Operation Infinitely Invisible

Whatever happened to Operation Infinite Justice? When President George W. Bush spoke last week his vague rhetoric was acceptable, because the American people thought they would quickly see action. But yesterday, when Bush announced his plan for airport safety, his statement, “We will do everything we can to achieve our objective, which is to root out and destroy global terrorism,” was more trite than triumphant.

I do not want the United States to rush headlong into a war with one of the poorest nations on earth, but if we are going to war, I’d like to know whom against. If we are going to war, I would sure like to know it. And I’m sure a lot of other Americans would too. I can’t believe that the government is simply dilly-dallying as it fuddles around trying to figure out what to do. I’d much rather believe that they are simply not telling us what the plan is (oh, right, it’s to root out and destroy global terrorism). I sure hope that Bush administration officials are very busy laying plots and schemes to defeat international terrorism. But as to what those schemes and plots are, I can only speculate.

If I find out, 10 years from now, that CIA agents initiated massive covert operations to prop up U.S.-friendly but highly corrupt governments that massacred their own people, as we now know occurred in Latin America during the 1980s, I will be able to say self-righteously, “You never told me you were going to do that.” And even if our actions eventually destabilize entire regions of the world, foster global anti-Americanism and bomb a country back into the Stone Age, I might (probably not) argue that it was worth it in order to prevent a Sept. 11 from every happening again.

But neither of these things will absolve me from my utter failing as an American citizen. The primary duty of democratic citizens is to be cognizant and critical of their government’s policies and actions (critical not meaning unsupportive, but unwilling to accept on blind faith). I don’t have to know the exact battle plans, the sites of surprise attacks before they happen or the locations of secret missile bases. However, the argument that national security prevents my knowledge (and the public’s) of American military action in all cases is highly flawed.

That argument is premised on the notion that our politicians can be held accountable through the election process, and so therefore can be trusted to act in our best interests in situations of crisis, such as war, even if we don’t know what their actions are. This is the “I’m running on my record” argument, that says that politicians are self-interested individuals who expect to be rewarded with re-election for good behavior. The flaw in this argument is that if we are not—as Bush said we might not be—informed should America’s anti-terrorist operations be successful, we will have no basis on which to judge our representatives come Election Day. And if we find out, many years down the road, that our politicians took actions in this situation that we would not have supported had we known of them, it will already be far too late to force them out of office (unless they’re Strom Thurmond).

The second part of this argument is that politicians, and especially our president, are elected to protect the safety and interests of the American people. This is the “I’m running on my platform” argument. Ostensibly, since we elected Bush on a platform of things he pledged to do, we can have reasonable expectations of what he will do. And, since we put our faith in him not only as a man of ideas and vision, but also as a man of character and wisdom, we have entrusted him with our safety and the nation’s. He is perfectly empowered to act in whatever way he thinks best to secure that safety because the American people placed that power in his hands.

Well, not quite.

The problem with this line of thinking is that we have then simply elected ourselves a dictator. Already, there are plenty of restraints on the president so he cannot merely act and then claim that it was in the nation’s best interest. Unfortunately, many of those restraints seem to all but disappear during war. No wonder Bush was so quick to declare the bombings “Acts of War.” Admittedly, a president should have more leeway for action during a crisis—the ability to call up troops, for instance, and to engage in high-level diplomatic talks. But it never relieves him of his responsibility to tell the American people what he is doing. If we aren’t a nation of democratic citizens, then he does not have much of a nation to protect, and such a nation cannot exist if its citizens do not have access to information about their government’s policies and plans.

This is just part of an argument that says our civil liberties should not be sacrificed for “the nation’s best interest.” Surely, the thing most fundamental to our interest is our liberty. If not for that, then for what did our forefathers fight?

Having read the newspaper every day, I can honestly say I have absolutely no idea what the Bush administration is planning to do, only that they’re putting a coalition together to do it. And I’m pretty sure most Americans have even less of a clue than I do. So, before we have air strikes or ground troops, I’d like to know, what ever happened to Operation Infinite Justice?

Meredith B. Osborn ’02 is a Social Studies concentrator in Leverett House. Her column appears on alternate Fridays.