RE: John Rawls on Just War

[Brian Considine <bconsidi@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

		This 'solution' reminds me of the current Star Wars movie,
where the hostile invaders of a peaceful planet try to buy time by demanding
that a committee must first study if an invasion actually happened.

		One should not assume that an ethnic cleansing will be put
on hold during an international investigation.  Remember the UN 'safe
havens' in Bosnia?

				-----Original Message-----
				From:	Claudio Sardoni
[mailto:sardoni@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
				Sent:	Wednesday, June 02, 1999 10:22 AM
				To:	POST-KEYNESIAN THOUGHT
				Subject:	RE: John Rawls on Just War

				Did you hear that a UN mission has been to
Kosovo and came back horrified?
				Claudio Sardoni
				-----Original Message-----
				From:	owner-pkt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:owner-pkt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On
				Behalf Of Zhiyuan Cui
				Sent:	Tuesday, June 01, 1999 8:38 PM
				To:	POST-KEYNESIAN THOUGHT
				Subject:	John Rawls on Just War

					In light of Susan
Woodward's(Brookings Institution) book "Balkan
				Tragedy"(finding that Western Powers is the
major cause of ethnic conflict
				in the former Yugoslavia to begin with in
1991 ) and John Rawls' following
				article(establishing the conditions for just
war), it seems to me that NATO
				should :
				(1) stop air bombing immediately;
				(2) No right to use ground troops either;
				(3) Given that the Yugoslavia agreed to open
for international
				investigation in the very begining, the
correct solution is to have an U.N
				investigation on whether the ethnic
cleansing has indeed occured in Kosovo.
				Even if it occured, when the international
investigation is going on, the
				ethnic cleansing cannot continue. Therefore,
international investigation is
				a first step, by all account, to the correct
solution.
				-------------------------
				"50 Years after Hiroshima"
				by  John Rawls
				Dissent, Summer, 19995

					The fiftieth year since the bombing
of Hiro-
				shima is a time to reflect about what one
should
				think of it. Is it really a great wrong, as
many now
				think, and many also thought then, or is it
perhaps
				justified after all? I believe that both the
fire-bomb-
				ing of Japanese cities beginning in the
spring of
				1945 and the later atomic bombing of
Hiroshima
				on August 6 were very great wrongs, and
rightly seen as such. In order to
				support this opinion, I set
				out what I think to be the principles
govening the
				conduct of war--jus in bello-of democratic
				peoples. These peoples 1 have different ends
of war
				than nondeniocratic, especially
totalitarian, states,
				such as Germany and Japan, which sought the
				domination and exploitation of subjected
peoples,
				and in Germany's case, their enslavement if
not
				exterinination.
				Although I cannot properly justify them
here,
				I begin by setting out six principles and
assump-
				tions in support of these judgments. I hope
they
				seem not unreasonable, and certaiuly they
are fa-
				miliar, as they are closely related to much
tradi-
				tional tbought on this subJect.
				l. The aim of a just war waged by a decent
				democratic society is a just and lasting
peace be-
				tween peoples, especially with its present
enemy
				2. A decent democratic society is fighting
				against a state that is not democratic. This
follows
				from the fact that democratic peoples do not
wage
				war against each other,2 and since we are
con-
				cerned with the rules of war as they apply
to such
				peoples, we assume the society fought
against is
				nondemocratic and that its expansionist aims
				threatened the security and free
institutions of
				democratic regimes and caused the war.3
				3. In the conduct of war, a democratic
society
				must carefully distinguish three groups: the
state's
				leaders and officials, its soldiers, and its
civilian
				population. The reason for these
distinctions rests
				on the principle of responsibility: since
the state
				fought against is not democratic, the
civilian mem-
				bers of the society cannot be those who
organized
				and brought on the war. This was done by its
lead-
				ers and officials assisted by other elites
who con-
				trol and staff the state apparatus. They are
respon-
				sible, they willed the war, and for doing
that, they
				are criminals. But civilians, often kept in
ignorance
				and swayed by state propaganda, are not.4
And
				this is so even if some civilians knew
better and
				were enthusiastic for the war. In a nation's
con-
				duct of war many such marginal cases may
exist,
				but they are irrelevant. As for soldiers,
they, just
				as civilians, and leaving aside the upper
ranks of
				an officer class, are not responsible for
the war,
				but are conscripted or in other ways forced
into it,
				their patriotism often cruelly and cynically
ex-
				ploited. The grounds on which they may be
at-
				tacked directly are not that they are
responsible
				for the war but that a democratic people
cannot
				defend itself in any other way, and defend
itself it
				must do. About this there is no choice.
				4. A decent democratic society must respect
				the human rights of the members of the other
side,
				both civilians and soldiers, for two
reasons. One .
				is because they simply have these rights by
the
				law of peoples. The other reason is to teach
en-
				emy soldiers and civilians the content of
those
				rights by the example of how they hold in
their
				own case. In this way their significance is
best
				brought home to them. They are assigned a
cen-
				tain status, the status of the members of
some hu-
				man society who possess rights as
humanpersons.5
				In the case of human rights in war the
aspect of
				status as applied to civilians is given a
strict inter-
				pretation. This means, as I understand it
here, that
				they can never be attacked directly except
in times
				of extreme crisis, the nature of which I
discuss
				below .
				5 . Continuing with the thought of teaching
the
				content of human rights, the next principle
is that
				just peoples by their actions and
proclamations are
				to foreshadow during war the klnd of peace
they
				aim for and the kind of relations they seek
between
				nations. By doing so, they show in an open
and
				public way the nature of their aims and the
kind
				of people they are. These last duties fall
largely on
				the leaders and officials of the goverments
of
				democratic peoples, since they are in the
best po-
				sition to speak for the wbole people and to
act as
				the principle applies. Although all the
preceding
				principles also specify duties of
statesmanship, this
				is especially true of 4 and 5. The way a war
is
				fought and the actions ending it endure in
the his-
				torical memory of peoples and may set the
stage
				for future war. This duty of statesmanship
must
				always be held in view
				6. Finally, we note the place of practical
means-
				end reasoning in judging the appropriateness
of
				an action or policy for achieving the aim of
war or
				for not causing more harm than good. This
mode
				of thought--whether catried on by
(classical) utili-
				tarian reasoning, or by cost-benefit
analysis, or by
				weighing national interests, or in other
ways---
				must always be framed within and strictly
limited
				by the preceding principles. The norms of
the con-
				duct of war set up certain lines that bound
just
				action. War plans and strategies, and the
conduct
				of battles, must lie within their limits.
(The only
				exception, I repeat, is in times of extreme
crisis.)

					In connection with the fourth and
fifth principles
				of the conduct of war, I have said that they
are
				binding especially on the leadere of
nations. They
				ar'e in the most effective position to
represent their
				people's aims and obligatioiis, and
sometimes they
				become statesmen. But who is a statesman?
There
				is no office of statesman, as there is of
president,
				or chancellor, or prime minister. The
statesman is
				an ideal, like the ideal of the truthful or
virtuous
				individual. Statesmen are presidents or
prime min-
				isters who become statesmen through their
exem-
				plary performance and leadership in their
office
				in difficult and trying times and manifest
strengyh,
				wisdom, and courage. They guide their people
				through turbulent and dangemus periods for
which
				they are esteemed always, as one of their
great
				Statesmen.

					The ideal of the statesman is
suggested by the
				saying: the politician looks to the next
election,
				the statesman to the next generation. It is
the task
				of the student of philosophy to look to the
perma-
				nent conditions and the real interests of a
just and
				good democratic society. It is the task of
the states-
				man, however, to discem these conditions and
in-
				terests in practice, the statesman sees
deeper and
				further than most others and grasps what
needs to
				be done. The statesman must get it right, or
nearly
				so, and hold fast to it. Washington and
Lincoln
				were statesmen. Bismarck was not. He did not
see
				Germany's real interests far enough into the
fu-
				ture and his judgment and motives were often
dis-
				torted by his class interests and his
wanting him-
				self alone to be chancellor of Germany.
Statesmen
				need not be selfless and may have their own
inten
				ests when they hold office, yet they must be
self
				less in theirjudgments and assessments
ofsociety's
				interests and not be swayed, especially in
war and
				crisis, by passions of revenge and
retaliation
				against the enemy.
					Above all, they are to hold fast to
the aim of
				gaining a just peace, and avoid the things
that make
				achieving such a peace more difficult. Here
the
				proclamations of a nation should make clear
(the
				statesman must see to this) that the enemy
people
				are to be granted an autonomous regime of
their
				own and a decent and full life once peace is
se-
				curely reestablished. Whatever they may be
told
				by their leaders, whatever reprisals they
may rea-
				sonably fear, they are not to be held as
slaves or
				serfs after surrender,6 or denied in due
course their
				full liberties, and they may well achieve
freedoms
				they did not enjoy before, as the Germans
and the
				Japanese eventually did. The statesman
knows, if
				others do not, that all descriptions of the
enemy
				people (not their rulers) inconsistent with
this are
				impulsive and false.
					Turning now to Hiroshima and the
fire-bomb-
				ing of Tokio, we find that neither falls
under the
				exemption of extreme crisis. One aspect of
this is
				that since (let's suppose) there are no
absolute
				rights--rights that must be respected in all
circum
				stancesthere are occasions when civilians
can
				be attacked directly by aerial bombing. Were
there
				times during the war when Britain could
properly
				have bombed Hamburg and Berlin? Yes, when
				Britain was alone and desperately facing
				Germany's superior might, moreover, this
period
				would extend until Russia had clearly beat
off the
				firot German assault in the summer and fall
of
				1941, and would be able to fight Germany
until
				the end. Here the cutoff point might be
placed dif-
				ferently, say the summer of 1942, and
certainly
				by Stalingrad.7 I shan't dwell on this, as
the cru-
				cial matter is that under no conditions
could Gen-
				many be allowed to win the war, and this for
two
				basic reasons: first, the natiire and
history of con-
				stitiitional democracy and its place in
European
				culture, and second, the peculiar evil of
Nazism
				and the enormous and uncalculable moral and
po-
				litical evil it represented for civilized
society.
				The peculiar evil of Nazism needs to be un-
				derstood, since in some circunistances a
demo-
				cratic people might better accept defeat if
the terms
				of peace offered by the adversary were
reason-
				able and moderate, did not subject them to
hu-
				miliation and looked forward to a workable
and
				decent political relationship. yet
characteristic of
				Hitler was that he accepted no possibility
at all of
				a political relationship with his enemies.
They were
				always to be cowed by terror and brutality,
and
				ruled by force. From the begining the
campaign
				against Russia, for example, was a war of
destruc-
				tion against Slavic peoples, with the
original in-
				habitants remaining, if at all, only as
serfs. When
				Gocbbels and othere protested that the war
could
				not be won that way, Hitler refused to
listen.8
					Yet it is clear that while the
extreme crisis ex-
				emption held for Britain in the early stages
of the
				war, it never held at any time for the
United States
				in its war with Japan. The principles of the
con-
				duct of war were always applicable to it.
Indeed,
				in the case of Hiroshima many involved in
higher
				reaches of the government recognized the
ques-
				tionable character of the bombing and that
limits
				were being crossed. Yet during the
discussions
				among allied leaders in June and July 1945,
the
				weight of the practical means-end reasoinng
carried
				the day. Under the continuing pressure of
war,
				such moral doubts as there were failed to
gain an
				express and articulated view. As the war
pro-
				gressed, the heavy fire-bombing of civilians
in the
				capitals of Berlin and Tokyo and elsewhere
was
				increasingly accepted on the allied side.
Although
				after the outbreak of war Roosevelt had
urged both
				sides not to commit the inhuman barbarism of
				bombing civilians, by 1 945 allied lcaders
came to
				assume that Roosevelt would have used the
bomb
				on Hiroshima.9The bombing grew out ofwhat
liad
				happened before.


				The practical means-end reasons to justify
us-
				ing the atomic bomb on Hiroshima were the
fol-
				lowing:
					The bomb was dropped to hasten the
end of
				the war. It is clear that Truman and most
other al-
				lied leaders thought it would do that.
Another rea-
				son was that it would save lives where the
lives
				counted are the lives of American soldiers.
The
				lives ofJapanese, nnlitary or civilian,
presumably
				counted for less. Here the calculations of
least time
				and most lives saved were mutually
supporting.
				Moreover, dropping the bomb would give the
				Emperor and the Japanese leadera a way to
save
				face, an important matter given Japanese
samurai
				culture. Indeed, at the end a few top
Japanese lead-
				ers wanted to make a last sacrificial stand
but were
				overruled by others supported by the
Emperor, wbo
				ordered surrender on August 12, having
received
				word from Washingion that the Emperor could
stay
				provided it was understood that he had to
comply
				with the orders of the American military
com-
				mander. The last reason I mention is that
the bomb
				was dropped to impress the Russians with
Ameri-
				can power and make them more agreeable with
				our demands. This reason is highly disputed
but
				urged by some critics and scholars as
important.
					The failure of these reasons to
reflect the lim-
				its on the conduct of war is evident, so I
focus on
				a different matter: the failure of
statesmanship on
				the part of allied leaders and why it might
have
				occurred. Truman once described the Japanese
as
				beasts and to be treated as such, yet how
foolish it
				sounds now to call the Germans or the
Japanese
				barbarians and beasts! 10 Of the Nazis and
Tokyo mili-
				tarists, yes, but they are not the German
and the
				Japanese people. Churchill later granted
that he
				carried the bombing too far, led by passion
and
				the intensity of the conflict. 11  A duty of
statesman-
				ship is not to allow such feelings, natural
and in-
				evitable as they may be, to alter the course
a
				democratic people should best follow in
striving for
				peace. The statesman understands that
relations
				with the present enemy have special
importance:
				for as I have said, war must be openly and
pub-
				licly conducted in ways that make a lasting
and
				amicable peace possible with a defeated
enemy,
				and prepares its people for how they may be
ex-
				pected to be treated. Their present fears of
being
				subjected to acts of revenge and retaliation
must
				be put to rest; present enemies must be seen
as
				associates in a shared and just future
peace.

					These remarks make it clear that, in
my judg-
				ment, both Hiroshima and the fire-bombing of
				Japanese cities were great evils that the
duties of
				statesmanship require political leaders to
avoid in
				the absence ofthe crisis exemption. I also
believe
				this could have been done at little cost in
further
				casualties. An invasion was unnecessary at
that
				date, as the war was effectively over.
However,
				whether that is true or not makes no
difference.
				Without the crisis exemption, those bombings
are
				great evils. Yet it is clear that an
articulate expres-
				sion of the principles of just war
introduced at that
				time would not have altered the outcome. It
was
				simply too late. A president or prime
mimster must
				have carefully considered these questions,
prefer-
				ably long before, or at least when they had
the
				time and leisure to think things out.
Reflections
				on just war cannot be heard in the daily
round of
				the pressure of events near the end of the
hostili-
				ties; too many are anxious and impatient,
and sim-
				ply worn out.
					Similariy, the justification of
constitutional de-
				mocracy and the ba sis of the rights and
duties it
				must respect should be part of the public
poliiical
				culture and discussed in the many
associations of
				civic society as part of one's education. It
is not
				clearly heard in day-to-day ordinary
politics, but
				must be presupposed as the background, not
the
				daily subject of politics, except in special
circum-
				stances. In the same way, there was not
sufficient
				prior grasp of the fundamental importance of
the
				principles of just war for the expression of
them
				to have blocked the appeal of practical
means-end
				reasoning in terms of a calculus of lives,
or of the
				least time to end the war, or of some other
balanc-
				ing of costs and benefits. This practical
reasoning
				justifies too much, too easily, and provides
a way
				for a dominant power to quiet any moral
worries
				that may arise. If the principles of war are
put for-
				ward at that time, they easily become so
many
				more considerations to be balanced in the
scales.
				 Another failure of statesmanship was not to
				try to enter negotiations with the Japanese
before
				any drastic steps such as the fire-bombing
of cit-
				ies or the bombing of Hiroshima were taken.
A
				conscientious attempt to do so was morally
nec-
				essary. As a democratic people, we owed that
to
				the Japanese people--whether to their
govenment
				is another matteL There had been discussions
in
				Japan for some time about finding a way to
end
				the war, and on June 26 the govement had
been
				instmcted by the Emperor to do so.12 It must
surely
				have realized that with the navy destroyed
and the
				outer islands taken, the war was lost. True,
the
				Japanese were deluded by the hope that the
Rus-
				sians might prove to be their allies, 13
but negotia-
				tions are preciscly to disabuse the other
side of
				delusions of that kind. A statesman is not
free to
				consider that such negotiations may lessen
the de-
				sired shock valuc of subsequent attacks.
					Truman was in many ways a good, at
times a
				very good president. But the way he ended
the war
				showed he failed as a statesman. For him it
was an
				opportunity missed, and a loss to the counny
and
				its armed forces as well. It is sometimes
said that
				questiomng the bembing of Hiroshima is an
in-
				sult to the American troops who fought the
war.
				This is hard to understand. We should be
able to
				look back and consider our faults after
fifty years.
				We expect the Germans and the Japanese to do
				that--``Vergangenheitsverarbeitung"-- the
Germans say. Why shouldn't we?
				It cann't be that we think we waged the war
without the moral error!
				None of this alters Germany's and Japan's
re-
				sponsibility for the war nor their behavior
in con-
				ducting it. Emphatically to be repudiated
are two
				nihilist doctrines. One is expressed by
Sherman's
				remark, ``War is hell:' so anything goes to
get it
				over with as soon as one can. The other says
that
				we are all guilty so we stand on a level and
no one
				can blame anyone else. These are both
superficial
				and deny all reasonable distinctions; they
are in-
				voked falsely to try to excuse our
misconduct or
				to plead that we cannot be condemned.
					The moral emptiness of these
nihilisms is
				manifest in the fact that just and decent
civilized
				societies--their institiitions and laws,
their civil
				life and background culture and mores--all
de-
				pend absolutely on making significant moral
and
				political distinctioiis in all situations.
Certaiuly war
				is a kind of hell, but why should that mean
that all
				moral distinctions cease to hold? And
granted also
				that sometimes all or nearly all may be to
some
				degree guilty, that does not mean that all
are
				equally so. There is never a time when we
are free
				from all moral and political principles and
re-
				straints. These mhilisnis are pretenses to
be free
				of those principles and restraints that
always ap-
				ply to us fully.

				Notes
				1. I sometimes use tbe term ``peoples'' to
mean much the same
				as nations, especially when I want to
contrast peoples with
				states and a state's apparatus.
				2. I assume that democratic peoples do not
go to war against
				each other . There is considerable evidence
of this important
				idea. See Michael Doyle's two part article,
``Kant, Liberal
				Legacies, and Foreign Affairs", Phiiosophy
and Pubhc Af-
				fairs, Vol. 12, Summer and Fall 1983. See
his summary of
				the evidence in the first part, pp. 206-232.
				3. Responsibility for war rarely falls on
only one side and
				this must be granted. Yet some dirty hands
are dirtier than
				others, and somotimes even with dirty hands
a democratic
				people would still have the right and even
the duty to defend
				it self from the other side. This is clear
in World War II.
				4 Here I follow Michael Walzer's "Just and
Unjust Wars" (Ba-
				sic Books, 1977).
				5. For the idea of status, I am indebted to
discussions of
				Frances Kamm and Thomas Nagel.
				6. See Churchill's remarks explaining the
meaning of ``un-
				conditional surrender'' in The Hinge of Fate
(Houghton
				Miffiin, 1 950), pp. 685-688.
				7.I might add here that a balancing of
interests is not in-
				volved. Rather, we have a matter of judgment
as to whether
				certain objective cireumstances are present
which constitute
				the extreme crisis exemption. As with any
other complex
				concept, that of such an exemption is to
some degree vague.
				Whether or not the concept applies rests on
judgment.
				8. On Goebbels's and others' protests, see
Alan Bullock,
				Hit!er: A Study in Tyranny (London Oldham's
Press, 1952),
				Ch. 12, 65, pp. 633-644.
				9. For an account of events, see David M.
McCullough.
				Truman (Simon and Schuster, 1992), Ch. 9:IV
and 1O,
				pp.390-464, and Barton Benstein, ``TIie
Aiomic Bombings
				Reconsidered:' Foreigu Affairs, 74: l ,
Jan-Feb 1995.
				10. See McCullough`s Truman, p. 458, the
exchange between
				Truman and Senator Russell of Georgia in
August 1945.
				11. See Martin Gilbe't, Winsron Churchill:
Never Dcspair,
				Vol. Vlll. (Houghton Mifllin, 1988),
refleciing later on
				Dresden, p. 259.
				12. See Gerhard Weinberg, A World at Arms
(Cambridge: The
				University Press, 1994), pp. 886-889.