{"id":44536,"date":"2023-10-30T14:32:01","date_gmt":"2023-10-30T22:32:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=44536"},"modified":"2023-10-30T14:32:01","modified_gmt":"2023-10-30T22:32:01","slug":"collateral-damage-is-a-confession-not-an-excuse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2023\/10\/30\/collateral-damage-is-a-confession-not-an-excuse\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Collateral Damage’ Is a Confession, Not an Excuse"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cCivilians are not collateral damage,\u201d the World Health Organization\u2019s Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean tweeted<\/a> (or whatever it\u2019s called now on X, formerly Twitter) on October 27. \u201cPatients are not collateral damage. Health staff & health facilities are not collateral damage. Children, women & men sheltering in health facilities are not collateral damage. International Humanitarian Law must be respected.\u201d<\/p>\n

WHO is obviously referring to events in Gaza. Unfortunately, the statement goes both too far and not far enough.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The \u201ctoo far\u201d part:<\/p>\n

On a quick read of \u201cinternational law\u201d \u2013 specifically Protocol I and the 1997 Additional Protocol of the 1949 Geneva Conventions \u2013 the claim that people in hospitals can\u2019t be \u201ccollateral damage\u201d seems unsupported. Article 19 does order that such facilities \u201cshall not be attacked,\u201d but if the attack is on a nearby \u201clegitimate\u201d military target, then per Article 51(5)(b) the attackers merely need avoid\u00a0 \u201canticipated civilian damage or injury\u201d that\u2019s \u201cclearly excessive\u201d in relation to \u201canticipated military advantage.\u201d<\/p>\n

The \u201cnot far enough\u201d part:<\/p>\n

There is no moral, nor should there be any legal,\u00a0 Get Out of Jail Free Card for those who injure or kill non-combatants.<\/p>\n

War is an intentional activity and \u201ccollateral damage\u201d is therefore by definition not \u201caccidental.\u201d<\/p>\n

When YOU squeeze the trigger on a rifle, pull the lanyard on a howitzer, or press a button that drops a bomb or launches a missile, YOU are morally responsible \u2013 and should be held legally responsible \u2013 for the results of your actions.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s on YOU to know where that munition is going and who\u2019s on or near that spot.<\/p>\n

If the results of your action include the deaths of, or injuries to, non-combatants, that\u2019s also on you.<\/p>\n

Your action may be intentional, reckless, or negligent, but whatever else it may be it is NOT accidental.<\/p>\n

The obvious objection to imposing something analogous to a\u00a0 \u201cfelony murder rule\u201d on actions taken during war is that few would willingly participate in such activities if they expected to be held to account for their crimes. That\u2019s a feature, not a bug. War is a bad thing. Making it harder to recruit people to conduct it is a good thing.<\/p>\n

Regimes (both actual and would-be) try to claim special exemptions from basic morality for themselves and their agents when it comes to the lives and livelihoods caught in the middle of their fights. But shiny badges and fancy uniforms don\u2019t change the moral equation. Nor should they.<\/p>\n

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter:\u00a0@thomaslknapp<\/a>) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cCivilians are not collateral damage,\u201d the World Health Organization\u2019s Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean tweeted (or whatever it\u2019s called now on X, formerly Twitter) on October 27. \u201cPatients are not collateral damage. Health staff & health facilities are not collateral damage. Children, women & men sheltering in health facilities are not collateral damage. International […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":80,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-44536","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44536","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/80"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44536"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44536\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44538,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44536\/revisions\/44538"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44536"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44536"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44536"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=44536"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}