As the possibility of war with Iraq seems increasingly inevitable, Americans are grappling with questions about the ethics of war. Scholars, political theorists and religious leaders have continued to debate and discuss what criteria must be met for war to be justified.

At a recent symposium hosted by the Ethics and Public Policy Center, several prominent scholars detailed their views on U.S. military action in Iraq in the context of just war tradition, including journalist Christopher Hitchens, I. F. Stone Fellow at the Graduate School of Journalism, U.C. Berkeley and professor at the New School in New York City; William Galston, professor of Civic Engagement and director of the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy at the University of Maryland; and George Weigel, a Catholic theologian and senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.

While Hitchens argued that war is justified on the basis of the actions of the Baath regime, Weigel agreed based on principles found in the just war tradition.

Galston, who served as deputy assistant to the president for Domestic Policy during the Clinton administration, believes that despite the fact that Iraq has violated numerous agreements, the United States should work with the United Nations to legislate effective foreign policy for ourselves and for the world. In his view, deterrence is still a viable option and the threats posed by Saddam Hussein’s regime and the accumulation of weapons of mass destruction do not constitute and act of aggression. "Agression is an action, it is not a capability or a potential. There are many things that people would do if it were not for the consequences," he said. "That is what divides the proponents of deterrence from the proponents of prevention. This distinction must not be erased by a redefinition of classic concepts."

In Galston’s view, Iraq does not pose a direct threat to the people and territory of the United States, and the "declaratory purpose" of our policy ought to be preventing a "nuclear-armed Iraq from altering the balance of power and influence in a region of vast importance to the U.S. and its allies."

According to Weigel, who authored a 1987 book on just war theory titled Tranquillitas Ordinis: The Present Failure and Future Promise of American Catholic Thought on War and Peace, the just war tradition, which dates back to St. Augustine’s City of God, is a theory of statecraft that continues to develop as new political realities arise. "New realities in American public life and new weapons technologies have posed new questions for the just war tradition," he said.

Rather than beginning with a "presumption against violence," Weigel said that just war tradition takes as its starting point "the moral responsibility of legitimate public authority to provide for the security of those for whom it has assumed responsibility." In this context, just war tradition aims at defending morally worthy political ends of justice, freedom, security, order, the general welfare and peace.

Citing his recent lecture titled Moral Clarity in a Time of War, Weigel focused on three classic war decision criteria that have framed the public debate over the last several months. The first of these is just cause. Traditionally, within the just war theory, just cause has been understood as a "response to an aggression under way, the recovery of something wrongfully taken or the punishment of an evil." While most just war theorists in recent history have restricted the definition of just cause to "aggression under way," Weigel called for a re-examination of the definition of an aggressive action in light of the accumulation of weapons of mass destruction by "rogue states" that defy norms of international order. "Denying rogue states the capacity to create international disorder serves the world order," he said.

In addition to just cause, Weigel called for careful consideration of the issues of competent authority and last resort. Calling into question the United Nations Security Council as presently constituted a "dubious representative of moral authority," Weigel said that according to the Catechism it is the responsibility of statesmen who have relevant information and who are entrusted with the common good ultimately to decide whether war is justified. Similarly, religious leaders and scholars, while called to develop and teach the moral and philosophical aspects of the just war tradition, do not represent the final authority on decisions about war.

Last resort, he said, has always been a prudential calculation and cannot mean waiting until an aggressor is ready to deploy weapons of mass destruction before trying to stop him.

While some have applied the term "preventive war" to the current situation, Weigel said the term is not helpful, since the conflict with Iraq has been underway for 12 years.

Finally, Weigel said the fact that Americans are discussing the possibility of war within just war categories is positive and encouraging as it indicates that the "natural philosophical human instinct to know the true and the good" is very much alive in our society.

"It says something about the United States of America that our national debate on this very urgent and dangerous matter has been conducted instinctively within just war categories. That does not happen, I dare say, in France and Germany. That says something about us, a people given too much moral flagellation that this tradition still lives as a cultural memory in this country," Weigel said. "That it can be misused and has been in the present circumstances by some is obvious. But that these criteria emerge as natural philosophical instincts from the human person to know the true and the good are still alive and well bodes well for the future of our country and public policy."