Well, they didn’t have atom bombs in feudal times. And the hang-up isn’t about civilian casualties per se. It’s about “…every act of war directed to the indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast areas with their inhabitants.” That is what the Church condemns in CCC 2314. And that is what dropping an atom bomb on a city does.Miguel, from reading your post, it seems a hang up is about the use of tactics and weapons that will result in civilian deaths. The question you seem to hold supreme is whether bombs can be used in warfare against any built up position. There might be some agrement modern armies exist and are as affective as the strength of their logistical and material support and that means the civilian populations supporting them. This means there will always be civilians around legitimate military targets. And if your only criteria for invoking CCC 2314 is civilians dieing then any bombardment must be a war crime. Including Sherman’s bombardment of Atlanta and Grants bombardment of Vicksburg.
For myself and my two cents worth I think Wolseley has it mostly right. Because the one thing the CCC doesn’t take into consideration is that modern governments authorize the legitimate; that is legal killing of other human beings. Normally, that type of warfare is going to be conducted by uniformed military personnel but now the latest vogue is gorilla and insurgent warriors . Civilians for the most part are only applauding the military and throwing food, clothing, munitions, and everything else the military needs to execute its job of killing the approved targets. So, under such a sociological construct of a military, killing at the orders of civilians, being supplied and funded by civilians, is there any such thing as innocent civilians; especially in the cultural and ethnic circumstances of WWII? Remember, the Japanese were as much, if not more, a racist culture then the US at the time. And their children were being trained in school how to assault the American soldiers with bamboo spears.
IMHO the CCC 2314 reads as if the world was still a feudal organization with distinct classes and clearly identifiable roles. But the world isn’t that clearly divided any more.
Sherman still has it right, “War is hell , it is all hell… you can not refine it.”
as so does firebombing.Well, they didn’t have atom bombs in feudal times. And the hang-up isn’t about civilian casualties per se. It’s about “…every act of war directed to the indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast areas with their inhabitants.” That is what the Church condemns in CCC 2314. And that is what dropping an atom bomb on a city does.
Wrong. It certainly can with today’s technology.An atom bomb dropped on a city can’t be used any other way. That’s the nature of it.
In CCC 2314, the word indiscriminate is applied to the “destruction of whole cities or vast areas with their inhabitants.” That is the effect of dropping an atom bomb on a city. It’s not talking about just any old bomb dropped on a military target with civilian casualties.Only to the extent that any bomd is indiscriminate. Trying winning a war without bombs. If one is in the blast area, one will die. If a military target is chose over a civilian target, that is a discrimination.
Let me give an example: There is a large munition plant on the west end of a city. This country is engage in an unjust war aimed at the eradication of all that are not part of their Empire. The plant is hardened and the only way to penetrate and destroy everything inside is the use of a nuclear weapon. Such a weapon will kill 10,000 to 20,000 civilians, but it is the only way to destroy the plant. The product of this plant? A genetically altered virus that will probably result in the deaths of hundreds of million, if not billions, when it is released.
You may not want to use the law of double effect, but it surely applies, or no just war can exist.
The precursor of the word “indiscriminate” is the phrase “unrestricted warfare.” This was condemn during WWII. If indiscriminate applies to the armament and not the use of the arms, that is, targeting, then all weapons are indiscriminate, even small arms.
OK, so what technology allows you to drop an atom bomb on a city and it not result in the “indiscriminate destruction of…a vast area with its inhabitants”?Wrong. It certainly can with today’s technology…
I guess I just can’t agree with how you interpret that section. It does not seem consistent with the CCC context of justified war. The motive must be considered.In CCC 2314, the word indiscriminate is applied to the “destruction of whole cities or vast areas with their inhabitants.” That is the effect of dropping an atom bomb on a city. It’s not talking about just any old bomb dropped on a military target with civilian casualties.
2314 "Every act of war directed to the indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast areas with their inhabitants is a crime against God and man, which merits firm and unequivocal condemnation."110 A danger of modern warfare is that it provides the opportunity to those who possess modern scientific weapons especially atomic, biological, or chemical weapons - to commit such crimes.
I think the Church assumes the motive is evil if you drop an atom bomb on a city. But maybe you could explain why you think it’s inconsistent with just war.I guess I just can’t agree with how you interpret that section. It does not seem consistent with the CCC context of justified war. The motive must be considered.
The act is not just “dropping a bomb.” The act is “dropping an atom bomb on a city.” As I see it, it is impossible to do that and not have the result of indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast area with their inhabitants." The two go hand in hand.“Every act of war directed to the indiscriminate destruction…” If the act of dropping a bomb is not directed at the indiscrimate destruction of civilians, yet that is the foreseable consequence, the law of double effect can most definitely be applied.
You’re right. It doesn’t state that. Testing one underground in the unihabited part of the Nevada desert is not intrinsically evil. Targetting an enemy military vessel at sea with a nuke is not an intrinsic evil either and certainly not what CCC 2314 addresses.Section 2314 does not state that any use of an atomic weapon is intrinsically evil. Only then can your use of the axiom that one can not do evil to affect good applies.
Then such an act would be wrong. But the question is what is the act** directed** toward, If, as in the case above, one committed an act directed at the prevention of a billion deaths, then the result must be measured against the good. If, as in the case of WWII, the act was directed toward preventing an invasion that would cost a million lives, maybe si, maybe no. I have no judgment there.The act is “dropping an atom bomb on a city.” As I see it, it is impossible to do that and not have the result of indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast area with their inhabitants." .
Many. There are tactical nuclear warheads designed to be used by artillery, for one. To indulge in your grand over-generalizations is hyperbole, to say the least.OK, so what technology allows you to drop an atom bomb on a city and it not result in the “indiscriminate destruction of…a vast area with its inhabitants”?
If your interpretation of “indescriminate” is correct then it would never be realistically appropiate to use a nuclear weapon.The act is not just “dropping a bomb.” The act is “dropping an atom bomb on a city.” As I see it, it is impossible to do that and not have the result of indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast area with their inhabitants." The two go hand in hand.
You’re right. It doesn’t state that. Testing one underground in the unihabited part of the Nevada desert is not intrinsically evil. Targetting an enemy military vessel at sea with a nuke is not an intrinsic evil either and certainly not what CCC 2314 addresses.
If your interpretation of “indescriminate” is correct then it would never be realistically appropiate to use a nuclear weapon.
I think that is his position. Some people think these weapons are intrinsically evil.
War is never pleasant. We were forced to choose between two options. No one wanted to do either one.
That’s pretty much it in a nutshell.
I know this thread is 5 pages long, and this may have been brought up already, but most people forget that there were also some 5000 Chinese being killed each and every day in the war or due to the war. That’s about 150,000 Chinese deaths each month. If the conquest of Japan had lasted another 6 months that’s nearly a million more Chinese lives lost.I was listening to an historian on this subject last week on C-SPAN, he pointed out that the USSR entered the war against Japan the same time we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, invading Manchuria with 1.5 million troops.
Any invasion would have been of the Japanese homeland would have been by the US and the USSR, leading to a Japan divided like Germany. The Sovs would have certainly gotten Hokkaido, the northern island. Dropping the bombs avoided this.
Does this make dropping the bombs more moral? Preventing the communists seems like a good side benefit.
I also think it’s a mistake to get hung up on the atomic bombs just because they were atomic. We fire-bombed Tokyo, causing greater death and devastation than in either Hiroshima or Nagasaki.
And if the Army Group sets itself up in the heart of a city ( across the street from a school), does that make it immune from attack in Catholic Moral teaching?Dropping a bomb on the 5th Army Group where some civilian casualties occur is very much different than dropping an atom bomb on a city. I don’t think it’s possible to make this rationalization when we’re talking about dropping an atom bomb on a city. This is precisely what the Church condemns in CCC 2314.
By the same token, you would have to argue that the massive shell and bomb campaing against the Normandy coast prior to D-Day was immoral, as there was no way to restrict damage to just German troops instead of French civilians.If you drop an atom bomb on a city, you can’t argue that it wasn’t directed at civilians. .
There the act was firing at definite military targets. There was of course, unintended damage of civilians, but that occurred in the course of firing at the Nazi installations up and down the coast.By the same token, you would have to argue that the massive shell and bomb campaing against the Normandy coast prior to D-Day was immoral, as there was no way to restrict damage to just German troops instead of French civilians.
The nature of the bombsights and artillery tables of the time would certainly mean civilians would be hit as well.
Was D-Day immoral because of that?
But if the target of the bomb was the HQ of the 2nd Army and the Home Defense Command, would not the civilian casualties also fall under ‘unintended damage’?There the act was firing at definite military targets. There was of course, unintended damage of civilians, but that occurred in the course of firing at the Nazi installations up and down the coast.
No, one can be a straight Thomist or neo-Thomist and hold that it was a morally acceptable act of war.The only way the Atomic bombs of Hiroshima and Nagasaki can be viewed morally is if one is a follower of McBrien and Curran, a proportionalist. .