A definition of justice as it relates to war.
To gain insight into the nature of justice as it relates to war in the 21st century, this paper uses three books that review its role: Michael Walzer’s Just and Unjust Wars; Michael Howard’s “War in European History”l and Kauppi and Viotti’s The Global Philosophers: World Politics in Western Thought.
Walzer is unique in that he portrays war as a matter of morality, when conventionally it is almost always thought of as a matter of interest. In his book, Just and Unjust Wars, Walzer attempts to make a distinction between the good fight and other kinds of fighting. War has been traditionally thought of as force employed in the interest of those that possess the power and will to successfully employ it. However, because the soldier in the battlefield faces uncertain death, moral arguments are necessary to compel him to fight unless his ability to vanquish is consummate; plunder seldom befits a coffin.