A cautionary note on the war on terrorism

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This one is a very thought-provoking piece by well-respected professor of philosophy. I received it by e-mail this morning.

A cautionary note on the war on terrorism

With regard to the impeding "war on terrorism," there are two groups of people I do not particularly want to address. The first consists of those folks who, following the old Rothbard strategy, oppose any proposed military action by the U.S. government on the grounds that, whatever the current crisis or horror, the fault ultimately lies with past U.S. policy. While it will be obvious in the following that I am not great admirer of the actions of our esteemed leaders, this strategy has always seemed to me to be motivated by a perverse desire to condemn one's own state especially and to deny the evils of other agents in the world. The second group I do not particularly want to address are those who, like Peikoff, are quite willing -- indeed, it seems eager -- for the U.S. military to wipe out entire cities or nations on the grounds that "they" are harboring murderous terrorists. This is an extraordinary thing to hear from people who purport to be individualists, i.e., who purport to take individuals and not collectivities as the bearers of value, responsibility, and rights.

The people I want to address are those who, like myself, believe that some sustained, extensive, and death-inflicting response by the U.S. military is justified, but who are prepared to be cautious in what response they endorse and very concerned about what the costs may be of a war on terrorism.

Any libertarian or Objectivist must take any killing of the innocent to be profoundly morally troubling. And any large-scale military operation, any "war," no matter how just its cause, will inevitably involve the killing of some innocent people. This is one major reason why libertarians and Objectivists should think carefully about what sort of a war they are prepared to endorse. The other major reason to think carefully is that the war you endorse is going to be carried out by a government that may have something less than a sterling record in the particular ends it chooses to pursue, in the types of means it is be willing to use, and in its effectiveness at attaining its chosen ends.

I would argue that a version of just war theory that says that, if one's cause is just, then one may engage in military action -- but only if one's action targets the enemy forces. One may never target innocents (i.e., those not directly contributing to the aggressive threat); but one may proceed with actions that target the enemy forces even if one foresees that some innocents will be killed as a side-effect of one's attack. (Actually, this is not enough, the weapons and the types of tactics one employs in the attack upon enemy forces must themselves have been developed with the aim of minimizing "collateral" damage.) Highly precise attacks on terrorist camps and hideouts would satisfy this just war standard. Highly precise attacks on the military posts, weaponry, etc, within nations whose governments genuinely harbor terrorists would satisfy this standard. But attacks that -- as one contributor to this list so elegantly put it -- would "pave Iraq" would be war crimes in the same general category as the actions perpetrated in New York.

The problem is that we have no reason to expect our leaders to be morally fastidious -- or even militarily competent. They will most want to satisfy the demand for "results" that they are now carefully orchestrating. When they fail to root out and kill the terrorists themselves, they will be strongly tempted to blame the "harboring" nations -- and take it out, not on the autocrats of those nations, but on the people who already have the misfortune to be under their heels. The individual autocrats are, after all, hard to kill; their oppressed subjects are often sitting ducks. The people who will be conducting this war on terror are essentially the same people who stupidly stopped military action twenty-four hours too soon, then encouraged dissident groups in Iraq to rebel, then betrayed those people, then settled on a policy of embargo against Iraq that has probably been responsible for the deaths of many thousand Iraqi children over the past decade. Indeed, the people who will be conducting this war are essentially the same people who could not figure out that people might use knives to hijack planes. These are essentially the same people who would rather people afflicted with cancer suffocate in their own vomit than allow them to use marijuana. These are essentially the same people who have proven to be much better at burning to death children within the U.S. or protecting those who did that killing than in preventing foreign threats from burning children to death.

And who are our leaders eager to recruit as our allies in this crusade against terrorism? High on the list are Assad of Syria and the current military rulers of Pakistan. And clearly, our leaders would welcome cooperation from the current rulers of Iran. Will the enemies of those regimes thereby become our enemies? Will our part of the bargain be to held suppress resistance to those regimes? In Pakistan, blasphemy is a capital crime. If the physician now on trial there for blasphemy were to kill his jailor and escape, would the U.S. have to help track him down in the name of anti-terrorism? How tolerant will the sort of men in power in Washington feel they have to be of Sharon if, in the course of our cooperative war on terrorism, he decides to engage the sort of slaughter of innocents that occurred under his watch in southern Lebanon in the early 1980s?

Objectivists have been slow to appreciate the many ways in which "war is the health of the state." But what we see now among many of our politicians and pundits is thrill at the prospect of finally having a national purpose that will require discipline, control, and the elimination of that pesty thing, liberty. War always ratchets up the power and the influence of the state; it always reinvigorates the idea that we must turn to and rely upon the state for all the really important things in life. Since the terrorists may be everywhere, insinuating themselves into every nook and cranny of our society, no nook or cranny of our society should be left uninspected and uncontrolled. As always, every failure of the government's campaign will be blamed on its not yet possessing sufficient power. Every failure will be an excuse to wage further war on our liberties.

I do not mean all of this to be prediction but, rather, warning. The terrorists ought to be hunted down and killed (very slowly). But there are deep dangers to our liberties associated with entering into any sort of war and, perhaps, especially a war that is as ill-defined as one against terrorism. Moreover, there are deep dangers of moral corruption -- the corruption of coming to support or coming to tolerate the moral tribalism that wants to see "us" killing "them" and the corruption of refusing to recognize it when "our" means of waging war become unjust and "our" political leaders themselves become war criminals.

It is one thing to feel deep and abiding moral anger toward the murderers and their supporters. It is one thing to feel renewed loyalty to the special sort of society that these murderers hope to destroy. It is one thing to believe that justice permits robust self-defense and retaliation. But I urge people to recognition that it is yet another thing -- it is a very different thing -- either to endorse an open-ended, ill-defined war on terrorism or to expect that those at the head of our government will, with dedication to our liberties, actually conduct themselves with intelligence and due moral constraint.

Eric Mack

-- Eve (eve_rebekah@yahoo.com), September 18, 2001

Answers

"NOW look what you made me do."

(Osama bin Laden's "Oliver Hardy Defense")

-- Eve (eve_rebekah@yahoo.com), September 18, 2001.


Spoken like someone who has experienced the horrors of war at Barnes and Noble.

-- Remember (the@ld.forum.com), September 18, 2001.

Well of course Professor, what do you recommend?

-- Lars (lars@indy.net), September 18, 2001.

Stupid article. Bush's cabinet is filled with folks who know far more than this chump will ever know about war fighting strategies.

-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), September 18, 2001.

Actually, Maria, I think it is a good article. It never hurts to be reminded to take a good, hard look at our leaders ... especially at a time like this.

-- Debra (Thisis@it.com), September 18, 2001.


Take a hard look Debra; you absolutely should. But this moron is only speaking the obvious that went through the heads of our military leaders in a matter of milliseconds some time on Tuesday around 9. As I wrote before, Eric knows nothing compared to our leaders. But you continue to take a good, hard look. Let me know when you're done.

-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), September 18, 2001.

Since I'm hard pressed to think of a past administration that was entirely free of colossal blunders, I am inclined to take a close look at serious issues our leaders are said to be contemplating.

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), September 18, 2001.

Don't do it David. You'll be chastised for questioning the Supreme Being.. I mean Commander.

Besides, it was all Clinton's fault anyway.

-- Jack Booted Thug (governmentconspiracy@NWO.com), September 18, 2001.


now do any SEE, why JESUS needs to return?????

-- al-d. (dogs@zianet.com), September 18, 2001.

David, I can assure you that a few blunders will be made along the way, but we will work very hard to minimize any errors. For the most part, a great deal of our actions will be done in the utmost secrecy so don’t look for this campaign to show up on CNN everyday. We have the best collection of hard-nosed ass kickers that any administration could ask for and like the great manager that I am, these highly qualified people will be allowed to showcase their formidable skills; both in strategy and implementation.

-- Your (Supreme@Commander.com), September 18, 2001.


Sir, I am both surprised by and appreciative of your alleged reply. Be assured that I fully understand the need for our countermeasures to be discreet. Besides, I don't watch television anyway.

A question, if I may. Given that our actions will primarily be carried out in secrecy, I'm not clear on the manner in which the skills you had alluded to would be showcased, except perhaps to those on the receiving end.

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), September 18, 2001.


David--

I usually don't believe people who say they don't watch TV. But if you don't, congratulations. I went without a TV from summer 1996 to summer 1999. I proved that I could live without it but I don't apologize for enjoying some of it.

At times like this, "enjoy" is not the right word, but I wouldn't want to not have a TV when the world is changing.

-- Lars (lars@indy.net), September 19, 2001.


Lars,
Would I lie to our Commander-in-Chief.

I've never been a television addict, but some time back I realized that if I was home during the evening and didn't watch any television, my day felt incomplete. And that disturbed me.

From that time forward, television is reserved for when I'm away from home and it happens to be on where I happen to be. Cable is not offered where I live, and I have no interest in getting a satellite dish. Because I'm situated in a valley, only one station comes in marginally well enough to watch, were I so inclined.

Sure there are some programs that I used to enjoy, but there are other enjoyable pursuits to take their place. With regard to tracking what's going on the world, there are ample sources outside of television. Besides, television news is too filtered and processed for my taste (I don't like food that comes in a box either), and it's so rapid fire that the viewer doesn't have time to reflect on or probe what is being presented.

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), September 19, 2001.


This is an absurdly convoluted pseudo-intellectual attempt at stating the obvious; something every Basic Trainee is taught in less than one hundred plain-Enlish words. It's called "The Rule of War". I think the author makes many valid points, but they would have had far more impact had he left the psycho-babble out of it.

-- (cyberscribe@chartermi.net), September 20, 2001.

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