A terrorist Hesbollah flag over Wall Street

[The Magistrate]

107. Some Of It Is a Sort Of Catagory Error, Sir

War being itself immoral, consisting in the attempt by violence to impose your will on another, it is pointless to quibble about moral concerns within the conduct of war. Things advance a belligerent's aim, or they do not. It may be useful to achieving its aim for a belligerent to behave in some ways, such a treatment of prisoners or care for safety of enemy non-combatants, as a virtuous man engaged in a virtuous pursuit would be expected to act. But it's a simulacrum of virtue, not the actual stuff: clemency rather than mercy. And often the opposite conclusion is drawn, that atrocity is just the thing that can secure the aim of the exercise. The only thing that 'justifies' the cruelties of war is achievement of the aim, and that only in the eyes of the victor and friends. To fail in achieving the aim by violence is the sole sin available....