Justice Under Attack

In the coming weeks and months there will be a significant public debate in the United States on the proper and precise response to the acts of terrorism of September 11. As we are now confronted by the nature of war in the 21st century, clear, principled Christian reflection is critically important.

Before Christians analyze and evaluate the various recommendations for responding to these acts of terrorism, we must first ask what makes terrorism a particularly grave evil. The initial answer is, of course, so obvious to both Christian believers and nonbelievers alike that the very question seems ridiculous.

Terrorists are particularly evil because, unlike trained and disciplined soldiers on the traditional battlefield, they deliberately and intentionally attack innocent and defenseless civilians. Christians tutored in the just-war tradition will denounce terrorism because, in the language of the tradition, such actions are morally forbidden by the "principle of discrimination" or "noncombatant immunity."

To be morally appalled at the attack on innocents is entirely justifiable, and the call for justice in the form of retribution is entirely warranted. In fact, what makes this attack even more egregious than the attack on Pearl Harbor, aside from the fact that the number killed will be far greater, is that the focus of Japanese attack was at least on military targets. If a declaration of war was justified in the former instance, it is hard to see how it is not justified in this one.

Still, a Christian political and moral judgment against terrorism cannot remain confined to the violation of the principle of discrimination and the targeting of civilians. Indeed, to understand the evil of terrorism exclusively through the prism of noncombatant immunity is to make a dangerous moral and political concession.

Classically, Christian teaching on war and the use of force are known by the Latin terms jus ad bellum (literally, justice toward war) and jus in bello (justice in war). The jus ad bellum provides guidance on the resort to force. The jus in bello places restraints on fighting a justified war. It is important to understand that the prohibition of attacks on noncombatants is part of the jus in bello, or the right conduct of war. The very distinction between guilt of the combatants and innocence of noncombatants is a legal one, which only applies in a state of war between recognized combatants.

To fully gauge the evil of this attack and of contemporary terrorism in general, and hence properly choose and evaluate a response, we must turn to the other part of the just-war tradition, the jus ad bellum. Christian just-war theory prescribes that before war can be waged there must be a legitimate authority, just cause, and right intention. Political leaders must then prudentially judge that the use of force will be successful, is a last resort, will produce more good than evil effects, and will secure peace.

To fully understand the injustice of terrorism, we must consider in particular the requirement of legitimate authority. Who has the right to make war? In recent years, discussions of authority often focus on such questions as whether the president can use force without the consent of Congress or whether a nation must first seek international approval for the use of force. Those are important questions, but they fail to address the most fundamental issue.

It is not insignificant that in addressing whether war could be waged justly, both St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas began with the issue of legitimate authority, citing as biblical support Romans 13:1-6. By legitimate authority they meant a political authority to whom there is no superior.

Beginning with Augustine, and throughout the Middle Ages, Christians sought to curb violence by emphasizing that only legitimate political authority could wage war. They thereby declared illegitimate any use of force by subordinate nobles, private soldiers, criminals, and even the church.

Eventually, when confronted with a militaristic Germanic culture in which princes frequently engaged and glorified in combat for private ends, Christian thinkers repeatedly insisted that warfare was a public issue. War could not merely be an extreme tool of private parties but had to be a legal instrument, a part of the coercive power of law itself. Historically and theoretically, securing the public monopoly on the use of force was a necessary (albeit not sufficient) precondition for a peaceful and civilized society.

The freelance terrorism of the late 20th and now the 21st century is nothing less than a direct assault on this Christian achievement. Left unchallenged, the rise of terrorism may foreshadow a return to the barbarism of private war. But a return to private warfare is even more ominous since vengeance is no longer fueled by distorted notions of private glory and honor. Today motives are ideological, ethnic, and religious fanaticism, which know no bounds. And they are accompanied by technology that's capable of inflicting massive carnage.

While the precise political-military response to terrorism both in the short and long term will generate vigorous debate, the U.S. government must not fail to respond firmly, deliberately, and aggressively as a legitimate authority to the challenge of terrorism itself. This will involve killing or capturing those responsible. And it will probably involve military action against those nations that have aided and abetted them. Our public officials must do so because, whether they know it or not, they are responsible to God for the protection of the innocent. They must not carry out their responsibilities in a manner that suggests frustration with due process and the rule of law but in a way that indicates that terrorist acts cannot be respected as having any public legitimacy.

The grievances of a people may never be legitimately represented by an act of terrorism because injustices must be addressed by legitimate public authority. Failure of the United States to act decisively against terrorism in a publicly authorized way may encourage the proliferation of disorder and barbarism of a kind far worse than the private wars of the so-called Dark Ages.

-- Keith Pavlischek is a fellow at the Center for Public Justice, Washington, D.C., and director of the Pew Civitas Program in Faith and Public Affairs. He is also a colonel in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve.

This article originally appeared online at http://www.thebanner.org. Copyright 2001, CRC Publications. All rights reserved.