What constituents “doing anthropology”? I will only speak of my eight months of experience in Iraq as a social scientists for the HTS program, but in my experience, and from other social scientists have told me, long-term ethnography does not exist. We have exchanges with locals but repeated interaction (more than once and more than 30 minutes) is extremely rare.

I introduce myself as a social scientist and tell them exactly why I would like to talk with them. I do not take names nor even want to as it is unimportant to the mission of providing population perceptions. Individual opinion is irrelevant as notes are collapsed into lump population opinion. If they indicate they do not want to talk or if it looks like they are uncomfortable them we walk away. There are plenty of locals who want their voice heard and in my opinion they appreciate our openness.

So can anyone tell me the difference between doing ‘anthropology’ and applying a method of qualitative assessment? Anthropology has not held the copyright on qualitative research for many decades now. If what we do is not anthropology then really all we have is a bunch of individuals who happen to be anthropologists protesting military actions. It will not have deleterious effects to anthropology as a discipline or individual research. I see HTS social scientists as doing qualitative assessments and not anthropology. Maybe my definition of cultural anthropology is to strict.

Also, good point about the archaeologist someone posted. It is also in my experience that whole discipline of anthropology is not at odds with HTS. Cultural anthropologists are more sensitive to it but they do not speak to biological anthropologist, archaeologists, and others. Granted, the AAA is the umbrella organization for American anthropology but I find it amusing that cultural anthropologists think they speak for the discipline-at-large. Maybe one day I may even join AAA- highly unlikely. Unless of course finally decide to attend a AAA conference and become forced to join just register to attend which I believe is the case. Correct if I am wrong on this.

There has been internal discussion of archaeology’s role in the HTS/counter-insurgency (although evidently not much, as my own search for it brought me here!), but a lot of intrigue/concern has foundered on the very lack of information to sate it (so another reason so much more had been said about anthropology was because so much had been said, so much was known to be commented upon).

(I guess also sometimes archaeologists may be invisible, but nonetheless present in references to anthropologists, because of the American construction of archaeology as part of anthropology, rather than a distinct or historical discipline.)

What are archaeologists’ roles in counter-insurgency? We know they’re studying the historical record of insurgencies, so presumably archaeologists are doing that. We know they’re trying to win wars and maintain occupations, so presumably archaeologists are involved in that, too, identifying historically-strategic sites and strategies.

Perhaps one worry is that archaeologists have been co-opted, not just unwillingly, but unknowingly (thereby precluding contemplation of that exploitation), when they’ve appealed for cultural heritage protection, or they’ve been approached for information ostensibly for cultural heritage protection, and Babylon has been militarised, Ur has been militarised.

I know that the archaeologists have good intentions, and I’m sure that even some of the military do, but how are they using the information they’re gathering? Are they misusing it? We don’t know, in an absolute sense, and that makes it difficult to debate the issue.

We would be debating hypotheticals without any hope of direction or resolution. We could have the debate, but we wouldn’t know what effect the hypothetical use of our knowledge was having; and we wouldn’t know whether they were actually using our knowledge or not.

Even if we could agree that it was unethical to provide information that would be misused, we couldn’t make them prove a negative (that they’re not misusing our knowledge) as a prerequisite of helping to protect cultural heritage. So, we’re waiting on a revelation.

As for the legality of the war: the UN Charter, to which the U.S. is a signatory, says that countries can go to war in self-defense or if they are backed by a UN resolution. Neither was the case when the US invaded Iraq. It is clearly, as Kofi Annan says, an illegal war.

Again, thank you for the unnecessary but appreciated response. I looked at the link you provided. Very interesting. You are probably right that legal scholars have debated this issue thoroughly. I think, that if the war was in fact illegal, we would have heard a much bigger stink than has been the case. I’m still leaning towards not illegal for the war in Iraq. But Afghanistan is not marred with questions of illegality, is it? Alas, these questions are very much a different topic.

Thanks, again, for your blog.

Gonzo