I’m watching Seymour Hersh on CNN discussing the possibility of a war against the Ahmadinejad regime in Iran. His most recent essay in the New Yorker bears reading. Some of it seems rather dubious (such as the claim that regular combat forces have already been ordered into Iran), but the claim that the administration is planning (not in the sense of contingency plans, which are always underway, but actively planning) a strike against Iran is worrisome, especially if it were the same kind of careful planning as we’ve seen in the Iraq war.
“a strike against Iran is worrisome, especially if it were the same kind of careful planning as we’ve seen in the Iraq war.”
Would you be less worried if you thought this next engagement is likely to be an efficient application of the preemptive war doctrine?
Yes, I would. Think about it. One opposes going to war because war is destructive, because it costs lives and treasure, and because it creates yet more risks. If a military strike were not to have those effects, or if it were to pose less risk of them, that fact would provide less reason to oppose it.
Your question has the same form as the following: Would you be less worried about risky behavior if it were less risky? How could you not answer that in the affirmative?
I am worried about a nuclear weapon in the hands of fanatics. Aren’t you? Does that justify a strike? No, I don’t think so, because such a strike would be likely to create yet more risks. Were one able to strike without those risks, I’d be in favor of it. I oppose such a strike because of the risks. The lower the risks, the less a rational person’s opposition is likely to be.
I don’t oppose wars merely because of the way the word is spelled, but because of what war entails. And I am more opposed to a war if I think that it will be improperly planned and therefore more likely to bring about catastrophic results. To say that I am more opposed when I expect it to be badly planned entails that I am less opposed when I expect it to be well planned or less badly planned. Hence my statement.
Mr. Palmer, Thanks for the thoughtful response.
You wrote:
“Your question has the same form as the following: Would you be less worried about risky behavior if it were less risky? How could you not answer that in the affirmative?”
War is to be opposed in almost all instances because it involves the killing of innocents, not because it could backfire on you strategically if poorly executed. War is not “diplomacy by other means,” or merely an expensive and sometimes risky state action. When I hear our politicians refer over and over again to the “military option” in regard to Iran’s nuclear energy program I get the idea they consider their policy options as part of a continuum — if bribes don’t work then maybe sanctions, if sanctions fail then we nuke them.
I wonder if you lapse into such amoral calculations when you write:
“Were one able to strike without those risks, I’d be in favor of it. I oppose such a strike because of the risks. The lower the risks, the less a rational person’s opposition is likely to be.”
It is not a “risk,” but an absolute certainty that Iranian children and the mothers who love them will be incinerated by Satanic bombs paid for by you and me if Bush wages war against their country.
$100 says that Iran is due to get a PR whitewashing by the so-called anti-war “libertarians.” Keep an eye out…you know where to look.
Then you (anon1) are opposed to each and every war, including the War for American Independence, in which innocents were also killed, as well as all defensive wars, such as resistance to the National Socialist and Soviet occupation of Poland, in which innocents were also killed. It’s a coherent position, but not one that I hold.
Risk assessment deals with all probabilities, including the probability of unity, i.e., 100% certainty. Perhaps anon1 might acknowledge that the risk of innocents dying in a a defensive war could be weighed against the risk of innocents dying in an occupation (I’m thinking of a case such as Poland). In both cases, there is a 100% risk that some innocents will be killed; we just don’t know which ones. Were one to conclude that more innocents would be killed in an occupation than in a defensive war, would one be justified in waging defensive war, despite the fact that the probability that some innocents would be killed is surely 100%? What if a belligerent state were to have a nuclear weapon with which a million people could be killed? Would the political leaders of its neighboring states be justified in a targeted strike to destroy it? Were it situated in a populated area and were there to be a number of deaths, would it be rational to attempt to compare the likely number of deaths from a preemptive strike against the likely number of deaths from the deployment of the weapon, multiplied by the likelihood that it would be deployed? Those might be interesting questions for anon1 to ponder.
Tom,
Anon1 wrote “in almost all cases.” Maybe he could explain what cases would be exceptions and why, since all cases of war involve deaths of innocents. Why would some be justified and not others?
Does the assumption that a well-planned war would be less risky and destructive than a poorly planned war presuppose that the war planners have the minimization of risk and destruction in mind when planning their war? Isn’t it too much to assume that a well-planned war, from the point of view of those planning it, would in reality be less devestating to life, liberty and property than if their war failed?
It seems to me that a war or military strike against Iran, as it currently appears most likely to develop, would not simply be a well-intentioned maneuver to protect the innocent from Iranian nukes, with all or most of its regrettable, condemnable results being neatly attributable to instances where the planning went wrong. On the contrary, those who would wage war against Iran would be aggressors, and their reported plans are plans to commit violence that is inherently aggressive in the present context. Although it is certainly possible that a poorly planned execution of their designs could yield more destruction than they would want or anticipate, it is also possible that the more perfectly planned their war is, the more destructive certain aspects of it will be, in the short and long term.
Of course, what do I know? I’m what the anonymous poster above refers to as one of those “anti-war ‘libertarians'”–as if there is something odd about the concept that warrants scare-quotes–and, accordingly, I am suspicious of the war planners and do not assume that they share my interest in minimizing harm to the innocent when they make their plans.
As for whitewashing Iran’s government’s crimes, I don’t expect to see much of it. It is a deadly evil regime, one of many in the region. If years from now it obtains nuclear weapons, I won’t be happy. But U.S. intervention throughout the world has encouraged nuclear proliferation, as nuclear powers are not bullied as much by the U.S. government as nations without nukes. Given all this, I do think many libertarians are doing a disservice by blindly accepting the premise that Iran presents a major threat that has to be dealt with by the US government.
I continue to be amazed at people who profess to be against war, but think that arguments against going to war must be rejected if they are not categorical.
Mr. Gregory asks questions, answers them on behalf of others, and then assumes that unnamed others believe that an attack would “simply be a well-intentioned maneuver to protect the innocent from Iranian nukes, with all or most of its regrettable, condemnable results being neatly attributable to instances where the planning went wrong.” Why assume that? What seems to be lurking in the background of Mr. Gregory’s statement is the belief that the motives of people who would support a strike against Iran are themselves suspect. Maybe, but maybe not. Maybe they err in their evaluation of the likely consequences. Mr. Gregory, however, is having none of that. People whom he has not convinced must be wicked and evil. That’s the only explanation for why they would propose what they propose. And, of course, since they’re wicked and evil, there’s no point in arguing with them and trying to show that their arguments for war don’t work. How much more comforting it is to know that those who agree with you are good, and that there’s no point in presenting arguments or evidence to those who don’t agree, since they’re just evil because what they truly seek is mayhem, the proof being that that would be the outcome of their policies. They know the truth but come to the wrong conclusions, not because they don’t know the truth, but because they seek evil for its own sake. Why even bother to consider the case that they might be underestimating the bad consequences of their policies?
The anonymous poster (one of them, at least) above asks anon1 to explain why “War is to be opposed in almost all instances,” rather than in all, considering his or her insistence that it is the 100% certainty of innocent deaths in war that motivates him or her to oppose “almost all” wars. I think that that’s a fair question. I did not notice the “almost all” qualification when I responded (sorry), but if it is a qualification, it would be helpful to know what would justify it.
Anon1 writes: “War is to be opposed in almost all instances because it involves the killing of innocents, not because it could backfire on you strategically if poorly executed.”
1. But defensive war involves the killing of innocents. More generally, one simply cannot engage in violent self defense without a positive probabilty of harming the innocent. Is this then an argument against self defense?
2. Suppose we were to agree that “avoiding the killing of innocents” is the most important reason for opposing war… this standard gives ambiguous results here. If a nuclear-armed Iran were to use its nukes on a neighbor, or allow them to fall into the hands of a terrorist group, the number of innocents killed would likely far exceed the number killed in limited strikes against nuclear facilities. If an attack saves more innocents than it kills, then is an attack justified? Yes? No?
3. Poor execution and strategic blunders are perfectly sensible reasons (additional to moral reasons) for opposing wars. As I understand it, Iran is currently at least two years from having a nuke, and an attack on Iran now would be a terrible blunder for a number of strategic and practical reasons.
This position is perfectly compatible with being a consistent libertarian and generally opposed to war.
to A. Gregory:: You claim that “many libertarians are doing a disservice by blindly accepting the premise that Iran presents a major threat that has to be dealt with by the US government.”
First, who are these mystery libertarians you’re refering to?
Second, what does “blindly accepting” refer to? To Iran being a potential threat? (The case for Iran being a threat is not a weak one.) To this being necessarily a job for the U.S. military? (Since the Whitehouse publicly is denying this, it can’t be that these mystery libertarians are blindly accepting Bush’s argument.)
Mr. Palmer wrote:
“Then you (anon1) are opposed to each and every war, including the War for American Independence, in which innocents were also killed, as well as all defensive wars, such as resistance to the National Socialist and Soviet occupation of Poland, in which innocents were also killed. It’s a coherent position, but not one that I hold.”
I’m not sure than a description of my own personal defintiion of a just war is useful in the context of this conversation, but briefly: I wish I could say that I have attained a Christ-like level of detachment, but unfortunately I maintain the position that civilized people often must organize themselves in credible militias to persuade huns and vandals and conscript armies to stay clear of their settlements. I won’t get in to listing which wars I consider “just” or not, but to feed the piranhas I will note that “the War for American Independence” was almost certainly avoidable and a tremendous tragedy for the thousands and thousands of civilized “loyalists” stripped of their lives and property by marauding “rebels.”
“Those might be interesting questions for anon1 to ponder.”
I am not a total boob and, as I mentioned above, I’m not even a pacifist. In my own little way, with my own little brain, I have grappled with the calculus of death. Additionally let me assure you I’m what you might call “open minded,” meaning when I ask a question on a this forum it is because I’m genuinely interested in thoughtful feedback, which you, Mr. Palmer, provide at least 98% of the time.
So let me try again. Mr. Palmer do you consider the justificiations necessary to wage war different in kind than those sufficient, for a thoughful executive, to raise taxes?
Consider the possibility that an “air-strike” on an inhabited apartment building ordered by President Bush in March 2003 had actually succeeded in killing Saddam Hussein, thereby making the subsequent invasion of Iraq unnecessary. President Bush’s action would be justified based on the calculation that these deaths, and Saddam’s in particular, had saved American “blood and treasure.” But should he feel regret for the incineration of all the innocent residents of that apartment building? Oughtn’t he publicly demonstrate his remorse somehow? Or is mathematics synonymous with morality?
Fairly put.*
Feeling regret is one thing and being justified or unjustified in one’s actions is another. Any decent person feels regret any time an action harms an innocent, even when that action is justified. Someone who discharges a weapon in self-defense and ends up wounding or killing an innocent person should feel regret, even if the action were justified and he were free of any criminal responsibility.
If President Bush could have killed Saddam and the strike would have caused dozens or even hundreds of innocent deaths, would it have been justified? The case anon1 raises is more complicated than it might seem at first, because such a huge percentage of the subsequent deaths have been deliberately caused by the insurgents murdering civilians in order to create mayhem and disorder and to discredit the occupying coalition forces. Presumably, that would still have happened even if Saddam had been killed in a targeted strike (even one that killed innocents in the building under which he was hiding). Such anticipated consequences should figure into the decision to go to war or not. A good reason for not attacking North Korea’s nuclear facilities, for example, is that they have tens of thousands of artillery tubes aimed at Seoul right over the border and they would wipe out hundreds of thousands — perhaps millions — of people with a variety of chemical, biological, conventional, and possibly nuclear warheads. That is a predictable consequence of a military attack and it has a very strong deterrent effect.
Decisions have consequences. Once made, the consequences should be “credited” to those who made the decisions. The same goes for the mayhem in Iraq; the people who approved that war bear responsibility for what follows. At the same time, they’re not the ones driving car bombs into crowds or sending suicide bombers into mosques to maximize civilian casualties. Those people bear a different kind of responsibility; in their absence, Iraq would be relatively peaceful, but their presence should have been foreseen by those who planned this war and decided to embark on it on the grounds that after the dictator had been deposed, the country would revert to a Middle Eastern version of California.
*(I don’t understand the last comment, however, about mathematics and reality.)
Regarding anon1’s question:
Mr. Palmer do you consider the justificiations necessary to wage war different in kind than those sufficient, for a thoughful executive, to raise taxes?
If the option is to risk being nuked or to use military force to reduce or eliminate the risk, then I would prefer not to be nuked and I might very well choose to wage war. Ditto for the distinction between being attacked and occupied or using military force to repel an invasion. I’m no friend of taxes and I’m not in favor of raising them; I’d much prefer to eliminate the bulk of what they’re spent on. So I see no good reason for raising taxes at all; better to reduce unjustified and needless spending. If we ever get down to the level where all that the state does is to provide defense, security, and the administration of justice, then I’d be happy to have a discussion about whether taxes should be eliminated or kept, reduced or raised, but we’re a long way from that point now.
Mr. Palmer, I didn’t “answer [questions] on behalf of others,” nor did I assume that “unnamed others believe that an attack would ‘simply be a well-intentioned maneuver to protect the innocent from Iranian nukes, with all or most of its regrettable, condemnable results being neatly attributable to instances where the planning went wrong.” I answered my own question myself, true, but not for others, and did not assume that others would take the position polar opposite to my own. When you ask questions, you yourself sometimes provide your own answer. And sometimes, you present your views such that the opposite to what you say might indeed sound kind of silly. For example, you said, “I don’t oppose wars merely because of the way the word is spelled, but because of what war entails.” Well, I don’t know many people who do oppose wars merely because of the way the word is spelled, do you?
I was trying to ask you a question in the first half of my post, and I’d like to know the answer. Do you really believe that it’s so clear that a poorly planned strike against Iran would be worse (from a libertarian perspective, presumably) than would a properly planned one? If you believe this, isn’t this perhaps assuming too much that the war planners have good intentions and the same concern for risks that you do? Couldn’t it be possible that a failed U.S. war policy is actually better for liberty than a successful one?
You say that “[w]hat seems to be lurking in the background of Mr. Gregory’s statement is the belief that the motives of people who would support a strike against Iran are themselves suspect. Maybe, but maybe not. Maybe they err in their evaluation of the likely consequences. Mr. Gregory, however, is having none of that. People whom he has not convinced must be wicked and evil. That’s the only explanation for why they would propose what they propose.” Now, to steal your own quote, “Why assume that?” I didn’t say that at all. You are assuming far too much from what I said. I believe that a military attack on Iran would be wicked and evil. I believe the war planners are planning a wicked act. I believe the motives of the war planners are certainly suspect. This is not to say that anyone who merely supports or believes in or even advocates an attack is evil or wicked, even if what they are supporting or believing or advocating clearly is. Not every advocate of taxation and drug laws is an evil person. But the policies are definitely evil, and those who implement them are certainly morally suspect–if for no other reason, because they’re doing something immoral.
It is very important to try to convince people to oppose aggressive war, and show them why they’re mistaken and misguided. But the war planners themselves will probably not be convinced by moral or even practical arguments. I do think that, in the long run, the way to fight the warfare state is not to convince its top leaders not to wage the murderous war that they’ve worked their entire lives to be in a position to dish out. In the long run, I think the people have to oppose statism, and that the state will only let go of its stranglehold when the people stop putting up with it. We might disagree on strategy here, but I never said that all people who believe in the war are evil. I do believe you have put words in my mouth, the very thing you’ve suggested I have done to others.
To C. Steele, you asked me, “You claim that ‘many libertarians are doing a disservice by blindly accepting the premise that Iran presents a major threat that has to be dealt with by the US government.'”
Yes.
“First, who are these mystery libertarians you’re refering to?”
I’m going to answer your second question first, since it matters what I claim they believe before I explain who they are.
“Second, what does ‘blindly accepting’ refer to? To Iran being a potential threat? (The case for Iran being a threat is not a weak one.) To this being necessarily a job for the U.S. military? (Since the Whitehouse publicly is denying this, it can’t be that these mystery libertarians are blindly accepting Bush’s argument.”
I was fairly precise. What they blindly accept is that Iran is a major threat that has to be dealt with by the US government. In other words, they believe that not only is Iran a major, considerable threat, but that it is something the US government should do something about. I don’t think the US government should do anything except withdraw from the whole region. I believe that a very good share of what the US government and its kept media are saying about Iran as a threat is probably deceptive propaganda, as it was in the case of Iraq and, come to think of it, virtually every war in US history. I think that the fact that many libertarians are so concerned with finding alternative methods through which the US government can pressure Iran to give up its nuclear weapons program demonstrates that they’ve accepted too many of the statist premises of the war on terror–namely, that the US government should, can, and will protect us from an Iranian threat that would be worse without such protection.
So to answer your first question, I was referring to any libertarian that fits my description of what I consider an unfortunate belief among many libertarians about Iran. I’ve seen it on blogs and throughout cyberspace. I’ve met a good number of so-called libertarians who supported the Iraq war and support a full war on Iran. I’m thinking of the type that would relate to Larry Elder or Neal Boortz, the neo-libertarians, some of the Reason writers, many people in the LP, and the liberventionists everywhere. But even many who oppose a military war with Iran are still buying too much of the propaganda, in my opinion.
An anonymous poster above had said that we should expect antiwar libertarians to whitewash Iran in the next few months. Well, I don’t know what that means, exactly, but I do suspect that many pro-war types in libertarian circles would consider it whitewashing Iran merely to cast doubt on the US government’s claims about that regime. I remember that, during the build up to the last war, antiwar libertarians were accused of siding with Saddam Hussein because they didn’t believe the administration’s lies about WMD and Saddam’s operational ties to al Qaeda. The pro-war libertarians were, as it turns out, blindly accepting the premise that Iraq presented a major threat that had to be dealt with by the US government. I do think they were wrong to accept it so blindly, since the adminstration’s case for war was very, very weak, and since, historically, US politicians have lied about war.
to Anthony Goodman — your answers to my questions more or less satisfy me.
I think a few of us may be talking past each other, because “antiwar libertarians” and “prowar libertarians” are undefined.
I do think it is clear that a great deal (though not all) of the current mess in the middle east is the result of U.S. gov’t meddling in the region. And in general, more meddling doesn’t fix things, but digs the hole deeper.
This doesn’t necessarily mean that immediate and complete withdrawal from the region is the optimal policy, but the presumption in each case should be for such withdrawal, unless there’s a very strong counterargument.
This position is quite different from Anon1’s (and also quite different from Bush’s). It’s not prowar, but simply recognizes that sometimes a war is called for, because the alternative would be worse. Neither Iraq, nor a an Iran adventure in the immediate future, meets this standard.
Mr. Gregory’s last point deserves a more thoughtful and considered response than I can provide at the moment. I’m both under a few deadlines and bone tired. So I will turn to this either tomorrow morning or tomorrow evening.
Mr. Gregory makes a fair point (there seems to be a parallel between asking questions and rebutting silly answers and my noting that “I don’t oppose wars merely because of the way the word is spelled, but because of what war entails”), but rather misses mine. I didn’t mean to suggest that anyone would oppose war for so frivolous a reason, but was trying to indicate that there are reasons to oppose war, and that those reasons come with weights; if the consequences of a war are worse, then one has more reason to oppose it.
Now to his question. Yes, I believe that a poorly planned invasion into Iran would be worse than a well planned and targeted strike against a facility for producing nuclear weapons. I do not think that “a failed U.S. war policy is actually better for liberty than a successful one.” We have a failed U.S. war policy in Iraq, and I dare say that it is worse for liberty than A) not having gone to war at all, and B) having gone to war, gotten rid of Saddam, not made so many blunders, and gotten out.
As to Mr. Gregory’s background thinking, I believe that he has indicated an unwillingness to spell out, in less than shrill terms, the consequences of war for the people who will pay them. If you want to avoid going to war, start by trying to convince people not to support it. I know enough military officers to say that I don’t think that most officers (surely there are some bad apples, but I doubt that there are a lot) are eager for war because they love the smell of combat. Nor do I believe that Dick Cheney supported war to increase the value of his pension or stock portfolios. I think that they were in error. And those errors could and should have been corrected. That’s one reason why I was not amused, but angry, that the president awarded a medal to the CIA head who provided faulty intelligence; it was a poke in the eye to the American public and a reward for incompetence and failure.
I disagree that “the war planners themselves will probably not be convinced by moral or even practical arguemnts.” I don’t intend to spend much time convincing top leaders, but I also think that these remarks of Mr. Gregory’s are highly implausible:
“It seems to me that a war or military strike against Iran, as it currently appears most likely to develop, would not simply be a well-intentioned maneuver to protect the innocent from Iranian nukes, with all or most of its regrettable, condemnable results being neatly attributable to instances where the planning went wrong. On the contrary, those who would wage war against Iran would be aggressors, and their reported plans are plans to commit violence that is inherently aggressive in the present context.” I think that the threat of Iranian nukes is the most important issue that is motivating all who are considering a military attack. Mr. Gregory’s remarks about “aggressors” suggests that it is aggression per se, rather than fear about nukes, that motivates them. I didn’t put those words in his mouth; he did. And I don’t find them plausible interpretations of how policies are shaped or justified. They suggest that it is simply evil that motivates bad policies. No doubt evil exists in the world (with whatever ontological status one accords to evil), but I doubt that evil, in the form of the love of aggression per se, is very common among policy makers in democratic states.
I think that most rulers, of democratic states and non-democratic ones, have motivations that are not so simplistic as aggression as an end in itself. Security, humanity, freedom, equality–all of these are often involved, perversely enough, in the motivations behind state aggression, including that of officials of authoritarian regimes. At the end of the day, though, they are aggressors, they are using the evil and impractical instrument of aggression to bring about whatever good they believe it will, and this aggressive impulse makes me quite worried about their plans, whether well devised or not, and whether or not I think their motivations are purely malicious or not. In the case of the current administration, I do happen to think that most of the top leaders are not simply in intellectual error, but have motivies that are themselves nefarious, at least on some level. (For example, if the real reason to invade Iraq in 2003 was to conquer it and put permanent US bases there, rather than the reasons given, it might still have been that the planners expected that, in the long term, US bases in Iraq would be good for liberating for the region. I still consider the motivation wicked, even if it has a layer of good intentions to it.) Furthermore, their methods are evil, even if they’re motivations aren’t, and they appear to be compulsive liars.
I don’t think it’s fair to compare “a poorly planned invasion into Iran” with “a well planned and targeted strike against a facility for producing nuclear weapons.” I think the right comparison would be a poorly planned invasion versus a well planned invasion, or a poorly planned and targeted strike to a well planned and targeted strike. (Incidentally, when the projectiles are as destrucive as they are, the term “targeted” can be deceptive. I can target a mosquito with a grenade and still be considered an aggressor if you happen to be in the vicinity of my “target.”)
Dr. Palmer writes, “We have a failed U.S. war policy in Iraq, and I dare say that it is worse for liberty than A) not having gone to war at all, and B) having gone to war, gotten rid of Saddam, not made so many blunders, and gotten out.”
I agree with that. But do you believe that the reason the US should not have gotten out by now is that it has made so many blunders and must stay to fix them? I ask this because I know you think it shouldn’t pull out immediately, meaning it probably shouldn’t have left by now, and yet you think getting out would have been better than staying, at least assuming there hadn’t been so many blunders. Is this the correct understanding of your position?