Where do we go with this State sponsored murder stuff: “Intercepts Solidify C.I.A. Assessment That Saudi Prince Ordered Khashoggi Killing.”

Though we all hate it, State sponsored killings happen.  Yikes, did I just say that?!  But where do we go with the harsh blatancy that was associated with the ruler (de facto) of Saudi Arabia ordering the murder of an inconvenient critic of that authoritarian dictator ruled State?   (Uh, please excuse my biased description of Saudi Arabia and calling it what it is – a dictatorship – not a kingdom of princes and princesses, and kings and queens, we all in the West like to gush over due in no small part to so many Disney classics).  The simple answer is found in another question: what is in America’s best interests in the assessment of our empowered Executive Branch’s estimate?

The Khashoggi murder scandal disturbs the conscience – as it of course should.  Regardless of whether you like Saudi Arabia or not, and regardless of whether you believe Khashoggi, a U.S. resident, U.S. Green Card holder (https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2018/10/12/here-why-should-care-about-khashoggi-case/h3R3EFF3gSljvmCzmBtnyK/story.html), and Washington Post columnist (https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2018/10/18/who-jamal-kashoggi-former-royal-court-confidante-turned-critic/1684611002/), was a friend or foe of U.S. and Saudi interests, State sponsored murders, killings, assassinations are detestable to most of us – unless, that is, they are done against villain’s as defined by the “good-guys” (as in Hollywood’s Mission Impossible and Jason Borne movies, etc.).  So, yes, they happen.  But, they in real life are a Pandora’s Box most of us shudder at the thought of opening for fear of them becoming mainstream and spiraling out of control into oppressive police state circumstances where none of us are safe and we live in fear of the State (Recall Stalin and the Soviet Union, or, today’s Putin and N. Korea’s Kim Jung un, etc., etc.).

States direct assassinations.  We only need to recall Russia’s recent murder of Sergei Skripal using military grade nerve agent in London (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/britain-charges-two-russians-with-attempted-murder-of-ex-spy-with-nerve-agent/2018/09/05/db99c5c8-b0f7-11e8-a20b-5f4f84429666_story.html?utm_term=.73e75ed2641c), or North Korea’s recent murder of their leader’s half-brother, Kim Jong-nam, in Malaysia using VX (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-43312052).  We can even consider another case of State directed killing that occurred on May 2, 2011 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Osama_bin_Laden).  On that date, as we all know, President Obama ordered the invasion of Pakistan targeting and killing Osama Bin Laden – (assumptively with the intent to capture alive and bring to trial in accordance with standards of widely accepted international law).  State directed assassinations happen.  (Anecdotally and off topic, the Osama / Pakistan thing resulted in my christening of the “Osama Bin Laden Memorial Tactical Operations Center” in Israel – a dark military operations officer humor and story for another day – my gosh, I can see the red flags going up already - yikes).

Of course, all cases have their unique characteristics and arguments over the moral foundations that underpin the orders given by the State to kill people considered worthy of such action.  And, we all make a judgement on when and when not the action of killing is justified.  Crown Prince (“I gag”) Mohammad Bin Salman was “cold-shouldered” at last week’s G-20 meeting by many of the western leaders – but not the U.S., Russia, or China (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-12-01/saudi-prince-finds-both-friends-and-disapproval-at-g-20-summit).  His ordering of Khashoggi’s murder, dismemberment, and “baggie stuffing” of the resultant mess in the Saudi Consulate in Turkey seems to have crossed some line in what is okay in the minds of the leadership and peoples of numerous countries. 

So, I go back to the question: what is in America’s best interests in the assessment of our ruling Executive Branch’s estimate?  In this instance of State sponsored killing, America’s leadership has calculated that it is better to excuse this circumstance verses take a more simplistic ethical, and populist, position that punishes Saudi Arabia as an unconscionable action that cannot be tolerated in a civilized world – presumably for numerous reasons that are well published – including Saudi Arabia’s importance to the U.S. interests as a counter-balance to Iran.  This is because of something we’ve doctrinally defined in our War Colleges and Pentagon as “Wicked Problems” (http://adminpubs.tradoc.army.mil/pamphlets/TP525-5-500.pdf):

“Ill-Structured Problems (Wicked Problems).  Ill-structured problems are the most interactively complex, nonlinear, and chaotic—and therefore the most challenging.  Unlike well- or medium-structured problems, professionals will disagree about how to solve this type of problem, what should be the end state, and whether the desired end state is even achievable.  At the root of this lack of professional consensus is the difficulty in agreeing on the structure of the problem.  Unlike medium structured problems, it is not clear what action to take, because the nature of the problem itself is not clear.  In 1972, a professor of Design at UC Berkeley, Horst Rittel, described the characteristics of socially complex problems, which he called “wicked problems”—not wicked in the sense of evil, but rather extremely difficult.”

As congress remains without a consensus on how to sweep this circumstance under the proverbial rug and confront Saudi Arabia and the Executive Branch on this “Wicked” Khashoggi murder problem, I also wrestle with what the right thing to do.  Simple moral me says this murder is outrageous and Saudi Arabia and/or the Crown Prince (“I Gag”) should be held to account and pay a stiff price.  However, the responsible senior leader in me, who is charged with dealing with “wicked problems”, mission analysis, and the variables associated with alternative courses of action, knows a more thoughtful and pragmatic approach needs to be considered.

Since I am consistently on the record with the Utah Bull Moose Party, and my bias’ are well documented, I think we should always “Do the Right Thing” even when it is painful.  I would not be in favor of spending treasure and going to war over this circumstance, but I would be in favor of laying out the facts, without undermining our intelligence apparatus, and publishing what we call in Embassy speak a formal demarche condemning Saudi Arabia’s actions – perhaps in the next U.N. General Assembly – and using the occasion to delineate the values America stands for.  Values that we must recognize can be used against us by our foes, however do not have to be a constraint in any given circumstance simply by freely articulating our position relative to a given circumstance, and avoiding our values from becoming a handicap, vulnerability, or liability.   Also, America routinely imposes penalties against governments for individuals guilty of crimes against humanity.  Penalties often include the cooling of diplomatic relations, reductions in foreign assistance, bi and multilateral engagements, and withholding of endorsements for key representational positions on the global stage that give nations, in the community of nations, legitimacy.  The end state should be to reaffirm what America stands for, and call for Saudi Arabia to reassess who among its hundreds of royal princes (I gag) should be next in line for the crown (still gaging) if America’s C.I.A. intelligence report is accurate that the Saudi Crown Prince  (I gag) is responsible for the murder.

I say this because if we don’t call Saudi Arabia out on this, then we are just another thug on the global stage that will justify the behavior routinely exercised by those we call enemies.  Our American Values and upholding them, but not being hamstrung by them, are in our nation’s best security interests and are a critical lever in maintaining American power on the global stage - even in this current time when American power on the global stage is being laid into question due to relative decreasing GDP, international political policy, and accumulation of U.S. debt - matters we must fix. 

Excusing free-wheeling State sponsored murder is not in the direction of America’s best security interests.

There you have it…

COL (Ret.) Michael Seguin (USA)