Matthew, You wrote: I can't see how being in a supporting role to combatants is much more justifiable than being a combatant. If anyone disagrees with this assertion I would be anxious to hear them out as it would solve my problem entirely.
That's interesting. You've said that you recognize that under Objectivism there is a valid role for the military in general. Ayn Rand gave speeches to the cadets at West Point - she may have had strong disagreements with America participating in the war in Vietnam, and certainly with the military draft, but not with the training of officers... even if at that time the officer training would support the war in Vietnam, and many of those officers would end up commanding draftees in ways that led tens of thousands of them dying. The heart of the matter lies in what is the specific immorality that shouldn't continue, and what constitutes your "support" specific to that immoral set of actions, and who is the cause of the actions being put into play. I'm sure that Ayn would never have condoned those who were members of draft boards. And she certainly didn't support those politicians who made the decisions as to how the war was fought in Vietnam. Nathaniel Branden was a speaking on behalf of Objectivism/Capitalism at a conference of some sort, and during lunch he, another speaker, who was speaking on behalf of socialism, and a number of students of Objectivism were at a table eating. The socialist asked if someone would pass the salt. Nathaniel passed him the salt. And some of the students were agast that he would, in effect, support the socialist - actually helping him. I wish I could remember what Nathaniel said, the actual words, because it was the kind of proper parsing of categories that this discussion needs. But basically, passing the salt to that fellow didn't move socialism forward, and it didn't compromise Nathaniel's principles. Be careful not to make the mistake that much of society did back in the Vietnam days. They condemned those wearing a uniform for what was ordered by politicians. Today, people tend to recognize that the soldiers are carrying out orders and that orders aren't clearly immoral as were, for example, the orders to the soldiers of Nazi Germany who ran the concentration camps. Are you "supporting" an immoral act, or are you "supporting" the functioning of the military? As long as our military is not an evil organization, that is a critical distinction. I, along with all other taxpayers of every kind and stripe are THE supporters of the government (except where it gets funding via borrowing and printing money). I know of a great many immoral acts being carried out by the government. But I would never voluntarily cease funding the government when the result would be imprisonment for me. But more to the point, I can't separate out what funds go to what projects. I wouldn't want to defund military defense of our country, for example, but my support is general and I can't make my support specific. Ayn could be supportive of West Point, while not being supportive of Johnston or Nixon in their manner of pursuing of the war. You believe in the military. I assume you believe in the marines in general, but I don't know at what organizational level or specific project or policy you find yourself deeply at odds. I don't know what your job description is, so I can't say anything about what that kind of activity does or doesn't support. And I don't know exactly which kinds of military actions the Marines are now engaged in that you find so deeply immoral that you would be willing to take life-altering actions to disassociate yourself from them. You wrote: ...providing a service that directly and solely supports a group of individuals (combatants) performing actions one believes to be immoral.
What specifically is the service? And what specifically are the immoral actions?
----------------------- You asked what I considered to be "seriously immoral actions" - in this military context that's pretty easy to answer. An example would be killing civilians when it wasn't needed as part of an all-out war where our national survival was at stake - like it was in WWII. There we killed lots of civilians with bombs. The same kind of thing, done even on a much smaller scale, where our national survival wasn't even in question, would be immoral. Being asked to torture, or imprison, or harm people who aren't clearly aren't enemy combatants would be another example. Being asked to take actions that clearly violated our constitution, that would be another. The military has its chain of command and the need for orders to be followed, but this isn't like it was centuries ago. We have seen that "I was just following orders" isn't an adequate defense. We have things that are considered "war crimes." And no officer has the right to order someone to violate the constitution. Our voluntary military has given substance to concepts like individual initiative over blind obedience.
-------------- You wrote: My point being, why would one need to wait to be given these immoral orders for lying as a preventitive measure to be justified in your opinion as I understand it, rather than upon recognizing that the orders you have voluntarily signed a contract saying you will follow, are immoral.
You would have to be able to say, specifically what orders are we discussing. Otherwise that just doesn't make sense. And once you have specified the orders that would be immoral, you would have to show that they are on-the-way, maybe even imminent, at least certain, before one could talk about a justification/defense against them. For example, I can't say that this person, a known thug, is going to assault me and therefore justify shooting him. Not until there is a some specific act that can be named that he might initiate against me, and reasonable certainty that the act is imminent.
| 
