[Fwd: Iraq Dispatches: Inside Abu Hanifa mosque during attack

[boblq]

On Tuesday 30 November 2004 11:50 am, RBW1 wrote:
> On Mon, 2004-11-29 at 21:56, boblq wrote:
> > On Monday 29 November 2004 09:14 am, RBW1 wrote:
> > > Somehow some think that the actual process of War can be made civilized
> > > or sanitized into some sort of acceptable "that makes sense" model. It
> > > does not, it cannot, it will not ever be anything like acceptable.
> > > Everyone who thinks that is delusional. War is brutal, unjust, unfair
> > > and uncivilized and ends only after one side either begs for it to stop
> > > or one side no longer has the ability to continue... It is not nice at
> > > all.
> >
> > Who said war was "nice"?
>
> Every single person that tries to put a "clean" war face upon war
> itself, to somehow make some war "more" just than other wars. IMNSHV.
> The whole concept of justness on the part of those that claim to be just
> but insist upon continuing the concept that war is an acceptable tool of
> human conflict makes no sense. If you do not argue against war itself
> but rather try to make it "clean" then you can't object when traumatized
> humans act brutally. You are left with only one option to stopping the
> conflict... Increase the brutality until the other side can't take it
> anymore.
>
> This has always seemed to me to be unacceptable where ever I read the
> activities of men against men in history, regardless of  the underlying
> justifications...
>
> But you never hear anyone (not even the UN) question War itself...

This is simply not so. There are always people who question War. 
Our very laws respect this position by creating a conscientious 
objector status. 

Many of us, myself certainly included, despise war but are pragmatic
enough to recognize the fact that we have not yet found a way to 
eliminate it. This does not mean that the elimination of war is not a
goal but that we (as a species) have not yet found a means. 

I do think there are people who want to keep war for several reasons:
they benefit from it, they believe it is the only alternative to tyranny, 
they enjoy it. You can add your own reasons to the list. 

> > So do you believe that the Geneva Conventions should be ignored?
> > http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/91.htm
> >
> > Should we simply kill (I am seeking a neutral term) all of the
> > prisoners that we take? Or better yet mutilate them with great
> > scientific skill and send them home to act as reminders of what
> > happens when you oppose a great power? Some might, if released
> > someday become combatants again.  It certainly is cheaper to kill
> > them than to imprison them.
>
> Certainly the people at war with us right now think this way.

True. So do I understand you to say that we should do the same? 

Seriously, should we kill all of our detainees, or better yet surgically 
and physchicly mutilate with all of the scientific skill our side can muster
so as to thus illustrate just how brutal war can be? I assure you that simple
beheading would come to be a preferrable death to the life we could 
sentence prisoners to. 

> > > What happens when one side makes war and does not care about its
> > > individual combatants or the individual civilians in the population?
>
> Geneva is fine for War (unacceptable for all sides IMV) where those who
> have been captured serve a purpose for those who remain uncaptured and
> have an interest to reciprocate treatment for the sake of theirs that
> are captured. But that assumes the enemy is willing to to choose life
> regardless of their creed or how bad things get. If the enemy does not
> fundamentally choose life then Geneva is a (good) rejection of brutality
> on a moral basis and/or because you don't think it will gain an
> advantage in the conflict outcome (covering motivations here).

Ultimately War is where Power confronts Morality. Where Power is near 
balance then the Moral can sway the outcome. This is ancient knowledge. 
I am surprised that you would choose to ignore it. 

> If (unlike the cold war) your opposition is willing to despense with
> good treatment of prisoners Geneva is your personal choice and an
> admirable one. It is not going to help a captured soldier in Iraq right
> now because just like passenger plane hijackings no one even thinks that
> those that would capture you are looking for anything but death for the
> captured (video taped and broadcasted). Geneva is the willful rejection
> of death for those who you have power over. The people in the current
> conflict seek the death of whoever they can gain power over.

So what? They most likely hurt their own cause by acting in this way. 
I am not sure what your point is. Are you arguing that their is no practical 
gain from observing the Geneva Conventions in this case so it should be 
ignored? 

I can assure you that abiding by the conventions does have practical value
because war is policy by other means and the battlefield is much larger 
(especially in a world of modern communications) than you seem to 
comprehend. 

> > In
> >
> > > that case war will continue until they can no longer continue.
> >
> > Uh, does not war always continue until one side decides it cannot
> > continue? Or both sides in the case of protracted stalemate?
> >
> > Only reasons differ.
>
> This is what I am gettiing at. By jumping straight to the issue of
> valid/invalid reasons for war we assume that war is a constant in the
> first place.

No. We simply note that it does occur since we do not yet have 
a means of eliminating it. That does not meant the its elimination 
is not a goal. 

The elimination of cancer is a goal. We don't know how. Does that 
mean we should simply allow everyone who has the disease to die
without treatment? A poor analogy I admit but I can do better with 
some time to reflect. So can you. 

> The UN and the large militarized societies of the world need to think
> about a reformation of their fundamental rights and relationships with
> each other and how war can be factored out.

I totally agree. I do not agree that making War ever more brutal is a 
path towards this outcome. 

> I don't hear anyone making any arguments along these lines at all. The
> only thing true is we will make war for "valid" reasons

Well if you want to argue that we should go to war for the hell of it 
or for any reason at all because we are humans and never consider 
an alternative than go for it. I consider that a pretty lame argument. 

> > > Trying to
> > > make like there are niceties in the conduct of War is to engage in the
> > > European model of battlefield glory and honor that led to endless war
> > > and the institutionalization of war in the previous few centuries and
> > > has only been averted after the horrors of the industrialization of war
> > > in the last century in which more people died in war than all previous
> > > wars combined.
> >
> > So again do you reject as "niceties" of war the Geneva Conventions?
> > Do you hold these very conventions as responsible for war as it seems
> > that you are arguing.
>
> Yes it is a nicety. The Geneva accords are about the "nice" treatment of
> captured combatants and being "nice" in the context of war is a good
> thing for the individuals captured where you can get the sides that
> assume that war is a valid tool of interaction to agree to sign onto
> those conventions.
>
> Geneva is a chink in the assumption that war can be valid or is a valid
> method of inter-societal conflict resolution. It makes my argument that
> we do understand that war is invalid and we could discuss human systems
> that prohibit war as a method of conflict resolution.

Here we agree. I think we should enlarge that chink not ignore or
abolish it. I can see an extension of the Geneva Conventions that
within a millennium or two would lead to the concept that War itself
is a crime and that those who pursue when found guilty are given 
sentences appropriate to that crime. 

> If we don't even talk about it then we have to accept that their are
> always going to be brutal acts in war because the whole enterprise is
> brutal.

I don't get this "we don't even talk about it". I suppose you are saying it
is not mainstream political thought. Not so long ago neither was the 
abolition of Slavery. I honestly think that War will go the same way 
but not any time soon. Color me optimistic but not naive. 

I do think that the greater long term problem is tyranny. A massive 
global police state may well reduce war to the sort of gang warfare 
we see in our cities (where last year 17000 homicides occurred) 
and create a world without War but with economic Slavery that 
is effectively worse. A world without War but segmented into 
"haves and have mores" and "have nots" may be less attractive 
than a world where war makes this segmentation still contentious. 

You can die from poverty as well as from "war". 

> > > War is what people do. Blaming some individual soldier for putting
> > > holes in people, like he's supposed to do, and requiring he make no
> > > mistakes (however that is defined) all within the context of the
> > > barbarity of War itself conducted by nation states and their arrogant
> > > insistence on "Individual freedom of soveriegnty" in the resolution of
> > > conflict between each other is just plain simple minded.
> >
> > Well the insistence upon individual responsibility even for some thing
> > as innocuous as "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" is
> > supposedly a major credo of this society. Odd that is should be dismissed
> > for the sake of the defense of that credo.
>
> War, itself, is not about "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness".
> The absence of war is what brings about this credo. One thing I have
> always noticed is that when we go to war it is to deliver the greatest
> amount of force in the shortest amount of time possible to make the
> fighting stop. That has been our history up until Vietnam and this "War
> on Terra" (as Bush pronounces it... Almost sounds like war on the world.
> eh?). We have always been the ones trying to preserve the "life,
> liberty, pursuit" ideals whereas the Middle East, Europe and even Asia
> for 3 millinea have made continuous war and never found our creed to be
> at their core. 

Chuckle. It is fairly easy to let us off this hook since the population 
here has only been dense enough for "War" to exist for a few hundred
years. Don't forget we had our own Civil War which introduced modern
industrial methods of war ... and before us there were the Aztec, Maya
and Inca empire populated by folks who were hardly to be described as 
peaceniks. 

> Now we are throwing up our hands and joining them and 
> turning away from the great experiment we started. We are going to kick
> ass just like the Europeans have for the last 2 thousand years...

I suppose we do to some extent agree here. When Bush decided, and as
the last election appears to show a majority of US voters agreed, that the 
US  would invade Iraq despite a lack of real provocation then we joined that 
stream and turned our backs on an honorable tradition of not starting wars. 

BTW, not all of the intelligence was "wrong". The UN inspectors appear to
have had it right. 

> > > The culpability is in the power of nation states to <i>individually</i>
> > > insist on a right to self protection (which the UN recognizes FWIW) and
> > > to insist that the soldier go to a combat zone to solve the problems of
> > > nations. To then focus on that one lone soldier with his platoon in a
> > > free fire zone as the one culpable for the deaths that occur in War is
> > > banal... But that sounds exactly like network news now doesn't it?
> >
> > There is more than enough guilt to go around. I hold both the power
> > hungry leadership of these nation states and those whom they manipulate
> > responsible. Now if you ask me who bears the greater guilt I will
> > certainly point at the leadership but I will not absolve the individual
> > of some component of culpability.
>
> I don't either necessarily BUT you have to assume war for the
> circumstance of individual culpability to exist. Nation states agree
> (stumble into etc) to make war. You and I can act within that agreement
> and violate the internal rules to that agreement but we can't
> individually make the war.

Agreed. 

> No war, no need for Geneva.

No crime no need for law. 

No disease no need for medicine. 

Can you tell me how to eliminate Crime? or Disease? or War? 

> > > BTW the whole discussion of the individual soldier is a diversion.
> > > Notice that the soldier (on our side only) will be investigated and
> > > maybe prosecuted and that the embedded free lance news guy with his
> > > camera will still be embedded per official policy on our side only and
> > > all the while the aggregate behavior of all nations that cause the
> > > circumstance of war is still not an issue on the table.
> >
> > Agreed. Again there is more than enough guilt to go around. Focus
> > upon the individual soldier is not the best way to understand the
> > problems. Neither is ignoring the actual levels of depravity that
> > these conditions can bring out in individuals. War is a classic case
> > where over abstraction misses the essence of the issues involved.
>
> I make the argument that the essence of the problem of war is how to
> eliminate war. All other discussions are internal to the care and
> maintenance of war.

OK. Let's start that discussion. How do you propose to eliminate War? 

I don't think that ignoring the Geneva Conventions is a good start. 
Do you? 

boblq