foreign affairs – We The People

Will Michael Flynn be Prosecuted by the Logan Act?

On November 30th, Michael Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI. This raised questions about the Trump administration and the “Logan act.” The Logan Act forbids Americans from unauthorized negotiations with foreign governments, especially those that seek to “defeat the measures of the United States” aimed at those same countries. In short, it protects the ability of the U.S. government to conduct foreign policy without interference from private citizens.”

The Logan Act accusations started in the summer of 2016 when Donald Trump told Russia to find Hillary Clinton’s missing emails. In February, the White House said that they were confident Michael Flynn didn’t say anything that violated the Logan Act. Should the Trump administration be worried? No, no one has ever been prosecuted through the Logan Act. It’s mainly just used as a political scare tactic. Newsweek wrote about how Michael Flynn probably won’t be convicted:

What the Act criminalizes is an unusually harmful subset of communications with foreign governments: ones intended to “defeat” concrete “measures” of the United States, or to undercut the authority of a sitting President by altering how foreign governments will resolve pending “disputes or controversies. In other words, the Logan Act’s limited domain ensures that transitional figures won’t be jailed for swapping pleasantries with foreign leaders or even engaging in substantive foreign-policy discussions with the United States.”

I don’t think Michael Flynn intended to do any of this especially since he’s a decorated general and was on the transition team.

Early Tuesday morning, a U.S District Court judge ordered Robert Muller to turn over any information on Michael Flynn tbe used for sentencing. A sentencing date has not been yet announced, but people have been speculating sometime in February. The majority of political sites are saying that it is going to be hard to prosecute Michael Flynn.

If they would try to prosecute Michael Flynn they would also have to prosecute Nancy Pelosi For violating the law when she went to Syria against the State Department’s wishes. Last year Robert F. Turner chimed in:

Ms. Pelosi’s trip was not authorized, and Syria is one of the world’s leading sponsors of international terrorism. It has almost certainly been involved in numerous attacks that have claimed the lives of American military personnel from Beirut to Baghdad.

Jimmy Carter also violated the Logan act. The OPU blog stated when he visited Hamas in 2008. He said that no one from the State Department told him not to, but Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had said:

The State Department had explicitly informed Mr. Carter that it opposed his plans to meet with leaders of Hamas.

Will these two ever be tried under the Logan Act?

The First Thanksgiving… and Diplomatic Empathy

Image: Faith and History

In late September or early October 1621, the Pilgrims hosted a celebration of their first harvest. The Native American tribe, Wampanoag, that had helped them through the spring came with twice as many people, making it an overwhelmingly Native American celebration. While there was turkey, deer was the main course, it was a multi-day affair and there was not enough tables nor chairs to seat everyone. This celebration has been heralded as the first Thanksgiving, despite the fact, Puritans defined a Thanksgiving as a period of prayer and devotion to God, not a meal or celebration. Every year, Thanksgiving is held throughout America with a turkey dinner on the fourth Thursday of November commemorating that celebration. Despite the historical fallaciousness, the sentiment shines through. In modern America, Thanksgiving is a time to be thankful for what you have, the first Thanksgiving was the Pilgrims celebrating their first harvest and possibly was their way of thanking the Wampanoags. The Pilgrims owed the Wampanoags not only for single-handedly saving the Pilgrims lives that wretched first year but also for the political connection to the Native American tribes that allowed the Pilgrims to be active diplomatic players in North America and would continue to help them for years to come. The political bond formed between the Wampanoags and Pilgrims was an incredible feat given the huge cultural difference between the groups and that the Wampanoag’s past experiences with white settlers had been overwhelmingly negative. In fact, the Wampanoags and other Native American tribes had at very least discussed killing the Pilgrims when they first arrived. In the end, the Wampanoags helped them out of their own necessity. They were a small tribe, weakened by diseases and increasingly threatened by the stronger more populous tribes surrounding them. They decided to become allies of these new settlers who brought technology the Native Americans were familiar with but didn’t have a source for. For the Wampanoags, it was a risky bet that they hoped would have a high political and financial payout.

The Pilgrim-Wampanoag alliance was an extremely beneficial one. They both benefited in trade and were much safer than they would have been alone. Amazingly this alliance lasted nearly 50 years, and so did peace between the Pilgrims and Wampanoags despite the fact that everything about the culture of Native Americans and Pilgrims was different, their languages, their traditions, their religions. The alliance was an incredible feat of diplomacy between the two groups, created primarily by mutual necessity and opportunism but also an incredible amount of empathy. The Pilgrims came from Europe in the 17th century, where people were seen as less for having a different religion or race, but in this new world, the Pilgrims couldn’t afford to be intolerant. The two peoples coexisted in a way future settlers wouldn’t even be able to imagine. The Pilgrims hired Native Americans, stayed in their Wigwams during diplomatic meetings and a few Native Americans even lived with the Pilgrims. The Pilgrims treated Native Americans and their ways with respect, they were even subdued in their Puritan evangelism. Possibly the best account of how much respect the Pilgrims had for the Native Americans was a trial. In 1638 four European settlers robbed and killed a Native American. The Pilgrim’s court found the settlers guilty and executed them. The Pilgrims saw a Native American life as equal to a European’s.

Leading up to King Philip’s war in 1675, the European settlers became less and less empathetic to the Native Americans. Missionaries began converting tribes to Christianity, a religion Philip, the new leader of the Wampanoags, was increasingly wary of. More Europeans poured over from Europe and they bullied the Wampanoags into giving up more land than the tribe could survive without. The Europeans provoked the Wampanoags more and more until one event finally sparked King Philip’s war. Three of Philip’s men were accused of killing a European educated Native American. The three were found guilty despite the fact only one witness had seen the alleged events and the law required two witnesses. The Pilgrims hung the three Native Americans, the last of the three hangings failed because the rope broke and the Pilgrims forced a confession from the third Native American after already hanging the other two, securing their second witness. It was a demolition of justice and started the war Philip had already been preparing for. A war that the Europeans had forced upon the Native Americans by trying to take over and bully them. The Pilgrims had treated their neighbors as subhuman. The result was a war. One that the Europeans won, but not without paying a heavy price. One in ten soldiers on both sides was killed and 1,200 homes of colonists were destroyed. The colonists lived in terror during the war and felt its financial effects long after.

That war might have been inevitable for America due too the number of Europeans coming in who needed to take land from someone and the natural clash between government and cultures, but if the Pilgrims had been more respectful, diplomatic and empathetic with their neighbors they could have left that war for another group of colonists. As it was, they put themselves in a similar situation to the one they had been in 55 years prior, months before the first Thanksgiving when they were low on supplies and terrified. That Thanksgiving was the Pilgrims reaping the benefits of a win-win alliance they created with the Wampanoags when they had been in that dark desperate situation. In the modern world, our countries need win-win solutions. Life is better in a peaceful world. Any conflict, whether physical, economic, or political, hurts civilians. Also, bullying may have worked for America’s forefathers but the world is different today, the United States can’t force Mexico to pay for a wall, or North Korea to give up its weaponry or China to stop building islands, we need diplomatic win-win solutions and we need people who have empathy, who can look at thing from other people’s point of view, to create those win-win solutions.

This Thanksgiving let’s be thankful for the leaders around the world working in governments, nonprofits, and privately to make the world safer. Let’s be thankful the UN exists, as an organization that is dedicated to creating diplomatic solutions. Let’s be thankful the United States and any other country that signed the UN charter into law must seek diplomatic solutions before starting a war. Let’s be thankful the world has come a long way in diplomacy since 1675.

Another Atrocity In Syria

Image: VOA News via AP Images

On the fourth of April, the Assad regime attacked civilian targets in Syria. A doctor in a hospital near the attack told CNN, “Today around 7:30 a.m., about 125 … arrived to our hospital. Twenty-five of them were already dead, 70% to 80% of the wounded people were kids and women.” He went on to describe symptoms indicative of a sarin gas attack. More than eighty-six people died in the chemical attack on Khan Sheikhoun, a small town in Syria. The main hospital in Khan Sheikhoun was bombed as well. Neither of the attacks seemed to have any counter-terrorism purpose. In response, Trump fired fifty-nine missiles at the air base responsible for much of Assad’s bombing in Syria.

In 2013, a similar attack by Assad happened with very different results. Over a thousand people were killed in a sarin attack by the Assad regime in 2013. The attack was investigated by the United Nations and was a human rights scandal even though Assad had attacked his citizens with chemical agents before in much smaller attacks. In Syria’s six-year civil war, Assad’s regime has been accused of torture, sieging cities and starving innocent citizens, chemical warfare and other war crimes. Assad’s government is in a fight against rebel groups that include ISIS but is also an oppressive regime that has repeatedly targeted civilians instead of rebel groups and terrorists. Obama’s secretary of state, John Kerry, even conceded that Assad’s regime used chemical warfare. America’s previous policy did include removing Assad from office, but Trump’s air strike was the first American attack on the Assad regime.

Because it is backed by Russia and stands between ISIS and complete control of Syria, attacking the Assad regime could lead to a disastrous international fallout. This is why Assad has been able to use chemical warfare on civilians without fear of being attacked by a superpower. By attacking Assad, Trump attacked an ally in the fight against ISIS. America has supported rebel troops trying to overthrow Assad while Russia has supported Assad claiming that ISIS will take over Syria without his leadership. Opponents of Russia’s viewpoint claim ISIS has taken over much of Syria because the Assad regime was not stable enough to fight back well. If America continues to attack and possibly overthrow Assad, it would be up to the rest of the world to create a stable government fast enough to stop ISIS from taking over. It is also worth noting that citizens may be less likely to join ISIS or Al-Qaeda if they feel the West is doing something to stop the bombing and terror that comes with daily life in Syria.

Russia has already responded to the attack on its ally in a joint statement with Iran that says, “What America waged in an aggression on Syria is a crossing of red lines. From now on we will respond with force to any aggressor or any breach of red lines from whoever it is and America knows our ability to respond well.” This means if America attacks the Assad Regime again it might start a war with Russia and Iran. Once again the world may be teetering on the edge of a world war. But at the same time, how can America and the rest of the free world continue to allow a brutal and repressive government to abuse its people?

Trump added more frightening dimensions to the story by not getting congress’s approval before issuing the air strikes. This could be illegal and shows he is willing to attack countries without going through the necessary diplomatic steps. When Obama considered bombing Assad in 2013, he got congress’s approval, yet Trump neglected to go through the fundamental procedure. Trump has been criticized for his flippant statement on nuclear weapons while on the campaign trail; he even asked why we were making nukes if we weren’t going to use them, demonstrated minimal to no knowledge of the nuclear triad, and refused to promise not to nuke Europe. He also said we had to be unpredictable with nuclear power and said he was okay with countries such as South Korea and Saudi Arabia getting nuclear power. In some cases, he even encouraged it. He has also been criticized for suggesting that America should torture the families of terrorists and commit other war crimes. Because of these statements, it is especially worrying to see him bomb Assad without going through congress, in a move that can be seen as having little foresight. Next time, he may decide to drop a bomb on a city instead of an air base. Also, the decision has been criticized because it makes little sense strategically in that it did little more than anger Assad. Planes started taking off from the airbase America bombed less than 24 hours after it was bombed. Comedian John Oliver had made a joke, saying, “Delta passengers experience more significant delays on a daily basis.”
Thomas Friedman had said, speaking of the Syrian crisis, “If there were a good, easy solution it would have been found already.” The decision to fight Assad or let him do as he pleases without fear of retaliation is foreign policy at its most treacherous. Both choices have a very real human cost and a million repercussions, but to some extent, they also come down to how much Americans care about Syrians being slaughtered and living in terror. Enough to risk the lives of Americans? Enough to let them into our country? Enough to send money and aid?

As for the air strikes, many human rights advocates are just thankful a foreign power is finally standing up for the civilians of Syria. These people are being attacked by ISIS, other rebel groups and their own government in a brutal civil war. They face a perilous and often deadly journey to a refugee camp if they decide to leave. Whether you agree with Trump’s retaliation or not, keep the people of battle torn Syria in your thoughts.