[Among] certain non-negotiable requirements… [on] the decision to use lethal force… [is to] ensure robust protection for civilians and the infrastructures necessary for their survival… When we witness the bombing of civilians, attacks on hospitals, schools or vital infrastructure, and violence that affects children, we are confronted with scandals that wound humanity itself. (Magnifica Humanitas 200, 216)
This is not
a novel teaching but simply the reiteration of what has long been standard Catholic
moral theology, and in any event it is an obvious implication of natural law
principles governing respect for the lives and property of the innocent. A faithful Catholic cannot approve of
deliberate attacks on civilian lives, property, or infrastructure any more than
he could approve of abortion, theft, or vandalism. As the Compendium
of the Social Doctrine of the Church says:
The good of the human person must take precedence over the
interests of the parties to the conflict. The principle of humanity inscribed in the
conscience of every person and all peoples includes the obligation to protect
civil populations from the effects of war.
That minimum protection of the dignity of every person, guaranteed by
international humanitarian law, is all too often violated in the name of
military or political demands which should never prevail over the value of the
human person. (504-505)
Similarly,
Pope St. John Paul II taught:
War cannot be decided upon, even when it is a matter of
ensuring the common good, except as the very last option and in accordance with
very strict conditions, without ignoring the consequences for the civilian
population both during and after the military operations. (Address to the
Diplomatic Corps, January 13, 2003)
The need to
protect civilian lives and property was a special concern of Pope Pius XII
during World War II:
The Holy See has always been, and still is, greatly
preoccupied, out of a heart filled with constant solicitude, with the fate of
civil populations defenseless against the aggressions of war. Since the outbreak of the present conflict, no
year has passed that We have not appealed in Our public utterances to all the
belligerents – men who also have human hearts molded by a mother’s love – to show
some feeling of pity and charity for the sufferings of civilians, for helpless
women and children, for the sick and the aged, on whom a rain of terror, fire,
destruction, and havoc pours down out of a guiltless sky… If aerial
bombardments must continue to form part of this harrowing war, let them with
all possible care be directed only against objects of military value and spare
the homes of noncombatants and the treasured shrines of art and religion.
(September 26, 1942)
The threat
to destroy Iranian civilian infrastructure also illustrates the incoherence of
much of the rhetoric by which the war’s defenders try to rationalize it. For example, it is often claimed that if the
Iranian regime were ever to get hold of a nuclear weapon, neither diplomacy nor
deterrence would prevent them from using it against either the U.S. or
Israel. The regime is so suicidally irrational
and ruthless (so it is alleged) that it would launch such a nuclear attack even
though this would guarantee a retaliatory strike that would utterly destroy
Iran.
But if that
were true, how could an attack on Iranian civilian infrastructure bring the regime
to its knees or to bargaining table? You
can’t have it both ways. If the regime
really were so irrational that even the threat of annihilation would not deter
it from using nuclear weapons, then it would also be too irrational to be moved
by attacks on civilian infrastructure.
But if it can be prompted to change course by attacks on civilian infrastructure,
then surely it can be deterred from using nuclear weapons by the threat of massive
retaliation.
Here is another
bit of incoherence. The war’s defenders
routinely say that they hope for the liberation of the Iranian people. That implies that Iran’s civilian population
are the innocent victims of the Iranian regime.
But if they are innocent, then U.S. attacks on the civilian population’s
infrastructure would be no less unjust than the regime’s oppression of the population. Again, they would make the U.S. a second
oppressor, rather than a liberator.
On the other
hand, suppose the war’s defenders were to appeal to a theory of collective
guilt in order to defend attacks on civilian infrastructure. That is to say, suppose they were to claim
that the entire population of Iran somehow bears sufficient responsibility for
the crimes of the regime for it to be legitimate to target civilian infrastructure
no less than military targets. Such a
doctrine of total war is simply evil by just war standards, but put that aside
for the moment. The point is that it
would, given this theory, no longer make sense to speak of “liberating” the
Iranian people. For on this scenario,
there are no innocent people in Iran to be liberated from evildoers; there are only
evildoers. The war would not be a war of
liberation but entirely punitive.
Again, you
can’t have it both ways. If you think it
is legitimate to attack civilian infrastructure, then you cannot coherently
claim to be interested in liberating the Iranian people. But if you are sincerely interested in
liberating the Iranian people, then you cannot approve of attacks on civilian
infrastructure.
Related
articles:
The
U.S. war on Iran is manifestly unjust
America’s conflict in
Iran is not a just war
Just
war doctrine and the duties of soldiers
Does
just war doctrine require moral certainty?
Misunderstanding
the “just cause” condition of just war doctrine
The complication (that, as it looks, hasn't been addressed in this post) is that the said infrastructure seems to be both "civilian" and "military".
ReplyDeleteThat is, a bridge is used by civilians, but it is also used to transport military supplies. The power plant produces electricity that is used both for street lighting and for military drones.
In fact, the same bridge can be used both by civilians, and by thugs who are going to beat those civilians up. (That shows that the contradiction between trying to liberate the Iranian people and attacking such infrastructure hasn't been proved yet.)
For example, if Pius XII distinguishes "objects of military value" and "the homes of noncombatants and the treasured shrines of art and religion", could a bridge or a power plant be more like "objects of military value"?
One option would be to say that any infrastructure that is used for civilian purposes is to be off limits, but that seems to be exploitable: send a singe civilian to find shade under the surface-to-air missile installation for five minutes, and the SAM installation would become "civilian infrastructure" that can't be targeted. That's clearly absurd.
I suppose that the guidance that the Church provides at the moment is that this has to be "proportional", which does not seem to be so easy to apply in practice.
I guess the Pope is right: the Just War Theory needs more work...
I think the point is that something that is genuinely essential to civilian life remains off-limits, even if military necessity would dictate otherwise. The alternative, given the entanglement of civilian and military infrastructure since the advent of modern war (that is, post-WWI), is simply to abolish any concern for civilians and embrace total war, since modern warfare has a supply chain that reaches deep into the civilian sphere.
DeleteI think what you're missing with your bridge example is that, if that bridge really is necessary for survival, you've simply doomed the civilians to starvation to protect them from being murdered. People in the English-speaking West (yes, even the British) have been insulated from the harshest realties of war for more than a hundred years, and so don't reallly understand (or believe) that a war can cause a famine in which millions of people die. I mean, hundreds out thousands of civilians died as a consquence of the British blockade of Germany during WWI, and Germany was an industrially-advanced nation not substantially different from America or the UK. The millions that died in China during WWII primarily perished due to famine and disease caused by Japan's invasion (and made worse by the KMT's destruction of Chinese civilian infrastructure to slow the Japanese advance) rather than being directly murdered by the IJA.
Of course, the flipside of all this is that some bridges may be mainly used by the military and not necessary for civilian survival. Many of the bridges bombed by the Allies during WWII were perfectly legitimate targets by that standard. But power plants nearly always support hospitals, water treatment plants, refrigeration, and other absolute necessities that, if lost, could plausibly plunge the civilian population into famine or cause an outbreak of disease. Thus, Dr. Feser's point holds.
(What's really behind this whole discussion, incidentally, if the Trump administration's frustration that the "Greatest Nation in the World" can't steamroll a second-rate regional power in a fair fight despite having the absolute advantage in military power and industrial capacity. Threatening to target bridges and power plants is an act of desperation on Trump's part, not unlike the threats my four-year-old makes when he doesn't get his way. There is no serious discussion to be had here; just an oversized toddler throwing a tantrum.)
"I think the point is that something that is genuinely essential to civilian life remains off-limits" - yes, that seems to be much closer to the truth than both extremes.
Delete"I think what you're missing with your bridge example is that, if that bridge really is necessary for survival, you've simply doomed the civilians to starvation to protect them from being murdered." - I do not see how that is something I am missing. I get an impression that you think I am arguing that Trump's decision is correct. But I am not doing that. I am merely arguing that the contrary proposition has not been proved beyond reasonable doubt.
"But power plants nearly always support hospitals, water treatment plants, refrigeration, and other absolute necessities that, if lost, could plausibly plunge the civilian population into famine or cause an outbreak of disease. Thus, Dr. Feser's point holds." - they also support us arguing about philosophy, which, I'm afraid, is not to be found among "absolute necessities"...
The problem is that in many cases (and in this specific case) it is not so easy to tell what infrastructure is needed for civilians. I am not sure that the government of Iran knows that. I doubt Trump knows that. I am pretty sure that our host is not in position to know that.
Yes, sometimes we can easily tell that specific attack on infrastructure is unlawful. But not in this case.
And thus one should avoid rash judgement.
@MP
DeleteIt is Donald Trump who should learn to "avoid rash judgment," not those urging restraint on moral grounds. The entire structure of just war theory places the burden of proof on those who would wage war. The president of a country does not need your mollycoddling.
MP has beat me to the punch and is pointing to the same issues I noted in reading Feser's post. Let me pick this point:
DeleteThe innocent do not lose the right to their property and capacity to get on with ordinary everyday life by virtue of living under an unjust and oppressive regime.
We're not talking merely about "living under an unjust regime" but "living in a country that (at least putatively, though there's arguments on both sides) is the unjust party pursuing warlike aggression and cannot be stopped without the other side (the US and its allies) defeating them in war. They are AT WAR. A civilian population of a country at war (whether they are the unjust side or the just side) have no legitimate expectation of being able to continue "ordinary life", and still less so if they are citizens of the unjust war power. War disrupts, and a notion of pursuing war that doesn't disrupt "ordinary living" is an idiotic theory of war, an impossible standard for ius in bello.
The goal, for the just belligerent, should be to pursue the war in a manner with the least evils possible consistent with winning the war, and considering the sufferings of the citizens of the opposing belligerent ALONGSIDE of the sufferings of their own people in balancing the goods and evils of warfare in toto. If the enemy had invaded your own territory, and you would be willing to do a bombing campaign that damaged your own infrastructure in that region in order to deny it to the enemy forces, that's a pretty decent indicator that the evils thus suffered by the innocent civilian population may be proportionate to the goods sought. If that's true, then inflicting similar damage in the enemy's territory cannot be in principle off limits. Yes, the civilians will suffer. War has ALWAYS entailed that, you shouldn't pretend that war can be prosecuted without it, and the modern Vatican diplomatic trope of pursuing "suppression" of unjust aggressors via means that DON'T involve any civilian suffering is empty platitude.
The whole matter is subject to degrees and prudential analysis. The better analysis is to talk about UNDUE suffering of civilians for the military benefits, and so on. And here Feser's other points have a better target. It is unseemly to talk about bombing such infrastructure as if you don't care about whether the sufferings imposed have proportionate military advantage, and it remains morally problematic to intentionally target those items in order to get the CIVILIAN sufferings to change the regime's mind about continuing the war (as well as dubious in plausibility anyway, besides the moral problems with that approach).
"It is Donald Trump who should learn to 'avoid rash judgment,' not those urging restraint on moral grounds. The entire structure of just war theory places the burden of proof on those who would wage war." - "Thurible", you do not know what "rash judgement" is, do you?
DeleteFor it is not merely "making a decision or conclusion recklessly".
The Catechism says: "He becomes guilty: - of rash judgment who, even tacitly, assumes as true, without sufficient foundation, the moral fault of a neighbor;" (2477), "To avoid rash judgment, everyone should be careful to interpret insofar as possible his neighbor's thoughts, words, and deeds in a favorable way" (2478).
So, I do not see any major objections to the way in which Trump is handling the situation with Iran that would accuse him specifically of "rash judgement".
"The president of a country does not need your mollycoddling." - it is not fine to murder presidents of countries, it is not fine to slander presidents of countries, it is also not fine to judge them rashly. Just as it is not fine to do this to any other people.
You know, for people who loudly shout "No Kings!!!", you are rather strongly opposed to treating people equally...
“given the entanglement of civilian and military infrastructure since the advent of modern war (that is, post-WWI),“ the claim this entanglement, and thus the civilian suffering in war, is new is simply false. Honestly it has only been with the advances of modern warfare that it has even become possible to more precisely target solely military objectives. Throughout most of human history, siege warfare was the norm because urban areas have often been valuable enough to defend and been made defensible. It is only very recently that moralists have started claiming that it is the attacker’s duty to take on the extra risk of an assault in order to mitigate the suffering of the civilians in the besieged city, rather than the welfare of the defenders’ people being something they must consider as they refuse to surrender their position.
DeleteA good point is made about targeting civilian infrastructure in order that civilians be deprived of certain goods in order that the regime crumbles or is deterred from some evil action. I agree with that point.
ReplyDeleteProfessor, moving to a different war theatre in Gaza, what do you think about the IDF's willingness to bomb a hospital - for example - not in order to cripple civilian infrastructure per se, but in order to destroy underground military targets.
Abstracting this example from any particulars, it seems like it could be legitimate given the right particulars.
You are bombing the hospital not to kill the patients inside and not to end certain medical services, but to destroy a hidden military target.
Is this decision just subject to the proportionality aspect of double effect reasoning? Or does it fail to meet other elements of that criteria?
I’m not the Professor, but as far as I am aware military use of civilian infrastructure makes it fair game. Don’t take my word for it tho.
DeleteIs this decision just subject to the proportionality aspect of double effect reasoning? Or does it fail to meet other elements of that criteria?
DeleteThis is an excellent and worthwhile question regardless of the particulars like which country is doing the bombing. It can be considered as a general matter.
My opinion is that it is indeed subject to proportionality (and other aspects) of prudential reasoning and double effect principles. There are many who urge that bombing a hospital or ANY civilian location can never be justified. A problem with this assertion is that while there are indeed places that are simply military installations, and places that are simply civilian in nature, there are also lots and lots of something in between. And (IIRC) moral teachers (including those of the Church) have taught that a government that intentionally co-locates military alongside of civilian facilities has morally lost the right to argue that the civilian facility is "off limits" for war actions. The just belligerent should - to the extent possible - try to avoid damage to the civilians while going after the military facility, but the "possible" there is subordinated to successfully taking out the military unit.
And as there is an infinite variety of in-between cases, this is a matter of prudence.
A good point is made about targeting civilian infrastructure in order that civilians be deprived of certain goods in order that the regime crumbles or is deterred from some evil action.
DeleteThis raises an interesting dilemma: in principle, international standards of war recognize blockade as a legitimate tool of warfare. Then they typically try to say "but there's limits to how far you can pursue that, a 'humanitarian' baseline - you cannot starve a population to force a regime to cave in and surrender." This is, broadly, an incoherent theory. Warfare of nation on nation (not merely army on army) entails subduing the forces military capacity of a whole nation, and those are scattered over a large area that (necessarily) includes the civilian population as well. It is not possible to deny imports to "the military" as a whole without also denying imports to the civilians. Furthermore, any sane regime will attempt to prioritize limited resources like food to ensure the military can continue to operate, even if civilians get short rations, in the hopes of success in military actions. (The entire populations of the Allies in WWII accepted rationing for the war effort, i.e. they went short of many food (and other) goods).
When you impose broad-based shortages on a whole people, you are going to get a range of effects from reduced resources. Even a 'mild' shortage (e.g. caused by a blizzard) will have the effect that a few of the people whose food supply is always low and precarious - "at risk" - will die, and some others who are merely poorly fed will suffer malnutrition but survive, and others will be merely more susceptible to illness for a time. A graver shortage will increase those effects, but the rub is that there's no DEFINITIVE point at which you say "the shortage is causing starvation" and mean it in a moral sense that the belligerent who caused the shortage is morally responsible for it as if they were engaging in an immoral form of warfare by causing "enough" cases of starvation to "count". (Even if the enemy NEVER imposes a blockade, mere disruptions in the economy may cause damage to producing FULL crops (e.g. taking men out of the fields), and so on.) There's no CLEAR standard for this: war causes suffering, and this is just one more of them.
And to be blunt: if one belligerent successfully imposes a true blockade, and the other CANNOT break it, and also CANNOT win without forcing its own people to starve so the army will be fed, that should be grounds for the blockaded country to be morally required to surrender, and any starving that occurs at that point is on the immoral regime that won't surrender in that situation, not on the successful belligerent who militarily is just pursuing a legitimate win. The whole world should step in and force the blockaded country to accept that THEY HAVE LOST ALREADY and not prolong the undue suffering of its own people.
@Tony: yours "And to be blunt: if one belligerent successfully imposes a true blockade, and the other CANNOT break it, and also CANNOT win without forcing its own people to starve so the army will be fed, that should be grounds for the blockaded country to be morally required to surrender, and any starving that occurs at that point is on the immoral regime that won't surrender in that situation, not on the successful belligerent who militarily is just pursuing a legitimate win. The whole world should step in and force the blockaded country to accept that THEY HAVE LOST ALREADY and not prolong the undue suffering of its own people."
DeleteThe above seems to apply, for example, to Hamas and to Iran's Revolutionary Guards. I get the impression that those guys would rather their entire populations be reduced to Stone Age levels, or even to massive die-offs, rather than ever relinquish control over those populations -- however small those populations might become. "Better to be first among these than second in Rome."
The whole world is hardly going to step in and force Hamas or Iran ever to accept that they have lost already.
But what do I know.
The above seems to apply, for example, to Hamas and to Iran's Revolutionary Guards.
DeleteI think it applies very clearly indeed to Hamas. Perhaps less clearly to IRG.
The whole world is hardly going to step in and force Hamas or Iran ever to accept that they have lost already.
I think this is an accurate assessment of the situation. For Hamas and Gaza, I would urge the world leaders who keep mouthing platitudes about "the suffering, the suffering" in Gaza to put their money where their mouths are, or just shut up and let Israel FINISH the job and thus shorten the war. They shouldn't be granted the luxury of a place at the table or a platform from which to claim moral high ground if they will not carry through on moral principles.
Wow. Just when I think Right-Wingers can't sink ANY lower. This is on par with suggesting that the resistance movements in WW2 should have just laid down their arms and let the Nazis kill them. I'm sure Jesus would be so proud of you.
DeleteTony, listen to yourself. If you cannot in fact force the opponent to surrender, then you HAVEN'T won, at least not yet. End of story. No amount of bitching and moaning about how the rest of the world ought to step in to enforce your victory is gonna change that. And not only has Iran not lost, Iran is WINNING. America has no path to victory, and has limited time before economic pressure and nosediving polls forces them to admit defeat. Iran is not under anywhere near as much pressure. Denying that is just straight up delusional at this point.
DeleteWere the rule of war different in the past? If I remember, the rules were if a city surrendered to an invasive army the citizens would be spared. But if they chose to fight and lost too bad for everyone inside because it was assumed the people who disagreed would leave whether possible or not.
ReplyDeleteWasn't it ever considered what the civilians what was the fate of those that were trapped inside and wanted to leave but could not? What is the verdict about the Anabaptist revolt in Muenster?
"The rules of war" and "just war" are separate concepts; the former is always an imperfect (and usually secular) instantiation of the latter. So, yes, the laws of war have changed, and many premodern or early modern wars, even those fought by the Church, were riddled with criminal and immoral acts despite technically following the rules of war as defined at the time. Executing or enslaving defeated enemies used to be allowed, even though it blatantly contradicted many of the requirements of jus in bello. The requirement that civilians essentially be neutral or else be treated as enemy combatants makes a nonsense of the principle of distinction.
DeleteAre you saying that executing or enslaving the defeated was technically allowed at the time or that it was not technically allowed but done anyway? Or that at that time the rules of war contradicted themselves?
DeleteWell, lots of things were viewed as fine in the past - slavery, genocide, the murder of religious dissenters, colonialism, and so on. Our consciences have evolved since then. It was wrong then, and the authorities at the time were wrong to allow it. I dunno about Thurible, but I for my part think it is entirely correct to state that the Church was simply wrong in the past, nakedly approving of many evil acts, and even where their morals were in the right place, enforcement was typically poor and subject to veto by the secular powers that the Church cozied up to. Witness the fact that Emperor Charles V was able to get Pastorale Officium effectively repealed, twisting the Pope's arm until he lifted the penalty of Latae Sententiae excommunication that the letter had imposed on those who despoiled Native Americans. Of course, I expect everyone here to refuse to accept any of that, because you are dogmatically committed to refusing to acknowledge the Catholic Church's sins, but it's the truth regardless, at least as far as I can tell it.
DeleteThis whole column rests on an ambiguity about what civilian infrastructure really is. It is precisely that ambiguity that guts Feser’s claim that killing Iranians makes U.S. oppressors and not liberators - far, far more civilians were killed during the Normandy landings than have been killed in Iran. Were we oppressors on a par with the Nazis? No.
ReplyDeleteThe civilian causalties in the D-Day invasion were nearly all caused by the unnecessary and indiscriminate Allied bombing of French towns based on the mistaken belief that German troops would be stationed there instead of closer to the coast. The raids achieved basically nothing apart from needless loss of life, despite wiping out many of the towns almost completely. So, D-Day is actually an excellent argument in favor of the point Dr. Feser is making (and the arguments he's made in the past against strategic bombing.) Well done.
DeleteExactly; there have long been regimes that are keenly aware of these Christian-worldview-based norms, and they weaponize them with the use of "human shields" and intentionally intermingled civilian/military infrastructure, not to mention media manipulation. To bring old norms to bear in such situations is to effectively commit to handing over your populace to the dictates of whatever regime is most willing to violate decency. There's no great answer here as far as I'm aware.
Delete@Anonymous
DeleteEveryone one of the OKW's war crime orders from the invasion of the Soviet Union begins with the complaint that the other side ignoring the "old norms" of warfare. "The enemy is taking advantage of how civilized we are, therefore we must set aside pity and resort to brutal measures" is a fairly standard justification offered for war crimes across human history. Nothing is unique about the situation in Iran.
Thurible - alas, I am afraid you are quite wrong about what my argument is doing. Civilian casualties on the basis of faulty intelligence are not and cannot be considered imputable to the perpetrators.
DeleteThurible, you're completely correct, of course; so what do you suggest one does in the face of aggression with no scruples? Is it just a suicide pact with your principles at that point?
Delete> Thurible, you're completely correct, of course; so what do you suggest one does in the face of aggression with no scruples? Is it just a suicide pact with your principles at that point?
DeleteIt might not be clear what to do, but it's very clear what not to do. "Don't go to hell for mass murder" is a good starting point.
If you're not Catholic, then it becomes a matter of virtue ethics vs consequentialism, which of course can't be hashed over in a combox.
> This whole column rests on an ambiguity about what civilian infrastructure really is
Obviously there are some borderline cases. But many things aren't. Bombing an oil refinery in the middle of Tehran, and causing several million people to choke (and presumably not a few of these to die) is not a borderline case.
Further, the existence of borderline cases is not an argument against the general principle that governs said cases. It's the relativist's fallacy of "we can't say when day becomes night, therefore there's no distinction between day and night". Really, the sophistry that people on the right use to justify murdering foreigners is just as disgusting as that used by people on the left to justify murdering babies.
"Were we oppressors on a par with the Nazis? No." - the competition was fierce, but yes, in this case America might have "lost". In fact, all the major combatants acted as if the victory in WW2 was to be gained not by winning battles or taking territory, but by the number of atrocities and broken promises...
DeleteIn fact, it sounds silly when some describe WW2
as a "good war", when pretty much any other war America fought seems to deserve such a description more.
As for "so what do you suggest one does in the face of aggression with no scruples?" - one can fight without war crimes. In fact, one can often fight more effectively when one fights honourably.
Did Nazi Germany benefited from Holocaust? No, it only forced the Jews who escaped to fight against them. Did Nazi Germany benefited from declaring the Slavs to be "untermenschen", and treating them accordingly? No, they only got people to join the Soviet partisans.
And did British and Americans benefit from terror bombing? Not much. In fact, not at all if we'd remember that terror bombing was not "free", it used resources (metals, fuel, manpower, even manpower used for research) that could be more profitably used elsewhere (for example, for tanks, trucks or tactical bombers). Just imagine: what if Americans would have had not Sherman tanks, but Pershing tanks right after D-Day?
“In fact, it sounds silly when some describe WW2 as a "good war", when pretty much any other war America fought seems to deserve such a description more.”
DeleteA student of history you aren’t.
"A student of history you aren’t." - a "vagueposter" you are.
DeleteWhy not show how, let's say, Korean War is a "worse war" than WW2?
Coincidentally, that will show what, in your opinion, makes the war "good".
Actually Korea is another splendid example of a just war. Thanks!
DeleteEnglish Catholic has it exactly right. There are only a handful of cases where there is genuine ambiguity between military and civilian targets, unless you're willing to engage in wilful sophistry and extend the definition of "military target" to mean "anything that might plausibly be of use to the military", like drinking water. There is zero argument to be made that a desalination plant (whose only purpose is to provide potable water to the population) is a military target. Similarly with power plants, schools, hospitals, etc.
Delete"The war’s defenders routinely say that they hope for the liberation of the Iranian people. That implies that Iran’s civilian population are the innocent victims of the Iranian regime. But if they are innocent, then U.S. attacks on the civilian population’s infrastructure would be no less unjust than the regime’s oppression of the population."
ReplyDeleteThis becomes especially clear when you transmute it to a smaller scale. Imagine a police department bombarding a slum to "liberate" its inhabitants from a dangerous gang, or a SWAT team shooting through human shields to "save" hostages taken by bank robbers. Sure, law enforcement isn't an exact parallel to war, but it's the closest analogy we've got. We expect police to take on additional risk to themselves to protect civilian life, even if it makes their goal (protecting the innocent) more difficult. Just war theory demands that we apply the same logic to warfare; anything less renders its principles meaningless.
(I accidentally posted this as a reply to another comment, when it was intended as a reply to the original post, so I've deleted my other comment and re-submitted this.)
Trump doesn't know what he is doing. Here are his 32 comments about the Iran War.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/32-times-trump-suggested-iran-war-was-almost-over-rcna385846
Thanks for your courage Prof !
ReplyDelete"Courage"? Do you think he is in some danger?
DeleteHow many of you know that Israel has nuclear weapons?
ReplyDeleteThe chances of Iran bombing the USA are zero. Why would they.
The question is “What is the cause of this unjust war?”
Israel indeed has nukes and would not hesitate to use them. The cause of this unjust war is that Trump is unhinged and flailing around. He may try to attack Cuba soon.
DeleteThat Israel has nuclear weapons is well known. If they didn’t have any there wouldn’t be an Israel.
DeleteIran is a clear and present danger to its own people, the stability of the Middle East, and the integrity of the global order more broadly. Any denial of this is willful blindness to reality.
Israel indeed has nukes and would not hesitate to use them.
DeleteThis is manifestly not true, as Israel has nukes and in fact HAS NOT used them. Obviously, they "hesitate" to use them in the current situation, and also in all prior cases where they were at odds with others militarily after they got the nukes. That JUST IS hesitating to use them.
What you presumably mean is that they would not hesitate to use them...in X conditions. I don't know what conditions you have in mind, but given that they have had some pretty harrowing and concerning conditions, it is possible they would indeed think twice, even 3 times, before using them in ANY conditions short of Iran using them first. And everyone who has nukes would consider using them if Iran (or anyone else) used nukes on them, (just like Iran would too), so that's no mark of an unusual attitude.
Well, Tony, I meant Israel would not hesitate to use nukes them if Iran nuked them, just as we would not hesitate to use nukes if Putin the Mad nuked us
DeleteIsrael's Samson Option is an open secret. Their "plan" seems to be threatening a "taking you withe me" approach where they would launch massive nuclear attacks on all hostile regional nations in the event of a likely military defeat of the Israeli state. Given that this would be unlikely to actually prevent said defeat, this is a strategy of deterrence only. Actually launching the strikes would be little more than petty, spiteful vengeance, an attempt to take as many people with you as possible. Of course, none of this is officially codified doctrine, because Israel maintains deliberate strategic ambiguity about its nuclear capabilities (IE, deliberately choosing to be vague about your capabilities in order to encourage your opponents to be cautious), but the fact that they use this strategy is both consistent with the behavior of multiple Israeli governments over time and also the consensus opinion of experts on the topic.
DeleteWell said. When this war started, I was skeptical and a bit disappointed but thought, “Trump has a good record on foreign policy, so let him cook. We’ll see how things are in five or six weeks.”
ReplyDeleteWell 21 weeks later, I think Trump has burnt whatever he has been cooking to a crisp and needs to get the hell out of the kitchen!
Learn to take the loss. People make mistakes. It was a bad call. The American people can forgive him. He needs to stop making it worse by digging in his heels.
Bret Stephens supported the war. In March, Stephens said it would be over by the end of the month. Now it's nearing the end of July. Stephens still supports the war -- we need to stop Iran from getting the bomb is his reason, I think -- and the war is no nearer an end or a win for our Leader.
DeleteYou thought Trump had a good record on foreign policy?. Really? What gave you that idea? Alienating literally the entire world with tariffs? Deleting all of your soft power by gutting USAID, killing millions in the process? Bending over for Israel at every opportunity? Genuinely, I wanna know what convinced you of that.
Delete"He needs to stop making it worse by digging in his heels."
Fat chance of that. Donald Trump has literally never held even a single L in his entire damned life. He's too much of a pathological narcissist, and up until now his wealth has insulated him from ever needing to do so. He's STILL can't accept that he lost the 2020 election, for crying out loud!
“If I claim to be righteous, all is permitted.” This is the Christianity many of you folk. are practicing. Reminder to the trolley guys in this thread: real people are being murdered, and on day 1, 168 Iranian girls were -while you play theory and justify it all. You are moral reprobates.
ReplyDeleteIntelligence failures are not necessarily morally imputable.
DeleteIts incoherent to claim to be saving people from a government that abuses its people while abusing the people you're claiming to save, and on a larger scale!
ReplyDeleteThe notion that the US is abusing the Iranian people on a larger scale than their own government is ridiculous nonsense.
DeleteOh no the horror, they cant wear mini skirts and the government puts down revolts ;-;!!!
DeleteThis is really bad satire @Terilien
DeleteProf. Feser:
ReplyDeleteGoing into the weekend, we learned that Ukraine has bombed a couple of Wildberries distribution hubs, striking a severe economic blow against Russia's pet version of Amazon. Would you consider this an attack against civilian infrastructure? Would you consider Ukraine to be in violation of just-war principles?
I think calling the attacks "a severe economic blow" is an overstatement. Wildberries has more than 200 warehouses across Russia, and just a few (most of them in medium-sized cities in Western Russia) were actually destroyed in the drone attacks. And no, online retailers are not vital civilian infrastructure, as the comparison to Amazon should have made clear: Iran could wipe out every Amazon warehouse in America and not a single person would starve to death as a result. E-commerce warehouses are distribution centers for manufactured goods, most of which are luxuries rather than necessities. If they're being used to stockpile or distribute military equipment (which they are), that makes them fair game.
DeleteAttacks that kill civilians are governed by the principle of double effect. A direct attack on a civilian target in which the killing of civilians is a means to the end ( say killing enough civilians to end the enemies will to continue) is intrinsically immoral. An attack on a target that has military value in which the attack causes civilian deaths that can be foreseen but are not intended could be moral if proportionate to the good sought. So if you destroyed an enemy nuclear missile facility that would destroy an entire city and 1000 civilians died but this is the only way to destroy the facility it could be justified. It is hard to imagine a scenario in which large swaths of civilian power plants and desalination plants that cause massive amounts of civilian deaths are proportionate to the good sought and not also the means by which the good is sought. In contrast to the first example of destroying the nuclear weapons facility the goal is the destruction of the military target not the killing of the civilians per se and if the civilians could be evacuated the good would still occur. As the infrastructure is not primarily military in nature it seems as if the good aimed at is destruction of the destruction of Iran as a society ( Trump has at times said this). So it would be a direct not an indirect attack. Even if one imagined these facilities were military in the sense that the military can no longer function without a power grid the question of proportionality would remain.. If the attacks resulted in hundreds of thousands of dead civilians it would seem pretty clear this is not proportional to any good. Finally from a purely strategic point of view this seems not likely to achieve any goal other than to risk the entire Islamic world being convinced the US is indeed as evil as they Jihadists say we are.. IT is hard to see what kind of government would result from such destruction that would not be a failed state and breeding ground for ISIS terrorists at best versus a more entrenched and vicious Iranian Islamist tyranny at worst.
ReplyDeleteThis is spot-on. It's also worth noting that the "destruction of an entire society" strategy has been tried many times in the 20th century and it doesn't work. Air raids on cities in WWII had no significant effect on morale and did not lead to the collapse of any regime (even imperial Japan, which used the atom bomb as a pretense for surrender to avoid the shame of admitting they could not repel an Allied invasion). The same proved true in Korea and Vietnam. You cannot bomb a people or a government into submission, or start a revolution from the air. Even setting aside the inherent immortality of "the killing of civilians is a means to the end," it doesn't even pass the test of cold, amoral realpolitik.
DeleteIt has long been known amongst military analysts that you cannot win a modern war purely with airpower. Bombing alone, however devastating, has never been able to force a nation to surrender.
DeleteExcept in the rare case of being able to totally and utterly defeat the enemy, all wars end by mutual consent - both sides have mutually incompatible goals, and the war ends when enough pain has been inflicted on one side that the range of outcomes they're willing to accept finally overlaps with the range of outcomes that the winning side is willing to accept. America can't inflict enough pain on Iran to make them come to the table, and Iran is inflicting enough pain on America (via the Strait of Hormuz) that they are the ones who will have to surrender very soon. The only question remaining is whether there's enough wits left in Donald Trump's molding brain to spin that humiliating surrender into something that merely gravely wounds his Presidency instead of destroying it.
America can't inflict enough pain on Iran to make them come to the table
DeleteWell, since they have already come to the negotiating table, this is not correct. If you mean "come to the table willing to accept a position of 'DEFEAT' and forego all nuclear ambitions", well you might be closer to correct on that. But you can't be certain of that: if Trump's methods were to manage to eliminate the leadership over and over, he might eventually get a leadership that had less compulsion for nuclear capability and more willing to consider such terms. We're using probable reasoning here, not mathematical proofs, and Trump has more info than we do. I don't have confidence he's right, but I don't see why we should have confidence you are, either.
and Iran is inflicting enough pain on America (via the Strait of Hormuz) that they are the ones who will have to surrender very soon
It's affecting our allies a lot more than the US, at least in direct terms. It's not obvious that the "pain" is enough to make the US surrender, though it might eventually.
to spin that humiliating surrender into something that merely gravely wounds his Presidency
He probably would have no trouble at all issuing a spin - on any hypothetical final resolution largely in Iran's favor - into a "win" for the US, such is his nimble (read: self-serving) ego and flexibility in defining "win". But it is plausible that he would locate SOME sort of final terms of benefit for US objectives, even if lesser ones, that it looks less than horrible on paper. Real life is complicated, all he has to do is make it even muddier than it already is and, voila, it's "reasonable"-ish.
Don't be pedantic, Tony. It should have been obvious from context that I meant "accept defeat". I'll be more specific in future.
Delete"But you can't be certain of that: if Trump's methods were to manage to eliminate the leadership over and over, he might eventually get a leadership that had less compulsion for nuclear capability and more willing to consider such terms."
You said here that you were using probabilistic reasoning, right? But the scenario you suggested does not seem plausible at all. The idea that repeatedly murdering a country's leaders would make them more amenable to peace is highly unlikely off the bat, so the prior probability of that is low. Furthermore, we have seen proof that it HAS NOT worked when it has been tried in Iran. In fact, it's backfired - every indication is that the murder of the elected Iranian government near the start of the war has lead to the ascension of the IRGC's hardliners, who are more radical, more extremist, and more uncompromising. So we actually have evidence *against* your hypothesis, which was unlikely to begin with.
It's also true that I don't have as much information as Donald Trump, but I don't need to in order to make reasonable predictions about the Iran War. No secret information that Trump might possess is going to change the basic, publicly-known facts of the conflict. You are running out of ammunition and popular will already, and Iran does not show serious signs of collapsing. Trump has absolutely no reason to want to drag the war on, so the fact that it drags on can only mean that he cannot end it in a way that's to his liking. If there were any secret weapon it would've been deployed months ago. It may be true that your allies are hurting more than you, at least directly, but that's still terrible for you! You do business with Europe, with Japan, etc! If their economies crash, you get seriously harmed as well! Plus, you've drained your Strategic Petroleum Reserve to its lowest level in four decades. You can't do that forever.
I've said a lot, but let me sum it up super quick - you have no plausible path to victory in Iran, therefore you cannot win. If you're willing to waste lives, money, and resources, you can stubbornly persist for a few more months before reality finally twists your arms, but you can't win. I know that's going to be a hard thing for you to accept (there are STILL people who try to debate semantics over the Vietnam War just because admitting that America lost a war hurts their feelings), but you're going to have to get over that arrogance if you want to adapt to the new world that's dawning.
Is there any evidence out there that Israel is more congenial to the natural law than Iran is?
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to acts of terrorism which government, Iran or Israel, has a higher moral standard or less appalling record.
As an American would you rather be known as pro-Iran or pro-Israel, anti-Persianist or anti-Semitist.
And why.
Tell us more about your ignorance of geopolitics.
DeleteThe question as posed is what is Iran or Israel ( referring to the government presumably) more antagonistic to the natural law. Lets state for A Christian to be "anti Semitic or anti Persian would be equally immoral as we are called to love everyone ( in the sense of willing their good). Lets dismiss that bit of rhetoric than as nonsense since it does not help answer what policy we should pursue.
DeleteIt is obvious that Iran as a regime is much more wicked than Israel as a regime and this does not require us to endorse any or even most of Israel's particular actions. The reasons for this are as follows
Iran is a theocratic dictatorship in which it kills political protestors in large numbers and suppresses non Muslims and in particular Christians. Conversion from Islam is apostasy associated with treason and can get you imprisoned or killed. Christian churches are heavily monitored, harassed and can not publicly preach. In contrast Israel is more or less a secularized European style democracy.. Think a France in the Middle East.. With the Jewish religious identiy ( as opposed to cultural and ethnic identity) a little more prominent than the Catholic one in France.. which is to say not all that prominent at all. Christianity is legal in Israel, you are not arrested if you convert to Christianity. In fact you can hold political office as an Arab Christian.
Iran sponsors terrorist groups as a matter of policy that attack civilians directly, this includes Hamas ( which perpetrated the Oct 7 2023 attacks even the Arab world condemned and involved the murder and rape of civilians and the killing even of infants, not to mention the support of Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthi pirates in Yemen. As the above discussion makes clear, whatever even legitimate beef the Palestinians have with the Israeli government it would not justify these attacks. The israeli's in contrast with whatever objections you might legitimately have with them do not directly as a military policy directly murder civilians. We can debate to what extent they Israeli military in retaliation for attacks on Israel respects the proportionality of the deaths and suffering inflicted on the civilian population but equating the Israeli government to to Iranian government would be like equating the US and the Allies with the Nazis because the US and British arguably caused disproportionate civilian deaths bombing Dresden with the Nazis who were the aggressors in WW II and used civilian murder of Jews and Eastern Europeans as a direct matter of policy. It is and absurd and wicked comparison.
It is perfectly reasonable to say this war is not justified and to disagree with some of the policy of the Israeli government. This is not anti Semitic and some supporters of the war sometimes go to a charge of anti Semitism unfairly in defending the current policy.
On the other hand if you equate the terrorism perpetrated and supported by Iran and its theocratic Islamic dictatorship that kills its own citizens with Israel you are so far from any kind of fair objective comparison than perhaps the anti Semitic charge is indeed apt in your case.
Haven't hear Iran called Persia since I was studying Middle Eastern History back in the day.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I've heard, they don't particularly like the name. Iran ("Land of the Aryans") is the indigenous term for the land, "Parsa/Fars" is simply the westernmost province and the one that the Greeks encountered first. They've been officially requesting the international community to use "Iran" since 1935. This'd be kind of like if everyone insisted on calling England "Albion" because the Romans called it that.
DeletePro Iran because I’m a proud Aryan.
ReplyDeleteThere is nothing in Iran to be proud about.
DeleteBut you are anti-Persia, for you are not a proud Persian cat, right?
DeleteI don't like cats, much less Persian cats.
DeleteIt seems to me you're making a really strange equivalence there at the beginning: between actual civilian attacks on one hand and the threat of annihilation on the other. But actual attacks and threats are very different things, so to make a kind of a fortiori argument with them seems out of order. Am I misreading you?
ReplyDeleteTo threaten to do something is to be willing to do it, at least in principle. To threaten to do something grotesquely immoral is itself immoral - after all, isn't that how most forms of coercion and theft work? Otherwise there would be no evil in literal highway banditry as long as the bandit didn't pull the trigger.
DeleteTo threaten to do something is to be willing to do it, at least in principle.
DeleteThat's kinda true, but not entirely. A 5-year old made very angry by merciless teasing from his 9-year old brother might start attacking the older brother and yell "I'm going to kill you" but not mean it, and have no intention of actually killing him, but to beat him up.
To threaten to do something grotesquely immoral is itself immoral
I've said all along that Trump should not have threatened to eradicate their whole civilization, to threaten it is immoral. To do it would be grotesquely immoral.
It is somewhat probable that Trump has never, at any moment, actually intended to actually carry through with that threat. But to make that threat when you know that your words give the lie to your thoughts is immoral.
He would probably argue one of two things in response: (1) they know I'm not going to actually nuke the whole country back to the stone age, but I am trying to make them come to their senses and be real at the negotiating table. Or (2) they won't know how far I am willing to take things, I make myself unpredictable, and this is supposed to make them afraid enough to stop their nonsense and make a peace deal.
Neither one of these is an adequate reason to make such threats. In addition to being morally wrong, I don't think it's very good management of strategy, either.
Question for anyone who still supports this war: do you have a red line? Is there anything, literally anything, that Trump could do which would convince you to stop supporting the war? Dropping a nuke on Tehran? Ordering a ground invasion? Nothing, ride or die to Hell with the Orange God? I'm genuinely curious.
ReplyDeleteGenuinely shocking to me that anyone supports this war.
DeleteSo am I but we know the answer: there is none. When you don’t actually care about the lives of other people, it is very easy to constantly make up reasons to justify anything done to them. A war of aggression we started and, which, initially killed 168 girls ( a desperate cry from the universe when the war began showing us the folly of all this - but these people just shrugged, made up reasons why it was the crazy Muslims fault and continued their day). We have one guy here who spends most of his time theory crafting why Iran is morally wrong for not giving up.By the end of his essays, it could very well be a book “The Bully’s guide to the Art of War.” Just ridiculous.
ReplyDeleteA nuclear bomb on Iran would immediately be justified by their intransigence. These people don’t care.
It is said in this article that "[...] if the regime really were so irrational that even the threat of annihilation would not deter it from using nuclear weapons, then it would also be too irrational to be moved by attacks on civilian infrastructure."
ReplyDeleteA possible objection to this is that destroying the cuvilian infrastructure may have the effect of economically starving the regime to death, and that this effect could perhaps trigger a successful revolt against the regime that ends the war.
It is also said: " [...] suppose the war’s defenders were to appeal to a theory of collective guilt in order to defend attacks on civilian infrastructure. That is to say, suppose they were to claim that the entire population of Iran somehow bears sufficient responsibility for the crimes of the regime for it to be legitimate to target civilian infrastructure no less than military targets."
I don't understand why anyone would take recourse to this kind of justification. Why do we need a justification for doing things that supposedly are necessary to win a war? Why this weird approach, as if war were subjected to some kind of moral symmetry between me and my enemy? War is ultima ratio: I must survival and my interests must prevail against my enemy's survival and his interests. That's all. It is I or the other. I don't have to be right, I must simply survive.
It is another matter whether it would be smart to destroy Iranian civilian infrastructure in this war. One can debate about this and causing many civilian victims can lead to moral outrage among the masses here as well as there. Moral outrage is a real power factor, something to reckon with. And to me that's precisely where morality in politics and war is relevant and has a role to play. If you threaten to do something which can bring about your own defeat or downfall because of moral outrage against you, then better don't do it, because it is against your interests.