Just and Unjust Wars: A Moral Argument With Historical Illustrations

Walzer explains the ways that ordinary people argue about the morality of war and elaborates on the terms used in such arguments. He is not focused on positive laws or those constructed by lawyers. He attempts to “recapture the just war for political and moral theory” (xxvi). Someone can be labeled a criminal on moral principle even if that person could not be indicted by a legal tribunal. Walzer assumes that human beings share a common sense of morality grounded in a doctrine of human rights. Recognizing that he is engaged in practical morality, Walzer warns that there will be tensions within the theory of just war. Most importantly, there is an inherent tension in the dilemma of winning the war and fighting well. Yet “if comprehensive and consistent moral judgments are possible” (xxix) in war, they are possible in all other realms.

Walzer must challenge the realist paradigm to argue that moral decision-making applies to conduct during wars. He cites the ancient historian Thucydides and 17th-century British political theorist Thomas Hobbes as defenders of realism. Realists deny any moral code during wartime; actors simply defend interests, not values. For example, Thucydides evaded the moral question about the need to preserve the Athenian empire and exaggerated the foresight of Athenian generals in his account of Melos. The people of Melos wanted freedom, while the Athenian generals required them to yield or be destroyed. When the people of Melos did not yield, the Athenians killed the men and enslaved those who remained. Walzer argues that this decision is subject to moral debate. In the case of Mytilene, Athenian citizens debated a decree that would have punished not just those fomenting rebellion but all citizens. Walzer maintains that moral anxiety, not simply interests, led Athenians to worry about the decree to kill the men and enslave the women and children.

There is disagreement about the application of justice to cases in wartime. However, there is an agreed-upon language. Over time, arguments and judgments have created a moral reality of war: Walzer observes that “notions about right conduct are remarkably consistent” (16). Strategies are defended in a language of justification. Walzer highlights the similar lies told by statesmen and soldiers to justify war and wartime strategies. The very consistency of those lies speaks to a stability of moral values even in wartime and reveals the need for a code that explicitly addresses the rules for wartime actions.

War is morally evaluated in two ways: the reasons for fighting and the means adopted to do so. Walzer calls the former jus ad bellum, or justice of war, and the latter jus in bello, or justice in war (21). It is criminal to begin a war, and the targets of such aggression have a right to resist. Yet even if fighting for a just cause, soldiers can commit crimes if their means of resistance are unjust. Walzer argues with Clausewitz, who sees war as limitless once initiated. Invoking the example of General Sherman who infamously destroyed lives and property in his march to the sea during the American Civil War, Walzer maintains that it is possible to condemn criminal acts on both sides during a war: All cannot be blamed on those who began the war.

War is a social creation with institutions, conventions, and practices that modify it (24). When soldiers voluntarily engage in battle, it is not hell as long as they can “break off fighting without dire consequences” (26). If mercenaries “choose” war because they are desperately poor, that is not voluntary. Most often, war is tyrannical for the people forced to fight, even in a society with political self-determination. While the distinction between combatants and noncombatants is important in just war theory, Walzer notes that most soldiers would be noncombatants if they could.

Soldiers must be held to certain standards. They are not responsible for the war itself, but for the conduct of the war. Walzer cites General Rommel, who fought for Nazi Germany, as someone who fought a bad war well. There are two sets of prohibitions for soldiers, namely when and how they can kill and whom they can kill (41). The former set of rules is subject to change over time given innovations and customs. The latter set of rules, however, is more persistent and connected to notions of right and wrong, with some people, such as children, deemed off-limits.

There is a war convention, consisting of “articulated norms, customs, professional codes, legal precepts, religious and philosophical principles, and reciprocal relationships that shape our judgment of military conduct” (44). This convention has been created over centuries, and Walzer examines historical cases and debates that reflect the convention and give it life (45). The existence of this war convention differentiates the actions of soldiers from butchery and allows people to experience outrage at certain actions even in the hell of war. For example, soldiers who surrender are not executed but quarantined. Such conventions can hinder the quest for victory but are nonetheless obligatory given the general consent of humanity. Walzer concludes, “We want to have it both ways: moral decency in battle and victory in war; constitutionalism in hell and ourselves outside” (48).