Brekke's text, The Ethics of War and the Concept of War in India and Europe, talks about the
comparative analysis of ethics of war by arguing that a difference in the ethical concept of war is
deeply rooted in the way “war” is perceived across different cultural connotations. He talks
about the principles of jus ad bellum and jus in bello through this analysis. Jus ad bellum refers
to war being used as a justified framework, while jus in bello talks about how one should fight
war morally. Jus ad bellum can be seen more prominently in European literature while jus in
bellum can be observed in various Hindu works of literature. Brekke draws this distinction
between these two principles and is against the idea of using them as universally applicable
categories. He draws this distinction by looking at these two ideas from the lens of: external vs
internal violence, public versus private violence. The concept of war in Europe came to be
defined as public, sovereign action driven by an external political entity. This differentiation
resulted in debates around legitimacy and just cause.
On the other hand, Brekke demonstrates how classical Hindu texts and tradition did not develop
a discourse around jus ad bellum. Instead, ethical thought circled around the idea of jus in bello.
In Indian mythologies, such as the Mahabharat, war is viewed as heroic and often ritualized,
with a focus on rules around conduct in battle such as noncombatant immunity and fair combat.
In this case, a clear distinction has not been made between war and duels, and this confusion
remains embedded within heroic ethos instead of a public judicial framework. Whereas, in
statecraft traditions, such as Kautilya Arthasharstra, violence is framed as a tool which acts as an
extension of kinship. External war and internal punishment are viewed as means of state
violence. This absence of a strong internal/external divide reduces the need to look at a “right”
authority in a European context. In this sense, Brekke concludes that “war” does not have a
universal understanding but is rather massively impacted from the cultural connotation it comes
from and how the different ethical understandings emerge from this.
A strong feature of the texts is its critique of the universal model. Brekke challenges scholars
such as James Turner Johnson, by saying that it is crucial to draw distinctions between
public/private and internal/external violence. By differentiating these, Brekke avoids treating just
war tradition as a normative benchmark and instead emphasizes conceptual plurality.
However, a weakness in the text lies in the conflict between “Indian” and “Hindu” traditions.
While the title is framed as a comparison between Europe and India, the analysis remains limited
to Hindu works of literature. Although, Brekke does mention that he is going to analyse Hindu
texts in his summary, but still titles the paper as a comparison between Europe and India. As a
student from India, I find this rather problematic, especially because India is a constitutionally
secular and religiously plural society. Using “India” and “Hindu” interchangeably risks erasing
non Hindu works of intellectual traditions and promotes the narrative of Hindutva that equates
the Indian identity with that of the Hindu identity. A clear differentiation between the Hindu
traditions and the overall Indian civilization would have strengthened the analytical framework
of the paper.
I would like to look at the case of the recent US-Israel attacks on Iran in order to better
understand the arguments that Brekke is presenting. The recent attacks by the United States of
America and Iran were a series of air strikes on the sovereign territory of Iran. The strikes
resulted in the killing of the supreme leader of Iran, Ayyatollah Ali Khamenei. The strikes also
resulted in the killing of Ali Shamkhani (secretary of Iran’s Defense council and a close adviser
to supreme leader Khamenei), Abdolrahim Mousavi (Chief of Iran’s armed forces), Aziz
Nasirzadeh (Iran’s minister of defense), and Mohammad Pakpour (commander-in-chief of Iran’s
Islamic Revolutionary Guard). These strikes were clearly aimed at overthrowing the regime.
Although, this might have strengthened the legitimacy of the regime even more. The narrative of
Khamenei dying as a martyr against western forces of imperialism is already becoming more
popular. Hence, according to me, these strikes not only resulted in an increase in anti-US
sentiment in Iran but also legitimized the power of the Iranian regime even more.
The US-Israel not only targeted leaders but also targeted a girls elementary school in Iran which
resulted in the death of more than 150 individuals, mostly kids. This is not just morally wrong
but also goes against international law. If Iran had targeted a school in either Washington or Tel
Aviv the global narrative would have viewed it as an “act of terrorism”. But when the western
world commits an act such as this, it is looked at as a “pre-emptive strike”. I find this extremely
hypocritical in nature. Nevertheless, the state of Iran has a lot of problems, whether it be the lack
of political freedom which resulted in a massive death toll due to the protests in Iran earlier this
year, rapid economic inflation with commodities such as basic food becoming inaccessible to the
common populous or the unequal treatment of women and minorities in the country. This still
doesn’t justify the invasion of a sovereign country, is against international law and should be
treated as a war crime.
To connect this to Brekke’s argument, I see clear parallels between the European idea of jus ad
bellum and what the US and Israel is doing with a comparison to the Hindu principle of jus in
bello. The US and Israel view these strikes as justified as they are against the idea of the state of
Iran possessing nuclear weapons, while, Iran looks at its retaliatory strikes as an act of heroism
against western imperialism with Iran hitting targets in Israel as well as US army air bases in
middle eastern countries such as the UAE and Bahrain. Iran views this from such a perspective
especially due to the killing of Ayyatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran. Khamenei
was not the Iranian head of state but also the highest religious leader for Shia Islam. He can be
equated to the stature of the Pope or the Dalai Lama. This reminds me of a quote by Mahatma
Gandhi, he says “an eye an eye makes the whole world blind”. This is extremely relevant in this
context because what the US and Israel did is viewed as “justified” from the western perspective
but what Iran is doing in retaliation is looked “as an act of heroism" from the Iranian viewpoint.
This is a clear failure of global diplomacy and is clearly not the first instance of war being used
as a tool for western imperialism. As citizens of the world and not just our own individual nation
states, we can hope for the growth of diplomatic solutions rather than war.
References:
1. Brekke, T. (2005). The ethics of war and the concept of war in India and Europe. Numen,
52(1), 59–86.
