What's the difference between paying someone to kill another country's soldiers, and arming that someone to kill another country's soldiers?

Question

This question is inspired by this New York Times article. The crux of the article is that some Russians think if the GRU are paying the Taliban bounties to kill US soldiers (something denied by both the Taliban & Russia), then the US deserved it, because they also gave the mujahideen weapons in 1979-1989 to kill Soviet soldiers as part of Operation Cyclone.

Superficially it seems to me that the ultimate aim of both these activities is the same - kill as many of the rival power's soldiers as possible without directly getting involved. But the US political response to the alleged bounty program has been unanimously negative, implying they are not drawing the same parallel that the Russians are doing, presumably because they reject the comparison as invalid.

The question is: what is the difference between the two activities that makes the comparison invalid? What justifies providing weapons, but not providing a bounty? Have any US leader directly compared the two, and if so, what was the justification they offered?

Answer 1

When a nation provides arms to another nation, there is at least the pretense that the recipient will use those weapons in accordance with international law (i.e. defensively in accordance with Article 51 of the UN Charter). When a nation directs another nation to attack, that pretense crumbles. Of course that's between nations. There used to be principles in international law where damages might be owed for arms sales to belligerents, e.g. after the UK sold warships to the Confederates during the American Civil War.

But that happened one and a half centuries ago, and the Afghanistan example you cite was during the Cold War. Back then there were measures like CoCom, so it wasn't exactly "business as usual."

So arguably the Russians went back to what they and the Americans did in the Cold War, yet the current US Administration wants to re-invite the Russians to the G7/G8 ...

Answer 2

Defense vs. Offense

If you provide arms to a country, you can claim it was for purely defensive purposes, which is considered a valid right by every nation (and certainly every nation with a military).

If you provide a bounty for the death of particular individuals, then you are saying: "Our interests are not naturally aligned, but I will align them by proffering a financial incentive." If the targets needed to be eliminated to secure the country, then no bounty should be required. The money says: "Those people don't need to die to make your country secure. They need to die because I want them dead." This is literally "contract killing", and no country's legal system allows that as a matter of course.

Comparisons

Thus, we see that the CIA offering weapons to the Afghan Mujahideen is not contract killing, because the CIA didn't need to tell the Mujahideen to target anyone in particular. However the Afghan Mujahideen chose to use the weapons was more or less aligned with the CIA's interests.

While the CIA has been involved in coups all around the world, they primarily worked with actors that had aligned interests. So, without condoning its behavior, it is fair to say that as far as we know, the CIA has not needed to compel lethal action via direct financial incentives. It has largely been sufficient to provide weapons, transport, and logistics to actors who are already internally motivated to work towards a particular outcome.

Perhaps the closest American case would be that of the failed 2020 Venezuela coup attempt. In this case, mercenaries were allegedly contracted by the Guaidó administration-in-exile (for lack of a better term). However, in the end, it is presumed that the ill-fated operation proceeded because of the $15 million bounty on Maduro placed by the US government. Technically, the bounty is for information leading to the arrest of Maduro, not his assassination. However, one can presume that actually handing over Maduro in handcuffs would also qualify. Presumably, handing over Maduro in a body bag would not, since the US does not have provisions for arresting dead bodies.

Answer 3

Warfare has a geopolitical goal: it aims to secure or defend political control over a particular state or territory. Death and destruction are unfortunate but incidental by-products of trying to achieve the goal. Most warfare is legitimized and excused by the ideal that death and destruction will be minimized as much as possible, and targeted at 'combatants': people and institutions that physically oppose the geopolitical goal in an organized manner, and any bases or industries that provide combatants with the essentials of combat. The death and destruction of warfare is meant to be practical and impersonal; targeting groups or people for unnecessary or prejudicial harm is often considered a war crime, and is always looked on with distaste.

We can argue about how well or how much that ideal matters in actual strategic decisions, but the ideal of war as a noble and dispassionate business has far-reaching influence.

This is where the difference lies. Providing a military group with weapons works on the presumption that they are operating within the normal ideals of warfare: i.e., that this military group wants to exert geopolitical control, and that they are focussed on that goal and that goal alone. If another nation agrees with that goal, then providing the military group with weapons and support is natural and unobjectionable. However, when a military group is targeting civilians, specific groups, public buildings, or the like — when they stray outside the broadly defined category of 'combatants' — they begin to engage in what we typically call terrorism, ethnic cleansing, assassination, police states, pogroms, total war, etc. The military group is no longer engaged in 'warfare' in the ideal sense, but in something more unsavory and disreputable. Most nations will withdraw 'official', 'public' support from such groups, to avoid being tarred with that offensive brush; no nation wants to be seen as supporting 'evil'.

If a nation like Russia to offers bounties on specific troops they have stepped out of the normal ideal of dispassionate warfare, because their goal is no longer merely to help a military group achieve territorial control. They've entered into something that lies between terrorism and targeted assassination, which would ultimately damage their reputation. Of course, Russia is by no means the only nation that plays fast and loose with the ideals of warfare — consider the ongoing use of CIA drone strikes, or the recent US assassination of an Iranian general — but the point still stands that these kinds of acts are political nightmares. People and nations alike expect warfare to follow certain rules and principles; violating those expectations can have significant international consequences.

Answer 4

Arming someone to defend themselves is an act of overt friendship. Whether they use those weapons overtly to prosecute an act of defense or offense is on them, not on their friends who helped them. They are not compelled to kill by this transaction.

Paying someone a bounty, on the other hand compels them by motive of profit to commit killings. They are compelled to kill by this transaction. This is an act of war.

In the case of the alleged Russia/Taliban transactions, this bounty has not been confirmed at all by

1. any credible witness,

2. any credible document, and

3. any credible money trail.

Therefore it is apparently just a rumor that was picked up by Intelligence sources, and these sorts of rumors can be leveraged to try to deceive one party or other into an act of unjustified war. The President is wise to demand authoritative verification before acting. Otherwise he could be manipulated by anyone who wanted to start a rumor and inject it into Intelligence streams.

Answer 5

I think this question, and the answers, entirely miss the point. It's not that there is actually any particular difference, or any specific ethical issue here. It is simply a question of US/Russian relations, and US domestic politics.

Specifically, in the 1970s, the US and USSR were in a state of proxy warfare. (The "Cold War", if you remember?) Both sides armed various forces, and had their militaries fighting in various countries.

Now in 2020, the US and Russia are supposedly at peace. (And I doubt that many Americans consider Russia to be a serious rival :-)) The US President, Donald Trump, claims that his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, is his "good buddy", and that the two countries are on good terms. (Source: search for "Trump Putin relationship, and read a few of the 9 million or so hits.)

Therefore, to discover that the Russians are supposedly paying bounties for killing US soldiers casts doubt on the sincerity of this relationship. Further, the fact that Trump knew about these allegations (or should have known, as it was in his intelligence briefings) casts doubt on his competence. Especially in an election year, it becomes an issue for his opponents to use, and the New York Times has not exactly been noted for its support of Trump.