NOT JUST A WAR AND NOT A JUST WAR

I once delivered a series of speeches in the Senate, all of them titled, "A
Just War Against Drug." In those speeches I liberally adopted elements from
the Just War theory in Catholic tradition, a theory that some theologians
claim goes as far back as St. Augustine, who maintained that rulers of
nations have the obligation to maintain peace, and that this obligation
gives them the right to wager war. Indeed, for St. Augustine, the only
reason for waging a war would be to defend the nation's peace if there is a
serious threat to it.

Then as now, the illegal drugs trade is the most serious threat against
peace and order in our country.

Over two-thirds of all heinous crimes committed in our country are
drug-related. Billions in drug money have been used to corrupt the
institutions that are supposed to establish law and order.

The scourge of illegal drugs has claimed both children and adults in families.

It has spread through schools and workplaces. Today, it has inflicted
damages far worse than any terrorist can and, I believe, ever will inflict
in the future.

I've devoted several columns about illegal drugs already (with perhaps more
to come) but this will not be another one of them. It's enough to say that
in those speeches I was urging the state to uphold its responsibility to
wage a war against illegal drugs to reestablish peace and order.

Eventually, among the policy measures that would be adopted in the war
against illegal drugs was the imposition of the death penalty on drug
traffickers, a law enacted through a bill I authored in the. Senate.

I said I only liberally adopted elements from the Just War theory because
the theory actually applies or should apply to two sovereign nations
engaged in armed conflict.

It's not a theory one usually applies when the state wages a war against a
particular group of people within it, like say drug traffickers. Still, St.
Augustine emphasized the idea of restoring peace as the main motive for
war. "We do not seek peace in order to be at war, but we go to war that we
may have peace ...," he said.

Through the centuries, the Just War theory would be further developed into
the set of ethical conditions justifying modern warfare that some
governments and peoples continue to use (and some denounce) today.

For instance, in the 16th and 17th centuries, a couple of theologians,
Victoria and Suarez, would make the distinction between offensive and
defensive wars. If a peaceful country is attacked and it launches an armed
response against the aggressor then such is an offensive war, which, they
said, needed no moral justification. The other type of war is an aggressive
war, where injurious actions that do not result in death and destruction
(insulting a people's religion for example) are taken against a peaceful
country and the latter launches an armed response. Aggressive wars need to
be justified, they said, thus the need for a Just War theory (the Popes of
the two World Wars, Benedict XV and Pius XII would later rule out
aggressive wars altogether). Victoria and Suarez would add two more
principles to the theory: that war must be used only as a last resort and
it must he conducted in a proper manner without killing the innocent.

In the 20th century, the basic principles of the Just War theory would be
amended. "Peace" would be better defined by the term "just cause" for a
Just War. A just cause would be using armed response to correct a grave
public evil like the massive violation of the basic rights of whole
populations. And other principles would also be added, like the principle
of proportionality, which says that the overall destruction from the use of
force must be outweighed by the good to be achieved, and the probability of
success, which says that arms may not be used in a futile case where
disproportionate measures are required to achieve success.

The United States Catholic Conference explained the criteria of the Just
War theory in its 1993 statement "The Harvest of Justice Is Sown in Peace."

Now, we are facing America's imminent war on Iraq. It is a war that is not
just any war. Thinking on the extreme, it is a war that could very well
trigger the Third World War. Not a few Muslim leaders have called America's
use of military force against Iraq as an attack against Islam. Some have
even called it the 21st Century Crusade, a label guaranteed to bring on
rancor among many Muslim people.

Even if one is not being alarmist the war on Iraq cannot bring much good,
especially to us who really have not tiff with the country.

It is also not a just war, even if one considers only two of the most basic
principles of the Just War theory.

First, is there a just cause for America, Great Britain and their other
allies to attack Iraq at this time? The answer is clearly no. Since Iraq's
invasion of Kuwait precipitated the Gulf War it has not been an aggressor
towards any country.

Allegations that it is going to lay siege on America with weapons of mass
destruction are just that, mere allegations, which up to this time are
unfounded.

Linking Saddam to al-Qaida is even more of a stretch.

The fact is, Iraq has not killed citizens nor destroyed properties in any
of the countries itching to bomb her. There is no casus belli for an armed
response or retaliation, certainly not for the sake of peace, because
attacking Iraq will do the very opposite, provoke Saddam and the Iraqi
military to unleash whatever weapons he has or forge ties with other Muslim
extremists to sow terror on the rest of the so-called civilized world.

Saddam knows only too well after Kuwait that using the Iraqi military and
its resources against another country would invite massive and rapid
retaliation from the community of nations.

There were 37 nations who joined the coalition against Iraq in the Gulf War
and Saddam got creamed. Saddam would not want to be humiliated like that
all over again unless you give him no other option.

Even a mouse can fight hack when cornered by a cat, what more a dictator?

As Sun Thu said, one should always give an enemy an honorable way out.

Furthermore, who is really the aggrieved party here? Saddam may deserve all
that is coming to hint but the people of Iraq do not. They are victims of
Saddam's tyranny as well as the economic sanctions imposed by his western
enemies, sanctions that have claimed the lives of millions of innocent
civilians in Iraq.

Secondly, is the war against Iraq really the last option?

Have all the peaceful alternatives been tried and exhausted?

Again the answer is no. News articles everywhere have repeatedly pointed
out that the UN weapons inspections in Iraq are not even halfway through.

If Iraq is indeed developing and manufacturing weapons of mass destruction
and is intending to use them, then the world must first enforce
international law and the UN resolutions against Iraq, not launch a
military strike against her right away. The UN weapons' inspections would
allow the world to restrict or eliminate Iraq's capability to use such
weapons, and would allow the process of peace to continue.

There are other principles in the Just War theory that the preemptive
strikes against Iraq would violate.

But just these two basic principles show that in Iraq's case, the balance
comes down strongly against war.