Threads from Henry's Web

Tag: War

  • Is Killing Every One of Them Really Our Only Option?

    I saw a Facebook post that claims that in the light of the beheading of U. S. journalist James Foley our only option is to hunt down and kill every one of them as soon as possible.

    I think I’ve mentioned before that I’m not a pacifist. I believe acts of violence and even war can be justified. On the other hand, I think they rarely are. The question is whether we’ll really get the results we intend.

    I’m human. I’d like the people who did this to pay for it. I would have no problem condemning the perpetrators to death in a court of law.

    The question is whether another war is actually going to make anything better. Will it make less people die? Will it reduce the number of fanatics in the world? Will it mean that we won’t see another American beheaded in some other place at some other time?

    I hope we think about that.

    But more importantly, why did the killing of one American make this sort of violence our only option, but the killing of hundreds of Iraqis did not. Is there a difference in the value of these various lives?

    I pray that we, as Christians, will try to apply grace to this situation, to look on everyone, even those committing atrocities, as souls for whom Christ died. I hope as a nation that we will consider looking further forward in time and more broadly in space before we act to solve one problem by creating dozens of others.

    There may be a military option. The state bears a modern sword. Were I still in the military, I would be prepared to participate, to help wield it. But let’s look at the results of our previous military efforts before we move too quickly and ineffectively.

  • The Art of Not Waging War

    A Chinese bamboo book, open to display the bin...
    Image via Wikipedia

    As we become involved in the conflict in Lybia, I’ve been reflecting on the American strategy–or lack thereof–in foreign policy. To the extent that we have such a strategy it appears to be big on expenses on low on good results.

    I’m not a pacifist, and I certainly won’t object to seeing Gaddafi out of power. There’s plenty of reasons why he should go. The question in my mind is how we decide where to take military action, and what goals we set.

    It’s very difficult to attain victory in a war when the goals are either not well-defined, or difficult to measure, or impossible to attain. The latter is usually the case with goals that are assigned to the military but which the military is ill-equipped to accomplish, such as nation building.

    Our politics, and the lack of strategy in our international policy, tend to create situations in which our military will be tied up for long periods of time without any real hope of actual success.

    For some reason some people think no-fly zones or sanctions are more humane means of accomplishing the mission than actual war. I disagree. If there is a reason to intervene militarily, that intervention should be aimed at well-defined goals, and the means should be sufficient to accomplish those goals quickly. Any other course of action is actually less humane–it simply kills more people and extends the misery for long periods of time.

    If we cannot find the moral justification to take decisive action, let me suggest that we take no action at all.

    As I was thinking about this, I watched a show on the History Channel about Sun Tzu, and when the show was over I chose to take a run through The Art of War. It’s not a large book. Here are a couple of notes I underlined today:

    There is no instance of a country having benefitted from prolonged warfare (2:6).

    It is only one who is thoroughly acquainted with the evils of war that can thoroughly understand the profitable way of carrying it on (2:7).

    In war, then, let your great object be victory, not lengthy campaigns (2:19). 

    Hence to fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting (3:2).

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  • Bad Reasons for Getting Out of a War

    I’m an opponent of the Iraq war, but I oppose it on strategic grounds. Even now, I believe that we have gained very little, and are in fact worse off than when we started. After a period of time we will find that Iraq has become another haven for terrorists, perhaps not as bad as Afghanistan was, but definitely not safe and friendly. We can blame that on the idea that we can create a government in such a state that is both democratic and reliably friendly, and do so by force from the outside.

    For some odd reason, foreigners killing local folks, however they may express their justification, just don’t become popular with the same local folks. Sometimes you have to do it, but don’t expect it to make you popular. So if you are carrying out a war in order to become popular, for some reason you’re likely to fail.

    Stupid, conflicting aims – lousy results. We similarly harmed our own interests when we pushed for early elections for the Palestinians, and then were shocked by the results. (Ex-President Bush take note: People do freely choose terrorists as their rulers.)

    But then there are bad reasons for getting out of a war, for example:

    • The people will start to love us if we go home after the invasion.
    • Force is really unnecessary if we just talk enough.
    • We’re really tired of fighting the war.
    • This is harder than we thought when we started.

    Thus I view with some alarm this report that only 1/3 of Americans support sending more troops to Afghanistan. In this case the point is not popularity, though we may be able to aid the current government. The point is hunting terrorists, in a place where actual terrorists live. As long as that is a viable option, we need to be willing to use the necessary resources. When it is strategically right, we need to be able to move on.

    Now I must give a hat tip to Dr. Michael Westmoreland-White, who alerted me to this report. In his case I must note that he is consistently opposed the war, in fact, all wars. That is a consistent and moral position, even though I disagree.

    The folks that get on my nerves are the ones who are happy to invade, kill a few thousand people, and then get out because it’s inconvenient. They don’t oppose war; they oppose inconvenience. Theirs is not a moral choice; it’s a position into which they drift for their own comfort.

    Americans have a bad habit of supporting the glory of a quick invasion when we can see the enemy running and dying. It’s the hard job of cleaning up afterward for which we lack the stomach. That’s the worst of all possible combinations; it’s childish and immature. A nation with our kind of firepower can’t afford to be so childish and immature.

  • Why I am Not a Pacifist

    Recently there have been a number of articles on pacifism in the Methodist blogosphere, and not a few elsewhere. The most recent set started on Locusts and Honey with his recommendation of this article by Dave Kopel. Another of my blog favorites, Mark Warnock, has challenged the foundation of Kopel’s arguments in Pacifism Got Wrong. John Meunier, member of both the Methodist blogroll and the Moderate Christian Blogroll (thus doubly read by me!) responded thoughtfully to both in his post The Impossibility of Christianity.

    Now I’m not going to try to respond directly to any of these. Instead, I’m going to make a brief (I hope) Sunday morning statement of my own view on this fine Veteran’s Day. When I link to several people who got me thinking on a topic, and then write without responding directly, I almost always get a comment or an e-mail saying that I have misconstrued something one or another of the linked posters said. My only response is that I’m not critiquing anyone. I found all of the articles helpful. I’m making my own statement, not trying to critique that of others.

    I come to this subject with some bias. I am a veteran. I spent 10 years in the U. S. Air Force, during which I collected two Armed Forces Expeditionary Medals (Grenada, Panama), and did my time in the first gulf war. I was honorably discharged, having decided that the 20 years required for retirement was not for me, and went to work for a defense contractor. Bible teaching came a couple of years later.

    On the other hand, my father spent World War II planting trees in Canada as a conscientious objector. He would have served in a medical capacity (after the war he became an MD), but he was not given that option. For refusing to bear arms he was given alternate service. Thus I have a certain amount of sympathy for the conscientious objector, even though I do not accept that position for myself.

    I think that we in the United States often fail to appreciate the value of a professional military under civilian control. I experienced being part of that military. We came from a variety of political persuasions and religious views. We could argue about practically any political topic you would hear debated in a civilian forum. I served most of my two enlistments under commanders-in-chief for whom I did not vote, and went to wars I personally opposed. But that is the task of one who serves in professional armed forces under civilian control. If you do not appreciate that, it’s possible you aren’t carefully observing the rest of the world.

    Our troops are sometimes vilified as warmongers, and sometimes praised as the protectors of peace and freedom. They are invoked in arguments on both sides of the political arguments about any conflict. They are described as the poor of society, and as those who couldn’t get any other job, by those who somehow claim to defend them.

    But what they are is the folks who will go out there and carry out the policies of those we elect, and they do so almost universally with professionalism and honor. The vast majority could get other jobs, if they chose, but they have taken a job–a profession–that is challenging and dangerous. Whatever we think of any particular policy, they should have our thanks. I’m proud to have served.

    But getting back to pacifism, over the years in my discussions on this issue I’ve heard two basic categories of arguments. First is the “gentle Jesus” argument. Let’s become more and more like Jesus, and Jesus was a pacifist, even going to the cross without fighting. Second is the utilitarian argument, which says simply that pure pacifism doesn’t work. Now in summarizing those arguments I do them some violence, because they are generally a bit more nuanced than that, and there are also many positions in between. I’m not trying to tell anybody who they are and what they have to believe–I’m just categorizing the arguments I have experienced.

    My personal position is driven by two principles that I teach in Bible study and theology. The first is the toolkit. The toolkit is a metaphor I use to illustrate selecting scripture and/or doctrinal principles suitable to the circumstances. Scripture frequently gives multiple answers, my favorite example being Proverbs 26:4-5. You need to apply appropriate principles to applying each possible response.

    The second principle is prioritizing. Not all doctrines or principles are equal. In this case, I would ask the following questions:

    1. Is the principle of non-violence universal or specific?
    2. Where and how does it apply?

    This involves nuancing the toolkit idea just a bit, because it is not just a matter of selecting one tool or another; it’s also a matter of selecting where to use them, how much, and how many different tools to use. When building a cabinet I may well use a hammer, a saw, and a screwdriver. I don’t have to decide that a particular job is a “screwdriver” job, and thus throw out the hammer and saw.

    When I look at the question of the use of violence as a Christian I do see a number of principles that I must apply. Some major ones are:

    1. Being a peacemaker
    2. Protecting the weak and disadvantaged
    3. Carrying out justice
    4. Doing to others what I would have them do to me
    5. Last, but not least, loving God, and loving my neighbor as myself

    Now let me dismiss out of hand the utilitarian argument in its blatant form, at least. God can ask me to do things that do not appear to have utility by the standards of this world. My primary citizenship is in God’s kingdom, and kingdom activities don’t have to have worldly utility. At the same time, however, I can seek means that are successful in accomplishing kingdom goals.

    Let’s look at the goal of being a peacemaker. One can pursue peace in quite a number of different ways. At home or in church, I have observed that very often some authoritative speaking, and even application of authority, is very good for making peace. There may be a need for some people to move on before there can be peace in a community. (This doesn’t necessarily mean violence; I’m simply pointing out that different strategies may be useful.) How much talking, how much separation of angry parties, how much compromise, and so forth are all elements of a peacemaking strategy. I think I can justly ask how appropriate my peacemaking strategy was, and a good test will be just how much peace I made!

    In the case of war or any other type of violent activity, we can look at the results of those activities to see just how appropriate the means was to the end. The question, I believe, is utility for what? What are we trying to accomplish and have we done so successfully?

    This is not a case of putting up a worldly goal and standard against Biblical principles. I’m not going to extend this essay by extensively quoting scripture, but I will be glad to respond in that way in comments or future posts. What we are looking at is not the world vs the church, but rather different values and goals that are provided in scripture.

    Let me look at a very simple example. Let’s say I see someone in a wheelchair who is about to become the target of violence. Some thug, let us say, is going to rob him. There are a number of principles that come into play, as I read scripture. I am commanded to love not just the man in the wheelchair. I am commanded to love the thug. I am also commanded to protect the weak. I combine these principles as requiring me to take a best choice of actions to defend the weak, while at the same time requiring me to give consideration to the thug. (I use the word thug to emphasize the contrast.) Thus I must avoid a hands-off policy on the one hand that allows unnecessary injury, but I should also not simply draw a gun and blow the attacker away, unless that is the only avenue open to me consistent with protecting the weak. (Note that I give priority to “protecting the weak” over “loving the thug.”)

    I see a similar weighing of principles on the question of war. The question, in my view, is which type of behavior is closer to kingdom behavior. Now many of my friends and colleagues will take the view that obviously the most “kingdom-like” behavior is to refuse to engage in violence. I see where that comes from, but I don’t agree.

    The main line of defense on this is such things as the commands and example of Jesus. I agree that Jesus lived his life and went to the cross without committing violence against any person. He commanded people to turn the other cheek, and to carry a burden the second mile. I also believe that Jesus, because of the incarnation, was God in the flesh, and in practical terms this means that he presented God to us in the clearest way possible.

    But there are two points I would like to add. Jesus was also finite as a human, that is, he presented God to some folks in 1st century AD Galilee and Judea, and a few people elsewhere. That is, he acted in a divine manner in a particular place and time, and his actions were, by definition, appropriate to that place and time. Second, we do not directly perceive the physical, 1st century Jesus. We see his reflection in his followers. Again, this ties the teachings of Jesus to time and place.

    Amongst the characteristics of that time and place were the Roman occupation of Palestine and a powerlessness on the part of most of his audience. We do not, for example, have any record of the advice Jesus would have given to a good Roman soldier if he was confronted by a colleague engaged in brutality. Might the good Roman soldier, who possessed some civil authority and physical means, have been given different instructions than the disenfranchised peasant who lacked both? I think it is quite possible that he would have. But if Jesus ever did give such advice we have none of it available.

    We do know that Paul was willing to place himself in the hands of the Roman authorities from time to time, allowing them to protect him when they were willing to do so. What might he have done if those authorities had been even more friendly than they were?

    I believe that the implementation of kingdom principles will differ based on the means available. Being a follower of Jesus requires me to implement those principles in the best way possible in my circumstances. Whether I call in the police, take action on my own, or choose to suffer without resistance is not a universal choice. It is a choice specific to the circumstances under which I encounter the choice.

    When we look at the broader lines of scripture I think we see this kind of thinking repeatedly implemented. The same God appeared at Sinai who later appeared on Golgotha, but he acted very differently in the two cases. Why? The circumstances and the needs were different.

    There are times when he Israelites are ordered to collect a large army and attack their enemies. Deuteronomy 20 assumes that there will be occasions for war. God will fight for them, but they are to fight as well. Then there are other times when they are to get rid of most of the army and wait for God to respond (Gideon). When God has a lesson to teach, he can even call in the heathen enemies of Israel, such as Assyria and Babylon to attack them. Different circumstances, different actions.

    There are times when failing to employ violence is equivalent to collusion with violence. That is why, for example, I cannot stand with my father’s position in World War II. I would feel that failing to stand up to the violence of the axis powers would be, for me, equivalent to collusion with it. I am not, however, going to disrespect those, such as my father, who saw the matter quite differently. I would place a much higher value on living in accordance with your own conscience.

    I want to make clear, however, that I don’t see this approach as permission to do whatever we want in terms of war or violence. We have seen folks condone torture because of violence that has been done to us. Others here in the U.S. accept any amount of violent action simply because we were attacked. I think it is important here to note that we are not the primary victims of terrorism in the world. That doesn’t mean that we need to roll over and permit any amount of terrorist action, but it does mean we need to keep a sense of proportion. It is not surprising that other nations are often less than sympathetic when they have lost a greater proportion of their population to terrorist acts.

    The temptation is to justify any amount of violent action based on the notion that I have the means and I must protect the weak. But very often more violence is not the best way to protect the weak. Violence is always a terrible temptation; once you allow yourself to use it, you can often justify it where it does not belong. As Christians, we need to be very careful to be willing to accept the blow on the other cheek when that is what we are called upon to do. We would be amazed, I believe, with what could be accomplished with a little more application of love to our enemies. While I believe that there is a time for violence, I also believe that we in America have generally tended to lean the other way and justify violence when the situation called for grace.

    There are those who would prefer to deny violence because that prevents the temptation to use violence improperly. But I believe we are called upon to make the hard decisions, and to use the tools available to us as and when they are appropriate, facing the danger and the consequences of wrong decisions.

    My own views on the balance of these principles have led me to support the war in Afghanistan (though I think we have failed to follow through), but to oppose the war in Iraq. That should give folks enough grounds on which to attack my specific applications. I’ll enjoy hearing from you.

  • PTSS and Military Discharges

    This is the sort of story that makes me so angry that I want to hope it’s not really true. Fortunately, it appears a couple of senators with some substance are on the case, and hopefully will get to the bottom of this and hold some people’s feet to the fire as appropriate.

    According to an AP Report in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (HT: Thoughts from the Heart on the Left):

    After two combat tours in Iraq on a “quick reaction team” that picked up body parts after suicide bombings, Donald Schmidt began suffering from nightmares and paranoia. Then he had a nervous breakdown.

    The military discharged Schmidt last Oct. 31 for problems they said resulted not from post-traumatic stress disorder but rather from a personality disorder that pre-dated his military service.

    Assuming the facts are correct, I wouldn’t care if he did have a pre-existing condition. After two combat tours the military should be taking care of him.

    Amongst those in congress who are moving to take action, Senators [tag]Barack Obama[/tag], Senator [tag]Christopher Bond[/tag] are investigating this in the Senate, and Rep [tag]Bob Filner[/tag] in the house.

    Please read the whole St. Louis Post-Dispatch article. It has more information and the Pentagon’s response, which thus far doesn’t impress me.

  • Anthropology and Military Planning

    It seems that some people in the military have noticed the fact that we don’t really understand the territories and the countries about which we so glibly pontificate. And much of the pontification is official, which makes the ignorance more egregious.

    In an BBC article received via e-mail, I read the following:

    But that is not all. The US military has developed a new programme known as the Human Terrain System (HTS) to study social groups in Iraq and Afghanistan.

    The HTS depends heavily on the co-operation of anthropologists, with their expertise in the study of human beings and their societies.

    Steve Fondacaro, a retired special operations colonel overseeing the HTS, is keen to recruit cultural anthropologists.

    “Cultural anthropologists are focused on understanding how societies make decisions and how attitudes are formed. They give us the best vision to see the problems through the eyes of the target population,” he said.

    There’s a story that brings up mixed emotions. We certainly do need to understand people better, but a phrase like “target populations” presents an understanding that is at least equivocal. What exactly are we targeting these populations for? What are we going to do with them, and what gives us the right to do it?

    But despite my questions I welcome the notion of creating a better educated military. Hopefully somewhere in this process some military leaders will be asking just how we can cooperate with, rather than dominate local populations. Perhaps troops can learn how to work in a way that minimizes offense. But as long as those military forces are operating under orders to transform those societies into an image that is desirable in American eyes, I don’t think it will work perfectly. It’s good military strategy, but good military strategy needs to be employed in the service of good political and diplomatic strategy.

    And that is the level at which I believe our country as a whole, and particularly the appropriate portions of our government need to be better educated. A little bit of anthropology would go a long way with our diplomats. To those who suggest that we have such experts, I would answer that we are 1) not listening to them, 2) they are not as expert as they appear, or 3) we don’t have enough of them.

    I suspect all three. Why? Because somewhere up there in the American government somebody thought that we would easily accomplish the invasion of Iraq (we did), would be welcomed by the Iraqi people as liberators, and then would easily create a new government. Low cost in money, in lives, and even in time. Then we could get on with other targets in the war on terror.

    Whoever painted that scenario was somewhere between criminally negligent and grossly stupid. There was never any reason for anyone to believe that in the first place.

    Of course we need anthropologists and other social scientists in the military. The more wisely force is applied, the less force is needed. In social situations, the best result is when no force is actually applied at all. I’m not so optimistic as to think we can attain that easily, but the more intelligently we act, the less people we’re going to have to kill–our own and others.

    The tragedy is that we’ll be sending in anthropologists to help us deal with various tribal groups after much of the damage is already done. If we are to fight and win a war on terror, we will need more than a military strategy. The prime error of diplomats is the belief that diplomacy accomplishes all; the prime error of those who wield military power (but not usually of the soldiers on the front line) is to believe that force can ultimately solve all problems.

    A strategic approach to the [tag]war on terror[/tag] will have to involve an intelligent strategy, first political, and then military where problems are actually intractable.

    One further note–I can see the ethical objections to anthropologists in being part of these teams. Do you want to use your understanding of a tribal group to facilitate their manipulation by the military with no control over just what will be done and how? You would never know when your knowledge might become the key to destroying a culture. At the same time, applied at the proper level, such knowledge could result in great savings of life. Perhaps there is a balance to be sought here.

  • Important Senate Business: Condemning Ads

    They took the time to condemn the [tag]MoveOn.org[/tag] Ad on General [tag]Petraeus[/tag] (LA Times story).

    Now I don’t like the ad, and I don’t particularly like MoveOn.org, and I think private groups and politicians should go ahead and do all the condemning that the ad deserves. Though I’m an opponent of the war in Iraq, I think the ad deserves a good deal of condemning. But all of that, like the ad itself, is simply part of the free exchange of ideas that we have in this country. MoveOn.org gets to act irresponsibly; that’s their right. I get to loathe them for it; that’s my right. I get to think General Petraeus is wrong even though I loathe the ad attacking him, that’s my right. None of it is a matter for the law.

    And of course one can point out to me that the Senate didn’t pass a law. It’s not binding. OK, fine. But if it’s not a law, it’s non-binding, and it just expresses their opinion, why bother doing anything about it in the Senate? This is not the only such resolution, of course, and they have varying relevance to the business of the Senate. But right now, our government lacks a coherent policy on terrorism, the president and congress are wrangling over just how to behave in Iraq, thus preserving the maximally nasty situation in which we hold on, but with no reason to expect success. At the end of the fiscal year, the Senate will be running out of time to accomplish important business like appropriations bills.

    And here they are condemning an ad. Let them condemn (or condone) ads on their own time out on the campaign trail. That’s where it belongs.

  • Learning from the War

    Joe Carter caught my attention again today with his post This I No Longer Believe: 5 Lessons Learned from the Iraq War. Now he’s responding to this post by Rod Dreher, but I actually found his list more interesting.

    I’m not going to make my own list, because I don’t think I’ve learned five things from the Iraq war. I’m not usually terribly prescient, and I have a long line of bad calls on elections to prove it, but I thought this war was going to be a failure from the start. The one thing I have definitely learned is that the American voters in general, and the leadership in particular do not seem to be able to think in terms of strategy. We seem to manage one step at a time, with two at the outside. “Let’s withdraw from Iraq so American soldiers will quit dying.” That’s one step. “What do we do about the genocide that will result?” That’s two steps. A third might be to ask whether there will come a time we can withdraw without destabilization, and if so when that will be, and how much it will cost. We can continue on from there to ask what other things we might do with the same resources to change the future.

    I think in general both sets of lessons learned don’t look far enough into the context of each war and why people might have supported or opposed them. I know that many people expected the war in Iraq to be short and easy, and there was no reason to expect that. In fact this is one area where I personally give politicians little slack. I think anyone should have known that establishing a stable and democratic government in Iraq such that we could withdraw was going to be massively difficult.

    A couple of days ago I made a somewhat intemperate remark about the Lybian government with reference to the Lybia 6. Despite calling my remark intemperate, and despite the fact that I might well not have said it, I’m not apologizing for it, because it does reflect what I think in an unedited way. Yet the Iraq war has involved similarly stupid activities.

    I would suggest Guantanamo as a good combination of the immoral and the strategically stupid. Leaving aside the immoral, let me look at the strategically stupid part. Is it likely that the additional information gained by the controversial actions helped against terrorism enough to justify the political fallout, both domestic and foreign? I doubt it. There is a tendency amongst some people to think it’s patriotic to say “the hell with everyone else” and go it alone. I won’t debate “patriotic,” but that attitude is definitely dumb. We do need international cooperation to fight terrorism. In addition, the domestic political viability of a policy is also one of the considerations for whether a policy is strategically viable. In other words, the political support has to last until the policy is completed.

    But I wanted to respond to one particular point Carter said he learned:

    3. I no longer believe that Arab nations are capable of sustaining liberal democracies. The empirical evidence for this belief is overwhelming: Arab culture is currently unable to sustain democratic forms of government. Some people will decry this belief as racist or xenophobic. But it is simply being realistic. I used to think that Samuel Huntington was an intelligent crank; now I think he’s prophetic. As he once noted, the Western belief in the universality of Western culture suffers three problems: it is false; it is immoral; and it is dangerous. Thinking that freedom could take root in the blood-soaked soil of Arab culture was a naive assumption. Iraq has disabused me of such notions.

    It simply amazes me that anyone thought that they were capable of doing so, or that if they were, such a democracy could be imposed from outside. Iraq is an especially tricky case. We try to think of all the people of Iraq as “Iraqis” in the sense that we think of Americans as Americans. But the border lines that create Saudi Arabia, Syria, Kuwait, and Jordan, amongst many others, are the product of the activities of western powers. We start with the notion of having the majority rule, or something close to that. Well, for Sunnis, that means Shi’ite rule in Iraq. They are, understandably, not crazy about it. And that’s only the first of many, many problems.

    We have somehow gotten the idea that an American style democracy is the best thing for everyone, and that, if they are given the opportunity, everybody will embrace it. It’s a highly arrogant position for us to take. Might it not be better to suggest that a country’s government needs to arise out of its own history and culture? And perhaps we should extend that to the idea that a “country” should arise out of its own history and culture.

    A similar oddity occurred with the Palestinian election. We wanted a democratic election amongst the Palestinians. But then they went and elected the wrong people! All from our point of view, of course. So we cut off funding because now the Palestinian government was run by terrorists. I would suggest that we go back to the first step and ask whether it should be up to us to tell the Palestinian government that it must be democratic. Maybe we should only specify our requirements of them in terms of foreign policy goals, not their governmental forms.

    If we, as a country, could learn something from this war, I would hope it would be this. Be determined in defending ourselves, but lose the arrogance about telling other people how to run their countries. We don’t have enough troops available to pay for our arrogance.

  • Impeachment and Political Strategy

    I have long argued against the war in Iraq on strategic grounds. I don’t object to war when war is absolutely necessary, but I believe that when war is waged for the wrong reasons, conducted improperly, or for unattainable goals, however good those goals sound, that war is a tragedy and is immoral. Killing is such a terrible thing that one must weigh very carefully one’s decision to take that route.

    Now we have a situation of political strategy, and I think the various factions are taking just as little consideration for strategy in the political conflict as others have in the planning for war. Recent polls show a substantial amount of support for impeaching President Bush and even more for impeaching Vice-President Cheney. It would be nice if one could believe that most of those who favor impeachment actually knew what impeachment is, and for example which house impeaches and which tries impeachments. That is probably too much to hope. I suspect the answers in favor of impeachment include a large number of folks who simply want Bush and Cheney gone, and the sooner the better. One should also recall that this is the same electorate who once produced an approval rating for Bush in the 80s.

    I don’t really like either man. I didn’t vote for them, and I abhor their war policy. I think very often their domestic strategies in terms of home security have been crude and ineffective while unnecessarily threatening civil rights. I think Bush’s use of signing statements to ignore portions of the law is wrong. I think his efforts to continue the war right now are misguided. He’s missing an opportunity to at least control the mode of exit. One aspect of the strategy of war is the political support one has for the action. Ignore that portion, and you ask for trouble.

    Now I’m no legal expert. I’m not going to argue what congress can and cannot use as the grounds for impeachment. I’m pretty sure, however, that the final answer is going to be that they can use pretty much anything they can get a 2/3 majority of the Senate agree on for conviction. Violating the constitution is a form of violating the law, but it doesn’t have fixed penalties. “Abuse of power” is a rather hazy sort of concept. I actually think it’s quite reasonable to have 2/3 of the Senate agree on what it might be.

    But the question is just how valuable is this particular means of getting rid of a president? We’re already into the election campaign for the next presidential election. In a little more than a year we’ll be voting on who we want to succeed Bush and Cheney. Is it a good idea to go through the contentious process of impeachment right now? One question, of course, is whether 2/3 of the Senate would agree to convict on any particular charge. I suspect the answer is no.

    The impeachment talk is, I think, directed to the hardliners in the Democratic party and those who are to its left. It shores up the base, and provides a means to keep from losing those supporters to third party candidates. At the same time there are quite a number–a growing number–of people who are like me in one respect. We don’t have party loyalty. We believe both the Democratic and Republican parties have forfeited any right to our support as parties. When all the partisan bickering has played out (on this topic; there will be another by then), some one of you is going to need our vote, and we’d like to see you show some good strategic sense, an ability to see all aspects of a problem and to find the best strategy to get where you’re going.

    Cindy Sheehan has told Speaker Nancy Pelosi she’s going to run against her if she doesn’t work to impeach President Bush. I think this is a good opportunity for Pelosi to demonstrate some good strategic sense. Not statesmanship; that would probably be too much to ask–just good strategy. She can say, “No, that’s a bad idea. I’m interested in keeping and building a Democratic majority. I’m more interested in withdrawing from Iraq successfully than I am in scoring revenge points on the current President.”

    She’s played this one right so far; hopefully she’ll continue.

  • Good Judgment and Iraq War Flip-Flops

    I’m watching the list of GOP legislators who are breaking with President Bush on the war in Iraq with mixed emotions. On the one hand it’s nice to see people realizing that we are trying to force our military to accomplish the impossible. On the other hand, I have to ask why they are doing this and what changed their minds.

    According to an MSNBC story:

    More than a dozen Republican senators who are running for re-election next year head the list of lawmakers to watch. But others, too, have expressed concerns that the GOP has grown increasingly vulnerable on the issue. As the clock ticks toward Election Day, voter pressure is building against any lawmaker still standing with President Bush on the war.

    So what’s driving these defections? Is it a sudden realization that they were wrong about the original invasion? Is it an attack of strategic good sense, in which one examines the goals and the means available to accomplish them and then reassesses the appropriate use of one’s resources?

    Well, no. The legislators in question are in election campaigns. They are watching Bush’s popularity drop, and they feel the need to get out.

    The wildcards in the debate are senators, like Roberts, Stevens and Chambliss, who have staunchly defended Bush but are watching his poll numbers drop.

    Now my question is this: How will the voters react to a flip-flop to get out of Iraq just because of the poll numbers? Shouldn’t the voters in those districts have expected these legislators, who after all have research staffs and access to much sensitive information, to have made a better judgment call in the first place? And if the Iraq war was a good idea, as these senators seem to think (or have thought, at least), why is it now a good idea to pull out after thousands of casualties? If the goal is attainable, as they apparently used to think, shouldn’t one put in the resources and accomplish things? If it is not attainable, what has happened in the last few months that would change that assessment?

    I personally believe the goal of a united, democratic, and secure Iraq was never attainable in the first place, and if we did invade, that should not have been one of our aims. I’d say that the last four years lines up with my assessment. But this is not just my assessment. There are plenty of experts on the region who were prepared to say this and back up their claims before the invasion. In comparison to other wars, and in relation to the war aims, this one has not gone all that badly. In fact, I personally expected it to go a bit worse. The government building efforts have gone better than I would have expected, though not enough better to change my mind in favor of the war. I have been hoping from the start that I would be proven wrong, but time is not doing so. It is so tragic to have these numbers of deaths without success. But the bottom line is that the “Iraqi people” would need to bear the major burden of creating a free, democratic, and secure nation, and there isn’t even a truly definable “Iraqi people,” and to the extent we can imagine such an entity, their goals are not our goals.

    I welcome the idea that we will have an effort to withdraw troops. I just think these senators who have supported the war up to now and are switching in the face of opinion polls do not have the courage of their own bad judgment. They hope to place all the blame on President Bush, who is term limited, and somehow to escape their own responsibility. I hope the voters don’t let them by with it.