Jeff McMahan (Rutgers) foi o autor convidado da última edição do Forum na Boston Review. Para aqueles que não conhecem o evento, no Forum um autor ou autora é convidado para escrever e propor soluções sobre algum tópico relevante do debate público nos EUA. Suas propostas são, então,
avaliadas por profissionais da área e respondidas pelo autor
. McMahan é o autor de Killing in War um dos livros mais importantes sobre o problema da "guerra justa" dos últimos anos. No ensaio "Moral Wounds: The Ethics of Volunteer Military Service" o filósofo parte dos argumentos de seu livro - especialmente do pressuposto de que não existem "guerras justas" - para questionar a proibição de soldados em recusar ordens moralmente questionáveis vindas de seus superiores.
Os comentários ficaram por conta dos filósofos Lionel McPherson e Kimberley Brownlee, do ativista Matt Gallagher, do oficial Brian Imiola. Para os interessados sobre o assunto, os argumentos de McMahan contra a noção tradicional de guerra justa podem ser encontrados nesse artigo:
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McMahan: "The Ethics of Killing in War"
The Moral Responsibility of Volunteer Soldiers
Should they say no to fighting in an unjust war?
The military services in the United States have been organized on a volunteer basis since 1973, when President Richard Nixon abolished the draft. The end of conscription came as a relief to most people—to young men, their parents, and eventually the leaders of the military services, which had been plagued by internal dissent and a lack of professionalism, partly as a result of having so many unwilling members.
Though isolated voices have always challenged the shift to a volunteer military, their criticisms have recently become more widespread and more vocal. The main objections come from two quite different directions.
Some critics argue that the reliance on an all-volunteer, professional army has led to diminished public concern and vigilance with respect to the wars the government decides to fight. Limiting the burdens of military service to volunteers has, according to these critics, weakened inhibitions against the use of military force. When the Iraq War was debated in 2002–3, most citizens were not concerned that they or their children would be required to fight. This eliminated a powerful constraint against the resort to war. According to these critics, the reintroduction of some form of conscription is necessary to reestablish greater democratic control over the practice of war.
Other critics come from the ranks of just war theorists. Their concern is not with diminished public vigilance but with individual moral responsibility. They argue that volunteering for military service in current conditions is morally problematic. Those who join the military may be motivated by a desire to serve their country; to prove, improve, or reform themselves; to have a steady income with benefits; to get an education; to carry on a family tradition; or some combination of these. Whatever their motivation, they are committing themselves to become weapons controlled by others whose purposes cannot be reliably predicted. Some just war theorists question whether it can be permissible for people thus to convert themselves into instruments for killing without knowing whom they may be required to kill, or why. In contrast to the problem cited by the first group of critics, this one would be exacerbated rather than resolved by the reintroduction of conscription.
I will focus here on the second, less familiar critique. I believe that the all-volunteer military can survive the challenge, but only if it undergoes significant reform and acknowledges a right of selective conscientious objection.
Traditional Just War Theory
The idea that voluntary enlistment in the military can be morally problematic derives from a neglected tradition of just war thinking. This approach to the ethics of war informed the work of some of the classical just war theorists, such as the 16th century Spanish philosophers Francisco de Vitoria and Francisco Suárez. It was, however, gradually abandoned by thinkers whose views together constitute what I call “traditional just war theory.” The traditional theory has been ascendant since at least the 18th century, but the older approach has recently been resurrected by a group of “revisionists.” The best way to understand revisionist just war theory is to contrast it with the traditional theory, which has had a profound influence in shaping common sense thinking about the ethics of war, in part because it was developed in tandem with the international law of armed conflict.
According to traditional just war theory, a soldier does no wrong by fighting in an unjust war, provided that he or she obeys the rules regulating the conduct of war. This theoretical idea finds powerful expression in public sentiments. For centuries it has been regarded as not merely permissible but conspicuously noble and admirable for a soldier to go to war without any concern for whether the war’s cause was just. Although the famous lines in Tennyson’s “The Charge of the Light Brigade” refer to obedience to tactical commands within a war, they articulate a general Victorian ideal of soldiering: “Theirs not to reason why / Theirs but to do and die / . . . When can their glory fade?” Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes was even more explicit:
In the midst of doubt, in the collapse of creeds, there is one thing I do not doubt, that no man who lives in the same world with most of us can doubt, and that is that the faith is true and adorable which leads a soldier to throw away his life in obedience to a blindly accepted duty, in a cause which he little understands.
Traditional just war theory offers a theoretical basis for this familiar sentiment. A foundational tenet of the theory is that the principles governing the conduct of war (jus in bello) are entirely independent of those governing the resort to war (jus ad bellum). One implication of this fundamental dualism in traditional just war theory is that what it is permissible for soldiers to do in war does not depend on whether the war is just. Whether the cause is just or unjust, soldiers are prohibited, for example, from intentionally attacking noncombatants. And whether the cause is just or unjust, soldiers are permitted to attack and kill enemy combatants. Typically in a war between states, one state’s war is just while the other’s is unjust. Yet according to the traditional theory, the principles of jus in bello are neutral between soldiers on opposing sides and are equally satisfiable by all.
One rationale for this traditional dualism is provided by a view about responsibility. Soldiers cannot do wrong by violating the principles of jus ad bellum because, it is claimed, those principles do not apply to them. The principles of jus ad bellum govern decisions concerning the resort to war, but ordinary soldiers have no control over those decisions and thus are not responsible for them. Only those who are involved in making such decisions—political leaders—are capable of either violating or complying with ad bellumprinciples. But even though ordinary soldiers cannot be responsible for whether a war is fought, they are responsible for how it is fought. And according to the traditional theory, there are permissible and impermissible ways of fighting even in a war that is unjust.
The traditional theory seeks to reinforce its claim that one can permissibly fight in an unjust war in part by observing that all soldiers fighting in a war pose a threat to others. Because they pose a threat, even if they are fighting for a just cause, they forfeit their right not to be attacked. But even though they forfeit this right, they retain their rights of self- and other-defense. Hence all soldiers, including those who fight for unjust aims (unjust combatants), are permitted to attack enemy combatants because those combatants pose a threat and are thus liable to attack. The traditional principle of noncombatant immunity is an extension of this line of argument. Noncombatants pose no threat and thus do not forfeit their right not to be attacked. Hence no soldiers, even those fighting in just wars (just combatants), are permitted to attack noncombatants.
We can refer to the traditional theory’s claim that it is always permissible to fight in a war, whether just or unjust, provided that one obeys the principles of jus in bello, as the permissibility of participation. It is a moral principle that is echoed by a parallel permission in the law of armed conflict, which allows that it is legal to fight in a war that is itself illegal.
