Regime Concept

  

Regime Concept

Peter Schultz

 

                  From JFK and Vietnam: report on Nam when JFK assumed the presidency: “an extremely vivid and well written account of a place going to hell in a hack….”

 

(1)     Decision made, acceptance follows, ala’ el jefe. The die was cast, with the war to follow. So it goes.

(2)     That Vietnam was “going to hell in a hack:” no one ever came close to questioning this; accepted by all as if it were a self-evident truth, unquestionable. Why? The regime made this assessment seem to be self-evidently true, unquestionable.

 

Perhaps this is what Aristotle meant by regime being “a way of life.” Something like Quinn’s Mother Culture. Regimes determine what people take to be real. America’s regime, its way of life, its way of living led Americans to accept without question that Vietnam was going to hell, even though many Vietnamese didn’t think that. But then the Vietnamese didn’t live like Americans. Different regime, different way of life, different truth.

Technologically Advanced Barbarism

  

Technologically Advanced Barbarism

Peter Schultz

 

"Chris Hedges’ recent speech at Princeton is not simply a commentary on the wars in Gaza, Lebanon, and Iran — it is a sweeping indictment of a global order collapsing into what he calls “technologically advanced barbarism.” 

 

https://consortiumnews.com/2026/04/03/chris-hedges-the-new-world-order/

 

Chris Hedges is correct: The world order is experiencing “technologically advanced barbarism.” Or, as some would put it, in order to get to the bottom of things: what we are experiencing is “technologically advanced politics” because “barbarism” is intrinsic to, indistinguishable from politics. By labeling what he is calling “a new world order” “barbarism,” Hedges is laying the groundwork for affirming the political. Ironically, affirming the political points in the direction of “barbarism.” And if that sounds strange, just review in your mind how the US has waged continuous war since the end of WW II, all for the sake of peace, prosperity, and progress. Or, review in your mind how its greatness was built on the backs and corpses of slaves and the indigenous. 

 

Trump's Trap

  

Trump’s Trap

Peter Schultz

 

This headline almost has it right.

"Trapped by His Own Image: Trump's Iran War and The Politics of Ego"  

 

                  Trump is trapped, but it isn’t only because of his ego. He is also trapped by the presidency or, more generally, the American political order. That order, despite repeated denials by many, is geared toward war. It isn’t “the politics of ego” that has Trump trapped; rather, it is the politics of war. And the politics of war is intrinsic to the American political order.

 

                  JFK, allegedly, couldn’t pull out of Vietnam before the 1964 presidential election because he would, he was convinced, lose that election. He also could not squash the Bay of Pigs invasion and although it proved to be a fiasco, his popularity rose as a result. Similarly, LBJ couldn’t pull out of Nam because he was convinced that he would lose the 1968 election had he done so. And, of course, Nixon continued the war for four years in order to secure his reelection in 1972, even telling the Chinese that he was prepared to lose that war provided there was a “decent interval” before the North Vietnamese won.

 

                  There is little need to list all the examples of presidents being “trapped” into wars, but some examples are: Truman in Korea; Carter in Afghanistan and Iraq; Reagan in Nicaragua; Bush Sr. in Kuwait; Clinton bombing Iraq on a daily basis; Bush Jr. in Afghanistan and Iraq, and so on and so on and so on. War is a continuing presidential phenomenon.

 

                  We do not have an “ego problem,” but a political problem; what one might call “a regime problem.” As some of those who opposed the Constitution when it was being debated argued, it has “an awful squinting,” it squints in the direction of monarchy and of war. Or as Ben Franklin is reputed to have said when asked what the new Constitution created: “A republic if you can keep it.” We haven’t, but then Franklin might have been being kind in his assessment. 250 years later, the proof is in the pudding or, as my mother use to say regarding human beings, “the fruit don’t fall to far from the tree.”

Trump: A Psychological and Political Phenomenon

  

Trump: A Psychological and Political Phenomenon

Peter Schultz

 

                  Is Trump a reflection or result of a psychological problem or of a political problem? Which is more clarifying: Treating Trump as a psychological or as a political phenomenon?

 

                  Obviously, both phenomena are operative because Trump has a psychological profile and a political profile. So, this isn’t an either/or question.

 

                  Psychologically, Trump is clearly narcissist. He has an inflated ego that allows him to believe he is always justified in his actions and, for that reason, believes he has been rewarded with status and wealth. Moreover, he believes that his enemies, when they defeat him, are only able to do so by means of unfair, covert actions. Their victories are never merited.

 

                  Politically, Trump is pretty much mainstream, despite his attempts to present himself as something else. His commitment to greatness has been a constant commitment of US elites since at least 1789, when the Constitution was first implemented. “Empire,” as in “an American empire,” was a constant theme in elite rhetoric and was reflected by such actions as Jefferson’s purchase of the Louisiana Territory from the French. It was also reflected by the continuation of slavery and in wars against indigenous peoples in America. Generally, and consistently, wars followed the implementation of the Constitution as US elites universally agreed that the US deserved to be and would be a great nation.

 

This greatness had different and intertwined roots: European/white supremacy, Christianity, evangelical religions, modern science, capitalism, and liberal progressivism. The depth of the commitment to greatness, achieved through war, was illustrated by America’s Civil War, fought to “preserve the Union” as the basis of America’s greatness. Once that was achieved, the South was allowed to re-create a form of slavery and an apartheid system that lasted for a century and more. Greatness, being the goal, it was to be achieved even at the expense of justice or human rights.

 

As Trump has embraced greatness, it may be said that his psychological profile, his narcissism has political roots. So, what is needed is a critique and rejection of greatness, insofar as this appeals even to most of Trump’s enemies. As Socrates recommended to Athens, i.e., to Periclean Athens, the US needs to turn inward, turning away from “foreign affairs” – as they are quaintly called – and away from citizenship, and turning toward making souls the best possible.

 

Empire as Virtue

  

Empire as Virtue

Peter Schultz

 

                  The following passage is from a book entitled The Rule of Empires, by Timothy H. Parsons.

 

                  “This reading of history ignores the essential characteristic of empire: the permanent rule and exploitation of a defeated people by a conquering power. By their very nature, empires can never be – and never were – humane, liberal, or tolerant. Would-be Caesars throughout history sought glory, land, and, most importantly, plunder. The true nature of empire was more obvious in pre-modern times when it was unnecessary to disguise such base motives. In recent centuries, however, imperial conquerors have tried to hide their naked self-interest by promising to rule for the good of their subjects. This was and always will be a cynical and hypocritical canard. Empire has never been more than naked self-interest masquerading as virtue.” [4]

 

                  A question: What if, in fact, empire is or reflects virtue? That is, so far from being “naked self-interest masquerading as virtue,” empire is virtue itself. Which is what makes it so appealing. Human beings, universally, want to be virtuous, perhaps more than anything else. And in their quest to be virtuous, they seek to dominate, to rule, and to seek glory by ameliorating the human condition politically.

 

                  Insofar as this is the case, the issue is or should be virtue, not empire. If, as Parsons so aptly argues and illustrates, empires have been, are, and will be intolerable to their subjects because violently oppressive, then virtue should be investigated. A politics of virtue, e.g., politics as soul craft as so many espouse might have consequences that will not be, that cannot be “humane, liberal, or tolerant.” Perhaps the crafting of souls, making our souls the best possible as Socrates recommended, should not and cannot be done politically. Good persons and good citizens are, for all practical purposes, distant, even conflicting phenomena, always.

Defeat

  

Defeat

Peter Schultz

 

                  The following are reflections spurred by a reading of D. Michael Shafer’s book, Deadly Paradigms: The Failure of US Counterinsurgency Policy.

 

                  As Shafer summarizes the realist explanation of US involvement in Vietnam, “Communist expansion threatened Vietnam; if Vietnam fell … other countries would … follow; this would damage America’s security and credibility as an ally. Thus, the United States had to stand in Vietnam.” [240-41]

 

                  Yes, the problem was Communist expansion, but it was not simply because it threatened Vietnam, but also and more importantly because it threatened the established elites who were governing the United States. It might even expose “the myth of invincibility,” as Dean Rusk put it, which was the basis of the claim to rule by those elites.

 

                  As one senior official put it: “We must avoid harmful appearances which will affect judgments by … other nations regarding the US … power, resolve and competence to deal with their problems…. It is essential – however badly [Southeast Asia] may go … - that the US … kept [ its] promises, been tough, taken risks, gotten bloodied, and hurt [and been hurt by] the enemy very badly.” [241] Getting bloodied, getting US troops killed, being hurt badly by the enemy demonstrated that US elites deserved to rule.

 

                  Take note: the primary goal was to “avoid harmful appearances,” not necessarily or primarily winning the war. And to avoid such appearances, it was necessary for the US to engage in a “War of Liberation … [which was] costly, dangerous, and doomed to failure.” [Dean Rusk, 241] To maintain and fortify their claim to rule, US elites had to show resolve, not quit, even or especially because the war was “costly, dangerous, and doomed to failure.”

 

So, ironically, what happened in Vietnam was not nearly as important as what happened in the United States; that is, what US elites were willing to do to maintain and fortify their claims to rule, even or especially to the point of undertaking futile policies. That counterinsurgency policies were not successful was not, in the final analysis, a sufficient reason to abandon them. In fact, as things went from bad to worse in Vietnam, the ruling elites would double down on such policies as a way of proving their bona fides.

Duplicitous Politics: The Heart of Darkness

  

Duplicitous Politics: Heart of Darkness

Peter Schultz

 

                  Duplicity is intrinsic to government and politics and one of the best illustrations of this was the Obama administration and its targeted assassinations program. The following is from Jeremy Scahill’s book, Dirty Wars.

 

                  “President Obama’s credentials as a popular, liberal Democrat and constitutional lawyer who pledged to end the excesses of the Bush war machine [was] of tremendous value in selling [his presidency].”

 

                  And now for the facts: “A year into his presidency, Obama and his … team were fully committed to the process of assassinations against terror suspects and other ‘militants.’ Unlike … Bush, who delegated decisions of assassinations, … Obama personally signed off on most strikes…. Tuesday afternoons [were] dubbed ‘Terror Tuesdays’ [when] targets would be ‘nominated’ for spots on the kill list…. This secret ‘nominations’ process was the invention of the Obama administration…. In essence the kill list became a form of ‘pre-crime’ justice in which individuals were considered fair game if they met certain life patterns of suspected terrorists…. Their potential to commit future acts could be a justification for killing them…. In Yemen, Obama authorized the JSOC to hit targets even if the mission planners did not know the identities of those they were bombing. Such strikes were labeled Terrorist Attack Disruption Strikes, or TADs.” [351-352, emphasis added]

 

                  Duplicity is absolutely essential in politics in order to disguise the violence, the injustice, the inhumanity that is intrinsic to politics and government. And it is worthwhile to underline just how pervasive this duplicity is, including as it does here Obama’s claim to be a liberal Democrat who as such was committed to distinguishing himself from his predecessors, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, et. al. So, even our most basic political categories like “liberal” and “Democrat” are duplicitous, serving to hide the collusion between what are conventionally known as our “two political parties.” That there are two political parties is a fantasy constructed to hide the true character of our politics.

 

                  Joesph Conrad wrote an excellent novel, The Heart of Darkness. But, in the final analysis, he did not get to the actual heart of civilization’s darkness, which is only visible when it becomes clear that the “Kurtz’s” of the world are no longer outliers, rogue actors but are, in fact, in charge of the asylum. We have, it seems, reached that point.

Obama's Duplicity

  

Obama’s Duplicity

Peter Schultz

 

                  “Obama campaigned on the idea that Bush had drained resources in Iraq that should have been used to fight al Qaeda. ‘They [Bush and McCain] took their eye off the people who were responsible for 9/11,…al Qaeda.’ The new president pledged to rearrange US priorities to Afghanistan….” [Dirty Wars, 237]

 

                  Clever. While apparently criticizing Bush and McCain, Obama is endorsing the war on terror. His is not even a criticism that cuts very deeply. They spent too much in Iraq, which doesn’t mean the war and occupation was a mistake. Obama allows people to think he is opposing Bush and McCain when, in fact, he is endorsing their war on terror and even, up to a point, their invasion and occupation of Iraq. His endorsement is hidden behind a very mild critique of Bush and McCain and their actions. So, Obama is actually colluding with Bush and McCain with regard to the war on terror, even with regard to the invasion and occupation of Iraq.

 

                  Duplicity: the coin of the realm used to hide colluding political parties.

The Ambiguity of Moral Virtue

  

The Ambiguity of Moral Virtue

Peter Schultz

 

                  As noted in the book, Patriotic Betrayal, there was a time in the United States when “neutrality [was viewed] as ‘immoral and short-sighted.,’ by both liberal and conservative Cold Warriors.” [145]

 

                  Now, if we grant that neutrality is, actually, immoral or amoral, as thought by “both liberal and conservative Cold Warriors,” then these Cold Warriors were, in fact, moral human beings. But this means that these moral human beings accepted and embraced war, both cold and hot.

 

                  A question occurs to me: Isn’t this a good argument on behalf of immorality insofar as it is pacifistic, insofar as it points toward peace or peaceful coexistence, and not to war? Ironically, it would appear that immoral human beings are less warlike than moral human beings. Put differently, courageous human beings are more warlike than cowardly human beings. So, what’s so great about courage?

 

                  In other words, courage – and moral virtue generally – has ambiguous consequences, just as does cowardice and immorality generally. So, what’s needed? Intellectual virtue: that is, the capacity to discern when courage makes more sense than cowardice and when cowardice – e.g. “appeasement” – makes more sense than courage. The fact that neutrality was immoral was not necessarily an argument against it, at least not during the Cold War. And the fact that the Cold Warriors were moral need not lead to their endorsement or the endorsement of the Cold War itself. Ironically, at times, a little immorality goes a long way.

Patriotic Betrayal #2

  

Patriotic Betrayal #2

Peter Schultz

 

                  According to Leonard Bebchick, one of members of the National Student Association who knew of the CIA’s connections with that organization, he and his cohorts were realists.

 

                  “We were not starry-eyed idealists; we were all pretty hardened people, all political types who had a realistic assessment of what the world was about, and yet we felt we were doing God’s work.” [136]

 

                  Leaving aside the claim that it was or is realistic to think of yourselves as “doing God’s work,” Bebchick’s claim that he and his cohorts had “a realistic assessment of what the world was about” is open to challenge. In his reality, the world was experiencing a war against communism, a war that was divinely inspired, a war unlike other wars.

 

However, this was not so. The world was experiencing just another war that was, like all other wars, politics by other means. Just more politics not fundamentally different than politics as it had appeared throughout human history. And, so, while war had a role to play in this political drama, it would not be decisive in its resolution.

 

                  It would not be decisive because political conflicts can only be resolved politically, via compromises, negotiations, and diplomacy. Why? Because defeated nations are not vanquished nations. So, the defeated must be “dealt with.” As Aristotle indicated in his Politics, democratic factions, aristocratic factions, oligarchic factions, even despotic factions are permanent features of the human condition because humans are political animals. Hence, all political disputes must be resolved, insofar as they can be, politically. And all those resolutions will lack finality or permanence. “Regime change,” which Americans take to be uncommon, carefully constructed events, are intrinsic to political life, happening continually and even haphazardly. Regime changes make political life look like a madhouse.

 

                  American elites do not understand this and, so, they repeatedly fail because they do not know what they should be doing. They seek the impossible, vanquishment and the elimination of political conflicts. Given the political character of the human condition, institutions like the CIA are or become despotic. Despotism and despotic institutions are appealing because they claim to be able to eliminate political conflicts and, hence, the need for politics. But ironically, despotisms do not eliminate conflict, they feed them. So, as its history demonstrates, the CIA feeds conflict and it cannot resolve them. To rely on the CIA to achieve peace is madness. And insofar as the CIA is victorious, prevails, that victory contains the seeds of its own destruction.

Patriotic Betrayal

  

Patriotic Betrayal

Peter Schultz

 

                  A few remarks about some passages in Karen M. Paget’s book, Patriotic Betrayal, which is about the CIA’s covert attempt to control the NSA, the National Student Association during the Cold War.

 

                  Among the leaders of the NSA, there was a “naïve faith … that American know-how could replace politics.” This phenomenon is common among Americans because the real naivete is the American conviction that its embrace of know-how isn’t political.

 

                  As the “students” involved with the NSA sought to recruit students from other parts of the world, they concluded that Asian students, for example, were “prone to agitation.” They concluded that “Asian students needed to move beyond the ‘outmoded tactics’ used during independence movements, when their ‘major purpose was to create havoc and unrest for the Western powers….” They had to learn “to work with the Western powers.” [124]

 

                  So, American “students” were not prone to agitation.  Why not? Because Americans focus on acquiring expertise, achieving success, being ambitious, rather than being political. But this is a political choice or a choice with significant political implications. It may be said that it is as political as the choice to adopt tactics that are used to create havoc and unrest. It might best be called bourgeois politics.

 

                  The Asians adopted such tactics because their purpose was independence and, so, “their energy could be redirected” only by changing that purpose; for example, by giving up the pursuit for independence for the sake of “work[ing] with the West.” The Americans did not understand that working with the West was a substitute for, a replacement, a subversion of the drive for independence. So, their energies could only be successfully redirected if they gave up their drive for independence. Although the Americans did not understand this, those seeking independence did know it, which is why they distrusted Americans as much as they did. Working with the West is, obviously, a political agenda and not one the agitating students were prepared to embrace. They wanted their independence. In fact, advocating for American know-how, advocating against agitation are just covers for opposition to genuine independence. As such, they were bound to fail, at least absent despotic repression.

 

                  Beyond the students, even American elites are guilty of the same ignorance. LBJ, at one point in Vietnam war, offered to build a Vietnamese Great Society if they would end the war. What he did not know, at least not sufficiently, is that the Vietnamese did not want a Great Society. They wanted a unified, independent Vietnam. And they also knew, what LBJ did not, that an American sponsored Great Society would not accomplish those goals. Surprisingly, perhaps, the Vietnamese understood the situation better than LBJ did, which may help explain why they won the war. Ignorance is not always bliss.

Walter Karp and the Political

  

Walter Karp and the Political

Peter Schultz

 

                  It is interesting that both JFK and Nixon, and also LBJ, waged war in Vietnam in ways that were intended to guarantee their re-elections, JFK in 1964 and Nixon in 1972, A question is: What does this teach us about American politics and politics in general?

 

                  Walter Karp wrote several interesting books on American politics, one of them being Indispensable Enemies: The Politics of Misrule in America. In that book, he focuses on party politics and the established wisdom that the primary purpose of political parties is to win elections. Looking at the facts that throughout the United States there are many places where one party constantly wins while the other party constantly loses. Karp argues this phenomenon ultimately proves that political parties are not driven primarily by the desire to win elections. Rather, they are driven by the desire of their leading members to control the party and to do so even it requires losing elections.

 

                  “Insofar as a state party is controlled at all, the sole abiding purpose, the sole overriding interest of those who control it, is to maintain control. This, not election victory, is the fundamental, unswerving principle of party politics in America….” [19]

 

                  “The prevailing doctrine of the parties thus describes what party organizations are perpetually striving to avoid.” [19]

 

                  The parties and those who control them fear most of all loss of control over nominations and loss of political power. Loss of control over nominations means loss of political power. Insofar as the loss of political power is the goal, then controlling nominations is more important than winning elections. Winning elections with uncontrollable, that is, insurgent candidates is to be avoided at all costs, including losing elections. So, in 2024, the leading Democrats’ goal was not to defeat Trump but to continue in control of the party. Nominating a likely loser like Kamala Harris was the result.

 

                  This political phenomenon effects politics generally, that is, beyond elections. In the normal course of American politics these days, the leading Democrats’ actions are intended not to defeat Trump and his policies but to enable the party’s big wigs to retain control of the party. Because maintaining control of the party is the most important goal, more important than defeating Trump’s policies, the result is compromise and collusion between the Democrats and Trump and the Republicans, collusion which allows the leading Democrats to retain control of the party.

 

                  Now, return to examples this essay started with, how JFK and Richard Nixon waged war in Vietnam. JFK is reputed to have told people that his policies in Vietnam, particularly his desire to pull out of Vietnam were dictated by his goal of being re-elected in 1964, so he could retain control of the Democratic party, increase his chances of successfully disengaging from Vietnam, and protect himself and the party from an assault by rabid anti-communists. Nixon followed the same path in his first term, waging war in Vietnam in ways that would best guarantee his re-election in 1972. So, when Nixon went to China, he conveyed to the Chinese that he was would accept defeat in Vietnam provided it occurred after “a decent interval” after the United States pulled out. So, for the sake of re-election and party cohesion, Nixon “sold out” South Vietnam, after extending the war for almost four years in order to achieve a “peace with honor” he could have achieved earlier in his first term.

 

In these examples, winning elections in order to retain power personally as well as politically took precedence over ending the Vietnam war. So, winning elections, like losing elections, is done to enable party organizations “to maintain control, [which] is the fundamental and unswerving principle of party politics in America….” Thus, the deaths, both Vietnamese and American, that occurred during Nixon’s first term and those that occurred during JFK’s only term were in the service of that “fundamental and unswerving principle of American politics.”

 

So, both JFK and Nixon were not only principled but shared the same principle. Which might lead one to conclude that this principle is intrinsic not just to American politics but to politics generally. And to further conclude hat that principle and its consequent behaviors are, to use a now discarded language, “natural.”

 

 

Lost Crusader: William Colby, DCI

  

Lost Crusader: William Colby, DCI

Peter Schultz

 

                  The following are some reflections on passages from John Prados’s book on William Colby, Lost Crusader, in the context of Colby’s nomination as Director of the CIA.

 

                  “A related aspect of this … is the degree of comity that … existed at that time. In not exhibiting much interest in the CIA’s Family Jewels, [Senators] Stennis, Symington, [and Representative] Hebert followed norms long established: {Representative] Nedzi’s inspection was the exception. Intelligence oversight in 1973 was exercised with a light hand, if at all.” [264, emphasis added]

 

                  Now, “intelligence oversight” meant accountability. So, what does this tell us about government? That it functions best when there is little or no accountability. “Functions best” means acting freely; it does not mean achieving the desired results, because without accountability the results cannot be known or evaluated. Demanding  little or no accountability means that those “investigating,” say, the CIA, are not interested in knowing or evaluating the agency’s results. Whether the CIA achieved its goals are of no interest to the “investigators.” Perhaps that is because they know it is highly unlikely that the CIA did achieve its goals. Duplicity is essential to maintaining the illusion that government works.

 

                  “Nedzi also confronted Colby with the question [that was the] hardest of all: Why not make public the report? Colby argued that such an action might cripple the CIA, and Nedzi accepted the argument.” [263]

 

                  Take note that duplicity and/or secrecy is absolutely essential for the government, here the CIA, to function. Why is that? Because without duplicity and secrecy the illusion that the government works or that it reflects the popular will would be shattered. Governments must deal in delusions, meaning politics and politicians are and must be delusional. And insofar as politics is intrinsically delusional then it is fair to say that politics is the problem. That is, the political, meaning every particular form politics takes, is problematical. Affirming the political in order to solve political problems is delusional, it is madness. Politics is a madhouse and, very often, it becomes a mad slaughterhouse. Which explains why Plato Is reputed to have said: “Only the dead have seen the end of war.”

Party Politics

  

Party Politics

Peter Schultz

 

                  Both American political parties compete by acting as if and even believing that their differences are significant, when they are not. Why this duplicity?

 

                  Because without it, the political would be revealed as delusional and our politicians, our elites would be revealed as delusional. As political animals, humans cannot, will not accept such a revelation. That is, they cannot accept that politics, all politics is delusional, is madness and that the political arena is a madhouse. To make sense of their actions, to make their actions seem sensible, duplicity is absolutely essential. In the United States this means that people must believe and act as if there are two political parties with significant political differences and that each party offers solutions to our problems.

 

                  But there are no political solutions to our problems because, at the most basic level, the problem is politics. Hence, embracing or affirming the political in any imaginable way, capitalistically, communistically, socialistically, democratically, or oligarchically, is intrinsically flawed. The best that can be done is to minimize the flaws. So, the best regime is simply the least bad or unhealthy regime, the order or arrangement with the least flaws. As an old saying has it, democracy is preferable to the alternatives only because it is less bad.

 

                  Political parties blind us to what is actually going, viz., the constant and continuing pursuit of power, by presenting themselves and their politicians as being concerned with justice or the common good. Without such duplicitous behavior, it would be impossible for people, both in and out of government, to affirm the political, to take politics seriously. So, political behavior is intrinsically duplicitous, which helps explain why the most duplicitous humans thrive in the political arena. Seriously.

Bill Colby and Political Madness

  

Bill Colby and Political Madness

Peter Schultz

 

Two reflections inspired by John Prados’s excellent biography of William Colby, Lost Crusader: The Secret Wars of CIA Director William Colby.

 

Here are two sentences from John Prados’s biography of William Colby referring to his sending people into North Vietnam under Project Tiger, even though they disappeared or were “doubled”, I.e., captured and used by the North Vietnamese unbeknownst to Colby, et. al. “From one point of view,  Colby’s stance could be considered one of steadfast determination. From another it could be seen as ignorant and naive.” (81) 

Sounds like a dichotomy: Colby as virtuous or Colby as ignorant/naive. But why should we think of “steadfast determination” as a virtue? Or, put differently: why not recognize that being morally virtuous in this way, being steadfastly determined, leads to what were deadly or cruel results? 

Most assume that being morally virtuous always leads to proper results. But Aristotle argued that being morally virtuous leads to being magnanimous, with results that seem less than desirable, viz., haughtiness, vanity, injustice even. By being “steadfastly determined,” i.e., by being morally virtuous, Colby in fact was sending men to their deaths, to torture, or to captivity. Being morally virtuous doesn’t always lead to proper or humane results. Sometimes, e.g., in Vietnam or the war on terror, it leads to inhuman cruelty. 

 

 

 

 

 

“Frustration drove Bill Colby after the Diem assassination. He…and the CIA might have lost the policy battle in Washington, but Colby emerged determined to effect change directly…in Vietnam. This became the subtext of his post-coup swing through Southeast Asia. That trip [led] to new CIA initiatives, greatly increasing the agency’s role in the Vietnam war….Colby created some of these projects while energizing or becoming instrumental in others. In a way he…submerged his loss of friends in the Ngo family with frantic activity that might avenge them by winning the Vietnam war.” (132 Lost Crusader) 

 

Madness through and through. It wasn’t frustration that drove Colby; he was delusional. As if doing more of what he had been doing would have different results. Definition of insanity: keep doing the same things while expecting different results. As if “frantic activity” is a virtue. As if “determining to effect change” is a virtue. As if “steadfast determination” is a virtue. As if “avenging loss” is a virtue. 

 

We can’t see the madness because its elements are taken to be moral virtue. And, so, because we can’t see it, we don’t question moral virtue, its ambiguous value as reflected by its often untoward results.

 

 [What would have happened if Darcy had dealt with Lydia and Wickham moralistically, rather than mercifully? What might have transpired – or not transpired – in Vietnam if the US had treated the Vietnamese mercifully rather than moralistically?] 

 

Politics: The Seduction of Crime

  

Politics: The Seduction of Crime

Peter Schultz

 

“Beyond the specific individuals involved, the Epstein scandal reveals the character of a social class. The American oligarchy has amassed its wealth through parasitism, speculation and fraud. It is, in its social being, in its mode of acquisition, a criminal class at the summit of American politics. Its fortunes are the product of financial manipulation, corporate swindling, war profiteering and the exploitation of billions of people.

 

“The oligarchy feels itself above the law. Trump is the personification of this class—brazenly criminal, contemptuous of democratic norms, openly inciting fascist violence and plotting war. His administration views the Constitution as a worthless piece of paper, international law as irrelevant. It declares the right to murder individuals, citizen or non-citizen, with, in the words of Vice President JD Vance, “absolute immunity.”

 

“The American ruling class is wallowing in political, social, legal and moral degradation. The Epstein scandal holds up a mirror to itself.”

 

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2026/02/02/wepr-f02.html

 

The statement above does not go far enough, because not only does “the Epstein scandal reveal the character of a social class,” it also reveals the character of the political. Criminality is intrinsic to politics. In fact, politics may be said to involve, always and everywhere, socially approved criminality. For example, consider what is called “the war on terror” which has revolved around “targeted assassinations.” Certainly, these “targeted assassinations” would be crimes, would be “murders,” if committed by, say, Tony Soprano or any other mafioso. It is, in brief, impossible to imagine politics devoid of such socially approved criminality, or to imagine that politicians aren’t attracted to politics, to a political life because it involves, revolves around socially approved criminality. You may even say that politics involves, intrinsically, the seduction of crime.

 

So, yes, “the oligarchy feels itself above the law” and, yes, “Trump is the personification of this class.” The oligarchy feels itself above the law because it is above the law or outside of the law, and Trump is its personification because he proudly asserts, over and over, that he is not bound by law, that he engages in socially approved criminality. So too did Ollie North, when he became a national hero during Iran-Contra. And, of course, Dick Cheney embraced lawlessness when he took the United States to “the dark side” after the attacks on 9/11. But it is a mistake to think that “The American ruling class is wallowing in political, social, legal and moral degradation.” They are not “wallowing” in anything, nor are they experiencing any kind of “degradation.” Their criminality is socially approved. Expose it as much as you like, but do not expect that that exposure will lead to their demise. In fact, expect that it will not only maintain but that it will fortify their power.

 

So it goes.

 

House of Imperialism

  

House of Imperialism

Peter Schultz

 

                  Katheryn Bigelow’s movie House of Dynamite created quite a stir, and rightfully so. And this led me to think about a similar, yet very different movie on the same theme but that might be called House of Imperialism. The following passages are from a book, How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States, by Daniel Immerwahr.

 

                  “The Japanese [after WW II] were right to be nervous. Despite all the duck and cover warnings about Soviet strikes on Cincinnati and Dubuque, the real lines of nuclear confrontation were the overseas bases and territories. Hundreds of nuclear weapons, we now know, were placed in South Korea, the Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico. Throughout most the sixties, there were more than a thousand on Okinawa. Johnston Island, one of the guano islands Ernest Gruening had recolonized, bristled with nuclear armed Thor missiles. An unknown number of nuclear weapons were stored in Hawai’I, Alaska (including on the Aleutian Islands), and Midway.

 

                  “Yet while the nukes on bases protected the mainland, they imperiled the territories and host nations. Flying nuclear weapons around the bases – something the military did routinely – risked catastrophic accident. Even when the weapons stayed put, their presence turned the bases into tempting targets, especially since overseas bases were easier to Moscow to hit than the mainland was. Arming the bases was essentially painting bright red bull’s-eye on them.

 

                  “A sense of the risk can be gained by considering the Arctic base at Thule in Greenland…. The virtue of Thule was that it was close enough to the Soviet Union that from there, the United States could lob missiles over the North Pole at Moscow. The drawback was that the Soviets could fire missiles back. The Soviet premier warned Denmark that to allow the United States to house its arsenal at Thule – or anywhere on Danish soil – would be ‘tantamount to suicide.’ Nervous Danish politicians incorporated a ‘no nuclear’ principle into the platform of their governing coalition: the United States could have its base, but no nukes.

 

                  “… Washington pressed the issue. When the Danish prime minister didn’t explicitly object, U.S. officials took his silence for winking consent and secretly moved nuclear weapons to Thule. Soon the air force began covertly flying nuclear armed B-52s over Greenland daily. This was part of airborne alert program to keep armed planes aloft and ready to strike the Soviet Union at all times – the subject of Stanley Kubrick’s Doctor Strangelove….

 

                  “The general responsible for the program readily conceded how much danger this placed Greenland in. Thule, he told Congress, would be ‘one of the first ones to go’ if war came. Even without war, it faced peril. In 1967, three planes carrying hydrogen bombs made emergency landings in Greenland. The next year, a B-52 flying near Thule with four Mark 28 hydrogen bombs crashed, hard….

 

                  “The accident at Thule didn’t set off a nuclear explosion. It did, however, spew plutonium all over the crash site. The air force scrambled to clean up the mess before the ice thawed and carried radioactive debris into the ocean. The recovered waste filled seventy-five tankers. Had an accident of that scale happened over a city, it would have been mayhem.

 

                  “Could that have happened? Yes…. Two years before the Thule accident, a B-52 crashed over the Spanish village of Palomares while carrying four hydrogen bombs, each seventy-five times as powerful as the Hiroshima bomb. Part of the plane landed 80 yards from an elementary school, another chunk hit the earth 150 yards from a chapel. The conventional explosives went off in two of the bombs, sowing plutonium dust into the tomato fields for miles.”

 

                  It isn’t inaccurate to say, as a character in Bigelow’s movie does say, that we’ve created a house of dynamite. But it should be noted that what makes that house of dynamite so bloody dangerous, even makes it a madhouse, is that the United States has created a house of imperialism, one that requires it to subject other nations to the possibility of nuclear catastrophes.

Politics and Justice

  

Politics and Justice

Peter Schultz

 

                  If, as many believe, politics is about justice, why are the results so very often injustice? Could it be that injustice is more firmly established in the political arena than justice? Ruminate on the following passages from the book, No Good Men Among the Living, and see what you can see regarding justice, injustice and the political.

 

                  “Across the country … the story repeated itself. In a way…, retribution should have been expected. After all, the Taliban’s human rights record … inspired no sympathy. The problem was not so much that the Taliban were targeted but that they were uniquely targeted: the men allied with the US [had] similarly deplorable records…, yet their crimes went unpunished. A true reconciliation process would have required bringing justice to people from across the political spectrum, or pardoning them all. To the Taliban, justice unequally applied felt like no justice at all.

 

                  “For the top Taliban leadership, the apparent inequity of a ‘war forced on us’ … was so great that there seemed no choice but to organize resistance…. In late 2002, the leadership met … and voted in favor of a last-ditch effort to come to accord with Kabul. Emissaries were sent … but with reconciliation still a toxic idea in Washington and in Northern Alliance circles, the effort fizzled.

 

                  “The course now seemed set. Mullah Omar organized … a dozen top Talibs … [in] a new leadership body…. Mullah Obaidullah took on the task of resurrecting dormant Taliban networks in Afghanistan. He and others reached out to communities … where the resentment was steadily building over the killings, the night raids, the abductions, the torture, the broken alliance, and the fractured hopes. In these communities, the American presence was … seen as an occupation, and Karzai’s government … as Washington’s venal and vicious puppet.

 

                  “From this point on, there would be no turning back.” [195-96]

 

                  Where did the pursuit of justice lead? Retribution is a kind of justice, but it led to injustice. The pursuit of justice short-changed any possibility of reconciliation, ultimately leading to a rebirth of the Taliban and, hence, renewed violence and further injustices. Could it be that despite the claims of many, injustice is intrinsic to politics and what’s required for human decency is to turn away from seeking justice and a turn toward caring and/or reconciliation? Human life is more humane to the extent that caring supplements or displaces justice.

 

                  Machiavelli taught that political greatness, the peak of political virtue, rested on inhuman cruelty. Empires, that is, the greatest political achievements, rest on cruelty, as has been illustrated time and again throughout human history. The greatest political actions, the greatest human actions are the cruelest and bloodiest of wars. Their victors are celebrated with fame, a kind of immortality. When Socrates went in search of justice in the Republic, he ended up recommending the banning of the poets and the exiling of everyone over the age of ten. When Aristotle went in search of the best regime, he ended up with slavery joined with a powerful warrior mentality. As Rousseau said: “Man is born free but everywhere he is chains.” And Huck Finn had to flee “sivilization” in order to be happy, while Tom Sawyer had to manipulate and obfuscate in order to displace and become “the model boy of the village.”

 

                  The line between being president and being criminal is a fine line indeed – as we are witnessing today. In fact, being criminal seems intrinsic to being great politically. Politics may be defined as socially acceptable criminality. And isn’t that one thing that draws people to organizations like the CIA or the FBI? It certainly draws people into the military, as socially approved killing offers fame and glory for those who are most proficient at it, e.g., Chris Kyle, “the most lethal sniper in U.S. history.”

 

                  So, ironically, the pursuit of justice has ambiguous consequences, including the encouragement or production of injustice. As is emphasized in No Good Men Among the Living, Americans engaged in combating the Taliban in Afghanistan were led, again and again, to embrace cruelty. “… the political has a way of making a virtue of necessity, [which meant] that soon suicide bombers became the outgunned Taliban’s answer to B-52s and up-armored Humvees.” [208] Politics also has a way of making a virtue out of injustice, and even of cruelty.

American Savagery

  

American Savagery

Peter Schultz

 

                  The following, which is from the book, No Good Men Among the Living, by Anand Gopal, is an account of US allies in Afghanistan after the 9/11 attacks, called the

“mujahedeen.”

 

“Like victors in a medieval battle, the mujahedeen attacking Afshar hauled captives and booty away. Some…were forced into slavery…. After two days of bloodshed, most of the population of Ashar was dead or missing….Sometimes [the] killing was not enough. A man named Fazil Ahmed was decapitated and his limbs sawed off; his body was found with his penis stuffed in his mouth.

 

“What is certain, however, is the Ashar violence had clear enough political motives: to eliminate a Hazara militia stronghold….At the top of the chain of responsibility sat the operation’s architects, Massoud and Sayyaf….A number of their sub-commanders bear direct culpability, yet every one of them has emerged politically unscathed. Marshal Muhammad Fahim, who oversaw the operation and commanded an important outpost during the siege, became a key American ally during the 2001 invasion, earning himself millions in CIA dollars. Eventually, he became vice president of Afghanistan. Baba Jan, who also helped plan and execute the siege, became a key Northern Alliance commander. After 2001, he grew extravagantly wealthy as a logistics contractor for the US military. Mullah Izzat, who commanded a group that led house searches, also struck gold after the invasion….Zulmay Tofan, complicit in the house searches and forced labor, reaped his post-2001 windfall by supplying fuel to US troops.

 

“The twin dislocations of the Soviet invasion and CIA patronage of the mujahedeen irrevocably reconfigured Afghan society, leading directly to the horrors of the civil war, then to the Taliban, and ultimately to the shape of Afghan politics after 2001. Still, when Zbigniew Brzezinski…was asked in the late 1990s whether he had any regrets, he replied: ‘What is more important in the history of the world? The Taliban or the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some stirred-up Muslims or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the Cold War?” [66-67]

 

Brzezinski seems to think that his answers are, self-evidently, the correct ones and indisputable. But, of course, the USSR was on its way to collapsing and probably would have done so even it had not been attacked by the US and its mujahedeen allies in Afghanistan. But let’s say it did not collapse. Wouldn’t the world and Afghanistan have been a better place if the savagery created by the USSR, the US, and mujahedeen had not occurred? Had the USSR prevailed in Afghanistan, women would have been much better off, as would many Afghan men. The Taliban would not have appeared, and its tyranny would be unknown. In fact, it would seem that the best outcome for Afghanistan would have been the rule of the Communists. It would also have meant that the 9/11 attacks would not have occurred. Brzezinski tries to turn the US involvement with the mujahedeen into a melodramatic turning point in world history. Maybe it was, but it is far from clear that if it was, it was a turning point that improved the human condition. It certainly did not improve the condition of Afghanistan and Afghanis as savagery was imposed upon them. But, then, savagery is precisely what realists like Brzezinski embrace, even taking it as proof of their virtues.