A "Just" War against ISIS?

A "Just" War against ISIS?

10/02/14

Robert Sharp, Jennifer Jefferis

ISIS, Political Theory, United States, Iraq, Syria

"If America is not prepared to supply the means necessary to achieve a just end, then the probability of success is in greater jeopardy than if we had never decided to destroy ISIS at all."

The relationship between ends and means is one that is crucial to get right in any conflict, and the launching of attacks against ISIS in recent days makes the discussion more important now than ever. Not only can the relationship between the two guide us through the subjective decision to wage war at all, but it can also guide our conduct in war as we consider whether one can ever justify the other.

There were many interesting components of the recent testimony by Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel and Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs Martin Dempsey, but none perhaps so much as the evaluation of the special relationship between these two elements: ends and means. In his remarks, Secretary Hagel laid out clearly both the ends he and the president sought, as well as the ways they proposed to achieve them.

If the secretary’s remarks had been the only ones we heard that week, we could be relatively comfortable that the fight to destroy ISIS was one that fit within the bounds of jus ad bellum (loosely, the right to wage war). Indeed, to meet this categorization, Just War Theory tells us that five basic criteria must be met: War must be declared by the right authority (traditionally, this is a state), declared in pursuit of a just cause, be a proportionate response, be used as a last resort and be used with probability of success.

The first four criteria are easily—if subjectively—met when we consider the wide coalition that is forming around the objective to destroy ISIS, the indiscriminate violence ISIS is waging against civilians, the choice to use (limited) air, ground and humanitarian support and also the recent history of power vacuums in both Iraq and Syria.

Read full articlehttp://nationalinterest.org/feature/just-war-against-isis-11388