Bad arguments against funded desertion

Overblown excuses masquerading as solid arguments

At the start of the Russian war against Ukraine, the economist Bryan Caplan made an interesting proposal:

Enticement to desert should be a standard part of military strategy, but hardly ever is. But let me propose a Version 2.0 to better fulfill the intent of the original offer.

Version 2.0: The EU, in cooperation with Ukraine, offers $100,000 plus EU citizenship to any Russian deserter. Russians can either go directly to the EU, or surrender to Ukrainian forces for speedy transport to the EU border.

The rough idea, I take it, is that it would be cheaper and morally better to drain the Russian army of manpower by luring away their soldiers, and breaking the Russian will to fight, with financial incentives. Recently, critics proposed several arguments against Bryan’s proposal. Whatever one thinks of his proposal—perhaps one worries it may push Russia closer to using nuclear weapons by cornering them further—these arguments are awful. There are too many to disarm at once—so this post focuses on a couple of real doozies. The first argument proceeds as follows:

THE DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE ARGUMENT

• Soldiers that are participating in their country’s unjust aggression against us are engaged in a serious collective wrongdoing.  

• If we defuse this threat by killing the soldiers that are participating in it (the WAR option), then we are achieving our defensive aims by punishing these wrongdoers (imposing costs on them)

• If we defuse this threat by offering money and relocation to the soldiers that are participating in it (the INCENTIVES option), then we are achieving our defensive aims by effectively rewarding these wrongdoers. 

• It is better, from the point of view of justice, that wrongdoers be punished rather than rewarded all else equal. 

• Therefore, from the point of view of justice, the WAR option is preferable to the INCENTIVES option.

The argument rests on a key premise—what philosophers call the major premise—that is initially plausible:

It is better, from the point of view of justice, that wrongdoers be punished rather than rewarded all else equal.

This principle strikes me as initially correct—one might have a quibble with some of the details, but overall it looks plausible. Whether one worries that not punishing wrongdoers would incentivize future injustice, or because one thinks that wrongdoers deserve to be punished, this principle has some obvious moral support.

A real problem with this distributive justice argument though—one among many—is the claim that Russian soldiers, merely in virtue of being Russian soldiers, are engaging in wrongdoing such that they are culpable for it. But that is just non-sense: it is plausible that many Russian troops are coerced into fighting, and would love the opportunity to do something else, something more productive.

To see why, imagine the following scenario: Sammy is robbed late a night as he walks home from work. The mugger uses a knife and the threat of lethal force to compel Sammy to surrender his wallet, watch, and other valuables. Sammy surrenders to the mugger. Here one could conclude that Sammy has done something wrong: by giving in to the mugger, instead of fighting back, Sammy has indirectly subsidized and enabled the mugger to continue mugging people using the threat of lethal violence. There is some truth to that charge, but the violent threat morally excuses the downstream consequences of Sammy surrendering his valuables. There is thus good reason to reject the following premise:

If we defuse this threat by offering money and relocation to the soldiers that are participating in it […], then we are achieving our defensive aims by effectively rewarding these wrongdoers.

Given our earlier clarification, there are a couple of problems with this premise. The first is that the author equivocates on the word ‘wrongdoer’—there are wrongdoers, and there are those who are forced with threat of violence into doing wrong. The former are those who would do wrong of their own accord, while those in the second group are doing wrong under threat, not of their own accord.

Second, bribing Russians soldiers, at least in some cases, isn’t rewarding wrongdoing, but rather giving people doing wrong under threat an option to escape from under that threat, thereby removing (or weakening) their incentive to do wrong. Not to mention, those at the top who are in fact wrongdoers—who choose to do wrong of their own accord—would be disincentivized by an effective desertion scheme from starting another war if they knew their soldiers would be bribed away from wagging war, with the promise of cash and citizenship, robbing them of the manpower needed for their wrongdoing.

The critics of Caplan’s proposal offer another terrible argument:

THE WRONG REASONS ARGUMENT

• An incentive is odious if it encourages individuals to do things for the “wrong reasons”.

• Financial gain is the wrong reason to participate in war. That decision should always be based purely on patriotic duty and/or a commitment to justice.

• Contracts for mercenary services are therefore odious because they encourage people to do things for the wrong reasons.

• Financial gain is also the wrong reason to refuse participation in war. This decision can be justified, but personal profit is never a suitable justification.

• Desertion incentives are odious for the same reason that mercenary contracts are odious; both encourage individuals to do things for the wrong reasons.

The wrong reasons concern is a long-standing philosophical issue. And in some cases, acting for the wrong reasons is morally bad. The fact that someone is generous is a reason to admire them. The fact that someone will pay you to admire them is also a reason to admire them. But there is a difference between these reasons: the former seems to be the ‘right’ kind of reason to admire, while the latter seems to be the ‘wrong’ kind of reason to admire. Or take another example: the fact that you love someone and want to have children with them is a good reason to marry them. The fact that someone’s father will pay you millions of dollars if you marry them is a bad reason to marry someone—one that will likely backfire if their spouse were ever to discover the reason real they married them.

A key premise in this argument is that,

Financial gain is also the wrong reason to refuse participation in war. This decision can be justified, but personal profit is never a suitable justification.

There are two majors problems with this key premise.

The first is that is assumes that the reason Russian soldiers would defect is solely for the money; but it could be that some Russian soldiers already want to defect for moral and personal reasons that we would consider legitimate but lack the money they would need to facilitate their defection. Imagine someone thinks that slavery is wrong, but is afraid to speak their mind publicly for fear of financial and social reprisal—perhaps they cannot afford to feed their children if that happens. However, they discover that many others in their community feel similarly, prompting them to speak up. Did they speak up for the wrong reason? No. The fact that they would have some social support, upon speaking up, only facilitated what they already wanted to do.

Second, even if Russian soldiers would defect purely for the bribe, and even if that is the wrong reason to defect, consider the alternative: they would otherwise be fighting a war against Ukraine based on the wrong reasons too. Allegedly reclaiming old parts of the Russian Federation is a poor reason to invade Ukraine, for example—morally far worse than deserting purely for monetary gain. Or, fighting to keep Russian authorities from killing them and their families—a good moral excuse, a poor moral justification. The point is that there are better and worse wrong reasons for actions like desertion and military service. Better to pick the best wrong reason if one must. Many times our choices are limited by circumstances and tradeoffs.

There are a few even worse arguments against Caplan’s proposal at the link. But the fact that the most plausible of the bunch are such weak arguments does not bode well for the others. Paying for desertion looks like a moral and financial bargain.