@Darth:
Never seen a single reasoning that would convince me of that. Feel free to try, though.
Hey Darth. I'm going to give you an argument. I want to start with three disclaimers though. I absolutely respect your ability to reason, think you are obviously intelligent, and value skepticism and criticism highly. If in any of what follows it seems as if I am insulting you, or implying you are an idiot, or anything like that, I assure you that is strictly due to a failure of communication on my part. We have disagreed before, I hope we do again, and I am open to changing my mind in light of good reasons. Here, I am not even sure of my stance, but I will be forwarding an argument for us both to consider together. I, like you, have studied logic; actually, I've taught logic at the university level for 2 years, and if 1/4 of my students argued like you I'd be a very happy prof. Second, I have offered something like this argument before, but I do not believe you ever responded, and I don't think I quoted you so that's my bad. Third, it is relatively early for me and I am in somewhat of a rush; please interpret me charitably where possible. I know this is not as streamlined as it could be, but I can respond with more clarity and focus if you have specific concerns with what I am trying to say. Of course, that is not to say that you must accept what I am saying, but just that I may not have made what I mean as straightforward as I would like.
Okay, let's get on with it then. First, I will offer a valid deductive argument (though, perhaps it would be more fair to put this in terms of an inductive argument; if you think so, you can read what follows in that way instead). Next, I will give reasons for thinking the premises are true. Applying the definition of validity (if the premises are true then the conclusion must be true) I will note that - if the premises are in fact true - the conclusion must be true. I believe this argument might approximate Fujitora's own when he goes to Reverie. As a side note, I will include a little bit about Fujitora that I think relevant.
Argument:
P1: If Fujitora qua admiral is not permitted to intervene in cases such as the Dressrosa incident, then the Shichibukai system is problematic.
P2: Fujitora qua admiral is not permitted to intervene in cases such as the Dressrosa incident.
C: The Shichibukai system is problematic.
This is a valid deductive syllogism, as you'll agree; for anyone interested, it is called "Modus Ponens," from latin essentially meaning 'the mode of positing/putting/affirming.' It's abstract formulation looks like this:
If P then Q
P
Therefore Q
As a valid deductive syllogism, if the premises are true, the conclusion must be true, no matter what the argument is about. The question becomes: Are the premises true? If so, then this argument is sound, and the conclusion must be true. But if at least one premise is false, then we have no idea if the conclusion follows.
Support for P1:
As I understand it, the terms of the agreement between the Shichibukai and WG include this: The marines are not to interfere with a Shichibukai unless a Shichibukai directly antagonizes/attacks/disrupts the WG and its affairs.
Yet, a Dressrosa type incident is one that most certainly should receive marine intervention. By all means, it is an incident in which a WG countries citizens are suffering at the hands of a pirate. So, if the marines can't intervene in such a case, then there is a problem with the Shichibukai system.
Fujitora is just one token marine, but this premise could be a claim about the marines in general; he is just the one who happens to be present and capable.
Support for P2:
This is, in my opinion, the contentious premise (I take 1 to be evident). I think that showing this premise to be true could be why Fujitora is doing nothing. I agree with you, Darth, that Fuji's inaction is not just a matter of letting the incident escalate; your arguments, especially by analogy to crocodile, are convincing. Keep in mind, though, that if P1 is true and the above argument is valid (it is), that if P2 is true then the conclusion must follow. Showing P2 to be true goes a long way towards Fuji's goal of showing the conclusion. So, here is what I think is happening.
I think Fujitora could argue (though it may not necessarily be accepted) that he is technically not allowed to act against Doflamingo during this incident. The reasoning goes something like this: The King of a country turning against his own country and its citizens is, while a horrendous act that should be stopped, arguably not a direct action against the WG. All that is necessary is for this claim - about a king against his country - to be contentious; if it is unclear whether Doffy's actions are directly against WG, then Fujitora could argue that he was not to interfere, that is, could argue that P2 is true.
Yet, he obviously has a moral obligation to stop Doflamingo. That is the heart of the matter: The agreement between WG and the Shichibukai is hindering the marine's abilities to fulfill their moral obligations. I point that out not as a fundamental part of the argument (so it can be dismissed if you like), but as Fujitora's motivation behind the above arguments and behind his (in)actions. On the flip side, it may be as much of an argument is Fujitora is willing to give (I doubt he will bust out a modus ponens), but examination of the above argument brings out and is very much within the idea of this motivation.
(The argument can now be put into a stronger form, if we prefer - still a modus ponens, though:
If the shichibukai system is preventing the marines from fulfilling their moral obligations, then it should be abolished.
The shichibukai system is preventing the marines from fulfilling their moral obligations (in accordance with the rules of the system and an ambiguity about Doflamingo's actions and Fujitora's duty).
Thus the shichibukai system should be abolished.
The idea is that he would be able to act - no ambiguity about the "rules" would ever arise - if there were no agreement between WG and these pirates in the first place.)
Conclusion: If the premises are true, the conclusion must be true. The question is whether or not people at Reverie would accept P2 (in either the original or "strong" version of the argument). If Fujitora were to act against Doffy, then his actions might risk contradicting his claim that he was not supposed to act, as it could be claimed that he does not actually believe that himself (potentially tu quo que circumstantial ad hominem, but the fallacies are prevalent because of how successfully they mislead), and it could also be said that - even if he does believe P2 - that didn't get in the way, and so long as admirals use their best judgment things will turn out alright. So, by not acting, he is making the strongest case for premise 2, and he is best motivating the entire argument. In this way, you might even say his inaction is rhetorical, though perhaps not "logical" in certain senses.
(Though, one might argue that it is logical to use rhetoric to get what you want… that is a good question that I will have to put off for another day!)
End notes about Fujitora: As a marine draftee, it is not entirely clear that Fujitora ascribes to "absolute justice." If he does not, then he could be allowing Doffy to do what he is going to do (while, purportedly, protecting citizens), and he could refuse to arrest the straw hats, all for what he personally considers to be right - the abolition of the Shichibukai. An absolute justice guy would likely stop Doflamingo and arrest the Straw Hats regardless of his own agenda (well, absolute justice would BE his agenda).
Lastly, I will note that this is just meant to offer an argument to make sense of his actions - if he doesn't act due to some ambiguous agreement with pirates, resulting is a catastrophe, that may lend credit to the idea that there should be no such agreement at all. I am entirely open to the fact of the matter being that Fujitora is just inept, or that everyone at reverie is an idiot, or so on, and in that case I absolutely 100% agree with you that Oda is doing a bad job with his character.