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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Christianity says to treat your enemies well, not just your neighbors. Don’t know how that works in the other religions but would love to hear. [/quote]

OP  - Good point / it is probably no accident that modern Just War theory grew out of Christian theology.

The principles of a Just War originated with classical Greek and Roman philosophers like Plato and Cicero. Christian theologians St Augustine of Hippo (354-430) proposed the first modern version of JWT in the fourth century while Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) refined it towards the end of the Crusades. It asserted that christian nations should hold a presumption against the morality of going to war except in circumstances of self defense with heavy protections for civilians, vulnerable and innocents.

There are two parts to Just War theory, both with Latin names:
• Jus ad bellum: the conditions under which the use of military force is justified.
• Jus in bello: how to conduct a war in an ethical manner.

The Crusades obviously did not follow Just War Theory. They were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The best known of these Crusades are those to the Holy Land in the period between 1095 and 1291 that were intended to recover Jerusalem and its surrounding area from Islamic rule.

The pope (Urban II) absolved all who took part in the crusade of all their sins. The first Crusade captured Jerusalem after bitter fighting, and the residents of the city were brutalized and slaughtered by the Christian invaders. The invaders' conduct breached the principles of modern just war ethics, and the massacres still color Islamic politics today.

I have not read this but wonder whether Thomas Aquinas revisited Just War theory in response to the horrors of the Crusades unleashed in the Holy Land.

According to Aquinas, three requirements must be met. Firstly, the war must be waged upon the command of a rightful sovereign. Secondly, the war needs to be waged for just cause, on account of some wrong the attacked have committed. Thirdly, warriors must have the right intent, namely to promote good and to avoid evil.

Many Western and even non Western countries have adopted JWT for providing ethical military guidelines. It is used in secular way now but still widely influential for guiding military treatment of enemies[/quote]

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