How Does Anyone Still Defend the Bombing of Hiroshima?

As you likely heard, President Obama became the first sitting US President to visit Hiroshima, Japan last week, and laid a wreath at the atomic bombing memorial. Predictably, this brought on a wave of discussion of the subject, most of which was bad. Conservatives saw it as a continuation of Obama's mythical apology tour, which never has and never will occur, no matter how justified it might be at this point. In reality, Obama's speech employed the passive voice "death fell from the sky" with no apparent perpetrator, and no apology was to be found. Given by most other people--those that do not have vast amounts of blood on their hands from the wars and assassinations they are actively overseeing--it would have been a beautiful speech. As it happened, with Obama as the messenger, it comes off mostly as a kind of cruel sarcasm. Some examples:

Technological progress without an equivalent progress in human institutions can doom us. -- [er, like the US drone assassination program?]

... 

But among those nations like my own that hold nuclear stockpiles, we must have the courage to escape the logic of fear and pursue a world without them. 

We may not realize this goal in my lifetime, but persistent effort can roll back the possibility of catastrophe. We can chart a course that leads to the destruction of these stockpiles... -- [Yes, we can. Unfortunately, President Obama has committed $1 trillion to modernizing the nuclear weapons arsenal instead of reducing it. ]

I suspect you get the idea.

My deep frustrations with President Obama aside, he should be commended for at least making the trip. And it's returned the spotlight to a question that, frankly, should be rhetorical by now. Was the US justified in bombing Hiroshima?

And to answer this question, there are two dimensions to consider: moral and strategic.

Moral Considerations
On this count, the issue is rather straightforward. The prevailing justification is, as we all learned growing up, that the atomic bombing was necessary to shorten the war and prevent a bloody invasion that would have cost thousands of American soldiers' lives in the process. There's good reason to doubt that narrative, as we'll see shortly. But for now, let's grant the assumption.

Now, it's important to note that Hiroshima (and Nagasaki, for that matter), were not militarized cities for the Japanese. The US was not bombing the equivalent of Pearl Harbor or West Point; it was bombing a city that had relatively little significance to the Japanese military effort. Indeed, that's why the city hadn't been bombed before then; it was far down on the priority list. As such, the overwhelming majority of victims in the strike were civilians, and this reality was known in advance.

Thus, the question is whether it is justified to intentionally kill civilians (nuking a population center) in pursuit of political ends (unconditional Japanese surrender)? And before we answer, it's worth considering the definition of terrorism. According to the FBI, one essential characteristic of terrorist activities is that they:

Appear to be intended (i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping;

Or stated more simply, terrorism is intentionally harming, intimidating a civilian population for the purpose of achieving a political end. And we should note that saving American lives or revenge for Pearl Harbor can't be a valid justification either. If it were, consistency would demand that we also endorse the rationale adopted by most of the terrorists that have attacked (or tried to attack) American and Western civilians in recent years--namely to try to stop military intervention in their home countries (save lives) or avenge fallen victims in the Middle East. The details and magnitudes of the attacks are different; the predominant justification underlying them is not. I don't know about you, but I'm not about to justify those other acts of terrorism.

It may be uncomfortable to think about the issue in those terms, but it should not be. Relatively few of us were even alive when the Hiroshima occurred; fewer still were old enough to vote for the Roosevelt-Truman ticket that carried it out; and virtually no one at all directly influenced Truman's decision to use the bomb, or even knew of the possibility in advance. So why should any of us feel a reflexive need to justify that barbarous action our government undertook over 70 years ago? We should not. War crimes are still war crimes, no matter how sophisticated the justification or the colors of the flag that sponsored them. And if American Exceptionalism is to ever mean anything worth a damn, it should be more than pretending the US government has never done anything wrong.*

Strategic Considerations
Above, we took for granted that the US had a choice between a brutal invasion of Japan or dropping atomic bombs to end the war effort. And it is in the context of this choice that many will defend the bombings as necessary. However, there's actually good reason to doubt this conventional narrative. And for the details, we recommend this excellent piece at Harper's, which addresses the most important historical questions on the subject with the person who wrote the book on them. And you can probably tell from the title which side of the issue they come out on. Here's the link:

Unjust Cause

*For more on this line of argument, also check out this article at the Independent Institute.

More Troops and Weapons to Iraq, Still Just As Futile

US participation in the War in Iraq continues to build this week with the announcement of 200 more troops, Apache helicopters, and $415 million in new aid for the Iraqi Kurds in the name of battling ISIS. Additionally, Defense Secretary Ash Carter said that American troops will now be moved "closer to the action," though the US appears to still be committed to describing them as "advisers".

Naturally, the move is a reminder of how far we've come from President Obama's oft-repeated promise of "no boots on the ground" in the latest Middle East war. Now, not counting Special Operations forces, there are officially around 4,000 troops in Iraq, and The Washington Post has reported that the actual number is close to 5,000.

The new announcement is also a good time to remember that the war against ISIS remains thoroughly illegal. Congress has not passed an Authorization for the Use of Military Force, let alone a formal declaration of war. Instead, President Obama is still relying on the legal authority passed in the aftermath of 9/11 to go after Al Qaeda and associated forces. This rationale is absurd, not only because of how long ago it was passed, but also because Al Qaeda and ISIS have had a very public split and are in no way "associated forces". Still, the escalation continues regardless, as most Democrats refuse to break step with their President on foreign policy and most Republicans can't bring themselves to oppose a war, no matter how futile.

All of which brings to the question of effectiveness, "Will it work?" In part, the answer depends on one's definition of success. If the goal is to merely unseat ISIS from Mosul, that goal is certainly within reach if the US is willing to throw enough money and bodies at it. However, if the goal is to create a sustainable political outcome in which a group like ISIS cannot gain a foothold, there is virtually no conceivable way in which the US's growing intervention will succeed.

Unfortunately, there's good reason to believe that Obama is operating on the first definition. In a recent interview cited in the Reuters piece, he said this: 

My expectation is that by the end of the year, we will have created the conditions whereby Mosul will eventually fall.

Clearly, Obama is not concerned about the all important question of what comes next. Instead, he is only concerned about his own political legacy, and, perhaps, the electoral chances of his party in the upcoming election. But neither of those require a long-term strategy. All they require is a well-timed victory moment sometime this year and a relative pause in hostilities that is long enough to give the impression of stability where none exists. Then when chaos invariably resumes, it will be someone else's problem.

That's the current trajectory we're on. Perhaps the Iraqi Kurds, with their additional funding and support from the US, will launch an assault on Mosul. Perhaps the US will have to send significantly more troops to ensure it goes according to plan. Either way, there is no solution for the day after. Neither the Kurds nor the US Marines are likely to welcome in Mosul for any period of time after the invasion ends. Both would be all but certain to face a low-level insurgency for as long as they stayed.

Returning Mosul to the formal control of the Iraqi government is unlikely to prove successful either. After all, Mosul fell to ISIS in the summer of 2014, due in part to the fact that much of the local Sunni population was sufficiently fed up with the corrupt central government in Baghdad that ISIS didn't seem to be an obviously worse alternative. While any romanticism of ISIS has probably been crushed out of the local population over the past two years of ISIS rule, the corruption of the Iraqi central government endures. Thus, the idea that Baghdad could successfully govern a liberated Mosul essentially relies on the assumption that Sunnis will be excited to trade the devil they know now, for the devil they used to know.

The tragic circumstances above are why nonintervention remains the only appropriate position on Iraq. It's not an endorsement of the status quo, but merely a recognition that there are limits to US military power. The latest announcement from the Administration suggests President Obama is not willing to recognize this yet.

US Kills 150 People in Somalia; Media Offers Collective Shrug

The ongoing US assassination program just completed one of its most deadly strikes on record in the country of Somalia, killing an estimated 150 people. Rest assured though, the US government said that all the victims were "militants". The US government also stated that the airstrikes were in self-defense, so you know, no big deal.

Of course, the US isn't actually at war in Somalia. No evidence has been provided as to the identity of any of the dead. And no details have been provided as to precisely who these 150 people were allegedly threatening that necessitated their execution. The Pentagon press release merely indicated that the attack was on an al Shabaab training camp.

Yet in spite of the clear lack of information, the killing of 150 people in a neutral country does not entail a scandal or even warrant comments from the President of the United States. It's just a normal event. The Pentagon's version of events was reported uncritically throughout most of the US media. Not enough details were offered to really corroborate the story, and no major US outlet bothered to try. Somalia is pretty far away, after all.

If this sounds problematic, it should. A few important questions come to mind:

• What is al Shabaab and why is the US trying to kill its members?
• How can we assume all 150 people were not civilians given that the US government has a policy of labeling all fighting-age males as militants, until proven otherwise?
• How can we exclusively trust the US government's version of events, given that it has a vested interest in how the story gets reported? 
• Why are there US troops in Somalia to be threatened in the first place?
• Is it remotely legal for a country to assassinate people in a foreign country with which it is not at war?

On the question of al Shabaab, the background is both important and informative. When the War on Terror kicked off in 2001, Somalia remained largely ungoverned. In this void, the US backed local warlords in Somalia to engage in counterterrorism activities, even though none of the 9/11hijackers were from Somalia. Being warlords, however, they grabbed what power they could and committed various forms of brutality. After a few years of escalating civil war, a group of Somali religious leaders put together a coalition of groups that was finally able to marginalize the warlords and establish some semblance of authority and stability in Somalia. This coalition was called the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), and al Shabaab, which means "the youth," was a minor subgroup within this coalition.

Unfortunately, the US government was unwilling to tolerate Islamic self-government in Somalia. So the US supported neighboring Ethiopia's invasion of Somalia, in an attempt to weaken or overthrow the new Somali government. After two more years of chaos and violence, Somalia eventually drove the Ethiopians out in 2008, led by the fighters of Al Shabaab. With Ethiopia out, the leaders of the ICU agreed to make a deal with the US and use a secular form of government that the US preferred. But the Al Shabaab movement denounced the deal as betrayal, and effectively declared another round of civil war. At this point, after being emboldened and radicalized by years of fighting, Al Shabaab also declared allegiance to Al Qaeda and thus made its way onto the US hit list, where it remains today. In effect, Al Shabaab is the perfect example of how the US War on Terror can be counterproductive.

Though it seems impossible, the story of Somalia actually gets worse from then on, eventually culminating in a famine that killed hundreds of thousands of people. If you're interested to know more, check out this excellent summary by Scott Horton in The Future of Freedom.

And to answer the rest of the questions posed above, check out this great write-up from Glenn Greenwald at The Intercept, which explores them in-depth:

Nobody Knows the Identity of the 150 People Killed by U.S. in Somalia, but Most Are Certain They Deserved It

The Senate Nears Vote on Open-ended War Authorization

While most of the US is focused on the early primaries and caucuses, Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has been quietly working to introduce an open-ended war authorization bill. The proposed war-making powers would be essentially unlimited, with no restrictions on where war can be waged, how long it can be waged, or whether ground troops can be used. In other words, the same Republicans that occasionally criticize Obama's excessive use of Executive Power, are trying to give him complete discretion on the most important issue of all: war.

Of course, it's not like the absence of any authorization for the war against ISIS has had much effect on President Obama's actions thus far. To name just a few examples, we have ground troops in Iraq already, special forces in Syria, and some special forces in Libya, with open talk of a larger escalation coming soon. We also regularly conduct airstrikes in Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan, and conduct drone assassinations in other countries. And most of this, particularly the strikes in Iraq and Syria, is being without any plausible legal justification, as commentators on both sides of the political spectrum acknowledge.

All of this points to the convoluted nature of partisan politics on foreign policy. Like any other issue, the Republican opposition will always try their best to criticize a Democratic president on foreign policy. Prior to 9/11, that often (though not exclusively) meant complaining about efforts to nation-build or police the world. Indeed, even that well-known peacenik George W. Bush, initially campaigned on a "humble foreign policy" back in 2000. But after 9/11 and the Iraq invasion of 2003, the dynamic was flipped. Suddenly, the Republicans hadn't met a war they didn't like, and it was left to the Democrats to be the opposing antiwar voice. As mentioned in yesterday's post, President Obama's campaign was successful in large part because he was the relatively antiwar candidate in the Democratic primary, and again in the general election against Senator McCain.

But President Obama disrupted the partisan status quo once more on foreign policy. Despite winning the Nobel Peace Prize early in his first term, his Presidency has been anything but peaceful. Indeed, he even openly bragged about using military force in seven different countries. This naturally left the hawkish Republicans in a tough predicament. On the one hand, they needed to find a way to criticize President Obama, and the obvious option would have been to show how counterproductive Obama's military interventions have been. Remember when we won the War on Terror by drone striking civilians, everyone? Nope, me neither. But on the other hand, Republicans had made supporting war an essential part of their brand. Given the choice between rebranding the Republican Party as the party of peace and shameless nationalistic fear-mongering, most politicians in the GOP unfortunately chose the latter.

And that's what explains the bizarre circumstances in which we find ourselves. President Obama has been waging an indisputably illegal war in Syria for over a year with barely a whimper of protest from the Republicans. And now, the leading members of the Republican Party are trying to grant him (and his successor) even more power to wage war. These days many people complain about the lack of bipartisanship in Washington DC. But when it comes to matters of war and peace, both parties have been on the same disastrous page for the last seven years: more war, less peace.

For more on the details of this new story, check out this write-up on the bill from former Congressman Ron Paul:

Congress is Writing the President a Blank Check for War