Iraq bans Blackwater operations, all Blackwater personnel told leave immediately

[longeyes]

Privatizing war is wrong, but isn't it what happens when there is very little public involvement in the martial responsibilities of the Republic?  Morality abhors a vacuum.

[Len Budney]

Privatizing war is wrong...

I couldn't agree more! 

but isn't it what happens when there is very little public involvement in the martial responsibilities of the Republic?  Morality abhors a vacuum.

I think you're assuming that defense is only possible following the statist model of standing armies. The founders thought that a well-trained militia was the way to go, and Switzerland is doing quite well with exactly that. But a well-trained militia lends itself very well to privatization by a combination of corporate and fraternal arrangements. Private local armories and shooting ranges make perfect sense, for example.

I think that would be more moral than the current arrangement, in which we delegate our defense to young men composing a tiny minority of the population, many of them poor and minorities, that the rest of us can regard as chess pieces and sacrifice on a whim. I do not refer to politicians as "chicken hawks," but the point is valid that we'd take a different perspective on foreign invasions if we personally were expected to take up arms and ship out. Washington led his army from the front, not from a comfy safe chair in the White House. If GWB were required by law to lead the invasion into Iran personally, we can be quite certain he'd take a much more thoughtful approach to his next war.

--Len.

[The Rabbi]

"War is wrong"
"War never solved anything."

I could think of a dozen examples where war was exactly the right thing to do.  The Iraq War being an outstanding one.

I think that would be more moral than the current arrangement, in which we delegate our defense to young men composing a tiny minority of the population, many of them poor and minorities, that the rest of us can regard as chess pieces and sacrifice on a whim. I do not refer to politicians as "chicken hawks," but the point is valid that we'd take a different perspective on foreign invasions if we personally were expected to take up arms and ship out. Washington led his army from the front, not from a comfy safe chair in the White House. If GWB were required by law to lead the invasion into Iran personally, we can be quite certain he'd take a much more thoughtful approach to his next war.

I'd like to hear from some of the career military folks on the board about this.  Maybe you regard them as chess pieces and disposable, but I doubt the military, or society, does.

[K Frame]

Privitizing war has been around for at least 3,000 years.

And strictly speaking, in this case, it's not an issue of war being privitized. It's an issue of internal security being privitized inside the greater framework of a war.

[Len Budney]

"War is wrong"
"War never solved anything."

I could think of a dozen examples where war was exactly the right thing to do.

I fully support self-defense, and defensive war is nothing more than large-scale self-defense. So my above was a bit tongue-in-cheek. Offensive war is always wrong, and the Iraq war is one example of offensive war.

I think that would be more moral than the current arrangement, in which we delegate our defense to young men composing a tiny minority of the population, many of them poor and minorities, that the rest of us can regard as chess pieces and sacrifice on a whim.

I'd like to hear from some of the career military folks on the board about this.  Maybe you regard them as chess pieces and disposable, but I doubt the military, or society, does.

I don't regard them as chess pieces. The current administration, however, does. If they did not, they would have used the military only for defensive purposes, rather than squandering their lives for reasons that are still not clear to this day.

--Len.

[The Rabbi]

How do you define "offensive" and "defensive" in a world where waiting for evidence of an impending attack is tantamount to surrender?

Was WW2 an offensive or a defensive war?
Why is an "offensive" war always wrong?

[Len Budney]

How do you define "offensive" and "defensive" in a world where waiting for evidence of an impending attack is tantamount to surrender?

The bit I italicized is begging the question: you're assuming that the only defense is preemptive offense. But you can't assume it; you need to prove it. In the case of the Iraq war it's wrong on three counts:

First, the attack would not have come in the first place if we hadn't been interfering--criminally, I might add--in their affairs for decades.

Second, assuming Iraq had every intention of invading the continental US, they utterly lacked the capability. Under the most pessimistic scenario, Iraq could have caused at most a few thousand deaths, which is a far cry from "tantamount to surrender."

Third, if Iraq were to contemplate invasion despite their absurdly overmatched status, the cost of the invasion would be unbearable. An outright attack on the US would have justified a full military response, which would have destroyed their forces even before they could reach our shores--with full approval of the American people and anyone else with a shred of morality. Successful deployment of a nuke (pretending they had one in the first place) would result in immediate and devastating counterattack on Iraq, possibly including nuclear strikes, and again with the people's approval. Deployment of a nuke by a proxy would not affect anything; it's a straightforward matter to figure out whose nuke it was.

In short, the US has never been, and is not now, in anything approaching mortal danger from any Muslim nation. The combination of a nuclear arsenal and an armed citizenry suffices to ensure that we never will be in such danger.

Why is an "offensive" war always wrong?

You just asked why it's wrong to kill someone who isn't ready, willing and able to kill you. Are you being rhetorical?

--Len.

[The Rabbi]

How do you define "offensive" and "defensive" in a world where waiting for evidence of an impending attack is tantamount to surrender?

The bit I italicized is begging the question: you're assuming that the only defense is preemptive offense. But you can't assume it; you need to prove it. In the case of the Iraq war it's wrong on three counts:

First, the attack would not have come in the first place if we hadn't been interfering--criminally, I might add--in their affairs for decades.

Second, assuming Iraq had every intention of invading the continental US, they utterly lacked the capability. Under the most pessimistic scenario, Iraq could have caused at most a few thousand deaths, which is a far cry from "tantamount to surrender."

Third, if Iraq were to contemplate invasion despite their absurdly overmatched status, the cost of the invasion would be unbearable. An outright attack on the US would have justified a full military response, which would have destroyed their forces even before they could reach our shores--with full approval of the American people and anyone else with a shred of morality. Successful deployment of a nuke (pretending they had one in the first place) would result in immediate and devastating counterattack on Iraq, possibly including nuclear strikes, and again with the people's approval. Deployment of a nuke by a proxy would not affect anything; it's a straightforward matter to figure out whose nuke it was.

In short, the US has never been, and is not now, in anything approaching mortal danger from any Muslim nation. The combination of a nuclear arsenal and an armed citizenry suffices to ensure that we never will be in such danger.

Why is an "offensive" war always wrong?

You just asked why it's wrong to kill someone who isn't ready, willing and able to kill you. Are you being rhetorical?

--Len.

Wow, lots of assumptions.
So you think that a measly 2-3000 people dead in a terrorist attack is OK?  I'd say the vast majority of people would disagree.
As for lacking the capability, that is unclear, even now.  Lacking capability to carry out a full scale conventional war like those fought in the past?  Yes, probably.  But we live in a time of unconventional warfare.  Could Iraq have joined up with al Qaeda, supplying them with some kind of nuclear weapon or other dirty bomb?  Yes, certainly.  It is an obvious thing and something any gov't would be responsible to counter.
Your answer to the offensive war makes no sense.  It is a complete non-sequitur.  I ask about war between nations and you answer a question on personal defense.

[Len Budney]

So you think that a measly 2-3000 people dead in a terrorist attack is OK?

"OK"? Of course not! I never said such a thing, and it was never the question at hand. The question is: does 2-3,000 deaths justify killing 30-100,000 people who had nothing whatsoever to do with those 2-3,000 deaths? If a gang-banger kills my son, can I hunt you down and kill you and your whole family, even though you have nothing to do with anything? That's what you're talking about when you suggest that invading Iraq is justified by the fact that a bunch of Saudis with no ties to Iraq killed a bunch of Americans.

As for lacking the capability, that is unclear, even now.  Lacking capability to carry out a full scale conventional war like those fought in the past?  Yes, probably.  But we live in a time of unconventional warfare.  Could Iraq have joined up with al Qaeda, supplying them with some kind of nuclear weapon or other dirty bomb?  Yes, certainly...

I covered that possibility. You're supposing that Saddam is so insane that he's willing to be nuked in response--and that would be the response. It's a fictional fantasy to suppose that he'd hand off a nuke to some whacko knowing that Baghdad would be the first target vaporized in response. That's precisely the scenario that people like to propose, but they're not even thinking 30 seconds past the big kaboom; in their minds, the curtain falls and the credits roll once an attack is carried out. In the real world, there's major hell to pay after the attack.

Your answer to the offensive war makes no sense.  It is a complete non-sequitur.  I ask about war between nations and you answer a question on personal defense.

Killing is killing, whether one man does it or a million. Killing is justified in response to a real and present deadly threat. It is not justified for the hell of it, or because "they" have more cotton candy than "we", or because we don't like the cut of their jib. Your question is what makes no sense. How do you justify killing for any reason other than defense of self or others? And how do you square that with the tenets of Judaism? You are authorized to kill an attacker, or a rodef, or a criminal convicted of a capital crime.

--Len.

[Manedwolf]

I fully support self-defense, and defensive war is nothing more than large-scale self-defense. So my above was a bit tongue-in-cheek. Offensive war is always wrong, and the Iraq war is one example of offensive war.

If someone is pointing a gun at you, do you wait for them to shoot at you and hopefully miss, or do you draw and shoot before they can really draw a bead on you?

The question is: does 2-3,000 deaths justify killing 30-100,000 people who had nothing whatsoever to do with those 2-3,000 deaths?

Utter fallacy. WE DID NOT KILL MOST OF THOSE PEOPLE! The insurgents, terrorists and factional-violence fighters did!

[Len Budney]

I fully support self-defense, and defensive war is nothing more than large-scale self-defense. So my above was a bit tongue-in-cheek. Offensive war is always wrong, and the Iraq war is one example of offensive war.

If someone is pointing a gun at you, do you wait for them to shoot at you and hopefully miss, or do you draw and shoot before they can really draw a bead on you?

Since this is ARMED POLITE SOCIETY, I hope that everyone here has the answer to that drilled thoroughly into their heads: a deadly response is justified if your attacker has the intention, ability and opportunity to inflict grave bodily harm on you. You can't shoot a guy who says, "I want to kill you!" when he's unarmed and 1,000 miles away. You can't shoot a man who says "I want to kill you!" when he's armed but 1,000 miles away. You can't shoot him when he says, "I want to kill you!" and he's nearby, if he's unarmed and unable to pose a threat. He must have the motive, means and opportunity to harm you before you can apply deadly force.

Needless to say, the same applies internationally: it would be immoral to carpet-bomb Elbonia because they say mean things about us, when their most advanced weaponry consists of yak jaws and longbows. It would be immoral to bomb India because they're (nuclear) armed, when they haven't threatened us.

Iraq, of course, lacked the means or opportunity, since they were heavily watched by US forces, were already surrounded and subject to enforced no-fly zones, had no WMDs, had no navy or air force to speak of, and could hardly march their troops to the US overland (via Europe?) without our noticing.

The question is: does 2-3,000 deaths justify killing 30-100,000 people who had nothing whatsoever to do with those 2-3,000 deaths?

Utter fallacy. WE DID NOT KILL MOST OF THOSE PEOPLE! The insurgents, terrorists and factional-violence fighters did!

We took a country that was NOT a bloodbath, and turned it into a bloodbath. Even if none of those people were killed by direct US action, we are responsible for the chaos that gave rise to their civil war.

--Len.

[The Rabbi]

Len, you're committing a metaphorical fallacy.  A nation is not an individual.  A war is not an act of self-defense.  Foreign policy is in no way analogous to two people having some kind of relationship.

Really, if I have people I think are going to threaten me in the future, I'm going to hunt them down and kill them.  Is there something wrong with that?

[Paddy]

Really, if I have people I think are going to threaten me in the future, I'm going to hunt them down and kill them.  Is there something wrong with that?

So prior restraint is OK by you?   Wait, I know.  You'll call it 'preemptive action'. 

"A turd rose by any other name will still stink smell as sweet"

Minority Report, anyone?

[The Rabbi]

Really, if I have people I think are going to threaten me in the future, I'm going to hunt them down and kill them.  Is there something wrong with that?

So prior restraint is OK by you?   Wait, I know.  You'll call it 'preemptive action'. 

"A turd rose by any other name will still stink smell as sweet"

Minority Report, anyone?

Yeah.  What's the problem?

[Len Budney]

Len, you're committing a metaphorical fallacy.  A nation is not an individual.

I never said it was. Indeed, I consistently say the opposite: not only aren't nations individuals, but because they are not individuals, they do not have "rights" or "authority" or any other human qualities that we normally attribute to them by anthropomorphism. A "nation" is a group of individuals, and nobody in it is exempted from morality by virtue of wearing its flags, uniforms or insignias.

It's very simple. I'm allowed to defend myself. Therefore, I'm allowed to delegate that authority to anyone I choose, such as a bodyguard or security agent. The police get their power to defend me from me. They're acting as my agents, on my behalf, and they have no more or less authority, morally, than would I personally. That's why, morally, they have no more right to shoot someone that I myself would in their place, and they should be (though they often aren't) held to exactly the same standards as anyone else--in particular, they should not get any extra "benefit of the doubt" when they kill someone.

The army's authority to defend me also comes from me. If Hottentots invade, *I* can shoot them--or I can delegate that task to soldiers who do it on my behalf. But those soldiers still have the same human rights, moral obligations and legal restrictions as I do. They aren't free to murder, and they don't have any special rights to kill with impunity. They are obligated to kill attackers, and not kill the innocent, exactly as I would be if I were there acting on my own behalf.

And thus the army's powers are precisely the same as my own. The laws governing self-defense apply to them as well as to myself. Their actions are nothing more than my self-defense, carried out by them as my agents.

I realize that you will dispute this. However, you'll have a tough time proving that gathering men into a mob and dressing them in khaki changes the rules of morality and makes mass-murder or other crimes acceptable.

Really, if I have people I think are going to threaten me in the future, I'm going to hunt them down and kill them.  Is there something wrong with that?

You think I might threaten you someday, and therefore you feel free to hunt me down and kill me? Did you actually say that? Any randomly-selected black or hispanic might threaten you someday. Why don't you kill them now in self-defense? YOU DON'T, of course. Because you realize that it's immoral when we're talking about individuals. But when soldiers or cops act as our agent, for some reason we assume that they're under a different morality where murdering people who might be a problem someday is perfectly acceptable.

--Len.

[The Rabbi]

That's really bizarre.  Your whole conception of a state as being merely a collection of individuals, like some homeowners association or something.
It isn't.  Not a single political philosopher says it is.  A state is something that has an identity separate and distinct from the individuals comprising it.  The Founders recognized that.  Thus they gave the government powers.  Those powers are fundamentally different from the rights of individuals, because a state is fundamentally different from an individual.

As for hunting people down, you introduced the word "random."  You also chose to introduce race.  Bad boy.
Why dont you explain why its wrong to hunt down and kill someone who I have good reason is going to threaten me in the future.

[Len Budney]

That's really bizarre.  Your whole conception of a state as being merely a collection of individuals, like some homeowners association or something.

Rather than attacking the position by insulting it, how about actually attempting to justify your position? I look forward to your argument that a nation is not a group of individuals.

It isn't.

Unsupported assertion.

Not a single political philosopher says it is.

Appeal to authority, using an unsupported assertion. And besides, it's false. Murray Rothbard is one example, which suffices to disprove your claim.

A state is something that has an identity separate and distinct from the individuals comprising it.

Another unsupported assertion; still begging the question. I'd love to see you attempt to prove this. Nations have identity? Are you saying that they're self-aware? That they get hungry, and sleepy, and happy, and sad?

The Founders recognized that.

Another appeal to authority.

Thus they gave the government powers.  Those powers are fundamentally different from the rights of individuals, because a state is fundamentally different from an individual.

You are actually very much mistaken. The founders believed that the powers of government were powers granted to it, by consent of the governed, and represented a delegation of powers possessed by the governed in the first place. This was precisely Locke's theory of government as a revocable social contract. Madison specifically cites Lock in a letter to Jefferson in February of 1825, saying in particular, "Sidney & Locke are admirably calculated to impress on young minds the right of Nations to establish their own Governments, and to inspire a love of free ones...." To the founders, a government was something established by the people; it was not an entity in its own right with a separate identity and rights superseding those of the citizens.

Why dont you explain why its wrong to hunt down and kill someone who I have good reason is going to threaten me in the future.

I could argue using your favorite style of reasoning: go ahead and try it and see what the US government does to you. You'll be charged and convicted of murder.

Or I could leave the burden of proof where it belongs and ask how you justify such a thing. On that note, I repeat my curiosity how you manage to justify that in the context of Jewish law? Judaism certainly does not condone hunting down someone and killing him based on what he might do someday.

Or I could point out the obvious: killing someone who neither has done anything to you in the past, nor is threatening imminent harm in the present, is what we call "murder." If I'm not threatening you, the fact that I might threaten you at some day in the future justifies nothing. Indeed, your argument is deliciously Hobbsian: your own statements prove conclusively that you might threaten me in the future; any time you get it in your head that I might threaten you, you will hunt me down and kill me. By your own expressed morality, the sensible thing to do would be to eliminate the threat by neutralizing you now.

--Len.

[The Rabbi]

"I consider the foundation of the Constitution as laid on this ground: That "all powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States or to the people." [X Amendment] To take a single step beyond the boundaries thus specifically drawn around the powers of Congress, is to take possession of a boundless field of power, no longer susceptible of any definition." --Thomas Jefferson: National Bank Opinion, 1791. ME 3:146

There is obviously a differentiation between powers the state has and the rights of an individual.  This seems elemental.
The power of taxation is exclusively the domain of the government.  It has no analogy to the individual.

Appeal to authority, using an unsupported assertion. And besides, it's false. Murray Rothbard is one example, which suffices to disprove your claim.

In addition to the fact that I've never heard of him before, he was an economist.  And you can always find some crackpot somewhere.  It proves nothing.

[Len Budney]

In addition to the fact that I've never heard of him before, he was an economist.  And you can always find some crackpot somewhere.  It proves nothing.

You said "none." I demonstrated one. Your appeal to authority of course included the implicit intention to discredit any authorities who disagreed with your position, so this comes as no surprise.

In any case, I await with interest your proof that "America" or "Canada" has an individual identity distinct from the persons making them up, and that those entities have rights and prerogatives that include, among other things, stealing, enslaving and killing. You have made no effort to prove this rather outlandish claim of yours yet.

--Len

[The Rabbi]

If I had actually made any of those claims you might be right.
As it is, I made the claim that nation states have powers that individuals do not have.  Among those are taxation, levy of troops, and yes, eminent domain.

The first case of eminent domain in English law is called the "Saltpeter Case" or the "King's Prerogative in Saltpeter Case". The English king needed saltpeter for munitions and took a saltpeter mine from a private individual. The private party sued the king and the court established the right of the sovereign to take "private property for public use" without liability for trespass but requiring payment of compensation for the taken saltpeter. When the colonies became the United States and the English Common Law was adopted as the law of the new nation, this principle was recognized. Contrary to popular belief, the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution did not establish this right in the U.S., as it was already inherent in common law.

[Paddy]

HTH do we get from Blackwater kicked out of Iraq to eminent domain?  ED belongs in the Union of North America thread.

Why can't we stay on topic?

[RevDisk]

If someone is pointing a gun at you, do you wait for them to shoot at you and hopefully miss, or do you draw and shoot before they can really draw a bead on you?

A more accurate description would be that someone is pointing a gun at you, so you turn and shoot a bystander who happened to live in the wrong neighborhood.

I am apparently amoung a minority these days that still believe certain elements of fundimentalist Islam are at war with us.  We provided them a rally point and a training grounds in Iraq.  Like the previous generation had the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan as a rally point and training grounds.  We have diverted very significant resources from said war to nationbuilding and dealing with a low scale civil war.

The question is: does 2-3,000 deaths justify killing 30-100,000 people who had nothing whatsoever to do with those 2-3,000 deaths?

Utter fallacy. WE DID NOT KILL MOST OF THOSE PEOPLE! The insurgents, terrorists and factional-violence fighters did!

Those numbers are extremely low.  According to the Iraqi Health Minister, as of Nov 2006, 100,000-150,000 directly war related deaths.  Other sources claim mid 600k, if you include all deaths indirectly associated with the occupation.  Most are due to infrastructure issues.  Lack of electricity, clean water, sewage systems, hospitals, refrigeration, food distribution, etc.  The current infant mortality rate is 47.04 (male 52.73, female 41.07) per 1,000 live births according to the CIA World Factbook.  The Iraqi diaspora continues, of course.  Several million Iraqis are leaving Iraq as refugees.  Unfortunately, a lot of them are the educated and skilled employees.  Including a lot of doctors.  This will be problematic in restarting Iraqi's economy.

We bare some level of responsibility of those indirect deaths.  Not complete, by a long shot, but some level.  It's part of war.  Not the celebrated or cherished part.  In every war, primarily civilians die.  Historically due to disease and starvation.  Not soldiers, on either side.  There is no way around it and it has been that way since the dawn of recorded history.

[Len Budney]

If I had actually made any of those claims you might be right.

Appeal to authority. Yawn.

As it is, I made the claim that nation states have powers that individuals do not have.  Among those are taxation, levy of troops, and yes, eminent domain.

You've claimed it. You haven't pretended to prove it. Where does a nation get "powers" from? How does the state exercise those "powers"? If you even try answering that question, of course, you'll fall into the obvious trap: a "nation" does nothing. Individuals do. How does A killing B come to be regarded as murder, while C killing D is deemed to be the action of "the nation"? Because C wears a uniform or badge of some sort?

--Len.

[wooderson]

Utter fallacy. WE DID NOT KILL MOST OF THOSE PEOPLE! The insurgents, terrorists and factional-violence fighters did!

This is an interesting conundrum. To what extent are you responsible for the unintended consequences of your actions?

This is one of the moral calculations that has to be made in regard to Iraq - how many people would have died under Saddam, under sanctions (nb: right-wingers and Clintonistas laughed off the suggestion that a half-million Iraqi children died over 12 years of sanctions) vs. how many people died in the initial invasion/'shock and awe' and as a result of the turmoil of the occupation?

We may not be responsible for those killed by insurgents: but are we not responsible for the existence of insurgents - unless someone were to argue that a religious civil war would have sprung up in Iraq with Saddam in power...

[Len Budney]

Utter fallacy. WE DID NOT KILL MOST OF THOSE PEOPLE! The insurgents, terrorists and factional-violence fighters did!

This is an interesting conundrum. To what extent are you responsible for the unintended consequences of your actions?

That can be a hard question. But when your actions were illegal to begin with, you're much more liable. For example, if you happen one day to invade a nation and topple its government even though it had nothing to do with the claimed provocation (9/11, say) and posed no direct threat of any kind, and mayhem ensues. You're pretty culpable for that.

Interestingly, pro-invasion types try to claim responsibility for the chaos ("we broke it; we bought it") and deny it ("those people killed each other! We didn't do it!") in the same breath. It depends whether we're talking about withdrawal, or about body counts.

--Len.