{"id":11273,"date":"2015-10-09T12:03:32","date_gmt":"2015-10-09T12:03:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:#clients.elainemichele.com\/SPC2022\/?p=11273"},"modified":"2022-11-12T08:27:43","modified_gmt":"2022-11-12T13:27:43","slug":"satsa__the_professionalization_of_war_on_campus_1273","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/clients.elainemichele.com\/SPC2022\/articles\/satsa__the_professionalization_of_war_on_campus_1273\/","title":{"rendered":"SATSA & The Professionalization of War on Campus"},"content":{"rendered":"

Vani is a doctoral student at SU.<\/p>\n

On February 27-28, 2015, the Syracuse University (SU) Student Association on Terrorism and Security Analysis (SATSA) held its yearly conference on campus,  entitled \u201cThe New Global Threat: Emerging Issues in National Security.\u201d SATSA publishes The Journal of Terrorism and Security Analysis, and is oriented towards the policy and legal implications of military action. Students contribute to the journal to increase their marketability for jobs such as National Security Attorney. Broadly, this conference is geared towards training students so that they have the tools to advise military personnel and military contractors on what authority they have, and how to use the law to justify military operations.
\nA coalition of students and local activists affiliated with the Syracuse Peace Council attended the conference to intervene in the keynote address by Bill Smullen, the Director of National Security Studies at SU. For a group of activists committed to resisting militarism, this conference offered an opportunity to improve our understanding of how students at a major research university are being encouraged to pursue jobs that justify imperialism. The following rhetorical moves witnessed at the conference reveal the violence of the \u201cprofession\u201d of war.<\/p>\n


\n1. Linking the International Criminal Court to Military \u201cClient\u201d Well-being. In \u201cLegal and Policy Challenges in a Theater of Operations,\u201d Col. Richard Whitaker and RADM Jim McPherson discussed \u201cchallenges for military commanders\u201d around laws of armed conflict and international humanitarian law. These speakers described themselves as legal advisors to \u201cclients\u201d (e.g., military contractors). Their role is to give \u201clegal \u2018reads\u2019\u201d of situations where operations (e.g., killing, torture) might be carried out; carry out covert operations and \u201cdetainee ops,\u201d and prioritize their \u201cclient\u2019s career, operational opportunity, and Congressional funding.\u201d
\nWhile it is not surprising that a lawyer prioritizes the needs of their clients, this priority is disturbing when a military contractor\u2019s \u201cclient interest\u201d invariably means escalated violence. For example, referencing a talk from the conference (discussed shortly in this article) about the potential for a US-backed \u201cregime change\u201d in Iran, Whitaker noted that \u201coperational lawyers would immediately say, \u201chow can I weaponize or operationalize that?\u201d Similarly, the speakers\u2019 legal concern with the International Criminal Court (ICC) was grounded entirely in the interests of military personnel and contractors. When asked how much they think about the ICC in their work lives, McPherson said, \u201cA lot! Particularly when figuring out where our bosses can travel. For example, Kissinger has arrest warrants out in a bunch of different countries.\u201d
\nFurther, United States Special Operations Command (SOCOM) was framed by Whitaker as \u201ca global combatant commander with personnel in 82 countries doing \u2018all sorts of neat things\u2019 and making \u2018innovative legal arguments for four-star commanders.\u2019\u201d \u201cInnovative,\u201d here, means that SOCOM is finding new and improved ways to justify force. SOCOM\u2019s presence in 82 countries\u2014undeniable evidence of militarized imperial expansion\u2014is framed as a good thing, a site that students should look to as a site of innovation.<\/p>\n

2. Pushing for military\/police collaboration. At the Friday night keynote, Rear Admiral (RADM) James McPherson, 39th Judge Advocate General of the US Navy, invoked a history of \u201cdomestic terrorism\u201d in the US (tracing it to the US post-Reconstruction, the 1920s, the 1960s, Timothy McVeigh, and 9\/11) to argue for more collaboration between military and police: \u201cThe FBI has open terrorism investigations in all 50 states. We need a hybrid between law enforcement and military. How would we do this as policy makers?\u201d
\nIt is important to consider the context in which this call is being made. In response to the brutal crackdown on protests in Ferguson following the murder of Mike Brown, the Black Lives Matter movement has called for the demilitarization of the police. Additionally, there have been several recent exposes on FBI entrapment schemes, where undercover agents profile Muslim communities and produce many \u201cdomestic terrorism\u201d cases. By arguing in favor of military\/police collaboration, McPherson is supporting an infrastructure that profiles, detains, incarcerates, and murders people of color in the US and around the world.<\/p>\n

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3. Framing deregulation as moral. Whitaker and McPherson explained that when military operations are contracted out, the US government is not directly held accountable for human rights violations. For example, the speakers explained that legally, Blackwater\u2019s Nisour Square killings in Iraq represent an \u201cindividual violation of the Geneva Convention\u201d because Blackwater had been contracted to \u201caugment\u201d US operations.\u201d Thus, the US government has no accountability for the actions of Blackwater.
\nWhat, then, is holding private military and security contractors accountable for human rights violations? Apparently, it is the market. In a talk on Somali piracy, a graduate of the SU College of Law argued that, although private security firms have been accused of \u201cexcessive force,\u201d these firms should not be regulated: \u201cCritics say there needs to be regulation. I argue that self-regulation by market incentives to keep clients has been successful. There is evidence that there is higher participation in regulatory agencies and compliance with international law when companies are concerned about keeping clients.\u201d
\nIn other words, he suggested, we should let the market decide whether these companies are the best option, rather than take a stand against \u201cexcessive force.\u201d The speaker legitimized \u201cexcessive force\u201d through a violent and dehumanizing portrayal of the people on the receiving end of the force: \u201cSomali pirates are often treated with a \u2018catch and release\u2019 philosophy that\u2019s usually reserved for trout.\u201d (This elicited a loud laugh from the room.)
\nWhile capitalism is often tied to moral good in political rhetoric, it was deeply troubling to see the market-as-inherent-good argument applied to privatized war, particularly in an educational setting.<\/p>\n

4. Equating military intervention with grassroots movements. Dr. Ivan Sascha Sheehan, PhD, of the School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Baltimore, discussed the possibility of US intervention supporting \u201cregime change\u201d in Iran by invoking three grassroots movements. First, he argued that South Africa required \u201cglobal assistance\u201d to end apartheid. In another example, Sheehan suggested that \u201cregime change\u201d can happen \u201cwith covert\/material help from the diaspora,\u201d citing Che Guevara\u2019s movement between various Latin American countries. Finally, he cited global use of Twitter\/social media in the Arab Spring as \u201ccrucial\u201d to the Egyptian Revolution.
\nThe US supporting and backing a coup\/\u201cregime change\u201d in Iran is fundamentally different than a worldwide bottom up movement to topple apartheid, Che Guevara\u2019s instrumental role in the Cuban Revolution, or global social media coverage\/circulation of a grassroots revolutionary movement. Framing all these things as \u201cexternal intervention\u201d flattens the differences between imperial intervention and the tactics of people\u2019s movements.
\n\u2013
\nThis is only a small slice of what was said at the conference. These speakers are high-ranking officials; they are people in power who interpret the law and make life-or-death decisions on the ground. They are offering this advice to students\u2014who will go on to work the jobs that justify imperial military aggression in banal, everyday acts. Student and community activists must continue to stand against this blatant show of empire-building on campus.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Vani is a doctoral student at SU. On February 27-28, 2015, the Syracuse University (SU) Student Association on Terrorism and Security Analysis (SATSA) held its yearly conference on campus,  entitled \u201cThe New Global Threat: Emerging Issues in National Security.\u201d SATSA publishes The Journal of Terrorism and Security Analysis, and is…<\/p>\n

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