2 What principles should guide our thinking?

There are some very basic principles that can be applied to devise appropriate actions. If they were used, they would lead to a course of action that was both pragmatic and ethical. They would be pragmatic because they would be designed to match ends and means, by doing so they would have the best chance of success and the least chance of doing more harm. They would be ethical set against the principles of just war theory. 

Let’s run through these principles and see how they can guide thinking.

• Balancing ends and means
• Reciprocity
• Just war theory
• Power, warfare and the art of the possible 

Balancing ends and means

To balance ends and means we have to know what it is we want to achieve, only when we know that we can formulate actions (means) that move us towards the objective (end)  Note; Balancing Ends and Means

For the sake of argument let’s say the objectives are as follows.

• The war should be brough to an end as soon as possible
• It should support a rules based international order that respects national sovereignty   Note; Rules based world order  

This is simple to express but difficult to do, in warfare even more because the other side is actively trying to make you fail. The reason to balance ends and means is also simple – because any action will create reactions; if the West wants to take meaningful actions it will have to assess how those actions will be responded to and whether they take us towards the objective. 

There is no reason why this cannot be both the right approach and at the same time be very  difficult to bring about – anything to do with 9 billion squabbling primates is not going to be easy or simple. What is simple, is the vital fundamental to a life and death situation - because the right thing to do is hard we do not give up on it or do other, easier things, just because something must be done if those things are in themselves dangerous or unlikely to work (i.e. they are the wrong things to do)  Note; Something must be done

Reciprocity

Whenever an action is taken it has a reason, it may be reflexive (a knee jerk or emotional response) or it may be deliberate, that is it is intended to make something happen – so for deliberate actions it is obvious to ask what the action is intended to achieve and judge it by whether it works. 

Because all actions are reciprocated, they cause reactions: one way to judge an action is to look at the reactions that it is likely to trigger and judge if the reaction also represent a step in the right direction. If it does how do you amplify it, if it does not perhaps it is the wrong action to take. We all know this through saying like “be careful what you wish for” and are aware of consequences through sayings like “if it can go wrong, it will”. 

Reciprocity is simply the mechanism by which virtuous and vicious circles are created – if an action helps to improve things it can start a virtuous cycle, if it makes them worse a vicious one. 

In a war a lot of actions are directed towards the enemy’s ability (or will) to keep fighting, in a conventional/legally conducted war there is a tacit agreement that if one side can overcome the others materiel (the army/equipment it uses to conduct military operations), then it will see that it has lost and seek terms. This lies behind a lot of writing on the “art” of war. Unfortunately, reality is not so simple – everything attempted by one side is the target of spoiling actions by the other. Depending on what you read about war this is friction  Note; Friction , because it is impossible to know many things action must be take in ‘the fog of war’ and ‘no plan survives contact with the enemy’. 

In analysing different approaches to prisoner’s dilemma Axelrod discovered a strategy that could lead to the emergence of cooperation even in a highly competitive environment. The approach most likely to succeed was to let no wrong go by without an appropriate, proportional response but signal in advance that you are willing to cooperate.  Note; Axelrod

We can make sense of the Ukrainian tactics through this lens; so far they have fought the Russians to a standstill (without escalation) and have kept the lines of communication open by continuing to engage in peace negotiations  Note; Ukraine's approach

Just war theory

With balancing ends and means and reciprocity defined we can move to the core of the issue and look at the war in the Ukraine though the lens of just war theory  Note; Just War . 

This is just a quick run through from the perspective of the West getting involved. Looked at from Ukraine position it is certainly fighting a just war and looked at from the Russian side it fails on all counts  Note; Russia's unjust war

Ad Bellum (before the war)

• Just cause; wars must have a just cause, in this case a wrong has surely been committed 
• Last resort: wars must be undertaken only as a last resort, everything else must have been tried and failed, according to just war principles war is only ever a lesser evil but is still an evil. As this essay will show the West is far from having tried everything else. 
• Proper authority: a war can only be conducted by a recognised authority, there are issues here with insurgencies, however NATO is a defensive alliance and as such its remit does not allow it to make an armed intervention and it has stated categorically that it will not do so. Given that the war is one of aggression it can be argued that the UN would be an appropriate proper authority to deal with this.
• Right intention; a war must be fought with the right intentions, to right a wrong, it can be waged against aggression but not for self/national interest or aggrandisement. 
• Reasonable chance of success; a war must have a reasonable chance of success because if it does not it is doing harm (evil) for no effect. Against this criterion a lot of actions fail because e.g. bombing to indicate disapproval or send a message. This requires ends and means to be in sync. 

In Bellum (during)

• Discrimination: military targets are the only legitimate ones
• Proportionality: there must be no escalation or wanton destruction/killing
• Individual responsibility: hold throughout the chain of command, just obeying orders in not a valid defence 

Post Bellum

• Reasonable terms in the case of victory; any peace settlement must be fair and avoid punitive terms, there is no place for vengeance. 

Yes these are a tall order, but combined with reciprocity and balanced ends and means there is no reason why a pragmatic approach should be dismissed as idealistic. 

Power, warfare and the art of the possible

Anyone who wants to improve the world must engage with the problems associated with the use of power. War (including civil war) is simply the raw application of power , it is basically what happens between sovereign states (monopoly holders of the legal authority to kill) when extortion is refused; a transaction is rejected - do what I/we want is met with a No, in a war this becomes do what I/we want or we will force you (involving killing), this is met with a no that says, no I will kill you instead. 

It possible to dress this up and talk about the art of war, the most famous expression being Clausewitz’s observation that war is the pursuit of policy by other means. 

There was a peculiar period in European history when limited war regarded as “the sport of kings”. The convention was that armies fought each other and the result would be abided by. Even then it had its limits, as we see in the right to plunder after a siege, or the application if scorched earth policies when needed. It was a limited view hardly extending beyond Europe and it would break down in the second half of the c19th and completely during the c20th. The second world war was fought with the aim of Unconditional Surrender and brought to close with the use of nuclear weapons. 80% of the casualties were civilians (against 20% in World War 1). Nevertheless, the cold war in Europe had a limited aim, to “contain” communism not to overthrow it. Outside Europe it was fought hotly and brutally; anything went. 

So here is a problem, the rest of the world might be less sympathetic than we expect to a war in Europe which Europe cannot deal with, as a result mobilising in the UN is likely to be very difficult. My question is simply this - does that mean the West shouldn’t try and do the right thing? 

When the West needed legal cover for a war in the Gulf we were all over the UN. The silence from the EU and NATO on using the UN in this war is deafening (Note; using the UN)