Myths have a way of resurfacing in the public narrative from time to time. In our era, this often comes with the help of organized communication campaigns aimed at swaying public opinion toward a desired belief for the purpose of achieving a planned behavioral outcome.
You can observe a recent example in the onslaught of information operations canonizing Renee Good—the woman who struck a federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent with her SUV in Minneapolis last week—as a gentle mother and poet rather than the radical, lawbreaking activist she chose to become. That narrative is bought and paid for by someone.
Despite the strong temptation to dig into that issue, it’s important to explore another example of a manipulative narrative plaguing our nation over the last several weeks. The news cycle, after all, is designed to prevent serious reflection by moving us from one outrage to another. We would do well to buck the desires of progressive elites and reflect on the reality of a myth that has more longevity.
I have watched with interest over the course of recent weeks the resurgence of law of war mythology. Curiously, those speaking most frequently on this topic seem to think that only the United States violates this alleged set of laws—and only when a Republican holds the White House, I might add. Those perpetuating this idea—safe within the nation they find no end of reasons to castigate—mislead much of the public on the subject of just war theory.
Contrary to their premise, there is no such thing as a law of warfare. At best, there are norms of war. Those norms span the range of what we consider fair to barbaric. Each warring faction decides what its norms will be. That’s true of combat at all levels, ideological to physical, regional skirmish to global war.
Most who live in countries managed through representative forms of government are unaware that the fundamental condition of power is one in which he with the strongest arm rules. That remains true in most parts of the world. The Republic—in which disputes are typically settled with some form of public input—is an exception to how mankind usually operates, and requires the good faith commitment of all involved to operate successfully. The neo-Bolsheviks among us know well the fact that those who control the majority of violent force usually win. They count on it and don’t hesitate to use force when they have it.
We’ve all heard the statement that all’s fair in love and war. Civil War era general William Tecumseh Sherman’s assessment was more candid. “War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it.” But we want to refine battle, to make it less brutal.
Enter Christian Just War Tradition. This ethical framework aims to restrict the act of waging war to only the most morally just causes, with the intent of minimizing loss of innocent life and restoring the peace expeditiously. Christian Just War Tradition says the ends must justify the means, and the means must be righteous.
This philosophy informed the post WWII Geneva Convention, to which the United States is a signatory. That set of international agreements was written to set parameters for uniformed militaries representing legitimate states. Its writers were powerless to restrict the conduct of insurgent forces that the U.S. has engaged with regularity for decades, such as the Taliban, ISIS, Haqqani Network, and other Iranian proxies, in addition to South American drug cartels. The philosophies observed by their kind hold that any means can be justified in order to achieve the ends. It is one thing to fight with honor, another to fight with one’s arms tied behind the back. Enemy forces know the rules of engagement that restrict American forces and take full advantage of them. The same can be said of the neo-Bolshevik revolutionaries at continual work against ordered liberty in spaces that include our classrooms, news agencies, civil halls of power, and streets.
When someone says something is wrong, we have to ask by what standard. Those claiming that America is violating the supposed laws of war in defending our shores from drug traffickers make a moral claim in doing so. But on what authority? The theoretical law of war for humanity was not written by the almighty creator on a sacred tablet. American laws were passed through a legislative process and apply to those within the purview of American law. There is no legitimate lawmaking body superior to those we elect to legislate global law on how nations clash. The U.S. can make laws for how our nation’s forces engage in combat. Yet America’s enemies will always fail to similarly self-restrict.
Many among the retired military officers condemning use of military force against seaborne drug runners found it in themselves to approve of unending, stalemate combat operations across the Middle East for the entirety of their careers. Commanding such operations—most of which lacked clear connection to our nation’s security—was their credentialing process for promotion during the forever war era. To now jeer at limited strikes betrays a conveniently timed moral epiphany.
In a further twist of irony, most critics of sinking drug boats managed to fully support the U.S. helping to prolong the deadly war in Ukraine. The biggest change in the conduct of military operations under President Trump, compared to the last several commanders in chief, is that recent American military strikes are increasingly limited and more surgical than those ordered by his recent predecessors. Collateral damage is less than at any point in my global war on terrorism era military career. Former President George W. Bush dragged America into decades of war that killed thousands of Americans to end Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq. Trump ended the Maduro regime in one night, without the loss of a single American.
Actual American law prohibits the smuggling of deadly drugs into the nation, and it turns out that making the drug boat business one with deadly risk is making it an undesirable career path. Defending against that threat is not unlawful, but the righteous application of force to protect the nation. Against such, there is no legitimate international law of war.
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