While it is true that the execution of intention is intentional action, it does not follow that the object of intention is doing A intentionally (cf. Searle 1983, pp. 85 6).
If our agent-relative obligation is neither of these alone, but is rather, that we are not to kill in execution of an intention to kill, both such instances of seeming overbreadth in the reach of our obligations, are avoided.
For example, our deontological obligation with respect to human life is neither an obligation not to kill nor an obligation not to intend to kill; rather, it is an obligation not to murder, that is, to kill in execution of an intention to kill.
Erroneous execution of good intentions created terrorists that the world is now trying to surgically remove.
When S is doing A intentionally, she is doing it in execution of an intention in action, though except in very unusual cases she also intends to do A: to complete the action she is in the midst of performing.
According to the simplest possible view, an intentional action of doing A is the execution of a prior intention to do A, and doing A with the intention of doing B is intending, of one's doing A, that it promote or constitute one's doing B. There are two immediate difficulties.
But the validity of that intention was undone by the execution.
The second problem is more a question: whether 'the relation of being done in execution of a certain intention, or being done intentionally, is a causal relation between act and intention.' (Anscombe 1983, p. 95) Anscombe denies that it is.
But the execution of intention remains the core phenomenon from which all instances of intentional action are derived.
While we may not always be perfect in our execution of that goal, our efforts are always made with the best intentions, and if we err we intend to learn and quickly improve.
