One four-page paper is due for Phl 317: Ethics and Modern War. This paper is due on Thursday, November 17. Description of topic for this paper is given below. The paper requires factual statements and an ethical analysis. The paper is expected to be roughly four double-spaced (12 pt.) pages and to be endnoted with references to material covered in class and any other essays or websites that you have consulted. (With a website be sure to give the complete address and what organization that site presents.) The paper counts for 50 points. The paper is expected to be turned in on the date assigned, although some leeway is given before a grade is deducted for lateness. Please contact Dr. Kunkel for extensions of the deadline. For papers turned in before Thanksgiving I will allow a rewrite for grades of less than 40 points, provided the rewrite is turned in by the time of the final exam. With a rewrite your grade will be the median grade between your first and your rewrite papers.
 

The topic for your four-page paer is The Morality of the Israeli-Palestinian War after Oslo (1993) or The Morality of the Iraq War of 2003. For the Israeli/Palestinian conflict argue the just war doctrine from the Israeli viewpoint, and the consequentialist/utilitarian viewpoint for Palestinian suicide bombings. For the ongoing Iraq War use the just war doctrine for the U.S. position, and consequentialism for the insurgency.

For the Israeli-Palestinian conflict use the MERIP online primer on "Palestine, Israel and the Arab-Israeli Conflict" (see our course syllabus to click-on to this primer) for full factual background information. For more specific background information from 2000 on go to the "MERIP Primer on the Uprising in Palestine." (This can be found at the end of chapter 14--"The Fall 2000 Uprising"--of the first primer; from there click on "Primer of the Palestinian Uprising.") For references to the moral theories see Kunkel, "Just War" and Kunkel's notes emailed to everyone on "Rule-Consequentialism and War." For an interpretation that is more sympathetic to Israel than Kunkel has been in class, work with Walzer's account "The Four Wars of Israel/Palestine," pages 113-129 (place page number references in brackets in your text.) There are a host of other sources online or in the UD Roesch library that you can use as long as you list them in your endnotes. For this paper you need to present some factual information on post-WWII happenings, and such recent events as the occupied territories since 1967, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), the Oslo Accords of 1993, Camp David II, and the 2000 uprising. Then you need to do a double effect/just war analysis (five conditions) of the Israeli military operations from 2000 on, and a consequentialist analysis of the Palestinian suicide bombings. Conclude with your own argued views about what steps need to be undertaken in order to bring this conflict to an acceptable ending.

For the current Iraqi War use a just war approach for the U.S. position and a consequentialist analysis for the Iraqi insurgency. You have my essay on "Just War" to explain each of the conditions and my notes that were emailed to everyone on "Rule-Consequentialism and War." For a positive political spin on the Bush doctrine see John Lewis Gaddis, "A Grand Strategy of Transformation" (a pdf file sent to you); check out what the national security strategy is, what the grand strategy regarding Iraq entails (p. 54), and what Gaddis says is needed to make the strategy work. For a different view see Walzer, "Five on Iraq," pp. 143-168. You can look at other sources on the Internet or perhaps check out a weekly, such as Newsweek, in order to update what has happened since the war began. (Be sure to cite all sources that you use in your paper in your endnotes; do not rely on your memory.) For this paper you need to present some factual information of events leading up to, and following after the March 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq. Then you need to do a double effect/just war analysis of the U.S. intervention, and a consequentialist analysis of the ongoing Iraqi insurgency. Conclude with your own argued views about what steps need to be undertaken in order to bring this conflict to an acceptable ending.