Should anthropologists work alongside soldiers?
SAN FRANCISCO -- The military for years has enlisted anthropologists, depending on their expertise to write up analyses of distant places and cultures.
But debate is growing among those scientists over whether it is appropriate for them to be involved in actually working alongside soldiers in combat or to contribute to the growing field of counterterrorism research.
At the just-concluded American Anthropological Association meeting here, the question of whether anthropologists should take part in military operations took the stage, though not for the first time. In 2007, the AAA's executive board expressed "disapproval" of anthropologists' work in Afghanistan and Iraq, arguing that they helped in "identifying and selecting specific populations as targets of U.S. military operations."
The debate is more than academic. Two social scientists with the U.S. Army Human Terrain System (HTS) were killed in bombings this year in Afghanistan and Iraq.
HTS researchers are essentially the Army's polling force, surveying local sentiments to, among other things, increase the security of the area and facilitate aid and rebuilding efforts and to ensure those efforts are culturally sensitive, according to the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command, which runs the program.
Anthropology, military go way back
Ties between anthropology and the military are old ones. The science originated as a "tool of colonialism" in the 19th century to understand British Empire subjects, says historian David Kaiser of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
In Iraq and Afghanistan, field anthropologists study culture, kinship and networks in societies, "particularly key" factors in the insurgencies, according to the Army's counterinsurgency manual. For example, in these countries it is considered reasonable to put family ties above the needs of society, and nepotism is seen as positive, not negative. That's something young soldiers raised in the USA, with our veneration of the rugged individualist, may not immediately understand.
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