After assassinating Soleimani, Trump went on Twitter to threaten a “disproportionate response” to any Iranian retaliation and to destroy Iranian cultural sites. Intentionally targeting cultural property violates the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict. As such, Trump seems to have been threatening to commit a war crime. To be fair to Trump, he probably had no idea that doing so would be a war crime nor any idea that the United States signed the treaty. He is, by all accounts (other than his own), the most ignorant American president in history. Laying aside Trump’s ignorance of matters critical to his job, this threat does raise matters of philosophical interest.
Trump’s threat could be defended by noting that the United States military does allow for attacking cultural property when doing so is a matter of military necessity. This is certainly reasonable—no military could be expected to allow enemies to occupy and launch attacks from cultural property with impunity. The moral burden of the destruction of such property would weigh heaviest on those who turned it into a target, though those deciding to destroy or damage it would not be entirely blame free—they should attempt all reasonable alternatives.
In the case of Trump’s threat, there is clearly no military necessity in striking those targets. The cultural sites do not seem to have any military value nor do the Iranians seem to be posting military forces in or near them. And even if they had some value or targets were nearby, there would still be an abundance of military targets to hit.
It could be argued that Trump’s threat is justified because of its deterrence value. This takes us into the ethics of threats and a common issue in this area is whether it is wrong to threaten to do what would be wrong to do. One stock argument in favor of allowing such threats is utilitarian: if threating something that is wrong to do creates a greater good than not making such a threat, then it would be morally acceptable. In this case, if Trump threatening to commit a war crime deterred Iran from a severe retaliation and thus removed the need for the United States to retaliate in turn, then the threat could be morally justified. However, if the same result could have been achieved without such a threat, then the utilitarian argument would not justify it—this is because there would be better alternatives that would have yielded the same results.
There are also clear negative consequences to making such threats. The most obvious is the damage to the reputation of the United States. It is no coincidence that fictional villains make terrible threats to try to achieve their ends—doing so is villainous. For the United States to threaten war crimes is certainly not a good look and, more importantly, serves to degrade our moral standing in the world. After all, if we want to claim to be the good guys, we must earn that and this involves, at the very least, not acting like the bad guys. But why is the destruction of cultural property wrong?
Since terrorist groups, like ISIS, and terrorist states often aim to eradicate cultural property as part of their agenda, this suggests that there is something wrong with this practice. But this is hardly decisive proof. The proof rests in the fact that the aims of such attacks include the destruction of history and the eradication of culture. This destruction does obvious harm to the culture that owns the property—it is destroying part of the record and reality of who they are as a people and an attempt to erase them from the world and memory. But the harm goes beyond this: cultural property also belongs to all of humanity as part of our history and heritage as a species; to destroy the culture property of one people is to destroy the cultural property of all of us.
Culture property often endures far beyond the time of its creation, out lasting the politics, religion and ideology of that time. To destroy such things for the fleeting wants of the powerful to advance some short-lived agenda or satisfy some irregular passion would be to destroy something of enduring and significant value for something ephemeral and of far less worth. I will certainly acknowledge that there can be exceptions, perhaps the sort of crazy examples that philosophers delight in.
To the credit of Trump’s wranglers, Trump seems to have been informed that destroying cultural property is a war crime and he has asserted that he likes to follow the law. While this is obviously not true, walking back the threat of war crimes is certainly a positive thing.
Of course, both Trump and the Pentagon have since backed off this threat. He said that he “likes to obey the law”, and is fine with following the laws that prevent him from targeting cultural sites.
No president knows everything; they depend on their advisers, both political and military, to keep them informed. The difference between Trump and other presidents is that he speaks first, listens later. That makes him seem to some like an unbridled, war-mongering, ill-informed maniac.
I truly believe that Trump enjoys his unpredictability and the way his detractors and enemies panic at his threats. Iran has some very accurate and destructive ballistic missiles at their disposal, yet they chose only to fire a dozen or so inaccurate ones, some of which are duds. Why do you suppose they did that? Because they are a good and gentle people, who wouldn’t think of harming anyone?
I think it was because they could not take a measure of Trump; they believe that he would do anything, and they feared his threats. In the end, I believe their retaliation was to save face. And I am just fine with that. If your enemies fear to attack you because they think you’re crazy, well, I think that’s a good thing. Especially if you’re not.
But I’m fairly certain that they will escalate in their own terroristic way, attacking US bases, embassies, and other interests in the region and around the world with car bombs and human bombs, with the aim of creating as much destruction of human life as possible, simply for the impact of it all. That’s what terrorism is, right? Is that a war crime?
Of course, there is also the benefit of trying to come out as “the good guys” in this one – as the ones who exercised restraint and did not escalate. This is the war of propaganda – which the US Democratic Party and Main Stream Media handed them on a silver platter. Over and over this morning the MSM replayed a feed from the Iranian state-run television network, showing the “tens of missiles” being launched. This, of course, was pure propaganda, but that didn’t matter to those who put their abject hatred of Trump above all else.
Here’s a question. Kellyanne Conway suggested that Iran may be hiding strategic military assets within some of these cultural sites. I know you don’t believe it – Iran would never do such a thing, being such good and wholesome people and all – but what if they actually did? Would it still be a war crime to attack them, if there was reasonable assurance that these strategic assets were there?
And what if, acting on fairly solid intelligence, we did target those sites and it turned out that the intel was faulty – would that be a war crime?
And here’s another one. Hypothetically, what if an Iranian terrorist were to set off a bomb in say, Virginia, destroying a statue of Robert E. Lee? Would he be hailed as a hero by the left, or a war criminal?
Mike, should Nazi cultural sites be protected?
Are people who tear down statues of Robert E. Lee committing war crimes?
Meanwhile, China is erasing Uighur culture and nobody cares.
Trump wanted to hurt Iran without killing people, so he thought that flattening a few old buildings would do the trick.
So naturally in Mike’s eyes Trump’s reluctance to kill people makes him a war criminal.
Haters like you have something in common. Presidents like Obama and Clinton have “advisers”, where as Trump has “wranglers”, like he’s some kind of steer or something. Bush had “handlers”.
“There are also clear negative consequences to making such threats. The most obvious is the damage to the reputation of the United States.”
I completely disagree. As I said in my other answer, it is advantageous to someone like Trump to not play all of his cards; by making his enemies question whether or not he would actually do something like that – to the point where they are unwilling to take the risk is a bloodless win for our side, and I’m happy to take it. “Try me!” says Trump. “I fold” says Iran. Well played.
I am reminded of the complete absurdity insisted upon by the Democrat Congress during the Iraq war; they actually withheld funding for necessary materiel for our troops until Bush announced a date-certain for US troop withdrawal. Setting aside the ethics of what amounted to holding equipment hostage for a political gain, this was an “anti-strategy”. As was pointed out by Bush and his military er, “handlers”, all the enemy had to do was pull back, regroup, and wait until we were gone. They could busy themselves by putting X’s on the days of the calendar. Even if we were committed to a date certain, to broadcast that to the enemy is just plain stupid. Threatening with the full force of the United States military to hit hard and where it hurts – even including the cultural assets – is a meaningful and credible threat coming from Trump, and it has a definite strategic advantage. And if asked later if he really would have done it, I’m sure Trump would just keep his mouth shut. The man does own casinos, after all, where they play a game called “Poker”.
I remember that in speeches at that time Bush would not take a nuclear strike off the table, and the Democrats went wild. How ignorant can they be? By publicly leaving the option on the table, it’s a strategy – a signal to Saddam Hussein that gee, maybe he’s just crazy enough to use it! Down in the situation room, of course, there may be a few winks and knowing smiles – but one would expect the Democrats to be at least a little smarter than Saddam Hussein.
I’m also reminded of the Cuban Missile crisis, where JFK stared down Kruschev, threatening to launch a nuclear war if Kruschev didn’t back down and turn his ships around. Would Kennedy really have done that? i don’t know. You don’t know. But the important thing is Kruschev didn’t know either – and he decided that it wasn’t worth the risk to find out.
Thank God you’re back. I get queasy when you disappear for weeks at a time. The pressure for me to fisk this nonsense builds up and I get cranky.
There’s this guy I work with (a Steve) who, whenever people say something stunningly stupid, he points these things out. Granted it makes people uncomfortable, like a lot of truths, but everyone is better off in the long run. Now I am working as a consultant here and it really would not be very useful or productive or politically wise for me in my ‘guest’ position to say such things. But when Steve isn’t around and the stupid starts to build up, I get the urge to say the things that Steve would say (or even beyond some of the things Steve would say) that need to be said but make people uncomfortable. It’s like I’m about to ‘sin’ but then Steve steps in and does the ‘sinning’ for me. I call him my Evil Jesus. With Regular Jesus you do the sinning but Regular Jesus has paid the price. With an Evil Jesus, you don’t even have to sin and there is no need for any sort of absolution, because Evil Jesus steps in and handles the whole situation for you. It’s a beautiful system when you really sit down and think about it. And it comes with no other rituals or holy days of obligation or any of that. In fact, neither party even needs to be a Christian. Hell, both could be atheists. So dude, you’re kinda my Evil Jesus. God bless you.
Thanks for the affirmation. Spending time on this forum sometimes seems like a colossal waste of time and worse – bringing myself down by just beating my head against the wall. I mean, why bother?
My absences from this forum are self-preservational. I take this stuff more seriously than I should; sometimes I get very depressed knowing that the fate of the world is in the hands of people who cannot get past their own hatred or tribal identity to work towards reasonable policy. In this sense, Michael’s strident, unwavering hatred of Trump along with his willingness to twist every legitimate philosophical discussion around to fit the narrative he feels in his soul aren’t much different than that of Soleimani, Bin Ladin, or any other Islamist extremist. There is “Truth”, which is immutable, and that Truth defines everything else. Sadly, this attitude has permeated the Democrat party, who seems willing to compromise or abandon everything this country stands for simply to get rid of Trump – even to the point of providing ideological support to terrorist networks by publicly announcing that they side with them.
Between you, TJB and me, we are giving legitimacy to what amounts to nothing but dogma. We may as well be trying to convince a religious zealot that logic and reason might offer an alternate view of the world.
I’m actually surprised that this forum gets the response it does. I keep thinking that one day I will log in and find essays that have no responses – which is often what I think they deserve.
Hey, you and me both. And I’ve got some bad news for you. If you’ve never spent much time on ‘conservative’ #NeverTrumper sites, the logic is as thickheaded as here. Not quite so much commie luvvin, but I often wonder if they are only ‘conservative’ because they never really sat down and honestly challenged what they were raised to believe.
I’d hate to see you go. The reason I’ve stuck around here (and a couple other places, #NeverTrump being just one) is that I firmly believe the reason we are where we are, that it has taken someone as flawed as DJT to push back on this idiocy, is due to those of us of a conservative bent (I really consider myself more of a classical liberal) not speaking up over the past few decades. And part of the reason we don’t speak up, besides being fundamentally opposed to politics itself, is we don’t hear many others who are not ‘conservative’ political junkies speaking up. We owe it to each other to provide some degree of moral support, even if putting a dent in the logic here is tipping at windmills. CT likes to point that out but I don’t think he grasps that the windmills are not the reason.
CT likes to point that out but I don’t think he grasps that the windmills are not the reason.
I don’t. I truly don’t grasp much here, or in many other places. I can follow logic, weigh likelihood and cogency of assertions, consider arguments, look up references, all that.
I just don’t understand what is going on.
I do understand that people can be almost infinitely influenced. We are all unreliable narrators. I watched a couple of Mike’s classes. He teaches Critical Thinking (whatever that is, these days). He knows all the categories that people have assigned for strengths, weaknesses, modes and tricks of argument – which is more than I do. And yet, he doesn’t even consider the possibility that these sites that are “important to Iran & the Iranian culture” may not all be separated from military targets.
This is entirely in line with my belief that we humans are all deeply stupid and self-deceiving, so I’m comfortable with that.
What I can’t understand is what has twisted his thinking so much that he reached that specific point. I’ve started looking for it, and I see it everywhere this past couple of years. It’s not about having different values, which is something I could understand; it’s an entire dismissal of reality – and that’s something I still don’t understand. It’s much worse in many other places.
I think what is distracting you from understanding is that you’re being blinded by logic. Those of us who hold logic and reason in high esteem find it very, very hard to understand that volume and screaming, especially when it is considered impolite to acknowledge that the volume and screaming exist, ultimately rule the day. In ‘polite’ society. In the real world, well…there was a song by Bob Dylan back in the 80’s, forget the exact song but it was on his Infidels album where he said, “This world is ruled by violence, but I guess that’s better left unsaid.” It’s an uncomfortable truth and one that we as people of a successful Western civilization of going on 500 years or so forget, especially in the last 100 or so. But it’s really violence that buys thinking people the space to do their thing and ponder these great questions, for better or for worse. Logic and reason can only function in a space where logic and reason are respected. Once those concepts are tossed aside by the unthinking pretenders, the Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return.
Hate to see you go, DH. I always enjoy reading your rigorous fisking of Mike’s sophistries.
This seems a nothingburger to me.
In the case of Trump’s threat, there is clearly no military necessity in striking those targets.
Which targets?
Do you have details on what targets he meant? I don’t.
When I heard of this originally, I thought nothing of it. It seems entirely likely to me that many legitimate targets are on or near sites of cultural importance. There’s a house half a mile from me that is designated a site of cultural or historic importance. That one’s well preserved. There is another, an old brokendown farm, about five miles away. There are probably a dozen within a day’s hike.
It seems to me extraordinarily unlikely that the generals presented the president with a menu of cultural sites to target, or that he specifically requested them. Much more likely, when the list of targets was prepared, some of them came with the caveat that an attack on them would also damage a site of cultural importance.
The cultural sites do not seem to have any military value nor do the Iranians seem to be posting military forces in or near them.
Again, evidence please? Which cultural sites was he targeting purely for being a cultural site?
If you present evidence that such sites that are not otherwise targets were meant, then we can have a dicussion. Without that, there is no charge to answer. In fact, unless he actually attacks one, it’s not clear there is a charge to answer. Nothing in the convention prohibits ominous vague threats.
There are also clear negative consequences to making such threats. The most obvious is the damage to the reputation of the United States.
The “damage to the reputation of the US” comes from Trump’s style. He talks wildly. A lot of people don’t like that. I don’t like that. But it is his style, and it works for him in keeping his opponents off-balance and guessing. If Obama or Bush had said the same thing, we would have been justified in reading more into it. Coming from Trump, though, it is much more reliably unspecific.
I do want to commend you in linking to primary sources for the information on the Convention and policy. It is so much more convenient than having to read and opinion piece and then search for the relevant information.
Excellent points of course. However…
I do want to commend you in linking to primary sources for the information on the Convention and policy.
Curious…why do you feel the need to ‘commend’ a highly educated person, an academic with a PhD, for doing something for which my 10th grade AP History teacher would downgrade me if I hadn’t done? I find this rather absurd. I understand that the vast majority of people would find my finding this absurd absurd, but that just adds to the absurdity. JMNSHO.
Well, just call me Beckett.
I saw a tweet a while ago from the authors of a sociology paper complaining that a current sociology textbook said it reached the exact opposite conclusion than it actually did. But, hey, sociology. Nobody expects anything from sociology. When I was a first-year math undergrad, one of our lecturers heard someone making an ethnic joke, and popped up: “Hey, we’re mathematicians here! We don’t make [ethnic] jokes – we make sociologist jokes.”
Blog culture is actually worse than sociology, if you can believe that. And sites that used to be news organisations are now effectively blogs. Every basic fact is smothered in layers of spin. (Of course, those layers of spin are also layers of ads and layers of tracking cookies on your PC, and layers of user behaviour data for Facebook and Google and the shadowier ones.)
Having clicked Mike’s first link, you have to click through no fewer than three CNN stories to get to the text of what Trump actually wrote.At this point, I wouldn’t trust any major US news site to quote Shakespeare straight, much less Trump.
Here, Mike is operating under the norms of blog culture, not academia. By all means, condemn the failure to do due diligence on what one asserts, but you will need a wider target than Mike. Please condemn CNN.
True dat.
In one of Charles Krauthammer’s most famous columns, he wrote: “To understand the workings of American politics, you have to understand this fundamental law: Conservatives think liberals are stupid. Liberals think conservatives are evil.”
This pretty much nails it, I think.