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Outline
introduction
War, including war on terrorism, is the health of the state
Libertarian Nationalism
Objectivists are less objective than the general public
Down with war, terrorism, racism, Marxism, imperialism, and all other forms of collectivism!
Terrorism against a Libertarian Nation
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, especially the attacks on the Twin Towers, which we saw over and over again so many times on TV, evoked horror, outrage, anger, fear, sympathy for the victims, patriotism, and admiration for the firemen, policemen, and rescue workers. I experienced all of these emotions, but my predominant reaction was amazement and a sense that the images of the planes crashing into the towers were so bizarre as to be incredible.

Three weeks before the attacks my sons and I flew from Raleigh to New York to spend a weekend in the city. We took in two games at Yankee Stadium and spent an afternoon walking around lower Manhattan. We took pictures of the Twin Towers from Battery Park and from the Staten Island Ferry. That is why it is so hard for me to accept that the towers are gone. Intellectually I know it is true, but emotionally I am still adjusting to it.

In general I was gratified by the way most Americans initially reacted to the attacks. Southerners put aside old grievances stemming from the War of Northern Aggression and rallied to help the victims in New York. On the weekend after the attacks firemen in Raleigh collected more than $1,000,000 in donations for disaster relief. The outpouring of support was similar all across the country. The attack on New Yorkers was felt as an attack on all Americans. As a New Yorker living in the South I was pleased to see the stereotype of New Yorkers change from cold and unfriendly to brave and humane in times of crisis.

But our emotions are not always rational, reliable, or humane. When we are emotional we can be manipulated into doing things that are wrong. We should not allow ourselves to be swept away by nationalism, outrage, or thirst for revenge.

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War, including war on terrorism, is the health of the state.

The number of victims and the amount of devastation were so massive that the September 11 attacks resembled acts of a state at war. But according to all reports, the attacks were committed by members of a terrorist organization that is not a state. The attacks were warlike in scale but not in authorization.

The first politician to call the attacks an act of war was the war monger and former fighter pilot, Senator John McCain. A couple days later Bush II adopted the same terminology. I believe this was done deliberately to emphasize the magnitude of the crime and, more importantly, to prepare the public emotionally for a massive response by the federal government that will put the nation under war-time restrictions.

The American public has rallied in support of the September 11 victims, firemen, policemen, rescue workers, Mayor Giuliani, Bush II, the FBI, the CIA, and the armed forces. The dying embers of patriotism and religious faith, which had been suppressed by the multiculturalists and secular humanists who dominate the media and the education establishment, were rekindled and set ablaze. I saw CBS news anchor Dan Rather drop his mask of objectivity and break down in tears on the David Letterman show trying to recite the lyrics to a patriotic song. I saw reporters for CNN weep as they tried to describe the memorial service for the victims of the attack on the Pentagon. Fox News, which had been my favorite TV news network because it gives air to the conservative perspective, became so jingoistic that I can hardly stand to watch it now. Stores are having a hard time keeping American flags in stock because the demand is so great. Young men and women are lining up to volunteer for the armed forces. CIA applications have increased tenfold since September 11. Politicians of both major parties have suspended their petty difference and worked together to increase federal spending for disaster relief and the war on terrorism.

Not only has the war metaphor succeeded in preparing the American public to accept a more intrusive role for the federal government, it has prepared them to allow the government to literally get away with murder. Americans have long been conditioned to accept a double standard for killing innocent people. When it is done by private individuals it is called murder or terror and the public condemns it as illegal and immoral. But when it is done by the federal government as an act of war it is called collateral damage, and the public regards it as regrettable but necessary, legal, and moral.

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Libertarian Nationalism

A libertarian is someone who consistently applies the nonaggression principle to determine what actions are crimes. According to the nonaggression principle it is a crime to initiate force, but under some circumstances it is not a crime to use force in self-defense against aggressors. I thought most libertarians regarded the nonaggression principle as a moral law that applies to everybody, but since September 11, I have learned otherwise.

In November 2001, I received a fund-raising letter from Steve Dasbach, the National Director of the Libertarian Party. In it he listed the following increased dangers to liberty resulting from the terrorist crisis:

The back of my 2001 LP membership card contains the following statement of principles:

The problem with the LP is not limited to its leadership. The LP "leaders" are actually following the will of the LP members. The results from an online poll of LP members and subscribers to the party's "LP.announce" e-mail list, taken October 9–12, 2001, shows that most respondents only apply the nonaggression principle to fellow Americans.

Almost all (94.8%) of survey respondents said they agree the U.S. government "has an obligation to bring the terrorists who are responsible for the September 11 attacks to justice." A majority (73.7%) support bomb and missile attacks on Osama bin Laden and his terrorist network. Most (65.1%) support putting more substantial numbers of American ground troops in Afghanistan to try to capture bin Laden. More (68.4%) support American military attacks against Afghanistan's Taliban government and against Afghan military targets. A majority (54.8%) support American efforts to topple Afghanistan's Taliban government and replace it with a less repressive government that doesn't support terrorism. A slight majority (51.9%) support future U.S. military action against any nation that supports or endorses terrorism.

The Charlotte Observer and the LA Times reported on 10/24/01 that Pentagon officials have admitted that at least three U.S. bombs went astray during weekend strikes against Afghanistan. They caused unknown casualties in a residential neighborhood northwest of Kabul and near a home for the elderly outside Herat. Also on 10/24/01 the Ledger–Enquirer reported that United Nations officials confirmed that American warplanes destroyed a military hospital near Herat in western Afghanistan. According to a 10/25/01 report in The Dallas Morning News, "U.S. officials face international criticism after American aircraft struck an Afghan village with a cluster bomb, killing eight people and scattering deadly unexploded ‘bomblets’ through village streets." On 11/5/01 The Guardian reported, "In a further departure from their original ‘surgical’ use of weapons, US aircraft have started to drop BLY-82 bombs on Afghanistan. Billed as the world’s largest conventional bomb, it is the size of a small car and was used in the Vietnam war to clear ground for helicopters. During the Gulf war they were dropped as much for their terrifying psychological effect as for their destructive power." At a meeting of Wake County Libertarians, two friends of mine gleefully celebrated this news.

The attacks supported by most libertarians in the survey have already killed at least 300 innocent Afghans and four UN workers, destroyed a village and a Red Cross food storage compound, and led to a disastrous refugee crisis and increased starvation. The respondents to the LP survey don’t seem to care about the inevitable consequences of the war on terrorism overseas. But they are very vigilant of their own rights and the rights of their fellow Americans. It is all right to endanger the lives of people in Afghanistan, but it is unacceptable to require Americans to carry a national ID card to fight terrorism (90.3%), or allow law enforcement to use the Carnivore e-mail surveillance system (87.8%), or restrict the right of Americans to use strong encryption programs that might also be used by terrorists (91.8%), or pass new laws that would make it easier for law enforcement to get wiretap warrants (78.6%).

I am sure most of these respondents would oppose missile attacks on terrorist strongholds in Jersey City or Tampa. Why don’t they oppose missile attacks on Kabul? The best explanation I can think of is that Kabul is in Afghanistan so the "collateral damage" will not affect the civil rights of Americans.

Since most of the libertarians in the survey support endangering the lives of people in Afghanistan by dropping bombs and missiles on alleged terrorist sites in that country, how could they object to lesser invasions on the Afghanis such as snooping on their phone conversations or reading their e-mail? Why do Americans have a right to privacy while Afghanis don’t even have a right to be free from bombardment?

Ray Ubinger of Durham, NC, who quit the Libertarian Party after the National Committee endorsed the war on terrorism, also finds the position of the Libertarian Party to be puzzling. In a note to the LPNC e-mail list he wrote, "I find it curious that a party which currently approves of non-evidence-based killing is making such a big deal out of a little non-evidence-based snooping."

Instead of having a jury trial in which evidence is presented, testimony is heard, and the accused is allowed to rebut the charges, the Bush II Administration has reverted to trial by ordeal. They are using "smart bombs" to sort terrorists from non-terrorists in Afghanistan.

Some of those who gave jingoistic responses to the survey were probably not thinking clearly because the emotions evoked by the terrorist attacks were so fresh and strong. Other respondents might actually believe that Americans have special rights because of the US Constitution, as though rights are grants from the state to its citizens. This is the opposite of the natural rights view, which holds that all people have inherent rights and a government has only those rights that its citizens grant to it.

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Objectivists are less objective than the general public.

As disappointed as I was with the results of the libertarian poll, the Randian reaction to the terrorist attacks has been worse. In "Kill an Arab for Ayn" Jeremy Sapienza reports that Capitalism Magazine, which is closely affiliated with the Ayn Rand Institute, has published articles that are so statist and pro-war that only a collectivist could agree with them. He found this sentiment on their website:

Down with war, terrorism, racism, Marxism, imperialism, and all other form of collectivism!

War and terrorism are forms of collectivism. Only a collectivist view of morality (one that judges people by their nationality, wealth, economic class, race, gender, geographic location, or other group characteristic), can justify the hijacking of commercial airliners, crashing them into the Twin Towers, and killing thousands of people who happened to be there. No libertarian, and hardly an American of any political creed, needs to be persuaded that the attacks on September 11 were terrible crimes.

Only collectivism can justify the carnage that inevitably comes with modern warfare. Unfortunately, the terrorist attacks brought to the surface the nationalistic and statist forms of collectivism in the hearts of most Americans and, evidently in most so-called libertarians. Before Bush II’s war on terrorism is over the number of innocent people whose deaths he is responsible for is likely to exceed the number of innocents killed on September 11. Evidently this is acceptable to most libertarians because (1) Bush’s victims are overseas, (2) his innocent victims are "collateral damage" rather than his primary targets, and (3) he regrets killing them and promises to give material aid to the ones he doesn’t kill.

I wish more libertarians and Randians had remained true to their individualistic philosophy and responded to the terrorist attacks by adopting an anti-collectivist slogan such as:

Treat people as individuals or leave them alone!

American libertarians, to their credit, are strong defenders of property rights, free enterprise, and free speech. But their love of America makes them blind to war-time atrocities committed by the USA. They fail to oppose mass murder of foreigners when it is done by American military forces.

American leftists in the peace movement generally take the wrong side on property rights and free enterprise, and they turn a blind eye to mass murder when it is done by communist regimes. But, to their credit, they vocally oppose mass murder when it is done by the USA.

In peacetime, the American libertarian position is more moral overall than the position of the radical left. But when the USA is at war, the anti-war position of the radical left is better. Unfortunately, in recent years the USA has been at war most of the time. The USA has been bombing Iraq for the last 10 years. Now they are also bombing Afghanistan. American libertarians support this. The Randians want them to bomb Iran as well.

These days I would be more ashamed to be identified with the libertarian position than with the radical left position. So I have decided not to renew my membership in the national Libertarian Party.

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Terrorism against a Libertarian Nation

A libertarian nation would not send troops abroad to intervene in other countries, nor would it drop bombs on or fire missiles at other countries. As long as there are imperialistic regimes that do these kinds of things, those regimes are more likely to be targeted by terrorists.

In so far as terrorist attacks are intended to get the citizens of a country to put pressure on their government to change its foreign policy, there is no point in launching a terrorist attack on a libertarian nation.

In so far as terrorist attacks are aimed at government buildings or military bases, a libertarian nation would have no high-value targets.

Nonetheless, despite its peacefulness, a libertarian nation could be a target for terrorists or anti-terrorists. It would allow gambling, prostitution, pornography, abortion, alcohol, and drugs, which could induce hatred in foreigners who oppose vice. It might be regarded like Sodom and Gomorrah. The freedom that defines a libertarian nation could inspire Muslim or Christian terrorists to make it a target. (But maybe not. The Netherlands have not been targeted yet.)

If being a center for vice isn’t enough, a libertarian nation could provoke terrorist attacks from animal-rights zealots by allowing fur coats, kid gloves, veal parmesan, and use of animals as test subjects in research labs. Civil rights advocates would condemn it for allowing racial profiling and other kinds of discrimination. Greens might attack it for allowing clear cutting, strip mining, and DDT.

If a libertarian nation has no government officials patrolling its borders and inspecting shipments that arrive from abroad at its airports and sea ports, and if people could enter it without a security check, well financed terrorist organizations could buy property in the libertarian nation and send operatives there to live, train, and plan terrorist attacks. By permitting itself to be a haven for terrorists (not to mention drug traffickers), a libertarian nation would be a prime target for attack by military forces of the USA and its allies. The Bush Administration is already considering an attack on Somalia because it has a large Moslem population and no central government.

A libertarian nation would consist of sovereign individuals who would each be responsible for his own defense. The nation as such would not have a defense policy. This is not a bad thing. It is actually an advantage. Governments do a poor job of defending their subjects. In "Fight Terrorism by Protecting Private Property" William L. Anderson writes:

I could be wrong, but it seems logical to me that if you are looking for Arab terrorists you should pay particular attention to Arabs. Neolibertarians will protest that this is unfair. So what? We have a perfect right to be unfair with our own property and our own services.

Different airlines, for example, could try different methods for screening passengers. Some might choose to thoroughly search everyone. Some might choose to give everyone an equal but cursory search, or no search. And some might choose to use ethnic profiling to select individuals to be thoroughly searched. The market will help the airline managers decide which method best satisfies the relative demands for safety and equality.

In addition to the right to determine who shall be allowed on their property, another advantage that people in a libertarian nation would have is the right to determine what kinds of weapons to allow on their property. William L. Anderson also makes this point:

The difference between these two constituencies is stark with regard to their attitudes toward weapons of mass destruction. People from the first group have proposed that a libertarian nation could defend itself with nuclear weapons. People from the second group regard the mere possession of a weapon of mass destruction as a crime, because it is a murder threat hundreds of times worse than aiming a loaded gun at an innocent person. In a libertarian nation whose courts support the position of the second group, terrorists would have a hard time developing or possessing weapons of mass destruction. Anti-terrorist regimes would have one less excuse to attack us, but they would also have less fear of attacking us.

A nation whose courts uphold the right of individuals to possess weapons of mass destruction might be safer from attack by the anti-terrorist powers, but it would correctly be regarded by them as a terrorist nation.

There are no smart bombs that distinguish between terrorists and antiterrorists. There is no way a state or a private organization can guarantee safety from terrorists. In a free nation, each sovereign individual will take precautions against terrorism as he sees fit.

We should oppose the war on terrorism for the same reason that we oppose terrorism itself—because it necessarily involves the murder of innocent people. D
 

Roy Halliday is the author of Enforceable Rights: A Libertarian Theory of Justice, available at his website http://royhalliday.home.mindspring.com/ROYHOME.HTM.  Roy is pleased that both of his grown-up sons are libertarians AND are now living in Raleigh, NC.
 
 

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