Thanks for the invitation to join an interesting topic. I may be largely unavailable the next few days, but I’ll gladly offer my few thoughts as I get a chance. I’ll post a link to this from my blog, as well, to spread the word.

Whatever one’s position, I think it an extremely important conversation to have.

If I may begin by offering a few viewpoints other than mine…

Since JWT was initially a Catholic proposition, consider that both the current pope and the last pope thought the Iraq War a “bad” war, not meeting JWT’s demands. These men are/were not pacifists - they both supported the US’ war in Afghanistan, for instance. But they questioned the legitimacy of the Iraq Invasion, thinking it not up to JW standards.

Then-cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict) said in 2003:

The Holy Father’s judgment is also convincing from the rational point of view: There were not sufficient reasons to unleash a war against Iraq. To say nothing of the fact that, given the new weapons that make possible destructions that go beyond the combatant groups, today we should be asking ourselves if it is still licit to admit the very existence of a “just war.”

I think I might begin by pointing out that JWT might be much more difficult to make a case for biblically than either pacifism or all out, no survivors warfare.

There certainly are places in the OT where it seems to indicate that God is commanding (or at least Israel is interpreting a command) to kill every man, woman and child in a village or town.

And I think we know that we who lean towards the pacifist end of the scale think Jesus’ commands to love our enemies, overcome evil with good, turn the other cheek make a fairly strong case for non-violent peacemaking as resistence (or perhaps, “as non-resistence…”).

But where do we find in the Bible the notion of Just Cause in regards to war? Or being declared by the Proper Authorities? Or “a reasonable chance of success”?

Understand, this is not exactly a criticism of JWT - I tend to think it’s a great starting place and wish we’d at least act according to its precepts. I’m just saying that its tenets are largely extrabibical and more a result of human reasoning out an answer to: “IF we’re going to wage war, what ought to be the guiding principles?”

You think?

I wonder if we are mischaracterizing the Iraq war as a war unto itself. The policy of ours and other governments may be that this is merely a battle, a front in a much bigger, longer struggle. One of the effects of this front is that it is succesfully causing the Islamic world to be a house divided against itself; which would be a tactic, a goal, that no politician could really openly describe as an overt policy.
A New Testament interaction between Jesus and a soldier in Mathew chapter 8 is a beautiful description of the apolitical nature of Jesus. Also, Jesus does not in any way condemn the role of soldiering, in those scriptures.
Jesus’ teaching about loving one’s enemies, in Mathew 5:43-48 are challenging to me, particularly when I am myself in the mood that foes should be smitten, thrashed with the jawbone of a donkey (Judges 15:14-17).
With regard to preemptive actions…I am glad that sometimes the police utilize preemptive deadly force in a variety of situations (hostage situations, brandishing with the intent to kill or harm, etc.). It is quite easy to think of situations wherein the use of preemptive force is entirely correct, reasonable and righteous.

Came over from a link off of Dan’s website.

The Iraq war clearly does not meet all of the requirements of JWT.

On a personal level, it doesn’t meet my requirements either.

The two choices given, pacifism or JWT, I am wondering if they obtain.

The historical Catholic Church had need to have a theological basis for war since it was often conducting war as a church. Christian churches don’t do that now of days, not even the Catholic church.

Through history many major social issues have been thrust before Christians with a demand that they take a stand on them: slavery, women’s rights, polygamy, and such and etc. Sometimes the faithful of the Bible seem to be embracing one thing and sometimes another.

It only makes sense, says I, when one realizes that that it probably doesn’t enter into one’s faith. It doesn’t matter whether the individual believer lives in a culture which practices polygamy or monogamy, practices slavery and servitude or universal freedom, ….. those aren’t the issues the faith is addressing.

Likewise war. The Christian faith, one might hold, is addressing something quite aside and entirely different than whether one’s nation is at war or not.

The Buddhists say: Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.”

The affairs of the world go on unabated, the transformation of the faithful lies elsewhere.

A rare thing in my brief encounters with both of them, I agree with Dan that the Catholic prerequisites for just war are hard to ground in specific passages of Scripture, and I am sympathetic with Eleutheros when he writes that faith is orthogonal with political issues.

I’d go further than Dan and say that not only is just war doctrine not explicitly biblical, it’s not practical.

On point 4, war is never a true last resort: one can always capitulate, surrender, and fall on your own sword.

Point 5 doesn’t consider the consequences of not fighting: if the alternative is catastrophic enough, it may not matter if victory is unlikely, and the right and honorable thing may be to die on one’s feet than to live on one’s knees.

Point 6 likewise doesn’t consider the consequences of not fighting: if the costs of fighting are still less than the costs of not fighting, the disproportionality to the benefits may not matter.

I’m not saying that there’s no such thing as a just war or that the Iraq war was unjust. (I would love to see Eben Flood do more than assert that the controversial is “clearly” true.) I’m saying that the formulation of what a just war is may be overly naive and insufficiently realistic.

Similarly naive is the idea that WMD’s preclude the possibility of a just war in the modern age: the implication is that it’s better to permit the proliferation of those weapons.

But just as I believe that the Catholic formulation of just war isn’t explicitly biblical, I believe the pacifism that I’ve seen justified by Matthew 5:39 is on a very weak scriptural foundation.

I believe the command to turn the other cheek is for the individual, not the state. The distinction between the two was clear in the Old Testament law: individuals were forbidden from murdering, but the state was authorized to execute murderers. To ignore that distinction is to distort the very Scripture Christ promised to fulfill.

If I’m wrong, and if “turn the other cheek” prohibits war, it prohibits much more than that. Non-violent resistence is *still* resistence. If the government must obey the command not to resist one who is evil, war and capital punishment is off the table, but so too are trade sanctions and censures, life sentences and *any* imposition of fines or jail time.

Taken to where its advocates rarely travel — namely, its logical conclusion — a strict pacifism based on Matthew 5 requires a practical anarchism, where the state can AT MOST write laws that it cannot and will not enforce in any meaningful way. Since that seems to contradict Romans 13:4, and since we’re talking about what the Bible teaches rather than selections of the Bible, the case of Scripturally mandated pacifism falls apart.

Bringing me to Eleutheros’ comment, I don’t think that the comparative silence on social issues means that the “city of man” ought to be utterly free from God’s influence, or that God doesn’t care what political policies we support or how we support them. It is simply that we are expected to use our God-given reason to apply His principles to our present situations, that the arena of war and peace is one where human prudence has a lot of room in which to maneuver.

Clearly, the Bible commends the peacemakers, but it doesn’t outline a clear path to political peace. It may be that those who use the weapons of war to defeat aggressive enemies and do so decisively have accomplished more for the cause of peace than those who refuse to take up arms against a legitimate threat. Colt’s revolver may not have been misnamed.

Is war a hard thing that ought not to be entered lightly? Of course, but so is surgery. We are not the Great Physician who could heal the blind and the lame; sometimes we must make due by amputating an gangrous leg.

Can we imagine Jesus Christ taking a carpenter’s saw to an infected leg? Of course not, but that doesn’t mean that a surgeon is always in the wrong for saving a life by severing a leg. Likewise, because we can’t imagine Jesus in a tank or bomber, it doesn’t mean that soldier who is there is there because he’s defying his Lord.

I’m a pacifist, but I came from the Just War tradition and, having trained as a Christian ethicist, am very familiar with it. You only posted the criteria of ius ad bellum–the criteria that justify going to war (according to JWT). There is also ius in bello, the criteria for waging a war justly. The first criterion here is “discrimination,” between combatants and non-combatants. This rules out any weapons or tactics which (a) deliberately target civilians or noncombatants–i.e., terror tactics, (b) any weapons or tactics which make it harder to hit only military targets (saturation bombing, shock and awe tactics, etc.), and (c) this requires that the enemy be given every chance to surrender and that all prisoners of war be treated honorably (no torture, no humiliation, no using for propaganda purposes).

The second principle in ius in bello is “proportionality” again, which you rightly listed with ius ad bellum considerations. Just as proportionality must be considered in deciding whether or not to go to war, it must also be used in making decisions in fighting the war. There can be no “we had to destroy the village to save the village” scenarios.

In JWT, if a soldier is given an order which violates ius in bello standards (an “unlawful order” as the U.S. Uniform Code of Military Justice puts it), s/he must disobey, refuse to follow the order, even if s/he is courtmartialed or executed for doing so. But JWT churches do not prepare members for this aspect of JWT.

Now, in both its Christian and secular/philosophical forms, JWT has developed 2 different forms which I call “strict” and “loose,” and the differences between them explain why 2 people can spell out the same JWT principles, but disagree on whether or not a given war was “just.” The “loose” form expects wars as a given, so it expects that the criteria will be fairly easily met. (Sometimes this is combined with a form of patriotism that has trouble believing one’s own country ever does something wrong. Thus, one begins by thinking that one’s own nation will only be involved in just wars.)

The strict form of JWT has dominated the conversations and outlook (if not the actual conduct) of most nations and JWT thinkers since WWII. The horrors of modern war are so great that strict JWT begins with a “strong presumption against war.” It sees the JWT criteria as designed to make it difficult, if not quite impossible, for a modern war to meet the criteria.

Now, you begin your post by saying that Christians have been divided into JWT and pacifist categories. There has actually been a 3rd historic option: the “crusade” or “holy war,” which, drawing on passages fom Joshua and Judges, sees certain wars as God’s instrument of judgment against the unrighteous. This kind of war mentality is not limited. The enemy is counted as the enemy of GOD and therefore, nothing is off-limits. In modern times the Crusade has few open defenders, but far too often this is the mentality and behavior actually at work. I suggest that America and American Christians are especially prone to crusade thinking while believing that they are holding to Just War principles. Factors pushing toward this, include:

1)The strong ideology of American ‘exceptionalism’ which believes that this country is always right and which resents rules or restrictions placed by treaties signed or by international organizations joined. Flags in our churches, the widespread belief that this is a “Christian nation” (a biblically unsound idea for any nation), and the identification of the Religious Right with the militant wing of the Republican Party all push toward crusade attitudes.

2)In democracies like ours, it is harder to get people to want to go to war. This is a good thing in itself, but it means that politicians who want to go to war have trouble “selling” their case for a war for limited goals with limited means, such as are entailed by JWT. So, the wars America fights tend to be painted by politicians in very bright colors as always pure good vs. irredeemable evil–whether we’re talking about the War of 1812, the U.S. Civil War, WWI (”The War to End All Wars”–very Holy War/Crusade language), WWII (in which the sides probably were closer to pure good vs. evil than most cases), or a “war against terror.” This “Good vs. Evil” mentality means that, in drumming up support for a given war, it becomes difficult for Americans to accept any conclusion other than unconditional surrender and total victory–which stands in stark opposition to JWT principles.

3)The rise of Dispensationalism and Christian Zionism in churches heightens #2, especially where the Middle East is concerned.

The bibliography you have appended tends toward the “loose” JWT model in which crusade language and reasoning creeps in. For an example of the strict version, see Alan Geyer and Barbara G. Green, Lines in the Sand: Justice and the Gulf War which shows how difficult the first Gulf War had in meeting the JWT criteria–and it came far closer than the Iraq war.
See also, John Howard Yoder, When War is Unjust. Like myself, the late JHY was a pacifist, but he wrote this book to keep JWT folks honest.

About preemptive actions and JWT. The Bush admin. muddies the waters. There is a distinction between “preemption” and “preventive war.” “Preemption” has always been considered by JWT to be part of the inherent right of nations to self-defense. Even in the strict JWT found in post-WWII thinking, the U.N. Charter, etc. For instance, in the 6 Day War, Israel found out about Arab plans to launch a sneak attack. JWT completely approves of her preemptive strike that did not wait until attacked. But to meet the criterion of preemption, a threat must be real and imminent.
The Bush doctrine of “preemption” is actually an embrace of “preventive war”–starting a war against a perceived but vague threat sometime in the future. This has been outlawed in JWT thinking and in modern international law. It counts in the Nuremberg Principles as a “crime against peace.” Responding to the police analogy by one of your commenters, police can act to prevent a murder, etc. But they cannot, like in the movie Minority Report, go around shooting or arresting people they believe will commit crimes EVENTUALLY, sometime in the future. But the Bush doctrine says that the U.S. will do just that–and that violates international law.

Michael, I do not believe shock-and-awe tactics involved indiscriminate bombing or the deliberate targeting of civilians: rather, if I understood its use correctly, it meant bombing legitimate military targets with a dramatic display of firepower.

I’m not sure that discrimination would prohibit harsh interrogation. Surely we can discriminate between situations where information is vital to protecting innocent life, and when it is not; between leaders who likely have that information and foot soldiers who don’t; and between methods that are harsh and those that are sadistic.

And the comparison between Bush and the police in Minority Report is hardly apt since, it wasn’t as if Iraq was minding its own business. Saddam had spent a decade violating the cease-fire to which he agreed, which ended the last war that he started, and he was in violation of about a dozen UN resolutions leading up to Resolution 1441.

I wonder if you believe that the goal of total victory and unconditional surrender — “which stands in stark opposition to JWT principles” — was invalid even in instances where the cause was clearly more just.

And even if I were to grant some legitimacy your three reasons for support of an implicit crusade, I believe that some on the other side of the political aisle embrace a negative exceptionalism of their own, where America is rarely given the benefit of the doubt; an effort to blur all lines between good and evil, such that the United States isn’t good enough to fight for and enemies like the Baathists and the Taliban aren’t bad enough to fight against; and an implicit anti-Semitism that results in accusing Israel of conducting its own Holocaust simply by building a fence and having security checkpoints.

Without engaging in the JWT v. Pacifism debate… For those who do hold to the JWT position, I’m curious as to if there is such thing as a Just War, how does the War in Iraq fail to meet those requirements? If the criteria is not met through state sponsored terrorism, the effort to obtain weapons of mass destruction, and genocide, then I am really intrigued to know what the criteria should be?

The saying goes, it takes two to tango. Why the hardline pacifists so rarely try to persuade the jihadists that their behavior doesn’t qualify as the waging of a just war?

“The enemy is counted as the enemy of GOD and therefore, nothing is off-limits.”

This most certainly describes the jihadists, but Michael focuses on this belief’s being latent in politically conservative Christians rather than its being explicit in the words and deeds of the militant Muslims who not only don’t care about discrimination and proportionality, but who actively seek to kill as many innocent people as possible.

Even in choosing to name this sort of warfare, he chooses “crusade” over “jihad.” That decision doesn’t mean nothing.

My comments about the horror of crusading certainly does apply to terrorists. I do not say “jihadists” because Muslims disagree among themselves about the meaning of “jihad.” Some, for instance, use the term only to apply to an internal struggle for righteous living. I spoke first to “politically conservative Christians” (Bubba’s description, not mine) because I always think that critique should begin at home. Starting with an out-group is too easy.
I assumed this was a conversation between Christians and those who agreed to the standards of international law based on JWT which developed in Western Christian circles. I used the term “crusade” because that is the term that has become standard in the CHRISTIAN literature to describe the position–beginning, perhaps, withh Roland Bainton’s Christian Attitudes Toward War and Peace, first published in 1960–well before the current Islam-inspired terrorists vs. West conflicts.

I have tried to keep conservative vs. liberal politics out of my comments, so far, Bubba. The criticisms I gave of Bush’s preventive war strategy, for example,were voiced first and loudest by retired military, including many who were Republican. According to the rules of the initial post, I have not tried to argue for my position (gospel nonviolence), but simply spell out more the principles of JWT and why different people who both hold to JWT can view the same conflict differently.

It is a principle tenet of JWT, even the “loose” version that violations by the other side NEVER justify reciprocal violations on our side. That is why, during WWII (which surely met the criterion of “Just Cause” more than any other modern war), Christian leaders both in the U.S. and the U.K. spoke out against the tactic of “city bombing” initiated by the British Royal Air Force commander “Bomber” Harris and then joined in by the U.S.–it didn’t matter what the Nazis did, the Allies were still wrong in bombing cities instead of military targets. “Shock and Awe” in this war was NOT aimed primarily at military targets, but at pounding Baghdad in hopes of an early surrender. Some civilian targets were deliberately chosen, such as the hotel where the journalists from al-Jazeera were staying (which was then hit AGAIN) by tanks after the U.S. came into the city.

I assumed this conversation was about CHRISTIAN ethics. If we just want to bash terrorists, whether Muslim or other, that’s easy and I see no reason to participate. Christian ethics is always about what behavior WE are allowed. For the sake of this conversation, I have bracketed my pacifist views, and am acting as if JWT were biblically justified. If so, then the conversation about how it is lived out, whether Christians can participate in this current war in Iraq, etc. become the conversation parameters. Terrorism is ruled out. So is torture. The other side’s actions do not justify in our sinking to their level.
(Note: Many Muslims, of course, want nothing to do with terrorism. I am trying not paint all Muslims any particular way. There are as many differences among them as among us Christians.)

“I’d go further than Dan and say that not only is just war doctrine not explicitly biblical, it’s not practical.”

There seem to be at least a few here who think JWT is not a good measure for war-making. I’m curious what they would use as guidelines in war-making if they reject not only just peacemaking but also just war theory?

Might makes right or every man/nation for themselves or some other series of guidelines?

Because I think that comment quotes in other people’s blogs should not be too long, I will not put here the detailed case for why this war does not meet JWT (seen from a strict viewpoint). But I will put that up on my blog Levellers in the next few days and link to this blog discussion. See it at http://levellers.wordpress.com/

I will also highlight the developing ethic of Just Peacemaking which makes common ground between pacifists (active nonviolent peacemakers) and JWTers (filling out the meaning of the JWT criterion of “last resort” by spelling out what kind of “resorts” should be tried first).

Again, I must deny Bubba’s charge that my characterizations are targeted against “politically conservative Christians.” This is simply false. Both WWI and Vietnam were modern “crusade” type wars started by liberals, not conservatives. Traditional conservatism holds high the virtue of “prudence” and works in international affairs with the political equivalent of a physicians’ first rule of medicine, “First, do no harm. Do not make the patient WORSE.” That is why traditional conservatives, even more than political or theological liberals, were and remain horrified by the Bush Doctrine of Preventive War. It is not prudent. It risks making things much worse on the chance that it can make great gains (U.S. style capitalism and democracy throughout the Middle East, for example). This violates the conservative doctrine, repeatedly told to political liberals, that history usually happens in gradual steps, and good things like democracy develop organically. Trying for major leaps forward in giant breaks from history is not conservative.

I, myself, am neither conservative politically nor theologically (depending on how you rate the latter). Theologically, I am Anabaptist (especially influenced by John Howard Yoder) influenced by liberation theologies, Karl Barth, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Jurgen Moltmann. I stand in the overlap between the left end of the Evangelical spectrum and the right end of the “mainstream liberal” spectrum. Politically, I am a democratic socialist with many Green influences.
But in answering these questions, I have not been making a case for any of that. I have been weighing Iraq in the balance of JWT and finding it wanting. I did this in print before the war.

I am glad Brent brought up this topic and that Dan directed me to this blog, which I had never before read.

“Why the hardline pacifists so rarely try to persuade the jihadists that their behavior doesn’t qualify as the waging of a just war?”

This would be true in my case mainly because I know no jihadists (what Bubba means by jihadists, anyway). They, for the most part, do not live in my country or community and they are not the ones I need to convince in regards to my nation’s policies.

I agree we need to reach out to all but I am primarily responsible - in a representative republic such as ours - for MY country’s decisions and so I direct my comments towards my country with which I have some say in our policy, not some other people in other parts of the world, with which I have no say.

Also, I’m taking to heart Jesus’ teaching to remove the plank from my own eye before talking to my neighbor about his speck in his eye.

Having said that, our church has for the last two years begun a Christmas-time effort to reach out to our Muslim brothers and sisters, at least in a small way. It’s a start.

Along those lines, I just heard a story yesterday in the news about a fella who’d done some research and found that there was this one town in Morocco (which is a Muslim nation that is not nearly as oppressive as many - where Christian churches co-exist with the Muslims with some tension but not usually violence) where some 30-40 suicide bombers had come from. A very large number for one town!

In looking in to why so many had come from one place, he said some of the common factors were poverty, lack of education and the sense that Islam was under attack.

Our small little church for the last two years has sponsored a literacy and work project in a similar little village in Morocco - a village built on and living off of a city dump of a more wealthy college town. Poverty and illiteracy are huge problems there.

What if each of the tens of thousands of churches out there were to do some similar act? Not some huge proselytizing outreach (”Here’s some bread, let me tell you about the four spiritual laws…”) - which may well justify the feeling of Islam being under attack - but just a common decency outreach as in Matthew 25 (what you’ve done for the least of these…). Having dinner with muslims. Participate in the equivelant of a barn-raising alongside muslims. A cup of cold water.

What kind of impact would such a huge outreach have?

It would seem that this sort of Just Peacemaking effort would
1. HAVE to have more success than all the bombing we’ve done thus far in Iraq, and
2. could be done without any efforts or obscene amounts of money from a Big Gov’t-style militaristic answer and therefore
3. could be the sort of approach that Christians from all “sides” could agree upon, as well as many non-Christians

As Michael pointed out, even if one thinks there is such a thing as a Just War, JW Theorists could join with Just Peacemakers in making sure we hew to the Last Resort as truly a last resort.

I am utterly unconvinced that Michael is right when he writes, “I always think that critique should begin at home. Starting with an out-group is too easy.”

This betrays a bias against one’s own and, implicitly, a bias toward one’s enemy. So too does maligning criticism of our enemy and acknowledging their evil aims as “bashing.”

Similarly biased is the term “Just Peacemaking.” Note here that the “T” in “JWT” is missing, that it’s not being called a theory; it is my belief that strict pacifism is (at least) not the most effective way to achieve peace, so it ought to be treated as a theory. Or, simply call it what it is rather than what you would like/hope it to be: it is STRICT PACIFISM; “Just Peacemaking” is a slogan, an unearned slogan, and one that wrongly implies that its opponents are uninterested in making peace. Most of us agree on the ends, just not the means.

Dan: we prosecute our soldiers who behave like barbarians, our enemies lionize theirs. We make admittedly imperfect efforts to limit civilian casualties, they want to murder as many civilians as possible. Our cause is political and religious freedom and equality, and theirs is subjugation and discrimination.

What in the world makes you think that it is we who have a whole log in our eye, and they who have a mere speck?

And you must surely realize that the two sides in this conflict are not symmetrical: convince the cops to lay down their arms before the hostage-takers, and the outcome WILL be different than if you did the reverse. There is nothing that makes me think that the quickest way to a good outcome in this conflict is to convince those to disarm first, whose goals are broadly more righteous than their enemies and whose methods are broadly more just.

And I do support the spread of literacy and prosperity — particularly through the encouragement of political and economic freedom, contrary to democratic socialists I join Hayek and Friedman in the belief that the two cannot truly be separated. But while I do so, I must remind you that neither bin Ladin nor Atta could remotely be said to have come from a background of illiteracy and poverty.

I would support an effort on the part of churches to reach out to the poor and needy in the Islamic world, but I wouldn’t eschew evangelism (why would any Christian?) and I do believe that Western nations should oppose rogue states that harbor terrorists and seek WMD’s, opposing them using military force if necessary.

I should have done this before, but to answer Dan’s questions…

There seem to be at least a few here who think JWT is not a good measure for war-making. I’m curious what they would use as guidelines in war-making if they reject not only just peacemaking but also just war theory?

Might makes right or every man/nation for themselves or some other series of guidelines?

I don’t oppose the idea that there is such a thing as a just war or that we should make efforts to ensure that the wars we wage are just. I just don’t think the formulation above is problematic.

As I said, “I’m not saying that there’s no such thing as a just war… I’m saying that the formulation of what a just war is may be overly naive and insufficiently realistic.”

I gave some specific criticisms earlier.

Just Peacemaking is not called a theory because those who have been developing the ethic have been basing its norms in a series of practices (10 of them) that work toward preventing and ending particular wars, rather than a series of theoretical ideals as norms. Only a minority of those working on Just Peacemaking are pacifists. Most are firm adherents of JWT–of the strict kind.

I don’t start with a bias against my own nation or people, etc., but with a bias against war. That, as I am trying to explain over on my blog, is part of the strict JWT tradition. I haven’t accused anyone of “bashing”–you are projecting your own issues onto my posts. And if starting critique at home (as Jesus commanded us to get the logs out of our own eyes, first; as the prophets always reserved their harshest denunciations for the people of Israel) is “bias in favor of the enemy” that may be entailed by the command to love enemies. It is not, however, a bias which blinds one to the faults of the enemy–in fact, the very command to love enemies is a strong realism assuming one will HAVE enemies. One is commanded to talk to the enemy, but part of that talk should certainly be blunt speech in airing grievances–but only out of humility that one’s own side is never sinless.

I assumed this conversation was about CHRISTIAN ethics. If we just want to bash terrorists, whether Muslim or other, that’s easy and I see no reason to participate.

In light of that comment and the context of your addressing my comments in particular, I don’t think it’s quite fair for you to write, “I haven’t accused anyone of ‘bashing’–you are projecting your own issues onto my posts.”

I believe it’s quite reasonable to infer from that original comment that you were accusing me of bashing Muslims. If that inference was incorrect, perhaps the problem lies with the man who wrote it rather than the one who read it.

As I understand it, Glenn Stassen developed just peacemaking theory: he did not eschew the word “theory”, and though I apologize for misunderstanding that the theory involves non-violent action but doesn’t require strict pacifism, I still believe the term is more a slogan than a useful description.

I don’t think it’s an entirely honest tactic to deny being biased against your own to offer immediate justification of precisely that bias by appealing to the Old Testament prophets and to Christ. I don’t the appeal is valid: one of the prophets’ chief complaints is that Israel was becoming like its neighbors, which assumes those neighbors were worse; and Christ didn’t command us to believe that we always had logs in our eyes and that our brothers always only had specks, as that assumption would run contrary to the premise of Matthew 18:15-17. Nevertheless, by making that appeal, you defend the idea of a bias against your own.

That’s not merely bias against war; in the cases where, compared to the enemy, your own are defending a just end using just means, your bias empowers the less moral enemy and accomplishes very little for the cause of peace.

And, I don’t think it’s honest at all to suggest that your bias against is equivalent to or necessary for a “humility that one’s own side is never sinless.”

I do not believe the West is sinless, and while I do believe that America is exceptional in leading the way for the cause of freedom, it’s simply not true that the belief in such an exceptionalism entails the belief that, as you put it, “this country is always right.”

(Funny how you’re picky about the word “jihad,” but not “exceptionalism.”)

I believe you are indulging a false dichotomy: a person is either biased against his own, or he thinks that his own is perfect. Since the latter is admittedly arrogant and clearly false, that leaves the former.

There is another option: one can admit all the ways the West has fallen short of its ideals — for America, that includes the treatment of native tribes, slavery and Jim Crow, suffrage issues, and abortion — and still believe, first, that the West ought to be supported in this global conflict; and, second, that because the threat we face is immediate we ought to support the West now despite its continued problems.

There’s a very good reason to support the West despite its failing to meet its ideals. Its ideals of individual freedom are superior to the alternative ideals of a global caliphate under Islam and all the oppression that entails.

Feel free to disagree, but I would ask you not to misrepresent the opposing view as if we sincerely believe this country to be sinless.

One more thing, regarding an earlier comment:

For the sake of this conversation, I have bracketed my pacifist views, and am acting as if JWT were biblically justified. If so, then the conversation about how it is lived out, whether Christians can participate in this current war in Iraq, etc. become the conversation parameters. Terrorism is ruled out. So is torture. The other side’s actions do not justify in our sinking to their level.

I don’t think we have sunk to their level, and I resent the ridiculous implication to the contrary. I will agree that, in war, the enemies’ actions do not justify retaliation in kind. If Dresden was justifiable, it wasn’t simply because of London.

But I do believe that the enemies behavior may change what it means to wage a just war.

For instance, let’s assume that a just war generally entails taking pains not to target civilian populations and churches. I could agree to that, but what do you do when the enemy starts hiding among civilian populations and using churches as weapons depots? Their doing so wouldn’t justify our doing the same, but it may require us target that which we would not normally target. I argue that doing so may still be just, because we didn’t make the enemy hide among civilians and in churches.

In an ideal world, we wouldn’t bomb churches, but we also wouldn’t have to: no one would use them to store munitions. Of course, in an ideal world, there wouldn’t be war in the first place, and my biggest problem with a lot being said by people like Dan and Michael is that it doesn’t ultimately seem to be rooted in the real world where bad men don’t play by the rules and where good men are tainted by hypocrisy and imperfection.

I had forgotten, Bubba, that I used the phrase ‘bash terrorists.” Sorry. You are right to say that I accused you of bashing terrorists or Muslims. I apologize. It does seem to me, however, that you are ONLY interested in hearing criticisms of others, never of your own nation or group. I’m not interested in having that conversation. If I am speaking with Muslims, Iraqis, Al-Qaeda members, etc. (although I cannot imagine the opportunity to speak to the latter–except in circumstances that would be VERY unpleasant!), I will denounce tactics used and remind them that the Qu’ran demands the protection of civilians, etc. Is someone on this list an Osama bin Laden supporter? Or a fan of Iranian president Ahmadinejad (sp?)? If so, this is an appropriate place to air differences.

But as long as this is a conversation between Christians, then speaking of the requirements of JWT (developed by Christians) for US seems best. I can also speak as an American to other Americans (Christian or not), because of our specific commitments to JWT as embedded in both our laws (including the Uniform Code of Military Justice) and international law.

If anything, I am biased in favor of my nation and my faith–I think Americans and Christians should have higher standards. When we lower our standards even a little, I think it our duty to criticize–not to excuse. I think that has always characterized the BEST of the American tradition (to say nothing of the even higher standards for Christians): I come from a long line of military people and myself was a soldier before becoming a conscientious objector. I was so proud that it was a U.S. Army attorney that successfully argued Hamdan v. Rumsfeld before the Supreme Court, despite watching that triumph for human rights and the rule of law partially undone by the Military Commissions Act of 2006.

If the only way we can survive against terrorism is by lowering our standards and abandoning our principles, then do we really deserve to survive as a nation?

This is all I am going to say on the subject. My arguments that Iraq does not meet a strict view of JWT will be posted on my blog today with links back to this discussion. Others can decide if my arguments have any value or to dismiss them as too “biased.”

Bubba said:

I don’t oppose the idea that there is such a thing as a just war or that we should make efforts to ensure that the wars we wage are just. I just don’t think the formulation above is problematic.

Okay. So I repeat my question: If not JWT, then what? What guidelines do you (or any who reject JWT) believe to be acceptable if not JWT guidelines?

As to your concern, Bubba, about Michael and/or my criticism of America to the exclusion of “the terrorists,” I might raise the question: Who did Jesus exclusively reserve his harshest criticisms for?

Caesar? No. He was a threat enough to Rome that they crucified him, but it wasn’t because he spoke out against Rome or Caesar overtly.

The Hated Samaritans? No. Jesus was exceptionally kind to these enemies of the Jews.

Is it not true that Jesus nearly exclusively - if not exclusively - criticized the religious in his own faith tradition? And some of his own disciples, to boot! (”Get behind me, Satan” to beloved Peter…ouch.)

Criticism rightly begins - and ought to be strongest - at home. Why is that? I’d say because it is Christians who stand the greatest chance of influencing other Christians. It is the Muslims who stand the greatest chance of influencing Muslims.

[...] A Just War Case Against the Iraq War, p. 1 No, gentle readers (all 3 of you), I haven’t abandoned my commitment to gospel nonviolence. Not at all. Like John Howard Yoder, I consider interacting with JWT a necessary ecumenical discipline of conversation with fellow Christians. Brent, over at Colossians 3:16, has started a thread on this topic.  I commented on it, but just as I don’t like hugely long comments in my blog posts (sometimes longer than the original post), I try to abide by that on other folks’ blogs. So, I am making the positive case against the Iraq War on JWT grounds here and linking back to the discussion there.  So, for the purposes of this post, I am bracketing all my exegetical and theological objections to Just War Theory as a Christian doctrine. Brent asked for wide-open comment, but respectful, of course. [...]

Thanks for the apology Michael; looking back, I think I should — and I do — apologize for presuming you were making a distinction between political conservatives and liberals.

I apparently failed, but I did try to convey the fact that I have no problem with the criticism of the United States and the West at large. I listed some of our worst failings — the treatment of native tribes, slavery and Jim Crow, suffrage issues, and abortion — and I now want to make absolutely clear that these were not excusable.

On the subject of war, I personally do not consider the destruction of Atlanta, Dresden, or Hiroshima to be seriously unjust tactics, but I’m fine with people who disagree while agreeing that our broader involvement in the Civil War and World War II were in fact just. I’m not wholly happy with our current foreign policy, though my criticisms come from the hawkish side things, and I can appreciate other criticisms that presume that the threat we face is serious enough to warrant war.

However:

That you would hypothetically try to persuade a member of al Queda that his tactics are wrong doesn’t lessen the negative consequences of what most Western pacifists are doing now: they’re weaking the will of the side whose ends and means are more just, and are therefore predictably (if not deliberately) enabling the side whose ends and means are more accurately described as evil.

If anything, I am biased in favor of my nation and my faith–I think Americans and Christians should have higher standards. When we lower our standards even a little, I think it our duty to criticize–not to excuse.

It is not our duty to criticize to the degree that it puts our American, Christian society at severe risk. If that society is overrun by an external — and objectively less moral — threat because its capacity and willingness to defend itself has been severely undercut, it seems to me that the criticism has accomplished nothing but enabling that which is evil.

If the only way we can survive against terrorism is by lowering our standards and abandoning our principles, then do we really deserve to survive as a nation?

I don’t know if we would deserve it, but I would hope that would survive nevertheless: better to be a living nation that has compromised some of its noble principles to survive, than a dead nation that’s been overrun by an enemy that is unblemished in upholding its evil principles.

You seem to imply that utter destruction at the hands of a tyrannical enemy is a proper price to pay for regrettable but necessary hypocrisy: better for countless generations to live under the iron law of sharia than for them to enjoy individual liberty because we dared to compromise our principles.

God help us if this is bias in our favor, and I hope you can understand how some people would interpret as anti-American the assertion that one loves this country so much that he would rather see it destroyed than anything less than morally perfect.

Actually, I deny the category of “regrettable, but necessary hypocrisy.” No, I don’t think our nation must be perfect. In fact, I think we would be better off if we stopped pretending we were. Then we could improve.

But, unlike most nation states (modern France is an exception, and Canada), formed out of historic gatherings of ethnic-linguistic groups, the U.S.A. is a nation formed by a set of ideas: principles. If we abandon them, we may survive physically, but we will cease in any important way to be the United States of America. Now, we have never embodied those principles perfectly: slavery, etc., as you point out. But that’s when we have always had movements of internal criticism and reform. They have seldom been popular.
I am a social critic. That’s the only kind of patriotism I can have.
I am also a critic of the Church–that’s the only way I know how to be faithful as a disciple of Jesus.
No, I don’t think the alternatives are either perfection or annihilation. However, I think those who are persuaded of this clash of civilizations/war on terror, etc. are FAR too willing to give up our principles out of fear. I’m not.

Dan, I’m not sure I have an answer to your question, though I don’t think it’s necessary to be able to say that X is right in order to argue persuasively that Y or Z cannot be right.

I’m skeptical about the possibility of clear and succinct guidelines for just war, particularly guidelines that are unchanging. If Rome can suggest that wars can no longer be just because of WMD’s, then there’s a clear admission that technology changes the equation. The spectre of the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in a highly interconnected world drastically changes the calculation, such that what might have been unjust in 1820 might be morally necessary in 2005.

(I believe that, about 1,000 years ago, Pope Urban II and Conrad III of the Holy Roman Empire both outlawed the use of the crossbow. Technology matters.)

Beyond our technology, enemies tend to adapt to take advantage of what we have forbidden. For instance, if one nation treats churches with respect, their enemy will use churches as munitions depots and headquarters. By forbidding X explicitly, we make it more likely that our enemies will force us to choose between X and defeat — and will do so precisely because we’ve made clear that X is forbidden. Our most vicious (and therefore often our most dangerous) enemies will use any explicit principles against us. It’s not as if we can craft a just war theory and our enemies never catch wind of it.

Beyond that, most evaluations of what is just in general involve incomplete information: both information we could not have known at the time and information we cannot ever know, such as (in war) what would have happened if we chose a different tactic or chose not to fight at all. A just war theory ought to be able to show that these wars were just and those wars were not, but I don’t see how those conclusions would be reliable about past wars or (more importantly) how they would justify applying the theory to a current war.

Finally, I believe the Bible distinguishes between moral actions for the individual and moral actions for the state, but it’s still useful to make a comparison: one probably could make a “just living theory” for an individual based on the teachings of the Bible, a theory that would cover the vast majority of most people’s choices. But though I believe the Bible’s principles are inerrant, a merely human synthesis of those principles into a theory of ethics is not, and it’s likely that any such theory would be increasingly unreliable in rare, extreme cases. Consider Oskar Schindler: it would be very difficult to construct a heuristic that both guides normal rules for living and explains why Schindler’s deception was not only permissible but also morally required — and does the same for all rare and extreme cases in the future.

The saying is, hard cases make bad law, and war itself is a hard case. This is, I might add, especially true for a classically liberal society: a classically liberal society permits/promotes individualism and free expression, but if its military is to be successful, it must suppress those things in its troops to promote group cohesion and cooperation. Likewise, that society encourages transparency in its government, but deception and the element of surprise are necessary weapons in the arsenal of war, so its plans (and methods of espionage) must remain a secret. The totalitarian regime has no hang-ups about free expression or transparency in government, so there’s no tension between its principles and what it must do to wage war.

The way Michael sounds, he acts as if such a regime is more deserving of survival, but the point is, the ends and means of warfare for a free society is always going to be one of those extreme situations where I doubt a search for a formulation for what’s just will be satisfied.

Dan, to respond briefly to this assertion:

Criticism rightly begins - and ought to be strongest - at home.

You assert that Christ most harshly criticized those closest to Him. I will note that He criticized them only when they deserved criticism: the Pharisees weren’t merely “the religious in his own faith tradition,” but were the superficially religious. Furthermore, Christ blessed those closest to Him, such as when Peter correctly acknowledged that He is the Christ.

A person whose criticism of his own family verges on nagging, and whose criticism prevents him from defending his family from genuine dangers, can hardly be said to love his family, and it is a shoddy thing (in my opinion) for that person to justify that nagging by pointing to Christ.

Acknowledging that (ceteris paribus) Muslims probably do stand a better chance at influencing other Muslims, I still wonder if it’s true that all things are equal. If not, if your chances at persuasion are greater than your hypothetical (and perhaps to some degree mythical) Islamic counterpart, then it’s still the case that the efforts of your pacifism and his will make the West’s efforts relatively more difficult and the jihadist’s less difficult.

And I believe that, for Islam, it’s quite possible that a literal war against unbelievers — to use a phrase in software development — is not a bug: it’s a feature. The Inquisition occurred despite the Bible, it’s possible that the same does not hold for literal jihad and the Koran.

If that’s the case, then hoping for Islam to reform itself is dangerous.

Again, Michael, I believe you misrepresent your opponents when you suggest that we believe that America is perfect and sinless. I wish your portrayal of our beliefs would more closely match reality.

I’m not suggesting America abandons its principles altogether, but some compromise may be unavoidable while man is free to sin.

However, I think those who are persuaded of this clash of civilizations/war on terror, etc. are FAR too willing to give up our principles out of fear. I’m not.

It sounds like, you’re not because you deny the threat altogether: there are “those who are persuaded” of the existence of this conflict, and you don’t number yourself among us. If you’re wrong that we do not face a serious threat, what use is your criticism?

I am a social critic. That’s the only kind of patriotism I can have.

I am also a critic of the Church–that’s the only way I know how to be faithful as a disciple of Jesus.

Patriotism requires more than criticism of one’s country, because of there are plenty of our enemies who criticize us. Discipleship requires more than criticism of Christ’s chruch, because their are plenty of His enemies who criticize us. Surely you agree with that even if you don’t say that outright.

But more is needed: a willingness to criticize even when your nation or church needs to be defended is truly less than useless.

But perhaps our differences lie in our perception of the threat that we face. It seems you don’t think it’s a big deal, and I most certainly do. That difference informs the different lines we draw between criticism that is necessary and criticism that is dangerous. Perhaps we should agree to disagree starting with this fundamental difference of perception (or focus on that difference).

Actually, Bubba, you have hit on something that is key. Perception of the threat (I see more than one, but I rank them differently than you) is a key variable in ethical decision-making. The first question is not “What must I do?” but “What is going on?”

I do not deny that al-Qaeda, and, perhaps some other groups, do want to use terrorist tactics to drive the U.S. from Islamic-majority lands. They have stated these goals openly. I strongly affirm that terrorism must be fought, but I differ on how that should be done–both on moral and pragmatic grounds.

I do deny that there is anything like a “War on Terror” except as a metaphor. One cannot wage war on a method, terrorism, nor on an emotion, terror. I deny that the U.S. is involved in any generation-spanning war against a network of groups unified by something characterized as “Islamist jihadist ideology.” I believe this to be a distortion of the real terrorist threat–and I believe the distortion to be deliberate in order to replace U.S. democracy from within with a de facto fascist and imperialist government. I believe this internal threat is much larger than the threat from terrorist groups and that the so-called “war on terror,” especially the invasion and occupation of Iraq, both increases the real threat of terrorism (by creating terrorists faster than they can be killed or captured) and both hides and “justifies” the internal threat to our democracy.

I also believe the U.S. churches are threatened by a nationalist, hyper-patriotic ideology (in contradiction to the universality of the gospel which places the Rule of God above any loyalty to any nation-state) that supports the “war on terror.”

After 30 comments in this thread, it’s finally time for me to weigh in…

Bubba for President in 2008.

My biggest objection to Just War philosophy is this: It is built mostly upon pragmatism (what works) and not biblical interpretation (what God says). And, worse perhaps, it doesn’t in fact, “work.”

deVictoria, for example, realized that two sides of a conflict could both be judged just and therefore be “right” killing one another. In his day the two right sides were the Spanish explorers and the natives they encountered in the new world. Both sides could argue, if they chose, using Just War criterion, that they were justified in warring against the enemy.

The same can be said of The U.S. government and Osama. His letter in November, following 9/11 laid out a case against the U.S. that “Hitlerized” our nation’s actions. He rightly stated that we as a people had set up governments that currently oppress Muslims. This was ONE of his accusations against us and it is accurate. He also stated that we are the leading producers, exporters and consumers of filth that objectifies and victimizes the young and the female. Again, he is right. He makes a case for these actions being attacks on his way of life, his people, and his god. There’s more, but suffice it to say, he makes a solid argument for his people being victims to decades of U.S. aggression, policy and general spreaders of moral degradation.

We can make a case as well that we are just in warring with him after his attack on our nation on 9/11.

Stalemate.

Just War was hatched because we needed the world to make sense, to live our faith without personal sacrifice pacifism would require, and we needed something that “worked” for us instead. As a result we have a philosophy constantly updated in support of Caesar’s latest crusade, and a system for divining right from wrong that doesn’t, in the end, do that all that well.

It’s broken and not congruent with the early Church’s understanding of Jesus’ values (non-violence, for one). It’s mostly pragmatism - something early Christians (before Constantine’s rule) saw as coming after faithfulness.

bubba said:

I’m not sure I have an answer to your question, though I don’t think it’s necessary to be able to say that X is right in order to argue persuasively that Y or Z cannot be right.

This is, of course, true. On the other hand, the criticism lobbed at peacemakers all the time that “Why are you complaining about this war? You’re not making any other suggestions!”

We, too, can certainly make the claim that “I may not have the answer, but still what you’re suggesting is wrong.”

But we do so at the risk of being taken less seriously. As is the case with your doing so.

The risk is that you will appear to not have any good solutions so you’re willing to accept whatever it is our country does in wartime - might makes right, ends justify the means, etc.

I’m sure you recognize there is a huge tendency for any people to justify their own actions in ways that they would howl in outrage if someone else did it.

For instance, if Japan had nukes in WWII and bombed two of our cities (”after all, it would end the war early and SAVE millions of lives! It must be just!”), I’m certain we would not be inclined to think kindly on such action.

A test might be: Can you name even one military action our nation has done that you consider wrong? Or, is it that you think every one of our wars was justified?

If your nation is always right in wartime, you MIGHT be a nationalist…

Dan, I mitigate the possibility of appearing to be a knee-jerk nationalist by explaining precisely why I doubt we could find a final and trustworthy formulation of just war. I did so in detail, so I would appreciate a detailed rebuttal of why you think I’m wrong. (If my argument’s solid, just what is your complaint?)

More to the point, I’m skeptical about a reliable just-war formulation being applied to any nation. I suspect that Japan’s attack of Pearl Harbor and our bombing of Hiroshima are closer to the line between just and unjust tactics than, say, our both being engaged in battle at Midway, but I’m not sure we could devise any reliable determination where we could say with confidence whether either decision lies on one side or the other. If I had seen fuzzy lines for us but bright lines for our enemies, then perhaps you’d have a point. And had the Japanese used nuclear weapons on our cities, yes, “we would not be inclined to think kindly on such action,” but I’m not sure that proves what you’re trying to prove, and that it proves anything at all.

To answer your question, I do think we’ve made mistakes. Many of criticisms are hawkish: we shouldn’t have withdrawn from Vietnam, to say nothing of defunding our allies there. But some are not: the harsh treatment of the former Confederacy after the Civil War and of Germany after World War I were unnecessary and — worse — counter-productive. I think the former encouraged the Klan and Jim Crow, and the latter encouraged the rise of Naziism.

So let’s see: I’ve noted my criticism of America’s treatment of native tribes, slavery and Jim Crow, suffrage issues, and abortion. (I did so twice, because Michael apparently missed it the first time to imply that I’m not apt to criticize my own country.) I’ve now noted a major misstep in three of our major wars, in the Civil War, World War I, and Vietnam.

I’m sure that’s not enough: I’m sure you’ll want my opinion on Dresden, but I’m getting damn tired of prostrating myself and enumerating my criticisms of my country in order to prove to the both of you that I’m not some knee-jerk nationalist thug.

It makes me wonder if you share Michael’s concerns — that the threat of jihad has been deliberately distorted “in order to replace U.S. democracy from within with a de facto fascist and imperialist government,” and that our churches “are threatened by a nationalist, hyper-patriotic ideology.” If you do, it would explain why you both apparently consider criticism that is less stringent than yours to be worthless, why you conflate the comparatively mild criticism I have with no criticism whatsoever. I don’t think that Bush is trying to transform us into a fascist state, and I do think that the jihadists pose a serious (if not yet existential) threat, so I will never join the deranged opposition to the war against jihad: I’m either a willing dupe of the “real” enemy or part of that enemy itself, so I must be villified and my positions demagogued.

Make no mistake, Michael’s opposition is deranged. And if you agree with him, I couldn’t care less what you think of me, as your perspective on things is too skewed to be meaningful.

But if you do disagree… well, I note in passing that I suggested that a fully reliable just-war formulation might not be possible, that Michael implied that Bush is a greater threat than bin Ladin, and that you took the time to criticize only one of us.

Shaun:

Just War was hatched because we needed the world to make sense, to live our faith without personal sacrifice pacifism would require, and we needed something that “worked” for us instead.

You should consider the possibility that those who believe in just wars — and I do, despite my skepticism of a perfectly reliable just-war formulation — do so, not because we believe the sacrifice that would be required by pacifism is not required by Christianity.

Consider the possibility that we’re acting in good faith.

After all, most of us do not deny that the Sermon on the Mount teaches personal non-retaliation; we just do not believe that particular teaching extends to what the government does.

(There are those who believe the Christian commands to turn the other cheek and to feed the poor entail and require a foreign policy of pacifism and a domestic policy of government-funded welfare. But some of these very same people believe that even allowing prayer in a public school puts us on the dangerous path to a theocracy. Funny, that.)

And as I pointed out earlier (#6), if Christianity requires the government to abstain from the use of military force, I believe the logical and inevitable conclusion is that Christianity also requires the government not to execute murderers or even imprison murderers or even fine or criticize murderers, because to do so would be to reject turning the other cheek.

If “turn the other cheek” applies to the government, the result isn’t mere pacifism. It’s a practical anarchism where the government cannot effectively enforce its own laws.

May I suppose that you reject this de facto anarchism because you’re unwilling to make the required sacrifice to live out your faith?

Misplaced “not”. The paragraph above should read:

You should consider the possibility that those who believe in just wars — and I do, despite my skepticism of a perfectly reliable just-war formulation — do so, because we believe the sacrifice that would be required by pacifism is not required by Christianity.

Bubba, you’re witnessing classic projectionism. Michael is a fanatic himself and so projects that onto others. In the fanatic’s world, people like you and I do not exist, we’re just as fanatical as they are (on the opposite side), only we’re dishonest about it. We’re hiding our true agenda, wink wink.

For example. The fanatics on his side believe that Bush is evil, in fact, there is none greater. Therefore, if you’re not on Michael’s side, it follows that you believe Bush is the essence of good, a virtual Christ in the White House. To the fanatic life is very simple, you’re either for them or against them. There’s nothing in between except ignorant sheep.

That’s why you’re criticisms are never critical enough; you don’t really believe them.

[...] For these reasons, I believe that the invasion and occupation of Iraq clearly violated the standards of Just War Theory–not to mention the higher demands of gospel nonviolence.  There is a correlary to JWT:  selective conscientious objection. It is the moral duty to refuse to serve in an unjust war (even at risk of prison or death) and, in a war fought for just reasons, to refuse any order that would violate ius in bello rules of war (even at the risk of a field court martial and imprisonment or execution).  But few churches which endorse JWT prepare their members for such possibilities. People who follow their consciences in this regard (e.g., Lt. Watada in the current conflict) are vilified rather than honored.  This undermines the ability of JWT to actually function as a curb on the conduct of wars.  I hope this exposition helps Brent of Colossians 3:16 and others. [...]

Michael’s second post at his own blog is interesting.

He argues that Iraq doesn’t simply qualify as a just war because it violates some of the requirements of JWT, he argues that it violates all of them. This sort of overkill ironically betrays the same sort of attitude critics attribute to the Bush Administration, a desire to game the system in order to create an argument for one’s position that is significantly stronger than the facts allow.

He doesn’t tackle the question of whether a United Nations that does not enforce its own resolutions — and I believe has authorized force only once, during the Korean Conflict — still retains its legitimacy in requiring member states not to act even though it will not authorize such action. And though he later considers the accusation of this being a war for oil, he doesn’t tackle the question of whether the involvement of France and Russia in the Oil-for-Food scandal doesn’t undermine the legitimacy of the veto power they weilded.

He writes, “It was clear even in 2002 that the probability of success was low,” when that simply is not true. There was no consensus on that point, and he appears to want to dismiss dissenting voices to create an illusion of consensus.

He writes:

Although not everything can be predicted beforehand, it is clear that the Bush administration did not calculate proportionality very well. It ignored repeated warnings about the likelihood of negative consequences. Instead, it projected a Neo-Con pipedream of a brief, almost harmless, war which would quickly result in a democratic Iraq leading the way in spreading democracy throughout the Middle East.

But this is what Bush said in February 26, 2003:

“Rebuilding Iraq will require a sustained commitment from many nations, including our own: we will remain in Iraq as long as necessary, and not a day more.”

And on March 19, 2003:

“I want Americans and all the world to know that coalition forces will make every effort to spare innocent civilians from harm. A campaign on the harsh terrain of a nation as large as California could be longer and more difficult than some predict. And helping Iraqis achieve a united, stable and free country will require our sustained commitment.”

The latter was in no small speech, either. It was in a prime-time address to the nation. A person could persuasively argue that the road was more difficult than the administration anticipated, and our tactics less effective. And one could argue that the administration did a poor job responding to their opponents’ attempt to downplay these sober warnings, but this stuff about their saying the war would be brief and almost costless is quite inaccurate.

In invoking Abu Ghraib, he ignores that the soldiers responsible were being prosecuted even before the scandal made news. And in invoking the Geneva Conventions, he fails to acknowledge that many of the combatants we have fought do not qualify for its protections and that it would be dangerous to extend the legal protections of that convention to combatants who refuse to sign the convention and in fact disregard its standards with impunity. He even writes that combatants “must not be tortured or treated in any way inhumanely, whatever they have done, notwithstanding,” but he ignores what they might know.

Let me say that I believe some of his arguments have much more merit than others. I don’t agree with Eben that Iraq was clearly an unjust war, but I think reasonable people can disagree.

But Michael’s exposition is helpful, less in proving his case and more in demonstrating the lengths he’ll go to villify an administration he thinks is guilty of fascist intentions.

To add a quick note about the issue of torture, I certainly think lawful combatants ought to be treated humanely. If the POW’s army didn’t sign the Geneva Conventions, it would be foolish for the capturing government to acquiesce to the idea that the POW is covered by the convention. But, the capturing government should extend humane treatment to that POW because it’s the moral thing to do — even if they should prudently assert that the humane treatment is because of their graciousness, not the Geneva Convention.

Spies are a whole ‘nother matter, first because they’re not uniformed soldiers. No one should be tortured for the sake of sadism, but the crucial task of finding out what a spy knows (and what he communicated to the enemy) may justify harsh techniques of interrogation.

Leaders of al Queda aren’t lawful combatants under the Geneva Convention, and they’re much closer to being comparable to spies than they are to uniformed soldiers. They may be worse than spies.

No matter what, we as a civilized society should not torture captured AQ leaders for the sake of torture: for sadism or vengeance. But because they may have crucial information that may save innocent lives, the idea that there are “no exceptions” for “degrading treatment” (to say nothing of anything with more teeth than that) strikes me as absurd.

Those who disagree could at least show our position the courtesy of accurately representing it by acknowledging the “who” and the “why” of the harsh interrogation techniques we defend.

I do not think that it matters who and why. Inhumane treatment is wrong, no matter to whom it is done and no matter how they would treat you in return. Anyone who advocates torture or any inhumane treatment deserves prison.

Also, I do not argue that this war violates every one of the JWT criteria. It MAY. It is difficult to tell with right intention or with just cause because the reasons given kept changing. I do argue that it violates most of them and is clearly an illegal and immoral war.

Again, Michael, you’re misrepresenting my position. The “why” isn’t “how they would treat you in return,” but to obtain information that could save innocent lives. You’re making me think the misrepresentation is deliberate.

Depending on what you mean by “inhumane,” I reject the idea that inhumane treatment is always wrong. I would think it’s obvious that being shot is much more inhumane than being waterboarded, but if shooting Charles Whitman keeps him from killing more innocent civilians, I say, open fire.

I apologize for misunderstanding your argument, but misrepresenting the facts to prove that the Iraq war “may” violate every single condition of JWT is hardly more commendable than doing so to prove that it does violate every condition.

Speaking of misrepresenting the facts, you reiterate a point I overlooked when you write, “It is difficult to tell with right intention or with just cause because the reasons given kept changing.”

They have not. The ultimately ill-advised emphasis on WMD’s does not mean that the WMD’s were the only reason given for war at the time. There were quite a few reasons given in Congress’ authorization and in Bush’s speeches leading up to the war , to say nothing of the name, “Operation Iraqi Freedom.” That the presence of WMD’s has not been confirmed does not invalidate these other reasons (including the evidence of WMD programs), and I believe all the reasons that are currently emphasized can be traced back to those original documents and speeches.

You obviously disagree; perhaps you can point to a recent justification for Iraq that cannot in any way be traced to these original causes?

Torturing to obtain information to save lives is still torture. It is also ineffective–someone tortured will say anything to make the pain stop.

Regime change is implied in the name “Operation Iraqi Freedom,” but regime change is not just cause for war unless one is trying to stop imminent or ongoing genocidal actions. Also, “Operation Iraqi Freedom” was simply a name change because Arabs objected to the name “Operation Infinite Justice!”
There was no just cause for the war. Further, providing that the authorization was constitutional (which I doubt–I think the Constitution demands a formal declaration of war), although it gave many reasons (most of which were just variations on the WMDs and immanent threat ideas), it only authorized such military force as was “necessary to disarm Saddam Hussein.” Since the weapon inspections were working, the actual invasion still violated the terms of “authorization.”

It has been shown, REPEATEDLY, that there were those in the Bush admin., related to the Neo-Con organization known as the Campaign for a New American Century, who were intent on war with Iraq even before the election of 2000. EVERYTHING said to justify the war were manufactured reasons to shield the real reasons for the war. Even as the buildings were still falling, Cheney and Rumsfeld were demanding that Saddam be connected–even while the NSA and CIA were saying, rightly, that this was Osama bin Laden. This administration took Afghanistan as a necessary detour on the way toward Iraq.
Repeated books by former Bush admin. workers have shown this, including those who showed Condi Rice trying to find alternatives to war only to hear Bush say, “F—, Saddam! We’re taking him out!” (Behind closed doors, this SOO Christian president is known to be extremely profane.) The Downing Street minutes have shown that the “intelligence was fixed around the policy.”
The amazing thing, Bubba, is that so many people like you still buy this propaganda.

I think there’s an argument to be made about the efficacy of harsh interrogation techniques, but isn’t that argument a distraction if it’s always immoral

I notice you didn’t clarify what you mean by inhumane treatment, and didn’t explain whether shooting Charles Whitman qualifies as such. I also notice you haven’t defended the charge that the reasons kept changing and are now arguing that all the reasons were unjust.

In asserting that the weapons inspections were working you could, at the very least, acknowledge that the administration disagrees with your assessment; that the list of weapons did not account for weapons that the inspectors knew Iraq had when they were last kicked out; that the reason inspections were working to any degree was the credible threat of the immediate use of force, a threat that would diminish over time; and that those who were insisting that the inspections were working (i.e., the French) probably didn’t have the right intentions in arguing that they were working: or does speculation about Bush’s interest in oil count, but not the reality of the Oil-for-Food scandal?

This?

EVERYTHING said to justify the war were manufactured reasons to shield the real reasons for the war.

Unprovable speculation that verges on conspiracy mongering. The Downing Street memo isn’t anywhere near as damning as you think it is, and I’ll reiterate that you seem to be doing exactly what you think Bush is guilty of: you’re grasping at anything and everything and manipulating the facts in order to make your case against the Bush Administration as strong as possible.

And, for what it’s worth, the F-bomb is an obscenity, not a profanity, and I hope that you don’t really think your case against Bush (which entails your being a calm, rational observer) is really helped by railing against his cussin’.

Let me correct myself. This statement…

EVERYTHING said to justify the war were manufactured reasons to shield the real reasons for the war.

…doesn’t verge on conspiracy mongering. It is conspiracy mongering. Combined with the claim that the Bush Administration is deliberately distorting the threat we face “in order to replace U.S. democracy from within with a de facto fascist and imperialist government,” you’re asserting extremely serious stuff, but no one from your position has been able to generate the massive amount of evidence that would be necessary to make these assertions credible.

The Downing Street minutes have shown that the “intelligence was fixed around the policy.”

They do no such thing: as Robbins put it, “the memo simply contains the impressions of an aide of the impressions of British-cabinet officials of the impressions of unnamed people they spoke to in the United States about what they thought the president was thinking.”

That this is the key document in the conspiracy theorists’ case against Bush demonstrates the weakness of the evidence. That they cling to that evidence so fervently demonstrates their lunacy.

Perhaps the Iraq war can be judged, as just or not, from the present moment, rather than as an exercise in hindsight. A possible consequence of a defeat, in the words, uttered in the near present, of the Australian Prime Minister John Howard, “will be an enormous victory for terrorism”. (Breitbart.com, posted April 26)
The Australian Prime Minister stated that the U.S. Congress push for a withdrawel time table (which I know to be a bad idea, for certain, in boxing, fencing, and also probably in international conflict),is wrong and will bring comfort to the worst terrorists.
As individual Christians our formost obedience should always be to the Great Commission (Mathew 28:19,20), far above politics, policy, and patriotic passion. I have no doubt whatsoever, however, that the terrorist enemy are wantonly and purely evil in every respect; and should be opposed with the gospel first, then with good deeds, and with “brother’s keeper” actions in defense of others against this foe, with the attempt to ever always be salt and light (Mathew 5:13-16).

I am not good at predicting the future (thank God), but I think it pretty clear that when the U.S. leaves Iraq–now or 10 years from now–chaos will follow, at least for a short term. A timetable may be a bad idea, but this admin. seems never to want to leave. Why else build permanent military bases? This war is already a victory for terrorism and the sooner we leave, the sooner we can do damage control.

Part of the Great Commission, Brent, is the command to teach Christians to do “everything I have commanded you” which certainly includes the Sermon on the Mount. But that gets beyond discussion of JWT to the Christian call, instead, to gospel nonviolence.

Terrorists are evil, but Christian orthodoxy insists that no human being is perely evil in every respect. None are beyond the redemptive power of the cross.

Michael, not a prediction, but I can state that it is highly probable that a withdrawel based on fear or ennui will hand terrorists a victory. In sports like boxing and fencing this is called “telegraphing your next move”. Common Sense.
Michael, Christian Orthodoxy includes the idea that there are those who will not be redeemed: reprobate people. Yes, Jesus is our redeemer. “For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost.” (Luke 19:10). But the Bible also has verses which discuss the wicked, the reprobate. Jeremiah 6:30, Second Timothy 3:8, Titus 1:16, and more. Titus 1:16 states: “They claim to know God, but by their actions they deny him. They are detestable, disobedient and unfit for doing anything good.”

I agree with Michael that no living human is utterly beyond the reach of Christ’s redemptive power.

That’s about all I agree with him on, at least concerning his latest comment.

He’s already asserted, “It was clear even in 2002 that the probability of success [in Iraq] was low,” but since there was no such consensus the assertion is false. I appreciate his humble admission that he can’t predict the future, but he goes ahead and does so anyway, using the same adjective “clear” to describe the inevitability of chaos following our eventually leaving Iraq.

What makes this prediction trustworthy? Suppose that we limit the Iraqi terrorists’ effectiveness to some upper bound by securing Iraq from external interference; that we make clear through our actions that the terrorists cannot drive us away; and that the Iraqi government and its emerging military and police forces prove themselves to be capable of surviving that level of terrorism. None of this will have any effect on Iraq’s government’s being able to survive without our large-scale involvement? I don’t think so.

It’s not that Bush never wants to leave Iraq.

(Does Michael care to speculate more about his sinister, fascist imperialism? Speculation with the thinnest of evidence is all I’ve seen so far.)

It’s not that he wants never to leave, it’s that he wants not to lose, which I believe is an admirable goal for any classically liberal world power that wishes to keep intact its reputation, in an arena where we have enemies and where those enemies respect little other than strength.

I don’t see the problem with a permanent base or two in Iraq, since we still have permanent bases in Germany and Okinawa, and since it makes sense to have a continued presence in such a vital and volatile region. I for one don’t want Iran developing nuclear weapons or otherwise causing mischief, and our having a base in Iraq would make credible the threat of a quick military response to any Iranian provocations. Further, military bases in a relatively democratic and secular Iraq would make it easier for us to push for reform in Saudia Arabia by making clear that we don’t need to have a base within their borders.

And because we still have an opportunity to show our resolve, that our leaving Vietnam and Somalia were exceptions and not the rule, I don’t believe that Iraq is yet a victory for our enemies. It is only if we leave prematurely that Iraq will become a country ripe either for another Taliban or for Iran’s direct influence, and it is only if we leave prematurely that our reputation as a strong world power will be incalcuably damaged.

(The administration “seems” never to want to leave? Some I’ve encountered seem to want to declare defeat as soon as possible.)

And beyond all the specific speculation about Iraq, there’s an insinuation that the Sermon on the Mount entails pacifism.

I will again assert that, if “turn the other cheek” requires a government to refrain from the use of military force, it logically and necessarily requires other prohibitions: war would be forbidden, but so too would a naval blockade, economic sanctions, verbal condemnation, and even diplomacy from any position other than appeasement and prostration. The government would not only be prohibited from executing any prisoners (including the most heinous murderers), it also could not impose a life sentence or any sentence, or impose a fine, or even rebuke a criminal in public.

Apply “turn the other cheek” to the government, and you don’t get mere pacifism. You get a practical anarchism where the government can do nothing to enforce its own laws. Because such anarchism runs utterly counter to Romans 13:4, I reject the idea that “turn the other cheek” should be applied to the government: it’s a command for individual followers of Christ, not the state.

What I continue to wonder is why, for those who seem to presume that “turn the other cheek” applies to the government, the conclusion is merely pacifism and not de facto anarchism. Is it that the conclusion I’m drawing is illogical, or is it simply inconvenient?

I agree with Michael that no living human is utterly beyond the reach of Christ’s redemptive power.

Let me clarify: I believe that Christ’s redemptive power does not compel the impenitent. Assuming the desire to repent and be saved, Christ can save you no matter what you’ve done, but not everyone has that desire. God is all-powerful, and Christ’s grace is sufficient for the redemption of all of us if we just accept the gift of that grace, but God chooses not to exercise His power to redeem against the will of those who choose not to be redeemed.

Amen, Bubba. No living being is utterly beyond the reach of Christ’s redemptive power. The Apostle Paul, when he was persecuting Christians, as Saul, is an example of one who committed horrers for “religious purposes”, but was later confronted and redeemed by Jesus.
God is loving, and God is holy, and thus the Bible also speaks clearly of those who will not be redeemed (Jesus speaks of Judas, for instance, in John 17:12).

[...] “Handing the Terrorists a Victory” Recognize the phrase? It is a stock phrase used by the Bush admin. whenever they want to explain why we cannot end the occupation of Iraq.  It has captured the minds of many ordinary citizens because, of course, no one wants to “hand the terrorists a victory.”  But I am not impressed with the phrase as meaning anything other than an emotional propaganda tool to keep support for a the biggest foreign policy disaster in this country since we took over the Vietnam war from the French! [...]

Brent, I understand your desire to focus mainly on “what do we do now,” rather than focus strictly on how we got into this war. That fits American pragmatism–and I do not say that disparagingly. Pragmatism has its limits as a philosophy, but it has many strengths and I am glad that it is part of our “national character” if we have one.

However, if it was unjust to start this war, as I argue, then the only thing just to do is to end it. I think the best way would be to replace our troops (who are an incentive to the insurgents by their very presence as occupiers) with an international peacekeeping force while we, under the “you break it, you fix it” rule (ius post bellum), take on the lion’s share of funding reconstruction. There is no military solution at this point–and by ignoring the recommendations of the bi-partisan Iraq Study Group I think Bush has ensured that when we leave the transition will be abrupt. NONE of the candidates for president wants to inherit this war, including McCain. If we are still in Iraq by January of ‘08, that will be THE issue of the ‘08 elections, and if we are still there by January of ‘09, we won’t be by February of ‘09.
So, trying for a