On the fence, SR? Not at all. My personal opinion of any particular religion isn't what's important here, of course. And indeed, the religion of those under attack isn't what's important either.

There are sections of the left who understand that, and sections of the left who think that attacking Islam is an important thing to do at the moment. I'm glad I'm part of the former.

AG - how did Iraq turn Afghanistan from a good invasion into a bad one?

So what exactly is the definition of "threat to national security" where the 9.11 attacks don't get to qualify?

TonTon wrote:

QUOTE:
AG - how did Iraq turn Afghanistan from a good invasion into a bad one?

I'm not quite sure I would characterize it quite like that, TT. I think I would say that what good came out of the latter (and I think I've outlined what I think that was above) was undone by the former.

I don't really follow. Are you saying that Afghanistan isn't a hideous mess that's getting worse by the day?

He's explained what he means quite clearly several pages ago.

Righty-ho

Who on the left (in the sense you'd use the term) supports attacking Islam, TonTon? In Britain, I mean.

Yeah, if it isn't yet another diversion, I'd like to ask who on the Left TonTon's referring to here.

QUOTE:
If I follow what you're saying, it's that whereas it can be legitimate to use force against threats posed by states because there's no alternative, it's illegitimate to use force against threats posed by entities other than states even when there's no alternative.

Well, yes, because threats from states are intrinsically greater than threats from individuals. If, say, France fired missiles at the UK, another identical missile attack is probably likely and, for them, logistically not a problem. Also, you can see that it's France wot dun it. So, in certain circumstances, international law says go ahead and bomb France back. If it's a bunch of guys with Stanley knives who live in America but are from Saudi Arabia, convened in Germany, were backed by people in Afghanistan and so on, not only do they pose far less of a threat (and no real threat to national security, not least because the actual perpetrators are no longer alive), but hitting back militarily at the country of your choice is, quite rightly, illegal because it can't be done effectively, and allowing it would give carte blanche to America and others to bomb countries they don't like on the flimsiest pretexts (you even mentioned one yourself by citing some US government guff about Afghanistan and Syria).

QUOTE:
No; the only justification would be to defend its citizens by disabling a threat. And defending its citizens is, surely, a primary "right" of Government, if anything counts as one. Indeed, an obligation. Indeed, something close to a minimal raison d'etre.

Sure, but 12/9/01 is a day late to start. Those Americans who survived 9/11 were not under imminent threat in the sense meant by the international law doctrine of self-defence. AG seems to think that doctrine covers terrorist organisations who may strike you in the future, but I don't know where he's getting that from. Both of you seem to think that America was entitled to decide who and what was a "threat" without recourse to any kind of legal process.

The Horse wrote:

QUOTE:
(and no real threat to national security, not least because the actual perpetrators are no longer alive),

I'm gonna ask again, how exactly are you defining "national security"?

QUOTE:
but hitting back militarily at the country of your choice is, quite rightly, illegal because it can't be done effectively, and allowing it would give carte blanche to America and others to bomb countries they don't like on the flimsiest pretexts (you even mentioned one yourself by citing some US government guff about Afghanistan and Syria).

How is this not question begging? You're defining the retaliation for 9/11 as the flimsiest of pretexts, or no pretext at all; others don't accept that.

QUOTE:
Sure, but 12/9/01 is a day late to start.

In a perfect world, certainly.

QUOTE:
Those Americans who survived 9/11 were not under imminent threat in the sense meant by the international law doctrine of self-defence.

What? "Those Americans who survived 9/11" all 300 million of them, then. But we didn't know, nobody knew for certain, whether additional attacks were in the offing, whereas we did know that the organization who had perpetrated them were still at liberty. The threat wasn't suddenly over and done, as far as anyone knew, on September 12.

QUOTE:
AG seems to think that doctrine covers terrorist organisations who may strike you in the future, but I don't know where he's getting that from. Both of you seem to think that America was entitled to decide who and what was a "threat" without recourse to any kind of legal process.

So the U.S. should need a legal sign-off from disinterested parties as to what constitutes a security threat before it moves to defend itself? (But of course you appear to view the retaliation as purely offensive, which is the only way I can see your logic making any sense.) So, just hand its decisions about clear and present dangers over to the international community. I think building coalitions are extremely important, but an actual legal process? How long would that take exactly? Months if not years I would think. Who speaks for the defense? I'm no international relations/law expert, and therefore honestly curious.

Horse, the correct legal process for deciding what is a "threat" is to go to the United Nations Security Council. Which the US did.

Resolution 1373 invoked chapter VII of the charter, which means the Security Council agreed that September 11 was an "act of aggression" in international law. Resolution 1368 invoked article 51 of the charter, which gives every nation the *inherent* right to collective self-defence until such time as the UN decides to take such measures as are necessary to defend themselves.

Was there some other process you think they should have followed?

I'm also not sure how you can simultaneous hold both that 9/11 was unremarkable as an act of violence if you take the actions of state actors into account (top of previous page, I believe, the post where you referred to my arguments as "wooly") and that non-state actors are inherently less of a threat than state actors (your last post). I would have thought that 9/11 showed that al Qaeda was entirely in a league with state actors. The entire Iraqi army in the first gulf war, at the time the fourth or fifth largest in the world, only managed to kill about 150 Americans. Al Qaeda did 20 times that in a couple of hours.

And on top of that, you seem to hold the belief that there was no danger that al Qaeda could ever have done anything like that again had they been left alone. On what basis you could argue that, given that bin Laden had just committed - let's repeat it again - the largest act of mass homicide by a non-state actor in history - and in addition had launched two other attacks on US targets in the previous 36 months, and is a bit beyond me.

Or is it just that you think they were in no "imminent" danger, meaning it wasn't coming in the next 48 hours or something? That's probably true, though irrelevant - contrary to what you imply, you won't find the word "imminent" in the UN Charter, and hence the concept has no relevance when it comes to international law.

And can I ask you one more thing? The first paragraph of your last post could be read as drawing some sort of distinction between the 19 guys on the planes who were the "perpetrators" of 9/11 and Al-Qaeda HQ in Afghanistan who merely "backed" them. Is there some kind of practical or moral distinction you're making here? Because it could be read in such a way that you think bin Laden, KSM et. al were somehow less culpable that Mohammed Atta et. al for the events of 9/11. I want to make sure: you're not actually saying this, are you?

Apologies, I didn't particularly mean just the real left in my own definition. I got severely told off even for explaining what my own definition is, so I wouldn't dare use it.

(Although there is always the AWL, which appears to be of the loony left but holds some awful positions on Israel and Islamophobia.)

I also wasn't clear enough about the word "attack". I didn't mean people on "the left" supporting bombing kids in their beds in Iraq and Afghanistan. I'm sure we can all agree that no-one who supports that should be calling him- or herself "on the left".

What bothers me, though, and it does come up on here as well as out there, is the anti-religionist position of, say, SR. Which is what I was responding to. I think that does have an echo out there.

Surely, the point is not whether Bin laden and Al Qaida were behind the attacks, but whether invading Afghanistan was a reasonable way to prevent further such attacks. Surely any future attacks that may or may not have been in the pipeline would have already been set up and the cells that would carry them out were not going to wait for BL to give them the final orders. So, while Al Qaeda might have been a continued threat to US national security, attacking Afghanistan was not a way to deal with that threat (especially because no other options were pursued).

It was even then fairly obvious that the attack on Afghanistan was mostly (if not entirely) about revenge, and nothing else. I lived in the US at that time and you just needed to watch TV for ten minutes to know what was going on. I think on an internal political level the US government almost had to attack Afghanistan, but let's not kid ourselves that it was about national security.

(By the way, AG, this is a meaningless piece of pedantry, but surely September 11th was not "the largest act of mass homicide by a non-state actor in history" since it doesn't take into account civil wars. Bosnia, Rwanda, even Spain have seen much greater mass murder by non state actors)

Looking for a specific example, the first that springs to mind is the attitude of most of the left in France over the issue of banning the hijab in schools. From memory, such a ban has some support on here too.

QUOTE:
Both of you seem to think that America was entitled to decide who and what was a "threat" without recourse to any kind of legal process.

Well, a couple of points. For one thing, as AG points out, the US did secure Security Council backing (a prerequisite they later decided they could do without). But in general, I don't think states are under any more obligation than individuals to secure prior legal sanction before they act. An International Law specialist will be able to correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the legal position is that a state may use force either if authorised by the UN or if certain other criteria having to do with the nature of the threat and the exhaustion of other avenues are met. As vfar as the latter goes, states need only seek legal advice.

So what it comes down to, again, for me, is whether other avenues had been exhausted and whether the action could be reasonably expected to succeed in its primary aim. It's fresh knowledge about those, rather than my coming into line with your (the Horse's) principled stance, that have changed my views on the original rightness of the invasion.

TonTon: may we not argue against what we see as false, and perhaps reactionary, religious ideas, while seeking to defend religious groups from persecution? Indeed, may our determination to defend religious groups from persecution not be rooted in secular thinking that finds religion itself inimical?