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commentary on chapter 3 Personal Reflections on Professor John FabianWitt’s “Two Conceptions of Suffering inWar” Steven H. Hobbs Professor John Fabian Witt presents an explication of the formal theories on suffering during armed conflict from the perspective of two theoreticians whose early writings were seminal in the development of contemporary thinking on international humanitarian law. Looking at the work of Henry Dunant and Francis Lieber,he describes the strengths and challenges of these divergent approaches to reducing the suffering experienced by both the combatants and the civilians who are caught in the zone of active conflict . Central to his discussion is the place of justification, both for the conflict and for the ones who suffer harm as a result. In this sense, one would consider whether the conflict can be rationalized as doing right or wrong in terms of a just cause and thereby recognize that suffering may and will occur in order to accomplish a good for society.The good in these terms would be something like eliminating an evil or defending first principles such as freedom or human dignity. The two approaches to suffering diverge on whether the purpose of the conflict is central to the theory of preventing suffering.For Dunant,the purpose or justification for a war should not be part of the equation for drafting rules of engagement that minimize suffering after a war begins. Hence, such documents as the Geneva Convention and organizations like the Red Cross permit expressions of the humanitarian impulse even in times of war. The Lieber perspective could be said to suggest that the consideration of suffering should be part of the calculus in determining strategic objectives. While suffering is an unfortunate part of war, the reasons for inflicting suffering must justify its happenstance. One view in this regard is that the suffering imposed must be proportional to the goals sought to be achieved. However, both have a primary focus on how war should be conducted such Commentary: Personal Reflections 159 that suffering is reduced as much as possible using principles of humanitarianism that would be in the self-interest of both sides of a conflict to follow. I I read Professor Witt’s essay from the perspective of a father of a United States Army soldier. I have no direct experience in war but have reflected on my son’s choice to join the army and become a warrior during the time of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Needless to say, I am proud of his service to his country and of the awesome responsibility that he voluntarily assumed by this decision. During his basic training he was drilled in the values of serving as a warrior in the US Army. In the Soldier’s Creed, he learned about the various duties he had as a “trained and proficient” warrior ; as a member of a team fully committed to accomplishing assigned missions ; and as “a guardian of freedom”for his country.1 Moreover,the portion of the creed that struck me to the core was this statement: “I stand ready to deploy, engage, and destroy the enemies of the United States in close combat.”2 He was placing himself in harm’s way, as we too often euphemistically use that phrase, and he was being trained to kill other human beings in order to protect the United States. For him, this was the core of who he had become as a soldier serving in the First Cavalry Division,a mechanized infantry unit. For me, he personalized another euphemism: he was part of “the boots on the ground.” Each one of my son’s three deployments served different objectives and required varying considerations, some strategic and some political.The first deployment placed him in the middle of the surge, that period when the forces were placed directly inside Baghdad and other Iraqi cities to quash the insurgency by routing out the insurgents (rebels) and forces of al-Qaeda. This was house-to-house, on the street, urban warfare requiring the capturing and/or killing of insurgents and the disarming of anyone who could be thought of as an enemy of the efforts to establish peace and order.The second deployment still involved search-and-destroy missions but also included a heavy dose of training so-called freedom fighters who were now taking ownership of the future security of their country. They had moved out of the urban centers to bases away from large populations. The third deployment was...

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