Friday, April 8, 2016

When There Is No Collateral Damage

French President Hollande referred to Islamist terrorism recently but the phrase apparently was edited out by the White House. The Obama administration has had trouble uttering the dreaded phrase “Islamist terrorists.” This is not totally nuts. George W. Bush himself named the conflict the Global War on Terror. Not all Muslims are murderous radical Islamists, but all murderous radical Islamists are Muslims and the help of Islamic nations is essential in the conflict against the terrorists. Indeed, most of the victims are Muslims.
The problem with proclaiming a “war on terror” lies in defining a war against a strategy rather than an opponent. And a big conceptual difficulty is the seeming separation created between "War" and "Terror." Has there ever been a war without terror? In the Second War terror was integral to the plans of all participants.
But is such terror a war? Bush pledged to bring the perpetrators of 911 to justice. "Perpetrators." "Justice." Similarly, Obama sought to have Guantanamo prisoners tried in a US criminal court. Yet U.S. divisions in Iraq and Afghanistan surely looked to be at war and both presidents frequently referred to it as a war. But conflicts in war are not punishment or retribution--although they may start out that way. Their aim is destruction of the enemy. Obliteration of them and their threat. Criminals, however well organized, are not attacked preemptively; no just society would stand for that. Yet the drone war is exactly that.
This problem is not new. Vicious irregulars are spread throughout history as patriots, partisans, pirates, rebels, freedom fighters, fifth column,...the list is endless. The Geneva Convention of 1949 recognizes the right of forces that are not formally military to conduct organized resistance to occupation, such as the resistance in Europe during World War II. However, the Convention requires two things. First, the partisans--they called them "partisans"-- must be marked as soldiers. They must at least wear armbands if they lack uniforms. Second, they must carry their weapons openly. These guys do not do that. As Nathan Hale and Captain Andre can attest, a soldier not in uniform has no right to the protections of the laws or the customs of war. In World War II, Americans executed German soldiers who were captured wearing American uniforms at the Battle of the Bulge.
The Geneva Convention offers no protection to these people. But, again, who are they? A non-uniformed attacker of civilian site must be defined.
A contributions Obama could make to the world is exactly this: Define these people. The ambiguity of the government and their careful mincing around definitions is unsettling to a worried people. Imprecision is leeching and debilitating. Define these guys. If they are not pirates, if you insist upon dignifying their motives as a movement, fine. Make the combatants in Syria "soldiers." But hold them to it. When they attack out of uniform or attack a non-combatant, make them war criminals with all the definition entails. Such a declaration would put this kind of behavior in a very cold light as words mean things; in this instance, none of it should be good. Himmler's "rights" should be, at best, limited. And it would get rid of a lot of the youthful romance. Joining a group generally agreed upon as the spawn of Goebbels, Mengele, Mladić and Kabuga should be daunting. Calling something an "atrocity" gives it a lot less dignity than an "attack." And saying that there are no "non-combatants," that "everyone is guilty" of whatever these maniacs are mad about is no excuse. It is time for us to do some defining.
Being at war with the world is adolescent. Taking up arms to war with the world is insane. Joining a group of armed men at war with the world is the act of a war criminal.

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