Re: The Illogic of Genocide

On Thu, 13 Sep 2001 [email protected] wrote:

> i concur that the calls to genocide by many public officials and 
> private citizens is the quickest and most vile way to dishonor the 
> memories of those innocent lives that have been lost.

Agreed.

>  However, from a 
> tactical point of view the question may come down to something like, " 
> we know that these people are here, but we can't get to them without a 
> military action of some kind, which, however surgically done will 
> involve the violation of another states soverignty and probably the 
> deaths and injury of civilians not responsible for the heinous crime."

Yes, exactly. Good way of putting it, if a tad abstract. By that I mean I
don't think the question *will* come down to that, per se. But let's go
with it for the moment.
  
> Do you believe that such an action would be justified.

There's a lot of details that would have to be supplied to be clear on
whether it would be justified, and, at this point, I feel so worn down I'd
*settle* for us not nuking :( That's how bad it is.

But let me try to explore some scenarios and principles. The seemingly
most justified scenario is that we have concrete, conclusive evidence that
a set of specific people are directly responsible for the specific attacks
on Tuesday, and they were acting more or less in concert with an explicit
policy of some specific government. Better, that government owns up and
declares war (specifically, the explicit intention to continue
hostilities). In that scenario, we clearly have a hostile, agressor
state. Now, to use force (under international law) we must either be under
direct attack or authorized by a UN resolution. If there is credible
evidence that the hostile state intends similar attacks, then I suspect
the self-defense clause would kick in. In any case, UN authorization would
be quick, if we bothered.

Ok, at this point, we have at least a prima facie justification for
"collateral damage" and for "violating sovereignty". Assuming we
fought within the Geneva Convention (a *real* stretch, it's pretty clear
that the US *hasn't* felt bound by GC anytime this century) whether you
think it's the right action depends entirely on your feelings about "just
wars". But let's give it the nod, assume that there really is no
diplomatic out, etc. etc. Given that what ever "side deaths" of innocents
that would occur were the result of "defensive" actions, then, I think I
must say they are justified, if horrible.

But note the restrictions, no nukes, no carpet bombing, probably can't
insist on unconditional surrender, no super high flying bombings,
etc. etc. etc. This isn't a matter of *surgicalness*, but of how we are
allowed to conduct a war against an aggressor.

A good case to examine is the Gulf War, which had a lot of the trappings
of the scenario I describe above, but was also pretty systematically
illegitamate, nay, pure evil.

So, if you buy that war and violent resistence are *sometimes* legit, then
you do accept that innocents may be killed. The problem is that people
leap from that to all restrictions fall by the wayside (see Ann Coulter).

----
Now, take the case where there is a nation responsible, but they don't
declare war, they say that they will not pursue further action against us,
and *even* that they will prosecute the people specifically responsible,
as determined by their legal system.

In that case, absent any credible evidence of their duplicity (i.e., they
are in fact gear up for further attacks) I don't think attacking, or
sending a kidnap team, etc. etc. is legit. I really really think this is a
no-brainer. The easy way to tell is to use the Chomsky technique of
reversal: Kissenger is clearly guilty of far worse crimes, yet I don't
think *ANYONE* would endorse bombing the building where the Kissenger
Associates are, or kidnaping him of the set of Good Morning America. I
don't and I think he should go to trial. Hell, it's even possible he'd
*get off*. Kerrey certainly might be able to weasal out.

Let's make it *more* specific. Suppose contrary to what seems to be the
fact, that the WTC *was* an attempt on Kissenger. I.e., the bombers were
cambodian, vietnamese, chilean, what have you, they had intel that Kiss
was going to be in either WTC building *or* the Pentagon, and they were
going to kill him in revenge for his actions, and yeah, it was overkill
but too bad.

Clearly, this is insane and wrong. No question. But where's the
difference?

If the elapsed time befuddles, look to Clinton or Albright, or Bush and
Blair. We bombed Iraq two days before the attack...how is *that* 
justified?

So, no, I don't think a strike into another nation to "get" the
mastermind/whatever behind the attacks is legitimate. At all.

Hmm. One line I've not considered is deterence. Note that this sort of
reasoning is, afaict, completely outside international law or general just
war theory. But let's explore it.

So, what's the scenario? We have conclusive evidence that some person was
directly responsible. We also know that there are other people with
relatively similar mindsets, greivences, causes, whatever. We don't want
such attacks to continue. One way to deter both the actual perp and others
is to kill them all. (Can't attack if you're dead.) Ok, that's a
non-starter, I hope. You can't kill people who merely *might* do something
bad.

bin Laden has a speech where he accused the US of being cowardly because
we're afraid to have our soldiers die (he cited Somolia and Berit retreats
as examples). Of course, we're willing, in seems, to kill loads of folks
anyway. If we kill *enough* people, with *that* deter? We've killed an
awful lot and it hasn't seemed to work.

Let's assume we aren't going to kill *everyone* who could possibly be
motivated by past or future actions on our part to attack us. So what's
the argument that killing *some* of them, or their loved ones, or random
innocents they identify with will deter them? I don't see it, I really
don't.

The us has been pursuing a "rouge, crazed state" theory at least since
Nixon. I.e., if we're perceived as irrational, people won't attack us
because it's Too Dangerous. I think the fallacy of that stance is proven
by the attacks.


>  Further, do you 
> believe that we can conduct a "war" against a group that is not a 
> nation and if so how?

Sure, in some sense. I mean, Bush is gearing up for a "new kind of
war" which is, roughly, afaict, a "global" guerilla war. <sigh/>I guess it
*is* world war three :( Weird that it would be a guerilla war, but that's
what Powell et al are setting up. 

Is it legitemate? In theory? I really don't know. But I'm sad to say that
I don't think that what we actually do will be good.

How can we "combat" such horror? Well, step one in my book is to stop
*committing* it. Close to or more people die each month in Iraq. Each
month. Serbia is mostly rubble, much of it
contaminated. Columbia...Columbia is a disaster area. And we've declared
"war" there (though "not really"), shouldn't we expect hostile responses?

But any discussion of how we should proceed has to be tempered by what's
achievable in the actual situation. I don't think, alas, that we're
suddenly going to acknowledge the evil and dangers of empire. It's feeling
like a lost cause to try to get any acknowledgement of the need for vague
proportionality. Perhaps our best bet is for a resurgence of isolationism
(hah). But that probably won't come until after a whole lot of people are
dead.

>  sorry to ask so many questions of you,

No problem. I hope my discussion helps.

> but i 
> have a great respect for your positions and your intellectual capacity 

I'm flattered and honored.

> and hope that you can help me to find answers to these questions.

Please share any further thoughts you have.

Cheers,
Bijan Parsia.