A Concept of Just War This research paper describ

This research paper describes and assesses Jean Elshtain's argument for the use of force against terrorists in her book, Just War Against Terror, and assesses it in the light of just war theories and my own approach to the subject.

Since the end of the cold war, international peace and order have been threatened by the potentially lethal consequences of internal political instability within states, including conflicts of ethnic and religious origin, the rise of terrorist groups and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Elshtain articulates justification for a military response by the United States to these threats which draws upon a number of strains in western thought on the subject of war and its limitations. She relies especially on Christian realism, a perspective which accepts the moral necessity of waging war to defend Western values while at the same time accepting the need for restraint in waging war. Her perspective is in my opinion sound and preferable to the muddy thinking about the use of force on the part of many self-styled moral philosophers and religious leaders. However, it is unclear whether Elshtain has thought through as comprehensively as she might have the ethical dilemmas and practical consequences which may flow from her reasoning.

Walzer (1997) said that two broad issues regarding war must be faced: why we fight and how we wage war, known as jus ad bello and jus in bello, respectively (p. 21). Elshtain re

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e Christian concept of just war, as it was developed by St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) and other medieval Christian thinkers, laid considerable emphasis on the moral intention of war-makers. As Aquinas' views are summarized by Pangle & Ahrensdorf, "war is just solely when it is a punitive police action authorized by duly constituted civil authority animated by rightful intention" (p. 86). However, in the age of religious wars, both sides were often convinced of the justice of their cause. An extreme example was that of St. Thomas More (1478-1535), who constructed an imaginary utopian society which then carried out wars of liberation to free others from tyranny. Dante (1265-1321) criticized Thomist just war thinking because it had been used to justify the expansion of some Christian states at the expense of others (Pangle & Ahrensdorf, p. 105). Elshtain acknowledged this unfortunate tendency when she says that "within the Christian just war tradition, . . . all notions of moral absolutism smack of triumphalism and a crusading mentality of war without limits and must therefore be repudiated" (p. 131). Renaissance thinker and political realist, Niccolo Machiavelli (1467-1527), took the view that Christian concepts of just war "have

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