Essay on The Right to Physician Assisted Suicide - 1887 Words

The right to assisted suicide is a significant topic that concerns people all over the United States. The debates go back and forth about whether a dying patient has the right to die with the assistance of a physician. Some are against it because of religious and moral reasons. Others are for it because of their compassion and respect for the dying. Physicians are also divided on the issue. They differ where they place the line that separates relief from dying--and killing. For many the main concern with assisted suicide lies with the competence of the terminally ill. Many terminally ill patients who are in the final stages of their lives have requested doctors to aid them in exercising active euthanasia. It is sad to realize†¦show more content†¦For the terminally ill, however, it is just a means of prolonging suffering. Medicine is supposed to alleviate the suffering that a patient undergoes.Yet the only thing that medical technology does for a dying patient i s give that patient more pain and agony day after day. Some terminal patients in the past have gone to their doctors and asked for a final medication that would take all the pain away- lethal drugs. For example, as Ronald Dworkin recounts, Lillian Boyes, an English woman who was suffering from a severe case of rheumatoid arthritis, begged her doctor to assist her to die because she could no longer stand the pain (184). Another example is Dr. Ali Khalili, Dr. Jack Kevorkians twentieth patient. According to Kevorkians attorney, [Dr. Khalili] was a pain specialist; he could get any kind of pain medication, but he came to Dr. Kevorkian. There are times when pain medication does not suffice(qtd. in Cotton 363). Terminally ill patients should have the right to assisted suicide because it is the best means for them to end the pain caused by an illness which no drug can cure. A competent terminal patient must have the option of assisted suicide because it is in the best interes t of that person. Further, a dying persons physical suffering can be most unbearable to that persons immediate family. Medical technology has failedShow MoreRelatedThe Rights Of Physician Assisted Suicide1347 Words   |  6 PagesThe Right to Die By: Antony Makhlouf Antony Makhlouf PHR 102-006 Contemporary Moral Issues Final Paper The Right to Die Physician-assisted suicide, also known as euthanasia, has been a hot topic as of late. If you do not know what this is, physician-assisted suicide is the taking of ones life. This usually occurs when a patient is in a irreversible state, and must live through a tube. With multiple cases occurring in the past, current and the more to occur the in the future, this looksRead MoreThe Right Of Physician Assisted Suicide1968 Words   |  8 PagesThe Right to Physicians Assisted Suicide Brittany Micceri Dominican College Dr. Bonk November 15, 2015 The Right To Physician Assisted Suicide Physician assisted suicide, or PAS, has always been a very controversial topic. This touches upon the healthcare side of the large spectrum of social problems today in America. An individuals view on this issue might vary depending on their political ideology. Modern conservatives might not necessarily agree withRead MorePhysician Assisted Suicide And The Rights Of Patients1523 Words   |  7 PagesPhysician-assisted suicide needs to be recognized by the federal government to show terminally ill patients that their right to autonomy is not being ignored. The Bill of Rights of Patients was constructed to outline just this. According to the American Cancer Society, â€Å"the American Hospital Association drafted a Patients’ Bill of Rights to inform patients of what they could reasonably expect while in the hospital.† One of the notes stated in the Bill of Rights of Patients is the right to autonomyRead MoreThe Right to Physician Assisted Suicide Essay590 Words   |  3 Pages Assisted suicide, by definition, is suicide facilitated by another person, especially a physician, in order to end the life of a patient suffering from an incurable or life-threatening illness. Ever since its first use in the 1970s, physician assisted suicide has been a topic of much controversy in the modern world. Issues surrounding the life or death of a person come with many sensitive areas of concern, including financial, legal, ethical, spiritual, and medical matters. Today, physician assistedRead MoreThe Right to Commit Physician-Assisted Suicide1685 Words   |  7 PagesThe Right to Commit Physician-Assisted Suicide Physician-assisted suicide is suicide by a patient facilitated by means or information (as a drug prescription or indication of the lethal dosage) provided by a physician who is aware of how the patient intends to use such means or information (â€Å"Physician-assisted suicide†). Physician-assisted suicide should be accessible to the incurably ill patient. Allowing a patient to have this freedom could, for one, bypass tremendous pain and suffering.Read MorePhysician Assisted Suicide : A Right Of The People1700 Words   |  7 PagesPhysician-Assisted Suicide: A Right of the People Most people have seen at least one person in their life suffering in unbearable pain up to their death, and it’s never something people find joy in. There is nothing pleasing about being in pain or watching someone be in pain. For those people whose pain does not respond to methods of modern medicine, there should be the option of physician-assisted suicide. â€Å"Physician-assisted suicide refers to the practice of a physician prescribing or regulatingRead MorePhysician-Assisted Suicide: Right or Wrong?1053 Words   |  4 PagesHead: RIGHT OR WRONG? Physician-Assisted Suicide Physician-assisted suicide occurs when a physician helps in the requested death of a voluntary patient (Smith, 2012). In most cases, the patient is terminally ill. A recent study revealed that pain or unbearable pain is not a major motivating factor for the request (Foley et al, 2001). Rather, the motivating factors are the effects of illness, the patients sense of self, and fears about the future. Methods used in conducting physician-assisted suicideRead MorePhysician Assisted Suicide Is A Human Right1809 Words   |  8 Pagesâ€Å"Death with dignity is a human right: to retain control until the very end and, if the quality of your life is too poor, to decide to end your suffering; the dignity comes from exercising the choice† 1 Have you ever had to watch a loved one suffer, with no chance of recovery? Cancer, and other fatal diseases take the lives of people we love every day. It’s hard to sit by and watch someone suffering when they are ready to let go. Think about an animal who is terminal and in pain, the only reason weRead MorePhysician Assisted Suicide: The Right to Choose2029 Words   |  9 Pagesyou know, about 57% of physicians today have received a request for physician assisted suicide due to suffering from a terminally ill patient. Suffering has always been a part of human existence, and these requests have been occurring since medicine has been around. Moreover, there are two principles that all organized medicine agree upon. The first one is physicians have a responsibility to relieve pain and suffering of dying patients in their care. The second one is physicians must respect patients’Read More Physician Assisted Suicide: The Right To Choose Essay2607 Words   |  11 Pagesrecognized physician performing assisted suicide, Dr, Jack Kevorkian, was sentenced to ten to twenty-five years in prison for second degree murder and three to seven years for delivery of a controlled substance. Assisted suicide happens when a person co mmits suicide with the help of someone else. Physician assisted suicide is generally pain free and, as some would say, the most peaceful way to die. Should it be the right of terminally ill patients to decide if they want to seek out physician assisted suicide

Business Regulation Law 531 - 1295 Words

Business Regulations Simulation Law/531 Business Regulation Simulation When conducting business whether it is local and global, big or small organizations have to abide by state and federal laws. Depending on the nature of the business different organization has to comply with certain laws and regulations. For example, retailers like Wal-Mart, Target and Kroger have to comply with the Department of Labor and a manufacturing company like LM Fiberglass and Toyota would have to comply with the Environmental Protection Agency and Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). When an organization do not comply with the state and federal regulation the company can face fines or become caught up in major†¦show more content†¦In this case of negligence Bates must prove that Alumina had a duty to keep the PAH levels contained. In a case Alumina breaches that duty by not staying in compliance with the EPA regulation several years ago. Bates assumes that the consumption of the water cause th e harm of her daughter to have leukemia. In response Alumina chose to conduct an independent site study for new violations. The reports come back good the PAH levels were well below the standard. After releasing a partial audit report Bates has threaten to file a lawsuit against Alumina of personal injury to recover compensation and punitive damages. Alumina negligent conduct of â€Å"serious violation of environmental laws five years ago is the cause of her daughter leukemia,† alleged by Bates (Business Regulations Simulation, 2010). The best resolution for this situation is mediation by a neutral third party, by choosing this options Alumina can provide Bates with a confidential settlement. The settlement includes that Alumina provides Bates with reimbursement of medical expenses for her daughter treatment a lump sum for future treatments and a college fund set aside if her daughters recovers from the leukemia (Business Regulations Simulation, 2010). Although tort liability is founded on intended harm strict liability is attached even though the defendant has been reasonable. In the Article titled â€Å" The American Influence on Canadian TortShow MoreRelatedWhich S takeholders Can Currently Be Considered to Be Part of the â€Å"the Company† for the Purpose of the Directors Duty to Act in the Best Interests of the Corporation?1667 Words   |  7 Pagessubstantial part of the company’s business can be defined as a director. The legal definition of director is stated under section 9 of the Corporations Act[1] which indicates that, it is more appropriate to look at the function of the people rather than at the job title itself. 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Russian Revolutions of 1917 Essay Example For Students

Russian Revolutions of 1917 Essay Russian Revolutionsof 1917The abdication of Emperor Nicholas IIin March 1917, in conjunction with the establishment of a provisional governmentbased on Western principles of constitutional liberalism, and the seizureof power by the Bolsheviks in November, are the political focal pointsof the Russian Revolutions of 1917. The events of that momentous year mustalso be viewed more broadly, however: as an explosion of social tensionsassociated with rapid industrialization; as a crisis of political modernization,in terms of the strains placed on traditional institutions by the demandsof Westernization and of World War I; and as a social upheaval in the broadestsense, involving a massive, spontaneous expropriation of gentry land byangry peasants, the destruction of traditional social patterns and values,and the struggle for a new, egalitarian society. Looking at the revolutionaryprocess broadly, one must also include the Bolsheviks fight to keep theworlds first proletarian dictatorship in p ower after November, firstagainst the Germans, and then in the civil war against dissident socialists,anti-Bolshevik White Guards, foreign intervention, and anarchist peasantbands. Finally, one must see the psychological aspects of revolutionarychange: elation and hope, fear and discouragement, and ultimately the prolongedagony of bloodshed and privation, both from war and repression, and thebony hand of Tsar Hunger, who strangled tens of thousands and, in theend, brought the revolutionary period to a close after the civil war byforcing the Bolsheviks to abandon the radical measures of War Communismin favor of a New Economic Policy (NEP). We will write a custom essay on Russian Revolutions of 1917 specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now Throughout, the events in Russia wereof worldwide importance. Western nations saw immutable values and institutionssuccessfully challenged, COMMUNISM emerged as a viable social and politicalsystem, and Third World peoples saw the power of organized workers andpeasants movements as a means of liberating themselves from bourgeoisexploitation. As such, the Revolutions of 1917 ushered in the great social,political, and ideological divisions of the contemporary world. Historical BackgroundHistorians differ over whether the Revolutionsof 1917 were inevitable, but all agree on the importance of three relatedcausal factors: massive discontent, the revolutionary movement, and WorldWar I, each operating in the context of the ineptitude of a rigid, absolutiststate. The emancipation of the serfs in 1861 left the countrysidein deep poverty. The newly freed peasants received inadequate land allotments,particularly in areas of fertile soil, and even these had to be purchasedwith redemption payments. Class antagonisms sharpened, particularly sincegovernment-promoted industrialization sent impoverished peasants flockingto jobs in urban areas for low wages under oppressive conditions. Governmentefforts to industrialize also required huge tax revenues, which intensifiedpressures on workers and peasants alike. Meanwhile, the rising businessand professional classes expressed unhappiness with tsarist rule and yearnedfor a Western-style parliamentary system. By 190 5 discontent amongthe bourgeoisie, peasantry, and proletariat had spurred Russian intellectualsto create the major political organizations of 1917. Populist groups, organizedin the countryside by the 1890s, joined radical socialist workers groupsin the founding of the Socialist Revolutionary party in 1901. The MarxistSocialDemocratic Labor party was established in 1898. Five years laterit divided into two factions: the Mensheviks, who favored a decentralized,mass party; and the Bolsheviks of Vladimir Ilich LENIN, who wanted a tightlyorganized, hierarchical party (see BOLSHEVIKS AND MENSHEVIKS). Middle-classliberals formed the Constitutional Democratic party (Cadets) in 1905. Russian losses in the RUSSO-JAPANESE WAR precipitated the RUSSIAN REVOLUTIONOF 1905. The massive urban strikes, rural rioting, and almost total liberaldisaffection from the tsarist regime in 1905 have been called a dressrehearsal for 1917. Reluctantly, Nicholas II granted a range of civilliberties, established limited parliamentary government through a DUMA,abolished peasant redemption payments, and under Pyotr STOLYPIN began anagrarian reform program to promote the growth of a rural middle class. These measures momentarily quieted the populace, but they also raised newexpectations; many concessions were later withdrawn, thus exacerbatingtensions. Furthermore, the social stability that some thought the tsarspromises offered required time to develop, and this Russia did not have. The March RevolutionIn 1914, Russia was again at war. Landreform was suspended, and new political restrictions were imposed. Disastrousmilitary defeats sapped public morale, and ineffective organization onthe home front made the governments incompetence obvious to all. The emperor,assuming command of the army in 1915, became identified with its weakness. The sinister influence of Empress ALEXANDRAs favorite, Grigory RASPUTIN,increased. By the winter of 1916-17, disaffection again rent all sectorsof society, including liberals, peasants, and industrial workers. .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c , .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c .postImageUrl , .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c .centered-text-area { min-height: 80px; position: relative; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c , .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c:hover , .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c:visited , .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c:active { border:0!important; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c .clearfix:after { content: ""; display: table; clear: both; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c { display: block; transition: background-color 250ms; webkit-transition: background-color 250ms; width: 100%; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #95A5A6; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c:active , .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c:hover { opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #2C3E50; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c .centered-text-area { width: 100%; position: relative ; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c .ctaText { border-bottom: 0 solid #fff; color: #2980B9; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; margin: 0; padding: 0; text-decoration: underline; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c .postTitle { color: #FFFFFF; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; margin: 0; padding: 0; width: 100%; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c .ctaButton { background-color: #7F8C8D!important; color: #2980B9; border: none; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: none; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 26px; moz-border-radius: 3px; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: none; width: 80px; min-height: 80px; background: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/plugins/intelly-related-posts/assets/images/simple-arrow.png)no-repeat; position: absolute; right: 0; top: 0; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c:hover .ctaButton { background-color: #34495E!important; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c .centered-text { display: table; height: 80px; padding-left : 18px; top: 0; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c-content { display: table-cell; margin: 0; padding: 0; padding-right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-align: middle; width: 100%; } .u85dd605fc28858d06f4dd8baeb6d3c5c:after { content: ""; display: block; clear: both; } READ: What Is Cystic Fibrosis EssayWhen food shortages provoked street demonstrations in Petrograd on March8 (N.S.; Feb. 23, O.S.), 1917, and garrison soldiers refused to suppressthem, Duma leaders demanded that Nicholas transfer power to a parliamentarygovernment. With the Petrograd Soviet of Workers and Soldiers Deputies,a special Duma committee on March 15 (N.S.; March 2, O.S.) establisheda provisional government headed by Prince Georgi Lvov, a liberal. On thesame day, the emperor abdicated. He attempted to give the crown to hisbrother Michael, but Michael refused to accept it. The 300-year-old Romanovdynasty came to an end. The new provisional government wasalmost universally welcomed. Civil liberties were proclaimed, new wageagreements and an 8-hour day were negotiated in Petrograd, discipline wasrelaxed in the army, and elections were promised for a Constituent Assemblythat would organize a permanent democratic order. The existence of twoseats of power, howeverthe provisional government and the PetrogradSovietnot only represented a potential political rivalry but alsoreflectedthe different aspirations of different sectors of Russian society. For most Russians of privilegemembersof the bourgeoisie, the gentry, and many professionalsthe March Revolutionmeant clearing the decks for victory over Germany and for the establishmentof Russia as a leading European liberal democracy. They regarded the provisionalgovernment as the sole legitimate authority. For most workers and peasants,however, revolution meant an end to an imperialist war, major economicreforms, and the development of an egalitarian social order. They lookedto the Petrograd Soviet and other soviets springing up around the countryto represent their interests, and they supported the government only insofaras it met their needs. Political PolarizationDiffering conceptions of the revolutionquickly led to a series of crises. Widespread popular opposition to thewar caused the Petrograd Soviet on April 9 (N.S.; March 27, O.S.) to repudiateannexationist ambitions and to establish in May a coalition governmentincluding several moderate socialists in addition to Aleksandr KERENSKY,who had been in the cabinet from the beginning. The participation of suchsocialists in a government that continued to prosecute the war and thatfailed to implement basic reforms, however, only served to identify theirpartiesthe Socialist Revolutionaries, Mensheviks, and otherswith governmentfailures. On July 16-17 (N.S.; July 3-4, O.S.), following a disastrousmilitary offensive, Petrograd soldiers, instigated by local Bolshevik agitators,demonstrated against the government in what became known as the July Days.The demonstrations soon subsided, and on July 20 (N.S.; July 7, O.S.),Kerensky replaced Lvov as premier. Soon, however, the provis ional governmentwas threatened by the right, which had lost confidence in the regimesability to maintain order. In early September (N.S.; late August, O.S.),General Lavr KORNILOV was thwarted in an apparent effort to establish aright-wing military dictatorship. Ominously, his effort was backed by theCadets, traditionally the party of liberal constitutionalism. The crisesfaced by the provisional government reflected a growing polarization ofRussian politics toward the extreme left and extreme right. Meanwhile, another revolution was takingplace that, in the view of many, was more profound and ultimately moreconsequential than were the political events in Petrograd. All over Russia,peasants were expropriating land from the gentry. Peasant-soldiers fledthe trenches so as not to be left out, and the government could notstem the tide. New shortages consequently appeared in urban areas, causingscores of factories to close. Angry workers formed their own factory committees,sequestering plants to keep them running and to gain new material benefits. By the summer of 1917 a social upheaval of vast proportions was sweepingover Russia. The November RevolutionSensing that the time was ripe, Leninand the Bolsheviks rapidly mobilized for power. From the moment he returnedfrom exile on Apr. 16 (N.S.; Apr. 3, O.S.), 1917, Lenin, pressing for aBolshevik-led seizure of power by the soviets, categorically disassociatedhis party from both the government and the accommodationist socialists. Liberals support the war and the interests of the bourgeoisie! he insisted,adding that socialist lackeys aided the liberals by agreeing to postponereforms and continue fighting. With appealing slogans such as Peace, Land,and Bread! the Bolsheviks identified themselves with Russias broad socialrevolution rather than with political liberty or the political revolutionof March. Better organized than their rivals, the Bolsheviks worked tirelesslyin local election campaigns. In factories they quickly came to dominatemajor committees; they also secured growing support in local soviets. ABolshevik-inspired military uprising was suppressed in July. The next month,however, after Kornilovs attempted coup, Bolshevik popularity soared,and Lenins supporters secured majorities in both the Petrograd and Moscowsoviets, winning 51 percent of the vote in Moscow city government elections. .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad , .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad .postImageUrl , .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad .centered-text-area { min-height: 80px; position: relative; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad , .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad:hover , .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad:visited , .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad:active { border:0!important; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad .clearfix:after { content: ""; display: table; clear: both; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad { display: block; transition: background-color 250ms; webkit-transition: background-color 250ms; width: 100%; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #95A5A6; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad:active , .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad:hover { opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #2C3E50; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad .centered-text-area { width: 100%; position: relative ; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad .ctaText { border-bottom: 0 solid #fff; color: #2980B9; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; margin: 0; padding: 0; text-decoration: underline; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad .postTitle { color: #FFFFFF; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; margin: 0; padding: 0; width: 100%; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad .ctaButton { background-color: #7F8C8D!important; color: #2980B9; border: none; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: none; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 26px; moz-border-radius: 3px; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: none; width: 80px; min-height: 80px; background: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/plugins/intelly-related-posts/assets/images/simple-arrow.png)no-repeat; position: absolute; right: 0; top: 0; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad:hover .ctaButton { background-color: #34495E!important; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad .centered-text { display: table; height: 80px; padding-left : 18px; top: 0; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad-content { display: table-cell; margin: 0; padding: 0; padding-right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-align: middle; width: 100%; } .u1c3ef0e8308f4e4439424a2c103cf5ad:after { content: ""; display: block; clear: both; } READ: What Do Christians Believe About Ghosts? EssayReacting to the momentum of events, Lenin, from hiding, ordered preparationsfor an armed insurrection. Fully aware of what was about to transpire,the provisional regime proved helpless. On the night of November 6-7 (N.S.; October24-25, O.S.) the Bolsheviks seized power in Petrograd in the name of thesoviets, meeting little armed resistance. An All-Russian Congress of Sovietsof Workers and Soldiers Deputies, meeting in Petrograd at the time, ratifiedthe Bolsheviks actions on November 8. The congress also declared the establishmentof a soviet government headed by a Council of Peoples Commissars chairedby Lenin, with Leon TROTSKY in charge of foreign affairs. The Civil War and Its AftermathFew, however, expected Lenins proletariandictatorship to survive. Bolsheviks now faced thesame range of economic,social, and political problems as did the governments they had replaced. In addition, anti-Bolsheviks began almost at once to organize armed resistance. Some placed hope in the Constituent Assembly, elected November 25 (N.S.;November 12, O.S.); others hoped for foreign intervention. Few appreciatedLenins political boldness, his audacity, and his commitment to shapinga Communist Russia. These traits soon became apparent. TheNovember Constituent Assembly elections returned an absolute majorityfor the Socialist Revolutionaries, but Lenin simply dispersed the Assemblywhen it met in January 1918. He also issued a decree on land in November1917, sanctifying the peasants land seizures, proclaiming the Bolsheviksto be a party of poor peasants as well as workers and broadening his ownbase of support. He sued the Germans for peace, but under terms of theTreaty of BREST-LITOVSK (March 1918) he was forced to surrender huge portionsof traditionally Russian territory. Shortly afterward, implementing policiescalled War Communism, Lenin ordered the requisition of grain from the countrysideto feed the cities and pressed a program to nationalize virtually all Russianindustry. Centralized planning began, and private trade was strictly forbidden. These measures, together with class-oriented rationing policies, promptedtens of thousands to flee abroad. Not surprisingly, Lenins policies provokedanti-Bolshevik resistance, and civil war erupted in 1918. Constituent Assemblydelegates fled to western Siberia and formed their own All-Russian government,which was soon suppressed by a reactionary White dictatorship under AdmiralAleksandr Kolchak. Army officers in southern Russia organized a VolunteerArmy under Generals Lavr Kornilov and Anton Denikin and gained supportfrom Britain and France; both in the Volga region and the eastern Ukraine,peasants began to organize against Bolshevik requisitioning and mobilization. Soon anarchist Greens were fighting the Reds (Bolsheviks) and Whitesalike in guerrilla-type warfare. Even in Moscow and Petrograd, leftistSocialist Revolutionaries took up arms against the Bolsheviks, whom theyaccused of betraying revolutionary ideals. In response, the Bolsheviksunleashed their own Red Terror under the Cheka (political police force)and mobilized a Red Army commanded by Trotsky. The Bolsheviks defeatedAdmiral Kolchaks troops in late 1919, and in 1920 they suppressed thearmies of Baron Pyotr N. WRANGEL and General Denikin in the south. Foreigntroops withdrew, and after briefly marching into Poland the Red Army concentratedon subduing peasant uprisings. Some Western historians attributeultimate Bolshevik victory in this war to White disorganization, half-heartedsupport from war-weary Allies, Cheka ruthlessness, and the inability ofGreens to establish a viable alternative government. Most important, however,was the fact that even while Bolshevik popularity declined, Leni n and hisfollowers were still identified with what the majority of workers and peasantswanted most: radical social change rather than political freedom, whichhad never been deeply rooted in Russian tradition. In contrast, the Whitesrepresented the old, oppressive order. Nevertheless, with the counterrevolutiondefeated, leftist anti-Bolshevik sentiment erupted. The naval garrisonat Kronshtadt, long a Bolshevik stronghold, rebelled in March 1921 alongwith Petrograd workers in favor of Soviet Communism without the Bolsheviks!This protest was brutally suppressed. The Menshevik and Socialist Revolutionaryparties, harassed but not abolished during the civil war, gained supportas the conflict ended. The Bolsheviks outlawed these parties, signalingtheir intention to rule alone. Lenin, however, was astute enough to realizethat a strategic retreat was required. At the Tenth Party Congress, in1921, the NEW ECONOMIC POLICY was introduced, restoring some private property,ending restrictions on private trade, and terminating forced grain requisitions. The foundations had been laid for building Bolshevik socialism, but therevolutionary period proper had come to an end.

Space Shuttle Program Essay Example

Space Shuttle Program Essay This is an edited version of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board report released in August, 2003. It provides a comprehensive and often sobering example of management lapses that have severe consequences. The original report was over 280 pages. This edited version eliminates the much of the technical discussion and focuses instead on the organizational factors that lead to the accident. You may obtain the entire report from http://www. caib. us/news/report/default. html I have included some sections for background. Read these sections to gain an overview of the accident and the report. I have included some pages simply to provide context for sections that relate to questions below. I have placed arrows in the text to indicate those sections that are most important. Here Questions to Consider: 1. According to the report, what were the causes of the Columbia accident? 2. What were the essential features of the culture at NASA? 3. Which factors played the greatest role in the events leading up to the accident: logical factors, such as schedule, technicalities of the shuttle design, testing, or psychological, such as politics, the perspective of deadlines? 4. What was the meaning of February 19, 2004? . How did February 19, 2004 contribute to the Columbia accident? 6. How did management and workforce differ in their perspective on the pressure to meet 2/19/04? Why did they differ? 7. What types of schedule management tools did NASA use? Were they effective? 8. What were the de facto priorities of the shuttle program leading up to the accident? 9. How did these prioriti es shape management’s perspective on â€Å"facts† presented by engineering after the launch of ST-107? 10. Which perspective on communication best explains the findings in the report: communication as information flow or communication as influence? 1. Which was most important in explaining the cultural factors leading up to the accident: a lack of management or a lack of leadership? Why? 12. What role did the management’s perception of NASA’s history play in the events leading up to the accident? 13. What role did a willingness to learn from mistakes play in the events leading up to the accident? 14. Given the example of the Navy’s reactor safety program, how could NASA correct these organizational deficiencies? 15. Could NASA managers have done a better job if they had followed Descartes’ four rules for thinking? Why? 6. What role did PowerPoint play in management’s failures? 17. How do the reports conclusions about leadership, cultu re, change, structure and risk apply to the management of everyday projects? COLUMBIA ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION BOARD Report Volume I August 2003 ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION BOARD COLUMBIA On the Front Cover This was the crew patch for STS-107. The central element of the patch was the microgravity symbol,  µg, flowing into the rays of the Astronaut symbol. The orbital inclination was portrayed by the 39-degree angle of the Earth? s horizon to the Astronaut symbol. We will write a custom essay sample on Space Shuttle Program specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now We will write a custom essay sample on Space Shuttle Program specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer We will write a custom essay sample on Space Shuttle Program specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer The sunrise was representative of the numerous science experiments that were the dawn of a new era for continued microgravity research on the International Space Station and beyond. The breadth of science conducted on this mission had widespread benefits to life on Earth and the continued exploration of space, illustrated by the Earth and stars. The constellation Columba (the dove) was chosen to symbolize peace on Earth and the Space Shuttle Columbia. In addition, the seven stars represent the STS-107 crew members, as well as honoring the original Mercury 7 astronauts who paved the way to make research in space possible. The Israeli flag represented the first person from that country to fly on the Space Shuttle. On the Back Cover This emblem memorializes the three U. S. human space flight accidents – Apollo 1, Challenger, and Columbia. The words across the top translate to: â€Å"To The Stars, Despite Adversity – Always Exploreâ€Å" Limited First Printing, August 2003, by the Columbia Accident Investigation Board Subsequent Printing and Distribution by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the Government Printing Office Washington, D. C. 2 Report Volume I August 2003 ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION BOARD COLUMBIA EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Columbia Accident Investigation Board? s independent investigation into the February 1, 2003, loss of the Space Shuttle Columbia and its seven-member crew lasted nearly seven months. A staff of more than 120, along with some 400 NASA engineers, supported the Board? s 13 members. Investigators examined more than 30,000 documents, conducted more than 200 formal interviews, heard testimony from dozens of expert witnesses, and reviewed more than 3,000 inputs from the general public. In addition, more than 25,000 searchers combed vast stretches of the Western United States to retrieve the spacecraft? s debris. In the process, Columbia? s tragedy was compounded when two debris searchers with the U. S. Forest Service perished in a helicopter accident. The Board recognized early on that the accident was probably not an anomalous, random event, but rather likely rooted to some degree in NASA? s history and the human space flight program? s culture. Accordingly, the Board broadened its mandate at the outset to include an investigation of a wide range of historical and organizational issues, including political and budgetary considerations, compromises, and changing priorities over the life of the Space Shuttle Program. The Board? s conviction regarding the importance of these factors strengthened as the investigation progressed, with the result that this report, in its findings, conclusions, and recommendations, places as much weight on these causal factors as on the more easily understood and corrected physical cause of the accident. The physical cause of the loss of Columbia and its crew was a breach in the Thermal Protection System on the leading edge of the left wing, caused by a piece of insulating foam which separated from the left bipod ramp section of the External Tank at 81. seconds after launch, and struck the wing in the vicinity of the lower half of Reinforced CarbonCarbon panel number 8. During re-entry this breach in the Thermal Protection System allowed superheated air to penetrate through the leading edge insulation and progressively melt the aluminum structure of the left wing, resulting in a weakening of the structure until increasing aerodynamic forces caused loss of control, fai lure of the wing, and breakup of the Orbiter. This breakup occurred in a flight regime in which, given the current design of the Orbiter, there was no possibility for the crew to survive. The organizational causes of this accident are rooted in the Space Shuttle Program? s history and culture, including the original compromises that were required to gain approval for the Shuttle, subsequent years of resource constraints, fluctuating priorities, schedule pressures, mischaracterization of the Shuttle as operational rather than developmental, and lack of an agreed national vision for human space flight. Cultural traits and organizational practices detrimental to safety were allowed to develop, including: reliance on past success as a substitute for sound engineering practices (such as testing to understand why systems were not performing in accordance with requirements); organizational barriers that prevented effective communication of critical safety information and Report Volume I d Here stifled professional differences of opinion; lack of integrated management across program elements; and the evolution of an informal chain of command and decision-making processes that operated outside the organization? rules. This report discusses the attributes of an organization that could more safely and reliably operate the inherently risky Space Shuttle, but does not provide a detailed organizational prescription. Among those attributes are: a robust and independent program technical authority that has complete control over specifications and requirements, and waivers to them; an independent safety assurance organization with line authority over all levels of safety oversight; and an organizational culture that reflects the best characteristics of a learning organization. This report concludes with recommendations, some of which are specifically identified and prefaced as â€Å"before return to flight. † These recommendations are largely related to the physical cause of the accident, and include preventing the loss of foam, improved imaging of the Space Shuttle stack from liftoff through separation of the External Tank, and on-orbit inspection and repair of the Thermal Protection System. The remaining recommendations, for the most part, stem from the Board? s findings on organizational cause factors. While they are not â€Å"before return to flight† recommendations, they can be viewed as â€Å"continuing to fly† recommendations, as they capture the Board? s thinking on what changes are necessary to operate the Shuttle and future spacecraft safely in the mid- to long-term. These recommendations reflect both the Board? s strong support for return to flight at the earliest date consistent with the overriding objective of safety, and the Board? s conviction that operation of the Space Shuttle, and all human spaceflight, is a developmental activity with high inherent risks. A view from inside the Launch Control Center as Columbia rolls out to Launch Complex 39-A on December 9, 2002. August 2003 9 ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION BOARD COLUMBIA CHAPTER 5 From Challenger to Columbia The Board is convinced that the factors that led to the Columbia accident go well beyond the physical mechanisms discussed in Chapter 3. The causal roots of the accident can also be traced, in part, to the turbulent post-Cold War policy environment in which NASA functioned during most of the years between the destruction of Challenger and the loss of Columbia. The end of the Cold War in the late 1980s meant that the most important political underpinning of NASA? s Human Space Flight Program – U. S. -Soviet space competition – was lost, with no equally strong political objective to replace it. No longer able to justify its projects with the kind of urgency that the superpower struggle had provided, the agency could not obtain budget increases through the 1990s. Rather than adjust its ambitions to this new state of affairs, NASA continued to push an ambitious agenda of space science and exploration, including a costly Space Station Program. If NASA wanted to carry out that agenda, its only recourse, given its budget allocation, was to become more efficient, accomplishing more at less cost. The search for cost reductions led top NASA leaders over the past decade to downsize the Shuttle workforce, outsource various Shuttle Program responsibilities – including safety oversight – and consider eventual privatization of the Space Shuttle Program. The program? budget was reduced by 40 percent in purchasing power over the past decade and repeatedly raided to make up for Space Station cost overruns, even as the Program maintained a launch schedule in which the Shuttle, a developmental vehicle, was used in an operational mode. In addition, the uncertainty of top policymakers in the White House, Congress, and NASA as to how long the Shuttle would fly before being replaced resulted in the delay of upgrades needed to make the Shuttle safer and to extend its service life. The Space Shuttle Program has been transformed since the late 1980s implementation of post-Challenger management changes in ways that raise questions, addressed here and in later chapters of Part Two, about NASA? s ability to safely Report Volume I operate the Space Shuttle. While it would be inaccurate to say that NASA managed the Space Shuttle Program at the time of the Columbia accident in the same manner it did prior to Challenger, there are unfortunate similarities between the agency? s performance and safety practices in both periods. . 1 THE CHALLENGER ACCIDENT AND ITS AFTERMATH The inherently vulnerable design of the Space Shuttle, described in Chapter 1, was a product of policy and technological compromises made at the time of its approval in 1972. That approval process also produced unreasonable expectations, even myths, about the Shuttle? s future performance that NASA tried futilely to fulfill as the Shuttle became â€Å"operational† in 1982. At first, NASA was abl e to maintain the image of the Shuttle as an operational vehicle. During its early years of operation, the Shuttle launched satellites, performed on-orbit research, and even took members of Congress into orbit. At the beginning of 1986, the goal of â€Å"routine access to space† established by President Ronald Reagan in 1982 was ostensibly being achieved. That appearance soon proved illusory. On the cold morning of January 28, 1986, the Shuttle Challenger broke apart 73 seconds into its climb towards orbit. On board were Francis R. Scobee, Michael J. Smith, Ellison S. Onizuka, Judith A. Resnick, Ronald E. McNair, Sharon Christa McAuliffe, and Gregory B. Jarvis. All perished. Rogers Commission On February 3, 1986, President Reagan created the Presidential Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident, which soon became known as the Rogers Commission after its chairman, former Secretary of State William Rogers. The Commission? s report, issued on June 6, 1986, concluded that the loss of Challenger was caused by a failure of the joint and seal between the two lower segments of the right Solid Rocket Booster. Hot gases blew past a rubber O-ring in the joint, leading to a structural failure and the explosive burnAugust 2003 99 ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION BOARD COLUMBIA ing of the Shuttle? s hydrogen fuel. While the Rogers Commission identified the failure of the Solid Rocket Booster joint and seal as the physical cause of the accident, it also noted a number of NASA management failures that contributed to the catastrophe. The Rogers Commission concluded â€Å"the decision to launch the Challenger was flawed. Communication failures, incomplete and misleading information, and poor management judgments all figured in a decision-making process that permitted, in the words of the Commission, â€Å"internal flight safety problems to bypass key Shuttle managers. † As a result, if those making the launch decision â€Å"had known all the facts, it is highly unlikely that they would have decided to launch. † Far from meticulously guarding against potential problems, the Commission found th at NASA had required â€Å"a contractor to prove that it was not safe to launch, rather than proving it was safe. 1 The Commission also found that NASA had missed warning signs of the impending accident. When the joint began behaving in unexpected ways, neither NASA nor the Solid Rocket Motor manufacturer Morton-Thiokol adequately tested the joint to determine the source of the deviations from specifications or developed a solution to them, even though the problems frequently recurred. Nor did they respond to internal warnings about the faulty seal. Instead, Morton-Thiokol and NASA management came to see the problems as an acceptable flight risk – a violation of a design requirement that could be tolerated. During this period of increasing uncertainty about the joint? s performance, the Commission found that NASA? s safety system had been â€Å"silent. † Of the management, organizational, and communication failures that contributed to the accident, four related to fau lts within the safety system, including â€Å"a lack of problem reporting requirements, inadequate trend analysis, misrepresentation of criticality, and lack of involvement in critical discussions. †3 The checks and balances the safety system was meant to provide were not working. Still another factor influenced the decisions that led to the accident. The Rogers Commission noted that the Shuttle? s increasing flight rate in the mid-1980s created schedule pressure, including the compression of training schedules, a shortage of spare parts, and the focusing of resources on near-term problems. NASA managers â€Å"may have forgotten–partly because of past success, partly because of their own well-nurtured image of the program–that the Shuttle was still in a research and development phase. †4 The Challenger accident had profound effects on the U. S. pace program. On August 15, 1986, President Reagan announced that â€Å"NASA will no longer be in the business of launching private satellites. † The accident ended Air Force and intelligence community reliance on the Shuttle to launch national security payloads, prompted the decision to abandon the yet-to-be-opened Shuttle launch site at Vandenberg Air Force Base, and forced the development of improved expendable launch vehicles. 6 A 1992 White House advisory committee concluded that the recovery from the Challenger 100 Report Volume I SELECTED ROGERS COMMISSION RECOMMENDATIONS â€Å"The faulty Solid Rocket Motor joint and seal must be changed. This could be a new design eliminating the joint or a redesign of the current joint and seal. No design options should be prematurely precluded because of schedule, cost or reliance on existing hardware. All Solid Rocket Motor joints should satisfy the following: †¢ â€Å"The joints should be fully understood, tested and verified. † †¢ â€Å"The certification of the new design should include: †¢ Tests which duplicate the actual launch configuration as closely as possible. †¢ Tests over the full range of operating conditions, including temperature. †¢ â€Å"Full consideration should be given to conducting static firings of the exact flight configuration in a vertical attitude. † †¢ â €Å"The Shuttle Program Structure should be reviewed. The project managers for the various elements of the Shuttle program felt more accountable to their center management than to the Shuttle program organization. † †¢ â€Å"NASA should encourage the transition of qualified astronauts into agency management positions. † †¢ â€Å"NASA should establish an Office of Safety, Reliability and Quality Assurance to be headed by an Associate Administrator, reporting directly to the NASA Administrator. It would have direct authority for safety, reliability, and quality assurance throughout the agency. The office should be assigned the work force to ensure adequate oversight of its functions and should be independent of other NASA functional and program responsibilities. † †¢ â€Å"NASA should establish an STS Safety Advisory Panel reporting to the STS Program Manager. The charter of this panel should include Shuttle operational issues, launch commit criteria, flight rules, flight readiness and risk management. †¢ â€Å"The Commission found that Marshall Space Flight Center project managers, because of a tendency at Marshall to management isolation, failed to provide full and timely information bearing on the safety of flight 51-L [the Challenger mission] to other vital elements of Shuttle program management †¦ NASA should take energetic steps to eliminate this tendency at Marshall Space Flight Center, whether by changes of personnel, organization, indoctrinat ion or all three. † †¢ â€Å"The nation? s reliance on the Shuttle as its principal space launch capability created a relentless pressure on NASA to increase the flight rate †¦ NASA must stablish a flight rate that is consistent with its resources. †5 disaster cost the country $12 billion, which included the cost of building the replacement Orbiter Endeavour. 7 It took NASA 32 months after the Challenger accident to redesign and requalify the Solid Rocket Booster and to return the Shuttle to flight. The first post-accident flight was launched on September 29, 1988. As the Shuttle returned to flight, NASA Associate Administrator for Space Flight August 2003 ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION BOARD COLUMBIA Richard Truly commented, â€Å"We will always have to treat it [the Shuttle] like an RD test program, even many years into the future. I don? t think calling it operational fooled anybody within the program †¦ It was a signal to the public that shouldn? t have been sent. †8 The Shuttle Program After Return to Flight After the Rogers Commission report was issued, NASA made many of the organizational changes the Commission recommended. The space agency moved management of the Space Shuttle Program from the Johnson Space Center to NASA Headquarters in Washington, D. C. The intent of this change was to create a management structure â€Å"resembling that of the Apollo program, with the aim of preventing communication Read Here deficiencies that contributed to the Challenger accident. 9 NASA also established an Office of Safety, Reliability, and Quality Assurance at its Headquarters, though that office was not given the â€Å"direct authority† over all of NASA? s safety operations as the Rogers Commission had recommended. Rather, NASA human space flight centers each retained their own safety organizatio n reporting to the Center Director. In the almost 15 years between the return to flight and the loss of Columbia, the Shuttle was again being used on a regular basis to conduct space-based research, and, in line with NASA? original 1969 vision, to build and service a space station. The Shuttle flew 87 missions during this period, compared to 24 before Challenger. Highlights from these missions include the 1990 launch, 1993 repair, and 1999 and 2002 servicing of the Hubble Space Telescope; the launch of several major planetary probes; a number of Shuttle-Spacelab missions devoted to scientific research; nine missions to rendezvous with the Russian space station Mir; the return of former Mercury astronaut Senator John Glenn to orbit in October 1998; and the launch of the first U. S. elements of the International Space Station. After the Challenger accident, the Shuttle was no longer described as â€Å"operational† in the same sense as commercial aircraft. Nevertheless, NASA continued planning as if the Shuttle could be readied for launch at or near whatever date was set. Tying the Shuttle closely to International Space Station needs, such as crew rotation, added to the urgency of maintaining a predictable launch schedule. The Shuttle is currently the only means to launch the already-built European, Japanese, and remaining U. S. odules needed to complete Station assembly and to carry and return most experiments and on-orbit supplies. 10 Even after three occasions when technical problems grounded the Shuttle fleet for a month or more, NASA continued to assume that the Shuttle could regularly and predictably service the Station. In recent years, this coupling between the Station and Shuttle has become the primary driver of the Shuttle launch schedule. Whe never a Shuttle launch is delayed, it impacts Station assembly and operations. In September 2001, testimony on the Shuttle? achievements during the preceding decade by NASA? s then-Deputy Associate Administrator for Space Flight William Readdy indicated the assumptions under which NASA was operating during that period: Report Volume I The Space Shuttle has made dramatic improvements in the capabilities, operations and safety of the system. The payload-to-orbit performance of the Space Shuttle has been significantly improved – by over 70 percent to the Space Station. The safety of the Space Shuttle has also been dramatically improved by reducing risk by more than a factor of five. In addition, the operability of the system has been significantly improved, with five minute launch windows – which would not have been attempted a decade ago – now becoming routine. This record of success is a testament to the quality and dedication of the Space Shuttle management team and workforce, both civil servants and contractors. 11 5. 2 THE NASA HUMAN SPACE FLIGHT CULTURE Though NASA underwent many management reforms in the wake of the Challenger accident and appointed new directors at the Johnson, Marshall, and Kennedy centers, the agency? powerful human space flight culture remained intact, as did many institutional practices, even if in a modified form. As a close observer of NASA? s organizational culture has observed, â€Å"Cultural norms tend to be fairly resilient †¦ The norms bounce back into shape after being stretched or bent. Beliefs held in common throughout the organization resist alteration. †12 This culture, as will become clear acros s the chapters of Part Two of this report, acted over time to resist externally imposed change. By the eve of the Columbia accident, institutional practices that were in effect at the time of the Challenger accident – such as inadequate concern over deviations from expected performance, a silent safety program, and schedule pressure – had returned to NASA. ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE Organizational culture refers to the basic values, norms, beliefs, and practices that characterize the functioning of a particular institution. At the most basic level, organizational culture defines the assumptions that employees make as they carry out their work; it defines â€Å"the way we do things here. † An organization? culture is a powerful force that persists through reorganizations and the departure of key personnel. The human space flight culture within NASA originated in the Cold War environment. The space agency itself was created in 1958 as a response to the Soviet launch of Sputnik, the first artificial Earth satellite. In 1961, President John F. Kennedy charged the n ew space agency with the task of reaching the moon before the end of the decade, and asked Congress and the American people to commit the immense resources for doing so, even though at the time NASA had only accumulated 15 minutes of human space flight experience. With its efforts linked to U. S. -Soviet competition for global leadership, there was a sense in the NASA workforce that the agency was engaged in a historic struggle central to the nation? s agenda. The Apollo era created at NASA an exceptional â€Å"can-do† culture marked by tenacity in the face of seemingly impossible challenges. This culture valued the interaction among August 2003 101 ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION BOARD COLUMBIA research and testing, hands-on engineering experience, and a dependence on the exceptional quality of the its workforce and leadership that provided in-house technical capability to oversee the work of contractors. The culture also accepted risk and failure as inevitable aspects of operating in space, even as it held as its highest value attention to detail in order to lower the chances of failure. The dramatic Apollo 11 lunar landing in July 1969 fixed NASA? s achievements in the national consciousness, and in history. However, the numerous accolades in the wake of the moon landing also helped reinforce the NASA staff? s faith in their organizational culture. Apollo successes created the powerful image of the space agency as a â€Å"perfect place,† as â€Å"the best organization that human beings could create to accomplish selected goals. †13 During Apollo, NASA was in many respects a highly successful organization capable of achieving seemingly impossible feats. The continuing image of NASA as a â€Å"perfect place† in the years after Apollo left NASA employees unable to recognize that NASA never had been, and still was not, perfect, nor was it as symbolically important in the continuing Cold War struggle as it had been for its first decade of existence. NASA personnel maintained a vision of their agency that was rooted in the glories of an earlier time, even as the world, and thus the context within which the space agency operated, changed around them. As a result, NASA? s human space flight culture never fully adapted to the Space Shuttle Program, with its goal of routine access to space rather than further exploration beyond low-Earth orbit. The Apollo-era organizational culture came to be in tension with the more bureaucratic space agency of the 1970s, whose focus turned from designing new spacecraft at any expense to repetitively flying a reusable vehicle on an ever-tightening budget. This trend toward bureaucracy and the associated increased reliance on contracting necessitated more effective communications and more extensive safety oversight processes than had been in place during the Apollo era, but the Rogers Commission found that such features were lacking. In the aftermath of the Challenger accident, these contradictory forces prompted a resistance to externally imposed changes and an attempt to maintain the internal belief that NASA was still a â€Å"perfect place,† alone in its ability to execute a program of human space flight. Within NASA centers, as Human Space Flight Program managers strove to maintain their view of the organization, they lost their ability to accept criticism, leading them to reject the recommendations of many boards and blue-ribbon panels, the Rogers Commission among them. External criticism and doubt, rather than spurring NASA to change for the better, instead reinforced the will to â€Å"impose the party line vision on the environment, not to reconsider it,† according to one authority on organizational behavior. This in turn led to â€Å"flawed decision making, self deception, introversion and a diminished curiosity about the world outside the perfect place. †14 The NASA human space flight culture the Board found during its investigation manifested many of these characteristics, in particular a self-confidence about NASA possessing unique knowledge about how to 102 Report Volume I safely launch people into space. 15 As will be discussed later in this chapter, as well as in Chapters 6, 7, and 8, the Board views this cultural resistance as a fundamental impediment to NASA? s effective organizational performance. 5. AN AGENCY TRYING TO DO TOO MUCH WITH TOO LITTLE A strong indicator of the priority the national political leadership assigns to a federally funded activity is its budget. By that criterion, NASA? s space activities have not been high on the list of national priorities over the past three decades (see Figure 5. 3-1). After a peak during the Apollo program, when NASA? s budget was almost four percent of the federal budget, NASA? s budget since the early 1970s has hovered at one percent of federal spending or less. 4. 0 3. 5 Percent of Federal Budget 3. 0 2. 5 2. 0 1. 5 1. 0 0. 5 0. 0 1959 1962 1965 1968 1971 1974 1977 1980 983 1986 1989 1992 1995 1998 Figure 5. 3-1. NASA budget as a percentage of the Federal budget. (Source: NASA History Office) Particularly in recent years, as the national leadership has confronted the challenging task of allocating scarce public resources across many competing demands, NASA has had difficulty obtaining a budget allocation adequate to its continuing ambitions. In 1990, the White House chartered a blue-ribbon committee chaired by aerospace executive Norman Augustine to conduct a sweeping review of NASA and its programs in response to Shuttle problems and the flawed mirror on the Hubble Space Telescope. 6 The review found that NASA? s budget was inadequate for all the programs the agency was executing, saying that â€Å"N ASA is currently over committed in terms of program obligations relative to resources available–in short, it is trying to do too much, and allowing too little margin for the unexpected. †17 â€Å"A reinvigorated space program,† the Augustine committee went on to say, â€Å"will require real growth in the NASA budget of approximately 10 percent per year (through the year 2000) reaching a peak spending level of about $30 billion per year (in constant 1990 dollars) by about the year 2000. Translated into the actual dollars of Fiscal Year 2000, that recommendation would have meant a NASA budget of over $40 billion; the actual NASA budget for that year was $13. 6 billion. 18 During the past decade, neither the White House nor Congress has been interested in â€Å"a reinvigorated space program. † Instead, the goal has been a program that would continue to August 2003 2001 ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION BOARD COLUMBIA produce valuable scientific and symbolic payoffs for the nation without a need for increased budgets. Recent budget allocations reflect this continuing policy reality. Between 1993 and 2002, the government? s discretionary spending grew in purchasing power by more than 25 percent, defense spending by 15 percent, and non-defense spending by 40 percent (see Figure 5. 3-2). NASA? s budget, in comparison, showed little change, going from $14. 31 billion in Fiscal Year 1993 to a low of $13. 6 billion in Fiscal Year 2000, and increasing to $14. 87 billion in Fiscal Year 2002. This represented a loss of 13 percent in purchasing power over the decade (see Figure 5. -3). 19 1. 50 The lack of top-level interest in the space program led a 2002 review of the U. S. aeros

Levels of Measurement Worksheet With Solutions

Levels of Measurement Worksheet With Solutions Data can be classified into one of four levels of measurement.   These levels are nominal, ordinal, interval and ratio. Each of these levels of measurement indicates a different feature that the data is showing. Read the full description of these levels, then practice sorting through the following. You can also look at a version without answers, then come back here to check your work. Worksheet Problems Indicate which level of measurement is being used in the given scenario: SOLUTION: This is the nominal level of measurement. Eye color is not a number, and so the lowest level of measurement is used. SOLUTION: This is the ordinal level of measurement. The letter grades can be ordered with A as high and F as low, however, differences between these grades are meaningless. An A and a B grade could be separated by a few or several points, and there is no way of telling if we are simply given a list of letter grades. SOLUTION: This is the ratio level of measurement. The numbers have a range from 0% to 100% and it makes sense to say that one score is a multiple of another. SOLUTION: This is the interval level of measurement. The temperatures can be ordered and we can look at differences in the temperatures. However, a statement such as A 10-degree day is half as hot as a 20-degree day is not correct. Thus this is not at the ratio level. SOLUTION: This is also the interval level of measurement, for the same reasons as the last problem. SOLUTION: Careful! Even though this is another situation involving temperatures as data, this is the ratio level of measurement. The reason why is that the Kelvin scale does have an absolute zero point from which we can reference all other temperatures. The zero for the Fahrenheit and Celsius scales is not the same, as we can have negative temperatures with these scales. SOLUTION: This is the ordinal level of measurement. The rankings are ordered from 1 to 50, but there is no way to compare the differences in rankings. Movie #1 could beat #2 by only a little, or it could be vastly superior (in the critics eye). There is no way to know from rankings alone. SOLUTION: Prices can be compared at the ratio level of measurement. SOLUTION: Even though there are numbers associated with this data set, the numbers serve as alternate forms of names for the players and the data is at the nominal level of measurement. Ordering the jersey numbers makes no sense, and there is no reason to do any arithmetic with these numbers. SOLUTION: This is the nominal level due to the fact that dog breeds are not numeric. SOLUTION: This is the ratio level of measurement. Zero pounds is the starting point for all weights and it makes sense to say The 5-pound dog is one quarter the weight of the 20-pound dog. The teacher of a class of third graders records the height of each student.The teacher of a class of third graders records the eye color of each student.The teacher of a class of third graders records the letter grade for mathematics for each student.The teacher of a class of third graders records the percentage that each student got correct on the last science test.A meteorologist compiles a list of temperatures in degrees Celsius for the month of MayA meteorologist compiles a list of temperatures in degrees Fahrenheit for the month of MayA meteorologist compiles a list of temperatures in degrees Kelvin for the month of MayA film critic lists the top 50 greatest movies of all time.A car magazine lists the most expensive cars for 2012.The roster of a basketball team lists the jersey numbers for each of the players.A local animal shelter keeps track of the breeds of dogs that come in.A local animal shelter keeps track of the weights of dogs that come in.

Vietnam Essay

Vietnam Essay Free Online Research Papers From the beginning of John Kennedys Administration into this fifth year of Lyndon Johnsons presidency, substantially the same small groups of men have presided over the destiny of the United States. In that time they have carried the country from a limited involvement in Vietnam into a war that is brutal, probably unsinkable, and, to an increasing body of opinion, calamitous and immoral. How could it happen? Many in government or close to it will read the following article with the shock of recognition. Those less familiar with the processes of power can read it with the assurance that the author had a firsthand opportunity to watch the slide down the slippery slope during five years (1961-1966) of service in the White House and Department of State. Mr. Thomson is an East Asia specialist and an assistant professor of history at Harvard. As a case study in the making of foreign policy, the Vietnam War will fascinate historians and social scientists for many decades to come. One question that will certainly be asked: How did men of superior ability, sound training, and high ideals American policy-makers of the 1960s create such costly and divisive policy? As one who watched the decision-making process in Washington from 1961 to 1966 under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, I can suggest a preliminary answer. I can do so by briefly listing some of the factors that seemed to me to shape our Vietnam policy during my years as an East Asia specialist at the State Department and the White House. I shall deal largely with Washington as I saw or sensed it, and not with Saigon, where I have spent but a scant three days, in the entourage of the Vice President, or with other decision centers, the capitals of interested parties. Nor will I deal with other important parts of the record: Vietnams history prior to 1961, for instance, or the overall course of Americas relations with Vietnam. Yet a first and central ingredient in these years of Vietnam decisions does involve history. The ingredient was the legacy of the 1950s by which I mean the so-called loss of China, the Korean War, and the Far East policy of Secretary of State Dulles. This legacy had an institutional by-product for the Kennedy Administration: in 1961 the U.S. governments East Asian establishment was undoubtedly the most rigid and doctrinaire of Washingtons regional divisions in foreign affairs. This was especially true at the Department of State, where the incoming Administration found the Bureau of Far Eastern Affairs the hardest nut to crack. It was a bureau that had been purged of its best China expertise, and of farsighted, dispassionate men, as a result of McCarthyism. Its members were generally committed to one policy line: the close containment and isolation of mainland China, the harassment of neutralist nations which sought to avoid alignment with either Washington or Peking and the maintenance of a network of alliances with anti-Communist client states on Chinas periphery. Another aspect of the legacy was the special vulnerability and sensitivity of the new Democratic Administration on Far East policy issues. The memory of the McCarthy era was still very sharp, and Kennedys margin of victory was too thin. The 1960 Offshore Islands TV debate between Kennedy and Nixon had shown the President-elect the perils of fresh thinking. The Administration was inherently leery of moving too fast on Asia. As a result, the Far East Bureau (now the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs) was the last one to be overhauled. Not until Averell Harriman was brought in as Assistant Secretary in December 1961, were significant personnel changes attempted, and it took Harriman several months to make a deep imprint on the bureau because of his necessary preoccupation with the Laos settlement. Once he did so, there was virtually no effort to bring back the purged or exiled East Asia experts. There were other important by-products of this legacy of the fifties: The new Administration inherited and somewhat shared a general perception of China-on-the-march a sense of Chinas vastness, its numbers, its belligerence ; a revived sense, perhaps, of the Golden Horde. This was a perception fed by Chinese intervention in the Korean War (an intervention actually based on appallingly bad communications and mutual miscalculation on the part of Washington and Peking; but the careful unraveling of that tragedy, which scholars have accomplished, had not yet become part of the conventional wisdom). The new Administration inherited and briefly accepted a monolithic conception of the Communist bloc. Despite much earlier predictions and reports by outside analysts, policy-makers did not begin to accept the reality and possible finality of the Sino-Soviet split until the first weeks of 1962. The inevitably corrosive impact of competing nationalisms on Communism was largely ignored. The new Administration inherited and to some extent shared the domino theory about Asia. This theory resulted from profound ignorance of Asian history and hence ignorance of the radical differences among Asian nations and societies. It resulted from a blindness to the power and resilience of Asian nationalisms. (It may also have resulted from a subconscious sense that, since all Asians look alike, all Asian nations will act alike.) As a theory, the domino fallacy was not merely inaccurate but also insulting to Asian nations; yet it has continued to this day to beguile men who should know better. Finally, the legacy of the fifties was apparently compounded by an uneasy sense of a worldwide Communist challenge to the new Administration after the Bay of Pigs fiasco. A first manifestation was the Presidents traumatic Vienna meeting with Khrushchev in June 1961; then came the Berlin crisis of the summer. All this created an atmosphere in which President Kennedy undoubtedly felt under special pressure to show his nations mettle in Vietnam if the Vietnamese, unlike the people of Laos, were willing to fight. In general, the legacy of the fifties shaped such early moves of the new Administration as the decisions to maintain a high-visibility SEATO (by sending the Secretary of State himself instead of some underlying to its first meeting in 1961), to back away from diplomatic recognition of Mongolia in the summer of 1961, and most important, to expand U.S. military assistance to South Vietnam that winter on the basis of the much more tentative Eisenhower commitment. It should be added that the increased commitment to Vietnam was also fueled by a new breed of military strategists and academic social scientists (some of whom had entered the new Administration) who had developed theories of counter-guerrilla warfare and were eager to see them put to the test. To some, counterinsurgency seemed a new panacea for coping with the worlds instability. SO MUCH for the legacy and the history. Any new Administration inherits both complicated problems and simplistic views of the world. But surely among the policy-makers of the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations, there were men who would warn of the dangers of an open-ended commitment to the Vietnam quagmire? This raises a central question, at the heart of the policy process: Where were the experts, the doubters, and the dissenters? Were they there at all, and if so, what happened to them? The answer is complex but instructive. In the first place, the American government was sorely lacking in real Vietnam or Indochina expertise. Originally treated as an adjunct of Embassy Paris, our Saigon embassy and the Vietnam Desk at State were largely staffed from 1954 onward by French-speaking Foreign Service personnel of narrowly European experience. Such diplomats were even more closely restricted than the normal embassy officer by the cast of mind as well as the language to contacts with Vietnams French-speaking urban elites. For instance, Foreign Service linguists in Portugal are able to speak with the peasantry if they get out of Lisbon and choose to do so; not so the French speakers of Embassy Saigon. In addition, the shadow of the loss of China distorted Vietnam reporting. Career officers in the Department, and especially those in the field, had not forgotten the fate of their World War II colleagues who wrote in frankness from China and were later pilloried by Senate co mmittees for critical comments on the Chinese Nationalists. Candid reporting on the strengths of the Viet Cong and the weaknesses of the Diem government was inhibited by the memory. It was also inhibited by some higher officials, notably Ambassador Nolting in Saigon, who refused to sign off on such cables. In due course, to be sure, some Vietnam talent was discovered or developed. But a recurrent and increasingly important factor in the decision-making process was the banishment of real expertise. Here the underlying cause was the closed politics of policy-making as issues become hot: the more sensitive the issue, and the higher it rises in the bureaucracy, the more completely the experts are excluded while the harassed senior generalists take over (that is, the Secretaries, Undersecretaries, and Presidential Assistants). The frantic skimming of briefing papers in the back seats of limousines is no substitute for the presence of specialists; furthermore, in times of crisis, such papers are deemed too sensitive even for review by the specialists. Another underlying cause of this banishment, as Vietnam became more critical, was the replacement of the experts, who were generally and increasingly pessimistic, by men described as can-do guys, loyal and energetic fixers unsoured by expertise. In early 1965, when I confided my growing policy doubts to an older colleague on the NSC staff, he assured me that the smartest thing both of us could do was to steer clear of the whole Vietnam mess; the gentleman in question had the misfortune to be a can-do guy, however, and is now highly placed in Vietnam, under orders to solve the mess. Despite the banishment of the experts, internal doubters and dissenters did indeed appear and persist. Yet as I watched the process, such men were effectively neutralized by a subtle dynamic: the domestication of dissenters. Such domestication arose out of a two-fold cubbish need: on the one hand, the dissenters desire to stay aboard; and on the other hand, the no dissenter’s conscience. Simply stated, dissent, when recognized, was made to feel at home. On the lowest possible scale of importance, I must confess my own considerable sense of dignity and acceptance (both vital) when my senior White House employer would refer to me as his favorite dove. Far more significant was the case of the former Undersecretary of State, George Ball. Once Mr. Ball began to express doubts, he was warmly institutionalized: he was encouraged to become the in-house devils advocate on Vietnam. The upshot was inevitable: the process of escalation allowed for periodic requests to Mr. Ball to speak his piece; Ball felt good, I assume (he had fought for righteousness); the others felt good (they had given a full hearing to the dovish option), and there was minimal unpleasantness. The club remained intact, and it is, of course, possible that matters would have gotten worse faster if Mr. Ball had kept silent, or left before his final departure in the fall of 1966. There was also, of course, the case of the last institutionalized doubter, Bill Moyers. The President is said to have greeted his arrival at meetings with an affectionate, Well, here comes Mr. Stop-the-Bombing. Here again, the dynamics of domesticated dissent sustained the relationship for a while. A related point and crucial, I suppose, to the government at all times was the effectiveness trap, the trap that keeps men from speaking out, as clearly or often as they might, within the government. And it is the trap that keeps men from resigning in protest and airing their dissent outside the government. The most important asset that a man brings to bureaucratic life is his effectiveness, a mysterious combination of training, style, and connections. The most ominous complaint that can be whispered of a bureaucrat is: Im afraid Charlies beginning to lose his effectiveness. To preserve your effectiveness, you must decide where and when to fight the mainstream of policy; the opportunities range from pillow talk with your wife to private drinks with your friends to meetings with the Secretary of State or the President. The inclination to remain silent or to acquiesce in the presence of the great men to live to fight another day, to give on this issue so that you can be effective on later issues is overwhelming. Nor is it the tendency of youth alone; some of our most senior officials, men of wealth and fame, whose place in history is secure, have remained silent lest their connection with power is terminated. As for the disinclination to resign in protest: while not necessarily a Washington or even American specialty, it seems truer of a government in which ministers have no parliamentary backbench to which to retreat. In the absence of such a refuge, it is easy to rationalize the decision to stay aboard. By doing so, one may be able to prevent a few bad things from happening and perhaps even make a few good things happen. To exit is to lose even those marginal chances for effectiveness. Another factor must be noted: as the Vietnam controversy escalated at home, there developed a preoccupation with Vietnam public relations as opposed to Vietnam policy-making. And here, ironically, internal doubters and dissenters were heavily employed. For such men, by virtue of their own doubts, were often deemed best able to massage the doubting intelligentsia. My senior East Asia colleague at the White House, a brilliant and humane doubter who had dealt with Indochina since 1954, spent three quarters o f his working days on Vietnam public relations: drafting presidential responses to letters from important critics, writing conciliatory language for presidential speeches, and meeting quite interminably with delegations of outraged Quakers, clergymen, academics, and housewives. His regular callers were the late A. J. Muste and Norman Thomas; mine were members of the Womens Strike for Peace. Our orders from above: keep them off the backs of busy policy-makers (who usually happened to be no doubters). Incidentally, my most discouraging assignment in the realm of public relations was the preparation of a White House pamphlet entitled Why Vietnam, in September 1965; in a gesture toward my conscience, I fought and lost a battle to have the title followed by a question mark. THROUGH a variety of procedures, both institutional and personal, doubt, dissent, and expertise were effectively neutralized in the making of policy. But what can be said of the men in charge? It is patently absurd to suggest that they produced such tragedy by intention and calculation. But it is neither absurd nor difficult to discern certain forces at work that caused decent and honorable men to do great harm. Here I would stress the paramount role of executive fatigue. No factor seems to be more crucial and underrated in the making of foreign policy. The physical and emotional toll of executive responsibility in State, the Pentagon, the White House, and other executive agencies is enormous; that toll is of course compounded by extended service. Many of todays Vietnam policy-makers have been on the job for from four to seven years. Complaints may be few, and physical health may remain unimpaired, though emotional health is far harder to gauge. But what is most seriously eroded in the deadening process of fatigue is the freshness of thought, imagination, a sense of possibility, a sense of priorities and perspective those rare assets of a new Administration in its first year or two of office. The tired policy-maker becomes a prisoner of his own narrowed view of the world and his own clichà ©d rhetoric. He becomes irritable and defensive short on sleep, short on family ties, short on patience. Such men make bad policy and then compound it. They have neither the time nor the temperament for new ideas or preventive diplomacy. Below the level of the fatigued executives in the making of Vietnam policy was a widespread phenomenon: the curator mentality in the Department of State. By this, I mean the collective inertia produced by the bureaucrats view of his job. At State, the average desk officer inherits from his predecessor our policy toward Country X; he regards it as his function to keep that policy intact under glass, untampered with, and dusted so that he may pass it on in two to four years to his successor. And such curatorial service generally merits promotion within the system. (Maintain the status quo, and you will stay out of trouble.) In some circumstances, the inertia bred by such an outlook can act as a brake against rash innovation. But on many issues, this inertia sustains the momentum of bad policy and unwise commitments momentum that might otherwise have been resisted within the ranks. Clearly, Vietnam is such an issue. To fatigue and inertia must be added the factor of internal confusio n. Even among the architects of our Vietnam commitment, there has been persistent confusion as to what type of war we were fighting and, as a direct consequence, confusion as to how to end that war. (The credibility gap is, in part, a reflection of such internal confusion.) Was it, for instance, a civil war, in which case counterinsurgency might suffice? Or was it a war of international aggression? (This might invoke SEATO or UN commitment. ) Who were the aggressor and the real enemy? The Viet Cong? Hanoi? Peking? Moscow? International Communism? Or maybe Asian Communism? Differing enemies dictated differing strategies and tactics. And confused throughout, in like fashion, was the question of American objectives; your objectives depended on whom you were fighting and why. I shall not forget my assignment from an Assistant Secretary of State in March 1964: to draft a speech for Secretary McNamara which would, inter alia, once and for all dispose of the canard that the Vietnam conflict was a civil war. But in some ways, of course, I mused, it is a civil war. Dont play word games with me! snapped the Assistant Secretary. Similar confusion beset the concept of negotiations anathema to much of official Washington from 1961 to 1965. Not until April 1965, did unconditional discussions become respectable, via a presidential speech; even then the Secretary of State stressed privately to newsmen that nothing had changed, since discussions were by no means the same as negotiations. Months later that issue was resolved. But it took even longer to obtain a fragile internal agreement that negotiations might include the Viet Cong as something other than an appendage to Hanois delegation. Given such confusion as to the who’s and whys of our Vietnam commitment , it is not surprising, as Theodore Draper has written, that policy-makers find it so difficult to agree on how to end the war. Of course, one force a constant in the vortex of commitment was that of wishful thinking. I partook of it myself at many times. I did so especially during Washingtons struggle with Diem in the autumn of 1963 when some of us at State believed that for once, in dealing with a difficult client state, the U.S. government could use the leverage of our economic and military assistance to make good things happen, instead of being led around by the nose by men like Chiang Kai-shek and Syngman Rhee (and, in that particular instance, by Diem). If we could prove that point, I thought, and move into a new day, with or without Diem, and then Vietnam was well worth the effort. Later came the wishful thinking of the air- strike planners in the late autumn of 1964; there were those who actually thought that after six weeks of air strikes, the North Vietnamese would come crawling to us to ask for peace talks. And what, someone asked in one of the meetings of the time, if they dont? The answer was that we would bomb for another four weeks, and that would do the trick. And a few weeks later came one instance of wishful thinking that was symptomatic of good men misled: in January 1965, I encountered one of the very highest figures in the Administration at a dinner, drew him aside, and told him of my worries about the air-strike option. He told me that I really shouldnt worry; it was his conviction that before any such plans could be put into effect, a neutralist government would come to power in Saigon that would politely invite us out. And finally, there was the recurrent wishful thinking that sustained many of us through the trying months of 1965-1966 after the air strikes had begun: that surely, somehow, one way or another, we would be in a conference in six months, and the escalatory spiral would be suspended. The basis of our hope: It simply cant go on. AS A further influence on policy-makers I would cite the factor of bureaucratic detachment. By this I mean what at best might be termed the professional callousness of the surgeon (and indeed, medical lingo the surgical strike for instance seemed to crop up in the euphemisms of the times). In Washington, the semantics of the military muted the reality of war for the civilian policy-makers. In quiet, air-conditioned, thick-carpeted rooms, such terms as systema tic pressure, armed reconnaissance, targets of opportunity, and even body count seemed to breed a sort of games-theory detachment. Most memorable to me was a moment in the late 1964 target planning when the question under discussion was how heavy our bombing should be, and how extensive our strafing, at some midpoint in the projected pattern of systematic pressure. An Assistant Secretary of State resolved the point in the following words: It seems to me that our orchestration should be mainly violins, but with periodic touches of brass. Perhaps the biggest shock of my return to Cambridge, Massachusetts, was the realization that the young men, the flesh and blood I taught and saw on these university streets, were potentially some of the numbers on the charts of those faraway planners. In a curious sense, Cambridge is closer to this war than Washington. There is an unprovable factor that relates to bureaucratic detachment: the ingredient of crypto-racism. I do not mean to imply any conscious contempt for Asian loss of life on the part of Washington officials. But I do mean to imply that bureaucratic detachment may well be compounded by a traditional Western sense that there are so many Asians, after all; that Asians have a fatalism about life and a disregard for its loss; that they are cruel and barbaric to their own people; and that they are very different from us (and all look alike?). And I do mean to imply that the upshot of such subliminal views is a subliminal question whether Asians, and particularly Asian peasants, and most particularly Asian Communists, are real people like you and me. To put the matter another way: would we have pursued quite such policies and quite such military tactics if the Vietnamese were white? It is impossible to write of Vietnam decision-making without writing about language. Throughout the conflict, words have been of paramount importance. I refer here to the impact of rhetorical escalation and to the problem of overselling. In an important sense, Vietnam has become of crucial significance to us because we have said that it is of crucial significance. (The issue obviously relates to the public relations preoccupation described earlier.) The key here is domestic politics: the need to sell the American people, press, and Congress on support for an unpopular and costly war in which the objectives themselves have been in flux. To se ll means to persuade, and to persuade means rhetoric. As the difficulties and costs have mounted, so has the definition of the stakes. This is not to say that rhetorical escalation is an orderly process; executive prose is the product of many writers, and some concepts North Vietnamese infiltration, Americas national honor, Red China as the chief enemy have entered the rhetoric only gradually and even sporadically. But there is an upward spiral nonetheless. And once you have said that the American Experiment itself stands or falls on the Vietnam outcome, you have thereby created a national stake far beyond any earlier stakes. Crucial throughout the process of Vietnam decision-making was a conviction among many policy-makers: that Vietnam posed a fundamental test of Americas national will. Time and again I was told by men reared in the tradition of Henry L. Stimson that all we needed was the will, and we would then prevail. Implicit in such a view, it seemed to me, was a curious assumption that Asians lacked will, or at least that in a contest between Asian and Anglo-Saxon wills, the non-Asians must prevail. A corollary to the persistent belief in a will was a fascination with power and awe in the face of the power America possessed as no nation or civilization ever before. Those who doubted our role in Vietnam were said to shrink from the burdens of power, the obligations of power, the uses of power, the responsibility of power. By implication, such men were soft-headed and effete. Finally, no discussion of the factors and forces at work on Vietnam policymakers can ignore the central fact of human ego investment. Men who have participated in a decision to develop a stake in that decision. As they participate in further, related decisions, their stake increases. It might have been possible to dissuade a man of strong self-confidence at an early stage of the ladder of a decision, but it is infinitely harder at later stages since a change of mind there usually involves an implicit or explicit repudiation of a chain of previous decisions. To put it bluntly: at the heart of the Vietnam calamity is a group of able, dedicated men who have been regularly and repeatedly wrong and whose standing with their contemporaries, and more important, with history, depends, as they see it, on being proven right. These are not men who can be asked to extricate themselves from error. THE various ingredients I have cited in the making of Vietnam policy have created a variety of results, most of them fairly obvious. Here are some that seem to me most central: Throughout the conflict, there has been persistent and repeated miscalculation by virtually all the actors, in high echelons and low, whether dove, hawk, or something else. To cite one simple example among many: in late 1964 and early 1965, some peace-seeking planners at State who strongly opposed the projected bombing of the North urged that, instead, American ground forces be sent to South Vietnam; this would, they said, increase our bargaining leverage against the North our chips and would give us something to negotiate about (the withdrawal of our forces) at an early peace conference. Simultaneously, the air-strike option was urged by many in the military who were dead set against American participation in another land war in Asia; they were joined by other civilian peace-seekers who wanted to bomb Hanoi into early negotiations. By late 1965, we had ended up with the worst of all worlds: ineffective and costly air strikes against the North, spiraling ground forces in the South, and no negotiations in sight. Throughout the conflict as well, there has been a steady give-in to pressures for a military solution and only minimal and sporadic efforts at a diplomatic and political solution. In part, this resulted from the confusion (earlier cited) among the civilians confusion regarding objectives and strategy. And in part, this resulted from the self-enlarging nature of the military investment. Once air strikes and particularly ground forces were introduced, our investment itself had transformed the original stakes. More air power was needed to protect the ground forces, and then more ground forces to protect the ground forces. And needless to say, the military mind develops its own momentum in the absence of clear guidelines from the civilians. Once asked to save South Vietnam, rather than to advise it, the American military could not but press for escalation. In addition, sad to report, assorted military constituencies, once involved in Vietnam, have had a series of cases to prove: for instance, the utility not only of air power (the Air Force) but of supercarrier-based air power (the Navy). Also, Vietnam policy has suffered from one ironic byproduct of Secretary Mc Namaras establishment of civilian control at the Pentagon: in the face of such control, an interservice rivalry has given way to a united front among the military reflected in the new but recurrent phenomenon of JCS unanimity. In conjunction with traditional congressional allies (mostly Southern senators and representatives) such a united front would pose a formidable problem for any President. Throughout the conflict, there have been missed opportunities, large and small, to disengage ourselves from Vietnam on increasingly unpleasant but still acceptable terms. Of the many moments from 1961 onward, I shall cite only one, the last and most important opportunity that was lost: in the summer of 1964 the President instructed his chief advisers to prepare for him as wide a range of Vietnam options as possible for postelection consideration and decision. He explicitly asked that all options be laid out. What happened next was, in effect, Lyndon Johnsons slow-motion Bay of Pigs. For the advisers so effectively converged on one single option juxtaposed against two other, phony options (in effect, blowing up the world, or scuttle-and-run) that the President was confronted with unanimity for bombing the North from all his trusted counselors. Had he been more confident in foreign affairs, had he been deeply informed on Vietnam and Southeast Asia, and had he raised some hard questions that unanimity had submerged, this President could have used the largest electoral mandate in history to de-escalate in Vietnam, in the clear expectation that at the worst a neutralist government would come to power in Saigon and politely invite us out. Today, many lives and dollars later, such an alternative has become an elusive and infinitely more expensive possibility. In the course of these years, another result of Vietnam decision-making has been the abuse and distortion of history. Vietnamese, Southeast Asian, and Far Eastern history has been rewritten by our policy-makers, and their spokesmen, to conform to the alleged necessity of our presence in Vietnam. Highly dubious analogies from our experience elsewhere the Munich sellout and containment from Europe, the Malayan insurgency and the Korean War from Asia have been imported in order to justify our actions. And more recent events have been fitted to the Procrustean bed of Vietnam. Most notably, the change of power in Indonesia in 1965-1966 has been ascribed to our Vietnam presence; and virtually all progress in the Pacific region the rise of regionalism, new forms of cooperation, and mounting growth rates has been similarly explained. The Indonesian allegation is undoubtedly false (I tried to prove it, during six months of careful investigation at the White House, and had to confess failu re); the regional allegation is patently unprovable in either direction (except, of course, for the clear fact that the economies of both Japan and Korea have profited enormously from our Vietnam-related procurement in these countries; but that is a costly and highly dubious form of foreign aid). There is a final result of Vietnam policy I would cite that holds potential danger for the future of American foreign policy: the rise of a new breed of American ideologues who see Vietnam as the ultimate test of their doctrine. I have in mind those men in Washington who have given a new life to the missionary impulse in American foreign relations: who believe that this nation, in this era, has received a threefold endowment that can transform the world. As they see it, that endowment is composed of, first, our unsurpassed military might; second, our clear technological supremacy; and third, our allegedly invincible benevolence (our altruism, our affluence, our lack of territorial aspirations). Together, it is argued, this threefold endowment provides us with the opportunity and the obligation to ease the nations of the earth toward modernization and stability: toward a full-fledged Pax Americana Technocratic. In reaching toward this goal, Vietnam is viewed as the last and crucial test. Once we have succeeded there, the road ahead is clear. In a sense, these men are our counterpart to the visionaries of Communisms radical left: they are technocracys own Maoists. They do not govern Washington today. But their doctrine rides high. Long before I went into government, I was told a story about Henry L. Stimson that seemed to me pertinent during the years that I watched the Vietnam tragedy unfold and participated in that tragedy. It seems to me more pertinent than ever as we move toward the election of 1968. In his waning years Stimson was asked by an anxious questioner, Mr. Secretary, how on earth can we ever bring peace to the world? Stimson is said to have answered: You begin by bringing to Washington a small handful of able men who believe that the achievement of peace is possible. Research Papers on Vietnam EssayMr. Obama and IranInflation TargetingGlobal Distributive Justice is UtopianCombating Human TraffickingBooker T. Washington, W.E.B. Du Bois, Ida B. Wells-BarnettAmerican Central Banking and OilHas the British Welfare System beenDefinition of Export QuotasInternational PaperThe Equal Rights Amendment