Why is it so important for the "war on terror" to be a "war"?

Great Debates
21

Now that you mention it, I’m reminded that our participation in the Korean War was (and is) termed a police action. For legal / diplomatic reasons, it was rather important that it be called such. And that was much more of a “war” as I think of the term than what we’re now doing with regard to terrorism. Yet here we are insisting that our terrorism situation IS a war.

So I don’t know what we call this. I suppose I’m open to suggestions. All my rather unimaginative brain can come up with is that we have a terrorism problem. A serious one, to be sure. And while we’ve sent troops here and there for various stated purposes, I have a hard time thinking of the whole thing as a “war” because I’m unable to imagine what would entail victory.

But there’s a sort of breathlessness that I sense from the people who are adamant that we call it a war. That vibe always activates my BS meter and suggests to me unstated or veiled motives. While I still think simple vengeance is a big part of it, I agree with the suggestion that another part is the desire to simply dispose of caught suspects as we please without restraint.

22

The repeat was on in the UK just about an hour and a half ago. It was bemusing to hear that fellow Gingrich state the importance of a war context, given the fuss that Northern Irish paramilitaries made of their “special status” when imprisoned during The Troubles.

23

Let me take a shot.

To those who see this as a war, “terror” is not a tactic, not a practice nor a strategy nor a goal, not an ethical marker. Stalin was not a terrorist, nor Robespierre; they were state actors [del]terrorizing[/del] not terrorizing their own states.

No, to these people, “terrorists” are understood more like of the following things: a group of non-state actors with the hubris to declare war on established states; another word for fomentors of revolution against the Western powers, even if backed by other states; or The Enemy in an Orwellian sense.

So to one of this persuasion, the “terrorists” must be defined by where they come from & who they oppose, not, as in the old definition, by how they do it. And since they are now a team, we are free to “war” on them, including using tactics that would have been “terror” under the old definition. But whatever “shock & awe” or “rough tactics” we use, we are not terrorists, because we are the Good Guys. Good & Evil are teams, like in Forgotten Realms. And if we call them criminals, that doesn’t work, because the Bad Guys aren’t doing anything criminal. They are doing to us what we do to them, but We are Brave & Noble even in our ruthlessness, whereas They are Craven & Subhuman even in moments of desperate courage, because Words Mean Team, Words Mean Us’ns & Them’ns, & We Get the Good Words.

But crime is different. Crime is what you do, not whose side you are on. But…

[Or not. This is a Wild-Assed Guess. But the next bit is almost certainly the truth of the matter:]

…if one believes that all really is fair in love & war because All Truisms Are True, then what one thinks we need is a war. So we can win. The courts can acquit, but warriors supposedly don’t have to concede an inch.

24

War is illegal under the treaties that formed the UN. No, really. Yes, it still happens, but it’s illegal. We went into Korea under UN authority, so we were supposedly policing, not warring.

I haven’t run into that breathlessness, I wouldn’t know.

But perhaps something in our culture, or our nature, craves a war, wants back the right to wage a war, as such. And some want it to be Total War, all-out, city-bombing, no restraint, like in the “good old days” of our heroic “Greatest Generation” (a phrase I loathe)–never mind how horrified those who lived through it found all that–& to find a way to make that legitimate.

I blame the romanticization of WWII.

25

I confess, part of me wants to see the Democrats totally demagogue this issue:

[viciously cropped quotation from Senator Bedfellow ® from an appearance on Fox News, run as a voiceover over the most unflattering still photo to be found–one of those ones where you caught him with his mouth open in mid-sentence and he looks totally idiotic]: “…[w]e shouldn’t treat these Al Qaeda members as criminals…” [cut from quote: “…because this is a War on Terror, blah blah blah, reading them their Miranda rights, etc.”]

Voiceover narrator: “Senator Bedfellow says Al Qaeda terrorists who try to blow up airliners shouldn’t be treated as criminals.”

[cut to Senator Doright (D), directly addressing the camera]: “My esteemed opponent says that Al Qaeda terrorists aren’t criminals. I respectfully must disagree with that opinion. I say, people who try to blow up airliners are criminals who should be prosecuted to the maximum extent of the law. They aren’t soldiers–if you try to blow up an airliner, we aren’t going to put you in a P.O.W. camp and treat you as an honorable enemy and send you home when the war is over–we will put you on trial and, upon conviction, put you in Federal prison for the rest of your life–or if you’ve succeeded in killing innocents, we’ll give you the death penalty. Because these people aren’t soldiers, they’re common criminals, mass murderers, and they don’t deserve to be treated any differently than any other street thug or serial killer.”

[Voiceover narrator, over montage of pictures from the Oklahoma City bombing, the first World Trade Center attack, 9/11, Timothy McVeigh in an orange prison jumpsuit]: “Senator Doright supports sending terrorist murderers to Federal prison–or giving them the death penalty.”

[Voiceover narrator, over video of little children playing with puppy dogs with an American flag in the background]: “Senator Doright–keeping America safe from terrorist murderers.”

(If Senator Doright is a former prosecutor who can talk about how he used to keep the folks back home in Anytown safe by sending vicious, hardened criminals to prison and/or getting them the Big Needle, and now as Senator or President or whatever he’ll do the same thing to the terrorist murderers, so much the better.)

26

Under war conditions you can do things you can’t do under non-war conditions. Things that some people may object to. “But we’re at war.” Oh. Carry on then.

27

The UN didn’t outlaw war. That’s just simple nonsense. The UN Charter defines when war is legitimate.

28

I always look outside of our country for answers to questions that make no sense. Newt can’t be candid on the Daily Show. I also wonder why we need a war on terror. There have always been terrorists and we never gave in to the demands until Bush.

Here is a good article out of Australia.

29

I’d essentially agree with this.

Under a criminal law modality:
(1) terrorism/terrorists are hard to define. Some laws defining terrorism is too broad, some too narrow. Ex. I might not commit a terrorist act because I wouldn’t want to do 15-20yrs (whatever) in prison. Terrorists are less likely to consider this because the cause is to overwhelming.
(2) Criminal law is set up to punish wrongful acts. Terrorists in general are indifferent to punishment; other terrorists don’t survive to even be tried.
(3) Jurisdiction. Either the statute doesn’t provide for extra-territorial jurisdiction (outside the US) or international law prohibits the US from asserting such jurisdiction or asserting it would violate the US Constitution. Thus, you just take advantage of the somewhat antiquated nation-state model.
(4) Police. Killing as a measure of last resort.
(5) Right to remain silent (ie, we can’t even merely ask the accused a question).

Under a “war” modality:
(1) Military can project its force around the globe in a short period of time.
(2) Re: the UN. War is legal in two instances: UN authorizes, or self defense. Pushing the Al Qaeda attack as an act of war triggers self defense. Thus, the “war” response is legal.
(3) Commander in Chief has broad and expansive power during a war. He’s able to project lethal force anywhere in a short period of time.
(4) Can kill as a measure of first resort.
(5) Preventive detention
(6) legitimate incidental injury ok
(7) Scope (jurisdiction): wherever enemy is.
(8) Military (one unit, mission to fight and win wars, lethal capability) vs Police (jurisdictional “fractured” units, mission to maintain law and order, different training).

It’s easier to fight your enemy under a “war” paradigm. Thus, the push to keep calling it a “war.” Although, as we’ve learned, you can’t just plug in the military to fight what was a traditional criminal enemy.

30

Because in a war there is that unity of purpose and moral commitment mere campaigns against crime can’t muster. For instance we’re willing to sacrifice great things for victory in war but not in against crime.

31

Calling it a war instead of an intelligence problem confers the president with broad powers. He declares who ever he wants as an enemy and a terrorist allowing him to do pretty much whatever he wants to them. It permits him to wiretap the entire world. Now he can assassionate whoever he deems dangerous ,even Americans.

32

Well, we can call it the “War on Terror” all we want to, but to Iraq and Afghanistan and much of the World they will always see it historically as The American Invasion and Occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan. Sovereign Countries that certainly never declared war on us in any official capacity, until they were invaded.

33

There’s no legal significance to calling a war a police action. The Truman administration wanted to avoid calling the Korean War a war for political reasons - they were worried about the effect sending troops off to war in a country many Americans had never heard of would have in the 1950 elections.

It was, in fact, a reporter who invented the term police action and Truman jumped on it

34

One further issue on wars vs crimes. There’s a big financial aspect involved. Most insurance policies have a waiver that states they will not pay for damages caused by acts of war. So if a terrorist kills somebody or blows up a building and the act was a crime, then the insurer is probably going to have to pay up. But if it was an act of war, the insurer has a strong case for not paying.

35

No. We’re not. FDR’s America was willing to sacrifice. W Bush, on the other hand, cut taxes in wartime to secure support. In this, we have been more like the Nazi régime, which saw war not as a way to sacrifice, but a way to get rich.

It’s embarrassing is what it is.

36

Soldier

  1. Is identifiable
  2. Seeks confrontation with his enemy
  3. Plans to commit murder

Criminal

  1. Is unidentifiable
  2. Evades confrontation and tries to stay unfound
  3. Has already committed murder

Terrorist

  1. Is unidentifiable
  2. Evades confrontation and tries to stay unfound
  3. Plans to commit murder

The key point is #3. A criminal has acted, a terrorist or a soldier will act. Seeing as we can go and shoot dead soldiers by sheer act of them being the enemy, and a terrorist is a soldier who in all ways is a worse sort, there is no reason not to think that we should be able to shoot him dead.

The more salient point, though, is that you’re trying to find someone who doesn’t want to be found, who has no particular link to his target, who possibly lives in a land where everyone is hostile to you, and who possibly lives in a land where there is no centralized fingerprint database or whatever. You’re trying to play the world’s most unbalanced game of hide and seek with people who have not yet done anything. If you find one and you have to let him go running about simply because he hasn’t done anything, you’re allowing people to get killed for no practical reason. If he’s a soldier, you can capture him as a prisoner of war and interrogate him, which helps you to find other guys.

Ultimately, it’s a question of sheer practicality. If you want to be able to stop them, you need to get them before they do bad things, and in a world where you’re presumed innocent until you’ve done something, you can’t do that.

Practicality might not stand up to rigorous legal standing, but ultimately that’s a rather lame standard to hold by when you have regular citizens being attacked by extremists and there is no real fair alternative which could do anything. Of course, the ideal would be to get the legalities modified to match reality, but I’m not sure I want to encourage writing law which says that we can just pick up any random non-citizen and lock him up as a PoW.

37

Gotta admit, though, it looks a lot like we’re sacrificing the ideals that make America a great nation, and worth defending.

Embarrassing and ironic! Add self-destructive, and you’ve got a hat trick!

38

More profit and justification for overseas adventure.

39

There’s this one celebrity, Rosie O’Donnell, a talk show host, and she said this: “I don’t know anything about Afghanistan, but I know it’s full of terrorists, speaking as a mother.” So what is this “speaking as a mother” then? Is it a euphemism for “well, talking out of my arse”? “Suspending rational thought for a moment”? As a rational human being, Al-Qaeda are a loose association of fundamentalist zealots who could be rounded up with a sustained police investigation. But speaking as a parent, they’re all eight foot tall, they’ve got lasers under their moustaches, a huge eye in their foreheads and the only way to kill them is to nuke every country that hasn’t sent us a Christmas card in the the last 20 years. Speaking as a mother…

* Bill Bailey
40

Yeah, right. How many supporters of the conquest of Iraq support using Iraqis as human shields? I consider “we’re fighting them over their so we don’t have to fight them over here” to be extremely cowardly and to show a gross disregard for the lives of people whose problem this was not. Use your own cities as battlegrounds, it’s your war.