Sunday, October 23, 2011
Legalism leads here
BBC reports on a not-quite-serious debate between American and Brit scholars over the legality of the 1776 Declaration of Independence. From the British viewpoint it was pure treason. You can't really argue with that legalistically.
This shows the serious danger of the current EU-US focus on "war crimes" and similar legalistic concerns. We're worrying about whether Qaddafi was given "due process", whatever the fuck that's supposed to mean; and lots of leftists consider Bush's war against Iraq to be a "war crime". Of course they don't consider the NATO/US war against Libya to be a "war crime", because it was supported by a Democrat.
Applying legal standards to wars and revolutions is a category error. A logical fallacy.
Laws are meant to be applied by an existing government, against the people who are subject to that government.
Wars are interactions between two existing governments, and revolutions are replacements of existing governments by new ones. Within the context of those interactions and replacements, laws simply have no meaning.
After the war or revolution is done, the winners make the laws and the losers are no longer in a position to do anything. That's brute reality.
The only question we can meaningfully ask about a war or revolution is: Was this trip necessary? Was it helpful to the people involved? In the case of the 1776 Revolution, the answer is emphatically NO. ¶ 5:43 AM
This shows the serious danger of the current EU-US focus on "war crimes" and similar legalistic concerns. We're worrying about whether Qaddafi was given "due process", whatever the fuck that's supposed to mean; and lots of leftists consider Bush's war against Iraq to be a "war crime". Of course they don't consider the NATO/US war against Libya to be a "war crime", because it was supported by a Democrat.
Applying legal standards to wars and revolutions is a category error. A logical fallacy.
Laws are meant to be applied by an existing government, against the people who are subject to that government.
Wars are interactions between two existing governments, and revolutions are replacements of existing governments by new ones. Within the context of those interactions and replacements, laws simply have no meaning.
After the war or revolution is done, the winners make the laws and the losers are no longer in a position to do anything. That's brute reality.
The only question we can meaningfully ask about a war or revolution is: Was this trip necessary? Was it helpful to the people involved? In the case of the 1776 Revolution, the answer is emphatically NO. ¶ 5:43 AM
