Introduction
(Ritchie, 1940) Identifies to some point we will notice that we are all pacifists in a way, even the strongest and the most aggressive individuals or states do not use war as their first resort to dissolve conflict. They would rather send threats of war than real war. Everyone wants to achieve their goals peacefully. This essay is aimed to outline the Ritchie’s dilemma. Firstly it will define the term pacifism because it will be the term mostly used in the arguments. The secondly it will define the just war theory and outline the ethics of this theory. Lastly the overall view of both ethics are going to be give the conclusion. Hence the conclusion will set the benchmark of the ethics the author things are the can be best applied.
What is pacifism?
“You may cut of my head but I will not serve. My army is the army of God, and I cannot fight for this world I shall not die. When I leave this
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For it to be applicable the government has to play its role. The stability of the government determines the successfulness of pacifism (Ritchie, 1940). There are two different types of people. Firstly there is one who refuses to fight a war because they consider it unjust and second there is one who refuses to fight any war at all because it is not right. The one mentioned first is not considered a pacifist but the second one is considered to be pacifist. Therefore pacifism should not be linked to personal opinions only but to government opinions too. Hence Narveson as cited by (Regan, 1972) argues that the morals of pacifism are right even though in this modern world it is hard to apply such a doctrine because its more depend on the moral rights of the people hence it is linked more to the spiritual being than the physical world. Furthermore the idea of not using force is supposed to apply to those who try use force on others and those who are in the position of defence (Regan,