Transcriber: 소소한 이 Reviewer: Emma Gon
In the last 3400 years of recorded human history,
only 268 of them were spent at peace.
Often portrayed in novels or films as acts of total heroism.
When soldiers enter conflict, they effectively become legal murderers.
In the 20th century, it has been estimated
that over 108 million people died due to conflict.
This year, on the 24th of February,
as Putin launched his brutal full scale invasion of Ukraine.
Is that major question? Is there ever such a thing as a just war?
Although I wanted to start by defining what is actually classified as a war,
I quite quickly realized this would be an impossible task.
As Jonathan Garber wrote, war is not a unitary phenomenon.
There are many forms: nuclear, conventional, world,
local, revolutionary, religious.
But they all have one thing in common.
They’re all intense forms of aggression, violence and destruction.
There will always cause harm to both sides.
The just war theory provides justification for invasion to be deemed ethical.
They must meet these principles.
One - the use of violence must come as a last resort.
Two - It must be a just cause for invasion.
Three - orders must come from a valid authority,
Four- there must be a high probability of success.
Five - the forced use roughly proportional to the problem.
And six - it must end as quickly as possible.
In 1945, as United Nations Charter was being signed,
people uttered the words, “Never again.”
As the horrors of World War Two were finally a matter of the past tense,
people wanted wish for this trauma to never affect future generations.
However, since then, millions of people have died at the hands of war.
In recent times, the United States of America has stood for being
the leader of the free world, a world that promotes peace, diplomacy, democracy.
However, today I’m going to be talking to you
about two of the deadliest US invasions
and whether they can be justified in that context.
My generation were too young to question the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan
as they were happening, I myself wasn’t even born.
But now, as the world faces yet another mass conflict,
it’s important that we look at our country’s past and reflect,
so that we never make the same mistake twice.
In 2001, the United States led an international coalition
that launched an invasion of Afghanistan
in response to the 911 attacks across the US.
The tragic events of 911 resulted in 2996 deaths.
In response, the US-led coalition began attacking
the Taliban controlled Afghanistan a month later in October 2001.
Troops were stationed there until August 2021,
meaning that there was a 20 year military conflict in Afghanistan.
So what were the reasons that the US and their allies,
such as the UK, gave for such vast military intervention?
The US stated that they were declaring a war on terror.
They claimed that terrorist organisations in the Middle East,
specifically, Osama bin Laden and the Al-Qaeda organisation,
were the biggest threat to the world.
The Taliban who were the country’s leaders at the time,
were known to abuse many human rights,
specifically against women, girls and ethnic Hazaras.
4 million people died of starvation under that rule.
Therefore, the US justification of action was self-defense
and protection of human rights.
The US appealed to the UN Security Council for consultation
and it was deemed that the Taliban should turn over Osama bin Laden
to prosecution in the West.
The Taliban rejected this offer and offered counteroffers,
including trying bin Laden in an Islamic court.
However, before all diplomatic options had been explored,
the US began bombing large areas of Afghanistan, including the capital, Kabul.
This meant that in the eyes of the UN charter, the invasion was illegal.
War dragged on for 20 years and resulted in 3500 allied soldiers
and 125 000 Afghan fighters being killed.
The US insisted that they were freeing the Afghan population.
However, the conflict resulted in 71 000 civilians being killed.
As well as this, the population,
5 million people were displaced, making Afghanistan
the third largest displaced population after Syria and Venezuela.
Although in occupied territory,
women received rights such as education
that they would not have otherwise received,
the cost of human life in Afghanistan was enormous.
Subsequently, in 2003, the US-led coalition
sent 160 000 troops to Iraq
with aims to first, end the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein;
second, to disarm Iraq of its alleged weapons of mass destruction
and third, to remove terrorists from the country.
Troops were stationed in Iraq until 2011,
making it an eight year military conflict in which 461 000 people,
almost half a million people died.
So can this invasion be considered a just war?
Well, in 2004, the UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan,
stated that from our point of view
and from the UN charter point of view, it was illegal.
But the legality of the war is widely debated.
The US and the UK claim that from previous authorization
on the Persian Gulf War and an inspection of Iraqi weapons
gave authorization to the war.
However, they did not receive specific permission
from the Council to launch the attack.
But the US to launch pre-emptive strikes,
it would mean that there had to be a clear
and imminent threat to the American people.
However, this was not the case.
A basic principle of just war theory states that for a war,
an invasion to be deemed ethical,
it has to be carried out with a high probability of success.
However, this is also not the case,
as it was expected that the Iraqi war would drag on for many years,
and indeed it did, causing great harm to an already tortured civilian population,
and some of its aims weren't even met as that was an intelligence failure
and there weren't even weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
However, global terrorism after the 911 attacks posed
a threat to every country from America to the UK to Tunisia to Bali.
It was clear that the US had a moral obligation to tackle
the threat of global terrorism.
However, the connection between that war on terror
and Iraq was questioned, even by US troops.
And in fact, intelligence experts claim that despite
the US claiming that their war was to fight terrorism,
terrorism was increased as a result of the war as Iraq became a hub.
As Iraqi forces were quickly overwhelmed by allied soldiers,
government collapsed and Saddam Hussein was captured
in Operation Red Dawn in December 2003.
This freed the Iraqi people from dictatorship,
but not from violence.
And it didn’t free the world from the continued threat of global terrorism.
So today, in 2022, we must be using our past as a guide for the future.
War will always cause unthinkable harm, not only to those who don't return home,
but to the people who survive and forever have to live with
the trauma they've experienced.
The theory of just war provides supposed rationale for invasion.
However, whether the attacks are launched by NATO, Russia,
China or a terrorist organization in the Middle East,
there will never be such a thing as a just war,
as there will always be two sides in every story.
(Applause)