Is Britain a force for good? Investigating British citizens’ narrative understanding of war

It is commonly assumed in the foreign policy literature that narratives are uniquely persuasive and thus integral to obtaining public support for war. Yet, empirical research on “strategic narrative” is often vague on both the concept of narrative and how it persuades. Moreover, the stories publics use to interpret war are rarely examined. This paper offers a novel approach to studying “from the ground up” the war stories of individual British citizens. It examines public interpretations of war through emplotment: the way people select and link events to create a coherent story. Examining the wars people include and those they silence, it illustrates how a diverse range of citizens morally evaluates Britain’s military role, be it as a Force for Good, a Force for Ill or a country Learning from its Mistakes. In doing so, the paper offers an alternative methodological approach to studying how individual citizens understand war.     

The sixteenth-century antecedents of special operations ‘small war’

The first conceptual, theoretical treatises about small war (la petite guerre) as special operations appeared only from the middle of the seventeenth century. The term is not used in the eighteenth-century sense of ‘special operations’ in older sources. The supposed absence of any treatment of the subject is surprising considering the obsession with the ‘art of war’ in the Renaissance, but other authors attribute it to a supposed antinomy between chivalric ideals and irregular warfare. But the absence of explicit manuals on the subject is not evidence of absence of advanced reflection on this kind of operations in the Middle Ages and in Early Modern times. We should thus look elsewhere, in other genres, for writings that contain and pass on military knowledge. Epics, romances, educational and military treatises, and memoirs in fact contain elements of a theory of special operations, even though these genres differ from our conception of rationality inherited from the Enlightenment.     

The Changing Nature of Legitimate Authority in the Just War Tradition

ABSTRACT

The legitimate authority principle has become reduced to the issue of state authority. In its current formulation, the state has the sole authority to wage war, and because non-state actors, by their very definition, cannot satisfy this principle, their use of force is inherently unethical. This does not reflect the reality that non-state actors are increasingly engaging in the use of force, sometimes legitimately. As a result, the legitimate authority principle can and should look beyond the state. This article navigates a terrain in which non-state actors engage in the use of force, and in which revisionist just war thinking proposes that the concept of legitimate authority is irrelevant to thinking about the ethics of war. It proposes a principled approach to the inclusion of some non-state actors under the rubric of legitimate authority. This approach draws upon the historical development of the legitimate authority principle and incorporates the factors important to early writers on the subject.     

Jacques Maritain: Christian Theorist of Non-Violence and Just War

Jacques Maritain (1882–1973) is widely recognized as one of the foremost Catholic philosophers of modern times. He wrote groundbreaking works in all branches of philosophy. For a period of about 10 years, beginning in 1933, he discussed matters relating to war and ethics. Writing initially about Gandhi, whose strategy of non-violence he sought to incorporate within a Christian conception of political action, Maritain proceeded to comment more specifically on the religious aspects of armed force in “On Holy War,” an essay about the civil war then ongoing in Spain (1936–1939). After the outbreak of World War II in September 1939, Maritain penned a series of essays that sought to explain why the Anglo–French declarations of war were warranted on Christian just war principles. While the secondary literature on Maritain’s thought is extensive, thus far there has been little systematic exploration of his writings on war. In what follows I seek to remedy this lacuna, by examining how he conceptualized just war in the three phases outlined above.     

基于混合星座的卫星导航系统功率增强服务性能分析

在导航战中,卫星功率增强技术是提高战区卫星导航系统生存能力的重要措施.针对导航战背景下如何保持Compass系统对我国领土及周边区域导航服务能力的问题进行了研究,提出了一种基于混合星座和最优GDOP值准则的卫星导航系统功率增强方案,并就功率增强覆盖区域在不同实现方式条件下的覆盖性、可用性和实现复杂度等性能进行了对比分析.分析结果表明,采用“5GEO +4MEO”的功率增强组合形式,可以实现对我国领土及近海区域的全天时覆盖,可用性水平达到100％( GDOP ＜6.3),同时具有实现复杂度低和系统稳定性好等特点,可作为我国区域功率增强的备选方案.     

War,vagueness and hybrid war

It has frequently been observed in the literature on hybrid wars that there is a grey zone between peace and war, and that hybrid wars are conflicts which are not clear cases of war. In this paper, I attempt to illuminate this grey zone and the concept and nature of war from the philosophical discussions of vagueness and institutional facts. Vague terms are characterized by the fact that there is no non-arbitrary boundary between entities which lie in their extension, and entities which do not lie in their extension. I apply a theory of vagueness to notions such as “war” and “peace” and go on to suggest that the exact boundary for what counts as a war or not is arbitrary. However, the context in which the conflict occurs determines a range of possible locations for this boundary. The most important contextual parameter is in this respect how the parties to the conflict themselves conceptualize the conflict. I suggest that this can in various ways help us understand grey-zone conflicts.     

Currency Warfare and Just War: The Ethics of Targeting Currencies in War

ABSTRACT

Is Currency Warfare defined as, the use of monetary or military force directed against an enemy’s monetary power as part of a military campaign, a just way to fight a war? This article explores the ethics of waging currency warfare against the Just War Tradition’s principles of jus in bello (just conduct in war) and its criteria of discrimination and proportionality. The central argument is that currency warfare is inherently indiscriminate but may be proportionate when policy makers consider the nature of the threat confronted and the targeted currency's level of internationalization, that is, to what degree it is used in foreign transactions or used as a foreign currency reserve. I evaluate this argument against historical cases during the Second World War (1939–1945), the Gulf War (1990–1991), subsequent operations against Saddam Hussein in the early 1990s, and the ongoing campaign against ISIS.     

面向未来作战需求的装备保障训练问题研究

未来作战对新时期装备保障训练提出了新要求。以信息化战争为参照系,探讨了适应未来作战需要的装备保障训练思路、内容体系、方式方法、效果评估、训练保障等关键环节问题,为促进装备保障训练发展提供理论支持,增强装备保障训练工作实践的有效性和针对性。     

Legitimate Authority as a Jus Ad Bellum Condition: Defense of a Procedural Requirement in Just War Theory

ABSTRACT

Today, it is widely held that while authorization may be helpful in assuring that the other jus ad bellum criteria are met, legitimate authority is not itself a condition for just recourse to war. Or, if it is necessary, it is said to be a trivial requirement, as mobilization for war requires some political authorization. Those who would retain the legitimacy requirement have differing views about who the proper authority is. I argue that, reasonably understood, legitimate authorization is necessary for jus ad bellum. Considerations of agency and consent in force combine with the social contract to commit us to deferring to recognized authorities. These obligations are strengthened by the epistemic reliability and pragmatic value conferred by governing institutions and procedures limiting recourse to war. These same rationales imply that the U.N. Security Council should regulate the international use of force. I qualify that if higher authorities fail to act, other subsidiary authorities may then authorize force. However, the move to each subsequent level of authorization must be justified. Understood in this way, the requirement that wars not be fought without legitimate authorization is a non-trivial, necessary procedural jus ad bellum condition.     

毛泽东军事思想对古代兵学文化的传承与发展

毛泽东军事思想植根于中国古代兵学文化的土壤,它的战争观、军事伦理价值观、战争谋略法等思想,与中国古代社会"仁战"、"义战"、"以民为本"、"以奇制胜"、"以礼治军"等战略方法、战略思想一脉相承,同时也是对古代兵学文化的创造性发展,是中国革命战争实践、马列主义军事思想和古代兵学文化相结合的产物。     

战争复杂系统研究现状分析

分析了经典复杂系统理论、仿真建模方法、综合集成方法以及作战实验室等方法在战争复杂系统研究中的应用,在此基础上,分析了国内外对战争复杂系统分析方法的共同特点,指出了分析方法中存在的问题,进一步给出了战争复杂系统分析方法中需要深入研究和完善的内容.     

Soldiering the terrain of war: Zimbabwean soldiers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (1998–2002)

The paper reveals how Zimbabwean soldiers who fought in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (1998–2002) were challenged by the terrain of war. While soldiers are trained to live and fight in dreadful wars, I argue that immersing oneself in the war terrain is neither mathematical nor calculative; rather, war tactics to be employed are defined by the context in which soldiers operate in. When soldiers reflect on and about the war, they unconsciously produce accounts that are often not completely heroic, but a life lived in fear as well an issue that they had never anticipated when they set out to war. A main finding of this study is that while these soldiers were deployed to fight against the rebels, they find difficulties in locating physical features from map reading to the ground, distinguishing the enemy from civilian people and deployed for days without eating a proper meal as well as seeing their fellow soldiers dying in the context of war. The paper provides a vantage point in which we can also understand that trained soldiers do not exert total power over war terrains, they are sometimes challenged by the war situation itself.     

试论构建我军遂行非战争军事行动的科学机制

我军拥有丰富的遂行非战争军事行动理论总结和实践经验,但总体来说,还缺乏一个遂行具体任务的科学机制。从构建我军遂行非战争军事行动的操作机制、运行机制和保障机制入手,构建我军遂行非战争军事行动的科学机制,为新形势下我军更好地遂行非战争军事行动提供理论指导。     

网络舆论战效能评估探析

网络舆论战作为联合作战的重要组成部分,地位作用越来越突出,如何科学评估网络舆论战效能,是当前迫切需要解决的重点难点问题。文章探讨将多智能体建模仿真技术应用于网络舆论战效果评估,建立网络舆论战效能评估指标体系,构建网络舆论战效能评估模型,开发网络舆论战效能评估仿真系统软件,为信息化条件下的网络舆论战教育训练和作战提供辅助决策支持。     

Modern liberal wars,illiberal allies,and peace as the failure of policy

ABSTRACT

The post-Cold War period nearly up to the present has been characterised as the age of liberal wars, yet key facets of the liberal guidance of war remain under appreciated. This article seeks to address this wider gap with regard to the particular concern of war termination and the fulfilment or failure of policy. First, it develops characterisations of liberal wars based on the existing literature, identifying three broad types through consideration of context—defensive versus offensive—and of political and strategic agency, particularly regarding the motives for and intents of action. Three types of liberal wars result: defensive liberal wars, offensive liberal wars with humanitarian motive and geopolitical intent, and offensive liberal wars with geopolitical motive and humanitarian intent. The article then presents one exemplary case for each liberal war with an emphasis on how liberal strategy required an illiberal ally and that ally's effect on the subsequent peace.     

How Is a Man to Decide? Unjust Combatants,Duress and McMahan’s Killing in War

Jeff McMahan’s much-discussed work Killing in War is an important part of the revisionist school of just war studies. This paper avoids discussion of McMahan’s use of human rights and examines the practical consequences of his argument about duress on soldiers to fight an unjust war. These arguments are found to be wanting and to be impractical ones that do not fit battlefield realities. The importance of the Law of Armed Conflict and the legal equality of combatants that is part of it is emphasised and accepted as the most practical way of regulating battlefield behaviour and saving lives. It is concluded that attempts to tell soldiers what to do when they may be fighting an unjust war add to their burdens and are misplaced.     

WHAT ARE THE ODDS?

Nuclear optimists and pessimists disagree on whether the odds of nuclear war are low or high. This viewpoint assesses the odds of nuclear war over the past sixty-six years, exploring three pathways to nuclear war: an international crisis leading directly to nuclear war, an accident or misperception leading to nuclear escalation or nuclear retaliation against an imaginary attack, and a general conventional war leading to nuclear war. The assessment is based on the application of Bayes's theorem and other statistical reasoning and finds that the expected probability of nuclear war during this historical period was greater than 50 percent. This level of risk is unacceptably high. It is therefore urgent that effective measures be taken to substantially reduce the risk of nuclear war.     

采取仿真模拟技术预设战争实现训练与实战接轨

文章研究信息化条件下局部战争战法。利用模拟作战实验室实践检验、论证完善战争设计理论,普及电脑游戏开发战争想象力,借虚拟数学方式预测战争结果。强化“战争设计”对训练的牵引作用,落实训战一致。强调加强军事理论研究的针对性、前瞻性．综合考虑武器装备、战争战例、军事训练水平、人员素质、战役战术等因素,对未来可能发生的战争进行准确预测。     

Of war plans and war guilt: The debate surrounding the Schlieffen Plan

This article outlines the controversy surrounding the thesis advanced by Terence Zuber that there never was a Schlieffen Plan and that German war planning in 1914, far from having the aggressive edge that historians have attributed to it for decades, was in fact designed to deal with a Franco-Russian attack on Germany. In addition to reviewing the debate precipitated by Zuber's thesis, this article also takes a closer look at how Germany prepared for war in the years 1906–14, and particularly how it ended up embarking on that war in August 1914. Such an investigation of German war planning, with particular emphasis on the war plans of the younger Moltke, will serve as a critique of Zuber's controversial thesis, and it will be shown that while Zuber maintains that there never was a Schlieffen Plan, Schlieffen, Moltke and their contemporaries were certain that such a plan existed. In 1914, Moltke did not shrink from implementing his own version of Schlieffen's strategic thinking when war broke out.     

俄罗斯应对导航战举措

卫星导航系统作为重要的战场传感器,已经成为现代战争不可或缺的重要组成部分,围绕卫星导航系统的攻防博弈由此兴起。针对美国首先提出的导航战概念,俄罗斯为进一步提升导航战作战实力,有针对性地采取了应对举措。文章介绍了导航战概念及相关作战案例,具体分析了俄罗斯应对导航战威胁的主要举措,并结合美俄围绕导航战开展的攻防博弈,得出掌握现代战争制导航权的改进方向。