He’s no pacifist but he’s opposed to the United States waging war on Iraq. He considers the liberation of Bangladesh in the 1971 Indo- Pakistan war as ‘‘a justified military intervention.’’ Meet Michael Walzer, the author of the classic Just and Unjust Wars and professor of social science at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. After the recent death of John Rawls, the author of A Theory of Justice, Walzer is widely believed to be the numero uno political philosopher of America. The founding editor of Dissent and a contributing editor of the New Republic, Walzer describes himself as a ‘‘liberal communitarian’’ in philosophy and ‘‘neither a realist, nor a pacifist’’ in strategic theory.
Educated at Brandeis and Harvard, Walzer joined Princeton after having taught at Harvard for 15 years. He is author of several books, including Spheres of Justice, What it means to be an American, The Company of Critics, Interpretation and Social Criticism, and On Toleration. In a two-part interview with Ajit Kumar Jha, Walzer talks about how the way we perceive politics both at home and abroad has changed dramatically ever since the attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York on September 11, 2001 and that on the Parliament on December 13, 2001.
Q.: In your Just and Unjust Wars
you argued that if the cause is just and the means is just, then one can
wage a just war in self-defence. The US used that logic when it attacked
Afghanistan after September 11. Similarly, isn’t India justified in attacking
Pakistan, given the attack on our Parliament and over 70,000 deaths in
cross border terrorism? The attacks continue despite a very successful
election in Jammu & Kashmir.
A.: Yes, that is a fair question.
India has to, however, make the case that the Musharraf regime has a connection
with the terrorist organisations based in Pakistan of the same sort that
the Taliban had with the Al Qaeda. General Musharraf tried hard to demonstrate
that there isn’t such a connection. Certainly India had very good reasons
to expect that the Pakistani government should crack down on terrorists.
The Indian threat of war to enforce the crackdown seems to me absolutely
justified. However, you do have to distinguish between states that harbour
terrorists and those that are partners with terrorist organisations. Pakistan
seems to be the former, the Taliban regime in Afghanistan the latter.
There is another crucial difference: Both India and Pakistan are nuclear nations, Afghanistan is not. The risks that you are imposing when you go to war on Pakistanis, Indians and the rest of the world should not be disproportionate to the cause of the conflict. One of the crucial features of the Just War argument is the thesis about proportionately.
Q.: So what you are basically saying
is that if the source of terrorism is a nuclear power than do not attack,
but if a non-nuclear weak power officially supports terrorism than a nuclear
power is justified in attacking it? Is that fair or just?
A.: Not quite. Remember that the
world did not intervene even when they jolly well knew what the Chinese
were doing in Tibet, or what the Russians were doing in Chechnya. Not because
an intervention would have been unjust. Indeed, a humanitarian intervention
led by the United Nations would have been perfectly justified in each of
these cases. Both Russia and China are nuclear powers. In both cases, therefore,
there are prudential reasons for avoiding an intervention.
In other words, if the source of terrorism is a nuclear power than the moral and political calculations is a lot more complicated and the justification for the attack less easy to produce. Given a nuclear standoff in the subcontinent India is in a similar situation with Pakistan.
The need to look for other alternatives (including the threat of war, but actually falling short of war) including diplomatic means, even economic sanctions is much more. Prudential reasons do figure in Just War arguments. Prudence and justice are not entirely antithetical. Political leaders must respond to the lives of their own people and others in the world. Morality and prudence are interconnected.
Q.: Is that why you are opposed
to an American military intervention in Iraq, which might have nuclear
weapons?
A.: There are other reasons too:
The American establishment has not quite demonstrated that there is a connection
between Saddam Hussein and the perpetrators of 9/11, viz: the al Qaeda.
Q.: In the Just War book you called
the 1971 Indo-Pakistan war as a justified military intervention since it
was a liberation struggle for a new state of Bangladesh. Musharraf argues
that what we term as cross border terrorism is merely a freedom struggle
for the liberation of Kashmir. Would you agree?
A.: No, I wouldn’t agree with Musharraf.
Although I am not in a position to comment about Kashmiri independence,
I am quite sure that terrorist attacks on civilians in J&K are not
justified by the cause of Kashmiri independence. In the liberation of Bangladesh
there was genocide by the Pakistani army and there were millions of refugees.
Q.: The unfortunate events of 9/11
in the United States and December 13 in India have had another negative
fallout: any dissent anywhere is now being characterised as terrorism.
In the circumstances, should we redefine who a terrorist is?
A.: No, I don’t agree. We must
resist any attempt to redefine terrorism. The old definition of terrorism—the
deliberate choice to kill civilians for political purposes —still stands
whether before or after September 11 and the attack on the Indian Parliament.
And if there is to be an American or an Indian war on terrorism, they have
got to focus on that group of people who deliberately and randomly target
innocents to attract attention for some cause. Even if the cause is justified,
terrorism is not.
What has changed after September 11 is that Americans have changed, we simply feel more vulnerable. Moreover, I guess Indian citizens must be feeling the same being constantly targeted by terrorists. However, the criminal character of terror has remained the same. Terrorism is never justified even if its cause is.
Q.: Does a suspected terrorist have
rights, say a right to free trial?
A.: Yes, of course. I don’t like,
for instance, what the United States government has done to suspected terrorists
in the Guantanamo Bay (in Cuba). They are neither being treated as prisoners
of war or as criminals. They are not given a defence attorney. They are
not given any legal status. They are simply treated as ‘‘illegal combatants’’
whatever that means. That is not a legal term. Embarrassingly some of the
Taliban detainees it seems had no direct links with al Qaeda or to the
events of 9/11. These are gross violations of human rights. Civil liberties
organisations are right in opposing such measures.
(To be continued)