Essay on Wartime Decision
As the president of a country that is engaged in a war with another country, I am responsible for my citizens, but I should act ethically in relation to the citizens of other countries as well. I know that the country has a weapons factory from which it produces bombs and ammunitions that it is using to fight my country. The factory is located in a populated area. As the president I have to decide on a course of action, whether to bomb the weapons factory or not. According to military ethicists, “the pressures and high stakes in war, the moral legal tensions, and resulting conflicts, and the well-trained, but fallible, human beings making the decisions are inescapable sources of moral error” (Roblyer, 2014, p. 34). The choices that confront me and the consequences of each choice involve certain moral or ethical questions.
One of the choices that confront me as the president is to bomb the weapons factory, even if it is located in a densely populated area. In this case, the bombs targeted the weapons factory could kill civilians living or working nearby. I realize that this choice is unethical in relation to these civilians because the bombs could miss their military target, landing on the territory with dense civilian populations. However, it would be a correct choice to stop aggression against my country and my people. I would be able to destroy the weapons factory and my enemies would lack enough weapons to succeed in military operations. In this case, I could even win the war. Nevertheless, I should act ethically because the consequences of my choice could lead to immorality in military decision making. According to researchers, there are the so-called “neutralizers” that can effectively operate in any “wartime decision environment” (Roblyer, 2014, p. 32). These neutralizers make any successful decision morally justifiable. The application of ethics to military decision making is part of international law ethics (Johnson, 1999). It is necessary to assess the actual effects of weapons used.
Another choice that confronts me as the president is to avoid bombing the weapons factory. This military decision could be regarded as ethical. In this case, the civilians living or working nearby would not suffer. Opposing the use of the bombs on the densely populated areas, I should find another solution to stop the production of weapons. I would be focused on the use of some other strategies aimed at destroying the specific target, the weapons factory. This fact means I would not use the weapon for destroying a large area, but I would plan an operation locally. For example, skilled sabotage demolitionists could do it, avoiding numerous victims among civilians. Undoubtedly, in this case, there would be no serious damage caused to innocent civilians.
Thus, it is necessary to conclude that military decisions should be aimed at avoiding striking a target in populated areas, placing innocent people at risk. As the president of my country, I should minimize harm caused to innocent civilians, even if they are the citizens of other countries. Military targets are not worth the lives of civilians. As the president of a country that is engaged in a war with another country, I should follow “morality of war” based on the legal standards and norms of international law of war.
Do you like this essay?
Our writers can write a paper like this for you!
(No Ratings Yet)
Loading...