On: North Korea's Kim reaffirms support for Russia's 'sacred' Ukraine war

The dispatch from Pyongyang speaks of a “sacred” war. The term “sacred” implies a divine mandate, a righteousness beyond question, a justification that transcends mere human calculation. Yet, the evidence for such a mandate is conspicuously absent. One searches in vain for the celestial decree, the unambiguous sign that elevates this particular conflict above the common brutality of armed struggle.

To declare a war sacred is to remove it from the realm of rational discourse. It is to assert that its ends are unimpeachable, its means therefore justified by definition. By this standard, any conflict, however rapacious or destructive, could be cloaked in sanctity. One might as well declare a game of chess “sacred” and then insist that every move is divinely ordained. The logical consequence of such a premise is the nullification of all moral inquiry. If all is sacred, then nothing is.

The support offered by one autocrat to another, framed in such terms, reveals not a shared moral vision, but a shared utility in rhetorical obfuscation. The language serves to insulate actions from scrutiny, to replace argument with assertion. It is a familiar tactic: when the facts are inconvenient, elevate the discussion to a plane where facts are deemed irrelevant. This does not, however, alter the facts themselves. The war remains a war, its character determined by its conduct, not by the adjectives appended to it.