CRANFIELD UNIVERSITY DAREN BOWYER JUST WAR DOCTRINE

3.5 Summary
Care must be taken in making predictions about future war; we have only history to
guide and it would seem to suggest that however the character of war changes to reflect
the age, there are enduring aspects to its nature. Nevertheless, in considering the future
relevance of just war doctrine and the challenges posed to it, we must attempt some
analysis of the apparent trends in conflict.
In the near- to mid-term the identifiable trends are that warfare is becoming more
complex. Old boundaries and distinctions are becoming blurred or being breached; a
range of new protagonists is appearing – or adopting a more significant role; and new
technologies are impacting both on who can participate in conflict and how. Advanced
technologies – especially information and computing technologies – once driven by
military requirements, and the preserve of modern states, are now civilian market-
driven, cheap and readily available to all. ‘Security’ is no longer synonymous with
territorial defence and states’ security interests can no longer be met by largely home-
based military forces; a much broader approach is required, involving many more
agencies as well as a readiness to project power – both hard and soft – further afield.
From the perspective of jus ad bellum – dealt with in this chapter – the particular areas
of challenge this throws up are those of intervention and of pre-emption/preventive war.
For jus in bello – to be considered in the next chapter – the principal areas of concern
are the moral implications of technological advancement, especially the tendency to
remove the moral agent (the fighting man or woman) ever further from the battlefield;
the West’s greater willingness to engage in conflict but tendency – in part through
technological means – to transfer risk not only to the enemy (quite reasonably) but also
to the innocent, because of an unwillingness to accept casualties; the engagement of
new protagonists, and in particular the large increase in the use of child soldiers, and the
widening use of civilian contractors and Private Military Companies (PMCs); and the
resort by the West’s opponents to so-called asymmetric means to counter the West’s
unassailable superiority in conventional arms.
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