Is war ever justified?

[TommyWillB]

It seems a bit odd to ask if war against Iraq is "justified"...

Two things seem self-efident to me:

• War is never "justified"
• Justice is not really one of the things our government/military even bothers taking into account when considering war.

 

[toast]

Locate your question in time, using first A-Bomb use as a pivot. Idea est:

- War before 1945 was conceivable (hence, 1939, even though 1933 would have been a better date).
- War after 1945 makes no sense (hence, Vietnam, just to take some well-chosen example).

 

[MDLarson]

Hey! Where'd ya get the idea for this poll? Ha ha...

 

[edX]

i guess i have to see this 2 ways. i don't see war as ever being 'right'. it's not an answer to any question that i know of. at least not for anyone who values life, human or otherwise.

but is it ever just? i think maybe it is. if someone declares war on someone else, then i think the one who is attacked first is 'justified' in fighting back if they choose. i wouldn't let anyone take a swing at me and just stand there to take the punch. that still doesn't make fighting right. it just means that sometimes someone takes unjustifiable actions that must be stopped in some way. what's right has long since left the picture at that point. the trick is to figure out how to keep everyone acting in a manner that is right before it gets out of hand.

with long hair and a beard, i must look like quite a threat to some. the airport security always seems to treat me as such. i seem to get 'randomly searched' every time i go in there. as bad as this is, i can live with it given the state of the world. but i almost fear they day they will shoot me first and ask questions later.

 

[Ugg]

I agree with Toast, war is an idea that is past its prime.

Not long ago someone told me that up until the Middle Ages or thereabouts, standard economic theory posited that there was a finite amount of wealth and that the only way to increase one's wealth was to steal from someone else. This idea soon fell by the wayside and wealth began to increase by leaps and bounds.

I believe that we are at a similar period in history. Rather than pour our energies into fuel cells and increasingly efficient solar cells we spend a lot of time and money "defending" and "protecting" oil. If we were to take all the money that GW plans to spend on a war in Iraq and spend it on research, I think we would soon see the demise of the oil run dictatorships. Indonesia, Nigeria, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, etc. are able to be the despotic nations they are because the west is willing to "overlook" their human rights violations in exchange for free access to their oil.

IMO waging war has always been and will always be about the desire for more economic power and therefore will never be justifiable.

 

[Satcomer]

Does anyone ever learn history anymore? I'll give everybody a little clue why some times war is the only way, WW I & WW II !

 

[edX]

yea, but weren't those the wars to end all wars? seems that concept doesn't really work. not to mention that in those wars, the bad guys were the ones who attacked first. so from that 'history lesson', i can pretty much surmise that the US becomes about equal to Germany during those wars if we decide to tell the world to stuff it and start a war. and then how much longer till the world decides they can no longer tolerate us? and thenhow muchlonger after that til GW shows that he really doesn't have any concern for human life, even his own people, and starts pushing buttons to show how powerful he is?

i can draw a list of 'what if's' just as long as those who support this war that make going into an even scarier thing than not. no war based upon 'what if' could ever be right or justified. it could only be insane.

 

[RacerX]

Originally posted by Satcomer
Does anyone ever learn history anymore? I'll give everybody a little clue why some times war is the only way, WW I & WW II !

I'm up on my history. Those wars were started by someone else. Someone invading someone else as I seem to recall in the case of WWII. In the case of WWI, it was the assassination of the leader of Austria Hungary by a Serbian.

Lets see, we are about to invade another country (just like what started WWII), and we are most likely looking to assassinate that countries leader (just like what started WWI).

Bush has no moral high ground in this. He wants to start wars without provocation. At least the real President Bush was acting to repel a country which was invading another. That, at least, was a just fight.

Iraq hasn't invaded anyone. We actually have been keeping Iran from invading Iraq (one of the reasons for not finishing the job originally).

Since Bush took power, we have turned our back on treaties, gone back and dissolved treaties, bullied our allies and now are starting wars as a preemptive measure (but only against countries that can't really fight back). Bush is not considered a trust worthy person (other than to Republicans it seems), and now the rest of the world doesn't trust the US or it's motives anymore. We live in some scary times.

If I have learned anything from history, it is that Bush has us on the wrong side. Any President that we have had in the last 30 years (if not in the entire history of our nation) would be a better replacement then what we have now.

 

[toast]

RacerX: Someone invading someone else as I seem to recall in the case of WWII. In the case of WWI, it was the assassination of the leader of Austria Hungary by a Serbian.

Assassination of archduke François-Ferdinand was only a pretext for a war that was already industrially and economically planned long before his death. To put it simply, WWI is a war about ambition, expansionism, about European countries fighting to ruin their neighbours' colonialist ambitions in Africa and/or South-East Asia.

At the light of these facts, I can't see how WWI can be called a "war [that was]_the only way", Satcomer. WWI is undoubtedly the most stupid event the whole 20th century has known.

 

[Giaguara]

"A war for peace makes about as much sense as f***ing for virginity." - Unknown.

 

[symphonix]

As I'd figure it, justice exists to protect the innocent and punish those who would harm them. Justice is what makes us civilised human beings.

War, on the other hand, is the persecution and murder of people on a mass scale. War is an effort to punish people who have committed no crime other than that of being our enemies. War is what makes us ashamed to be human beings.

Justice is characterised by considering human suffering, and placing the value of our fellow humans higher than anything else.
War is characterised by denying the value of humanity, by cheapening it in favour of religion, politics, fear and greed.

War is the exact opposite of justice. Justice is noble, clean, merciful and symbolic of all the best qualities that we humans have. War is a dirty, vile and repulsive business and it shows us our worst elements.

As such, I'd have to agree completely with TommyWillB on this one ... War is never justified.

 

[marz]

War is good for nothing except making money for greedy military arms manufacturers.

 

[toast]

Originally posted by Giaguara
"A war for peace makes about as much sense as f***ing for virginity." - Unknown.

Refer to fryke's new signature.

 

[fryke]

 

[hulkaros]

Isn't this text:
"A war for peace makes about as much sense as f***ing for virginity"
from a sign/board which was shown during a demonstration against war by some people (women/girls I think)?

At first I didn't get it but after couple of seconds the message of that board was very clear to me

Now, I can't say the same think about Mr.Bush and Mr.Gates

 

[chemistry_geek]

Ask a WWII Holocost survivor if war is ever justifiable. Ask him or her if it was fun living in a concentration camp, or if he or she lost a spouse or children in one. Then tell me war is never justifiable.

Yes, war is ugly and gruesome, but sometimes it is necessary to get the environment (wether it be political, human rights, etc...) back in balance.

One thing we should ask ourselves when thinking about "justice" is:

Is it a "civilized" form of revenge? Who in Iraq is to be dispensed with "justice"?

Should the US Military fly over Iraq, drop billions upon billions of flyers saying that we are invading Iraq to implement a change of government and will respond with force if are forces are attacked? That seems to a better solution to the problem. There's no need to kill innocent people, and we all know they will be used as human shields by the Iraqi dictatorship.

 

[toast]

Holocaust supervened before nuclear power appeared as the supreme deterring means which has governed internal relations from 1945 to 1991 and who still does in some parts of the world.

Since 1945, war has turned out to be a non-solution to state problems. The first time this was realized was in Korea. The question of war as a solution reached its peak during the Vietnam war: hundreds of diplomats, politicians, teachers, scientists began to realize war was obsolete, that it wasn't a means any more, as it had been against fascism.

One of the people who realized that, even though he's far from being a pacifist, is Zbigniew Brzezinski. I'll take him as an example of the international community realizing war is no more efficient to solve nation conflicts, because he has written a very clear book where he details some very interesting points about American foreign policy.

The Grand Chessboard, America and the rest of the World, by Zbigniew Brzezinsk, member of Washington Geostrategic Studies Institute and former Presidential counsellor (Carter, if I recall well).
(I think the book is published by Public Press in the US. In France, the publisher is called Bayard Presse. date of 1rst publication: 1997)

BTW I don't know any civilized form of revenge. Revenge is already a primitive concept which has very little to do with civilization.

In brief, war is obsolete. It's used only, as I've already said, by barbaric dictators (such as the one pointed at by Freedom House) to find some immediate solutions to latent problems that deserve negociating and thoughtful compromises.
There's a distinction to make with civil wars here, esp. the form it knows in former colonies (Africa in particular), but it'd be too complex to fit the post .

 

[Jason]

i didnt read a whole lot of this thread but i have noticed there seem to be two distinct lines and no middle ground...

War sucks, we all know it, no one wants it...

but justifiable? sometimes it is... this time i dont think so...

when we got bombed by japan in pearl harbor... that was justifiable cause to go to war...

when we got attacked by al quada that was justifiable to go to war (although a different breed)

but to go to war against a country that is fairly crippled, without un support, for bullshit reasons is unjustified IMHO....

sometimes it is, sometimes it aint... you need that answer in yer pole

 

[chemistry_geek]

Originally posted by toast
BTW I don't know any civilized form of revenge. Revenge is already a primitive concept which has very little to do with civilization.

Toast:

That is exactly my point. Revenge is primitive, yet it is cast upon many criminals in our "modern" society. If our society was truely just, it would send criminals to hospitals and psychiatric wards to be rehabilitated. But instead, they are cast into prison to be PUNISHED, a lawful form of revenge, for their actions, often with little medical intervention. My point on this "justice" discussion is that our society is not perfect, and fails to recognize that not all people are cared for properly to stop the cycle of crime and violence. It is perpetuated by revenge, an eye for an eye, so to speak. No matter what you call it, serving out a sentence in prison is a form of revenge by the state, even if it does protect society from the social deviants. Another point I'm trying to make is that something has to be fundamentally wrong with someone to willfully commit a crime or invoke violence on another individual, whether the cause is genetic or environmental.

 

[habilis]

C'mon people. there's no debate. Except for ENDING Slavery, Fascism, Nazism & Communism, War has Never Solved Anything...

Bottom line is, ours is a world governed by the use of force, and it's the agressors in the world that set all the rules. Take a look at history.

Peace, as shown throughout history, and as history will show in time about our current crisis with out-of-control despot brutal dictators and fundamentalists, is always and only brought about with strength.

The Peace Movement is costing thousands of people their lives. Ask the Holocaust Survivors if war is justified, ask the Iraqi People who are suffering miserably if war is justified. There were peace protestors then trying to get us not to go to war against the Nazi's. They had all the same lingo. It's always the people that have never had any type of real anguish in life, or real suffering that think war is not justified.

Lazy Americans with the easy luxurious lives they lead never think war is justified until they are the ones being exterminated, which is now a reality right at your doorsteps. some of us woke up on 9|11. Some of us are still asleep.