Very much off-topic. I would very much like your perspective before I post this on my site. I could not post, or post and give you the heads up so you could comment early to set the tone, or about six other possibilities. It's David French about his time in Iraq.
So, French is making a very lawyerly argument here, and he's right about the terms and assumptions of the Law of Armed Conflict. (Joel Leggett, properly Colonel Joel Leggett of the USMC's own similar branch, can expound on this to greater effect than I can.) The logic of what he says exactly follows the way that the laws of war were written, from the late 19th century through the Geneva Conventions after World War II.
I have myself made very similar arguments, especially back at the time of the war. For example, I wrote a piece at BLACKFIVE called "On the Virtues of Killing Children" that argued that the only reason children are used as human shields is because we make it effective to do so; and jihadists, like Saddam, use them as shields for that reason. Making sure that you're right according to the Doctrine of Double Effect (explained at length in the comments to that piece, which turned into a huge brawl) is the only thing that matters. It suffices that your action was discriminate (the test is: if the harm by miracle didn't happen, e.g. if you blew up the factory and innocent workers somehow weren't killed, would you still be satisfied with the outcome? If so, it is discriminate); and proportionate. If you get that right, you have to strike without fear because otherwise you only increase the value of human shields, and therefore their likelihood of being used.
There are nevertheless good philosophical reasons to question whether these long-standing laws and doctrines (the Doctrine of Double Effect dates to Aquinas' work on the morality of war) are really the right ones. That's a discussion I'd be happy to have, if you'd like. It may be that we are licensing terrible sins with these laws and doctrines, and we ought to fear that and explore it to see if we are -- or more to the point, that we are not.
But if you want to speak as a conservative, this is indeed what our laws have held for generations, and our moral doctrines for centuries.
Oh, and his most basic point -- that the guilt falls on the jihadist or Saddam-type who is violating the law of war by hiding among civilians -- that is also correct per doctrine and by law. The offense is called perfidy in the laws of war. It is the most serious war crime except for aggression, because it undermines noncombatant immunity.
It might deserve more exploration. Aquinas' arguments aren't bad, but they depend a lot on the assumption of legitimacy of government. The more recent legalities privilege that same sort of legitimacy, which is supposed to derive from being a nation state of the sort that can sign and keep a treaty. Yet this is often said to undermine the right of resistance of ordinary people for whom all local governments have been oppressive; and, if the Declaration of Independence is right about the real source of legitimacy, it may well be that irregular combatants at least can (in the right circumstances) deserve more privileges, and regular armies fewer, than has been generally admitted to the traditions.
General Washington did a lot to try to regularize his militia, but they started as pure militia. That doesn't illegitimate their cause; not if the Declaration is right. They are legitimate because they are the authentic voice of the people, as proven by the fact that the people themselves take up arms and fight. Are they really obligated to assume marks of distinction and regularities to retrain that legitimacy? That's not clear to me, though the alternative seems to be endangering noncombatants per perfidy.
If I may interject some admittedly layman's thoughts on this. The path to revolution the American colonials followed is probably a dead-end in a post-Marx world. No revolutionary thinks of building a political following for governmental change prior to initiating hostilities anymore. In the Marxian context, guerilla and terrorist action are undertaken as the tools to build that following by exposing the oppression of the regime to overcome the 'false consciousness' of the population and prepare them for revolution. This tacitly acknowledged asymmetry is exploited by nation-states like Iran and Russia that lack the combat ability (so far) to go toe-to-toe with militarily superior opponents by using such tactics to destabilize their opponent's allies and client states. However, given the surveillance and precision strike technology afforded by satellites and drones, it might be useful for our military to think more about similarly asymmetrical strikes that are not directed at the usual targets that can be shielded by hostages but more along the lines of the strike on the Iranian General Soleimani.
I would also start worrying a lot about those military strikes — probably using deputized assets — being deployed domestically. Obama broke the seal on that by drone assassination of an American citizen outside the US, for nonviolent support of terrorism but without trial; but these days all the talk I hear from the Feds about terrorism ponders domestic ‘extremist’ or ‘terrorist’ threats.
They won’t do that while they still control the territory and can send police teams to raid anywhere; but if we get to a point where that’s not true, drone strikes seem to me to be a place they’re mentally ready to go.
All that of course is speculative; for now the political process continues and people on the right seem committed to it. Yet even as they worry aloud about insurrection from the right, I hear a lot of noises from the left that sound like they think they are going to need much stronger measures against us.
I forwarded the French article to a left-wing friend who teaches Just War theory and other forms of ethics, to see if he had any comment on it. He did, but it was entirely unprintable except for the words "war criminal apologist."
For years I've been hearing boasting from element of the "right" about how the left had best not mess with them and how well-armed/trained they were for when TSHTF. Perhaps the left are taking them seriously.
It's a bit ironic--on one side you find lots of boasting but not a lot of violence, and on the other a bizarre coalition of anarchists and hard leftists given to plenty of destruction, with lots of intimidation and some murder thrown in. Which has the FBI's underwear in a knot?
And when the FBI decided to finally investigate the Portland rioters, the pundits worried they were interfering with the political process.
The other striking thing, James, is the way in which they don't see the actual violence as violence. It's a version of that trick whereby people can't be racist unless they're 'dominant culturally.' These are the screams of the oppressed! They are inherently legitimate and a form of politics.
A much less vigorous response from the right is, however, an existential violent threat to democracy itself.
I'm pretty tired of the arguments over whether it's possible to be racist against "dominant" racial types--i.e., "punching up." Arguments over definitions like this are almost always sterile. If we need two new words to distinguish between Racism A (mistreatment of traditional disadvantaged ethic types) and Racism B (treatment of individuals according to stereotyped beliefs about their racial type rather than according to their actual characteristics), then fine. Progressives can argue that Racism A is bad but Racism B is OK as long as its target is guilty of privilege. The rest of us can argue that Type A is merely an ugly example of what Type B inevitably leads to, and that it doesn't matter whether the ethnic type in question has the best claim in history to maltreatment.
15 comments:
Very much off-topic. I would very much like your perspective before I post this on my site. I could not post, or post and give you the heads up so you could comment early to set the tone, or about six other possibilities. It's David French about his time in Iraq.
https://frenchpress.thedispatch.com/p/a-powerful-implied-indictment-in?token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjo5MzgyLCJwb3N0X2lkIjo0NTgzNDY0OSwiXyI6ImwwZEhKIiwiaWF0IjoxNjQwMTM4MTE1LCJleHAiOjE2NDAxNDE3MTUsImlzcyI6InB1Yi0yMTc2NSIsInN1YiI6InBvc3QtcmVhY3Rpb24ifQ.0w0B9WrOMB6KkNL_FO1HwY3fqcTno3zgU9MFrTsHn_U
OK, I'll read it.
So, French is making a very lawyerly argument here, and he's right about the terms and assumptions of the Law of Armed Conflict. (Joel Leggett, properly Colonel Joel Leggett of the USMC's own similar branch, can expound on this to greater effect than I can.) The logic of what he says exactly follows the way that the laws of war were written, from the late 19th century through the Geneva Conventions after World War II.
I have myself made very similar arguments, especially back at the time of the war. For example, I wrote a piece at BLACKFIVE called "On the Virtues of Killing Children" that argued that the only reason children are used as human shields is because we make it effective to do so; and jihadists, like Saddam, use them as shields for that reason. Making sure that you're right according to the Doctrine of Double Effect (explained at length in the comments to that piece, which turned into a huge brawl) is the only thing that matters. It suffices that your action was discriminate (the test is: if the harm by miracle didn't happen, e.g. if you blew up the factory and innocent workers somehow weren't killed, would you still be satisfied with the outcome? If so, it is discriminate); and proportionate. If you get that right, you have to strike without fear because otherwise you only increase the value of human shields, and therefore their likelihood of being used.
There are nevertheless good philosophical reasons to question whether these long-standing laws and doctrines (the Doctrine of Double Effect dates to Aquinas' work on the morality of war) are really the right ones. That's a discussion I'd be happy to have, if you'd like. It may be that we are licensing terrible sins with these laws and doctrines, and we ought to fear that and explore it to see if we are -- or more to the point, that we are not.
But if you want to speak as a conservative, this is indeed what our laws have held for generations, and our moral doctrines for centuries.
Oh, and his most basic point -- that the guilt falls on the jihadist or Saddam-type who is violating the law of war by hiding among civilians -- that is also correct per doctrine and by law. The offense is called perfidy in the laws of war. It is the most serious war crime except for aggression, because it undermines noncombatant immunity.
Thanks. Keep alert, as I may post this and you may get a chance to say to my audience as well as yours. I am 75-25 at present.
It might deserve more exploration. Aquinas' arguments aren't bad, but they depend a lot on the assumption of legitimacy of government. The more recent legalities privilege that same sort of legitimacy, which is supposed to derive from being a nation state of the sort that can sign and keep a treaty. Yet this is often said to undermine the right of resistance of ordinary people for whom all local governments have been oppressive; and, if the Declaration of Independence is right about the real source of legitimacy, it may well be that irregular combatants at least can (in the right circumstances) deserve more privileges, and regular armies fewer, than has been generally admitted to the traditions.
General Washington did a lot to try to regularize his militia, but they started as pure militia. That doesn't illegitimate their cause; not if the Declaration is right. They are legitimate because they are the authentic voice of the people, as proven by the fact that the people themselves take up arms and fight. Are they really obligated to assume marks of distinction and regularities to retrain that legitimacy? That's not clear to me, though the alternative seems to be endangering noncombatants per perfidy.
If I may interject some admittedly layman's thoughts on this. The path to revolution the American colonials followed is probably a dead-end in a post-Marx world. No revolutionary thinks of building a political following for governmental change prior to initiating hostilities anymore. In the Marxian context, guerilla and terrorist action are undertaken as the tools to build that following by exposing the oppression of the regime to overcome the 'false consciousness' of the population and prepare them for revolution. This tacitly acknowledged asymmetry is exploited by nation-states like Iran and Russia that lack the combat ability (so far) to go toe-to-toe with militarily superior opponents by using such tactics to destabilize their opponent's allies and client states. However, given the surveillance and precision strike technology afforded by satellites and drones, it might be useful for our military to think more about similarly asymmetrical strikes that are not directed at the usual targets that can be shielded by hostages but more along the lines of the strike on the Iranian General Soleimani.
“ No revolutionary thinks of building a political following for governmental change prior to initiating hostilities anymore.”
Really? I’d say that’s the stage we are at in America right now.
I would also start worrying a lot about those military strikes — probably using deputized assets — being deployed domestically. Obama broke the seal on that by drone assassination of an American citizen outside the US, for nonviolent support of terrorism but without trial; but these days all the talk I hear from the Feds about terrorism ponders domestic ‘extremist’ or ‘terrorist’ threats.
They won’t do that while they still control the territory and can send police teams to raid anywhere; but if we get to a point where that’s not true, drone strikes seem to me to be a place they’re mentally ready to go.
All that of course is speculative; for now the political process continues and people on the right seem committed to it. Yet even as they worry aloud about insurrection from the right, I hear a lot of noises from the left that sound like they think they are going to need much stronger measures against us.
I forwarded the French article to a left-wing friend who teaches Just War theory and other forms of ethics, to see if he had any comment on it. He did, but it was entirely unprintable except for the words "war criminal apologist."
For years I've been hearing boasting from element of the "right" about how the left had best not mess with them and how well-armed/trained they were for when TSHTF. Perhaps the left are taking them seriously.
It's a bit ironic--on one side you find lots of boasting but not a lot of violence, and on the other a bizarre coalition of anarchists and hard leftists given to plenty of destruction, with lots of intimidation and some murder thrown in. Which has the FBI's underwear in a knot?
And when the FBI decided to finally investigate the Portland rioters, the pundits worried they were interfering with the political process.
The other striking thing, James, is the way in which they don't see the actual violence as violence. It's a version of that trick whereby people can't be racist unless they're 'dominant culturally.' These are the screams of the oppressed! They are inherently legitimate and a form of politics.
A much less vigorous response from the right is, however, an existential violent threat to democracy itself.
I'm pretty tired of the arguments over whether it's possible to be racist against "dominant" racial types--i.e., "punching up." Arguments over definitions like this are almost always sterile. If we need two new words to distinguish between Racism A (mistreatment of traditional disadvantaged ethic types) and Racism B (treatment of individuals according to stereotyped beliefs about their racial type rather than according to their actual characteristics), then fine. Progressives can argue that Racism A is bad but Racism B is OK as long as its target is guilty of privilege. The rest of us can argue that Type A is merely an ugly example of what Type B inevitably leads to, and that it doesn't matter whether the ethnic type in question has the best claim in history to maltreatment.
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