Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32 Page 33 Page 34 Page 35 Page 36 Page 37 Page 38 Page 39 Page 40 Page 41 Page 42 Page 43 Page 44 Page 45 Page 46 Page 47 Page 48 Page 49 Page 50 Page 51 Page 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 76Plough Quarterly • Winter 2015 57 said that even on the basis of Just War criteria, invading Iraq was not justified. The Pope said it. Christian leaders around the world said it. Many American Christian leaders said it. So I think one thing peacemakers, including pacifists like myself, need to do is to help their societies actually apply the Just War criteria carefully and consistently. That doesn’t mean presidents won’t ignore us, but if enough people speak out and enough political pressure builds, it can make a difference. Yet even apart from ISIS, the idea of nonviolent action strikes most people as unrealistic, some- what like the medieval Children’s Crusade. This is why we must re-educate people. We now know that nonviolence works. It has worked again and again, as we have seen espe- cially in the last fifty years. And it has worked even without very much training or very much analysis. I don’t pretend to be a sophisticated tactician of nonviolent campaigns, but I tell story after story in my book about amazingly successful nonviolent campaigns. For example? We can go back to the first-century Jews who offered to die rather than allow Roman military standards to be displayed in Jerusalem, causing Pontius Pilate to remove the standards. In the fifth century, Pope Leo I rode to meet Attila the Hun and his armies as they approached proved to be effective. So that’s the core of my message. Nonviolent action, if given a chance, is stunningly successful. For example, the Soli- darity movement defied the Soviet Union and they won. Over the past half year, ISIS forces in Iraq and Syria have committed horrific atrocities. Most people, including many churches, believe that nonviolent methods won’t work. Do you agree? People committed to nonviolence do not always have instant solutions to the messes that mili- tary policies get us into. There is plenty of evidence that shows how in different kinds of situations nonviolent strategies have been amaz- ingly effective. But in the short run, nonviolent actions are not always, or automatically, success- ful. It’s not very likely, at least at this point, that ISIS will respond to a nonviolent peacemaking team, or even to substantial numbers of nonvio- lent people taking action. Of course, military action isn’t always automati- cally successful either, and often has unintended consequences. ISIS terrorism, according to some, has only been able to flourish because of the deci- sions made by the United States and its allies in 2001 and 2003 to go to war in Afghanistan and Iraq. What’s your view? ISIS has certainly not come out of a vacuum. In 2003, except for some American evangeli- cal leaders, the global Christian community Just War doctrine is accepted by a wide range of Christian tra- ditions. As summarized in the Catholic Catechism, it requires that the following “strict condi- tions” must be fulfilled for a war to be legitimate: • The damage inflicted by the aggressor on the nation or community of nations must be lasting, grave, and certain; • All other means of putting an end to it must have been shown to be impractical or ineffective; • There must be serious prospects of success; • The use of arms must not produce evils or disorders graver than the evil to be elimi- nated. The power of modern means of destruction weighs very heavily in evaluating this condition. (CCC, para. 2309) In addition, Just War doctrine requires that war be conducted according to moral law, with humane treatment of non- combatants, prisoners, and the wounded. Acts of extermina- tion or mass destruction are prohibited. Although Just War doctrine goes back at least as far as Augus- tine of Hippo (AD 354– 430), it was not the teaching of the early church. In fact, Christian leaders of the first centuries overwhelm- ingly prohibited the use of lethal force for any reason. See Ron Sider, The Early Church on Killing: A Comprehensive Sourcebook on War, Abortion, and Capital Pun- ishment (Baker Academic, 2012).  T H E C R I T E R I A : W H A T ’ S A “ J U S T W A R ” ? Nonviolent action is an ethical demand that applies to both pacifists and Just War Christians.