Is America Waging a "Just" War?
  by Groff Schroeder

Countless memorials to those who died in wars pepper our planet. World War I in the last century (sometimes labeled "the century of war") was called "The War to End All Wars." The Second World War was a horrific disaster in which more than 50 million people died. Yet the "hot" wars continued (Korea, Vietnam, both tragedies for all involved) as well as an ominous "cold war" in which numerous nations squandered billions to maintain thousands of intercontinental ballistic missiles and to aim high- yield hydrogen bombs at cities teeming with civilians. Many of those missiles are still in place today, idling in silos. Despite this extensive history of waste, murder, destruction and woe, the allegedly most intellectually and morally advanced nation on the planet wages a new war - a "war on terror."

War generates terror, so a "war on terror" is a feedback loop generating more war and more terror.

Virtually every belief system on earth considers the killing of other human beings immoral. Still, rationalizations to placate these moral prohibitions and the sensitivities of those who truly hold these beliefs (versus those who hold them only when convenient) are common. Such rationalizations for murder spurred seven "Crusades" between 1095 and 1291, in which various Catholic Popes waged unspeakable wars on the followers of Islam, a religion whose religious text, the Qur'an, shares large common sections with Judaism's Torah and Christianity's Bible. These monotheistic religions share a common belief in a single common deity, yet they have been at war for generations. Many today see America's attack on Iraq as just another crusade, a word President Bush employed in a speech on September 16, 2001 to describe the already unfolding military attack upon Afghanistan.

The need to rationalize the industrial murder that is war led to the concept of "just war" (talk about an oxymoron!). The idea of just war found precepts of international law based upon modern, primarily Christian, interpretations of the work of Renaissance theologian Francisco de Vitoria. This Dominican cleric attempted to define moral behavior in war. The precepts of just war revolve around three general ideas, Jus ad Bellum, Jus in Bello and Jus post Bellum, literally Law to War, Law in War and Law after War.

The concept of "Law to War" governs the morality to starting wars: legitimate authority, spurred by a just cause, must employ right intention while applying proportional force to achieve comparative justice with a high probability of success, but only as a last resort.

The concept of "Law in War" focuses upon morality during war and prohibits military conscription, torture, attacks upon civilians and journalists and the use of overwhelming force, except as a means to reduce harm.

Finally, the concept of "Law after War" regulates the termination of wars and demands that victorious legitimate authorities employ right intention in negotiations with surrendering legitimate authorities to terminate wars after a reasonable vindication of the cause, that the victors initiate war crimes trials (for both sides), and that victors discriminate between political, military and civilian participants. Punitive measures are limited to individuals in direct participation in the war, and revenge is not permitted.


War stems from the idea that you can get other people to do what you want by killing their family and friends. The idea that this can be done with fairness, honor and morality founds the concept of "just" war.

 

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