The leaders of the three allies pronounced the attack effective, with President Trump, apparently oblivious of his GOP predecessor's presidency, declaring "Mission accomplished!" Experts aren't certain that anything good will come of this attack beyond possibly a pause in the use of chemical weapons - which, to be sure, is something.
The strikes were preceded by dueling sham resolutions in the UN Security Council, with Russia vetoing the US's resolution, and Russia's resolution failing to pass. Without UN authorization, the three allies (apparently this wasn't officially a NATO action, either) were spurred to action by their own consciences - or those of their leaders: unlike President Obama, President Trump didn't seek Congressional authorization for strikes, while British Prime Minister Theresa May afterward went to the House of Commons to defend her decision to launch missiles without consulting Parliament.
Amid the din of statements, accusations and propaganda, Catholic voices try to make themselves heard - or not. Pope Francis, probably with a glance across the Atlantic at the UN, issued a fairly generic call for peace:
“I am deeply disturbed by the current global situation, in which, despite the instruments at the disposition of the international community, it’s difficult to agree upon a common action in favor of peace in Syria and in other regions of the world,” the pope said. "While I pray incessantly for peace, and I invite all people of good will to continue to do the same, I appeal anew to all responsible political leaders, so that justice and peace may prevail.”Meanwhile, at the America site, blogger Antonio De Loero-Brust argued that "Peace in Syria is impossible without US military intervention":
The Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church makes clear that all governments have a responsibility to “ensure that the conditions of peace exist, not only within their own territory but throughout the world.” Backed by Russia and Iran, the Assad regime currently has nothing to lose and much to gain from continuing its war on Syrian citizens. The conditions for peace will not exist until this reality changes, and a one-time strike will not be enough. The United States, as the world’s most powerful country, has a moral responsibility to protect the innocent and to ensure some semblance of justice in international affairs. It is time for the strong and powerful to stand up for the weak, the innocent and the vulnerable.If the US bishops have issued a statement concerning the missile strikes, I haven't been able to locate it. I hope that the bishops do decide to publicly weigh in: as the national conference of the United States, it is the conference's role, arguably it's duty, to attempt to hold the federal government accountable to Catholic standards of social justice.
And beyond that responsibility, the situation in Syria brings to the fore a number of questions which are not easy for citizens, and probably even government officials, to think through with clarity:
- Does the Assad regime's use of chemical weapons warrant an international response?
- Does the responsibility for that response lie with the US and its allies?
- Is a missile strike an appropriate and proportional response?
The bishops, speaking from the Catholic moral tradition, can provide an important public service by commenting on the Syrian missile strike.
[NB: I changed the headline on 4/17/2018; the previous headline, "Syrian missile attack", implied that Syria was the attacker rather than the target.]
Contra De Loero-Brust, the conditions for a just war -- which I assume would hold over for the newly-found "duty to intervene" -- include the probability of success. The number of players and the wars within the war (like tornadoes spawned by hurricanes) make it impossible even for people with longer attention spans than our commander-in-chief to find a likely master strategy.
ReplyDeleteIt is not impossible that Putin's position (whatever his intentions) is correct: that Assad must be firmly in place to bring order -- ordnung muss sein -- before any solutions can be found. That makes more sense, in its way, than anything Obama or His Unfitness has said.
A hundred years ago, no one would have suggested that one country should butt into another country's business unless a) the unrest threatened the first country or b) the first country could gain something tangible from intervening. We got to this nascent "duty to intervene" through, among other things, recognition that genocide begins as an "internal affair." I don't see the duty to intervene as being "ripe" for application in international affairs.
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Delete"A hundred years ago, no one would have suggested that one country should butt into another country's business unless a) the unrest threatened the first country or b) the first country could gain something tangible from intervening. "
DeleteIn the spirit of conversation, let me suggest the following:
* It can be argued that Europe, in particular, is threatened by "unrest" in Syria. This is true on several levels: Syrian refugees come to Europe in large numbers, and that situation is seen as a genuine security risk; an aggressive and expansionist Russia under Putin is a threat to the EU; and an unstable Middle East can spill over into Europe: Turkey can get pulled in, and many European countries, certainly including France, have sizable Muslim minorities who see themselves as stakeholders in Middle Eastern affairs.
* The just-war tradition was developed at a time when universal human rights were not as appreciated as they have been in recent decades. The question of whether a world power like the US, or an international organization like the UN, has a duty to intervene in the "internal affairs" of another sovereign state to protect the victims of widespread violations of human rights, is not one to be easily set aside. The "duty to intervene" probably should be seen as a complement to, rather than a substitute for, the just-war tradition.
Honestly, I am not certain that the just-war tradition is applicable to Syria in general, nor to this missile strike in particular. I don't think the US, France or the UK have any desire to get pulled into the Syria war; they would position the missile strike as an instance of punishing a regime for human-rights violations. The stated goal of the missile strike was to destroy Assad's stockpile of nuclear weapons. Allegedly, the missiles struck with few or even no human casualties. Perhaps it's roughly analogous to the drone strike assassinations that the US pursues against its terrorist enemies: surgical exercises of unilateral justice, rather than acts of war.
I'm probably making this all sound a good deal more clinical than it really is. Not every missile strike is done with surgical precision; and it's an open question whether the recipient of these uses of military power are making the same distinctions between acts of justice and acts of war that I'm making here. My own supposition is that every time we launch a missile into some other country's sovereign space, we are adding to seething resentments that will be paid back some day, in some way, to our sorrow. The situation today is that we can do these things and our enemies can't. That situation won't prevail forever.
Jim, I am tempted to say Europe should just build a wall and make Syria pay for it, since we Americans decided that is an effective approach to refugees. But to say that would be a cheap shot, and cheap shots availeth nothing.
DeleteSeriously, I recognize that a duty to intervene is a legitimate subject for moral speculation. What I question is whether it has been thought through well enough to be invoked. Remember, we used to say that one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. The philosophers could be setting us up for one man's aggressor is another man's intervener, and then where would be be? About the only world statesman I'd trust with the duty to intervene at the moment is Angela Merkel.
Available evidence suggests that His Unfitness's first Twitterblast was an emotional outburst caused by a need to show strength and resolve to the dolts on the divan, and once cooler heads than Steve Doocy's got to him fire and fury gave way to a defensible, if costly*, statement of principles in collaboration with two allies. Tomahawk missiles cost $1.4 million apiece. I don't have a price list for the other missiles involved in the statement, but it appears it cost us a heck of a lot more than it does for the Trump family to enjoy a golfing vacation. Western Union might have been just as efficient for sending a message. Certainly cheaper.
I had to look at that second quote twice; it sounded like something more likely to have been from the National Review site than the America one. "The United States as the world's most powerful country, has a moral responsibility to protect the innocent and to ensure some semblance of of justice in international affairs." We're not even doing a good job of protecting the innocent or ensuring justice at home right now, I don't know how we are going to accomplish it in Syria. That Pax Americana thing has been working out so well for us in the Middle East. Sorry, I'm feeling rather pessimistic right now.
ReplyDeleteI don't expect to hear much from the bishops over the strike. There was enough warning that civilian casualties seem to have been avoided for the most part. I doubt if it did much to Assad's chemical arsenal either. It was a case of "We said we'd do something, that's something."
The attack may not be "fake news" but it is a "fake issue."
ReplyDeleteThe Russians were not targeted and they were warned in advance, as were the Syrians. So both really got off easy. While Trump likes to make threats and exhibit US power, he really wants to be "friends" with Putin, and he wants us to withdraw from Syria.
Faggioli had the best comment: "A Roman Curia cardinal, who was a Vatican diplomat in Lebanon during the civil war, told me that the war is always also an experiment about new kinds of weapons."
In effect this "attack" was a live ammunition war game on the part of all parties to test out their missiles and anti-missal defenses.
These cruise missiles and delivery systems are not new and the only possible information to be gained would be about russian countermeasures. Since they didn't exercise their countermeasures, no gain there. I think the real motivation was to distract from Trump's domestic problems. It's always about Trump. Only Trump is real to Trump.
ReplyDeleteLockheed-Martin's JASSM-ER missile was a new piece of ordnance making its debut. I think it has undergone enough testing to know what to expect.
ReplyDelete