Instapundit points to a Max Boot column reviewing films from Afghanistan and Iraq which makes the following observation:
Ultimately, Osama’s masquerade unravels, and she faces a gruesome punishment from an Islamic court. The ending, which I won’t give away, is enough to make anyone shudder ? and give thanks that U.S. troops have toppled the Taliban. Yet I don’t recall a single Hollywood feminist expressing gratitude to the U.S. military or its commander in chief for the liberation of Afghan women. No doubt Streisand, Sarandon & Co. were too busy inveighing against the horrors perpetrated by John Ashcroft.
To which Matt Yglesias responds with a bit of misdirection that’s obviously intended to make us believe the people Boot mentions actually supported the invasion:
The notion that the Bush administration invaded Afghanistan in order to help Afghan women is, of course, preposterous. Look at his remarks from the time and you’ll see that though the Taliban’s oppression was certainly mentioned, the war was motivated by the small matter of 9-11 and al-Qaeda. Equally preposterous is the suggestion that feminists are or were unconcerned with the fate of Afghan women. When I heard this stuff in the winter of 2001-2002, I assumed it reflected a kind of ignorance coming from the right. Years after the evident, it’s just a kind of malicious slander. Check out the Feminist Majority Foundation’s Afghanistan page and take note of the fact that, unlike Boot and his friends, their interest in this topic didn’t begin in September of 2001.
The truth is that Boot is right and Yglesias is wrong. The Hollywood Feminists Boot mentions opposed the liberation of Afghanistan from the Taliban, a fact that can very easily be checked:
The peace position was also taken by the Worldwide Sisterhood Against Terrorism and War, an organization of about 80 feminists that includes women from Central Asia as well as such U.S. notables as Gloria Steinem, Alice Walker, and Susan Sarandon. In a petition headlined “Not in Our Name,” the group declared, “We will not support the bombing or U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, for it would only punish suffering people and increase the hatred on which terrorists feed.”
Yglesias, consider yourself busted. The reversal of direction on Afghanistan on the part of some in the feminist establishment is one of the most shameful partisan flip-flops of recent times, but fortunately it wasn’t universal. Ellie Smeal apparently supported the invasion privately, contrary to my memory of events at the time and her public statements:
Perhaps it’s no surprise that some feminists, including Smeal, now feel the backward and violent regime deserves whatever it gets. The rare overlap between feminist and military interests made for particularly warm relations in the greenroom at an NBC station in Los Angeles when Smeal met up with three generals who were about to appear on Chris Matthews’s Hardball. “They went off about the role of women in this effort and how imperative it was that women were now in every level of the air force and navy,” says Smeal, who found herself cheered by the idea of women flying F-16s. “It’s a different kind of war,” she says, echoing the president’s assessment of Operation Enduring Freedom.
It’s too bad she didn’t go public with this sentiment, because if she had there wouldn’t be so much reason to point out that the position of the feminist establishment on Afghanistan was driven more by partisanship than by principle.
Interesting how people of a certain political persuasion always replace “oppose the bombing and oppose the war” with “oppose the liberation”. Neither the bombing of Afghanistan nor that of Iraq was ever – in any way more than rhetoric – about “liberation” of anybody (other than “liberating” many innocent people from their lives through death). Afghanistan was about revenge and Iraq is about oil and strategic influence. One need go no further than to note how Afghanistan has slipped back into the control of thugs and drug lords, how women have redoned the burka, and how American bloodlust was distracted by Iraq, to conclude that neither war was ever about “liberation”.
Furthermore, there is nothing contradictory about somebody opposing a murderous bombing campaign before a war, even if it is of an equally hideous regime, and then fighting to retain whatever shred of liberty a few people may obtained from that campaign. The only people who don’t change with circumstances are conservatives. It is not a flip-flop, it is simply a recognition that while the means (war) never justified the end in the first place, now that that end is here, one must accept it and fight to improve it.
I’ve noticed that people blinded by partisan hatred will often denigrate successful programs by the other side according to their imagination of what they were “about” rather than looking at what they actually accomplished. While Iraq is still up in the air, there’s not really much doubt that the US action in Afghanistan had the effect of not only making America safer but of improving the lot of the mass of Afghans as well. Anyone who can’t see that is looking through shit-colored glasses.
I’m afraid Rob’s right–& no tone of “hatred” comes through in his comments, at least nothing like “shit-colored glasses”. Partisan, yes–but then so are you. Nothing wrong in being partisan.
Where he’s right is that the bombing of Afghanistan (& Iraq) WAS about securing oil (even Ann Coulter agrees there), having revenge, & taking defensive action. Whatever “liberation” occured was essentially a by-product, & many liberals & conservatives alike would agree that it’s a positive “result”. But it was not the “purpose” of our attack. And this “liberation” itself is “still up in the air”—so maybe it would be best not to speak in terms of what’s been “accomplished”. Time will tell.
Even the question of America being “safer” is still up in the air. Neither shit-colored nor rose-colored glasses are needed right now–just clear ones.
Arguments about policy-makers’ “real” motives – are no more productive than theological arguments against evolution. They can’t be discussed empirically, and at the end of the day they’re meaningless because the actual results of policy are more important than the aims. So I have no interest in discussing what the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq were “about”, I want to talk about what they’ve actually accomplished.
Good point, & well said. Of course I agree.
Not sure if results are more “important than the aim” (think of the many notions a word like “important” conjures up!), but results are certainly more “real” than aims or motives–afterall, results are what IS, & can be different from what is HOPED.
Again, time will tell.
Thomas Friedman has an interesting editorial on the election in Iraq in today’s paper.
That is a terribly slippery slope, Richard, all more so coming on the heels of a statement about things that can’t be “discussed empirically”. Saying that the only thing that matters is the result, and not means or ends (aims), essentially makes it impossible to discuss the merits of any given policy initiative.
For example, if my aim is to eliminate the citizens of the state of Michigan, and I do so through the means of mass extermination, but the result is that in eliminating mass polluters, I clean up the North American environment, can we really say that the only thing that mattered is the effect on the environment. Any assessment of the results of an action cannot be isolated from the original ends and means. Beneficial results (intended or incidental) are only justified if their costs are not greater.
In the case of Afghanistan and Iraq, “liberation” (your claimed result) is still suspect in both cases. In Afghanistan, elections notwithstanding, legitimate government still only controls about 20% of the country. In Iraq, even if civil war is avoided – which is not obvious at this point – who is to say that the new government will not be just as ruthless. The interim government has already said that it will crush the opposition. Is that not what Saddam did?
But even if we grant you that liberation has been the accomplished result in both cases, what was the cost, and were there not less costly alternatives. Assuming Iraq can avoid civil war and stabilize in the _near_ future, how many people have died or have been permanently scarred (physically and mentally)? Assuming Saddam was murdering 10,000/year (and just to account for other effects of living under dictatorship, lets say 30,000), then we could have let diplomacy and other aggressive tactics work for at least four more years before his regime would ever have inflicted the damage on the Iraqi people that war has done. If Iraq does fall into civil war, then war will have been a clear and unmitigated disaster, with the SOLE responsibility on the US.
And that doesn’t even factor in illegitimate US control over Iraqi oil (the intended aim), the increase in hatred of the US for lost Arab lives, not to mention the long term systemic cost of preemptive war and the international legal system.
Answer this: if the US ups the rhetoric about attacking Iran, according to this new doctrine of preemptive strike, why would Iran not be right to attack the US first. If it never intended to do so in the first place, it now has a reason, and the (semi) legitimacy to do so. Many Americans will never really understand this, but the most far reaching problem of the US invasion of Iraq has been the undermining of rules that generally (I say, generally) keep countries from engaging in aggression.
Your “argument” falls down on two counts, Richard. For one thing, methods and intent do matter. If you know anything about computers I’m sure you’re familiar with “fixes” that did indeed address the immediate problem but ended up causing more trouble than the fix was worth. That’s what bad methods get you. For bad intent, consider the old thought experiment about shooting at your neighbor and hitting the murderer who was slipping in the back door instead. Ego-strokes about bad aim aside, the fact that a good outcome occurred once does not mean that actions performed with the same intent are generally defensible.
Second, intent can be determined via empirical methods. Any scientist can tell you that when one theory fails to explain observed phenomena another must be sought. If the justification given for a set of actions does not actually explain those actions, it would be irrational not to consider that other motivations might be at play, or what those motivations imply with regard to future decisions. If you’ve ever played chess or any other strategy game at a non-trivial skill level, you must be familiar with the idea that understanding why an opponent made a strange-seeming move is often crucial to winning.
Thus, I reject the claim either that motives can’t be discussed empirically or that they’re less important than the (immediate) results. That’s just intellectual laziness, often indulged in when self-interest requires not knowing (or admitting) something about one’s ideological allies.
American liberals love to wrap themselves up in a good intentions while creating social programs that aggravate the problems they’re supposed to be alleviating.
The net result of the expansion of welfare to unmarried mothers in the 50s helped fuel a massive increase in out-of-wedlock births, especially among the ethnic groups with the greatest welfare participation. The War on Poverty helped to produce larger disparities between rich and poor, and Affirmative Action increased the black and Hispanic college and professional school dropout rates. Radical increases in child support and alimony obligations in the 80s helped fuel an increase in divorce, with all the attendant social ills.
But all of these programs were undertaken with good intentions so they’re beyond criticism.
The problem with the use of intentions to the exclusion of results in judging public policy is aggravated by the extent to which intentions are so easily judged in a cynical and dishonest manner by critics. On this comment thread alone I read charges that the US invaded Afghanistan for its oil – it has none – and for “revenge”. I can’t take people who make such ridiculous and irresponsible charges seriously.
We didn’t invade Afghanistan simply in order to liberate Afghan women from oppression, we did it to remove the Taliban from power because they were a state sponsor of terrorism. As a side-effect of this invasion, Afghanistan held democratic elections in which men and women were both allowed to participate. This is a big step forward for the Afghan people, as anyone not blinded by hate and rank partisanship has to admit. And if the elected government only controls 20% of the land area (and 80% of the population), that’s 20% (and 80%) more than ever tasted freedom and democracy before.
Oddly, when we stack up the results we have to conclude that the left undertakes, with good intentions, policies that have mainly bad results, while the right, with its bad intentions, produces mainly good results.
No wonder the left doesn’t want to talk about results.
And frankly, the carping about international law isn’t at all persuasive. The edifice of International Law represented by the corrupt nations on the UN Security Council who were on the take from Saddam under the UN’s Oil for Food Program, the largest financial scandal in history, crumbled when the facts came out, not because the US and the UK and the rest of the Coalition took their leave of the Dictators’ Club and did what had to be done.
Finally, I’ll just point out that Saddam was responsible for 1.5 million deaths in his personal plaything of a country and in Iran, so the US has a long way to go before we make a dent in his record. If we want to assess costs, let’s get real.
“The problem with the use of intentions to the exclusion of results…”
Nobody’s suggesting the use of intentions to the exclusion of results. Find a valid argument, not yet another strawman.
“The War on Pverty helped to produce larger disarities between rich & poor” Where does this come from? Reaganomics & its continued practice by Bush has produced the largest disparity between rich & poor this country has seen since the Great Depression. To say this is not being “blindied by hate & rank partisanship” but to state a fact.
“Radical increases in child support & alimony obligations helped fuel an increase in divorce”–I don’t get the sense here; do not child support and/or alimony obligations begin “after” divorce?
If “intentions” or “motives” are considered too abstract to be discussed empirically, what about “freedom” & “liberation”? Are they also not abstractions?
I think it’s important to discuss BOTH intentions & results–as it is important to keep defining the terms we use so easily, such as “freedom” “liberation” “security” “evil” etc. so that they don’t start to morph or get twisted into buzz words that fuel power or stand as excuses or deceive.
Richard, how should we apply your “results are more important than intention” proposition to the following example: The US military bombs an Iraqi residential area with the INTENTION of killing Saddam, whom they have been told is hiding out there. As it turns out he is not there, but the REUSULT is that 100 innocent Iraqis get killed by accident.” The US distinguishes this slaughter of innocent civilians from those perpetrated by terrorists by claiming that it was not their INTENTION to kill civilians, it was simply the RESULT.
I can only assume you agree with this explanation because INTENTION does matter! And BTW, this is not a hypothetical example. It happened!
How coincidental that I find this story just after making my post above. Note the quote about “intended” target. I guess the US military believes intention is important. What about you, Richard?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4158463.stm
That’s a good example, Rob, and it illustrates my point: people caught screwing up will inevitably claim they had good intentions, if lying doesn’t work (“I did not have sexual relations…”). The case you cite is all the more interesting because I take it you would say the intention to kill Saddam was just as bad as the result.
Of course, once we understand that killing Saddam would have immediately saved 25,000 lives or so, maybe it wasn’t such a bad risk at that.
Kim, the War on Poverty has been an abject failure for all of the 40 years it’s been in effect, hasn’t it? That’s certainly what the liberals say.
And on your other point, child support and alimony begin well before divorce is granted, but the issue is the incentive value they represent for bad behavior, just as the welfare system has empirically motivated bad behavior.
People react to policy, and noble intentions have to recognize this.
Yes, the War on Poverty has been a failure, like the War on Drugs. Granted.
But it’s another thing entirely to suggest that the War on Poverty has “caused” an increase in poverty, or in the disparity between rich & poor, as you earlier said.
It would be like saying the War on Drugs has caused increased drug use, or the War on Terror has caused increased terrorism (oops! this last may or may not turn out to be true).
To say the “welfare system empirically motivates bad behavior” is very general. It’s like saying “capitalism empirically motivates bad behavior” or “religion empirically motivates repression.” These are such broad, general statements. They are true & untrue. Depending.
I couldn’t agree more when you say people react to policy.
No I don’t say that the intention to kill Hussein was a bad one. The point from the beginning of this discussion has been about whether good results justify bad intention, not whether bad results are justifiable if the intention was good. Remember we started this by taking about whether the US oil grab in Iraq (a bad intention) is now justified because one of the (possible) results may be liberation. You said you didn’t care what the war was “about”, but what it has accomplished. I liked Jeff’s example of shooting at your neighbour and hitting a murderer instead. The shooter is not going to get any medals for his actions, regardless of lives saved by his killing of a murderer, nor is he going to escape accountability for what he intended to do: kill his neighbour. Nor are we going to turn a blind eye to guys shooting their neighbours in the hopes that one of the results will be dead murderers. The point is simply that intention does matter is assessing the results: I would propose that good intentions should more easily excuse bad results (ex. shooting at a murderer and killing your neighbour) than bad intentions should be excused by good results (shooting at your neighbour and killing a murderer). Or two more relevant examples: bombing a house to kill Hussein and accidentally killing civilians is more excusable than invading Iraq to steal its oil and accidentally liberating the country (not that i oppose the liberation, but appose the theft; and liberation doesn’t relieve the perpetrators of the accountability for the theft. And this is not just because I am liberal and need to find excuses for bad results. It is just that INTENTION must matter. (It does in domestic criminal law).
And we have said nothing more about COSTS, which was my main point more so than intention versus results. All three must factored in… And in this case – Iraq – I think that regardless of INTENTION or RESULT, the COSTS has simply been too great for either…
The trouble with criticism of intentions is that it’s easy to lead yourself astray as to what the intentions are, especially among your political enemies. If an enemy of yours consistently produces good results (not just once as in the case of the hypothetical shooting) then I believe you’d best reassess his intentions. If an ally consistently produces bad results, then you should reassess his intentions as well.
To say that the Iraq War was “about oil” is to miss the point that the easiest way for us to get Iraq’s oil would have been to lift the embargo and buy it. But doing that would have had a number of other effects that we weren’t ready to take, so we did what we did not for oil but for security. Whether it succeeded is another question entirely, as you point out.
Richard, check out Jim Kunstler’s latest entry at Clusterfuck nation–predictions for Iraq. I’d be curious to hear your comments.
Richard is absolutely correct when he notes that the easiest way to get Iraq’s oil would be to simply lift the embargo, which, oddly enough, was the position of many on the Left before the war buildup started. (At which point many shifted to “the embargo and sanctions are working fine.)
In the case of the feminists, I think that for many it’s also a case of hating war more than anything else. That “war never solved anything” viewpoint. (Of course, when a country is already plunged into war without us…) What’s irritating is the way so many feminists seemed to act as though it were our fault that the Taliban were winning, yet refused to suggest or cheer any sort of action to get rid of them. What, in the end, is the point of complaining so much if you can’t propose a constructive policy to do something about it? Hand-holding meetings and committees don’t count if they don’t accomplish anything.