Posted by alexandra_k on October 14, 2006, at 19:12:24
In reply to Re: doctor jailed for refusing order to go to Iraq, posted by Jost on October 14, 2006, at 16:39:29
> My point about the low mortality was not the low mortality of non- US troops. Obviously, those are horrendous--
I thought something happened with that.
>doctors on the battlefield are saving lives-- and this seems, overall, to be a value.Doctors saved lives in concentration camps too. Would you really volounteer to follow Nazi orders to go work in one, though?
> I'm sure, despite the horrors of it, having one's loved one back alive, in most instances, except the worst, is something families and survivors prefer.
What I really struggle with is why they don't prefer them to stay safe in the first place. I mean, I can understand people choosing to go and fight in a war because they believe in the cause (fighting Hitler, for example). But fighting in a war risking your life killing others because... Some guy in a uniform says 'do this'. And somehow this is meant to be necessary for the good of... The country? I really struggle with this...
> However, I'm also not sure that it reaches the moral pitch where if you're a doctor, you have the moral high ground in not going. That's what I"m not sure of.The point is he got a court trial and his defence was that the war was unlawful. He was the first person to have a court trial and attempt to argue that the war was unlawful. They didn't hear his evidence to that effect... But he is going to continue.
If people didn't go to war... How many (US) lives and post traumatic stresses do you think that would save? How many lives and post traumatic stresses do you think Kendall-Smith would be saving if this has the result that the US doesn't invade contrary to UN policy again?
> The moral equivalence of this and Nazi Germany? No, that I can't see.
The moral equivalence he is claiming is that they are both contrary to international law.
> I think if what was happening now was what we wanted to have happen, or have planned to execute-- as our ultimate strategy-- maybe that would be-- getting there-- but I haven't yet gotten anywhere near the conclusion that our government wanted this to happen. No way.The US government didn't want to invade Iraq?
> By the way-- I'd always understood that those who practiced civil disobedience expected to be punished for it-- that was part of the idea. That you disobey, despite the consequences. Which doesn't make the consequences good- but it does make them normal science-- not Nazi science.
Normal science / Nazi science isn't thought to be a point in common here.
If the war was illegal then he wasn't committing civil disobedience.
To the contrary if he had have followed the order he could have been prosecuted for war crimes later.
The analogy again:
'Do this xxx' Person does this, person is later tried for being a war criminal. Defence: 'I was just following orders'.
Sentenced to death in some cases. Following orders is no excuse.
Kendall-Smith 'Do this xxx'. Kendall-Smith has done some reading about the justification for the war and knows what the UN has said and he is concerned that the war is an unlawful act of agression. If he follows orders and later the war is judged (by international law) to be an act of agression then he can be sentenced for war crimes. So... He said he wouldn't.
How many people followed German orders?
How many people are prepared to electrocute in the Milgrim experiment?
The Milgrim experiment doesn't need to be replicated...
I think Kendall-Smith should be commended.
poster:alexandra_k
thread:694101
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/poli/20061009/msgs/694827.html