Rejoinder to Kevin Duffy on War and Israel

By Walter E. Block

Let me start out my response to Mr. Duffy on a positive note. He is kind enough to call me one of his “libertarian heroes.” I gratefully accept this accolade from him. He also characterizes me as a protégé of my mentor and friend, Murray N. Rothbard. That is not only a signal honor. It is hard for me to think of a greater compliment.

Now for my critique. Duffy quotes Mr. Libertarian (Rothbard, 1973) as saying “War, then, is mass murder, and this massive invasion of the right to life, of self-ownership, of numbers of people is not only a crime but, for the libertarian, the ultimate crime.” Further, in his Graustark and Belgravia example Duffy mention this claim of Mr. Libertarian’s: “… because inter-State wars inevitably involve both mass murder and an increase in tax-coercion, the libertarian opposes war. Period.”

This is far from the only time that the mentor of both Duffy and yours truly avers such a claim. Here is yet another one: “War is Mass Murder, Conscription is Slavery, Taxation is Robbery.” (Rothbard, undated)

Nor can we forget this gem along these same lines from this author (Rothbard, 1963): “… are libertarians going to wax properly indignant about price control or the income tax, and yet shrug their shoulders at or even positively advocate the ultimate crime of mass murder?”

Duffy then quotes me and my co-author Alan Futerman (2023) to the effect that Israel is entirely justified in waging war against Hamas, in reaction to the atrocity perpetrated by them on innocent civilians on October 3, 2023. He mentions this statement of ours about the West: “In other words, it needs to support a complete, total and decisive Israeli victory. If this implies an overwhelming, unprecedented use of military force, so be it. Hamas is and will be responsible for any civilian casualties. Cause and effect. They created their own destruction, and its consequences.”

Here is Duffy’s criticism of the foregoing: “This in (sic) no minor deviation [from Rothbardianism]. Do I sense a fracture within the libertarian community regarding the killing of civilians in war or has Professor Block simply gone AWOL?”

Well, yes it cannot be denied that I have indeed “gone AWOL.” But not from libertarian principles; rather, from what Duffy has mentioned of Rothbard in this regard.

But there are problems with Duffy’s understanding. First of all, Murray has himself gone AWOL from libertarian principles, which allow for self-defense. When “the government of Graustark invades the territory of Belgravia,” contrary to Rothbard, the latter has every right to conquer the former.

Second, Murray Rothbard blatantly contradicts himself. On the one hand, as we have seen, he condemns war, all war, every war, no exceptions, in the most rigorous and uncompromising terms possible. It is wrong, “period.” No quarter does he give to the phenomenon; no compromise here; no exemptions.

On the other hand, he has supported at least two wars of which I am cognizant. One of them is the South against the North in 1861 and the other in behalf of the thirteen colonies vis a vis England in 1776. If that does not constitute a total contradiction, there is no such thing as a logical contradiction. Don’t believe me? Here is Rothbard (1963) on this matter in his own words:

“There have been only two wars in American history that were, in my view, assuredly and unquestionably proper and just; not only that, the opposing side waged a war that was clearly and notably unjust. Why? Because we did not have to question whether a threat against our liberty and property was clear or present; in both of these wars, Americans were trying to rid themselves of an unwanted domination by another people. And in both cases, the other side ferociously tried to maintain their coercive rule over Americans. In each case, one side — ‘our side’ if you will — was notably just, the other side — ‘their side’— unjust.

“To be specific, the two just wars in American history were the American Revolution and the War for Southern Independence.”

Here, again, we find Rothbard contradictorily supporting war:

“… while war in the narrower sense is a conflict between States, in the broader sense we may define it as the outbreak of open violence between people or groups of people. If Smith and a group of his henchmen aggress against Jones and Jones and his bodyguards pursue the Smith gang to their lair, we may cheer Jones on in his endeavor; and we, and others in society interested in repelling aggression, may contribute financially or personally to Jones’s cause.” Cheering Jones? That is indistinguishable from cheering warfare in behalf of him.

He continues in this vein: “The libertarian’s basic attitude toward war must then be: it is legitimate to use violence against criminals in defense of one’s rights of person and property…” It cannot get much clearer than that. Duffy correctly quotes Rothbard to the effect that war is necessarily unjust in several places. But there are yet others where he takes the exact opposite position.

Here is more pro-war material from Mr. Libertarian (1994): “My own view of war can be put simply: a just war exists when a people tries to ward off the threat of coercive domination by another people, or to overthrow an already-existing domination…. Even a just war cannot be entered into lightly….”

Further, there is nothing in the entire edifice of libertarian doctrine that condemns war per se. War simply consists of fighting on the part of thousands, maybe millions, of people. The initiation of violence, to be sure, is fully incompatible with the non-aggression principle (NAP) of our beloved philosophy, but whole-heartedly supports forcefulness in response. Support for defensive violence is by no means required of libertarianism; pacifism, too, is compatible with this doctrine, but it is by no means mandated.

If A hauls off and punches B in the nose without any provocation or previous injustice, the latter is entirely justified in retaliating. (I assume that no agreement has been made between the two of them what would justify A’s behavior, such as a voluntary boxing match, or sado-masochism). If B may properly respond forcefully against A, then millions of B’s made do exactly that against of millions of As. That, in a nutshell is war.

Defensive war is hence justified, period, to employ the linguistics of my very much mistaken mentor in this one instance. War is not at all mass murder, Rothbard to the contrary notwithstanding. Rather, offensive war, certainly is nothing but that. Defensive war is justified according to black letter libertarian law.

But does not Hamas have at least some justice on its side? Did not Israel in effect “fire first,” with a long record of abuses it had imposed upon the Gazans? No. A thousand times No. These Arabs have killing Jews from time immemorial. The Jewish state has been extremely gentle, way too gentle in my humble opinion, in dealing with pogroms emanating from that quarter. Jewish civilians have suffered greatly from suicide bombers, from an almost continual barrage of rockets heading eastward from Gaza. And this is to say nothing of the massacre of October 7, 2023. (Block and Futerman, 2021)

So, Mr. Duffy, I have not at all gone AWOL from libertarianism. Au contraire, the supposed libertarians who support the mass murdering Hamas, and oppose Israel’s right to fight back, have done exactly that.

Pegs: