To the Editor:

While it’s hard to take any comfort in the testimony given by Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Cocker [sic], it is at least refreshing to hear someone deliver the two-part reality check so few want to hear: No, the situation in Iraq will not necessarily improve if we stay; and yes, it will get much worse if we leave. The infuriating part is hearing so many lawmakers freely denounce a war that they voted for.

The notion that the Iraq war was the work of one president rather than an entire nation remains the most consistent fallacy of the whole debate. A drawdown of troops will obviously save American lives, but will cause incalculable grief for Iraqis. If Americans decide that’s a fair tradeoff, so be it. But if it inflames even more hatred toward the United States abroad, they shouldn’t act surprised.

Zach Ahmad
Rocky Mount, N.C., Sept. 12, 2007

Note from KBJ: To a consequentialist, a person is as responsible for what he or she allows to occur as for what he or she does. As Bernard Williams puts it:

It is because consequentialism attaches value ultimately to states of affairs, and its concern is with what states of affairs the world contains, that it essentially involves the notion of negative responsibility: that if I am ever responsible for anything, then I must be just as much responsible for things that I allow or fail to prevent, as I am for things that I myself, in the more everyday restricted sense, bring about. (Bernard Williams, “A Critique of Utilitarianism,” in Utilitarianism: For and Against, by J. J. C. Smart and Bernard Williams [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973], 75-150, at 95 [italics in original; footnote omitted])

It follows from consequentialism that if the United States withdraws its forces from Iraq, the United States is responsible for all of the harm that would have been prevented if it had stayed. I wonder how many of the people who insist on withdrawing from Iraq are consequentialists. I wonder why consequentialists such as Peter Singer are not making the case for retention of United States forces, or at least comparing the overall utilities of the two states (retention and withdrawal). Could it be that Singer is a progressive first and a consequentialist second?

Note 2 from KBJ: To a consequentialist, nationality is morally irrelevant, so it doesn’t matter whether a given harm is experienced by an Iraqi or an American. It doesn’t even matter that the Iraqi is a member of al Qaeda, bent on killing as many Americans as possible. All else being equal, it is better (morally) to allow one American soldier to die than to allow two members of al Qaeda to die. Consequentialism requires strict impartiality.