For anyone who wasn’t born before, during, or immediately after World War II, you may have forgotten or never been consciously aware of the crucial lessons taught by the conduct of WWII and its end.  If you are an American raised and living in America you probably have lived your entire life under an invisible shield called International Law.  Crimes agains civilians were made prosecutable under international law.  One of the invisible brakes on the use of nuclear weapons in your lifetime has been the devastation of civilian population that will come with the use of those overwhelming forces of destruction. Since the end of WWII and its nuclear bombs in Japan until this most current era of leadership has it even been even remotely acceptable to shoot and bomb your way through an innocent civilian population being used as a shield to get at the opposing military line. We have broken the rules that keep you safe. The guerrilla war tactics of the Viet Nam war began the erosion of distinction between soldier and civilian and it has been eroding ever since.  But lately the distinction has been cast almost entirely aside.  Appalling is it may seem a group of militants have shielded themselves, hiding behind their own civilians composed of doctors, mothers, children, infants, elders, and all walks of life. These last conflicts have given us a rare glimpse at what it looks like to destroy the innocent civilians in the path to get to the line of war. If we accept this approach, what stops any dictator or ambitious, desperate, politician from using nuclear weapons on civilian populations to make a military point. Which brings us to international law and the rules of military engagement.  Today’s  frightening alternative to the Nuremberg lessons is a new 21st century savagery.

A Desperate Proposal for Good.

It would be pathetic now to simply call for peace and call it good.  Too late.  We have elected leadership with a war mindset. If we aren’t at war internationally we nearly are domestically. The most radical change the 20th century brought to the world was to declare the individual civilian life having value and the right to live, even in a war. From the age of spears and arrows, combatants have declared themselves by tattoo, uniform, honor and discipline.  Of course there have been the Attilas and Hitlers who slaughtered civilians with both discrimination and indiscriminately, but the genius of weapons of mass destruction today have brought us to a brand new very dangerous threshold in this world. If we can’t bring peace, which is the value of this project, then we must reestablish international rules around use of the weapons.  Savagery against civilians and innocents poisons the military community as well as destroys the civilian population.  Good, until we can elect peace, is protecting the civilians who must maintain the sacred world to which every soldier someday must return.  This is an issue of the political results of our choices and not necessarily the fault of the military. We have already demonstrated the respect between soldier and civilian can be mutual if we work and design toward mutuality. Peace comes out of honor and discipline. Support the human rights of international law. That would be good.