On the moral equality of combatants

Journal of Political Philosophy

Volumn 14, Issue 4, 2006, Pages 377-393

  Mcmahan, Jeff ^a  

^a RUTGERS UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 33750689931     PISSN: 09638016     EISSN: 14679760     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9760.2006.00265.x     Document Type: Article

References (15)

1. IV.i.128-35.
2. For the distinction between a good cause and a just cause, see Jeff McMahan, "Just cause for war," Ethics and International Affairs, 19 (2005), 1-21.
3. Michael Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1977), p. 146.
4. Jeff McMahan, "The ethics of killing in war," Ethics, 114, (2004), 693-733, especially pp. 708-18.
5. In The Ethics of Killing in War I will identify some confusions that I believe motivate people's commitment to the doctrine of the moral equality of combatants.
6. Just and Unjust Wars, p. 145. On p. 136 he claims that "simply by fighting . . . [combatants] have lost their title to life and liberty."
7. Just and Unjust Wars, p. 37.
8. For a dissenting view of duress, see Peter Westen and James Mangiafico, "The criminal defense of duress: a justification, not an excuse - and why it matters," Buffalo Criminal Law Review, 6 (2003), 833-950.
9. I'm indebted to Raymond Martin for suggesting to me a version of this argument.
10. For a brief account of both groups and the effects of their action, see Guy Grossman and Rami Kaplan, "Refusal in Israel: the third wave 2002-2005," Journal of Peace Review 18, forthcoming. (The authors were co-founders of Courage to Refuse).
11. For an important contribution to the debate in Israel, see David Enoch, "Some arguments against conscientious objection and civil disobedience refuted," Israel Law Review, 36 (2004), 227-53.
12. "Young officers leaving army at a high rate," New York Times, April 10, 2006.
13. This challenge is suggested in Cheney Ryan, "The responsibility of soldiers and a new symmetry problem," (unpublished manuscript),
14. and in Colonel Daniel Zupan, "The logic of community, ignorance, and the presumption of moral equality: a soldier's story," (unpublished manuscript).
15. See Samantha Power, "A Problem From Hell": America and the Age of Genocide (New York: HarperCollins, 2002), chs 9 and 10.