6 ms·

"Ethics of War" sounds like an oxymoron.

teekert 10y ago
As a defender one is a partaker in a war. As partaker in a war one can choose to either take or not take prisoners and one can choose to torture said prisoners or not. These choices represent different levels of ethicality.
- elcapitan 10y ago
  It's also not always necessarily attacker vs defender. You can have wars between two sides that both want to go to war. Also, there was a whole period of war (the so-called Cabinet Wars, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabinettskriege https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabinettskriege) which was for the most part just princes with smaller armies in a very constrained manner fighting each other. So it's not always the same there.
wolfram74 10y ago
And yet it is internationally recognized to exist. Here's a video that goes into how war has more formalized ethics than, say romance. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oThh3_Srxtc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oThh3_Srxtc
- M_Grey 10y ago
  It's useful to recognize it, while simply abiding by only the parts of it which suit you. After all, if you need to, you can always ignore it and deny it. That's the reality of war.
  - jt2190 10y ago
    True, but this fatalistic view alone isn't an argument to stop trying to maintain ethical behavior even when when waging war.
    - M_Grey 10y ago
      Absolutely, and I didn't mean my post to come across that way. This topic makes me a bit glum, and I think that comes across as defeatist, but I'd rather take on the correct, losing fight, than not fight at all.
  - HarryHirsch 10y ago
    On the other hand, the Thirty Years War caused such destruction that the institutional memory in European nobility lasted 250 years. Total warfare on such scale was only seen again during the Peninsular War.
- rhizome 10y ago
  And yet Curtis LeMay died a free man.
- nostrademons 10y ago
  In times of peace, sure. In times of war, it's usually forgotten within 1-2 years of the outbreak of hostilities.
sgift 10y ago
Without ethics of war you'd have no war crimes, everything would be okay the moment a war starts - not really a good idea. Sure, in a perfect world there wouldn't be any war, but that won't happen as long as there are humans.
- mason240 10y ago
  Which is they Geneva Conventions and other treaties of the like make it clear that the protections only apply to groups that have signed and follow them. The proto-ISIS militia groups in Iraq did not, and would deliberately target civilians, refused to wear uniforms, and hid among civilian population. Because of that they did not have POW rights that afforded to legitimate militias.
  - lostlogin 10y ago
    Refusing POW rights is as much a reflection on those they fight as it is on ISIS. If you're making categories like this you have crossed the moral line, if not the legal one.
    - valuearb 10y ago
      POW rights are earned by wearing uniforms. Not wearing uniforms means you've passed a moral line that encourages the murder, if not slaughter, of civilians.
      - lostlogin 10y ago
        That may be legally correct but is that morally ok? How do you apply this to groups history looks upon sympathetically? French partisans come to mind, but there are dozens of other groups that had similar situations. Selectively deciding abuse of humans is ok is a slippery slope. Not wearing a uniform may relate more to total oppression or occupation rather than be an indicator of disregard for civilians.
        mason240 10y ago
smhost 10y ago
From the article: > Of course, the Just War Ethic suffers from a problem: The normative ideal in this case is the absence of war, yet the reality of war precludes that ideal. Therefore, any applied ethics of war are by definition morally flawed. The question for the ethicist then is this: Is it more ethical to make continued (and often ignored) normative pronouncements against the existence of war, or to engage with the temporal reality of war with ethics that seek to limit the cases in which war is undertaken, to moderate its effects, and to guide it toward the normative goal, with the understanding that this goal is not immediately or fully achievable? Obviously, advocates of the Just War Ethic, myself included, come to the latter conclusion.
- jessriedel 10y ago
  The author's argument is a good one, but note that, in the (perhaps rare) case of just wars, he doesn't even have to concede this point: > The normative ideal in this case is the absence of war, yet the reality of war precludes that ideal. Therefore, any applied ethics of war are by definition morally flawed. With the exception of true pacifism, which is exceptionally rare, essentially everyone agrees that there are just uses of violence. When within a nation with a functioning government, this is the police's uses of force. When it's between nations, it's war. No one would think that rules governing the police's use of violence are inconsistent with the fact that we'd all prefer violence be unnecessary. Likewise, there are at least some just wars (by at least one of the participants), and in these cases the just participant need not be morally flawed at all.
dickbasedregex 10y ago
Not a vet, eh?
angersock 10y ago
Careful not to cut yourself on that edge, sparky. :|

As a defender one is a partaker in a war. As partaker in a war one can choose to either take or not take prisoners and one can choose to torture said prisoners or not. These choices represent different levels of ethicality.

elcapitan 10y ago
It's also not always necessarily attacker vs defender. You can have wars between two sides that both want to go to war. Also, there was a whole period of war (the so-called Cabinet Wars, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabinettskriege https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabinettskriege) which was for the most part just princes with smaller armies in a very constrained manner fighting each other. So it's not always the same there.

wolfram74 10y ago

And yet it is internationally recognized to exist. Here's a video that goes into how war has more formalized ethics than, say romance. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oThh3_Srxtc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oThh3_Srxtc

M_Grey 10y ago
It's useful to recognize it, while simply abiding by only the parts of it which suit you. After all, if you need to, you can always ignore it and deny it. That's the reality of war.
- jt2190 10y ago
  True, but this fatalistic view alone isn't an argument to stop trying to maintain ethical behavior even when when waging war.
  - M_Grey 10y ago
    Absolutely, and I didn't mean my post to come across that way. This topic makes me a bit glum, and I think that comes across as defeatist, but I'd rather take on the correct, losing fight, than not fight at all.
- HarryHirsch 10y ago
  On the other hand, the Thirty Years War caused such destruction that the institutional memory in European nobility lasted 250 years. Total warfare on such scale was only seen again during the Peninsular War.
rhizome 10y ago
And yet Curtis LeMay died a free man.
nostrademons 10y ago
In times of peace, sure. In times of war, it's usually forgotten within 1-2 years of the outbreak of hostilities.

sgift 10y ago

Without ethics of war you'd have no war crimes, everything would be okay the moment a war starts - not really a good idea. Sure, in a perfect world there wouldn't be any war, but that won't happen as long as there are humans.

mason240 10y ago
Which is they Geneva Conventions and other treaties of the like make it clear that the protections only apply to groups that have signed and follow them. The proto-ISIS militia groups in Iraq did not, and would deliberately target civilians, refused to wear uniforms, and hid among civilian population. Because of that they did not have POW rights that afforded to legitimate militias.
- lostlogin 10y ago
  Refusing POW rights is as much a reflection on those they fight as it is on ISIS. If you're making categories like this you have crossed the moral line, if not the legal one.
  - valuearb 10y ago
    POW rights are earned by wearing uniforms. Not wearing uniforms means you've passed a moral line that encourages the murder, if not slaughter, of civilians.
    - lostlogin 10y ago
      That may be legally correct but is that morally ok? How do you apply this to groups history looks upon sympathetically? French partisans come to mind, but there are dozens of other groups that had similar situations. Selectively deciding abuse of humans is ok is a slippery slope. Not wearing a uniform may relate more to total oppression or occupation rather than be an indicator of disregard for civilians.
      - mason240 10y ago

smhost 10y ago

From the article: > Of course, the Just War Ethic suffers from a problem: The normative ideal in this case is the absence of war, yet the reality of war precludes that ideal. Therefore, any applied ethics of war are by definition morally flawed. The question for the ethicist then is this: Is it more ethical to make continued (and often ignored) normative pronouncements against the existence of war, or to engage with the temporal reality of war with ethics that seek to limit the cases in which war is undertaken, to moderate its effects, and to guide it toward the normative goal, with the understanding that this goal is not immediately or fully achievable? Obviously, advocates of the Just War Ethic, myself included, come to the latter conclusion.

jessriedel 10y ago
The author's argument is a good one, but note that, in the (perhaps rare) case of just wars, he doesn't even have to concede this point: > The normative ideal in this case is the absence of war, yet the reality of war precludes that ideal. Therefore, any applied ethics of war are by definition morally flawed. With the exception of true pacifism, which is exceptionally rare, essentially everyone agrees that there are just uses of violence. When within a nation with a functioning government, this is the police's uses of force. When it's between nations, it's war. No one would think that rules governing the police's use of violence are inconsistent with the fact that we'd all prefer violence be unnecessary. Likewise, there are at least some just wars (by at least one of the participants), and in these cases the just participant need not be morally flawed at all.

dickbasedregex 10y ago

Not a vet, eh?

angersock 10y ago

Careful not to cut yourself on that edge, sparky. :|