Barbarians at the Gates: A Post-September 11th Proposal to Rationalize the Laws of War

Since the dawn of man, war has been justified as an object of divine ordination, the natural state of humanity, and a tool in the progressive betterment of character, culture, and civilization. In this hyperideological age tragically symbolized by September 11, 2001, war, to the dismay of those who hoped material transformations might weaken its siren’s call, waxes ever more destructive, driving efforts to abolish force as a moral imperative and, less quixotically, to induce compliance with an accreting body