It has always seemed kind of odd to me that there exist laws of war because war seems the ultimate of crimes to begin with. The idea that war can be waged in a civilized manner is fascinating.
Nevertheless, war, at least in the conventional sense, is governed by a set of rules and/or customs that basically protect combatants who follow them from prosecution once hostilities have ceased, whether they are on the winning or losing side.
The most famous of these are the Geneva Conventions. Signed in 1864, the first Geneva Convention was subtitled “Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded in Armies in the Field.”
In a nutshell, it gave people providing aid to wounded soldiers immunity from capture and their equipment protection from destruction; required the impartial reception and treatment of all combatants; provided protection for civilians providing aid to the wounded; and established the Red Cross symbol as a means of identifying persons and equipment covered by the agreement.
There have been numerous updates to Geneva and dozens of other conventions, declarations, protocols and treaties dealing with everything from biological weapons to environmental protection to lasers to child combatants.
In fact, the laws of war are always being updated because, as Jean S. Pictet, a former director of the International Committee of the Red Cross noted in 1951, “the law, however, always lags behind charity; it is tardy in conforming with life’s realities and the needs of humankind.”
Of course, any law requires recognition and consent. What happens when participants do not follow the rules?
This is particularly relevant in the modern context.
The first big problem in current geopolitical conflicts is the lack of a discernable enemy. The first basic law of war was that waging it must be preceded by a declaration of such. But the authority who makes the declaration must also be recognized by the party on which the declaration is being made.
It was much simpler in the old days. Germany declares war on Britain. Britain declares war on Germany. At the end of the day, you exchange prisoners who followed the rules and prosecute in international court the ones who didn’t.
These days, things are not nearly so clean. We can’t even seem to agree on a name for the enemy. Is it ISIL or ISIS or Daesh? And although they have declared themselves a Caliphate in a fluid geographic area of Syria and Iraq, they can hardly be called a nation-state.
And then there are all the little Daesh-wannabes running around western countries being inspired by the movement. When they go on their rampages, shooting up nightclubs and restaurants and shopping malls and train stations, they are clearly not covered by the laws of war.
They are, however, covered by the rule of law. And so are we. We must never forget that. As a society we must rise above vengeance and stick to our principles.
We now have a president-elect in the United States who appears willing to throw that all out the window in order to “beat the savages.”
You don’t “beat the savages” by becoming savage. You also don’t beat them by calling them savages.
There is a very interesting video currently circulating on social media featuring a former CIA agent named Amaryllis Fox.
“The only real way to disarm your enemy is to listen to them,” she said. “If you hear them out, if you’re brave enough to really listen to their story, you can see that more often than not you might’ve made some of the same choices if you’d lived their life instead of yours.”
In that light, we must always be vigilant about not dehumanizing entire groups of people.
“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” is a central ethical precept of the laws of war, every major religion in the world and the constitutions of the world’s great liberal democracies.
It does not say: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you unless they waterboard you first.”
Despite assertions that he is both Christian and American, Donald Trump does not seem to get that at all.
“We have to play the game the way they’re playing the game,” he said. “You’re not going to win if we’re soft and they’re, they have no rules.”
That is simply wrong on so many levels. Americans frequently talk about winning hearts and minds. You do that by rising above, not sinking down into the muck.
advocating the beginning of the way out of the mess we’re in is to listen to the enemy.
The bottom line?
“Everybody believes they are the good guy.”
My teenage idealism and hope is long dead. I realize now war and human conflict is not going away any time soon. In the meantime, the very least we can do is be civilized about it, even if the other side isn’t.
Ultimately, war crimes are crimes, whether you’re on the winning or losing side.
