How can you distinguish between a just and an unjust war?

Question

Different people will have different views- our view might not be the same as that of the people whose country is the battlefield.

How do you tell?

Answer 1

War is neither just nor unjust.

It describes a state of being or an activity, of man's state and man's sin. If war is wrong, it can hardly be right to do wrong.

Can you have a just or an unjust murder? rape? theft?

Don't be deceived by sinful man and his words.

War results from man's sinfulness and his refusal to submit to God.

From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?
Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not.
Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.

We also have God's testimony that the nation who serves God and is obedient to Him, God will keep and deliver.

Answer 2

A just war is so rare, that one may not have ever existed (on second thought, I'm sure in this world's history, there must have been a few). A just war would be initiated by a group of people rising up against a different group of people, in which the latter group had a history of raping the women of the first group, and/or stealing from, killing, or torturing the members of the first group.
An unjust war is initiated for reasons like border, resource, or economic disputes.

Answer 3

Catholics use the rigorous consideration of the “just war” doctrine to determine if defense by military force is legitimate.

Offensive war is never justified.

All the following considerations must be true to justify war:
1. The damage inflicted by the aggressor on the nation or community of nations must be lasting, grave, and certain;
2. All other means of putting an end to it must have been shown to be impractical or ineffective;
3. There must be serious prospects of success;
4. The use of arms must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated.

It has been argued the pre-war Iraq:
1. Was not inflicting lasting, grave and certain damage to the United States;
2. Could have been influenced by diplomatic and international sanctions.

It is argued now that:
3. There is not a serious prospect of success;
4. The use of arms has produced evils and disorders greater than the evil eliminated.

The "new" philosophy of the United States to launch wars to get them before they get us can even be argued as an offensive war which would not be justified.

With love in Christ.

Answer 4

A war is surely just if your country is being attacked by a nation who if they conquer you will impose an evil tyranny on you.I also believe it would be a just war to remove an evil dictator like Robert Mugabe from power, when that dictator is bringing such misery to and so oppressing and destroying his own country and murdering his own people so mercilessly, yet such a war would be "illegal" under present internatiional law. An unjust war is one where a strong nation is intent on defeating a weaker nation in order to remove the weaker nation's people's freedom, milk them of their assets for the enrichment of the victor and make them subservient to the victor's ideology and ethnic domination.

Answer 5

I personally think there have been very very few just wars. I think that we should have a much greater aversion to war than we seem to have. That would force us to look for other means of settling our differences.

I do believe in a just war, and that is when a country is torturing its own people, and will not relent from doing that. I think that if a country has the means to help them without causing greater damage than is being caused to the country's own people, then it is ok - as a last resort - to go to war. An example would be going to war with the Nazi regime in order to get them to stop torturing Jews, mentally ill, gays, Jehovah's Witnesses, and the other groups they tortured. Something on that grand of a scale, and so horrific, needs to be stopped, and if other means do not suffice, then war is justified, in my opinion.

Unfortunately, many governments play on this emotion of people to justify a war that is otherwise not really just. They'll SAY that they are going to war to help the people, when really, there is an ulterior motive, for money, or something else. Any time the motives are not pure, things tend to end in disaster. The people who really do need help don't end up being helped, and more harm is done.

Answer 6

When one is on the winning side with more devastating weapons,
When one is the beneficiaries of a war that increases economy, increases jobs via rebuilding projects, Increases $$ in the pocket

To these people war is just.

When one is on the losing side , when one is the victim that needs help to rebuild the very land you live on, and the aid comes from the very people who tried to kill you, your family and loved ones...

To such people war is Un-Just, no matter what the purpose.

- Bottom line is its all from whose point of view one sees from




Add: P/s: Sean C... I agree with you for the most part... in the case of Afghanistan ... Yes, I agree 100%, Iraq was NOT an aggressor, they were accused of having weapons of MD, but even when the officials found none... the alliance still attacked them anyway.. That is not Justice, THAT is Power-madness, Stubborness and Hypocrasy

Answer 7

Some people are saying that no war is just because innocents will be killed. I would say that if going to war will prevent more deaths than it causes, say by removing a genocidal regime or ending a pre-existing war then it is justified.
For example the recent Bosnian war was, in my opinion, justified. There were relatively few deaths as a direct result of Nato's intervention, and it stopped the slaughter that was happening beforehand.

Answer 8

A just war is forced apon you. When you have no other recourse but to defend your nation or people. Like WWII for the allies. An unjust war is a war for profit or gain that you started. Even if it was well intentioned. War is by nature an immoral enterprise. Only an immoral person starts an unnescessary war. Like WWII for the Axis.

Answer 9

I always vote peace before war. When all talks of peace have failed, then try self-defense. I'm not for going out and getting them before they get you because that can get messy with a lot of innocent people being hurt like they did at Hiroshima. I sympathize with people who would rather act then wait for the next strike. It is better to change people's hearts and minds because then peace can be possible. You can't get peace when you force your ways or thinking on someone. That just creates more war. Why not trade people who don't want to work for people that do?

Answer 10

There are many varieties, but the basics are; Just; Responding to an act of war. Unjust; Starting a war out of greed or hatred.

There have and always will be people on both sides that profit from war. Ex; blacksmiths, horse ranchers, engineers, Boeing, Hummer, Jeep, etc, etc..