Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- PART I TERRORISM: WHAT'S IN A NAME?
- PART II WHY MORAL CONDEMNATIONS OF TERRORISM LACK CREDIBILITY
- PART III DEFENDING NONCOMBATANT IMMUNITY
- PART IV HOW MUCH IMMUNITY SHOULD NONCOMBATANTS HAVE?
- Introduction: the problem of collateral damage
- 17 The problem of collateral damage killings
- 18 The ethics of collateral damage killings
- Conclusion: terrorism and the ethics of war
- Bibliography
- Index
Introduction: the problem of collateral damage
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- PART I TERRORISM: WHAT'S IN A NAME?
- PART II WHY MORAL CONDEMNATIONS OF TERRORISM LACK CREDIBILITY
- PART III DEFENDING NONCOMBATANT IMMUNITY
- PART IV HOW MUCH IMMUNITY SHOULD NONCOMBATANTS HAVE?
- Introduction: the problem of collateral damage
- 17 The problem of collateral damage killings
- 18 The ethics of collateral damage killings
- Conclusion: terrorism and the ethics of war
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Since intentionally targeting civilians is a defining feature of terrorist attacks, I have focused so far on whether it can ever be morally right to launch intentional attacks on civilians. But what about attacks that cause unintended deaths and injuries to civilians? Many – perhaps most – of the civilian victims of war and political violence are not intentionally attacked. Their deaths and injuries are “collateral damage,” side effects of attacks on military targets.
What ethical judgment should we make of attacks that cause civilian deaths and injuries as collateral damage? Are they always permissible? Never permissible? Or sometimes permissible and sometimes not?
The standard view is that collateral damage attacks are often permissible. This view can be found in commonsense morality, traditional just war theory, and international law. All of these perspectives are more permissive with respect to collateral damage killings of civilians than they are of intentional attacks on civilians. But if attacks that kill civilians as collateral damage are permitted and if many civilians are killed in this way, we might wonder about the value of noncombatant immunity. What good is noncombatant immunity if it fails to protect civilians from being harmed by wartime attacks? How can we speak of the immunity of civilians if the ethics of war permits attacks that kill and injure large numbers of them?
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Terrorism and the Ethics of War , pp. 249 - 250Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010