Small Question for Amicus: Does 'objective' analysis lead to a pro-war conclusion?

[Pure]

ami, you said in part,

I think that is fairly easy to understand. If a single man observes a crime being committed, he has a moral 'right' to intervene on behalf of the innocent victim.

Not too hard for you to comprehend, right?

A single man, an individual, a town policeman, a county sheriff, a State trooper, a national guardsman, a marine, a secretary of defense, all these people are 'employed' to protect the innate rights of the individuals under their protection.

First, this ignores the Randians objection to paralleling the 'state' action case and the individual action case. It's far from clear what 'obligations' a state has, by way of world 'good samaritanism.'

Innate rights of individuals are violated daily and systematically in hundreds of countries, so that principle is hardly any basis for chosing a particular intervention. (I will agree that the Aghan-Taliban-al qaeda connection was a plausible basis for choosing Afghanistan.)

Beyond the above issue: What you fatally overlook, in stating your axiom

If a single man observes a crime being committed, he has a moral 'right' to intervene on behalf of the innocent victim.

is that the contemplated intervention should reasonably be expected to do more good than harm.

But my question did NOT concern the original situation but 'staying the course.' And wouldn't you agree, that, as regards *continuing* intervention, the following addition--along the lines of the above-- has to be made to your axiom.

In the process of intervening, should a preponderance of harm become evident (e.g., lots more *other* innocents getting killed), then the intervention should likely be re-tooled or halted.

 

[amicus]

Pure..

"...In the process of intervening, should a preponderance of harm become evident (e.g., lots more *other* innocents getting killed), then the intervention should likely be re-tooled or halted...."


I am sure you are convinced that the current Iraq war should have the above applied. I am rather certain that nothing I can say will change your opinion.

War is not pretty; the decision to go to war is not lightly made. Nor is it made without concern to an exit strategy and ongoing collateral damage.

By the time I visited Europe, in 1970, the ravages of war in London and Paris and Brussels were no longer evident. But how well I recall the films and histories of the blitz of London, the fire bombing of Dresden (which took as many lives as were lost in Hiroshima).

We will never know what history might have brought had the United States not invaded Afghanistan and Iraq.

By hindsight, we do know that had we intervened in Europe, say prior to August of 1939, that tens of millions of lives could have been saved.

I personally view the ongoing conflict in the middle east as a harbinger of things to come. Not just the Israeli Palestinian conflict, but the powderkeg of Islamic Radicalism sweeping the Muslim world.

Vietnam is often described as a terrible mistake, a war we lost and a misguided venture into Asia. History has shown, with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the containment (thus far) of Communist China, that intervention in Vietnam was a necessary and rational effort to stabilize the region and combat Communist expansion.

You want easy answers to Iraq and the middle east; there are none.

The government of the United States made the decision to act in the middle east. I support that action, now and in the long term.

If it is successful, there will be peace, prosperity and perhaps even other democracies in the region. People will be freed from oppressive regimes and perhaps taste of freedom for the first time in history.

With the continuing threat of international terrorism I doubt there will be an early withdrawal of American military forces in the middle east. I foresee a presence, as in Korea, lasting perhaps a half century or more.

I guess that answered your question; but more precisely, no, I would not append your addition to my earlier comments.

amicus...

 

[Pure]

thanks for sharing your thought on the present situation. focussing on just one point:

ami said,

I would not append your addition to my earlier comments.

Well, then, unmodified, your axiom is without plausibility

If a single man observes a crime being committed, he has a moral 'right' to intervene on behalf of the innocent victim.

since it gives a purported right to an intervenor, no matter how inept, bungling, or complicating.

If I see a holdup where A is pointing a gun at B, do I rush in, with the 'right' you assert, when it's pretty likely B will be shot?

If I see a bank robber, who's made himself a human bomb, and holds his finger on the detonating switch, do I rush him, knowing it's likely that 20 other patron will be blown up?

The axiom has no credibility at all without postulating the intervenors' ability to produce good results and that they are more likely than not.

Note that the addition proposed, does not hinder the application you want, in your own example: the use of atomic bombs in Japan. A common justification for that was the on-balance reduction in the loss of life attendant on a US invasion of the main islands of Japan.

Particularly when an intervention is a continuing episode-- like, say, a surgery-- when greater harms occur (become evident), and they're worsening-- I have a *duty* to discontinue.

Indeed the object of my [misfiring] 'good samaritanism' may beg me to!

 

[amicus]

Hello again, Pure...it seems we are the only ones keeping this thread alive...

This is the axiom in question:

"If a single man observes a crime being committed, he has a moral 'right' to intervene on behalf of the innocent victim."

As all of my posts are spontaneous, typed out as I think and usually left without editing, then I might adjust the above in a small way.

"If an individual observes the rights of another being violated, he has a moral 'right' to intervene on behalf of the innocent victim."

I changed single man to individual, that makes it gender neutral and I changed 'crime being committed' to 'rights of another being violated.

You may wish to question 'rights', but then again, you could have also questioned 'crimes' as well, but I think you see the meaning.

I am going to fall back on the old 'self evident truths' rather than list all the circumstances under which such assistance being rendered may be either futile or damaging.

As a boy, I stepped between my mother and stepfather as he was wailing away on her. They both turned on me.

Not learning my lesson, much later, I stepped between a couple, man and wife, also engaged in fisticuffs, once again, they both turned on me.

So the choice of intervening is fraught with pitfalls.

I do not think it possible to cover all circumstances wherein an attempt to help, defend or come to the aid of another, individual or nation should be modified or discontinued.

I think there is no kitchen recipe as all factors are variable.

It may well be true that the Iraqi populace in part, large or small, resents the occupying coalition forces.

It may well be that the occupation of Iraq will lead to further, exacerbated problems in adjacent countries.

It may well be that the situation deteriorates to the degree that Syria and Iran must be threatened or neutralized or invaded.

Is there a point wherein the assistance should be modified or cancelled? Vietnam seems to provide an example, perhaps even Mogadishu (sp) the black hawk down incident.

There is current conflict in Africa, the Sudan. Are we not there in force because they are black and not white or because there is no military solution or because we are too thinly stretched?

We live in a democracy; the people make their voices heard. Some support the government in Iraq, some do not.

I listen to what White House and Pentagon officials say concerning the war in Iraq. Some I accept as truth, some I do not and much is of a security nature that we may not know for many years to come.

***
"If an individual observes the rights of another being violated, he has a moral 'right' to intervene on behalf of the innocent victim."
***

I have not done as you asked, append the duties and obligations of the individual rendering assistance.

Implicit in the axiom would be the things you mentioned. 'Do no harm' I would add that if giving that assistance begins to endanger either party beyond reason then the behaviour must be modified. But again, it is filled with variation.

When giving assistance begins to go against ones own self interest, surely it is time to reconsider the balance of values intended by the action.

But there are times when a parent gives his life to rescue a child from drowning or other danger.

Times as in the film, In Harms Way, where naval forces embarked on a near suicide situation.

Perhaps you would care to offer another suggestion as to how the 'axiom' might be appended to include those attributes you seek. I would be appreciative and might even agree.

I am not always pissy, just most of the time.

regards...amicus...

 

[Pure]

very interesting points, ami; you can be quite a fine discussant when you look at an issue in a nuanced fashion, recognizing the 'grays' and implicit assumptions. also when you try to meet someone half way.

We do agree that a prospective intervenor is to 'do no harm,' i.e., NOT cause the loss of life of the person he's helping (esp. when that life is not clearly threatened).

As to harm to oneself, those are interesting points. Mostly we don't say anyone (in general) has a *duty* to undergo or risk harm in a 'good samaritan' situation (with a stranger). It's where the effort is trifling and the harm non existent-- as in throwing a life preserver to a 'man overboard'--that we properly contemplate intervening and think of a *duty* to do so. (In France, it's a duty backed by an actual law; it's 'criminal' NOT to help in some situations.)

Yes, I'm aware of suicide missions and individual gestures (as when I give my life for a strange child in harm's way). Usually one thinks of the 'greater good' accomplished. As you are familiar with Black Hawk Down (movie and actual situation) you know also that sometimes it's suicide to attempt something, AND no clear, tangible good can come of it. I.e., how much should you risk life to carry a dead body back to your own camp.

If I may return to the original example. While the rebuilding of Japan is often cited as a model of US 'intervention' and success, it had very special characteristics which were evident early on. Macarthur's compound was relatively unguarded because he was not an object of hostility. Not a single US soldier was killed in Japan, by Japanese 'patriots' in the occupation years of the late 40s.

At the other extreme is the Somali situation mentioned (and somewhere in between is Vietnam in the 60s and early 70s).

It's clear that apart from the possible virtue or good intentions of the intervenors some situations simply do not permit humanitarian (or 'democracy building') intervention. A Somali type situation of a divided country, 'war lords' and de facto civil war is just not something to jump into. Why, because no good will be accomplished, or it will be so little as not to be worth the cost of American lives (according to the Americans).

Iraq--and possibly Afghanistan-- are in analogous situations. Leaving aside the original move to intervene, the continuance, in light of evident ill will and danger, has to be questioned; subsequent civil strife and attacks on the 'occupiers' bode rather ill for the 'democracy** project', and heighten the contrast with Japan post WWII.

**PS, have you noticed that some US pro war thinkers are now saying, "yes it will be a democracy (that's brought about), but not quite in the usual sense...."