By way of Brendan James at The Dish comes this report by Ben Richmond on the disruption of vaccination efforts in rural Pakistan caused by the CIA smuggling a spy into Osama bin Laden’s refuge disguised as a health worker distributing hepatitis B vaccines. I won’t question the justice of killing bin Laden, nor will I call it useless because bin Laden may have been, by that point, barely even a figurehead of al Qaeda. I appreciate the value of propaganda by force in the important struggle against violent Islamists.
But when we reckon the costs against the benefits of killing terrorists, let us consider the 22 vaccination workers killed and 14 injured in retaliation attacks, or the many thousands who will be killed or maimed by polio, now that the realistic hope of soon eradicating that horrible disease has been set back, perhaps for a very long time. One wonders iƒ the cost to public health had any place in President Obama’s decision-making in approving this particular CIA operation. Is there anyone who speaks up for non-American interests? Is there any number of lives of the poor bystanders for whose sake a US president would judge it worth giving up a symbolic victory in the struggle to save American (and wealthy western more generally) lives? Other than because of threats of diplomatic or military retaliation against Americans.
I’d be genuinely interested if any political theorist has thought through how this calculus works.
Common Infirmities 