Principle of "just war"...Recommended geek link of the week...
Category: Kitchen Sink...
Posted Monday, March 10, 2003 at 05:01 PM [GMT-6]

I'd really prefer to be writing about meaningless pleasantries, like the extraordinarily beautiful weather we had last weekend (for March, anyway), or the continually amazing sight of our little Melissa Gilbert all grown up (and out), the latest revelation being at the Screen Actor Guild Awards last night. But life seems to be getting really, really serious, you know?

While the Pope works on a plan which will result in Saddam's exile, Father Richard Neuhaus looks at things from a more practical perspective in an interview about how preemptive military action by the US might fit into the historical Roman Catholic principle of "just war." Interestingly, Fr. Neuhaus, editor in chief of First Things and president of the Institute on Religion and Public Life seems to think that in the case of Iraq, the principle supports war. Here are a few excerpts from the interview:

As St. Thomas Aquinas and other teachers of the just war tradition make clear, war may sometimes be a moral duty in order to overturn injustice and protect the innocent. The just cause in this case is the disarmament of Iraq, a cause consistently affirmed by the Holy Father and reinforced by 17 resolutions of the Security Council.

...

In the judgment of the U.S. and many other countries, he [Saddam] poses a grave and imminent threat to America, world peace and the lives of innumerable innocents. If that judgment is correct, the use of military force to remove that threat, in the absence of plausible alternatives, is both justified and necessary.

Heads of government who are convinced of the correctness of that judgment would be criminally negligent and in violation of their solemn oath to protect their people if they did not act to remove such a threat.

...

Frequent reference to preventive or pre-emptive use of military force, and even to "wars of choice," have only confused the present discussion.

War, if it is just, is not an option chosen but a duty imposed. In the present circumstance, military action against Iraq by a coalition of the willing is in response to Iraq's aggression; first against Kuwait, then in defiance of the terms of surrender demanding its disarmament, then in support of, if not direct participation in, acts of terrorism.

Read the whole interview. His comments regarding the alleged "cowboy attitude" of President Bush and the "moral authority" of the U.N. are a breath of fresh air, and probably irritating as heck to many of his churchly brethren.

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