This is actually an important and interesting conversation to have. Indeed, Greenwald almost exclusively deals in important and interesting conversations, and that's to his credit. But this article is basically a plea to readers "don't associate me at all with the dumb arguments of people on my side, but make sure you hold Sam Harris responsible for everything anyone I disagree with says".
I can see how Greenwald achieves such success as a columnist and as a lawyer. He argues his positions with great passion and conviction, and it does a great job papering over how flimsy they are in a lot of cases.
On the Harris thing: we've gone over these things enough on here to know that I disagree with him on the torture (although he's not an unqualified supporter) and on Iraq, but agree on the war on terror, etc. On the question of Islam (the subject of this article), I think it's entirely appropriate to say that modern Islam - not all of modern Islam, but considering all the elements and not just picking the "good" ones - is indeed uniquely threatening to liberal civilization and insofar as it imposes itself on innocent Muslims and non-Muslims, it needs to be met appropriately (which, under some circumstances, also means lethally). I am very much in favor of the distinction between "Muslims" and "Islamists" precisely because modern Islam is diverse and not uniformly problematic. But I don't think it's inappropriate at all to note that Islam's "Islamist" faction is more prominent and more dangerous than say Christianity's "Christianist" faction. Five hundred or a thousand years ago you could probably say the reverse. At that time liberal elements dissented (with mixed results), left Europe, or (eventually) reformed the problem. But today, it is the Islamist community within the wider population of Muslims that poses the real threat to liberal civilization. And you know what? You can say that without supporting U.S. policy (I support some parts, but not others)
Thursday, April 4, 2013
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"Indeed, Greenwald almost exclusively deals in important and interesting conversations, and that's to his credit. But this article is basically a plea to readers "don't associate me at all with the dumb arguments of people on my side, but make sure you hold Sam Harris responsible for everything anyone I disagree with says"."
ReplyDeleteCan you explain what you mean? I mean, I didn't get this at all from Greenwald's article.
"I can see how Greenwald achieves such success as a columnist and as a lawyer. He argues his positions with great passion and conviction, and it does a great job papering over how flimsy they are in a lot of cases."
For what it's worth and I know we thoroughly disagree on this and most likely are not goiing to be able to change each other's mind: Of all the hundreds of columnists and pundits that I've read or listened to in every kind of field writing on any kind of topic, I find Glenn Greenwald to be the most convincing and brilliant and intellectually superior and honest one. I find it amazing that in the years that I've been following him his columns have virtually all been consistently exhaustively documented and brilliantly and carefully (but passionately) argued. I've not once caught him in some kind of intellectually dishonest or not quite honest or fair tactic, which is astonishing. And in his media appearances it is amazing just how quickly and convincingly he can devastate his opponents. Again, there's probably liottle point in discussing this further, but I just wanted to note this, for what it's worth.
Glen Greenwald is like the Lionel Messi of public intellectuals. He's in a cxategory of his own (No offense, Ronaldo).
Daniel wrote: "On the question of Islam (the subject of this article), I think it's entirely appropriate to say that modern Islam - not all of modern Islam, but considering all the elements and not just picking the "good" ones - is indeed uniquely threatening to liberal civilization"
As threatening as or more threatening that liberal civilization has been to Muslims in Muslim countries in the past two decades?
How do you propose measuring? (potential or actual) body count?
"and insofar as it imposes itself on innocent Muslims and non-Muslims, it needs to be met appropriately (which, under some circumstances, also means lethally)."
Would the same hold for non-Islamic violence imposed on innocent Muslims and non-Muslims? I take it tht you mean 'yes' but suspect that would undermine your more general point, so I wonder how you would reconcile those.
"But today, it is the Islamist community within the wider population of Muslims that poses the real threat to liberal civilization. And you know what? You can say that without supporting U.S. policy (I support some parts, but not others"
Althouigh some would say that it is exactly U.S. policy that directly or indirectly causes some Muslims to take up arms against the West and others to tacitly or actively support them, and/or for Islamic forces to be able to gain power (because for example they are willing to fight against (often U.S. supported) dictators) and potentially or actuallt suppress moderate Muslims and non-Muslims.
If that is the case, then not supporting U.S. policy but still saying that it is the Islamist community within the wider population of Muslims that is the biggest threat to liberal civilization becomes problematic.
There's this: : "Given that I had never written about Sam Harris, I found it odd that I had become the symbol of Harris-bashing for some of his faithful followers. Tweeting a link to an Al Jazeera column about Harris and saying I find one of his quotes revealing does not make me responsible for every claim in that column. I tweet literally thousands of columns and articles for people to read. I'm responsible for what I say, not for every sentence in every article to which I link on Twitter."
DeleteFollowed by a long discussion of how awful Harris's statements are because in some ways they are on the same wavelength with Islamophobia. Which is about as stupid as the people that blamed Greenwald for everything in the articles he linked to.
re: "As threatening as or more threatening that liberal civilization has been to Muslims in Muslim countries in the past two decades?
DeleteHow do you propose measuring? (potential or actual) body count?"
The elements that are threatening are more threatening (and as I've already said - not all elements in Islam are). And for that matter, these elements have also been more threatening to the welfare of Muslims in Muslim countries than liberal civilization has been. There are specific instances where I would agree with you on the guilt of liberal civilization (although here we should curtail it more specifically to the U.S.), and that's the case of Iraq. I'm not thinking in terms of body counts necessarily (although that's obviously a good one to talk about in the case of Iraq), but in terms of welfare loss and the likelihood of the perpetuation of liberalism.
re: "Would the same hold for non-Islamic violence imposed on innocent Muslims and non-Muslims? I take it tht you mean 'yes' but suspect that would undermine your more general point, so I wonder how you would reconcile those."
DeleteI'm not sure I understand this question. I think lethal force is justified as a response to some injustices no matter who the perpetrator is. I can't see how that undermines my general point, but perhaps I'm misunderstanding your statement.
re: "Althouigh some would say that it is exactly U.S. policy that directly or indirectly causes some Muslims to take up arms against the West and others to tacitly or actively support them, and/or for Islamic forces to be able to gain power (because for example they are willing to fight against (often U.S. supported) dictators) and potentially or actuallt suppress moderate Muslims and non-Muslims.
DeleteIf that is the case, then not supporting U.S. policy but still saying that it is the Islamist community within the wider population of Muslims that is the biggest threat to liberal civilization becomes problematic."
I agree to a certain extent. The most glaring is our policy towards Saudi Arabia.
But let's be very careful with this.
It's one thing to say that the Islamists have cause for being angry with us over that. They definitely have cause to be angry with Israel over certain policies towards the Palestinians (not other policies towards the Palestinians). Fine.
Does that give them cause to wipe Israel off the map? Does that give them cause to attack innocent Muslims? Does that give them cause to attack innocent Americans? Does that give them cause to establish a caliphate that tramples over the rights of Muslims and threaten everyone else?
Looking prospectively: would that give them cause to come to my home and set off a dirty bomb in the middle of DC while I'm on one side of the city and Kate's on the other side of the city and there's no cell service because of the panic?
I agree with this point of yours to a certain extent, but I think it's a weak reed to carry your argument on.
Really the most that could be justified by what we did to them (leaving Iraq aside for the moment - I'm thinking of the run up to this mess) is an insurrection in Saudi Arabia. Actually where we probably could have improved the most is if we had continued to make investments in Afghanistan rather than pulling out our interests there after the Soviets left.
btw - I appreciate your tone and demeanor in this comment - thanks
Delete"Followed by a long discussion of how awful Harris's statements are because in some ways they are on the same wavelength with Islamophobia. Which is about as stupid as the people that blamed Greenwald for everything in the articles he linked to."
ReplyDeleteBut the statements of Harris are themselves, at least in Greenwald's opinion, examples of Islamophobia (albeit of a more 'sophisticated' nature than other kinds), it's not as if Harris's statements were by themselves more innocent but they happened to be in the same column or whatever as much more objectionable statements by others were. So in that sense one could agree with Greenwald in his objection to some of Harris's supporters acting as if greenwald agrees with everything in the column that he referred to, while at the same time stating that Greenwald is not doing something similar (saying somebody's views are awful because they occur somewhere with or are only moderately similar ('in some ways on the same wavelength') with other views that clearly *are* awful): I mean, Greenwald objects to Harris's statements in their own right, not because they resemble even more objectionable views. Their resembling even more objectionable views and Greenwald's objecting to them have a common cause, namely that they themselves are pretty awful. (to be sure, you may disagree with whether they're awful or not, but that is irrelevant to my point here that Greenwald is not making the same mistake or a similar mistake as the one he says Harris's supporters make when they act as if Greenwald agrees with everything in the column he referred to.
Daniel wrote: "The elements that are threatening are more threatening (and as I've already said - not all elements in Islam are). And for that matter, these elements have also been more threatening to the welfare of Muslims in Muslim countries than liberal civilization has been."
ReplyDeleteOkay, so I'm inclined to disagree with this in the sense that I think:
1. a lot of Islamist power is the direct or indirect result of Western intervention (e.g. propping up dictators, sanctions against Iraq, military and political support of Israel, fighting wars that create oipportunities for Islamists, drone wars that terrify and kill people, etc.) So in that sense it is at least difficult to look at b) Islamist threats to the West and to Muslims and non-Muslims in the countries that the ISlamists are active in, and b) Western liberal democracy's threat to innocent people in Islamist and in Western countries, independently of one another.
2. in terms of body count the West seems to have killed a lot of people in Muslim countries. Of course Islamists (as well as non-Islamist political groups) have also killed a lot of people in Muslim countries (though priobably not as many as the half a million children in Iraq), but then I'd invoke my point #1 again
3. in terms of repression and hindering economic and cultural development in Muslim countries, the West also seems to have been pretty bad (by suppoirting/having supported dictators (in e.g. Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iraq)). islamists can be pretty bd as well but one wonders how much power they would have if it wasn;t for earlier and current Western actions (again, see my point #1)
"There are specific instances where I would agree with you on the guilt of liberal civilization (although here we should curtail it more specifically to the U.S.), and that's the case of Iraq. I'm not thinking in terms of body counts necessarily (although that's obviously a good one to talk about in the case of Iraq), but in terms of welfare loss and the likelihood of the perpetuation of liberalism."
But do you think that Iraq would have been worse off in those respects if the US hadn't intervened?
re: "But do you think that Iraq would have been worse off in those respects if the US hadn't intervened?"
DeleteIt's tough to say. It would have been a slow grind under Saddam. You're also then weighing "worse off" in terms of the more nebulous costs of life under a dictator vs. life under a dysfunctional democracy that may or may not be more functional over time. So I don't know what I'd say. But I don't really feel like I have to since I don't think we should make foreign policy decisions on the basis of whether people would be better off or not.
North Koreans would almost certainly be better off if we just went in and deposed the regime there, occupied it for a while and slowly opened it up. But I don't think we should do that. If we intervened everywhere we could make someone better off (1.) the variability in whether we're right in our assessments in any given case would be large and a lot of people would suffer for it, and (2.) we'd be intervening in lots of places. I don't think that's what justifies taking military action somewhere.
"I agree to a certain extent. The most glaring is our policy towards Saudi Arabia.
ReplyDeleteBut let's be very careful with this.
It's one thing to say that the Islamists have cause for being angry with us over that. They definitely have cause to be angry with Israel over certain policies towards the Palestinians (not other policies towards the Palestinians). Fine.
Does that give them cause to wipe Israel off the map? Does that give them cause to attack innocent Muslims? Does that give them cause to attack innocent Americans? Does that give them cause to establish a caliphate that tramples over the rights of Muslims and threaten everyone else?"
No, at least not any more than that Western countries would have the right to kill innocent people in response to Islamist attacks in the West.
But what I think is important is the distinction between on the one hand Islamist attacks being *justified* by earlier Western actions, and on the other hand these Islamist attacks being *caused* by the same earlier Western actions.
Even if one agrees that the attacks are not *justified* by earlier Western actions [leaving aside for the moment the question as to *their* justifiability], one could still argue that the attacks are likely to a significant extent *caused* by them, and therefore that even just as a matter of prudence it is necessary to stop those Western actions and to blame those Western actions because they invite such blowback. One could very well argue the latter without arguing the former.
"Looking prospectively: would that give them cause to come to my home and set off a dirty bomb in the middle of DC while I'm on one side of the city and Kate's on the other side of the city and there's no cell service because of the panic?"
Nope. Of course a lot of people would say the same thing about Western military actions not being justified in the same way.
"I agree with this point of yours to a certain extent, but I think it's a weak reed to carry your argument on."
disagree
"Really the most that could be justified by what we"
argh!
" did to them (leaving Iraq aside for the moment"
Also don't forget the sanctions against Iraq in the 1990s. That's a pretty big thing as well
" - I'm thinking of the run up to this mess) is an insurrection in Saudi Arabia."
I think people in Egypt and Iran and Yemen and probably a bunch of other countries had some right to be angry with the US government as well.
"Actually where we probably could have improved the most is if we had continued to make investments in Afghanistan rather than pulling out our interests there after the Soviets left."
yep, commercial and cultural relations rather than military action (and earlier supporting the Jihadists agaionst the Soviets) would likely have worked better.
re: "No, at least not any more than that Western countries would have the right to kill innocent people in response to Islamist attacks in the West."
DeleteOK, you are being very slippery with this one. Even in Iraq - which you and I both oppose - Americans didn't go in and purposefully target innocents. We can oppose the loss of innocent life and still distinguish between different ways that it is lost. If we are ranking "evil" (a word that comes up in Greenwald's article), the evil of actually seeking out innocents to kill far exceeds any evil we'd want to attach to someone going in in a war to save innocent lives and inadvertently killing innocent people in the process. Your false equivalence here is unconvincing and pretty transparent.
re: "Even if one agrees that the attacks are not *justified* by earlier Western actions [leaving aside for the moment the question as to *their* justifiability], one could still argue that the attacks are likely to a significant extent *caused* by them, and therefore that even just as a matter of prudence it is necessary to stop those Western actions and to blame those Western actions because they invite such blowback."
DeleteObviously. This has been my position throughout. But there's a big difference between saying "we shouldn't intervene in X case because the costs of blowback exceed the benefits of going in" and citing blowback as a general argument against intervention. If you want to convince me that we shouldn't go after al Qaeda because of blowback risk, don't cite blowback from our support for Saudi or Egyptian tyranny and just assume you can copy-and-paste to every other scenario you'd like to copy-and-paste to.
re: "Nope. Of course a lot of people would say the same thing about Western military actions not being justified in the same way."
DeleteAgain you're being slippery with "military actions". WHICH military actions are you thinking of?
I agree - the U.S. military should not set off a dirty bomb in Baghdad. Now if you want to extrapolate beyond the action discussed you need to make a case for it.
Do you think a dirty bomb in DC is comparable to a targeted drone attack on al Qaeda members that takes some innocent lives in the process. I don't. Do you? You need to stop concealing your arguments behind these vague claims. What is and is not right and why? What is and is not comparable and why?
"OK, you are being very slippery with this one. Even in Iraq - which you and I both oppose - Americans didn't go in and purposefully target innocents. We can oppose the loss of innocent life and still distinguish between different ways that it is lost. If we are ranking "evil" (a word that comes up in Greenwald's article), the evil of actually seeking out innocents to kill far exceeds any evil we'd want to attach to someone going in in a war to save innocent lives and inadvertently killing innocent people in the process. Your false equivalence here is unconvincing and pretty transparent."
ReplyDelete1. American soldiers *have* killed innocent people intentionally. Obviously those killings were not official policy and mostly the result of individual decisions and actions by soldiers, but still: American soldiers have killed innocent people just for the hell of it or to achieve some military or whatever effect. (I'm not sure what the official policy was on arresting, detaining, torturing and/or killing innocent people in e.g. Iraq or Afghanistan, but it seems that in some cases at least these actions were official policy)
2. More importantlyu, you are right that there is an important distinction between intentionally killing innocent people and unintentionally killing innocent people, and that Islamist terrorists have often done the former while official US policy does not condone doing the same. On the other hand, my point is that the morality of this distinction blurs quite quickly when actiosn that are not aimed at killing innocent people have as a regular byproduct the killing of a lot of innocent people (e.g. to target a whole group of people (e.g. in the form of a wedding or a funeral) when they want to kill only one or a handful of people, or targeting people on the basis of (knowingly) poor information).
It is in my view easy for the latter to become as evil and objectionable as the former, if one is not very careful to protect innocent lives and it seems to me that the US military is regularly pretty careless in this respect, with the result that on those occasions I regard both types of killings of innocent people as similarly, equally (or even more) evil.
You provide my response to your first point in the second sentence of that point. I was not under the impression that needed to be spelled out, but I guess maybe it was.
DeleteThere are tough issues in intervention, no doubt. That's a good reason to err on the side of caution. But if we can't distinguish morally between "I really want to kill an innocent person" and "I really don't want to kill an innocent person but understand that might happen", then something is very, very wrong with our morality IMO. Particularly when the person saying the former is the target of the person saying the latter and what we're really trading off is the innocent suffering in the counterfactual against the innocent suffering as collateral damage.
"Obviously. This has been my position throughout. But there's a big difference between saying "we shouldn't intervene in X case because the costs of blowback exceed the benefits of going in" and citing blowback as a general argument against intervention."
ReplyDeleteyes, i don't disagree with that.
"If you want to convince me that we shouldn't go after al Qaeda because of blowback risk"
to be sure, I'd like to distinguish between two different arguments here:
1. that Al Qaeda arose or was able to get as big and influential as it did/is, because of earlier Western actions in Muslim countries (supporting dictators, sanctions against Iraq, supporting Israel, US troops on Saudia Arabia)
2. that going after Al Qaeda now in the way that the US gov't has would invite too much blowback for the likely benefits to outweigh the costs.
I think both arguments are true, but they are distinct arguments.
", don't cite blowback from our support for Saudi or Egyptian tyranny"
so I would cite that part mostly to back up argument #1 that I mentioned above, not really for argument #2. for argument #2 I would sooner invoke e.g. drone campaigns in Yemen, Pakistan, Afghanistan
"and just assume you can copy-and-paste to every other scenario you'd like to copy-and-paste to."
I don't.
I'm glad to hear you wouldn't cite it for #2. I was under the impression that you were.
DeleteYou can invoke drone campaigns, but what makes you think they're going to develop the same sort of blowback? I've agreed in the past that we probably rely too much on drones. The administration seems to be of this position too lately. So maybe some blowback from the heavy reliance so far, but you'd have to make a case that it will be anything substantial that might override the decision to uses it in the first place.
Now we have to also be careful about blowback. Making al Qaeda and the remnants of the Taliban mad and go on the offensive isn't really "blowback" in the same way that I usually think of the term.
Daniel wrote: "I'm glad to hear you wouldn't cite it for #2. I was under the impression that you were."
DeleteNo, that never even crossed my mind when writing what I wrote.
"You can invoke drone campaigns, but what makes you think they're going to develop the same sort of blowback?"
Not sure what you mean by 'the same' or why it matters.
I think drone campaigns cause blowback, that they piss people off who are then more likely to either join Islamic groups attacking US military and/or innocents or more likely to support (in various possible ways) groups who do that (and who may, as a partial result of those new recruits and/or the increased support oppress the local population as well). I don't know how mcuh blowback there will be in each case, nor can I definitely say that the blowback will (always or often or even most of the time) result in a worse situation (in relevant respects) than there would have been without a drone compaign (either without US military action altogether or wioth a diofferent kind of military action). I strongly suspect that it most often makes things worse, but it's hard to make a definitive argument to that effect.
"I've agreed in the past that we probably rely too much on drones. The administration seems to be of this position too lately. So maybe some blowback from the heavy reliance so far, but you'd have to make a case that it will be anything substantial that might override the decision to uses it in the first place."
I know, but the same holds for the argument *in favor* of the (or a specific kind of) use of drones (or other military action).
"Now we have to also be careful about blowback. Making al Qaeda and the remnants of the Taliban mad and go on the offensive isn't really "blowback" in the same way that I usually think of the term."
No,that';s not the first thing I would think of either (although I guess if this is interpreted in the sense of 'the Taliban get so mad at the US military for these actions that they just go around slaughtering innocent people in the areas where they live' would count as a kind of blowback, but this is a problematic example for various reasons, I suspect).
But increased numbers of people willing to fight US military and/or innocents and/or to support those fighters, and/or increased power to such groups who also, as a byproduct and/or intention oppress local people, are what I'm thinking of when it comes to blowback.
The Narrator wrote:
ReplyDelete"re: "Nope. Of course a lot of people would say the same thing about Western military actions not being justified in the same way."
and Daniel responded:
"Again you're being slippery with "military actions". WHICH military actions are you thinking of?"
I mentioned some in other replies" e.g. drone strikes that terrify populations and result in many innocent people being killed; arresting, (indefinitely) detaining, torturing and/or killing people without giving them a trial first; militasrily supporting groups and people that commit horrible acts against innocent people; careless use of military might (e.g. in the Wikileaks video, and (and I think I'm being charitable here) the killing of that Iraqi family and the subsequent coverup)
It is these kinds of actions that make people regard the actions of the US military as morally unjustified as well.
To be sure, none of them on their own are likely to result in as many people being killed as in the case of a dirty bomb in Washington D.C. (which was your example), and so in terms of body count the latter may be even less justified than the individual military actions of the US government that I mention. (though these actions combined probably resulted in more deaths etc.)
Also, I wonder how many people (and who they are) *would* support the use of a dirty bomb in Washington D.C. (and I wonder how many people in the US *would* support the use of a similar kind of action carried out by the US government inside the countries it is currently waging war in)
"I agree - the U.S. military should not set off a dirty bomb in Baghdad."
this makes me curious btw how you regard the bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima and Dresden
" Now if you want to extrapolate beyond the action discussed you need to make a case for it."
see above re my examples
"Do you think a dirty bomb in DC is comparable to a targeted drone attack on al Qaeda members that takes some innocent lives in the process. I don't. Do you?"
I don't because prima facie the intentional killing of innocent people is more evil than killing innocent people as a byproduct, but if the unintentional killing claims *a lot* of victims and/or is the result of carelessness and/or happens regularly, then this can become equally evil as setting off a dirty bomb intended to kill innocent people.
I'm not sure at which body count, level of carelessness, frequency the two become equally evil.
"You need to stop concealing your arguments behind these vague claims."
I hope I'm being explicit enough in this and earlier replies. i'd be happy to try to be even more specific in response to new questions.
"What is and is not right and why? What is and is not comparable and why?"
See above.
re: "this makes me curious btw how you regard the bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima and Dresden"
DeletePreviously I never thought about it much (it's something you just grow up accepting in the US) - in the last several years I've thought about it more. I think it was a mistake, but I can see the logic behind bringing the war to a swift end. A better option would have been to hit a site that was exclusively military. Although that precedent might have institutionalized nuclear war (I imagine if we don't form a world government and end war between nation states it will be institutionalized in this way - use against military targets). Part of the power of MAD was the threat of use against civilian populations but if it's not thought of as a weapon used against civilians MAD has less bite.
I don't know how targeted Dresden was on munitions districts in the city so I couldn't say (although my impression is it was not targeted - is that right?). I could probably support targeting munitions.
I'm not sure I disagree with softening a target before a justified invasion. So with Baghdad, for example. If I thought the invasion itself was justified (I don't), I'm not sure if I would have a problem with the missiles we sent in before hand (obviously you don't want to carpet bomb cities to do this).
I've always found it interesting that as far as I can tell the Japanese have not harbored any long-term animosity about this. I have heard stories from people with experience in Japan about old guys that are virulently anti-American but I don't get the impression that is a broad feeling in the community. They're much more likely to be angry at the Chinese for their atrocities, for example (and vice versa). I'm not sure why that is.
re: "see above re my examples"
DeleteOK, but I don't personally consider examples as an argument. After all I mentioned those examples too and provided an entirely different argument (which I think is stronger than the one you chose to leave implicit).
Daniel wrote: "Previously I never thought about it much (it's something you just grow up accepting in the US) - in the last several years I've thought about it more. I think it was a mistake, but I can see the logic behind bringing the war to a swift end. A better option would have been to hit a site that was exclusively military. Although that precedent might have institutionalized nuclear war (I imagine if we don't form a world government and end war between nation states it will be institutionalized in this way - use against military targets). "
ReplyDeleteOkay, but so you don't think it was evil. In which case *would* you have thought it was evil?
E.g. if it served no military purpose? If there had been other similarly plausible ways of achieveing the same purpose without that massive loss of life?
If the US invasion of Iraq was unjustified and a (military or other) group in Iraq thought that by setting off a dirty bomb in Washington D.C. their military purpose of getting the US out of Iraq (or of stopping the US army as it was invadsing Iraq) could be achieved, you would likely not deem that justified, but can you say more about what the relevant moral differences between the cases of Hiroshima & Nagasakii on the one hand and this example on the other hand are.
[I won;t be able to resume the conversation until later in the day. have work to do now]
one more remark before I forget: this isn't necessarily relevant to our discussion but may be worth mentioning nonetheless. Often people act as if US military action aimed at innocents is of course bad but that there is little moral problem with US military action against e.g. foreign soldiers. So they would think it's okay to wipeout thousands of soldiers in the course of a military action, but what I think is easy to forget but what is morally significant is that probably a great majority of these soldiers are there not out of their free will: they would be executed or jailed and/or have their families punished if they deserted or refused to join the army. Most will be terrified beyond belief (imagine being an Iraqi soldier, away from his friends and family, lying in wait in some poorly defended bunker in the Iraqi desert, seeing and hearing US bombs drop all around him, and he's literally just waiting until they hit him and he is blown to pieces, and thjere's absolutely nothing that he can do about it)
DeleteAgain, this isn't necessarily relevant to out discussion nor am I saying that you don't pay attention to this element, I just thought it was importnt to mention that it's easy to forget this part when discussing the morality of warfare
re: "Okay, but so you don't think it was evil. In which case *would* you have thought it was evil?"
DeleteI didn't say that. I don't know... I hesitate more to use the word "evil". It came up above because Greenwald used it. I'd certainly say nuking civilians was immoral. Not sure why I hesitate at "evil". It just seems more institutionalized. I think of "evil" in cases like Nazi Germany where it really was institutionalized. This is all sentiment and impression associated with words - so understand it as such.
re: "If the US invasion of Iraq was unjustified and a (military or other) group in Iraq thought that by setting off a dirty bomb in Washington D.C. their military purpose of getting the US out of Iraq (or of stopping the US army as it was invadsing Iraq) could be achieved, you would likely not deem that justified, but can you say more about what the relevant moral differences between the cases of Hiroshima & Nagasakii on the one hand and this example on the other hand are."
I'm not sure I follow. Weren't the grounds on which I said H&N were unjustified the same grounds that you're highlighting here w.r.t. a dirty bomb in DC?
Daniel wrote: "I didn't say that. I don't know... I hesitate more to use the word "evil". It came up above because Greenwald used it. I'd certainly say nuking civilians was immoral. Not sure why I hesitate at "evil". It just seems more institutionalized. I think of "evil" in cases like Nazi Germany where it really was institutionalized. This is all sentiment and impression associated with words - so understand it as such."
DeleteOkay, it's interesting (and to me heartening) that you would call the Nagasaki and Hiroshima bombings immoral (and also interesting that you struggle with deciding whether to see it as / call it 'evil' as well and that you wonder why you struggle with it). I guess I hadn't expected that and assumed that you regarded it as more of a *strategic* or other type of mistake with some possibly morally problematic aspects as well (I guess I based my assumption on a reading of what you wrote earlier: "I think it was a mistake, but I can see the logic behind bringing the war to a swift end. A better option would have been to hit a site that was exclusively military. " These descriptions seem relatively morally neutral, or at least not as very morally charged.)
Daniel wrote: "I'm not sure I follow. Weren't the grounds on which I said H&N were unjustified the same grounds that you're highlighting here w.r.t. a dirty bomb in DC?"
Yes, they are, but since I hadn't expected that you thought the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombing were immoral (and sort of evil), I thought there would be a discrepancy between your moral ebvaluation of the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima on the one hand and the possible use of a dirty bomb in Washington DC by Iraqi military or other groups. But since there is no discrepancy and you regard both of them as immoral (and possibly evil), my question as to the basis of the difference in evaluation dissolves.
re: "I guess I hadn't expected that and assumed that you regarded it as more of a *strategic* or other type of mistake with some possibly morally problematic aspects as well"
DeleteWell it almost certainly wasn't a strategic mistake. In fact strategically it was probably a brilliant move (which is probably why it happened). But then, that's not all that we humans care about.
The idea of invading Japan in the summer of 1945 is horrifying. I don't blame Truman at all for wanting another option. And knowing that others had nuclear programs, I don't blame him for wanting to say "Don't you fucking think about it - we have these and we are putting you all on notice". But it seems to me there were better options than dropping it on a civilian population.
I guess this part I(that I wrote above) is the main point I'm trying to make in terms of morally evaluating Western military actions abroad, and I wonder how you see this:
Delete[P]rima facie the intentional killing of innocent people is more evil than killing innocent people as a byproduct, but if the unintentional killing claims *a lot* of victims (especially if the risk was known beforehand) and/or is the result of carelessness and/or happens regularly, then this can become as evil as (or even more evil than) setting off a dirty bomb intended to kill innocent people.
I'm not sure at which body count, level of carelessness, frequency the two become equally evil.
Jon Stewart in an interview on his show suggested that Truman drop the atomic bomb somewhere in a forest or something so that the Japanese would realize that they'd better give up but without half a million innocent people being killed. In the same interview he then said that what Truman did instead was a war crime. Sadly, he later apologized for that remark.
Delete(to be sure, opinions differ on the necessity of large scale military action against Japan at that point in 1945, as some argue that the Japanese were ready and willing to surrender but under some conditions such as wanting to keep their king in power but that Roosevelt and Morgenthau insisted on unconditional surrender. I don't know whether or to what extent and in what way this is true (or perhaps more of a revisionist myth) but if it is, then that seems highly significant in the moral evaluation.
Have you seen Grayling on H&N and Dresden? If not you should check it you.
Delete*out
DeleteDaniel
ReplyDeleteAny thread with The Narrator could benefit from The Redactor.
LSB attacks DK
ReplyDeleteDK writes ""...you did have people who wanted the right to worship as the[y] pleased leave for marginally more tolerant places on the mainland, and later the U.S."
and LSB: "That's flat out non-sense on stilts dude."
But it's strictly and accurately true. Did LSB notice the pronoun "they"? The Puritans di exactly what DK said. THEY wanted the freedom to worship as THEY chose and went first to Holland and then went to America, and they went to Amewrica to assert more control on how THEY chose to worship. That the Puritans tried to control how OTHERS worshipped, and opposed religious freedom in general, matters not one whit in judging DK's claim.