4 ANALYSIS & FEATURE
How much evil must we do to do good?
It is evil if powerful leaders start wars simply because they believe they are right
By Chris Williams
These words could be from a
Michael Jackson song. But they
come from another American
who died last week, Robert
McNamara.
Like Jackson, McNamara had
a successful but sad life. He was
an outstanding student and
then an impressive manager of
Ford. He was revered as a pub-
lic administrator and then ran
the World Bank for 13 years,
where he argued for less money
to be spent on arms and more on
aid. Later in life he worked for
nuclear disarmament. The “but”
is that he also had responsibili-
ty for the greatest unnecessary
loss of life in East Asian history,
in the Vietnam War.
McNamara’s own son took
part in antiwar protests while
his father was running the war.
Eventually McNamara conced-
ed, “We were wrong, terribly
wrong.” Writing about friends
and family lost and injured in
Vietnam, New York Times
columnist Bob Herbert, conclud-
ed last week, “I was lucky. The
Army sent me to Korea, which
was no walk in the park, but it
wasn’t Vietnam.” Sadly, the U.S.
failure to secure the whole
Korean peninsular fueled the
totalitarian war strategy in
Vietnam.
How do people with outstand-
ing abilities get locked into fail-
ure?
There is much to learn from
McNamara’s story. One of the
neatest assessments comes from
a school text book, “The
Anatomy of War,” by the former
Oxfam Director General, Brian
Walker, which links events in
Vietnam with Iraq. This is based
on McNamara’s own book “In
Retrospect.” In the week that
America withdraws its combat
troops from Iraq, it is worth ex-
ploring the similarities further.
Guess who the president is in
these two quotes: “Once the
president had taken a position,
it was set in concrete and no one
should expect to revisit its ratio-
nale. ... Having made the deci-
sion, there was no turning back.”
“He made the fateful choices
that locked the United States
onto ... a path of massive mili-
tary intervention, an interven-
tion that ultimately ... destroyed
his presidency.
“He had made the goal crystal
clear. ‘Win the war!’ ... He never
deviated from that objective.
But we could never show him
how to win at an acceptable cost
or an acceptable risk.”
The second was McNamara
talking about Lyndon Johnson;
the first was Paul O’Neill, for-
mer U.S. secretary of the trea-
sury, speaking about George W.
Bush.
Unsurprisingly McNamara
talked of “the staggering variety
and complexity of other issues
we ... faced. Simply put, we
faced a blizzard of problems,
there were only 24 ... hours in a
Obama officials debate N.K. policy
By Paul Richter
Los Angeles Times Service
WASHINGTON — American
diplomatic efforts regarding
North Korea are coming under
fire within the Obama adminis-
tration from those who consider
talks futile and instead want to
halt the regime’s trade in nu-
clear weapons and missile
equipment, U.S. officials said.
Since taking office in January,
the administration’s goal has
been to coax Pyongyang back
into the six-nation disarmament
talks that have been underway
since 2003.
Yet, privately, many officials
say they have all but lost hope
that North Korea will cooperate,
and some are arguing it is time
for a new approach.
“We don’t have six-party
talks,” said a senior U.S. official
who described internal discus-
sions about the shift on condi-
tion of anonymity. “We may
have no choice but to move to
containment.”
The change of heart has come
in the past three months, as
North Korea quit the talks,
restarted a nuclear reactor that
had been shuttered and con-
ducted bomb and missile tests
that have provoked an interna-
tional outcry.
Chris Williams
● Chris Williams is based at
the Center for International
Education and Research,
University of Birmingham,
United Kingdom.
● He can be reached at
chrisunula@yahoo.com
day, and we often did not think
straight ... “ Decades later, after
a meeting of British experts be-
fore the Iraq invasion, one par-
ticipant reported, “I was stag-
gered at Blair’s apparent
naivety, at his inability to en-
gage with complexities.”
In this unpredictable and con-
fusing context, simplistic intu-
itive and belief-based decision-
making is an attractive option.
Then leaders make their argu-
ments fit their intuition, which
creates what management train-
ers describe as a “declaim and
defend” situation. From the U.K.
meeting of experts, which was of-
ficially to inform the decision
about an invasion in Iraq, anoth-
er participant, Toby Dodge said
of Blair, “It seemed as if he was
just going through the motions. I
think he had made up his mind
already.” The then head of M16,
the British intelligence service,
Richard Dearlove, later claimed
that “intelligence and facts were
being fixed around policy.”
The problem has its roots in
elite education. Many British
and U.S. leaders had experi-
enced a traditional Oxbridge or
Ivy League system. This tradi-
tion produces elites who can ar-
gue their case effectively, and
Secretary of State Hillary
Rodham Clinton first voiced pes-
simism in April, when she told a
Senate committee that North
Korea’s return to the talks was
“implausible, if not impossible.”
The talks involve the United
States, North Korea, South
Korea, Japan, Russia and China.
Abandoning the six-party
strategy would mean giving up
a diplomatic tool that has
helped coordinate action by
North Korea’s closest neighbors.
It would also mean throwing
in the towel on an effort that in-
volved years of grinding diplo-
macy that, at times, seemed to
offer promise. As recently as
September 2008, in the waning
days of the Bush administra-
tion, some U.S. officials believed
Pyongyang would agree to give
international inspectors access
to North Korean facilities to ver-
ify that they were living up to
promises to abandon their nu-
clear program.
“Containment” was a term
adopted following World War II
to describe U.S. and Allied ef-
forts to prevent the expansion of
Soviet influence.
Against North Korea, the
strategy would entail blocking
shipments of banned equipment
by land, air and sea. It also
would mean trying to prevent
checking facts is often sec-
ondary. A scholar is held to ac-
count for not winning, but less
often for being wrong. Centuries
ago, a doctorate at Oxford or
Cambridge was gained through
candidates defending a claim
that was presented to them by
examiners — for example, the
Earth is flat or the Earth is
round. The ethos continues in
traditional doctoral oral exams.
To this day, Ph.D. candidates
“defend” rather than “discuss”
their theses at oral exams.
U.N. weapons inspector Hans
Blix complained that the fail-
ures of the American and
British leaders stemmed from
“a deficit of critical thinking”
and Nelson Mandela termed
Bush “a leader who cannot
think properly.”
Again, McNamara could have
reminded Bush and Blair of the
problems he experienced over
Vietnam — “We received no
thoughtful analysis of the prob-
lem and no pros and cons regard-
ing alternative ways to deal with
it. ... We failed to analyze our as-
sumptions critically, then or later.
The foundations of our decision
making were gravely flawed ...”
The related problem is patho-
logical information. As Robert
Pyongyang from importing
equipment that might be used
for weapons programs, includ-
ing dual-use equipment, which
is designed for nonmilitary uses
but can be adapted for weapons.
Such an effort could only suc-
ceed with strong cooperation of
North Korea’s neighbors, China
and Russia. Although they are
increasingly unhappy with
North Korea’s provocative be-
havior, they have for years re-
sisted U.S. attempts to crack
down on Pyongyang.
It remains to be seen whether
China and Russia would sup-
port new efforts to control ship-
ments of suspect material. But
U.S. officials point to support by
the two countries for U.N.
Security Council sanctions
adopted in June as a sign that
their attitude is hardening.
The administration has be-
gun stepping up U.S. efforts un-
der the new U.N. resolution,
which permits countries to take
steps to block trade in arms and
to halt international transac-
tions used to finance it.
Obama administration offi-
cials came to office believing
that with high-level diplomacy,
they would have more success
than either the Bush or Clinton
teams in convincing Pyongyang
to give up its nuclear program.
Park explains in “Voodoo
Science,” a pathological analysis
occurs when fractional pieces of
statistical and other evidence
are given immense importance
because they happen to fit a pre-
vailing analytical framework.
This is compounded by the na-
ture of risk communication in
organizations.
An expert on decision-mak-
ing, Lawrence Phillips, points
out how phrases such as “we be-
lieve” can be interpreted by ana-
lysts as indicating anything be-
tween 20 and 90 per cent cer-
tainty. He elaborates in relation
to an organization such as a
government department: “As
verbal phrases of uncertainty
are reported upward, the uncer-
tainty decreases for events peo-
ple want to happen, and in-
creases for events they don’t
want to happen.”
It seems that in the United
States this was paralleled by so-
called “cherry-picking” and
“stove-piping” information. The
Office of Special Plans in the
Pentagon apparently took selec-
tive intelligence information
and sent it direct to the
Presidential office without the
normal checking by analysts. In
the United Kingdom and United
But in their attempt to reach
out, “they’ve been slapped in the
face,” said Victor D. Cha, who
served in the National Security
Council under former President
George W. Bush and is now with
the Center for Strategic and
International Studies.
U.S. officials speculate that ag-
gressive North Korean actions
may indicate rising influence by
hard-liners in the course of an in-
ternal struggle over who is to
succeed the ailing North Korean
leader, Kim Jung-il. A South
Korean television station report-
ed Monday that Kim has been di-
agnosed with life-threatening
pancreatic cancer.
Senior administration offi-
cials have been signaling that
their foremost concern with
North Korea is the risk of prolif-
eration.
James L. Jones, the White
House national security adviser,
said in a speech in May that the
“imminent danger” in North
Korea was sales of arms to oth-
er countries or terrorist groups
rather than the launch of a nu-
clear-tipped missile. North
Korea’s efforts to design an ac-
curate long-range nuclear mis-
sile, he said, “still have a long
way to go.”
U.S. officials believe that
their efforts forced a North
States, the public inquiries re-
vealed the extensive degree to
which caveats and cautionary
notes had been removed from
early drafts of policy documents.
The inevitable result will be a
false and over optimistic view of
progress. McNamara had been
there before: “There was such
determination to do something,
anything, to stop the commu-
nists that discouraging reports
were often ignored. ... The re-
ports — including my own — on
the military situation were often
too optimistic. ... Like many peo-
ple, the U.S. commanders also
indulged ... in wishful thinking.”
Writing in 1759 Lawrence
Sterne was prescient of the
problem when his character
Tristram Shandy explains, “It is
in the nature of a hypothesis
when once a man has conceived
it, that it assimilates everything
to itself, as proper nourishment,
and from the first moment of
your begetting it, it generally
grows stronger by everything
you see, hear or understand.”
The more we read of
McNamara, the more confused
we become between Vietnam
and Iraq. He recalls, “All of this
occurred without adequate pub-
lic disclosure or debate, planting
South Korean conservative activists burn placards containing images of North Korean leader Kim Jong-
il and his son Kim Jong-un during an anti-North Korean rally in Seoul on July 10.
Korean ship they suspect was
carrying banned weapons to re-
turn home without delivering
them. They said at least three
ports denied entry to the ship,
the Kang Nam 1, after a U.S. ef-
fort to draw attention to suspi-
cions about the cargo.
International concern over
North Korea’s weapons tests
could help Obama administra-
tion efforts to enlist help from
other countries, Cha said. While
the Bush administration strug-
WEDNESDAY JULY 15, 2009
the seeds of an eventually debil-
itating credibility gap ... We mis-
judged ... the geopolitical inten-
tions of our adversaries and we
exaggerated the dangers to the
United States of their actions.
We failed to draw Congress and
the American people into a full
and frank debate.”
Religion is also deployed to
support dubious decisions, as
we have seen in Iran and
Somalia of late. At the U.K.
meeting of experts, Blair appar-
ently answered sophisticated
arguments for not invading
Iraq, by saying “But he
(Saddam) is evil, isn’t he?” One
participant recalled that “it
seemed highly personal: an evil
Saddam versus Blair-Bush.”
Recall that Bush claimed, “A lot
of my foreign policy is driven by
the fact that I truly believe that
freedom is a gift from the
Almighty to every person, and
that America has a responsibili-
ty to take a lead in the world, to
help people be free.” When he
addressed the U.S. Congress in
2003 Tony Blair said, “With
every fiber of instinct, of convic-
tion, I believe that we are right.”
In an open debate, someone
might have replied, so did Hitler
and Stalin.
gled for years to cut off trade uni-
laterally, that effort has been le-
gitimized with a U.N. mandate.
“I can’t conceive of an admin-
istration being better positioned
to undertake such an effort than
this one is,” he said.
At the same time, Cha said
there would be international
pressure on the White House to
return to talks if North Korea
makes an offer to do so.
U.S. officials believe they also
have leverage over Pyongyang
In “With God on Their Side,”
Esther Kaplan provides consid-
erable evidence of the faith-
based ideology of the U.S. lead-
ers, and reports that Bush had
once said, “God told me to strike
at al-Qaida and I struck them,
and then he instructed me to
strike at Saddam, which I did ...
“ Zimbabwe’s President Mugabe
was quick to exploit the weak-
ness at the U.N. General
Assembly in 2004 — “We are
now being coerced to accept and
believe that a new political-cum-
religious doctrine has arisen,
namely that there is but one po-
litical God, George W. Bush, and
Tony Blair is his prophet.”
Whatever their failings, neither
McNamara not Jackson claimed
divine inspiration.
It can be acceptable to do pro-
portionate harm to overcome
greater harm, as any doctor
would demonstrate. But any
harm can become evil if power-
ful people ignore history and ev-
idence. For Michael Jackson to
sing “We Are Here to Change the
World” is not evil. For powerful
leaders to start wars to change
the world simply because they
believe they are right, is. Let’s
give Jackson the last word —
“We’ve had enough.”
AFP-Yonhap News
through their authorization to
block international financial
transactions that may be relat-
ed to North Korea’s weapons
programs.
Such efforts have drawn a fu-
rious reaction from Pyongyang
in the past. In 2005, North
Korea angrily halted its partici-
pation in talks after the United
States essentially froze Pyong-
yang’s funds by threatening to
cut off a Macao bank from the
U.S. financial system.