The International Society for Military Ethics in Europe

Ukraine Russia FlagsThis blog is dedicated to bite-size pieces covering different topics related to the ongoing war in Ukraine. It will be updated with further articles over time and try to offer a more comprehensive picture of the conflict.

 

Everybody is invited to participate in the forum discussion.

 

A catastrophe with an announcement

By Prof Dr. Johannes Varwick

A permanent escalation cannot be the solution. So we have to freeze the conflict, thereby stabilizing the situation and intellectually preparing for better times. This is not happening at all in western politics at the moment. One acts as if sanctions would solve the problem. But that's just where the problem begins, because a state that's been hit to the core won't play by our rules.

A turning point in security policy

By Prof. Dr. Herfried Münkler

We glossed over the circumstances, pushed aside what we didn't want to see, suppressed what we saw, and from a security policy point of view we declared the worst-case scenarios to be quite improbable so that we could concentrate entirely on the best-case scenarios.

War and Peace, staged in 2012, screened at the Golden Mask festival

An Epic of Defiance? Ukraine 2022

By Patrick Mileham, EuroISME BoD member

This brief statement is to warn against indiscriminate reliance on the term ‘narrative’. While events unfold day-by-day participants can be deceived about ‘war aims’ and ‘campaign-plans’ and, how the actual fighting is progressing towards hypothetical ‘end-states’, acceptable or unacceptable.

Literature as a seismograph for crisis

By Prof. Dr. Jürgen Wertheimer

The medium of literature does not appear often when it comes to prognosis, prevention, proactive action. Occasionally one hears that it is too slow, too complicated, text-heavy, unworldly. The converse is the case. Literature is extremely realistic, even addicted to reality. Or why was it persecuted by censors and inquisitors for centuries?

Understanding War: Beyond Competing Narratives

By Dragan Stanar, Board Member, Euro-ISME

The article explores the influence of competing narratives surrounding the ongoing war in Ukraine on our moral evaluation of war and all of its dimensions.
Can we expect to properly morally evaluate anything regarding this complex conflict until we fully understand it? Narratives generated by both sides make this task incredibly difficult and challenging. Nevertheless, it remains necessary.

Revisions of Peace Ethics in the Face of the Ukraine War

By Prof. Dr. Markus Vogt, LMU
The brutal war of aggression on Ukraine, which the Russian president personally pushed forward without any external cause, was not only an violation of the territorial integrity of a sovereign nation, but was at the same time an attack on the order of values of Europe and the United Nations.
We should have been vigilant much earlier. Already for many years and recently bundled in his essay "On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians" (July 12, 2021), the Russian president, who sometimes acts as an amateur historian, has denied Ukraine's right to exist as an autonomous state and declared a Russian hegemony.
 

Ukraine:  With the courage of desperation

By Prof. Dr. Heinz Gerhard Justenhoven

"Are we really in the wrong movie?" That's what citizens, politicians and experts have been asking themselves during past weeks. An overwhelming military power invades his neighboring country, simply because it shouldn't actually exist!?

In Germany we have been discussing for too long what help we are obliged to provide. Emergency aid for refugees and medical help... we naturally were able to quickly agree on that.
But, I've been asking myself if we seriously want to wait until Ukrainians have been injured and then offer them medical help – but deny the means for defense so this shall not happen?

The assassination of Julius Caesar, led by Brutus, by the Senate

Thoughts on the topic of assassination

By Prof. Dr. David Whetham, Vice President, EuroISME
Given recent musings by some public figures, this post elaborates on a few thoughts on the topic of assassination and pleads for caution.

 

Forum discussion on the blog "Views on War in Ukraine"

Discuss this article and the other contributions to the Ukraine Blog in our Forum – Click here.

 

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