what's up with: Carr Center for Human Rights at Harvard?

[donsu]

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070730/hayden


Should a human rights center at the nation's most prestigious university be collaborating with the top US general in Iraq in designing the counter-insurgency doctrine behind the current military surge?

-snip-

The new doctrine was jointly developed with academics at the Carr Center for Human Rights at Harvard. The Carr Center's Sarah Sewell, a former Pentagon official, co-sponsored with Petraeus the official "doctrine revision workshop" that produced the new Army-Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual . The workshop was held at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, on Feb. 23-24, 2006, and can be accessed here.

This is not an academic text but, in the Marine Corps' title, a "warfighting doctrine," complete with hundreds of recommendations ranging from how to "clear, hold and build," how to use secret agents in calling in air strikes, even advice on public speaking ("avoid pacing, writing on the blackboard, teetering on the lectern, drinking beverages, or doing any other distracting activity while the interpreter is translating.")

The new counter-insurgency approach purports to be more civilized and humane than conventional kinetic war. It seeks to save the population ("winning hearts and minds") from the insurgents. It attempts to minimize civilian casualties and avoid torture of detainees. It promotes social programs. These no doubt were the attractions of the collaboration for Harvard's "humanitarian hawks." The introduction to the manual is thoughtful and balanced, even raising questions whether the effort can work at all. Sewall tastefully avoids any references to the brutal though targeted suppression necessary for the mission to succeed, but states in Ivy League language why she stands in coalition with the Marines:

"Humanitarians often avoid wading into the conduct of war for fear of becoming complicit in its purpose. The field manual requires engagement precisely from those who fear that its words will lack meaning..."

-snip-

The Carr Center does not officially favor the war in Iraq, though one of its former directors, Michael Ignatieff, is famed for endorsing the US as a "21st century imperium", an "empire lite", and publicly calling for "acceptable degrees of coercive interrogation." On the other hand, there is the formidable Samantha Power, an Irish-born humanitarian who strongly supported the US-NATO Balkans war and campaigned for Gen. Wesley Clark in 2004. Power is a close adviser to Sen. Barack Obama, who supports a withdrawal of US combat troops by next year with exceptions for "advisers" and special units to battle al-Qaeda. Power, who worked last year in Obama's Washington, DC office, writes that even the proposed combat troop withdrawal can be reversed if Iraq's condition continues to worsen. Intentionally or not, the cautious, complicated Obama proposal as described by Power leaves open the likelihood of thousands of American troops remaining in counter-insurgency roles for years ahead.

If that is the limit of legitimate debate at Harvard, the Pentagon occupation of the academic mind may last much longer than its occupation of Iraq, and may require an intellectual insurgency in response.
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[northzax]

1. sure

you wouldn't want human rights experts working on a manual that involves interaction with a civilian population?