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Saint Augustine was the first clear advocate of just-war theory.
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The just war theory (Latin: bellum iustum)[1][2] is a doctrine, also referred to as a tradition, of military ethics that aims to ensure that a war is morally justifiable through a series of criteria, all of which must be met for a war to be considered just. It has been studied by military leaders, theologians, ethicists and policymakers. The criteria are split into two groups: jus ad bellum ("right to go to war") and jus in bello ("right conduct in war").[3] There have been calls for the inclusion of a third category of just war theory (jus post bellum) dealing with the morality of post-war settlement and reconstruction. The just war theory postulates the belief that war, while it is terrible but less so with the right conduct, is not always the worst option. The just war theory presents a justifiable means of war with justice being an objective of armed conflict.[4] Important responsibilities, undesirable outcomes, or preventable atrocities may justify war.[3]

Opponents of the just war theory may either be inclined to a stricter pacifist standard (proposing that there has never been nor can there ever be a justifiable basis for war) or they may be inclined toward a more permissive nationalist standard (proposing that a war need only to serve a nation's interests to be justifiable). In many cases, philosophers state that individuals do not need to be plagued by a guilty conscience if they are required to fight. A few philosophers ennoble the virtues of the soldier while they also declare their apprehensions for war itself.[5] A few, such as Rousseau, argue for insurrection against oppressive rule.

The historical aspect, or the "just war tradition", deals with the historical body of rules or agreements that have applied in various wars across the ages. The just war tradition also considers the writings of various philosophers and lawyers through history, and examines both their philosophical visions of war's ethical limits and whether their thoughts have contributed to the body of conventions that have evolved to guide war and warfare.[6]

In the twenty-first century there has been significant debate between traditional just war theorists, who largely support the existing law of war and develop arguments to support it, and revisionists who reject many traditional assumptions, although not necessarily advocating a change in the law.[7][8]

Origins

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Ancient Egypt

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A 2017 study found that the just war tradition can be traced as far back as to Ancient Egypt.[9] Egyptian ethics of war usually centered on three main ideas, these including the cosmological role of Egypt, the pharaoh as a divine office and executor of the will of the gods, and the superiority of the Egyptian state and population over all other states and peoples. Egyptian political theology held that the pharaoh had the exclusive legitimacy in justly initiating a war, usually claimed to carry out the will of the gods. Senusret I, in the Twelfth Dynasty, claimed, "I was nursed to be a conqueror...his [Atum's] son and his protector, he gave me to conquer what he conquered." Later pharaohs also considered their sonship of the god Amun-Re as granting them absolute ability to declare war on the deity's behalf. Pharaohs often visited temples prior to initiating campaigns, where the pharaoh was believed to receive their commands of war from the deities. For example, Kamose claimed that "I went north because I was strong (enough) to attack the Asiatics through the command of Amon, the just of counsels." A stele erected by Thutmose III at the Temple of Amun at Karnak "provides an unequivocal statement of the pharaoh's divine mandate to wage war on his enemies." As the period of the New Kingdom progressed and Egypt heightened its territorial ambition, so did the invocation of just war aid the justification of these efforts. The universal principle of Maat, signifying order and justice, was central to the Egyptian notion of just war and its ability to guarantee Egypt virtually no limits on what it could take, do, or use to guarantee the ambitions of the state.[9]

India

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The Indian Hindu epic, the Mahabharata, offers the first written discussions of a "just war" (dharma-yuddha or "righteous war"). In it, one of five ruling brothers (Pandavas) asks if the suffering caused by war can ever be justified. A long discussion then ensues between the siblings, establishing criteria like proportionality (chariots cannot attack cavalry, only other chariots; no attacking people in distress), just means (no poisoned or barbed arrows), just cause (no attacking out of rage), and fair treatment of captives and the wounded.[10]

In Sikhism, the term dharamyudh describes a war that is fought for just, righteous or religious reasons, especially in defence of one's own beliefs. Though some core tenets in the Sikh religion are understood to emphasise peace and nonviolence, especially before the 1606 execution of Guru Arjan by Mughal Emperor Jahangir,[11] military force may be justified if all peaceful means to settle a conflict have been exhausted, thus resulting in a dharamyudh.[12]

East Asian

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Chinese philosophy produced a massive body of work on warfare, much of it during the Zhou dynasty, especially the Warring States era. War was justified only as a last resort and only by the rightful sovereign; however, questioning the decision of the emperor concerning the necessity of a military action was not permissible. The success of a military campaign was sufficient proof that the campaign had been righteous.[13]

Japan did not develop its own doctrine of just war but between the 5th and the 7th centuries drew heavily from Chinese philosophy, and especially Confucian views. As part of the Japanese campaign to take the northeastern island Honshu, Japanese military action was portrayed as an effort to "pacify" the Emishi people, who were likened to "bandits" and "wild-hearted wolf cubs" and accused of invading Japan's frontier lands.[14]

Ancient Greece and Rome

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The notion of just war in Europe originates and is developed first in ancient Greece and then in the Roman Empire.[15][16][17]

It was Aristotle who first introduced the concept and terminology to the Hellenic world that called war a last resort requiring conduct that would allow the restoration of peace. Aristotle argues that the cultivation of a military is necessary and good for the purpose of self-defense, not for conquering: "The proper object of practising military training is not in order that men may enslave those who do not deserve slavery, but in order that first they may themselves avoid becoming enslaved to others" (Politics, Book 7).[18]

Stoic philosopher Panaetius considered war inhuman, but he contemplated just war when it was impossible to bring peace and justice by peaceful means. Just war could be waged solely for retribution or defense, in both cases having to be declared officially. He also established the importance of treating the defeated in a civilized way, especially those who surrendered, even after a prolonged conflict.[19]

In ancient Rome, a "just cause" for war might include the necessity of repelling an invasion, or retaliation for pillaging or a breach of treaty.[20] War was always potentially nefas ("wrong, forbidden"), and risked religious pollution and divine disfavor.[21] A "just war" (bellum iustum) thus required a ritualized declaration by the fetial priests.[22] More broadly, conventions of war and treaty-making were part of the ius gentium, the "law of nations", the customary moral obligations regarded as innate and universal to human beings.[23]

Christian views

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Christian theory of the Just War begins around the time of Augustine of Hippo (Saint Augustine).[24] The Just War theory, with some amendments, is still used by Christians today as a guide to whether or not a war can be justified. Christians may argue "Sometimes war may be necessary and right, even though it may not be good." In the case of a country that has been invaded by an occupying force, war may be the only way to restore justice. [25]

Saint Augustine

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Saint Augustine held that individuals should not resort immediately to violence, but God has given the sword to government for a good reason (based upon Romans 13:4). In Contra Faustum Manichaeum book 22 sections 69–76, Augustine argues that Christians, as part of a government, need not be ashamed of protecting peace and punishing wickedness when they are forced to do so by a government. Augustine asserted that was a personal and philosophical stance: "What is here required is not a bodily action, but an inward disposition. The sacred seat of virtue is the heart."[26]

Nonetheless, he asserted, peacefulness in the face of a grave wrong that could be stopped by only violence would be a sin. Defense of oneself or others could be a necessity, especially when it is authorized by a legitimate authority:

They who have waged war in obedience to the divine command, or in conformity with His laws, have represented in their persons the public justice or the wisdom of government, and in this capacity have put to death wicked men; such persons have by no means violated the commandment, "Thou shalt not kill."[27]

While not breaking down the conditions necessary for war to be just, Augustine nonetheless originated the very phrase itself in his work The City of God:

But, say they, the wise man will wage Just Wars. As if he would not all the rather lament the necessity of just wars, if he remembers that he is a man; for if they were not just he would not wage them, and would therefore be delivered from all wars.[27]

Augustine further taught:

No war is undertaken by a good state except on behalf of good faith or for safety.[28]

J. Mark Mattox writes,

In terms of the traditional notion of jus ad bellum (justice of war, that is, the circumstances in which wars can be justly fought), war is a coping mechanism for righteous sovereigns who would ensure that their violent international encounters are minimal, a reflection of the Divine Will to the greatest extent possible, and always justified. In terms of the traditional notion of jus in bello (justice in war, or the moral considerations which ought to constrain the use of violence in war), war is a coping mechanism for righteous combatants who, by divine edict, have no choice but to subject themselves to their political masters and seek to ensure that they execute their war-fighting duty as justly as possible.[29]

Isidore of Seville

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Isidore of Seville writes:

Those wars are unjust which are undertaken without cause. For aside from vengeance or to fight off enemies no just war can be waged.[30]

Peace and Truce of God

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Main article: Peace and Truce of God

The medieval Peace of God (Latin: pax dei) was a 10th century mass movement in Western Europe instigated by the clergy that granted immunity from violence for non-combatants.

Starting in the 11th Century, the Truce of God (Latin: treuga dei) involved Church rules that successfully limited when and where fighting could occur: Catholic forces (e.g. of warring barons) could not fight each other on Sundays, Thursdays, holidays, the entirety of Lent and Advent and other times, severely disrupting the conduct of wars. The 1179 Third Council of the Lateran adopted a version of it for the whole church.

Saint Thomas Aquinas

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Further information: Thomas Aquinas § Just war
Saint Thomas Aquinas contributed to the development of the just war theory in medieval Europe.

The just war theory by Thomas Aquinas has had a lasting impact on later generations of thinkers and was part of an emerging consensus in medieval Europe on just war.[31] In the 13th century Aquinas reflected in detail on peace and war. Aquinas was a Dominican friar and contemplated the teachings of the Bible on peace and war in combination with ideas from Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Saint Augustine and other philosophers whose writings are part of the Western canon. Aquinas' views on war drew heavily on the Decretum Gratiani, a book the Italian monk Gratian had compiled with passages from the Bible. After its publication in the 12th century, the Decretum Gratiani had been republished with commentary from Pope Innocent IV and the Dominican friar Raymond of Penafort. Other significant influences on Aquinas just war theory were Alexander of Hales and Henry of Segusio.[32]

In Summa Theologica Aquinas asserted that it is not always a sin to wage war, and he set out criteria for a just war. According to Aquinas, three requirements must be met. Firstly, the war must be waged upon the command of a rightful sovereign. Secondly, the war needs to be waged for just cause, on account of some wrong the attacked have committed. Thirdly, warriors must have the right intent, namely to promote good and to avoid evil.[33][34] Aquinas came to the conclusion that a just war could be offensive and that injustice should not be tolerated so as to avoid war. Nevertheless, Aquinas argued that violence must only be used as a last resort. On the battlefield, violence was only justified to the extent it was necessary. Soldiers needed to avoid cruelty and a just war was limited by the conduct of just combatants. Aquinas argued that it was only in the pursuit of justice, that the good intention of a moral act could justify negative consequences, including the killing of the innocent during a war.[35]

Renaissance and Christian Humanists

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Various Renaissance humanists promoted Pacificist views.

  • John Colet famously preached a Lenten sermon before Henry VIII, who was preparing for a war, quoting Cicero "Better an unjust peace rather than the justest war."[36]
  • Erasmus of Rotterdam wrote numerous works on peace which criticized Just War theory as a smokescreen and added extra limitations, notably The Complaint of Peace and the Treatise on War (Dulce bellum inexpertis).

A leading humanist writer after the Reformation was legal theorist Hugo Grotius, whose De jura belli ac pacis re-considered Just War and fighting wars justly.

First World War

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At the beginning of the First World War, a group of theologians in Germany published a manifesto that sought to justify the actions of the German government. At the British government's request, Randall Davidson, Archbishop of Canterbury, took the lead in collaborating with a large number of other religious leaders, including some with whom he had differed in the past, to write a rebuttal of the Germans' contentions. Both German and British theologians based themselves on the just war theory, each group seeking to prove that it applied to the war waged by its own side.[37]

Contemporary Catholic doctrine

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The just war doctrine of the Catholic Church found in the 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church, in paragraph 2309, lists four strict conditions for "legitimate defense by military force:"[38][39]

  • The damage inflicted by the aggressor on the nation or community of nations must be lasting, grave and certain.
  • All other means of putting an end to it must have been shown to be impractical or ineffective.
  • There must be serious prospects of success.
  • The use of arms must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated.

The Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church elaborates on the just war doctrine in paragraphs 500 to 501, while citing the Charter of the United Nations:[40]

If this responsibility justifies the possession of sufficient means to exercise this right to defense, States still have the obligation to do everything possible "to ensure that the conditions of peace exist, not only within their own territory but throughout the world". It is important to remember that "it is one thing to wage a war of self-defense; it is quite another to seek to impose domination on another nation. The possession of war potential does not justify the use of force for political or military objectives. Nor does the mere fact that war has unfortunately broken out mean that all is fair between the warring parties".

The Charter of the United Nations ... is based on a generalized prohibition of a recourse to force to resolve disputes between States, with the exception of two cases: legitimate defence and measures taken by the Security Council within the area of its responsibilities for maintaining peace. In every case, exercising the right to self-defence must respect "the traditional limits of necessity and proportionality".

Therefore, engaging in a preventive war without clear proof that an attack is imminent cannot fail to raise serious moral and juridical questions. International legitimacy for the use of armed force, on the basis of rigorous assessment and with well-founded motivations, can only be given by the decision of a competent body that identifies specific situations as threats to peace and authorizes an intrusion into the sphere of autonomy usually reserved to a State.

— Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church[40]

Pope John Paul II in an address to a group of soldiers noted the following:[41]

Peace, as taught by Sacred Scripture and the experience of men itself, is more than just the absence of war. And the Christian is aware that on earth a human society that is completely and always peaceful is, unfortunately, an utopia and that the ideologies which present it as easily attainable only nourish vain hopes. The cause of peace will not go forward by denying the possibility and the obligation to defend it.

Russian Orthodox Church

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The War and Peace section in the Basis of the Social Concept of the Russian Orthodox Church is crucial for understanding the Russian Orthodox Church's attitude towards war. The document offers criteria of distinguishing between an aggressive war, which is unacceptable, and a justified war, attributing the highest moral and sacred value of military acts of bravery to a true believer who participates in a justified war. Additionally, the document considers the just war criteria as developed in Western Christianity to be eligible for Russian Orthodoxy; therefore, the justified war theory in Western theology is also applicable to the Russian Orthodox Church.[42]

In the same document, it is stated that wars have accompanied human history since the fall of man, and according to the gospel, they will continue to accompany it. While recognizing war as evil, the Russian Orthodox Church does not prohibit its members from participating in hostilities if there is the security of their neighbours and the restoration of trampled justice at stake. War is considered to be necessary but undesirable. It is also stated that the Russian Orthodox Church has had profound respect for soldiers who gave their lives to protect the life and security of their neighbours.[43]

Just war tradition

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The just war theory, propounded by the medieval Christian philosopher Thomas Aquinas, was developed further by legal scholars in the context of international law. Cardinal Cajetan, the jurist Francisco de Vitoria, the two Jesuit priests Luis de Molina and Francisco Suárez, as well as the humanist Hugo Grotius and the lawyer Luigi Taparelli were most influential in the formation of a just war tradition. The just war tradition, which was well established by the 19th century, found its practical application in the Hague Peace Conferences (1899 and 1907) and in the founding of the League of Nations in 1920. After the United States Congress declared war on Germany in 1917, Cardinal James Gibbons issued a letter that all Catholics were to support the war[44] because "Our Lord Jesus Christ does not stand for peace at any price... If by Pacifism is meant the teaching that the use of force is never justifiable, then, however well meant, it is mistaken, and it is hurtful to the life of our country."[45]

Armed conflicts such as the Spanish Civil War, World War II and the Cold War were, as a matter of course, judged according to the norms (as established in Aquinas' just war theory) by philosophers such as Jacques Maritain, Elizabeth Anscombe and John Finnis.[31]

The first work dedicated specifically to just war was the 15th-century sermon De bellis justis of Stanisław of Skarbimierz (1360–1431), who justified war by the Kingdom of Poland against the Teutonic Knights.[46] Francisco de Vitoria criticized the conquest of America by the Spanish conquistadors on the basis of just-war theory.[47] With Alberico Gentili and Hugo Grotius, just war theory was replaced by international law theory, codified as a set of rules, which today still encompass the points commonly debated, with some modifications.[48]

Just-war theorists combine a moral abhorrence towards war with a readiness to accept that war may sometimes be necessary. The criteria of the just-war tradition act as an aid in determining whether resorting to arms is morally permissible. Just-war theories aim "to distinguish between justifiable and unjustifiable uses of organized armed forces"; they attempt "to conceive of how the use of arms might be restrained, made more humane, and ultimately directed towards the aim of establishing lasting peace and justice".[49]

The just war tradition addresses the morality of the use of force in two parts: when it is right to resort to armed force (the concern of jus ad bellum) and what is acceptable in using such force (the concern of jus in bello).[50]

In 1869 the Russian military theorist Genrikh Antonovich Leer [ru] theorized on the advantages and potential benefits of war.[51]

The Soviet leader Vladimir Lenin defined only three types of just war.[52]

But picture to yourselves a slave-owner who owned 100 slaves warring against a slave-owner who owned 200 slaves for a more "just" distribution of slaves. Clearly, the application of the term "defensive" war, or war "for the defense of the fatherland" in such a case would be historically false, and in practice would be sheer deception of the common people, of philistines, of ignorant people, by the astute slaveowners. Precisely in this way are the present-day imperialist bourgeoisie deceiving the peoples by means of "national ideology" and the term "defense of the fatherland" in the present war between slave-owners for fortifying and strengthening slavery.[53]

The anarcho-capitalist scholar Murray Rothbard (1926–1995) stated that "a just war exists when a people tries to ward off the threat of coercive domination by another people, or to overthrow an already-existing domination. A war is unjust, on the other hand, when a people try to impose domination on another people or try to retain an already-existing coercive rule over them."[54]

Jonathan Riley-Smith writes:

The consensus among Christians on the use of violence has changed radically since the crusades were fought. The just war theory prevailing for most of the last two centuries—that violence is an evil that can, in certain situations, be condoned as the lesser of evils—is relatively young. Although it has inherited some elements (the criteria of legitimate authority, just cause, right intention) from the older war theory that first evolved around AD 400, it has rejected two premises that underpinned all medieval just wars, including crusades: first, that violence could be employed on behalf of Christ's intentions for mankind and could even be directly authorized by him; and second, that it was a morally neutral force that drew whatever ethical coloring it had from the intentions of the perpetrators.[55]

Criteria

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The just war theory has two sets of criteria, the first establishing jus ad bellum (the right to go to war), and the second establishing jus in bello (right conduct within war).[56]

Jus ad bellum

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Main article: Jus ad bellum

The just war theory directs jus ad bellum to norms that aim to require certain circumstances to enable the right to go to war.[57]

Competent authority
Only duly constituted public authorities may wage war. "A just war must be initiated by a political authority within a political system that allows distinctions of justice. Dictatorships (e.g. Hitler's regime) or deceptive military actions (e.g. the 1968 US bombing of Cambodia) are typically considered as violations of this criterion. The importance of this condition is key. Plainly, we cannot have a genuine process of judging a just war within a system that represses the process of genuine justice. A just war must be initiated by a political authority within a political system that allows distinctions of justice".[58]
Probability of success
According to this principle, there must be good grounds for concluding that aims of the just war are achievable.[59] This principle emphasizes that mass violence must not be undertaken if it is unlikely to secure the just cause.[60] This criterion is to avoid invasion for invasion's sake and links to the proportionality criteria. One cannot invade if there is no chance of actually winning. However, wars are fought with imperfect knowledge, so one must simply be able to make a logical case that one can win; there is no way to know this in advance. These criteria move the conversation from moral and theoretical grounds to practical grounds.[61] Essentially, this is meant to gather coalition building and win approval of other state actors.
Last resort
The principle of last resort stipulates that all non-violent options must first be exhausted before the use of force can be justified. Diplomatic options, sanctions, and other non-military methods must be attempted or validly ruled out before the engagement of hostilities. Further, in regard to the amount of harm—proportionally—the principle of last resort would support using small intervention forces first and then escalating rather than starting a war with massive force such as carpet bombing or nuclear warfare.[62]
Just cause
The reason for going to war needs to be just and cannot, therefore, be solely for recapturing things taken or punishing people who have done wrong; innocent life must be in imminent danger and intervention must be to protect life. A contemporary view of just cause was expressed in 1993 when the US Catholic Conference said: "Force may be used only to correct a grave, public evil, i.e., aggression or massive violation of the basic human rights of whole populations."

Jus in bello

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Once war has begun, just war theory (jus in bello) also directs how combatants are to act or should act:

Distinction
Just war conduct is governed by the principle of distinction. The acts of war should be directed towards enemy combatants, and not towards non-combatants caught in circumstances that they did not create. The prohibited acts include bombing civilian residential areas that include no legitimate military targets, committing acts of terrorism or reprisal against civilians or prisoners of war (POWs), and attacking neutral targets. Moreover, combatants are not permitted to attack enemy combatants who have surrendered, or who have been captured, or who are injured and not presenting an immediate lethal threat, or who are parachuting from disabled aircraft and are not airborne forces, or who are shipwrecked.
Proportionality
Just war conduct is governed by the principle of proportionality. Combatants must make sure that the harm caused to civilians or civilian property is not excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated by an attack on a legitimate military objective. This principle is meant to discern the correct balance between the restriction imposed by a corrective measure and the severity of the nature of the prohibited act.
Military necessity
Just war conduct is governed by the principle of military necessity. An attack or action must be intended to help in the defeat of the enemy; it must be an attack on a legitimate military objective, and the harm caused to civilians or civilian property must be proportional and not excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated. Jus in bello allows for military necessity and does not favor a specific justification in allowing for counter-attack recourse.[63] This principle is meant to limit excessive and unnecessary death and destruction.
Fair treatment of prisoners of war
Enemy combatants who surrendered or who are captured no longer pose a threat. It is therefore wrong to torture them or otherwise mistreat them.
No means malum in se
Combatants may not use weapons or other methods of warfare that are considered evil, such as mass rape, forcing enemy combatants to fight against their own side or using weapons whose effects cannot be controlled (e.g., nuclear/biological weapons).

Ending a war: Jus post bellum

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In recent years, some theorists, such as Gary Bass, Louis Iasiello and Brian Orend, have proposed a third category within the just war theory. "Jus post bellum is described by some scholars as a new "discipline," or as "a new category of international law currently under construction".[64] Jus post bellum[65] concerns justice after a war, including peace treaties, reconstruction, environmental remediation, war crimes trials, and war reparations. Jus post bellum has been added to deal with the fact that some hostile actions may take place outside a traditional battlefield. Jus post bellum governs the justice of war termination and peace agreements, as well as the prosecution of war criminals, and publicly labelled terrorists.The idea has largely been used to help decide what to do with prisoners taken during battle. It is through government labeling and public opinion that people use jus post bellum to justify the pursuit of individuals labeled as terrorists for the safety of the government's state in a modern context. The actual fault lies with the aggressor, and by being the aggressor, they forfeit their rights to honorable treatment by their actions. That theory is used to justify the actions taken by anyone fighting in a war to treat prisoners outside the bounds of war.[66][67]

Traditionalists and Revisionists

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There are two altering views related to the just war theory that scholars align with, which are traditionalists and revisionists. The debates between these different viewpoints rest on the moral responsiblites of actors in jus in bello.[68]

Traditionalists

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In the just war theory as it pertains to jus in bello, traditionalist scholars view that the two principles, jus ad bellum and jus in bello, are distinct in which actors in war are morally responsible. The traditional view places accountability on leaders who start the war, while soldiers are accountable for actions breaking jus in bello.[69]

Revisionists

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Revisionist scholars view that moral responsibility in conduct of war is placed on individual soldiers who participate in war, even if they follow the rules associated with jus in bello. Soldiers that participate in unjust wars are morally responsible. The revisionist view is based on an individual level, rather than on a collective whole.[70][68][69]

Additionally, the distinctive methodologies associated with the use of nuclear weapons to wage mass war in the modern era, have also led some "nonreductive" revisionists question the relevance the just war theory itself.[71] Such particular criticisms are more limited in scope, however, than the generalized objections which have been raised by both realists and pacifists.[72][73][74]

See also

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References

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Further reading

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[edit]
Revisions and contributorsEdit on WikipediaRead on Wikipedia

Just war theory

View on Grokipedia
from Grokipedia

Just war theory constitutes a set of ethical criteria for evaluating the morality of resorting to armed conflict () and the permissible means of waging it (jus in bello). Emerging from Roman legal traditions that required wars to address injuries or recover what is owed, the doctrine was reshaped by to permit defensive or punitive violence under strict conditions. Saint Augustine advanced it by positing that legitimate rulers could justly employ force to correct faults, avenge wrongs, or achieve , emphasizing sorrowful intent over glorification of battle. Saint Thomas Aquinas codified core requirements in his , mandating sovereign authority, just cause such as resisting , and right intention aimed at rather than or vengeance. Jus in bello principles, including between combatants and non-combatants alongside proportionality in force, evolved to constrain wartime atrocities regardless of a conflict's overall . While providing a framework for moral restraint amid inevitable human violence, the theory faces ongoing debates over applications like preemptive strikes, tactics, and the erosion of distinctions in modern irregular conflicts.

Core Principles

Jus ad Bellum

Jus ad bellum delineates the moral and legal conditions under which a state or may justly initiate . This branch of just war theory, rooted in the , seeks to limit recourse to violence by requiring that wars serve rather than or conquest. Early formulations appear in the writings of , who argued that wars must avenge injuries and restore order, but it was who in his (c. 1270) articulated three core requirements: the war must be declared by legitimate sovereign , pursued for a just cause such as or rectification of grave wrongs, and conducted with rightful intention aimed at . Subsequent thinkers expanded these into a more comprehensive set of six criteria, reflecting prudential considerations to ensure wars are not only right in principle but feasible and restrained in practice. These include: just cause, typically limited to against armed attack, defense of others from imminent harm, or punishment of severe ; legitimate authority, vesting the decision in a recognized body capable of representing the , excluding private or vigilante actions; right intention, ensuring the aim is not vengeance, territorial gain, or ideological imposition but the restoration of and . Further criteria emphasize last resort, mandating exhaustion of diplomatic, economic, and other non-violent means before force; reasonable prospect of success, requiring a realistic chance that the war's objectives can be achieved without disproportionate futility; and proportionality, balancing anticipated harms against the goods sought, such that the expected benefits—measured in lives saved, secured, or order restored—outweigh the inevitable costs of conflict. These principles, while normative ideals, have influenced , as seen in the Charter's recognition of under Article 51 (1945), though debates persist over their application in cases like preemptive strikes or humanitarian interventions.

Jus in Bello

Jus in bello encompasses the ethical and legal norms governing the conduct of hostilities once war has commenced, emphasizing restraint and humanity irrespective of the war's originating justice. This body of principles, distinct from , binds all combatants equally, a formalized by in his 1532 lectures on the rights of and elaborated by in (1625), where he argued that even unjust aggressors retain rights under war's laws to prevent total anarchy. These rules aim to limit war's destructiveness by prohibiting methods that cause superfluous injury or unnecessary suffering, as initially codified in the of 1863 for Union forces during the , which prohibited , poisoning wells, and wanton devastation. The core principles of jus in bello are discrimination, proportionality, and military necessity, which together constrain permissible violence to what is essential for achieving military objectives. Discrimination, also termed distinction, mandates that parties differentiate between combatants and non-combatants, forbidding intentional attacks on civilians or civilian objects unless they contribute directly to military action. This immunity for non-combatants, traceable to Thomas Aquinas's Summa Theologica (1265–1274) where he deemed the killing of innocents illicit, underpins modern prohibitions like those in Article 51 of Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions (1977), which deems attacks expecting excessive civilian casualties disproportionate. Proportionality requires that the anticipated concrete military advantage from an attack outweigh the collateral harm to civilians or civilian infrastructure, assessed case-by-case rather than cumulatively across a campaign; violations occurred, for instance, in the 1999 NATO bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade, where imprecise targeting caused unintended deaths despite claimed necessity. Military necessity permits only actions indispensable to weakening the enemy's military capacity, excluding reprisals against civilians or destruction for mere punitive reasons, as Grotius specified that "fury" must yield to "moderation" even against foes. Additional jus in bello norms prohibit , such as feigning protected status to ambush (e.g., misusing Red Cross emblems), and means of warfare causing inherent superfluous injury, like expanding bullets banned by the 1899 Declaration IV,3. These evolved from chivalric customs into positive via the 1907 Conventions, which in Article 22 affirm that "the right of belligerents to adopt means of injuring the enemy is not unlimited." Enforcement remains challenging, as self-judged compliance often falters in asymmetric conflicts, yet the principles' universality—applying even to non-state actors under —preserves a baseline against .

Jus Post Bellum

Jus post bellum encompasses the ethical and legal principles governing the transition from armed conflict to , including the terms of surrender, treatment of the defeated, prosecution of war crimes, and reconstruction efforts to foster sustainable stability. These principles aim to ensure that the end of war aligns with the original just cause, preventing cycles of vengeance or instability that could necessitate future conflicts. Unlike jus ad bellum and jus in bello, which have deeper roots in classical just war thought, jus post bellum received limited systematic attention until the , though antecedents appear in earlier discussions of peace terms by figures such as , who emphasized proportionality in reparations and restraint toward non-combatants. Core principles include proportionality in peace settlements, requiring that demands on the vanquished—such as territorial concessions or reparations—remain commensurate with the injuries inflicted and the war's objectives, avoiding punitive excess that undermines long-term . Discrimination mandates distinguishing between culpable leaders and combatants, who may face trials for atrocities, and innocent civilians, who should be shielded from ; this is evidenced in post-World War II tribunals like , where 22 high-ranking Nazis were prosecuted for specific , resulting in 12 death sentences but sparing broader populations. Rights vindication involves restoring violated rights through mechanisms like compensation and institutional reform, while reconstruction obligations compel victors to support rebuilding and , as articulated in frameworks demanding respect for persons and rectification of harms to prevent . In practice, jus post bellum has informed modern interventions, such as the Allied occupation of from 1945 to 1949, where processes removed over 8.5 million from public roles but were tempered by economic via the , which disbursed $13.3 billion (equivalent to $150 billion today) to avert and radical resurgence. Failures arise when principles are ignored, as in some post-colonial conflicts where disproportionate reprisals fueled insurgencies, underscoring the need for right in peace-making—typically requiring legitimate or international bodies to negotiate terms publicly and accountably. Contemporary scholarship debates maximalist versus minimalist approaches, with maximalists advocating extensive victor responsibilities for , such as democratic institution-building, while minimalists prioritize minimal intervention to respect post-victory.

Historical Development

Ancient and Pre-Christian Origins

The concept of justified warfare emerged in ancient Greek thought, where philosophers grappled with the moral limits of conflict amid inter-city-state rivalries. Plato, in works such as The Republic and Laws, portrayed war as a regrettable necessity arising from human flaws like greed, but allowable only under regulated conditions to preserve the ideal state's order, emphasizing defensive aims and avoidance of unnecessary aggression. Aristotle, building on this in Politics (circa 350 BCE), classified wars as just when aimed at establishing a "natural" hierarchy—such as Greek dominance over "barbarians" deemed unfit for self-rule—or in self-defense to avert subjugation, while deeming predatory wars for mere acquisition unjust, though his framework tolerated enslavement of the defeated as aligned with natural inequalities. These ideas prioritized legitimate authority and proportionate ends over unqualified pacifism, influencing later traditions despite their ethnocentric undertones. Roman practices advanced these notions into formalized procedures by the early (circa 509–27 BCE), embedding ethical constraints in the priesthood's rituals for declaring war (bellum iustum). The fetiales required envoys to present grievances to the enemy, demand restitution within a fixed period (typically 33 days), and secure senatorial approval before ritual spear-throwing symbolized legitimate initiation, ensuring wars stemmed from injury received rather than unprovoked ambition. This system, rooted in religious guarantees, prohibited wars without cause, such as those for glory alone, and extended to humane treatment of combatants, prohibiting perfidy or betrayal of truces. Cicero synthesized and refined these principles in (44 BCE), articulating that "no war is just unless it is entered upon after an official demand for satisfaction has been submitted or warning has been given and a formal declaration made," limiting resort to arms to or recovery of what is owed by right of or convention. He further stipulated proportionality, humane conduct (e.g., sparing the defeated who surrender), and post-war fidelity to agreements, drawing from Stoic to argue wars must serve , not vengeance or expansion, thereby providing a philosophical bridge from ritual to ethical criteria. These Roman elements—formal authorization, just cause, and restraint—formed the pre-Christian bedrock later adapted by Christian thinkers, though ancient applications often blurred into imperial .

Early Christian and Patristic Foundations

The early Christian era, spanning from the apostolic age through the third century, exhibited a prevailing stance against Christian involvement in warfare, rooted in interpretations of teachings such as ("turn the other cheek") and ("love your enemies"). This position manifested in prohibitions against , as participation required oaths to pagan emperors, in rituals, and acts of killing incompatible with Christ's example of non-violence. While not absolute—some Christians may have served in the Roman legions prior to conversion—doctrinal writings emphasized , with converts often urged to abandon arms for spiritual combat. Tertullian (c. 155–240 AD), a North African theologian, articulated this ethic forcefully in De Corona (c. 211 AD), declaring that "the soldiers of Christ require neither arms nor spears of iron" and viewing military oaths as idolatrous. of (c. 185–253 AD) echoed this in (c. 248 AD), arguing Christians contribute to the empire through prayer rather than bloodshed, as their kingdom is not of this world, and advocating non-retaliation even under persecution. Other fathers like (c. 250–325 AD) reinforced the incompatibility of faith and violence, stating in Divine Institutes (c. 304–313 AD) that killing, even in judicial roles, defiles the soul. This consensus reflected a minority faith's strategy of witness amid hostility, prioritizing martyrdom over . The Patristic shift toward conditional acceptance of war accelerated after Emperor Constantine's victory at the Milvian Bridge in 312 AD and the in 313 AD, which ended and integrated into imperial administration, including the . of (c. 339–397 AD), as bishop and advisor to emperors, bridged and realism by endorsing defensive force against invasions, as in his Letter to Marcellinus (c. 384 AD), where he affirmed the state's duty to protect the innocent, drawing on Ciceronian adapted to Christian charity. 's excommunication of Emperor in 390 AD for excessive retaliation underscored restraint, yet validated coercive authority when proportionate. Augustine of Hippo (354–430 AD) provided the foundational synthesis during Rome's sack in 410 AD, refuting Manichaean pacifism and Donatist absolutism in works like Contra Faustum (c. 400 AD) and City of God (413–426 AD). He posited war as a tragic necessity in a fallen world, justifiable only under legitimate authority (e.g., sovereign rulers, not private vengeance), just cause (self-defense or recovery of stolen goods, per Exodus 22), and right intention (peace restoration, not hatred). In this framework, Just War theory as advanced by Augustine permits killing in defensive wars under conditions of proportionality and right intention, distinguishing such authorized violence from murder prohibited by the Sixth Commandment ("Thou shalt not kill"). Augustine analogized just war to paternal or surgical discipline, where love demands restraining evil to prevent greater harm, as in Letter 189 (c. 418–419 AD) to Boniface, urging defense against Vandals without glee in killing. This framework, while not yet formalized as jus ad bellum, prioritized proportionality and discrimination, influencing medieval developments amid empire's collapse.

Medieval Formulation

The medieval formulation of just war theory emerged in the scholastic period, synthesizing patristic teachings with to address the realities of feudal warfare and crusading expeditions. Gratian's Decretum (c. 1140) marked an early systematic effort by compiling scriptural and patristic authorities into a dialectical framework that distinguished permissible wars—those waged by legitimate rulers to redress injuries—from illicit ones driven by private vengeance or aggression. This collection reconciled apparent contradictions in earlier Christian sources, such as Augustine's allowances for defensive violence, thereby providing guidelines that influenced both clerical and secular judgments on conflict. Thomas Aquinas further refined these principles in his Summa Theologica (1265–1274), articulating in Question 40, Article 1, the three essential conditions for a just war: legitimate authority, just cause, and right intention. Legitimate authority required the war to be declared by a sovereign ruler, not private individuals, as only the commonwealth's governor could lawfully mobilize forces for public justice. Just cause entailed responding to a verifiable fault or injury, such as punishing violations of natural law or recovering stolen goods, echoing Augustine's emphasis on rectifying wrongs rather than conquest for expansion. Right intention demanded that belligerents pursue peace and the , prohibiting motives like for glory or greed, and implying proportionality by tying warfare to moral ends. Aquinas's codification further clarifies the permission for killing in war if proportionate, defensive, and aimed at legitimate threats, distinguishing it from murder prohibited under the Sixth Commandment. Aquinas's criteria, grounded in and , elevated just war theory to a of moral theology, justifying defensive and punitive campaigns while curtailing arbitrary in an of frequent internecine and holy wars. This formulation persisted in , as seen in Innocent IV's 1240s endorsements of against heretics under similar rubrics, though Aquinas's work prioritized reasoned limits over unqualified holy war endorsements.

Early Modern and Enlightenment Refinements

Hugo Grotius's (1625) marked a pivotal of just war theory amid the , deriving principles from and the ius gentium—customary practices among nations—rather than solely theological authority. He identified three primary just causes for war: against , recovery of or wrongfully withheld, and punishment of violations of by another state. Grotius insisted on strict jus in bello observance, prohibiting unnecessary cruelty and requiring proportionality, even for belligerents claiming justice, to mitigate war's harms through rational restraint. Unlike medieval precedents, he endorsed preemptive action against credible threats, broadening while emphasizing voluntary compliance over papal enforcement. Samuel Pufendorf advanced this framework in De Jure Naturae et Gentium (1672), positing states as persons obligated by a natural duty of sociability, which imposed limits on warfare despite sovereign independence post-Westphalia (1648). Building on Grotius, Pufendorf affirmed defensive wars and interventions to allies under but subordinated them to principles of necessity and humanity, rejecting total destruction in favor of measured force to restore . His voluntarist imputed qualities to actions via divine will yet retained natural constraints, such as discrimination between combatants and non-combatants, influencing later views on state rights without endorsing unlimited aggression. Enlightenment thinkers like refined these ideas in (1758), prioritizing sovereign equality and as foundational , where served as a judicial tool for sovereigns denied peaceful redress. Vattel enumerated just causes as defense against , reparation for injuries (including breaches), and punishment of egregious wrongs, but mandated proportionality—limiting to actual —and exhaustion of diplomatic remedies as a last resort. He integrated balance-of-power considerations, justifying preventive wars to avert hegemonic threats that could undermine multiple states' independence, though this expanded permissible aggression under rationalist international norms. These developments, rooted in post-Reformation state sovereignty, transitioned just war from ecclesiastical oversight to a secular of nations, informing and while accommodating realist state interests.

19th and 20th Century Adaptations

In the , just war theory intersected with emerging positivist , which prioritized state consent via treaties over traditional moral criteria for initiating war, yet moral justifications persisted in practice. The U.S. , issued by President on April 24, 1863, as General Orders No. 100, marked the first comprehensive codification of rules during the , incorporating just war principles such as proportionality, , and distinction between combatants and civilians to limit excesses in total mobilization conflicts. This reflected adaptations to industrialized warfare involving conscript armies, where earlier assumptions of limited professional engagements no longer held, prompting restraints on conduct amid expanding battlefields. Claims of a complete shift to liberum ius ad bellum—unfettered state right to war without just cause—overstate the case; 19th-century jurists like Henry Wheaton and European diplomats continued invoking and injury redress, blending moral discourse with legal formalities in treaties like the 1856 Paris Declaration on maritime warfare. The 20th century saw just war theory revive as a counterpoint to total war's unprecedented scale, including aerial bombing, chemical weapons, and atomic deterrence, amid declining reliance on pure after I's devastation. The Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907 codified jus in bello norms, prohibiting poison gas and mandating humane treatment of prisoners, drawing implicitly from just war distinctions while focusing on conduct rather than resort to war. Post-1945, the Charter's Article 2(4) banned aggressive force except in (Article 51) or Security Council-authorized actions, operationalizing restrictions on unjust aggression, as evidenced in and trials (1945–1948) that prosecuted leaders for "wars of aggression" violating these principles. Philosophically, Catholic thinkers like Paul Ramsey in War and the Christian Conscience (1961) and John C. Ford revived Augustinian-Thomistic frameworks to critique strategic bombing's proportionality failures, while Michael Walzer's (1977) adapted the tradition to nuclear threats, introducing the "supreme emergency" exemption for extreme threats like Nazi conquest but rejecting deterrence as inherently unjust due to indiscriminate risk. These developments integrated just war with (1949), emphasizing accountability in asymmetric and high-tech conflicts, though tensions arose over total war's erosion of immunity. ![Gari Melchers war painting depicting 20th century conflict themes][float-right]

Philosophical Foundations

Traditionalist Approach

The traditionalist approach to just war theory upholds the classical framework originating in early Christian thought and systematized in medieval philosophy, emphasizing a bifurcated structure of moral criteria: for the justice of resorting to and jus in bello for ethical conduct during hostilities. This perspective maintains that these criteria apply distinctly, with justifying a state's initiation of under sovereign authority while jus in bello governs combatants' actions irrespective of their side's overall justice, thereby establishing a moral equality among soldiers who adhere to discriminatory and proportional . Rooted in theological and teleological , traditionalism privileges the preservation of political order and communal goods, viewing as a tragic but permissible instrument when aligned with objective moral principles derived from divine or . St. Augustine of Hippo laid foundational elements in works such as (c. 413–426 AD), asserting that legitimate wars must be waged by public authority to redress injuries, restore peace, or punish grave wrongs, always with a right intention aimed at achieving good rather than vengeance or conquest. He integrated Roman legal traditions with Christian pacifist inclinations, permitting defensive violence only when undertaken reluctantly and proportionately to avert greater evils, as seen in his endorsement of imperial forces against heresies like in during the early 5th century. Augustine's criteria implicitly required proportionality, precluding excessive force, and subordinated martial aims to the ultimate pursuit of eternal peace over temporal dominance. St. Thomas Aquinas refined these ideas in the Summa Theologica (1265–1274), articulating three core jus ad bellum conditions: declaration by a sovereign authority possessing coercive power; just cause, such as repelling aggression or redressing violations of natural rights; and right intention to promote good and avert evil, excluding ulterior motives like territorial gain. Aquinas grounded his theory in Aristotelian virtue ethics and natural law, positing that war's legitimacy stems from reason's dictate to defend the common good, with proportionality assessed by comparing anticipated harms to the justice secured. He extended discrimination to protect non-combatants, drawing from biblical precedents and emphasizing that even just warriors incur moral stain, underscoring war's inherent disorder. Subsequent scholastic developments by figures like (1483–1546) and (1548–1617) incorporated emerging international norms, expanding just causes to include defense of allies and humanitarian rescue from tyranny, while insisting on last resort after exhausting peaceful remedies and reasonable prospect of success to avoid futile bloodshed. (1583–1645) secularized the tradition in (1625), retaining core principles but framing them within rationalist jurisprudence applicable beyond , thus influencing modern state practice by linking war's justice to violations of . Traditionalists critique revisionist reductions to individual liability, arguing that state agency and political teleology necessitate a presumption of combatant immunity under jus in bello, preserving operational feasibility in collective violence. This approach has informed ecclesiastical teachings, as in the Catholic Catechism's endorsement of defensive wars meeting strict conditions, reflecting continuity from patristic to contemporary formulations.

Revisionist Challenges

Revisionist just war theory, emerging prominently in the early 2000s through works by philosophers such as Jeff McMahan and David Rodin, contests the orthodox separation of (criteria for resorting to war) from jus in bello (conduct during war), arguing that moral permissions in must derive from liability rather than uniform status or state . McMahan, in his 2009 book Killing in War, posits that traditional theory's independence of these criteria permits soldiers in an unjust war to lawfully kill defenders, a conclusion he deems morally incoherent since it equates threats from culpable aggressors with those from innocent victims. Instead, revisionists advocate reducing wartime ethics to the principles of ordinary self- and other-defense, where an agent's right to kill depends on whether the target is liable due to unjustly threatening harm. A cornerstone challenge is the denial of the moral equality of combatants, which traditionalists uphold to ensure reciprocal irrespective of a war's overall . Revisionists reject this , asserting that combatants on the unjust side forfeit their immunity to defensive force because their actions contribute to an aggressive lacking moral justification, rendering them liable even absent immediate danger. McMahan illustrates this with analogies to individual liability: just as a mugger threatening a can be killed in defense, so too can soldiers advancing an unjust be targeted, whereas defenders retain robust rights against lethal harm. This view extends to noncombatants, potentially permitting attacks on them if they directly aid an unjust war in ways that make them liable, though revisionists emphasize that such liability requires specific culpable contribution, not mere nationality. Revisionists further undermine traditional just causes like national defense, with Rodin arguing in his 2002 book War and Self-Defense that states lack the inherent of s to lethal , as institutional often infringes on in ways personal defense does not. They critique proportionality assessments as overly collective, insisting instead on aggregating liabilities and harms, which could invalidate wars where state-level benefits do not offset harms to innocents or unjust fighters. These arguments, grounded in deontological emphasis on violations over consequentialist balancing, aim to align just war criteria with first-personal , exposing traditional doctrine's concessions to political realism as ethical compromises.

Implications for National Defense and Sovereignty

Just war theory's jus ad bellum criteria, including just cause and legitimate authority, affirm the sovereign state's inherent right to self-defense against armed aggression, thereby justifying national military preparedness and the use of force to preserve territorial integrity and political independence. This principle aligns with Article 51 of the UN Charter, which recognizes the "inherent right of individual or collective self-defence" until the Security Council acts, providing a legal basis for states to maintain armed forces proportionate to credible threats. Traditional formulations, rooted in thinkers like Hugo Grotius, emphasize that only sovereign authorities possess the moral and legal standing to declare war, reinforcing the Westphalian system where states exercise monopoly over legitimate violence within borders and reject external interference absent consent or dire necessity. For national defense, just war theory implies a presumption against aggression but permits preemptive or preventive measures if exists, as in anticipatory against imminent , supporting doctrines like nuclear deterrence during the , where the U.S. maintained strategic arsenals to counter Soviet threats estimated at over 40,000 warheads by 1986. This framework legitimizes alliances such as , invoked under Article 5 for collective defense, as extensions of sovereign rights rather than dilutions thereof, provided they adhere to proportionality and . Empirical assessments, including post-World War II analyses, credit just war-aligned restraint with limiting escalation, as Allied forces adhered to targeting military objectives, averting on civilian populations despite capabilities for broader devastation. Revisionist challenges within just war theory, prioritizing individual rights over state , introduce tensions by elevating as a potential just cause, potentially eroding non-intervention norms codified in UN Charter Article 2(4), which prohibits force against . Critics argue this subordinates sovereign judgment to cosmopolitan standards, as seen in debates over the 1999 intervention in , where absence of UN authorization highlighted conflicts between state-centric legitimacy and moral imperatives against atrocities. Nonetheless, even revisionists concede national defense retains primacy, with serving as a baseline for stability, though requiring empirical thresholds like genocide-scale harm—evidenced in Rwanda's 1994 failure, where over 800,000 deaths underscored inaction's costs—to override. This duality implies that while just war theory bolsters sovereign defense against existential threats, it demands rigorous scrutiny of interventions to avoid pretextual erosions of state autonomy, informed by historical precedents like of Nations' ineffectiveness against Axis expansions in .

Modern Applications and Controversies

Post-World War II Interventions

The post-World War II era marked a shift in just war theory's application, aligning traditional criteria like just cause and legitimate authority with the Charter's restrictions on force to against armed attack or Security Council authorization under Chapter VII. This framework emphasized repelling aggression while prohibiting wars of conquest, though debates arose over proportionality and right intention in proxy conflicts and humanitarian cases. Interventions often invoked , but outcomes frequently tested theory against empirical realities, such as prolonged insurgencies and civilian casualties exceeding anticipated harms. The (1950–1953) exemplified a paradigmatic just intervention under principles. North Korea's invasion of on June 25, 1950, constituted clear aggression, providing just cause for the UN-authorized response led by the , with 16 nations contributing forces under Resolution 83. Legitimate authority stemmed from the UN's collective action, while proportionality held as coalition forces aimed to restore the status quo ante, halting at the 38th parallel despite MacArthur's push toward the , which risked Chinese escalation. Right intention focused on defense rather than conquest, and reasonable prospects of success materialized initially, though stalemate ensued; jus in bello was largely upheld via minimizing civilian targeting. Critics note the armistice's failure to achieve lasting peace, highlighting jus post bellum gaps in theory. In contrast, U.S. involvement in the (1965–1973) faced severe just war critiques, particularly on . Escalation followed the on August 2 and 4, 1964, but declassified documents later questioned the second attack's veracity, undermining claims of imminent threat as just cause. The intervention, framed as containing under SEATO auspices, lacked UN and strained legitimate , as Vietnam's government was unstable and non-representative. Proportionality faltered with over 58,000 U.S. deaths, 3 million Vietnamese casualties, and Agent Orange's ecological devastation, yielding no reasonable success against North Vietnamese resolve. Jus in bello violations, including free-fire zones and on March 16, 1968 (killing 504 civilians), exemplified intentional civilian harm, eroding moral restraint. The 1991 Gulf War against Iraq's invasion of on August 2, 1990, restored JWT's viability through UN Resolution 678 authorizing "all necessary means" to expel forces. Just cause was unambiguous—reversing —and coalition forces (34 nations, 956,600 troops) demonstrated proportionality with 148 U.S. battlefield deaths versus 20,000–50,000 Iraqi losses, minimizing targeting via precision strikes. Right intention aligned with liberation, not , though halted advance preserved Saddam Hussein's rule, critiqued for enabling future threats. Empirical success in restoring Kuwaiti affirmed reasonable prospects, but oil interests raised skepticism of pure motives. Multiple analyses, including from ethicists, affirm its adherence to core criteria, contrasting with unilateral actions. Humanitarian interventions tested JWT's expansion beyond state aggression. NATO's 1999 Kosovo campaign (78 days, 38,000 sorties) lacked UNSC approval due to Russian and Chinese veto threats but claimed just cause in halting ethnic cleansing of Albanians by Yugoslav forces, with 10,000–12,000 deaths reported pre-intervention. Proportionality debates ensued over civilian casualties (489–528 confirmed) and Serbia's post-war instability, while sovereignty erosion challenged legitimate authority. The 2011 Libya intervention, UN-authorized via Resolution 1973 for civilian protection amid Gaddafi's crackdown (estimated 1,000+ deaths), initially fit last resort after failed diplomacy but exceeded mandate toward regime change, yielding civil war and 20,000+ deaths by 2012. These cases spurred Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine in 2005, yet causal analyses reveal frequent failures: interventions correlated with prolonged chaos in Libya (GDP per capita fell 10%+ post-2011) and selective application, undermining universal jus ad bellum. Traditionalists argue such expansions risk pretext for power projection, prioritizing empirical outcomes over intent.

Asymmetric Warfare and Non-State Actors

Asymmetric warfare, characterized by disparities in military power and tactics between states and non-state actors (NSAs) such as terrorist groups or insurgents, poses profound challenges to traditional Just War Theory (JWT), which presupposes symmetric conflicts between entities with reciprocal adherence to rules. NSAs often operate without legitimate authority, a core criterion requiring recognized sovereignty or accountability to a political community, rendering their resort to force presumptively unjust unless defending against severe oppression—a condition rarely met in cases like 's eschatological aims or Hezbollah's proxy operations. States responding to NSA aggression, however, can invoke just cause via , as exemplified by the U.S. invocation of Article 51 of the UN Charter following the September 11, 2001, attacks by , which killed 2,977 people and justified in . Yet proportionality and last resort are strained: NSAs exploit sanctuary in failed states like pre-2001 or sympathetic regimes, bypassing diplomatic channels and necessitating preemptive strikes that exceed traditional imminence tests, such as the Caroline doctrine's requirement of "instant, overwhelming" necessity. Under jus in bello, NSAs frequently violate by deliberately targeting civilians—defining terrorism as acts intended to terrorize non-combatants for political ends—and employing human shields or blending with populations, as did during the with over 4,000 rocket attacks from civilian areas. This asymmetry erodes the moral equality of combatants, a JWT tenet assuming mutual compliance; states remain bound by proportionality and the doctrine of double effect, permitting incidental civilian harm only if unintended and outweighed by military gain, but face heightened risks in verifying targets amid irregular tactics. For instance, U.S. drone strikes against leaders post-2001 have been defended as proportionate responses to persistent threats, yet critics argue they risk excessive in densely populated areas, potentially undermining right intention if driven by vengeance rather than necessity. NSAs' martyrdom doctrines, prevalent in groups like , further complicate likelihood of success calculations, as they prioritize symbolic endurance over territorial gains, defying conventional utility assessments. Scholars propose adaptations to JWT for these "new wars," including Michael Walzer's expansion of preemption to "sufficient threat" based on intent and capability, rather than strict imminence, and conditional granting of combatant status to organized NSAs in controlled territories if they distinguish themselves and avoid civilian targeting. Others, like , affirm the as just, emphasizing states' duty to protect against NSA while upholding jus in bello restraints. Proxy use of NSAs by states, as in Syria's since 2011, further diffuses attribution, allowing deniability and complicating retribution under . Despite revisions, core principles persist: NSAs' systematic violations often forfeit protections, treating perpetrators as unprivileged belligerents subject to rather than prisoner-of-war status, as in U.S. policy toward detainees at Guantanamo Bay since 2002. This framework underscores JWT's enduring relevance, albeit tested, in constraining state power while condemning NSA impunity.

Recent Conflicts: Ukraine and Gaza

The , commencing on February 24, , has been widely analyzed through just war theory, with consensus among scholars that Russia's actions fail criteria, lacking a just cause as the incursion constitutes unprovoked rather than defensive necessity or , despite Moscow's unsubstantiated claims of "denazification" and protection of Russian speakers. 's resistance, conversely, satisfies principles including legitimate authority under its sovereign government, right intention of territorial defense, last resort after failed , and proportionality given the existential threat posed by occupation. Debates persist on Ukraine's reasonable chance of success, with revisionist theorists arguing that prolonged fighting may undermine proportionality if victory remains improbable without escalation, though empirical data on Ukrainian territorial recoveries—such as the and counteroffensives—support continued viability. In jus in bello, Russia's documented violations—over 65,000 alleged war crimes by late 2022, including indiscriminate strikes on civilian infrastructure like the theater bombing on March 16, 2022—contravene and proportionality, rendering its conduct morally and legally culpable. Ukraine has largely adhered to these norms, employing precision targeting and evacuations, though isolated incidents like the 2023 Chornobyl contamination risks raise proportionality concerns; overall, its defensive posture aligns with just war restraints, bolstered by international aid ensuring compliance. External support, such as NATO-supplied weapons, tests collective under but does not inherently violate theory, provided it targets aggression without expanding to offensive aims. The Israel-Hamas war, ignited by Hamas's , 2023, attack killing approximately 1,200 and taking over 250 hostages, grants jus ad bellum justification via against armed aggression, fulfilling just cause, right intention to dismantle Hamas's military capacity, and legitimate authority as a responding to territorial incursion. Hamas's offensive, involving deliberate civilian targeting and rocket barrages, fails all tests, qualifying as rather than lawful war, with no proportionality to its political aims. Jus in bello application in Gaza centers on proportionality and discrimination amid urban warfare, where Hamas's embedding of military assets in civilian areas—using over 300 miles of tunnels under hospitals and schools—shifts moral liability for non-combatant deaths primarily to the group, as just war theory permits attacks on legitimate targets despite foreseeable collateral harm if military advantage outweighs it. Israel's measures, including over pre-strike warnings via leaflets, calls, and "knock on the roof" munitions, demonstrate intent to minimize casualties, with data indicating roughly 17,000 Hamas fighters killed by mid-2024 relative to total Gaza deaths (many combatants), supporting claims of restraint under theory's standards rather than equivalence to Hamas's intentional barbarism. Challenges arise from non-state actor dynamics, where traditional JWT assumptions of symmetric compliance falter, yet proportionality—assessed not as symmetric casualties but as harm versus necessity—holds for Israel's objective of threat elimination, absent evidence of gratuitous excess. Critics invoking academic sources often overemphasize casualty ratios while downplaying Hamas's human shield tactics, reflecting institutional biases toward presuming state overreach.

Criticisms and Alternatives

Pacifist and Anti-War Critiques

Pacifists reject just war theory on deontological grounds, asserting that the intentional killing inherent in warfare violates absolute moral prohibitions against violence, such as the Christian imperative to love enemies and turn the other cheek as articulated in the (:38-48). This stance views nonmaleficence—the duty not to harm others—as inviolable, contrasting with just war theory's presumption against force that permits overrides to protect innocents. Influential pacifist theologians like and argue that just war criteria compromise core biblical ethics by subordinating scriptural authority to secular notions of justice derived from . Historically, pacifists contend that just war theory emerged as a post-Constantinian accommodation to state power after the in 313 AD, diverging from the early church's rejection of and , which aligned more closely with ' nonviolent example. Prior to this shift, Christian communities practiced as a mark of discipleship, viewing war as incompatible with the kingdom of God. Critics like maintain that just war theory's development rationalized the church's entanglement with imperial , providing theological cover for coercion rather than fostering transformative . Consequentialist pacifists extend this critique by appealing to empirical patterns in history, arguing that wars, even those framed as just, invariably escalate harm beyond any purported benefits, generating cycles of retaliation, civilian devastation, and moral corruption. For instance, utilitarian analyses highlight how conflicts produce disproportionate net suffering, undermining just war's proportionality criterion, which assumes calculable limits to violence that modern arsenals—nuclear, chemical, or precision-guided—render illusory. Figures such as Leo Tolstoy and Martin Luther King Jr. emphasized that nonviolent alternatives, as demonstrated in India's independence (1947) and the U.S. civil rights movement (1950s-1960s), achieve justice without the irreversible ethical stains of warfare. Anti-war objections, while not always absolutist, fault just war theory for its practical inefficacy in constraining belligerents, often serving as retrospective justification for rather than a binding deterrent. In contemporary settings, skeptics note that criteria like right intention and last resort are subjective and manipulable, as evidenced by invocations of just war rhetoric in interventions yielding prolonged instability, such as post-2003 . Pacifists counter potential rebuttals—such as the necessity of Allied action in —by proposing that nonviolent strategies, including and , could mitigate without endorsing total surrender, though such claims remain contested given the regime's extermination policies that claimed 6 million Jewish lives by 1945. Overall, these critiques prioritize eschatological trust in over human , advocating communal practices of as the sole faithful response to conflict.

Realist and Pragmatic Objections

Classical realists object to just war theory on the grounds that it imposes moral constraints incompatible with the anarchic nature of , where states prioritize survival and power over ethical ideals. , a foundational figure in twentieth-century realism, argued that must be guided by defined in terms of power, as attempts to apply universal moral principles like those in just war theory lead to self-defeating that ignores the competitive dynamics among sovereign states. This perspective echoes earlier thinkers such as , who in recounting the emphasized that "the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must," suggesting that justice claims in warfare are subordinate to necessity and force. Realists contend that just war criteria, such as legitimate authority and right intention, fail to account for how states invoke them selectively to mask expansions of influence, as evidenced in historical conflicts where professed moral justifications aligned with geopolitical gains rather than genuine restraint. Pragmatic critiques further challenge just war theory's applicability by highlighting its detachment from decision-making under uncertainty and incomplete information. In practice, assessments of proportionality and last resort—core ad bellum principles—require foresight that leaders rarely possess, often resulting in post-hoc rationalizations rather than genuine ethical deliberation. For instance, realists like have acknowledged just war theory as a compromise between and realism, yet critics argue this hybrid form still underestimates how powerful states exploit its flexibility to legitimize interventions, such as the 2003 Iraq invasion, where initial just cause claims eroded under scrutiny of intelligence failures and strategic overreach. Empirical analyses of reveal that just war norms correlate weakly with restraint, as states adapt to operational needs, prioritizing victory over abstract . These objections underscore a broader realist toward institutionalizing in statecraft, positing that just war theory distracts from the causal primacy of power balances and deterrence. While proponents defend it as a limiting mechanism, realists counter that its invocation has historically preceded escalations, as in the nuclear age where warned against moralistic crusades risking global catastrophe. Pragmatists extend this by advocating consequentialist evaluations over deontological checklists, arguing that effective policy demands weighing tangible costs—like alliance strains or —against vague moral thresholds, a process unfeasible within just war's framework.

Limitations in Contemporary Ethical Frameworks

Just war theory, originally formulated for conflicts between sovereign states with relatively symmetric capabilities, encounters significant limitations when applied to involving non-state actors such as terrorist organizations or insurgencies. In these scenarios, the traditional principle of the moral equality of combatants—positing that soldiers on both sides possess equivalent to kill despite differing causes—falters, as irregular fighters often embed among civilians, blurring distinctions essential for jus in bello requirements like and proportionality. This asymmetry undermines the theory's ability to provide clear ethical guidance, as defending states face heightened risks of civilian casualties while pursuing legitimate , rendering traditional restraints impractical without conceding strategic advantages to aggressors. Advancements in , including drones, autonomous weapons systems, and cyber operations, further expose gaps in just war theory's framework for assessing proportionality and necessity. Remote warfare enables precise targeting but introduces moral detachment, where operators distant from the battlefield may underestimate , complicating the jus in bello imperative to minimize harm. For instance, drone strikes, while reducing risks to one's own forces, often rely on imperfect intelligence, leading to unintended deaths that strain the theory's discriminatory principles without clear metrics for accountability. Cyberattacks, which can disrupt infrastructure without kinetic effects, evade categorization as acts of war under , as they lack the tangible aggression threshold like , yet they can cause widespread harm, highlighting the theory's state-centric origins ill-suited to non-physical domains. Contemporary ethical frameworks, influenced by paradigms and consequentialist analyses, amplify these limitations by prioritizing individual protections over , often rendering just war theory's thresholds for legitimate authority and last resort unattainable in protracted conflicts. Revisionist critiques within argue that moral liability to attack should hinge on individual responsibility rather than status, but this shift complicates jus in bello application in modern wars where non-combatants may pose threats, as seen in debates over preemptive strikes against emerging risks. Moreover, the theory's emphasis on victory and post-war justice struggles in "forever wars" without clear endpoints, where prolonged engagements erode public support and ethical coherence, as evidenced in analyses of endgame dilemmas in interventions like . These challenges reveal just war theory's reliance on outdated assumptions of decisive battles and sovereign symmetry, limiting its prescriptive power amid hybrid threats and globalized risks.

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