This short essay began as a critique of the conclusions of a far more in-depth and nuanced historical piece in Quillette, entitled Bitter Lessons from Afghanistan.
A great essay, providing much needed depth into the background of American policy making. But I don’t think that the author draws the right conclusions in the last three paragraphs. For a start, we have the example of the French intervention in Mali- the defence of a sovereign power and its people- in this case, the alternative of standing by and doing nothing would have been worse. Deciding to stay, however, is undoubtedly a bad habit the French picked up from America. In addition, we need to recognise that no matter how odious we in the West may find the behaviour of some Sovereign States, their continued stability is often infinitely preferable to the instability, mayhem and humanitarian disaster which often ensues from intervention and misguided nation building.
Although many cite the lucrative system of procurement and expenditure which follows any American deployment as an incentive for war, I think this is an unduly cynical take on the motivations of Washington Power Elites. Rather, I think that they are simply incapable of acknowledging the axiomatic truth of the just war fallacy, and instead seem congenitally prone to attempting to seize some post hoc justification for war and conflict, in the form of jus post bellum nation building and democratisation at the point of a gun.
There is so such thing as Just War, and all theories to that effect are just plain wrong. War is wrong, but sometimes the alternative is worse and this crucial understanding should negate even the suggestion of jus post bellum as contingent on a philosophically bankrupt framework. Failing that- loan the defeated your credit card, not your ‘help’ paired with occupation and continuing provocation. Attempts to snatch post hoc justifications for war are tantamount to polishing a turd- it’s not likely to accomplish much, but it will get your sleeve dirty. The only valid justifications for war are to be found prior to its declaration in “the responsibility to protect”, not least one’s own citizens and Allies- not in some imagined goal following its cessation. This can include swift moves to intervene against genocides, but not at the expense of global stability and potentially catastrophic wars.
In attempting to create post hoc justifications for war, the American establishment can be likened to the image of Narcissus staring at his own image in a pool. In this case it is American self-image of itself as a nation which is at fault, and the desperate desire to believe oneself a ‘force for good’ in the world. America is good, at least in its intentions- one only has to examine the ungodly amounts of money America spends on its weapons in order to minimise civilian casualties to see the truth of it, when one considers that other nations arm themselves with less discriminating, equally effective weapons which are far less costly in budgetary terms.
In trying to create post hoc justifications for war, lies the true synthesis of American decline. American wars are always swift and invariably successful, accomplished with a minimum of civilian casualties. If they wax brutal it is by the necessity of war. But occupations in the name of democracy and nation building on America’s part, have always snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Local populations are quickly going to turn unfriendly towards well-meaning foreigners telling them how to arrange their affairs.
This is where the real damage to America’s reputation stems from. It’s not the wars, it’s the open-ended commitments to occupations. To Allies their example represents a potential future liability- if currently unengaged, they may have dodged a bullet- but who knows the next time, if the opposition in is power? To the neutral they can seem like folly and a disruption to the more important business of peaceful trade and mutual enrichment. To adversaries, they encourage fourth and fifth generational warfare as a means of weakening a perennial threat.
It’s basic Machiavelli, after all “People should either be caressed or crushed. If you do them minor damage they will get their revenge; but if you cripple them there is nothing they can do. If you need to injure someone, do it in such a way that you do not have to fear their vengeance.”, with the proviso that in the modern age, it is far easier to caress almost every national player in one way or another- whether the rewards come in the form of mutually beneficial trade, development bribes, personal prestige or acknowledging the essential dignity of their people.
War should be brutal. It should also be swift and accomplished with as few casualties as the reality on the ground permits. Our leaders should acknowledge this truth, at least to themselves. If we acknowledge that war is inherently wrong, but caveat that it can be less wrong than the alternative, the cost-benefit analysis should also include the degree to which the war is unnecessarily protracted in the name of some supposed good which unfailingly fails to materialise. In this light, we can see jus post bellum occupations in the name of nation building as a bellicose variety of communism, always failing in their promise and never done right.
I’ll leave it to Augustine of Hippo to defend the idea of Just War. Machiavelli was a wise man and should be heeded. Shakespeare spent a great deal of ink on the problem of hubris and its cost in blood and treasure. Too bad no one reads Shakespeare any more.
The West has grown bored with liberty and too lazy to think deeply about much of anything. The East has not arrived at that point yet.
'Augustine of Hippo'- the problem with the idea injustice is the greater sin with war its corrective is that one man's perceived injustice is another man's rightful cause. It is all a matter of perspective- Isaiah Berlin would say the nun is always destined to disagree with the mother and international terms that means war.
Was it Hegel who foresaw that we would finally reach the perfect and enlightened society and that the next generation would get bored and simply throw it all away? I don't think its perfect, but it is certainly in many ways better than anything that came before...
If justice is merely a matter of perspective than we are all lost and the the man with the biggest gun will rule justly. Augustine wrote from a perspective that justice is absolute because it is defined by a Lawgiver who has made His law known, both in the human heart and in writing.
It didn’t take perfection for the populace to get bored; Hegel was on to something with that thought. Western man is the most free, most prosperous people in history but we are tired of the responsibility for our own actions and desire another to rule over us. As Mencken noted, we are most likely to get what we want; and get it hard. The Founders warned us that there would be no second chance if we muff this gift.
I think there is a fair chance that a society can come to a fair approximation of a mutually agreed standard for justice, but between different societies and especially different cultures the case is more fraught. Recently, a British cyclist was stopped in China for having a light on his bicycle at night. He explained about seeing and being seen by other road users- to which the Chinese policeman replied in horror "But can you imagine if everyone took your attitude?"
I’m perhaps not as hopeful that society will arrive at a sustainable measure of justice absent an absolute standard. Power dictates the rules, as it ever has. Even with a long history of titular submission to the Judeo Christian standards in this country, we see significant departures is what is acceptable. The Left is already resorting to the power of the State to overturn long held standards. They can not win those issues at the ballot box and so have employed threat of the cartridge box.
Augustine of Hippo has a lot to answer for. In the days when religion was a lot more important, justification was needed for something so clearly against the teachings of Jesus hence the just war.
However, the idea took on a life of its own and survived. The American experiment of trying to rebuild states in their own image is just an extension of the doctrine of 'American exceptionalism' but with a patchy understanding of what it is that makes America so exceptional.
Because of this lack of the ability to define the term adequately, all attempts to rebuild states in America's image are doomed to fail. One cannot create an overseas version of the home state without wholesale extermination of the native population. Even then the physical environment of the new lands will reshape and change the settlers to an extent that they will end up being a different people.
For Afghanistan, both Trump and Biden showed wisdom in cutting the losses. The withdrawal was always going to be messy but it was necessary.
Most of the strong democracies in the world came into being through the expenditure of the blood of patriots. Such sacrifices tend to acquire a holy gravitas over time, which helps to keep the country tethered to its political system.
It's worth noting that most systems have evolved methods which mitigate the worst of simple majority rule. In Parliamentary systems, the upper house is appointed over time and mitigates the worst elements of the temporal nature of politics- bills will be sent back to the house for mitigating amendments, the most coercive aspects eliminated or watered down. In many European countries, multi-party systems prevail, with the need for compromise all but eliminating ideologically driven agendas.
But you are right, self-governance by the people usually has to fought for by the people themselves.
I was watching a new Jordan Peterson interview today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4zZ2ker1iI . He talked a lot about the political being folded into the religious, the sacred into the profane. I think Just War is an older example of this post hoc justification which has been with us for some time. My local Norman church has a faded 'Dieu et mon droit' painted on the wall- it's not so far off the 'Deus vult' battle cry of the crusades.
Augustine understood the nature of man as well as the demands of a just God. He juxtaposed these in his two Cities. He also knew that in this life there would not be perfection and those who sought to live in the Light would have to use great wisdom in living with those who rejected the Light. To oversimplify; aggression was bad, defense against aggression was just.
America no longer believes in its own culture; how could it possibly impose on a radically different and antagonistic culture? This latest disaster is only the result of foolishness and hubris by those who think they can bring Utopia. There may have been reason to go into Afghanistan, there may have been reason to stay. There was no reason in Iraq or Afghanistan to think we could impose a Western democracy.
Trump was right in setting the stage for a withdrawal. Biden was a fool for creating an unnecessary disaster. General Austin had overseen the withdrawal from Iraq and knew it could be done correctly. The disaster was either the desired outcome, as Biden indicated or General Austin did not have the moral fiber to tender his resignation rather than be a party to the rout.
Generally, there needs to be a reset back towards the Westphalian Military Doctrine with exceptions made for non-state actors and, where possible, against genocides. The latter clause might seem as though it doesn't pursue Enlightened Self-Interest- until one considers that people prefer to consume the goods of nations they admire.
Boots on the ground should always require a definite time-limited exit strategy. That part is vital. It's never the wars themselves that cause America grief, but rather the open-ended commitments and occupations which follow.
The 'disaster' was inevitable. Once the decision was taken to withdraw there would come a time when the opposition would push to get rid of the occupiers sooner. The will to continue fighting wouldn't be there. Afghanistan never had the stability or civil society for the Americans to contemplate an orderly withdrawal a la Iraq. It would have been a similar mess under Trump, not because of any deficiencies but because the situation only allowed for that type of withdrawal.
If you fight a war and declare victory, mission accomplished and attempt to occupy the land BEFORE you received a unilateral surrender, you are deluded. Just look at nearly all American wars since the last time it declared one (WWII) and fought until they received a surrender.
The other thing to consider is that, despite the many crimes against humanity the Nazi Regime committed, the Allies weren't shy of utilising former wehrmacht resources, or police and civil institutions from within society. Compare that to the disbanding of the Iraqi military and the de-Ba'athification of Iraqi civil society and it becomes clear that moral self-aggrandisement became an impediment to the accomplishing of achieving anything of worth on the ground.
The Allies should have just pre-agreed a few show trials for the worst humanitarian offenders of little overall importance and turned it all over to the Iraqi military that a provisional interim government was to institute democratic governance at the earliest possibility, with the understanding we would be back if progress was not made.
The problem is that in the modern era politicians are wary of standing next to anyone with even a whiff of controversy or the potential for political blowback. The previous greater generation weren't afraid to stand next to monsters if it was expedient to their goals in the gritty world of realpolitik. Just look at the Malta conference- we knew full well what Stalin was, but we simply didn't care.
Quite apart from anything else the modern political paradigm fails to constrain the actions of very real modern-day monsters. The previous approach would have had them at least invested in commonly shared goals, and wary of the possibility of embarrassment they might pose to the West pushing those goals beyond reach.
That's true of Iraq, but wouldn't have worked with Afghanistan. And it's not clear that Iraq run by Baathists/Sunnis would actually have been any better than the Iranian/Shiite power since neither cared about liberty or equal protection.
Of course, neither nation attacked the US and thus neither nation was a valid target for defensive "just" wars.
“ Although many cite the lucrative system of procurement and expenditure which follows any American deployment as an incentive for war, I think this is an unduly cynical take on the motivations of Washington Power Elites.”
Absolutely. The people who claim that the Afghan war (or Iraq for that matter) were just part of a scheme to enrich defense contractors are not just cynical and wrong, they fundamentally don’t know what they’re talking about. The defense-industrial complex, for good or ill, does not need a war in the Middle East to make money. Far more is spent on procurement completely unrelated to anything used in Afghanistan. Nobody is going to lose their job because the withdrawal means their work is obsolete - they’ll just be shifted to a different system or weapon etc. The bigger problem in procurement is the vast amount spent on “science fair projects.” Even dumber is claiming some foreign policy elites will lose their jobs. Yeah right. They can pivot to a new area or get a different job in less time than we spent getting out of Afghanistan.
“ one only has to examine the ungodly amounts of money America spends on its weapons in order to minimise civilian casualties to see the truth of it, when one considers that other nations arm themselves with less discriminating, equally effective weapons which are far less costly in budgetary terms.”
Thank you for pointing this out. You’re absolutely correct and most people seem not to understand this. The amount of money, time, work, effort, and ingenuity that goes into designing systems and weapons and platforms in ways to avoid civilian casualties and friendly fire is enormous. Accidents are usually the result of poor intelligence or human error.
'The bigger problem in procurement is the vast amount spent on “science fair projects.”' Recently, I watched a video about the US Navy experimenting with rail guns. I have to say, I think they are taking the wrong approach. It would be far more useful to have a rail gun which could fire a rapid succession of very small tungsten-tipped flechettes at extremely high velocities towards a relatively small area in the air.
You know, I used the make the argument that the British Empire understood that war was brutal and that there was no jus post bellum to be found in it, but recently I read an article in Quillette (I think) which argued that British Colonialism in Africa was initially caused by the anti-slavery movement (although the article might have been withdrawn, because I can't seem to find it).
Perhaps in every age or for every nation there needs to be a post hoc justification for war.
'Accidents are usually the result of poor intelligence or human error.'
I think much of history and even individual decision making involves post hoc rationalization. Even the Nazis told themselves they were the good guys. I don’t believe people are incapable of rational action. But most individuals, much of the time, act on impulse and justify it later.
That's actually why just as most people believe they are better than average drivers, most people also believe they are more moral than average. It's because everyone has access to their own inner monologues, allowing them the luxury of all manner of justifications as to why they were forced into certain moral compromises.
It's also the source of the one of the remaining instances of pervasive racism, with discrimination in hiring strongly skewed towards customer facing roles. Steven Pinker has looked at the best data sources on racism in America and come to the conclusion that around 5% to 10% of the American population holds racist views. Other sources show that this demographic is around two-thirds over 65 and was in the process of slowly dying out.
Here's the kicker. Because so many people drastically overestimate the levels of racism in America, it influences their hiring decisions in customer facing roles, causing real racial discrimination. Personally, I take the view that people should have more faith in others and stop acting like hypocrites themselves- my usual bar consists of two things- is the salesperson reasonably casual smart and do they know their stuff? I generally only like buying from suits when its business-to-business and then it's a must.
Yeah that’s about the percentage I’d guess too. I agree that people shouldn’t be discriminated against in hiring on the theory that someone who is racist wouldn’t want to deal with them. I’d rather hire the best person for the job, in sales or in anything.
Aren't all accidents the result of poor intelligence or human error (by definition)?
Was it an accident when a drone strike killed a family of good Afghans at the end of the retreat and loss of the war? They claimed it was righteous even when first quizzed about the killing of good people and lots of children. Was it poor intelligence or none whatsoever?
Poor intelligence/human error. The drone just struck where it was told to. The military thought they were actually hitting a terrorist target when they weren’t.
I’ll leave it to Augustine of Hippo to defend the idea of Just War. Machiavelli was a wise man and should be heeded. Shakespeare spent a great deal of ink on the problem of hubris and its cost in blood and treasure. Too bad no one reads Shakespeare any more.
The West has grown bored with liberty and too lazy to think deeply about much of anything. The East has not arrived at that point yet.
'Augustine of Hippo'- the problem with the idea injustice is the greater sin with war its corrective is that one man's perceived injustice is another man's rightful cause. It is all a matter of perspective- Isaiah Berlin would say the nun is always destined to disagree with the mother and international terms that means war.
Was it Hegel who foresaw that we would finally reach the perfect and enlightened society and that the next generation would get bored and simply throw it all away? I don't think its perfect, but it is certainly in many ways better than anything that came before...
If justice is merely a matter of perspective than we are all lost and the the man with the biggest gun will rule justly. Augustine wrote from a perspective that justice is absolute because it is defined by a Lawgiver who has made His law known, both in the human heart and in writing.
It didn’t take perfection for the populace to get bored; Hegel was on to something with that thought. Western man is the most free, most prosperous people in history but we are tired of the responsibility for our own actions and desire another to rule over us. As Mencken noted, we are most likely to get what we want; and get it hard. The Founders warned us that there would be no second chance if we muff this gift.
I think there is a fair chance that a society can come to a fair approximation of a mutually agreed standard for justice, but between different societies and especially different cultures the case is more fraught. Recently, a British cyclist was stopped in China for having a light on his bicycle at night. He explained about seeing and being seen by other road users- to which the Chinese policeman replied in horror "But can you imagine if everyone took your attitude?"
I’m perhaps not as hopeful that society will arrive at a sustainable measure of justice absent an absolute standard. Power dictates the rules, as it ever has. Even with a long history of titular submission to the Judeo Christian standards in this country, we see significant departures is what is acceptable. The Left is already resorting to the power of the State to overturn long held standards. They can not win those issues at the ballot box and so have employed threat of the cartridge box.
Augustine of Hippo has a lot to answer for. In the days when religion was a lot more important, justification was needed for something so clearly against the teachings of Jesus hence the just war.
However, the idea took on a life of its own and survived. The American experiment of trying to rebuild states in their own image is just an extension of the doctrine of 'American exceptionalism' but with a patchy understanding of what it is that makes America so exceptional.
Because of this lack of the ability to define the term adequately, all attempts to rebuild states in America's image are doomed to fail. One cannot create an overseas version of the home state without wholesale extermination of the native population. Even then the physical environment of the new lands will reshape and change the settlers to an extent that they will end up being a different people.
For Afghanistan, both Trump and Biden showed wisdom in cutting the losses. The withdrawal was always going to be messy but it was necessary.
Most of the strong democracies in the world came into being through the expenditure of the blood of patriots. Such sacrifices tend to acquire a holy gravitas over time, which helps to keep the country tethered to its political system.
It's worth noting that most systems have evolved methods which mitigate the worst of simple majority rule. In Parliamentary systems, the upper house is appointed over time and mitigates the worst elements of the temporal nature of politics- bills will be sent back to the house for mitigating amendments, the most coercive aspects eliminated or watered down. In many European countries, multi-party systems prevail, with the need for compromise all but eliminating ideologically driven agendas.
But you are right, self-governance by the people usually has to fought for by the people themselves.
I think the idea of "just war" is built into all humans from the start. Sure, some use war to take by force, but self-defense is part of all nature.
I was watching a new Jordan Peterson interview today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4zZ2ker1iI . He talked a lot about the political being folded into the religious, the sacred into the profane. I think Just War is an older example of this post hoc justification which has been with us for some time. My local Norman church has a faded 'Dieu et mon droit' painted on the wall- it's not so far off the 'Deus vult' battle cry of the crusades.
Augustine understood the nature of man as well as the demands of a just God. He juxtaposed these in his two Cities. He also knew that in this life there would not be perfection and those who sought to live in the Light would have to use great wisdom in living with those who rejected the Light. To oversimplify; aggression was bad, defense against aggression was just.
America no longer believes in its own culture; how could it possibly impose on a radically different and antagonistic culture? This latest disaster is only the result of foolishness and hubris by those who think they can bring Utopia. There may have been reason to go into Afghanistan, there may have been reason to stay. There was no reason in Iraq or Afghanistan to think we could impose a Western democracy.
Trump was right in setting the stage for a withdrawal. Biden was a fool for creating an unnecessary disaster. General Austin had overseen the withdrawal from Iraq and knew it could be done correctly. The disaster was either the desired outcome, as Biden indicated or General Austin did not have the moral fiber to tender his resignation rather than be a party to the rout.
Generally, there needs to be a reset back towards the Westphalian Military Doctrine with exceptions made for non-state actors and, where possible, against genocides. The latter clause might seem as though it doesn't pursue Enlightened Self-Interest- until one considers that people prefer to consume the goods of nations they admire.
Boots on the ground should always require a definite time-limited exit strategy. That part is vital. It's never the wars themselves that cause America grief, but rather the open-ended commitments and occupations which follow.
The 'disaster' was inevitable. Once the decision was taken to withdraw there would come a time when the opposition would push to get rid of the occupiers sooner. The will to continue fighting wouldn't be there. Afghanistan never had the stability or civil society for the Americans to contemplate an orderly withdrawal a la Iraq. It would have been a similar mess under Trump, not because of any deficiencies but because the situation only allowed for that type of withdrawal.
If you fight a war and declare victory, mission accomplished and attempt to occupy the land BEFORE you received a unilateral surrender, you are deluded. Just look at nearly all American wars since the last time it declared one (WWII) and fought until they received a surrender.
The other thing to consider is that, despite the many crimes against humanity the Nazi Regime committed, the Allies weren't shy of utilising former wehrmacht resources, or police and civil institutions from within society. Compare that to the disbanding of the Iraqi military and the de-Ba'athification of Iraqi civil society and it becomes clear that moral self-aggrandisement became an impediment to the accomplishing of achieving anything of worth on the ground.
The Allies should have just pre-agreed a few show trials for the worst humanitarian offenders of little overall importance and turned it all over to the Iraqi military that a provisional interim government was to institute democratic governance at the earliest possibility, with the understanding we would be back if progress was not made.
The problem is that in the modern era politicians are wary of standing next to anyone with even a whiff of controversy or the potential for political blowback. The previous greater generation weren't afraid to stand next to monsters if it was expedient to their goals in the gritty world of realpolitik. Just look at the Malta conference- we knew full well what Stalin was, but we simply didn't care.
Quite apart from anything else the modern political paradigm fails to constrain the actions of very real modern-day monsters. The previous approach would have had them at least invested in commonly shared goals, and wary of the possibility of embarrassment they might pose to the West pushing those goals beyond reach.
That's true of Iraq, but wouldn't have worked with Afghanistan. And it's not clear that Iraq run by Baathists/Sunnis would actually have been any better than the Iranian/Shiite power since neither cared about liberty or equal protection.
Of course, neither nation attacked the US and thus neither nation was a valid target for defensive "just" wars.
insert: with the proviso after Iraqi military
“ Although many cite the lucrative system of procurement and expenditure which follows any American deployment as an incentive for war, I think this is an unduly cynical take on the motivations of Washington Power Elites.”
Absolutely. The people who claim that the Afghan war (or Iraq for that matter) were just part of a scheme to enrich defense contractors are not just cynical and wrong, they fundamentally don’t know what they’re talking about. The defense-industrial complex, for good or ill, does not need a war in the Middle East to make money. Far more is spent on procurement completely unrelated to anything used in Afghanistan. Nobody is going to lose their job because the withdrawal means their work is obsolete - they’ll just be shifted to a different system or weapon etc. The bigger problem in procurement is the vast amount spent on “science fair projects.” Even dumber is claiming some foreign policy elites will lose their jobs. Yeah right. They can pivot to a new area or get a different job in less time than we spent getting out of Afghanistan.
“ one only has to examine the ungodly amounts of money America spends on its weapons in order to minimise civilian casualties to see the truth of it, when one considers that other nations arm themselves with less discriminating, equally effective weapons which are far less costly in budgetary terms.”
Thank you for pointing this out. You’re absolutely correct and most people seem not to understand this. The amount of money, time, work, effort, and ingenuity that goes into designing systems and weapons and platforms in ways to avoid civilian casualties and friendly fire is enormous. Accidents are usually the result of poor intelligence or human error.
'The bigger problem in procurement is the vast amount spent on “science fair projects.”' Recently, I watched a video about the US Navy experimenting with rail guns. I have to say, I think they are taking the wrong approach. It would be far more useful to have a rail gun which could fire a rapid succession of very small tungsten-tipped flechettes at extremely high velocities towards a relatively small area in the air.
Haha, the rail gun is exactly what I was thinking of!
You know, I used the make the argument that the British Empire understood that war was brutal and that there was no jus post bellum to be found in it, but recently I read an article in Quillette (I think) which argued that British Colonialism in Africa was initially caused by the anti-slavery movement (although the article might have been withdrawn, because I can't seem to find it).
Perhaps in every age or for every nation there needs to be a post hoc justification for war.
'Accidents are usually the result of poor intelligence or human error.'
Or the fogs of war.
I think much of history and even individual decision making involves post hoc rationalization. Even the Nazis told themselves they were the good guys. I don’t believe people are incapable of rational action. But most individuals, much of the time, act on impulse and justify it later.
That's actually why just as most people believe they are better than average drivers, most people also believe they are more moral than average. It's because everyone has access to their own inner monologues, allowing them the luxury of all manner of justifications as to why they were forced into certain moral compromises.
It's also the source of the one of the remaining instances of pervasive racism, with discrimination in hiring strongly skewed towards customer facing roles. Steven Pinker has looked at the best data sources on racism in America and come to the conclusion that around 5% to 10% of the American population holds racist views. Other sources show that this demographic is around two-thirds over 65 and was in the process of slowly dying out.
Here's the kicker. Because so many people drastically overestimate the levels of racism in America, it influences their hiring decisions in customer facing roles, causing real racial discrimination. Personally, I take the view that people should have more faith in others and stop acting like hypocrites themselves- my usual bar consists of two things- is the salesperson reasonably casual smart and do they know their stuff? I generally only like buying from suits when its business-to-business and then it's a must.
Yeah that’s about the percentage I’d guess too. I agree that people shouldn’t be discriminated against in hiring on the theory that someone who is racist wouldn’t want to deal with them. I’d rather hire the best person for the job, in sales or in anything.
Addendum- it was an UnHerd article- not Quillette- no wonder I couldn't find it!
https://unherd.com/2021/09/how-liberals-made-the-british-empire/
Aren't all accidents the result of poor intelligence or human error (by definition)?
Was it an accident when a drone strike killed a family of good Afghans at the end of the retreat and loss of the war? They claimed it was righteous even when first quizzed about the killing of good people and lots of children. Was it poor intelligence or none whatsoever?
Poor intelligence/human error. The drone just struck where it was told to. The military thought they were actually hitting a terrorist target when they weren’t.