Doing Well, Not Doing Good

There is one statement of Linker's about Niebuhr that I must take issue with:

Niebuhr rightly remarks that Americans nearly always mean well when they act in the world. Our moral perils are thus “not those of conscious malice or the explicit lust for power.” Yet the rules of the world are such that good intentions—even our own—often lead to unintended bad consequences.

I think that is a very debatable point, actually. We Americans like to think that we always act around the world with overwhelmingly good intentions, and without the normal materialistic desires for prosperity or for power. You know, 'we're just defending freedom around the world.'  But isn't that really just a part of our national self-delusion?

Perhaps the most naked example of this was our invasion of Iraq in 2003.  That was sold to the American people as necessary in order to defend ourselves and the world against the aggressiveness of a madman, Saddam Hussein, who had WMD and who also had been a part of the 9/11 conspiracy.

Frankly, I didn't buy it at the time, and for a very simple reason.  Would we so quickly invade any nation that really had deployable WMD, and take the risk of the mass casualties to our soldiers and Marines?  We were so sure of our ability to defeat the Iraqis, and that would not have been the case if they truly had WMD.

No, I also thought that our reasons for invading were always more closely tied to our 'national self-interest', not for any altruistic or truly defensive reasons.  Among those most obvious motives: the vast oil resources of Iraq, the quasi-permanent military bases we would gain in the vital Persian Gulf region, and the support for Israel, that is so much a part of our national purpose recently.

We rarely if ever risk our national treasure and blood for primarily altruistic reasons.  It is nearly always to support some vital national self-interest, economic, political, or military.  Now, of course, we think that our national strength and self-interest is vital for the well-being of the world.  You know, 'what's good for business is good for the country.'  But I don't think the rest of the world buys that line most of the time.

Our 'good intentions' have mostly to do with our 'doing well,' not our 'doing good.'  This is something we need to admit, and perhaps confess. Or at least not feign goodness, and end up the hypocrite.