What Soldiers Really Think About Fighting Unjust Wars

Added: 2026-05-16

[00:00:00]I followed these veterans coming back from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan who were soldiers who were also aspiring philosophers, right? They're done with their tours of duty, they're done with their combat, and they were interested in issues about the ethics of warfare, right? There's a somebody who's like fought in what is essentially it's not really controversial that those were unjust wars that >> [laughter] >> that that the US is like fond of fighting them, but like what does the person who actually did the killing in those wars think about that? I didn't know what to expect. It turns out these soldiers had a lot of very interesting perspectives you wouldn't have that um that ordinary citizens just don't really think all that much about because it's even in the states it's you're kind of removed from that kind of thing. So, one example might be that um you know, soldiers take very seriously their responsibility to follow civilian command even if they're unjust commands because the alternative is that they get to decide what wars to fight and what not. And if they do get to make that decision, you're basically talking about military dictatorships, right? Kind of knew that. You take civics and you kind of have this idea, but you don't really understand the stakes of what's involved until you're faced with somebody who says, "Well, look, everything that it goes against the fiber of everything like a particular soldier thinks about when they're in Iraq in a war they don't think they should be fighting in a house that's not their own, right? Like terrorizing a family that they know they like you you shouldn't even be there.

[00:01:36]So, like what are you supposed to do when you're in that scenario, right? And in that scenario you're balancing like morality of you and this other person and the morality of okay, on the other hand, you just decide as soldiers that a particular war is not a war that you should be fighting and some other war is a war that you should be fighting. And then you've you actually just taken decision-making away from people in the country who do voting cuz nobody votes for soldiers and all that. I mean, it's a perspective, right?

[00:02:08]Does that make sense? I didn't think about that, but like here I am talking to people who have to literally think about that.