On Following Orders in an Unjust War*

IS a soldier morally obligated to obey ordinary (including lethal) commands, even when the war is unjust? I will argue that under the right conditions, the answer is “yes.” What drives me is hardly a pro-authority impulse, but rather a conviction that this kind of authority depends on demanding background conditions. Counterbalancing the authoritarian aspect of my argument is (among other things) a democratic imperative that warring nations have not often heeded. To this extent, declarations of war have often lacked the authority that would require soldiers to obey. The view taken here stands between two extant views of the matter. Some have held that if the war is unjust then the soldier is morally equivalent to a murderer. Others have held that the soldier’s obedience to his state automatically sanitizes his participation in an unjust war (even if there might yet be impermissible ways of fighting it). I will argue that when the political and institutional process producing the commands is duly looking after the question whether the war is just, the soldier would be wrong to substitute his own private verdict and thwart the state’s will. On the other hand, these preconditions are substantial, and the soldier will need to think for himself about whether they are met. The soldier is not exonerated simply because he was following orders. On the other hand, when the state and its procedures are of the right kind the soldier’s participation in an unjust war is sanitized precisely because he was following orders. Jus in bello, or justice in the conduct of war, is traditionally contrasted with jus ad bellum, or the justice of going to war. This traditional bifurcation (I will sometimes call it the ad/in distinction) leaves my question more or less out of the picture. The issue I want to consider arises for soldiers even if all issues of the justice of a war, and all issues of justice in the conduct of war are settled. Suppose that a war which is unjust to wage will nevertheless be fought with