March 21, 2003
From the desk of Jane Galt:One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. . .
Via Joanne Jacobs: Excellent essay on the thin, but vital line between a warrior and a terrorist.
We discussed the fact that it is unlikely that those who have been bewitched by the rhetoric of Osama bin Laden and others like him feel no revulsion at the thought (or in the act) of killing unarmed, helpless civilians. Rather, it is more probable that they are persuaded that any apparent pricks of conscience they may feel are not the screams of their precious humanity hoping to be heard but rather their human weakness battling against their will to perform their sacred duty. They would therefore consider it a triumph of will to carry out the charge to kill without mercy or discrimination.. . .
It is easier to remain a warrior when fighting other warriors. When warriors fight murderers, they may be tempted to become like the evil they hope to destroy. Their only protection is their code of honor. The professional military ethics that restrain warriors -- that keep them from targeting those who cannot fight back, from taking pleasure in killing, from striking harder than is necessary, and that encourage them to offer mercy to their defeated enemies and even to help rebuild their countries and communities -- are also their own protection against becoming what they abhor.
Posted by Jane Galt at March 21, 2003 7:19 AM | TrackBack | Technorati inbound links
Indeed, terrorists are the information age's strongmen and mercenaries.
The author has good intentions and articulates her case well, but her ethical foundation and nomenclature are somewhat amateurish, betraying a romantic view of the use and rule of force. At once, "warrior code" is practically a misnomer; strongmen are strongmen and thugs are thugs. Every ethnic group she mentions are well-documented for their dispostions: conquerers and devourers, however fascinating each historical account may be. Before the inception of United States of America, an abysmally scant number of rulers over the ages could even be considered benevolent autocrats; really, what is benevolence when it does not allow self-determination to those ruled? Very well none of them subjugated the use of force to the rule of law. "Codes" were less about justice than establishing even playing fields between strongmen and pacification of subjects. As force is the primary method for gain, negotiation is an auxiliary (thankfully, she does make note of that at the end of the fourth paragraph).
Steven Ambrose got it right: the men and women who defend free countries are citizen soldiers. Nothing else. They are absolutely not "warriors," an association inextricable to the deep implications of heredity, rank and privilege only justified through most of history by superior strength - anathema to the reality of liberty, wherein combatants are drawn from civilian status and are unconditionally held accountable to civilian leaders.
The use of force is an act of absorption; even when justified, it is a necessarily dangerous flirt with the evil of "Self." That's what the author appears to be getting at, if murkily. The great divorce between our boys and those fighting for dictators or terrorists? The latter destroy to dominate and consume the very being of those they fight; the former destroy to preserve or enfranchise, for as many as possible and including those they fight, the dignity and self-sovereignty of the unique entity of an individual.
I don't see Joanne Jacob's definition as a "fine line." Her description and indeed the truth is there is a vast sea of difference between the professional ethics of a soldier and a terrorist.
Last spring, when a Palestinian homicide bomber was accidentally left alive after his devastating bombing attack, the Isrealis put him in the same hospital as his victims and gave him the same care.
When the Americans came into Afghanistan, they earned the people's respect because they didn't steal their food; they gave them medical care; and they didn't treat them like the enemy.
A terrorist is a terrorist. Anyone who even has to ask the question is simply not paying attention to reality.
I linked to the essay, which is by Shannon French, who teaches ethics at the Naval Academy, including a course on The Code of the Warrior.
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