Enemy Combatants

[Grames]

If you volunteered for an operation that didn't get chosen in the end, you are not forced to participate in the operation that will be taking place.

Oh yes you will, and should. It is misleading and unethical to recruit for specific operations that may never come about, so there should not be any such clueless volunteers.

Up to the generals. If the generals deem somehow an occupation is necessary during the course of a war in order to complete the objective, then that will be that, for the citizens it's take it or leave it. But if they deem a nuclear strike and an occupation would both achieve the objective, the differences would be the cost, then they should give the choice to the citizens in that if people have personal interest in not nuking and want to go conventional instead, then pay up the cost with volunteers and extra donations. If not enough volunteers and donations comes in, then it's nuke time.

And you are way too deferential to generals when it comes to war aims. Ever hear of the principle of civilian control of the military?

[VECT]

Oh yes you will, and should. It is misleading and unethical to recruit for specific operations that may never come about, so there should not be any such clueless volunteers.

That's right you should, but it doesn't translate to you have to. If you think otherwise, offer an argument.

As for your second part, what reasons do you have to claim that perfectly rational volunteers will just suddenly turn into clueless blocks when you give them choices about how they should risk their life if such choice become available?

And you are way too deferential to generals when it comes to war aims. Ever hear of the principle of civilian control of the military?

Oh, so now you are saying I am been too deferential to professionals when it comes to their trade. Weren't you the who said and I quote:

That is just silly. Very few private citizens have the professional expertise to make a rational decision about war strategy.

Consider the life blood of the military, volunteers and donations, can only come voluntarily from the civilians, I'd say they have plenty of control of the military. They just don't get to micro it from the outside, as again, something which you have said it yourself:

Individual citizens and soldiers do not get to micromanage a war

Which I stated my full agreement.

But hey, if I somehow managed to misunderstand something here, I'd be all too happy if you want to make it clear

[Grames]

That's right you should, but it doesn't translate to you have to. If you think otherwise, offer an argument.

The law of the military requires you to obey orders. That is a short argument.

As for your second part, what reasons do you have to claim that perfectly rational volunteers will just suddenly turn into clueless blocks when you give them choices about how they should risk their life if such choice become available?

They are clueless if they believe they actually will have choices.

Oh, so now you are saying I am been too deferential to professionals when it comes to their trade.

It should be a civilian who decides if enemy territory is to be occupied or bombed, but not a random civilian or any kind of vote by the masses. It was also Clausewitz who said "war is politics by other means." Generals don't define the political aims of a war, they implement the decisions of politicians. The use of nuclear weapons is still too unusual and strategic to be considered a tactic left up to the military.

Consider the life blood of the military, volunteers and donations, can only come voluntarily from the civilians, I'd say they have plenty of control of the military.

The power to pay can easily become the compulsion to pay. The control necessary to prevent that from happening is a senior civilian chain of command.

[Zip]

It's crystal clear obvious what I said concerns with general war plans AFTER a war is already morally sanctioned and declared.

After war has been sanctioned and declared then the only people the general has to sell his plan to is his political leadership. That is why we elect the Legislative and Executive branch. That is why we have a professional public service full of bureaucrat subject matter experts to guide the political leadership (who before being elected could have been a plumber and as clueless about military tactics and strategy as I am about nuclear physics).

The people through their government, by referendum or what have you decide if they are going to go to war. The generals (if they are any good) are continually planning to wage war or conduct operations against whomever demonstrates themselves to be a threat. It's called contingency planning.

When the political leadership says "We are going to war" the generals say "Ok, here are options A,B,C,and D." by that time the option to or not to go to war is already out of the hands of the individual and the nation is going to wage the war. The individuals choice then is do I step up or don't I.

[VECT]

Interesting. I wrote up half way through my replies then realized something is amiss in what I was going to propose.

I'll sort out the logic tangles later, and if I come up with something good, I'll post it. If not then not.

[JeffS]

It means that unless otherwise told or if it would be strategically unwise, he should kill every enemy soldier that he can.

Why? I'm a soldier of Country A. Country B has initiated a war against Country A. I see Soldier B. He has done nothing to Country A, nor to any citizen of Country A. You say I should kill him on sight. Why? Because he's a citizen of Country B? Then should I kill every citizen of Country B? Because he's wearing a uniform? Does wearing a uniform constitute an initiation of force against me, or those I have chosen to protect?

War is hell. You're making a pacifist argument.

Indeed, war is hell, but you didn't address my actual argument: that yours is based upon making assumptions about individuals based upon their association with a particular group; assumptions which may, or may not be objectively true.

The notion of "arrest" is completely irrelevant when your nation is being attacked by another nation. "Arrest" presupposes rule of law which both nations are subject to, which obviously they are not.

True. It also presupposes an objective principle of Man's rights. Either Man requires certain considerations in determining whether or not force can morally be used against him, or he does not. If he does, is membership in a particular group sufficient to nullify that requirement?

I will tell you what the one complication is, that contemporary war is not a well-defined struggle between nations.

I believe I did mention this complication when I wrote, "A 'War on Terrorism,' to me, is fraught with even more problems since the collective nature of the combatants is exceptionally vague and transient."

To survive, we have no choice but to broaden the concept of "enemy".

And that is the nature of my questions: How do we define "enemy?" Is it a member of various and assundry groups? Well, what are the defining characteristics of those groups? Yet even more fundamental: Can we assign guilt by simply being a member of a group? If we can, how can we simultaneously espouse a morality based upon the individual?

Why would that be true [that it is right, just, and necessary for all men, regardless of what collective(s) they belong to, to follow certain procedures when an individual is alleged to have committed a crime]? What principle are you applying there?

That A is A; that men are men. Is it not right, just, and necessary to follow certain procedures when an individual is alleged to have committed a crime? Or, does Man not require any protection when the state wishes to use force upon him?

[DavidOdden]

I'm a soldier of Country A. Country B has initiated a war against Country A. I see Soldier B. He has done nothing to Country A, nor to any citizen of Country A. You say I should kill him on sight. Why? Because he's a citizen of Country B? Then should I kill every citizen of Country B? Because he's wearing a uniform? Does wearing a uniform constitute an initiation of force against me, or those I have chosen to protect?

The concept "initiation of force" does not mean that the act of force has to be actualized. You are not required to wait until the enemy's bullet enters your heart to gain the right to shoot the enemy. All that is required is that he has begun the process of applying force to you. This is a general fact about individual rights and the use of force -- it is not necessary for you to wait for the thief to actually stab you, or actually shoot you. All that is necessary is that the person act in a fashion that objectively is evidence that he is initiating force. If you look at US law in various states, these criteria are spelled out explicitly (this is spelled out in terms of "defense" laws, i.e. laws which state that "it is a defense against a charge of murder that....").

The same concept applies to war. A person's actual citizenship is irrelevant; what matters is whether the facts indicate that the person is acting in support of country B's program of using force against you. The clearest indication of that fact is that the person is an armed soldier of country B. This is a really elementary application of logic. Country B is actually using force against A, the agents of B who implement the force are dressed in the national uniform, therefore any person so uniformed may rightly be assumed to have the intent to implement force against you. There may be well-defined exceptions, for example medical doctors traditionally are unarmed, do not participate in combat, so do not get shot on sight. An enemy soldier who surrenders is assumed to have renounced the intent to kill so you do not shoot them. If you want to study these rules of engagement, you can, and probably without having to sign up for a couple of year hitch in the military.

The basic principle is that there exists objective reason to hold that the individual has the intent to apply force, and therefore you have the right to blow his head off rather than have to wait for him to first blow your head off. The fact that the person is associated with this group whose nature is to kill you is evidence of an intent to apply force. Your moral and legal justification for using force to defend your life lies in the individual's act, and that justification is not negated by the fact that you could imagine him having a secret intent to act as a peaceful trader.

Either Man requires certain considerations in determining whether or not force can morally be used against him, or he does not. If he does, is membership in a particular group sufficient to nullify that requirement?

Membership in that group is objective evidence of an intent to apply force, just as you have evidence that a man has an intent to kill you if he rushes at you with a sword drawn. You must judge, based on the evidence available to you, whether the person has the intent to apply force, and you must grasp the consequences of errors of judgment. The fact of being an enemy soldier is really cut and dried. If you see a 10 year old who appears to have a pistol and a malicious intent, you will have to do some pretty fast integration of knowledge in order to avoid being a new crime statistic or being reviled as trigger-happy.

And that is the nature of my questions: How do we define "enemy?"

Then your question is not appropriate. There isn't any serious question about what it means to be an enemy. The difficulty resides in the epistemological marginalia, where it is difficult yet obligatory to make a judgment as to which group a person belongs to. When you discover that seemingly innocent male Arab civilians are in fact randomly wrapped in explosives and that they blow themselves up in public, then you must take action to prevent this from happening, for example by subjecting all Arab males in Tel Aviv to a search. When you discover that Arab females are now blowing themselves up in a similar manner, you have to change your response to the threat of terrorism.

Please remember that moral responsibility for the rights violations that would ensue -- the mandatory stopping and frisking of actually peaceful individuals -- rests with those rights violators who do blow themselves up and who do recruit others to the Islamist cause. The facts that are relevant to correctly distinguishing friend from foe must be discovered. Wearing the uniform of a specific nation is now not a particularly useful criterion; sex and age are turning out to not be useful. You can't rationalize to some set of a priori criteria; you have to consider the actual facts. Terrorists in the Middle East have been able to successfully exploit cultural facts about women to turn them into powerful weapons, and that means we have to know how and why that works, to be able to correctly identify the enemy.

[Sev]

...the limits on the actions of soldiers in capturing, holding and interrogating them should be more relaxed, and should vary depending on the level of danger the prisoner and his camp present to the US.)

and how would you find out what 'camp' the prisoner belongs to? in afghanistan, an enemy combatant could belong to a local tribe, and fall under their tribal hierarchy, but also report to either the taliban or al quaeda. these are people often without papers or identification--without fully interrogating them in a controlled environment, getting their prints and retinal scan, and logging him into our 'systems', how can this person be identified, kept track of, let alone be identified as belonging to a camp or associated with a group? once identified, what if he switches allegiances? we currently pay insurgents in iraq in afghanistan to work for us, but they may switch allegiances to the local taliban if we don't pay them or provide them with food/security/protection/supplies. i have driven up to a checkpoint of shiite former insurgents who we were supposed to be paying off, and who almost got hostile towards us because they hadn't been paid in months. we're lucky to have passed this checkpoint without being fired upon or worse. moral of the story: allegiances can change rapidly, they are often based on physical needs of food and security, and you can never identify who an individual belongs to in theater at a given time, unless he's a known member of a heirarchy based on validly collected intelligence.

most of the time, you can't even bring them in for interrogation (in iraq, for example), without an iraqi security/military escort, and without approval from an iraqi judge. even after they are brought in, they could and often are released very shorty thereafter. i could give dozens of examples of high value targets that were brought in for interrogation, but then immediately released due to lack of evidence (even though we knew they were undoubtedly 'bad guys' who did bad things to us), but the details of all of them are not open source. the standards for detainment and capture, interrogration and imprisonment in this complex wartime environment, needs to be set by the rules of engagement based on international law, the treaties signed by the us and the foreign country we are occupying, and by the laws which govern humint collection practises. you can't base your intelligence collection doctrine on the perceived threat (by whom and based on what standard) of an individual against US--it has to be a more objective criterion which doesn't give as much authority to the commander in the local area based on his perceptions, even if based on validly collected intelligence.

Edited December 15, 2009 by Sev

[Sev]

Why is the US trying to apply due process in the first place? You are at war.

because due process governs our every action every time we go outside the wire. being at war means more regulations that govern our actions (read: tie our hands), not 'free for all'.

You fight your enemy, if he is captured

there is much due process for capture. sometimes it's simple, sometimes it's very complex and based the situation.

You keep your prisoners of war until the war is over, treating them fairly and humanely and then you send them home.

and where would you keep them? there aren't that many 'prison camps' in afghanistan--we have fobs all over afghanistan with 2-5 room detention centers. are we to bring all prisoners into these fobs, interrogate them, find out that they had something to do with low level activity such as shipping or transferring weapons (say a cache of ak47's) from one place to another, and then transfer them to a larger prison, and keep them in our custody till the end of the war? sounds like a preposterous idea. some targets are of such low value, low heirarchy and low importance to us that the only feasible thing to do is to put them in our systems and release them--the decision for which is required to be made shorty after interrogation, and then release them, and keep track of their movements activity if they are important enough. otherwise half the adult male population of a certain age range in afghanistan would still be in prison right now. furthermore, we offer afghans so much more in prison than they would get outside, that many of them would see a multi-year prison sentence in us custody as being far better than the life they would live outside, subject to taliban brutality. we'd be encouraging a welfare state of sorts for thugs or pretenders if we had such a policy of imprisonment

Edited December 15, 2009 by Sev

[Jake_Ellison]

and how would you find out what 'camp' the prisoner belongs to? in afghanistan, an enemy combatant could belong to a local tribe, and fall under their tribal hierarchy, but also report to either the taliban or al quaeda.

There are two armed camps in Afghanistan, or any country where the enemy is hiding among civilians: friendly and other. You find out which by asking. If a prisoner claims to be friendly, then the friendly tribe can claim him. If not, then he belongs to the other camp.

we currently pay insurgents in iraq in afghanistan to work for us, but they may switch allegiances to the local taliban if we don't pay them or provide them with food/security/protection/supplies. i have driven up to a checkpoint of shiite former insurgents who we were supposed to be paying off, and who almost got hostile towards us because they hadn't been paid in months. we're lucky to have passed this checkpoint without being fired upon or worse. moral of the story: allegiances can change rapidly, they are often based on physical needs of food and security, and you can never identify who an individual belongs to in theater at a given time, unless he's a known member of a heirarchy based on validly collected intelligence.

The moral of that story, to me, is that buying someone's allegiance is impossible, and should not be attempted.

Of course, I already knew that before your story, since it directly follows from the principle that victory in war requires the unconditional surrender of the enemy. Payment for peace is not very unconditional, it sounds more like what the Roman Empire did to make peace with the invading barbarians, just before there no longer was a Roman Empire.

the standards for detainment and capture, interrogration and imprisonment in this complex wartime environment, needs to be set by the rules of engagement based on international law, the treaties signed by the us and the foreign country we are occupying, and by the laws which govern .

What international law sets the rules of engagement for soldiers, who came up with it and who's tasked with enforcing it?

Also, what are the laws governing "humint collection practises"( or whatever you meant to write there)?

you can't base your intelligence collection doctrine on the perceived threat

Good thing I didn't say you should base intelligence collection doctrines on perceived threats, I said laws governing the treatment of prisoners should be based on actual threat.

and where would you keep them? there aren't that many 'prison camps' in afghanistan--we have fobs all over afghanistan with 2-5 room detention centers. are we to bring all prisoners into these fobs, interrogate them, find out that they had something to do with low level activity such as shipping or transferring weapons (say a cache of ak47's) from one place to another, and then transfer them to a larger prison, and keep them in our custody till the end of the war? sounds like a preposterous idea. some targets are of such low value, low heirarchy and low importance to us that the only feasible thing to do is to put them in our systems and release them--the decision for which is required to be made shorty after interrogation, and then release them, and keep track of their movements activity if they are important enough. otherwise half the adult male population of a certain age range in afghanistan would still be in prison right now. furthermore, we offer afghans so much more in prison than they would get outside, that many of them would see a multi-year prison sentence in us custody as being far better than the life they would live outside, subject to taliban brutality. we'd be encouraging a welfare state of sorts for thugs or pretenders if we had such a policy of imprisonment

Your assessment of the practicality of holding prisoners of war, the situation in Afghanistan, the percentage of the population who is being detained, the willingness of Afghan men to stay in a prison camp rather than be free are all obvious and deliberate exaggerations. There really is no point in addressing them, unless you can provide proof of each claim.

Edited December 15, 2009 by Jake_Ellison

[Grames]

Also, what are the laws governing "humint collection practises"( or whatever you meant to write there)?

We another veteran joining us. That is mil-jargon for "human intelligence". It means getting intel from people, versus signal intelligence where you eavesdrop or satellite intelligence where you look down from far above. Humint can discover things not possible by any other mode such as motivations and intentions. Of course, getting reliable humint is a much bigger problem than the device base forms which are more objective.

[Zip]

because due process governs our every action every time we go outside the wire. being at war means more regulations that govern our actions (read: tie our hands), not 'free for all'.

ROE's are not due process. Due process is the criminal justice system, i.e. applying criminality to a warfare setting. So again I ask why.

and where would you keep them? there aren't that many 'prison camps' in afghanistan--we have fobs all over afghanistan with 2-5 room detention centers. are we to bring all prisoners into these fobs, interrogate them, find out that they had something to do with low level activity such as shipping or transferring weapons (say a cache of ak47's) from one place to another, and then transfer them to a larger prison, and keep them in our custody till the end of the war? sounds like a preposterous idea. some targets are of such low value, low heirarchy and low importance to us that the only feasible thing to do is to put them in our systems and release them--the decision for which is required to be made shorty after interrogation, and then release them, and keep track of their movements activity if they are important enough. otherwise half the adult male population of a certain age range in afghanistan would still be in prison right now. furthermore, we offer afghans so much more in prison than they would get outside, that many of them would see a multi-year prison sentence in us custody as being far better than the life they would live outside, subject to taliban brutality. we'd be encouraging a welfare state of sorts for thugs or pretenders if we had such a policy of imprisonment

No, I'm certainly not suggesting that you take them to the FOB's, those are strategic and tactical locations. We (allies) built hundreds of POW camps during WW2, are you trying to suggest that we have lost the capability militarily to incarcerate unarmed prisoners? This is the solution to your low level operative, lock him up. Don't operate some sort of perverse catch and release program.

[JeffS]

Country B is actually using force against A, the agents of B who implement the force are dressed in the national uniform, therefore any person so uniformed may rightly be assumed to have the intent to implement force against you.

I had a much longer reply planned, but I think the above statement cuts to the gist of my argument. Country B is not actually using force against Country A. They are both abstract concepts which are completely incapable of acting, or receiving action. Japan did not attack the US - 700 some individuals attacked thousands of individuals in Hawaii. al Queda did not attack the US - 19 individuals attacked thousands of individuals in New York and Washington, DC. I understand this constitutes a threat against me personally (well, not Pearl Harbor), and I would be morally justified in killing any one of those 19 individuals who killed those people in NY and DC. What I can't reconcile is killing someone just because they are part of any particular group.

If wearing a uniform were enough of a justification, then I should be justified in killing anyone wearing the opposing team's uniform - which includes their doctors and surrendered soldiers. This approach seems even more tenuous when we consider terrorism, which in its present form means I would be killing someone just because of their ideology, regardless of their actions. How can that be objective? I can't observe what his ideology is; I can't objectively prove it even exists, or that he really believes it.

That isn't to say objective evidence doesn't, or can't exist. If a man comes at me with a sword in his hand, it doesn't matter if he's screaming, "Allahu ackbar!" or, "Christ saves!" I'm still going to plug him. But it is his actions which justify my response, not any particular ideology he espouses. I'm thinking of the Red Scare of the 50's: wouldn't it be an initiation of force if the government were to jail every card carrying member of the Communist party, regardless of their individual actions? If so, how is this different from killing someone just because they're a card carrying member of al Queda regardless of their individual actions?

Please remember that moral responsibility for the rights violations that would ensue -- the mandatory stopping and frisking of actually peaceful individuals -- rests with those rights violators who do blow themselves up and who do recruit others to the Islamist cause. The facts that are relevant to correctly distinguishing friend from foe must be discovered. Wearing the uniform of a specific nation is now not a particularly useful criterion; sex and age are turning out to not be useful. You can't rationalize to some set of a priori criteria; you have to consider the actual facts. Terrorists in the Middle East have been able to successfully exploit cultural facts about women to turn them into powerful weapons, and that means we have to know how and why that works, to be able to correctly identify the enemy.

Then it would seem to me the concept of "enemy" must be poorly defined. If we aren't able to correctly identify the enemy, then how can we argue we know who it is? I agree with you that there isn't any serious question about what it means to be an enemy, and that the difficulty lies in determining who the members of that class are. But the argument that we can classify whole swaths of individuals as enemies just by their membership in some other group seems to rely not upon objective facts, but upon a desire for automatic knowledge. As I wrote before, it reminds me of Rand's refutation of racism:

Like every other form of collectivism, racism is a quest for the unearned. It is a quest for automatic knowledge—for an automatic evaluation of men’s characters that bypasses the responsibility of exercising rational or moral judgment—and, above all, a quest for an automatic self-esteem (or pseudo-self-esteem).

“Racism,” The Virtue of Selfishness, 127

In other words, since Mohammed is a member of al Queda, I can't assume he's going to kill me, because that would be evaluating his individual character simply based on his membership to al Queda. You seem to be arguing I can kill him - regardless of the fact that he's been a trusted friend for years, has never threatened me or anyone I know, etc. Now, I think you would reply, "Of course not! You're not remembering that you need to consider the actual facts. You must judge, based on the evidence available to you, whether the person has the intent to apply force, and you must grasp the consequences of errors of judgment." To which I would completely agree. But there seems to be a contradiction - either I should kill Mohammed because he's a member of al Queda and al Queda has begun the process of using force against me, or I should not kill Mohammed because the objective facts don't point to any intent to do me harm.

This has ventured a little from Jake's original post, and for that I apologize. I would like to understand whether all men require due process for life qua men. If not, why not? If so, then how can those requirements morally be denied any man?

[Grames]

I'm thinking of the Red Scare of the 50's: wouldn't it be an initiation of force if the government were to jail every card carrying member of the Communist party, regardless of their individual actions? If so, how is this different from killing someone just because they're a card carrying member of al Queda regardless of their individual actions?

Don't round up every communist, but do round up every KGB agent.

[2046]

I had a much longer reply planned, but I think the above statement cuts to the gist of my argument. Country B is not actually using force against Country A. They are both abstract concepts which are completely incapable of acting, or receiving action. Japan did not attack the US - 700 some individuals attacked thousands of individuals in Hawaii. al Queda did not attack the US - 19 individuals attacked thousands of individuals in New York and Washington, DC. I understand this constitutes a threat against me personally (well, not Pearl Harbor), and I would be morally justified in killing any one of those 19 individuals who killed those people in NY and DC. What I can't reconcile is killing someone just because they are part of any particular group.

Ayn Rand disagreed with you:

The source of this kind of statement is the idea that nations do not exist, only individuals, and if some poor, noncommunist blob in Soviet Russia doesn't want an invasion, we mustn't hurt him. But who permits governments to go to war? Only a government can put a country into war, and the citizens of that country keep their government in power.... This is why they should be interested in politics and careful about not having the wrong kind of government. If in this context one could make a distinction between the actions of a government and the actions of individual citizens, why would we need politics at all? All governments would be on one side, doing something among themselves, while we private citizens would go along in happy, idyllic tribalism. But that picture is false. We are responsible for the government we have, and that is why it is important to take the science of politics very seriously.

Do you disagree with that? If so, why?

In other words, since Mohammed is a member of al Queda, I can't assume he's going to kill me, because that would be evaluating his individual character simply based on his membership to al Queda.

Are you seriously equivocating a sequence of nucleotides in someone's DNA with someone's choice to become a member in al Qaeda? I nominate that for the biggest non sequitur use of an Ayn Rand quotation of the year. In any event, yes you damn well should evaluate Mohammed's individual character based on his membership of al Qaeda and that evaluation would lead me to want to defend myself against this invidivual.

[DavidOdden]

Country B is not actually using force against Country A. They are both abstract concepts which are completely incapable of acting, or receiving action. Japan did not attack the US - 700 some individuals attacked thousands of individuals in Hawaii.

So you would then conclude that is someone says "The US should not have invaded Iraq", your reply would be simple denial -- the US never invaded Iraq. What do you gain by this bit of obfuscation?

I would like to understand whether all men require due process for life qua men.

From your perspective, this would be a meaningless question. Don't you see, treating "men" as part of a collective is wrong; they should all be treated as individuals, and you can not learn anything about one individual from looking at another individual no matter how similar they may seem. The concept "man" really needs to be totally disintegrated and deconstructed. All information has to be treated on a case-by-case basis.

[JayR]

...for situation such as taking care of a vastly inferior rouge state, where many options are viable, and the cost of those options differ somewhat greatly, then generals should present those options to the citizens and let them decide though volunteer and donation.

"

That would be an interesting phone call at dinner time, "Mr. smith? I'm calling on behalf of the U.S. government, do you think we should invade Iran, of nuke them off the planet?.... What does your wife think?""

[JeffS]

Do you disagree with that? If so, why?

No, I don't disagree with it. Would you mind telling me where I can find that quote?

But it does open up a whole slew of new issues that need to be worked through, such as: If attacked by a country, shouldn't we retaliate in the most efficient and least risky (to us) way? I can't think of anything more efficient and less risky than to immediately carpet bomb said country with the most powerful weapons we have at our disposal. i.e. We should've put as many tons of ordinance on Japan proper as we had in inventory, and as quickly as we could produce it, and not stop until either every Japanese was dead, or what was left of them gave up completely. We should've hit Afghanistan and Iraq with as many nuclear weapons as it took. Is this the position of Objectivism?

In addition, the quote indicates citizenship does matter since (I assume) citizens control their government.

Are you seriously equivocating a sequence of nucleotides in someone's DNA with someone's choice to become a member in al Qaeda? I nominate that for the biggest non sequitur use of an Ayn Rand quotation of the year. In any event, yes you damn well should evaluate Mohammed's individual character based on his membership of al Qaeda and that evaluation would lead me to want to defend myself against this invidivual.

Thank you for the nomination. As I wrote, it reminded me of the argument. If the argument is not sufficiently close to what we're discussing here, then I'm listening. However, I really find it difficult to believe Ms. Rand would argue we can make snap decisions about an individual, particularly an individual's actions, based upon their association in a group.

So you would then conclude that is someone says "The US should not have invaded Iraq", your reply would be simple denial -- the US never invaded Iraq. What do you gain by this bit of obfuscation?

It is a dilemma, but if I assume abstract entities can act, particularly abstract entities like collectives, then Ms. Rand's discourse on collectives and collectivism becomes confused. For example, when discussing "Common Good," she wrote (all quotes from the Ayn Rand Lexicon):

"'The common good' (or 'the public interest') is an undefined and undefinable concept: there is no such entity as 'the tribe' or 'the public'; the tribe (or the public or society) is only a number of individual men."

When discussing individualism, she wrote:

"The mind is an attribute of the individual. There is no such thing as a collective brain. There is no such thing as a collective thought. An agreement reached by a group of men is only a compromise or an average drawn upon many individual thoughts."

In "The Objectivist Ethics," she wrote:

"And - since there is no such entity as 'society,' since society is only a number of individual men - this meant that some men (the majority or any gang that claims to be its spokesman) are ethically entitled to pursue any whims (or any atrocities) they desire to pursue, while other men are ethically obliged to spend their lives in the service of that gang's desires."

How do these quotes, and Ms. Rand's view of collectives, reconcile with the assertion that societies can act?

From your perspective, this would be a meaningless question. Don't you see, treating "men" as part of a collective is wrong; they should all be treated as individuals, and you can not learn anything about one individual from looking at another individual no matter how similar they may seem. The concept "man" really needs to be totally disintegrated and deconstructed. All information has to be treated on a case-by-case basis.

I'm not treating "men" as part of a collective, at least not in the sense I believe we're both discussing citizens of a country, or members of a group as a collective. Each individual man is a concrete, any collective is an abstract. Each individual man can act, but a collective cannot - it relies upon the actions of each individual.

I can't learn anything about one individual from looking at another individual, including whether or not they seem similar. Whatever I can learn about that individual must be based upon objective evidence, not inductive assumption - isn't this the basis of Objectivism?

Unless I'm mistaken, the concept "man" is fairly general: "A rational animal." It doesn't specify what ideology he must hold, what he must think, how he must act, etc. Determining these things is, after all, philosophy. If you tell me we're discussing "man," I can only tell you we're discussing a rational animal; an animal capable of reason. Our discussion need not be limited by that, though. We can also discuss what is necessary for that man as a rational animal. In other words, we can discuss philosophy. I believe what is necessary for any rational animal is an opportunity to defend himself against force. Part of that defense is due process. Is that logical? Is it logical that rational animals require due process in order to exist as rational animals?

[Robert J. Kolker]

The actions of the military should be governed by laws based on the same principles of reason and justice as the Criminal Justice System, but applied in the context of wars and the fight against terrorism, not law-enforcement. (that means that the requirements for legal representation for prisoners, and the limits on the actions of soldiers in capturing, holding and interrogating them should be more relaxed, and should vary depending on the level of danger the prisoner and his camp present to the US.)

In the current conditions we are not fighting real honest to goodness armies a proper chain of command. We are fighting armed gangs, THEREFORE we have no duty, obligation or any compelling reason to recognize that these gangsters have any rights whatsoever. That means when we catch them we can pump them for whatever information we can get, after which we can kill them with impunity. They have no rights we are bound to recognize. In particular, Muslim Jihadis have no rights we need recognize. They should be killed without scruple or mercy.

This situation arose in the Pacific war against the Japanese. On the islands the Japanese soldiers did horrendous things to Americans, so the Marines, regardless of what their rule book said, killed Japanese who were caught and even killed those who surrendered (which was very rare, as Japanese soldiers did not wish to surrender even when beaten). The Marines played hard-ball against the Japanese to the same extent the Marines were abused by the Japanese.

Bob Kolker

[Zip]

Thank you for the nomination. As I wrote, it reminded me of the argument. If the argument is not sufficiently close to what we're discussing here, then I'm listening. However, I really find it difficult to believe Ms. Rand would argue we can make snap decisions about an individual, particularly an individual's actions, based upon their association in a group.

While that may be true for a group which one can not choose, such as ones race or the nation in which he is born it is most definitely an issue when a person makes a conscious decision to join a group.

Being born a German in 1920 didn't make a person a Nazi, joining the Nazi party in 1939 did.

To suggest that a German is a Nazi due to his birth is racist, to insist that a person who voluntarily joins the Nazi Party ought to be considered to merely be of German descent is idiocy.

[JeffS]

In the current conditions we are not fighting real honest to goodness armies a proper chain of command. We are fighting armed gangs, THEREFORE we have no duty, obligation or any compelling reason to recognize that these gangsters have any rights whatsoever. That means when we catch them we can pump them for whatever information we can get, after which we can kill them with impunity. They have no rights we are bound to recognize. In particular, Muslim Jihadis have no rights we need recognize. They should be killed without scruple or mercy.

So, it is possible for a man to lose his rights?

This situation arose in the Pacific war against the Japanese. On the islands the Japanese soldiers did horrendous things to Americans, so the Marines, regardless of what their rule book said, killed Japanese who were caught and even killed those who surrendered (which was very rare, as Japanese soldiers did not wish to surrender even when beaten). The Marines played hard-ball against the Japanese to the same extent the Marines were abused by the Japanese.

I think it could be argued this was an emotional reaction by the Marines and not exactly rational. That's what I'm trying to avoid with this "don't-worry-about-guilt-or-innocence-just-kill-'em-all" mentality and discover the rational reason for turning the Mid-East into a glass factory. 'Cuz, I really would like to, but that's not enough.

While that may be true for a group which one can not choose, such as ones race or the nation in which he is born it is most definitely an issue when a person makes a conscious decision to join a group.

That's an excellent point, Zip. Is this not guilt by association, though? I don't have a problem with that being the answer. You certainly can, and should make a judgement about a person's character, and his possible threat to your safety, based upon the people whom he chooses to associate with. In effect, the action he has taken to endanger you was to join the group.

I think that may answer the dilemma of whether we automatically pound Japan or Germany into the ground, or black-top Afghanistan and Iraq, too. Given the citizens of these respective countries didn't actually choose to be born there, we might want to try other methods of stopping the aggression first. Yet, then I'm reminded of Ms. Rand's assertion that all citizens are responsible for their government and for what their government does.

Yet I'm still not convinced a man accused of making war requires less protection of his rights than any other man accused of initiating force. Perhaps the answer is that too much consideration is given to the protection of the rights of those accused of crimes domestically? What objective principle leads to the requirement that a man requires the state to provide him with legal counsel? What objective principle leads to the requirement that a person be advised of his rights when arrested?

I'll have to go over the numerous threads on torture, but at this moment I can't condone the state torturing someone just because some person in a position of power believes that individual has some important information. After the accused has been convicted, then by all means do whatever you want. What objective principle leads to the requirement that a person convicted of a crime, particularly a capital crime, should be treated with the same deference as someone who has not committed a crime?

If a person is picked up in the Hindu Kush Mountains, and it can be proved he's part of al Queda (or any other group which has pledged its intent to kill Americans), then by all means take him out. Or, if you want to take him alive in order to get information out of him, do so and use whatever means you believe will be effective in getting that information. But it still must be proved he is part of that group. Being in the Hindu Kush, wearing a scarf on his head and an AK-47 slung across his back is not enough evidence, and whatever evidence is required to prove any man's guilt should be required in this situation as well. The requirements should not be relaxed.

[Zip]

That's an excellent point, Zip. Is this not guilt by association, though?

Guilt by association is a term analogous to the other examples I gave in my last post. The choosing is an admission of guilt. The person is telling you what his moral character is. He's not leaving it as a question, he's not shopping at the same corner store as the Nazi down the street, he's making him supper and discussing the final solution over a good bottle of Reisling.