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Eye on the Empire
by Alan Bock
Antiwar.com
October
17, 2001
Wartime Resignation or Endorsement?
I can understand a libertarian deciding that the war we are in is
virtually inevitable,
and that to argue against any kind of retaliation in the wake of
the terrorist
destruction of September 11 is fairly fruitless right now. I can
understand
a decision to pick and choose one's propaganda targets of
opportunity as the
war heats up, and choosing to criticize aspects of the war that are
likely to
resonate with most Americans rather than indulging in reap-what-you-
sow/America-deserved-it
rhetoric.
I have a hard
time, however, with the official
statement of the Libertarian Party's National Committee, passed at
a meeting
this last weekend in Atlanta, that endorses the military action now
underway
in Afghanistan. The statement did take some pains to say it favored
only a "measured" military response against Osama bin Laden's
network, involving "clear,
measurable and finite goals for this War on Terrorism." It does try to
distinguish between an attack on bin Laden and an attack on the Taliban regime
(although perhaps for the wrong reasons). It does call for a new, noninterventionist
foreign poli
cy.
But the statement
avoids some hard choices and accepts certain of the War Party's premises that
are unproved or clearly counterfactual. Perhaps it is unfair to criticize a
statement that is so clearly a result of committee deliberation. But it doesn't
strike me as evidence that this is really a party of principle.
MISSING THE REALITY
Understand that
this statement was composed over the weekend and released Monday, October 15, during
the second w
eek of the U.S. bombing campaign. It should be clear to almost
anybody by now that the bombing campaign has not been directed specifically
against Osama bin Laden and his henchmen, but against the military infrastructure
of the Taliban regime. Indeed, certain US spokesmen have been rather clear about
this. They acknowledge that bin Laden has not been hit, killed, and perhaps
not even personally targeted yet. Part of the stated objective of the campaign
has been to do damage to government military targets in hope of "smoking
out" some of bin Laden's network, either through attempted communication
or though personnel movements.
Clearly, the US
does not know for sure where bin Laden actually is, despite several leaks to
the effect that special operations forces have been in and out of Afghanistan
fairly often since September 11 (and perhaps sporadically for years before that).
The current bombing campaign is not directed against Osama bin Laden and his
group. (Well, a few alleged training camps might have been hit.) If it has any
purpose other than creating panic, demonstrating "will" and satisfying
a psychological need to retaliate, it is to try desperately to cause bin Laden
or a few lieutenants to panic and reveal themselves so the real retaliation
can begin.
COLLECTIVE GUILT
One can understand
such an action from the US military, which has certain weapons and knows how to use
them. Perhaps
it will even succeed in smoking bin Laden and some of his
associates out. But it is clearly not, as the LP statement would have it, "forceful
action against terrorists who have already killed thousands of Americans, and
who have threatened to kill more."
The US military
knows how to do state-against-state military action and that is what it is doing.
(To a man with a hammer everything looks like a nail.) If it gets an actual
bin Laden-linked terrorist during the current wave of bombing it is as likely
to be incidental to the main targets as the Afghan civilian casualties have
been.
If anything should
be characteristic of libertarian thought and ethics, it is that responsibility
is individual rather than collective. Treating people as members of groups rather
than as individuals is supposed to be anathema. Punishing one person, or a group
of persons, for the actions of another, is not justice but injustice. Viewing
people primarily as members of groups rather than as individual persons is unfair,
unjustified an
d socially corrosive.
If you want to
take that kind of analysis to the limit, those who perpetrated the terror of
September have already been punished (or rewarded, depending on how you interpret
certain somewhat ambiguous verses of the Koran). Those who actually did the
terrible deeds died in the doing of them. Even the all powerful State cannot
reach them now. It may be frustrating to acknowledge this, but we can't punish
those directly guilty.
AIDING AND ABETTING
That doesn't preclude
the likelihood, of course, that the actions of the 19 terrorists who shocked
the world September 11, were planned, aided and abetted by others. Most codes
of law can hold those who aid and abet a crime as bearing some responsibility
and deserving of some punishment, and an individualistic ethic can do so as
well.
The question is,
who exactly did the aiding an abetting? Was there a mastermind who planned and
financed the outra
ges? Although there is certainly a good deal of circumstantial
evidence pointing to Osama bin Laden or to people in his network, even now,
more than a month later, the precise identities of those behind the terrorism
are somewhat unclear. The LP National Committee finally gets around to acknowledging
this in its fifth paragraph, after it has already explicitly endorsed the bombing
campaign. There
it "call[s] on the United States government to publicly
reveal the evidence that conclusively links bin Laden and his terrorist network."
The statement acknowledges that most of the evidence released to date is
circumstantial
and "the US government has an obligation to conclusively demonstrate that
he is guilty of mass murder."
CART BEFORE THE
HORSE
That's an interesting
inversion of priorities. You would think that if you were endorsing something
as destructive and so certain to cause collateral damage including the death
of at least some innocent civilians as a bombing campaign, you would demand
proof first. But the LP endorses the bombing a campaign clearly aimed at people
other than the alleged guilty party or parties before demanding the proof.
And let us be
clear, while the proof of bin Laden's guilt may well be available, it hasn't
yet been made public. The UK government did put out a
white paper of sorts on the Internet. However, the Independent's
Chris Blackhurst ["Missing:
crucial facts from the official charge sheet against Bin Laden," October
7] calls it "a report of conjecture, supposition and unsubstantiated assertions
of fact," and backs it up reasonably well.
You can't analyze
a 21-page report line by line in a newspaper article. But it is true that the
UK report dwells almost entirely on previous bin Laden actions – the African
embassy bombings, Cole bombing, public declaration of jihad – and doesn't
really tie bin Laden directly and indisputably to the September 11 bombings.
The most important paragraph ends: "There is evidence of a very specific
nature relating to the guilt of bin Laden and his associates that is too sensitive
to release."
Well, perhaps
there is. Certainly much of the circumstantial evidence is suggestive and there
aren't a lot of other potential suspects who seem to have the resources, hatred
and resolve required. But what has been provided so far is much less than would
be required to convict bin Laden in a court of law.
Whether there's
enough evidence to justify killing agents of a government that has harbored
bin Laden though it may have been ignorant of and not directly implicated in
the specific acts of September 11 is a question worth pondering.
SOLICITUDE FOR
A STATE
The LP statement
actually acknowledges some uneasiness, noting that military action against the
government of Afgh
anistan is somewhat more difficult to justify than direct
action against bin Laden and the boys. Its reason is a little curious: "But
it is a sovereign nation, and a military strike against it is an act of war."
Well, the LP is
a political party which is presumably dedicated to achieving elective office
in a sovereign nation, though there's some evidence that its real purpose these
days is to provide fundraising lists to candidates and campaign managers past
and present. But this solicitude for the dignity of a "sovereign nation,"
while it might be consistent with certain brands of limited-government
libertarianism,
is hardly the most essential first principle of a freedom philosophy properly
understood.
Some of us think
the nation-state is a phase – and a not especially healthy one – humankind
is passing through just now. I fully recognize that the nation-state rules,
and I share the preference that if the government that rules me wants to go
to war with another government it would be nice if it formally declared war,
if only to precipitate discussion. But some governments are less legitimate
than others. None, in my view, deserves automatic special recognition by virtue
of being a "sovereign nation," whatever that rather amorphous concept
might be.
CREATING ENEMIES
The LP statement
does, toward the end, assert that a noninterventionist foreign policy in the
future "would reduce the chance that terrorists will ever again want to
strike a bloody blow at America." And it expresses concern that unnecessary
civilian casualties would create future enemies for America. It doesn't take
fully into consideration, however, the very strong likelihood that the present
campaign – even if
conducted without mistakes and with scrupulous regard
for avoiding civilian casualties, which is virtually impossible in the real
world – will create enemies for the United States who will haunt us for
years and decades to come.
President Bush
and his men can insist all they want to that this is a campaign against terrorism,
not Islam, and I happen to think it's true in the main. But it's too late to
convince a substantial number of Muslims. They may be wrong, they may be misguided,
they may be jumping to unwarranted conclusions, but more Muslims now believe
that the United States bears a special hostility toward Islam than did before
the bombing started. We can deplore it, but it would be foolish to deny it.
The bombing is a powerful symbol that will never be erased in the minds of many.
ACKNOWLEDGE,
NOT ENDORSE
I have known since
early in the day September 11 that Afghanistan was likely to be bombed sooner
or later. But I don't know that bombing is necessary to take out bin Laden.
Indeed, US authorities have hinted or even stated that removing the Taliban
– a "sovereign" government if you will – was one of the
objectives of the campaign. (A few even hoped the regime would collapse without
bombing.)
I acknowledge
the virtual inevitability of this bombing campaign – another undeclared
war to feed the apparently insatiable hunger of the state for more power. But
I don't have to endorse it or try to make a case that it is a good thing. Too
bad the Libertarian Party thought otherwise.
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