"I am responsible for the deployment of thousands of young Americans to battle in a distant land. Some will kill. Some will be killed," he said. "And so I come here with an acute sense of the cost of armed conflict -- filled with difficult questions about the relationship between war and peace, and our effort to replace one with the other."
Obama has been criticized by the right for not defending American exceptionalism around the globe, but he did just that in his speech Thursday by reminding his largely European audience that it was America that saved their continent, and the world, from tyranny.
“Whatever mistakes we have made, the plain fact is this: The United States of America has helped underwrite global security for more than six decades with the blood of our citizens and the strength of our arms. The service and sacrifice of our men and women in uniform has promoted peace and prosperity from Germany to Korea, and enabled democracy to take hold in places like the Balkans,” he said.
He laid out three principles that he said would help to achieve “a lasting peace” in the world: the world community banding together to hold rouge states such as Iran and North Korea accountable, respect for fundamental human rights around the globe and economic opportunity.
"Peace is unstable where citizens are denied the right to speak freely or worship as they please; choose their own leaders or assemble without fear. ... A just peace includes not only civil and political rights - it must encompass economic security and opportunity. For true peace is not just freedom from fear, but freedom from want," he said.
The theme of the speech, however, tended to veer back into a justification for his Afghanistan decision as a morally justifiable cause.
"We must begin by acknowledging the hard truth: We will not eradicate violent conflict in our lifetimes. There will be times when nations — acting individually or in concert — will find the use of force not only necessary but morally justified," he said.