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JUST-WAR DOCTRINE AND PACIFISM I HE USUAL ETHICAL ANALYSIS of war begins with a stated or implied contrast of two extreme positions , one labeled realist and the other pacifist. Both concur on the immorality of war, but divide on the ramifications . Realists maintain the necessity of war and participation in it, and pacifists reject the necessity of war and participation in it. Underlying both extremes is an accepted equation of war and violence with action and power; peace and nonviolence with passivity and love. The enigmatic implication is that both active opposition to evil and passive reception of evil beget more evil. Evil is victorious either way. Proponents of just-war doctrine tend to accept these connotations for realist war and pacifist peace, but hope to avoid the consequent dilemma. They cling to the necessity of war and violence, but advance loopholing circumstances under which violence is justified. At the same time, interpreting movement on behalf of peace as passive, they offer peacemakers only a ritualistic pat on the back. Such an approach concentrates ethical discussion on the details surrounding war battles, with little examination of the correlative moral necessity of peacemaking activities. Prior to a war, nuclear arms buildup, nuclear proliferation, and disarmament, for example, receive scant moral attention, but should World War III break out ethicists would argue a.d nauseam the morality of why and how it was fought. A second deleterious effect is that justifying circumstances or loopholes have become so pliable that any astute politician readily finds his or her warmongering accorded a moral evaluation, if not by all moralists, at least by a significant few. Thus serious moral criticism of even all-out nuclear war is effectively blunted. This article reexamines these concepts of just-war and pacifism. 501 50~ JOSEPH C. KUNKEL The Foundation £or Just-War In a recent article, Thomas Pangle points out that the discussion of just-war by St. Thomas Aquinas is placed not in the section on natural law, the law of nations, nor justice. "In fact," says Pangle, " it is treated in the context of none of the natural virtues but rather within the discussion of the most 'theological' or strictly Christian virtue of charity." 1 "Peace," to quote Aquinas, "is the work of justice indirectly, insofar as justice removes the obstacles to peace; but it is the work of charity directly, since charity, according to its very nature, causes peace." 2 I do not wish to enter into Pangle's concerns as to whether the source of just-war doctrine in Aquinas is divine law or natural law. But I do wish to reflect on some often overlooked implications of positioning the discussion of war ethics under charity. The principal act of charity is love and under the effects of love St. Thomas posits peace. War is a vice opposing peace. In this discussion Aquinas is clearly favoring the side of charity, love, and peace. Decidedly he is not taking a middleroad stance between war and peace. Given the two alternatives of warmongering and peacemaking Aquinas is a peacemaker. He would hardly see the makers of peace contributing to evil in almost the same mould as the realists, who hold that anything goes in war. Even in phrasing the question which leads to the celebrated just-war doctrine St. Thomas shows his leaning toward peace. He does not ask when are wars moral, nor what are the conditions £or a just war. Rather St. Thomas queries sharply "Whether it is always sinful to wage war." 3 What has happened to the Thomistic doctrine on just-war? A significant but simplified answer is that we have fallen prey 1 T. Pangle, "A Note on the Theoretical Foundation of the Just War Doctrine ," The ThomUit, Vol. 43 (1979), p. 467. 2 St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, trans. by Fathers of the English Dominican P:r'Ovince, Pt. II-II, ques. 29, art. 3, ad 3. Pangle also quotes this passage. a Ibid., ques. 40, art. 1. JUST-WAR DOCTRINE AND PACIFISM 508 to thinking characteristic of Machiavelli and Hobbes. Machiavelli says, "... Whoever desires to forward a state and give it laws, must start with assuming that all...

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