Essay Example - The Just War Theory

The Just war theory is a personification that deals with the justification of why and how wars are fought. Arguments, in this case, can either be historical or theoretical. In the academic aspect, it focuses on the justification and forms of warfare (Lango, 2014 p.20). The historical element, on the other hand, deals with the body rules of agreement that have been used in various wars for many years. However, in the role of ethics, the historical aspect examines the institutional contracts due to their philosophical coherence to inquire whether conventions must go through the process of change (Lango, 2014 p.32). The essay will elaborate more on the pro and cons of using the just war theory.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Order now

In the past, the just war theory had agreed rules of combat that evolved between two similar enemies. For instance, when an array of values is found between two warring groups, they end up explicitly or implicitly agreeing upon the limits that exist in the war. However, when enemies do not agree because of race, language, or religious beliefs, they end up seeing each other, not being human (Lango, 2014 p.40).

According to Jinks (2019) suitable example is the international agreements include Hague and Geneva conventions and how the rules they made aimed at specific types of warfare known as the prosecuting transgressors (p. 91). It is when enemies are seen to be individuals that have similar moral identities; then, they will do their activities in peace, similar to how explicit o tactic rules are formed.

When similarity is seen, then wars that are fought should determine the relations that would be gotten when the war is over. Therefore, the motivation for agreeing and forming to the convections is a mutual benefit because the deployment of the underhand weapons or tactics provokes the vengeance acts and the type of action which make it to be detrimental to the moral or political interests.

Regardless of the convections that were previously developed, the primary concern of the theory is the lack of rules to any asymmetrical morality or war between the belligerents meant to be denounced and the rules that should be applied during the war (Jinks, 2019 p. 99). In other words, the just war theory must be universal to bind all and turn all actions appraised on the parties that previously formed convections. The method portrays the same age as warfare itself. In the records, it is clear that fighting is a moral decision used by warriors to rein or limit an outbreak in the devastation of war.

Most of them were also involved in children and women as prisoners instead of exchanging them, killing them, or ransoming them. In the early traditions, there were considerations of honor. However, some acts were dishonorable while some faced the deem honor. Things considered honorable in this case portrayed a specific culture such as defense or a suicide attack for some people but ludicrous to others. According to Holden (2014), the convections are usually slippery because they give way to the military or pragmatic interest any time they are needed (p. 102).

The specifics, on the other hand, that make things honorable differ with place and time, similar to how the one moral virtue alludes in the literature. Melady (2017) tries to show that warfare is infused with the concerns of the moral of starting a war rather than a Macbethan bloodbath (p. 341). The just war theory, as analyzed, has a long history. For instance, parts of it are derived from the bible to hint at the ethical character in the concepts of war through the announcement of divine interventions.

The Greeks, in this case, depended on their gods, while Roman's political and practical issues were overwhelming the fledging legal conventions. Odriscoll (2018) argue that the just war theory is also known as a political realism that would do anything in waging and declaring war (p. 235). The same concept has also been used in the reading of political realists, particularly the history of the Peloponnesian War, to show the extension and interest of politics rather than the lofty pretensions of moral behavior.

Since the 2001 terrorist attacks which took place in America, academics have diverted their attention from the theory to the national, military, academic, and international conferences to consolidate and develop the theoretical aspects (Limbach, 2011 p. 589). The just war theory also became a popular topic of political science, military history, philosophy, and ethics courses.

Conferences that are regularly done tackle the issues of military interventions and human rights. The most significant concerns of these are the headline wars and the dynamic rules, convections, and interplays of warfare that remains intact in the Warfield but still awarded as a higher level of debate and scrutiny (Limbach, 2011 p. 599). For instance, in the political aspect, the justification of war needed a critical analysis of the explanation of acknowledgment.

At the battlefield, generals have made the solders adhere to rules of war convections in the military department through veteran experiences or military ethics courses. Yet the emphasis on war crimes and war convections continue to develop genocide campaigns waged by hating leaders and people who have waged total war on guerilla bonds that have committed murderous, humiliating, or atrocious acts on the enemy. Arguably, Gomke (2014), claim that the actions are still atrocities because of the war conventions that are deemed to be inexcusable regardless of the cause of the war (p. 178).

Increasingly, the rule of law in just war theory has transgressors and violators that are responsible for their actions after battle and in war, thus facilitating the battle (Strawser, 2019 p. 72). In these courageous times, academics always seek the absolutions that led to fighting even though Limbach supported the stance. For instance, today, courts are less forgiving where any convection violations have the assumption that soldiers are accountable and responsible and should face charges for the crime committed.

The idealism, however, of individually responsible and seek the imposition of law on the battlefield always run ahead of the customs and traditions that weaken and demean the evidence that exists in the warring factions. Allenby (2010) on the other hand, argue that the just war theory has no potential for legal acknowledgment in cases of the ethnic ear because the implicitly is beyond the norms of peaceful norms, thus separating the moral realm and ethics (p. 667).

An excellent example is in Rwanda, where people justification of killing and destruction related to the justifiable triumphs when tried to establish peaceful laws in the separate bloody realm. As a result, war emerged because people tried to fight for their nation to pick up the cudgel instead of the sword, as seen in the 'war and peace' book, which favored the etiquette of invading or occupational forces (Ramsay, 2014 p. 114).

The problem with the ethical issues is that they are restrictive or vague during the war. The consequential open-ended model, in this case, is vulnerable to the political or military needs if the code of conduct needs to be adhered to in war (Ramsay, 2014 p. 125). In other words, more will be gained when the rules are broken, particularly to the military necessities.

Also, intrinsics can become restrictive to disallow flexibility in war. If intrinsics develop a flexible model that can restrain worriers from achieving their targets, then the theory can be permissible. Even though prescription principles are commendable, then the nature of war is not legit when the objective of the military is invisible amongst the civilian centers.

The just war theory, in this case, offers a set of principles that targets to maintain a plausible moral framework concerning war. From the war traditions most, theorists differentiate between the rules that guide the justice of war from the fair conducts as well as the accountability and responsibilities of the war parties (Lango, 2014 p.47). The aspects also offer the aging war guidelines of restrictive and unrestrictive rules concerning the challenges for ethics in particular situations and wars.

Advantages of the Just war theory

Just war theories are held to have a cause and the last resort when declared by an authority that has the right to reasonable chances of success and intention whose ends are proportional to the truth (Draper, 2015 p. 132). The results can make one detect if the principles are consequential or intrinsics, especially if they invoke the model. Even though this provides the advantage of the theory, there is a lack of a strict framework that makes the principles open to broad interpretations thus examining the attention of relevant challenges.

Possessing the benefits of the just war theory is the jus ad bellum convection. According to Kashnikov (2020), the initiating aggression acts are unjust, thus allowing any group to defend themselves. However, unless aggression is elaborated, the benefits are open-ended. A suitable example is a cause resulting from an aggressive act that ostensibly responds to the violation of territory, a trade embargo, an insult, or the breach of individual prosperity (p. 147-156).

The onus in this is that the just war theory offers a sound and consistent account of the meaning of the cause. Even though this is not the reason why other explanations never provide the reason for the purpose, the consensus initiates why the physical force is unjust and why it is wrong (Watkin, 2016 p. 67). Self-defense in this case against physical aggression remains the only reason for the cause. The self-defense principles, however, are extrapolated to anticipate the aggression acts that assist against interventionism and the oppressive government.

The advantages, therefore, of the 'just war theory' are that aggressive war is permissible if it retaliates with the lawbreakers similar to the ones that want to punish and pursue the aggressor. According to Walen (2019), the preemption argument has gained many supporters, particularly from the West, stating that the consequentialists ground strike first if war can be avoided (p.142). Since the act can be decisive against the aggressor through a powerful message sent to defend the armed force, it can also create a peaceful and deterrent world.

Even though Pollack argues that the preemptive strikes depend on the conjectured instead of the effect of denouncing and impending aggression, the moral principle agent is building up the upright postures to constitute aggression in that a man with a weapon does not mean he is using it (2017, p. 429). Consequently, Simpsons (2015) argues that the preemption on the grounds may destabilize people even if the realists claim that the preemptive strike policy ploys a bullying or tyrannical power to justify the actions of the alliances or military (p.102).

The 'just war theory' also has a 'balance of power' principle that allows countries to continually renew their treaties and alliances to ensure that none becomes a hegemonic power. There is also a fear that the preemption policy slips into machinations of the 'false flag operations' in the pretext that the war is created by a contrived actual or theatrical stunt. Frowe (2013) believes that the theory also dresses the soldiers or even uses civilian dressing to gain political background of war (p. 148).