Some critics of the killing of Osama Ben Laden think that since he was not shooting at the Seals, his killing was murder.
That is, killing in war is not murder only if the enemy is actively attacking you.
This sounds very chivalrous but has no relation to reality. Enemy soldiers (and generals) are legitimate targets even if they are sleeping or praying.
I read in one memoir of the First World War how the British narrator, who was a sharpshooter, had a German soldier in his sights; the soldier was taking a bath – utterly vulnerable. The British soldier couldn’t bear to pull the trigger, and gave the rifle to someone else, who did. If the German soldier were not killed, he would have the opportunity to kill British soldiers. War is a nasty, nasty business, even when its laws are followed, even when it is a just, necessary, defensive war.
I agree, but I think it depends in part on the terms under which we go to war.
If I’m protecting the homefront against the invading Hun, who will pillage my town and rape people I care about unless I kill him, it’s a whole lot easier to shoot the guy in the bathtub.
But if I’m “nation building,” or otherwise meddling in some petty political dispute on the other side of the planet, it’s much harder to justify the harsh actions that war requires.
Killing OBL any way we can is justified because he is planning to kill us. Killing Kaddafi in the same way might not be.
Well, if the enemy is unarmed and close by, one takes him prisoner. One does not shoot enemy combatants who are under your control.
Leon, I see you’ve been looking at the National Catholic Register’s website, recently. It has been filled with all sorts of drivel about “praying for bin Laden’s” soul, speculating about his possible repentence and tut-tutting about “excessive” celebrations of his death.
Mary Ann, this is why I think Catholicism is becoming apostate, if it isn’t already. The perpetrators of evil seem to receive more compassion than the victims of evil. That, I think, also explains the reaction many Catholics had toward victims of clerical sex-abuse.
We aren’t talking about theological differences, here. We’re talking about people calling evil “good” and calling good, “evil.”
I’m with Joe. I think this weeping over what one teary-eyed ex-army man called “the murder of a sick old man” is idiotic. This “sick old man” was a hardened mass murderer who targeted innocent civilians. I don’t give a rodent’s rump wheather Bin Ladin was armed or not when the 9mm bullets ended his evil life. He forfeited his life by planning, and carrying out 9/11, and having the brass cojones to brag about it. Yep, this ‘sick old man” signed his own deathy warrent ten years ago!
Re : good is evil, evil is good….slight detour from the ethics of war, but maybe not since we’re battling the forces of evil within the church also.
I think it was Crowhill who posted the “ArchBish Dolan interview/ story” on this blog. I just wanted to mention ( if I did not already) that the very same story was repeated from a pulpit in a Latin trad church here. But rather than on a train platform the cleric /lay catholic encounter was allegedly in a Home Depot parking lot. A friend who heard the story aka (homily) , immediatly felt uncomfortable sensing it was a lie concocted to make the still in the pew people enraged at Catholics who are angered and speaking out against the clerical molestations. Also, she felt it was designed to elicit sympathy for the priests. Interestingly, she added that the homilist himself is noted for his effeminate characteristics and comments.We mused as to whether the very same homily, with slight twists ,were being heard in other churches ,since we both recalled the ‘Feather homily” repeated incessantly in most churches when the media broke the sex scandal in a way that most Catholics could not avoid hearing about it.
I am not showing compassion in my post. I was simply stating the law of civilized warfare: You don’t shoot unarmed combatants under your control.
Now, it may be that the soldiers believed he could have had hidden weapons on his person -a suicide vest or in his turban, but what has come out appears to negate that. Also, one Senator said that the executive order was to kill.
Admittedly, this is a situation in which holding bin Laden might result in more terrorism and death. I think that he should have been taken to the ship, given a military trial on the spot, and executed. Very odd that there was an exec order to kill – in war, this is not needed, and outside of war it is illegal for the president to order assasination.
Still, in the final analysis, absent the executive order, I would not second guess the SEALS. They are highly trained, and they do not shoot without reason.
I didn’t shed a tear over Bin Laden’s death, but I did pray for his soul. Why? Because Christ commanded me to pray for my enemies. I have no need to speculate about his repentance but I have no doubt that God’s mercy is offered to all, even a mass-murderer like Bin Laden
I was also among those who thought the celebrations were indeed excessive. When the celebration involves mostly drunken college students descending on Ground Zero (a solemn graveyard) shouting pep rally type chants, I think it is excessive. I was a medical student on rotation at St. Vincent’s Hospital on 9/11 and I saw the 2nd plane hit the towers from the roof of the hospital. My colleagues and I spent part of that night at Ground Zero. The image of that battlefield will never leave my mind. The brutality of 9/11 should have called those college students to fall to knees in thanksgiving to God for allowing the defeat of one evil man and then praying for the safety of this nation.
Mary Ann the media I watched reported that the military had orders to capture or kill Bin Laden.
What I find disturbing is that with all our sophisticated tecnology and intelligence it was allagedly possible for him to live in Pakistan in a million dollar house in a poor neighborhood.
Where I live when a million dollar mansion goes up most neighbors know who bought it and what the person does etc. People are people so I cannot fathom why the people in that village and or city had no clue or thought it odd.
Nor do I get it that it took us so long to locate him.Now we are being treated to the reports of his perverse videos.
Mere Catholic, it’s one thing to pray for your enemies while they live. The problem with your position is that once a person is dead, the offers of mercy disappear. Jesus offered mercy to Judas right up until Judas left the Last Supper. But did Jesus ever encourage His disciples to pray for Judas’ soul when He appeared to them between His resurrection and ascension?
At some point, Mere Catholic, one has to answer for the moral consequences of one’s own acts before a holy, righteous God. That true of bin Laden, Mother Teresa and everybody in between.
In the world affected by Christianity sympathy follows the victim even when the victim was a victimizer. It’s structural and it’s permanent and it has nothing to do with a victim’s guilt or innocence.
If you are right, Caroline, then Christianity cannot distinguish between the perpetrators of evil and the victims of evil…and if that’s true, then it doesn’t deserve to be taken seriously,since it has succumbed to the moral equivalence so prominent in Western secular thinking, these days.
If you study Scripture closely, Caroline, you will see that God takes profound interest in “widows and orphans,” not merely in a literal sense but as representatives of everyone who is vulnerable or devastated. His tenderness toward them is a matter of scriptural record. James said in his letter that “true religion” is helping such people.
Moreover, God hates evil. True, God makes repentence available to all who want it, and He wants to save all humanity. But the wicked who refuse to repent — such as bin Laden — will be judged and condemned. Sadly, modern Christianity has sacrificed this scriptural truth on the altar of political correctness to the god of intellectual fashion.