The documentary directed by Errol Morris represents us 11 lessons from Robert S. McNamara who was the former president of World Band, the first Ford Motor president who was not named after Ford and then the Secretary of Defense of the United States from Kennedy Period to Johnson Period. McNamara didn’t think that he was qualified for the position the Secretary of Defense at the end of 1960 when he was in Ford Motor Company, but Kennedy insisted that his background as the commander of World War II and his Pragmatism which was based on logical analysis make him the best person for this critical position. McNamara at that time didn’t know how much he would pay for his decision in the future.
Realist or not?
Just by watching McNamara’s earlier life through the film and no matter what he said later as an old man who was emotionally talking about his past as the Secretary of Defense also as a husband who deeply loved his wife, he is a realist.
During World War II, it was McNamara that recommended the air force to bomb Japanese cities by using B-29, quickly weakening Japan for just one night. He has always been in accordance with General Curtis LeMay in this point. He repeated what LeMay said after a wingman died from attacking from 5,000 feet in resolute and decisive manner, “I sent him ［the wingman］ there. And I've been there, I know what it is. But, you lost one wingman, and we destroyed Tokyo.” (Morris 2003) As we learn from lesson 4 which is to maximize efficiency during the war. If one want to achieve something one must sacrifice some other things. Like McNamara said that killing is sometimes saving. In China, there is a adage which is “You cannot both get fish and a bear’s paw at the same time.” That means if you want to eat fish then you cannot eat other kind of meat dish. You can only choose one you like more. That’s totally realism. According to realism, survival is one of the three main principles. McNamara had chosen to survive so he only focused on defeating Japan as soon as possible.
And in Cuban Missile Crisis it was the same. During the phone calling part, when Kennedy asked what to do with Cuba, he immediately claimed that they should make a striking plan to get ready to invade Cuba. He thought that the Cuban nuclear weapon was a big treat to America, and for the security of his country he need to defense first.
Even though he made a mistake, when he talked about it he seemed not felt that guilty. So we are going into the most contradictory part, and here is when McNamara began to doubt about himself. Two destroyers of the United States reported that they had been attacked. Though no one was certain about the attacker, Johnson and McNamara did believe and assume it was done by Northern Vietnam as a test of their durability, which turned out later to be a mistake. As a response, McNamara formulated the bombing program “Rolling Thunder”. Even at that time when he talked about the mistake which was the blasting fuse of Vietnam War he still didn’t think that he should be sorry for that. He said “everyone makes mistakes” with his shoulder shrugging a little bit like it was something normal. Because at that time when he decided to hit back, all in his mind was that Vietnam was attacking United States and this was a danger to his country. He only wanted to face the reality and stop this kind of invasion. All he had to do was just to fight before things getting worse. It was all originated in the same perspective just as before, so why should he be sorry for that? Until then, we still can assert that McNamara was a realist. But what makes us question about this assertion is coming.
In USA the Vietnam War can also be named as the McNamara War. But in the film, when 85-year-old McNamara was talking to 45-year-old McNamara, it seems that he was the backbone force in restricting the Military. And he highly praised in the Cuban Missile Crisis how President Kennedy focused on the main force of their enemy, making an agreement with the Soviet Union head Khrushchev as Tommy Thompson suggested, thus avoiding a devastating nuclear war. And McNamara still believes that if Kennedy had not been assassinated in 1963, the government of United States would in most cases withdraw troops from Vietnam in 1965, there wouldn’t be a 10 year long cruel Vietnam War.
It was like he would rather get rid of his noble position just for stopping the war. And in fact he did so. But what about the “killing for saving” before?
“In order to do good, you may have to engage in evil. ” This was from the Responsibility Theory in 1946 for introspecting about the World War II brought out by philosopher Reinhold Neibuhr. He thought that World War II was an American war of justice, even though they all violated the principle of not hitting the civilian. And American people must learn to accept this kind of moral idea. “We have certain ideals, certain responsibilities. Recognize that at times you will have to engage in evil—but minimize it.” (Morris 2003) And with the lesson 5 “Proportionality should be a guideline in war” McNamara at last concluded that if there had to be a war, it should be a war of justice just as what he thought of LeMay’s actions toward war were.
Justice is the relevant means of organizing social relations and their conflicting claims. The demands of justice exist paradoxically within the human heart. On the one hand, justice is imperfect. If humans pursue only justice then justice will inexorably fade out of existence and self-interest would take over. (Mark 231)
Even though McNamara was looking back to history just as Neibuhr
did, but all his experience pointed to the future, just to provide something
the young generations to refer to, to path way for the nuclear war in the future.
His educational background made him a rational analyst in data and strategy of war. His job made him a realist. Even though he admitted that the war brought too much misery for the civilians, he insisted that in a great measure it was because of the president. He said that the war was too complex for people to understand. And as for the responsibility and the guilty, he didn’t say a word. Because from the point of realism, he didn’t do anything wrong. His only fault was that he realized too late that the Vietnam War was meaningless. He resigned not because of the death number. If the Vietnam War would lead to a meaningful result, he wouldn’t resign no matter how many people would sacrifice.
If Secretary of Defense McNamara had been informed by Neo-liberalism, would it have been an effective way to avoid the need for his “eleven lessons”? My answer would be “No.”
Neo-liberalists believe that in order to counterbalance the fear that results from the anarchical international system, it is imperative that states peacefully coexist and create political, economic, and social ties to one another through treaties, alliances, and membership of international organizations and institutions.
“I'm not so naive or simplistic to believe we can eliminate war,” McNamara told Morris, “We're not going to change human nature anytime soon.” But he was not at all realism, because he was not blind at all. He could see through what he was doing and at the same time analyzing if he was doing the right and useful thing. So as Kennedy thought that he was a pragmatist.
Realism can be problematic for pragmatists where realists fear pragmatism's relativism, pragmatists fear realism's authoritarianism. This combination of realism and pragmatism basically represented the Guiding Ideology of the Kennedy Government and the Military Doctrine of the Cold War. Just as McNamara said “I was in Cold War!”
In the book written by David Halberstam which discussed the causes of the Vietnam War, The diplomatic of the United States Democratic Party Chester Bowles once wrote in his diary that “The new government is lack of a firm belief about what is right and what is wrong.” He thought that even though this kind of pragmatism which mostly relied on the logical analysis and mathematical operation did got the right answer in the shortest time, once the country went into the situation of specific international dispute, without taking the basic moral perspective into consideration, the pragmatism always cause the government to make wrong decisions which could not last long. Such as the Bay of Pig Events in Cuba.
As McNamara said, one of President Kennedy’s excellences was that he could introspect the logical reasoning and withdraw troops when it was necessary.
In the film we can see many times Domino were pushed down one by one on the map of Southeast Asia to indicate that the Kennedy Government determined to defeat the communist force of Vietnam then to pin down the whole East Asia by armed force in the early 60s. The Government took the independence of Vietnam for granted all for the leading position in Military force and thought spread strategy when facing the Communism during the Cold War. It wasn’t until that 58,000 American soldiers, causing an Anti-War wave that the Government started to think about withdrawing troops. I don’t think that the 30,000 Vietnam deaths were under the moral norms of the Government.
When McNamara talked about the bombing in Japan when assisting the General Curtis LeMay, being asked that if they should do this to Japanese civilian, the answer was a mater-of-course. Because if they hadn’t blown the willpower of Japanese Military thoroughly, it would have been the American soldiers that dying like Japanese.
In the book < The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara> by James G. Blight and Janet M. Langd, they provided a group of data which was in the 19th century , the rate of civilian death was 10%, in the World War II, it was 50% but 75% in 20th , called “McNamara’s Century”.
Nevertheless, all the wars in the world, no matter it was the 911 Event or the Gulf War, they all held the flags calling for freedom, for democracy. The Fog of War that McNamara said was that the modern war is becoming more and more complicated, more and more variable, and it was almost impossible for one not to make any mistake.
But I think there is something deeper inside. And that’s why I don’t think the influence of Neo-realism would eliminate the need for his <11 lessons> because his way to survival made him to be responsible and loyal for what he was doing which was to win the war for the competing interests, which was the Elitism covered by the Justice.
The two most common approaches, idealism and realism, and their offspring, Neo-liberalism and Neo-realism, are illustrated by two former Harvard professors and leaders in U.S. government, Henry Kissinger and Robert McNamara. For Kissinger, it’s not so much a question of universal moral principles; it is primarily a question of taking care of America’s national interests in a world compromised by human nature’s inherent pursuit of power.
If human nature is the problem, how to deal with it is the issue. The history of humanity’s attempts to do so does not give much cause for hope. We must admit that no method of taming human nature has yet been found. Albert Einstein famously said that it is easier to denature plutonium than to change human nature.
Just as what McNamara said at the end of the film, “There is a poem from T.S Eliot that I just love, ‘We shall not cease from exploring. And at the end of the exploration, we will return to where we started. And know the place for the first time. ’And that’s the sense where I’m beginning to be.”
What did he mean by return to where we started? Human nature I think. No matter what kind of perspective we stand for. We are human beings, even animals.
From the New Testament comes a relevant question: “Do you know where your fights and arguments come from?” The answer in the Apostle James’s words: “They come from the selfish desires that war within you. You want things, but you do not have them. So you are ready to kill and are jealous of other people, but you still cannot get what you want. So you argue and fight.” (James 4:1–2, New Century Version).
