Just War Theory Essay

“For war, as a grave act of killing, needs to be justified.” These words were written by Murray N. Rothbard, dean of the Austrian School and founder of modern libertarianism, who spent much of his academic career trying to determine what, exactly, defined a “just war”. In fact, for as long as humans have been fighting wars, there have been quotations referring to the justification and moralities of wars and how warfare can be considered fair and acceptable to each society’s individual standards. While the time and place of each war differs, the reality of the devastation of battle may be found warranted by those fighting using these just war standards to vindicate their actions.

Jus a bellum, the right to go to war, explicitly describes how a nation-state should conduct itself before preparing for war. There are seven sub-categories within Jus a bellum: Just Cause, Comparative Justice, Competent Authority, Right Intention, Profitability of Success, Last Resort, and Proportionality. Just Cause is explained as needing to have a

There are many questions surrounding the topic of war. Should we fight? How do we win? Why are we fighting? The most debatable question of all is if the war is considered just.

The Just war theory maintains that war may be justified if fought only in certain circumstances, and only if certain restrictions are applied to the way in which war is fought. The theory that was first propounded by St Augustine of Hippo and St Ambrose of Milan ( 4th and 5th centuries AD) attempts to clarify two fundamental questions: ‘when is it right to fight?’ and ‘How should war be fought?’. Whereas Pacifists are people mainly Christians who reject the use of violence and the deliberate killing of civilians but claims that peace is intrinsically good and ought to be upheld either as a duty and that war can never be justifiable. However, Realists agree that, due to the

The legitimate defense of a nation and the responsibility of the Security Council to take actions in the course of maintaining peace within its areas of influence. With the establishment of United Nations and the modernization of war and its materials; the theories and doctrines of the past also needed to evolve. The modern Just war theory in composed of two principles: jus ad bellum, the right to conduct war, and jus in bello, the correct conduct within war. Each principle also has its own set of criteria to follow. Jus ad bellum contains six: Just cause, right intention, proper authority and public declaration, last resort, probability of success, and proportionality. (Orend, 2006)

The ultimate goal of a just war is to re-establish peace and safety. The just war can only be waged as a last resort requiring that all reasonable non-violent options must be exhausted before the use of force can be justified. A war can be just when it is fought with a reasonable chance of success. The Just War tradition is a set of mutually agreed rules of combat may be said to commonly evolve between two culturally similar enemies. An array of values are shared between two warring peoples, we often find that they implicitly or explicitly agree upon limits to their warfare.

Most poets use their unique gift of writing poetry to relieve stress or just to document their emotions towards a given subject. Others use it as a key to bring about social change and voice their opinion on modern events. This is the case in Stephen Crane’s War Is Kind. The speaker in the poem uses irony as a strategy to convince the reader of the harsh reality of war.

The theory places emphasis on the division of the population into combatants, those who fight in the war (soldiers), and noncombatants, those who do not fight (civilians). It also encompasses two sets of principles: jus ad bellum, which governs the justness of going to war, and jus in bellum, which evaluates conduct in war (Lazar, n.d., p. 1). Jus ad bellum dictates that states are only permitted to go to war when satisfying a number of principles. For this discussion, the most important of these principles is the requirement of a “Just Cause,” meaning the war is initiated in an attempt to rectify an appropriate injury (Lazar, n.d., p. 7). Traditionally, the only appropriate injuries are national attacks (or attacks on allies), where war is incited for national self-defence, or to intervene in “crimes that shock the moral conscience of mankind, “ (Walzer, n.d.,

Just War Theory divides the morality of war into two parts. A war can be tried twice, first pertaining to why the nation decides to go to war, and secondly with how the nation actions are during the fighting (Walzer 21). The first part of war called jus ad bellem, translated to the justice of war, provides strict guiding principles with whether the war is just or unjust in the intentions of going to war. The second part of war jus in bello correlates to appropriate conduct while in war (Cook 27). Being just in jus ad bellum does not necessarily mean that jus in bello is just.

According to traditional just war theory, a just cause must serve peace and not simply protect an unjust status quo. War must be used as a last resort and all pacifistic approaches must be

“War may sometimes be a necessary evil. But no matter how necessary, it is always an evil, never a good. We will not learn how to live together in peace by killing each other’s children. This famous quote is from James Earl “Jimmy” Carter, Jr., who served as the 39th President of the United States. It implies that war can be justified under strict circumstances where it can be necessary, but it is still abhorrent. War is defined as a state of armed conflict between different countries or different groups within a country. Justification refers to the action of showing something to be right or reasonable. War brings many negative and catastrophic impacts not just to the country, but to the people living in the country as well, which this paper

The theory of just war has been around for several centuries. According to Ramsey and Walzer, the notion of wars being just or unjust has been debated since the fifth century B.C. E. However, it was not until Aristotle that the term “Just War” was conceived to refer to the wars initiated by Hellenes against non-Hellenes (Russell, 3). In the years after Aristotle, the just war theory was placed on the back burner. The next time it came up was in the early years of the Christian empire. Traditionally, the men of the Christian army were nonviolent. As a result of not fighting, they were unable to protect themselves and their land from invaders. With this in mind, Augustine was able to justify fighting by declaring “that war itself was not intrinsically evil but, rather, going to war for the love of violence, cruelty enmity, greed, lust of power and ambition were the real evils from which the Christians should protect themselves” (C. Taslaman and F. Taslaman).

In this essay’s scope, the Syrian war has been analyzed using the just war theory. The just war theory highlights situations where waging a war can be justifiable and also provides guidelines on how a war should be fought. In as much as the theory recognizes the need to protect innocent human life even when it involves the use of force, the theory puts in place several principles that need to be met to qualify a war as being just. As for the Syrian situation, the bone of contention is whether the proposed US military intervention is justifiable or not. Those who are for a US military intervention observe that the enormity of the massacre in Syria justifies an external intervention. They point out that an intervention would protect further loss of innocent human life. Those against such a move point out some guidelines that have not been met to merit such an intervention as a just

The Just War Theory is a doctrine founded by Saint Augustine which has helped bring much discussion and debate to wars and the morality to fight in them. Wars and fights between people have gone on forever and are not perceived to stop anytime soon so it is important that some people thought about when and why they should ever fight. For many years Christians never part toke in this fighting due to teachings of the Bible and Jesus' teaching on 'turning the other cheek' and 'live by the sword, die by the sword'. Saint Augustine would be one of the first to talk about how a Christian could be a soldier and serve God at the same time. Through this thought we would receive the Just War Theory which gave a set of requirements for someone to partake

War must be waged in accordance with the purpose of establishing justice, expressing the “right intention”.