Why Our Mid East Wars Are Doomed to Fail
For a short course in recent Anglo-American legal theory, go to:
http://www.iep.utm.edu/l/legalpos.htm
Of particular note are H.L.A. Hart's distinctions between what he called the 'INTERNAL' and 'EXTERNAL' aspects of legal rules. Taking the latter first, one can generally determine what legal rules are obeyed in a given legal system simply by observing their efficacy -- or lack of same.
Any legal system to work, must assume a general disposition to obey or accept of its rules. If a significant number of people are disobeying the rules whenever they figure they can get away with doing so, it will be in big trouble. Either it will have to introduce draconian measures to scare people into obedience -- which most likely will breed a counter revolution over the long run. Or it must at least imprison huge numbers of rule breakers and suffer massive disorders. One can see examples of these two alternatives respectively in Saddam Hussein's Iraq, which used extreme measures to maintain control, or in contemporary South Africa where one hears that crime is running rampant in the face of extensive poverty there.
Why, then, do some legal systems seem to work without either extreme punitive measures or disabling general disorders? Hart (and others) have suggested that most individuals in well ordered systems obey the rules -- not because of the threat of punishment, but rather because they feel for one reason or another (habit, moral commitments, whatever) that they have an obligation to obey -- what Hart denominated the 'INTERNAL' aspect of rules. To use a blunt example most of us feel we 'have an obligation' not murder people and do not do so simply because we fear punishment. Most murders take place precisely in those situations (crimes of passion, devious planning, etc.) where people are not weighing the threat of punishment as a deterrent.
Back to the real world: the disorders in Iraq manifestly display the absence for a significant number of Iraqis of any feeling of obligation (the INTERNAL aspect) to obey (American imposed) legal rules. Even Machiavelli warned princes not to send their armies to occupy conquered populations. Such would be resisted by the inhabitants who would feel no obligation to obey their occupiers. And the occupier's only recourse would be to get rid of the opposition with massive brutality -- which in turn would risk making the occupiers hated and starting the cycle of resistance all over again. The Iraqis who lived there presumably remember the Fallusha that we tried to destroy -- even if we don't. Now they are fighting back there again!
The same is obviously true for Afghanistan where the Taliban seem to be reviving following upon our drastic use of new and more horrible weapons against them (i.e. those 'daisy cutters':
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/nation/graphics/attack/response_14.html)
Our occupation is not respected there and our assigned leader seems to be pretty much confined in his influence to Kabul -- with the opium production for the world once again running full force outside its confines.
And so it goes when one does not understand the forces of human history!
--
"A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort
to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope." (Livy)
--
Ed Kent 718-951-5324 (voice mail only) [blind copies]
http://www.iep.utm.edu/l/legalpos.htm
Of particular note are H.L.A. Hart's distinctions between what he called the 'INTERNAL' and 'EXTERNAL' aspects of legal rules. Taking the latter first, one can generally determine what legal rules are obeyed in a given legal system simply by observing their efficacy -- or lack of same.
Any legal system to work, must assume a general disposition to obey or accept of its rules. If a significant number of people are disobeying the rules whenever they figure they can get away with doing so, it will be in big trouble. Either it will have to introduce draconian measures to scare people into obedience -- which most likely will breed a counter revolution over the long run. Or it must at least imprison huge numbers of rule breakers and suffer massive disorders. One can see examples of these two alternatives respectively in Saddam Hussein's Iraq, which used extreme measures to maintain control, or in contemporary South Africa where one hears that crime is running rampant in the face of extensive poverty there.
Why, then, do some legal systems seem to work without either extreme punitive measures or disabling general disorders? Hart (and others) have suggested that most individuals in well ordered systems obey the rules -- not because of the threat of punishment, but rather because they feel for one reason or another (habit, moral commitments, whatever) that they have an obligation to obey -- what Hart denominated the 'INTERNAL' aspect of rules. To use a blunt example most of us feel we 'have an obligation' not murder people and do not do so simply because we fear punishment. Most murders take place precisely in those situations (crimes of passion, devious planning, etc.) where people are not weighing the threat of punishment as a deterrent.
Back to the real world: the disorders in Iraq manifestly display the absence for a significant number of Iraqis of any feeling of obligation (the INTERNAL aspect) to obey (American imposed) legal rules. Even Machiavelli warned princes not to send their armies to occupy conquered populations. Such would be resisted by the inhabitants who would feel no obligation to obey their occupiers. And the occupier's only recourse would be to get rid of the opposition with massive brutality -- which in turn would risk making the occupiers hated and starting the cycle of resistance all over again. The Iraqis who lived there presumably remember the Fallusha that we tried to destroy -- even if we don't. Now they are fighting back there again!
The same is obviously true for Afghanistan where the Taliban seem to be reviving following upon our drastic use of new and more horrible weapons against them (i.e. those 'daisy cutters':
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/nation/graphics/attack/response_14.html)
Our occupation is not respected there and our assigned leader seems to be pretty much confined in his influence to Kabul -- with the opium production for the world once again running full force outside its confines.
And so it goes when one does not understand the forces of human history!
--
"A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort
to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope." (Livy)
--
Ed Kent 718-951-5324 (voice mail only) [blind copies]
posted by Ed Kent at 9:55 AM
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