It would be ideal if we could achieve all of our goals without participating in, or sponsoring ethically questionable actions. It would be ideal if we did not ever need to make choices trading one bad outcome for a lesser bad outcome. It is this ethical gray area that conspiracy theorists love. How do we justify doing something that is unethical, to avoid a bad outcome or “to ensure a greater good”.
Recently we heard about an Iranian nuclear scientist who was assassinated. We don’t know by whom – it is likely that it was a US or Israeli governments intelligence community covert operation. Both the US and Israel have national interest at stake in keeping Iran from exerting greater influence in the middle east region, and Iran’s influence is clearly on the rise.
Governments and rulers of nations have been engaged in doing some bad things to ensure the “greater good” for as long as their have been governments and rulers. And it is not just political assassination, but it is taxation, it is putting down protest, it is causing harm to its own citizens, it is engaging in foreign war or other covert military operations. Sometimes it is causing bad things to happen to the citizens of another nation to apply pressure to their government and rulers. This, effectively is how economic sanctions work. The idea is that you take people who are already under an oppressive regime, and you give them a reason for rebellion and revolt, by taking away the little that they already have.
The patriot act has reduced the rights of citizens in our own nation, in order to “ensure the greater good”, by allowing the government access to our private information so that they can prevent terrorist actions by people living in our own country. That is the justification. But at then end, it is a reduction in our privacy and freedom. It gives the government greater power to deal with individuals that are suspected of being terrorists.
In the US, we love to act as if we are some completely ethical, supremely moral nation, capable of teaching all other nations about human rights, and about freedom, and about justice, and about ethics. The truth is something a little different. When it is convenient, we are all of those things, and when it gets in the way of “national interest” – we abandon our ethics, get down off of our high horse and perpetrate dirty deeds just like all the rest. And if our citizenry were a little wiser, they would realize that at times it is necessary to do. If our citizens were a little more pragmatic and realistic and reading their history, they would know that we don’t live in utopia. We live in a world where competing national interests cause international conflict.
As for whether the ends justify the means, I am not going to judge. History will ultimately judge that. What is interesting about the US is that these things are talked about on the national stage. We have the freedom (at the moment) to criticize our government when they make these kinds of judgment calls. Politically, there is always plausible deniability, so our elected officials do not get pasted with the decisions that were made on their watch. They can claim that folks working for them made decisions that they were not aware of, or did not sponsor. We like to imagine that our leaders hands are clean, that we, as a nation, can claim the moral high ground. But I am afraid that it is not much more than imagining. I would be happy to learn that our leaders have enough of a conscience that they wrestle in their own soul with these decisions, that they are not so jaded and cynical that they simply assume that the end justifies the means and don’t give a second thought.
Geopolitical diplomacy in the 21st century is a rough game. It is often necessary to say one thing while executing another. It is sometimes necessary to do harm in order to secure a greater good. This is a political reality. Every national leader knows it, every diplomat knows it, every general knows it, and every soldier knows it. Nations don’t form alliances for sport, they form alliances for their own benefit. The first question asked in any transaction is “What’s in it for me?” The second question is “What’s my exit strategy?”
US citizens need to stop listening to media when they act like we live in some urbane utopia, where unicorns slide down rainbows, and nations play like civilized men at a chessboard. Nations play like kids on the playground:
1) sometimes the loudest most obnoxious kids are the weakest and most vulnerable.
2) some kids don’t fight “fair”; they bite, pull hair and kick you in the crotch.
3) some kids you think are weak have been studying martial arts.
4) when teams are picked, some kids are picked last of all.
5) some kids act out when they don’t get their way.
6) some kids are bullies – that’s just the way it is.
7) some kids take their ball and go home.
8) some kids are just trouble.
We need to be more realistic and understand the choices our leaders are required to make. We need to stay informed – something which our current media is not very helpful with. Because controversy sells, we get a boat load of that, but very little rational analysis of geopolitics. Because sensationalism sells, we get a boatload of stories that sound really horrible, but in the end are not really all that relevant. Our media would rather tell us about Newt Gingrich’s sex life than his proposed policies and solutions to our nations problems. Why? Because policies and solutions are boring. Boring doesn’t sell papers or get ratings.
Mostly, as I listen to news, news magazine and news round table shows, what we get are analysis of things that I consider largely irrelevant to my well being. I hear analysis of candidates likelihood of being nominated or elected, but no real insight into what that candidate would bring to office. I hear analysis of elected officials handling of issues and events, especially with a preference to whether he communicated effectively – but no real insight into what impact the content and intent of communications and the intentions that he shared may have on the current state of affairs. I can’t really evaluate the choices that the leaders make, because the media seems preoccupied with the leaders’ status and stature rather than their effectiveness in moving the state of affairs, and whether than movement is net beneficial or harmful to said state.
It is as if the media expects that we have already formed an opinion about which candidates we favor, or whether we approve of elected officials performance, and all they must do is tell us whether our opinion is aligned with others, or whether our favorites are likely to be elected or re-elected.