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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