Michael Totten, in The (Im)moral Case Against the War:
"The well-being of Iraqis isn’t even remotely what’s at issue to Mr. Savoy. He only cares that we are morally pure. Tyranny, barbarism, and genocide are fine with him in a lesser-evil sort of way as long as we can sit safe and sound on our side of the ocean and not have to dirty ourselves by messing with it. Not only is this morally reprehensible, it isn’t even logical..."
It's a very fine article, and highly recommended. My colleague Armed Liberal never lost an opportunity to lament this tendency among today's liberal left, some of whom:
"...believe they can have the benefits of modern liberal society without getting their hands dirty. They value moral purity and self-satisfaction above everything else - with the possible exception of creature comfort."
Since A.L. is away, I thought I'd take up the shillelagh on his behalf. Besides, Michael's work deserves more links than I've been giving it - I just don't have the same level of time for blogging these days.
Joe:
I think that, like Lincoln, I might be inclined to say that I don't care whether Arabs are free or in bondage as long as the security of the US is intact. I'd probably prefer that they weren't in bondage, but don't know how much I'd be willing to invest in a project to break their chains. But also like Lincoln (and those are the only two things we have in common, since I'm not a Republican, I'm not from Illinois, and I don't have Marfans) I think I've come to see that the security of the nation can't be preserved if Arabs, and other peoples, don't have at least a certain threshold level of political and civil freedom as well as material prosperity. I don't know whether we can give them all of those things, or that we need to, but if we could I'd sure be for it.
It's obviously a little more complicated than that, though.
If the Lincoln analogy is apt, then this war might break the bonds which have been placed upon many Arabs. But reconstruction won't be a picnic.
Just a hypothetical question:
If, in advance, you had known (by some omniscient oracle) that the war would end up leading to civil war followed by another dictator who's as bad as Hussein, would you still support the war?
Second hypothetical:
If, in advance, you had known (by some omniscient oracle) that the war would end up leading to a shining example of democracy, perfect in every way, would you still support the war?
I'd assume that the answers to those two questions is No, and Yes, in that order. But somewhere between those polar extremes are a variety of outcomes:
What if you had known, omnisciently, that it would lead to an Islamic Theocracy?
What if you had known, omnisciently, that it would lead to a corrupt pseudo-democracy with rigged elections, a single party always in control, and a poor human rights record?
What if you had known, omnisciently, that it would end up being a communist regime?
I guess the real question is, what's the cutoff line for you? How bad does it have to turn out for you to say it was not worth the investment of money, lives, and global political capital?
After you answer that, answer this: what if you had known (semi-omnisciently) that there was a 90% chance of civil war leading to Islamic Theocracy, and a 10% chance of shining democracy, would you still have supported the war? Again, what's the cutoff line? What percentage chance would you need (for democracy) before you would support the war?
It occurs to me that one possible answer to the above questions would be, "it could not turn out to be anything other than democracy, because we would not stop fighting until it was a democracy."
In which case, you need to answer these questions instead:
Let's say, that in order to achieve democracy, you knew you would have to kill 1% of the Iraqis. Would you still advocate the war? What about 10%? What about 80%?
Second question. Let's say that in order to achieve democracy, you knew it would take one year. What about five years? Fifty years? What's the cutoff?
How about dollars? What's the cutoff there?
The final question: if you had honestly predicted, in advance, that the costs of the war would exceed your threshold, would you be "evil" for resisting the war?
I suppose I could say something glib like, if I'd been omniscient I could have thought of a better, more precise, plan. What struck me is a passage from Hayek in which he says that market systems are fair precisely because we can't predict the outcome. We can't even assume the outcome will be "efficient" in anything more than a fairly rough sense.
And yes, I realize we aren't talking about markets, but if I had more knowledge than I have, and a better grasp on the variables, it probably would not be fair for me to direct the outcome, because people deserve to make mistakes, and by directing things I may well rob a fruitful dynamic of it's unseen potential to produce unsuspected good.
Relatedly:
I could answer in the same vein as about, but this is actually much easier. I considered the possibility of the growth of a raging totalitarian tidal wave engulfing the Middle East as a virtual certainty, so any option that offered the possibility of a different outcome was worth the risk. I've very dissatisfied with the mistakes that have been made, but it's not time to chuck it all just yet. And frankly I'm more worried about us than the Iraqis. The way I see it we're in a war with Totalitarianism 3.0 while we're still using Liberalism 2.0 software. It's a wonder we're not in deeper trouble.
> growth of a raging totalitarian tidal wave engulfing the Middle East as a virtual certainty
Really? I get the impression that the middle east is pretty much as totalitarian as it can get. I mean, ok, I suppose it could get slightly worse, but man...
Josh,
The Middle East was no where near as bad as it could have gotten. Visualize the Taliban model being replicated everywhere. or the Saddam model. What if the Wahabi's gained power in Saudi Arabia? You're not using your partial omniscience very diligently.
> Visualize the Taliban model being replicated everywhere. or the Saddam model.
Granted, that would be worse. I just don't see that happening. I see each nation engaging in its own local brand of oppression. But I really don't see them coming together under a unified oppressor.
(And yes, if we had allowed Hussein to take Kuwait, then it would have been a danger. But, of course, that's simple conquest: that's what militaries are designed to prevent. That was an easy war to fight, compared to this one.)