War and Ethics

In the Framework of Primordial Nature (Fiṭrah) Ethics

Dr. Reza Gholami

Faculty Member, Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies, Tehran

Head of Iranian Wisdom House, Vienna

Introduction: War and Ethics – A Question as Old as History

War is the oldest and bloodiest phenomenon in human history. From the first tribal wars to the nuclear wars of the twentieth century, humans have always faced this question: Can war ever be moral? Can we even speak of “ethics” in a situation where killing, destruction, and lies are the main tools?

This question has never been purely philosophical throughout history – it has always been political, legal, and religious. Cicero wrote about “just war” in ancient Rome. Saint Augustine brought it into Christian thought in the fifth century. Muslim jurists carefully developed rules for war and peace from the early centuries of Islam. In the modern era, the Holocaust and the atomic bombing of Hiroshima raised this question with new intensity and led to the Geneva Conventions and international humanitarian law.

But today, in a world where proxy wars, smart weapons, drones, and cyber wars have changed the face of conflict, this question is more complex than ever. Aggressors have become smarter — their justifications more sophisticated, their tools more deadly, and their propaganda more professional. In this space, the need for a solid ethical framework – not contractual, not political, but primordial (fiṭrah) and rational – is felt more than at any other time.

This note seeks to answer several main and secondary questions:

Main Question 1: According to which ethical system can we judge war, and is primordial-rational ethics more effective than other ethical systems in this field?

Main Question 2: Is defense against aggression morally justified, and if so, what are its ethical limits and conditions?

Secondary Questions: Can war bring freedom and democracy? What is the moral judgment on remaining silent in the face of aggression? What precise rules has Islamic ethics established for war and defense? And what is the relationship between ethics and human rights in this area?

1. Which Ethics?

Before any discussion, we must clarify which ethical system we are talking about. This question is not merely an introduction – it determines the entire analysis. If we understand ethics as the conventional norms of societies, then every nation and government can have its own independent “ethical” system and justify its wars with it. This type of relativistic ethics has no practical value in the global context of war – because every side can claim that it is “morally” right using the same logic.

What does have practical value is an ethics that arises from human primordial nature (fiṭrah) — stable and universal principles that stand above religion, above the state, and above social contracts. By “primordial” (fiṭrah) we mean exactly this: an ethics that blossoms from the depth of human innate reason and gives people the lasting and universal power to distinguish good from evil – not through calculation, not through teaching, but through the very reason that is inseparable from their existence.

The historical evidence for this claim is clear: no society in history has ever been found lacking this ethics. Even aggressors and oppressors, when injustice was done to them, considered it reprehensible. Even Hitler condemned harm done to himself – this is a sign that the primordial moral conscience does not fall silent even in the darkest minds; it is simply suppressed when it concerns others. This paradox – that people often do not apply to others the principles they accept for themselves – is itself the strongest evidence for the existence of primordial ethics. If ethics were merely conventional, such a contradiction would make no sense.

Primordial ethics has a special place in Islamic thought. Muslim philosophers, inspired by the Holy Quran and the concept of “fiṭrah” in it — “the primordial nature of Allah upon which He created people” (Surah Ar-Rum: 30) — have developed a coherent theory of primordial ethics. Avicenna (Ibn Sina) in Isharat wa Tanbihat considers this faculty to be inherent in the rational soul. Mulla Sadra in Asfar al-Arba‘ah describes reason not as a tool for calculation but as a light that reveals truth. Although this theory developed within an Islamic context, in its essence it is consistent with the Western natural law tradition – from Grotius to Aquinas – and can engage in dialogue with it.

By “rational” in this ethics, we do not mean instrumental and calculative reason. Max Weber formulated this distinction as “value rationality” versus “instrumental rationality.” Instrumental reason asks: What must we do to achieve the goal? Value rationality – which is the same innate primordial reason – asks: Is this goal and this path fundamentally right? Wars justified by instrumental reason have a bloody history; wars condemned by primordial reason have been condemned in every era and culture.

2. Ethics and Human Rights: A Necessary Distinction

One of the most common mistakes in this area is equating ethics with human rights. Human rights, in the form of the Universal Declaration (1948) and subsequent conventions, is a political-legal effort to codify some ethical principles – not the source of ethics. More precisely: human rights tries to turn ethics into law, not to be the foundation of ethics itself.

This distinction does not mean rejecting human rights. The text of the Universal Declaration is a valuable document. Eleanor Roosevelt, who chaired the drafting committee, explicitly said that the goal of the document was to translate human conscience into the language of law – this admission itself shows that moral conscience is the source and human rights is the result.

However, this document has two fundamental flaws. First, it is still incomplete – there is a long way to go to complete it based on primordial ethical principles. Second, even the existing covenants are not observed. If they were observed, it would be a great achievement. This is not a flaw in the text, but a sign that human rights without internalized ethical backing remains mere paper that the powerful ignore.

3. Initial Aggression and Weak Moral Justifications

Primordial ethics clearly considers initial aggression illegitimate. Ethics fundamentally does not accept the idea of initial aggression against lands and countries. No sound mind allows anyone to attack another country without a real threat, kill its people, and call it “preemption.” Nevertheless, aggressors throughout history have morally justified their aggression with titles such as preemption, active deterrence, and exporting democracy.

Thomas Nagel, a contemporary moral philosopher who experienced the wars of the second half of the twentieth century and the beginning of the twenty-first, carefully explains this justificatory structure in his article “War and Massacre” (1972). He distinguishes between two types of moral argument:

“Utilitarianism gives priority to what happens. Absolutism gives priority to what you do. When one of the options is to do something terrible to another human being, the issue changes fundamentally; it is no longer simply a question of which outcome is worse.”

— Thomas Nagel, War and Massacre, 1972

This simple but profound distinction strikes at the root of all war justifications. Nagel explains it with a memorable image:

“Once the door of utility calculations and national interests is opened, one can always use the usual arguments about the future of freedom, peace, and economic prosperity to soothe the consciences of those responsible for burning children.”

— Thomas Nagel, War and Massacre, 1972

The justification of “preemption” claims that an imminent threat exists. The American attack on Iraq in 2003, based on the claim of weapons of mass destruction – later proven false – is a clear example. This deliberate lie is a double violation of ethics: not only aggression, but a structured lie to justify it. The justification of “active deterrence,” which considers attack necessary to prevent a future danger, also arises from the same instrumental reason – killing innocent people today based on probabilities of tomorrow — which primordial ethics rejects.

4. The Tree of Freedom Does Not Grow in the Swamp of War

One of the common justifications for modern wars is the claim of “exporting freedom and democracy.” This claim conflicts with a fundamental truth: freedom and democracy grow from within societies; they are not injected from outside.

John Dewey saw democracy not as a form of government but as “a way of associated living” that arises from the habits, values, and developed institutions of a society. Amartya Sen in Development as Freedom (1999) shows that freedom takes shape in a long-term, interconnected process. Rousseau had written before everyone else: freedom cannot be given to anyone – if it comes from outside, it is not freedom.

War is precisely the environment that destroys all the preconditions for the growth of freedom: social trust, civil institutions, space for dialogue, a stable economy, and collective psychological security. Hannah Arendt in On Violence (1970) argues that violence and power are inherently opposed – real power arises from agreement and cooperation, not from coercion.

Historical evidence confirms this truth. Iraq after 2003, Libya after 2011, Afghanistan after 2001 – all show the same pattern: power vacuum, sectarian war, collapse of institutions. Francis Fukuyama, who was himself a defender of this project, later admitted that engineering democracy through war was an illusion. In contrast, successful transitions to democracy – Spain after Franco, Portugal in the Carnation Revolution, South Africa after apartheid – all came through national dialogue, reconciliation, and internal reform.

5. Ethics in the Details of War: Weapons, Civilians, Lies

Apart from the question of the legitimacy of war, the methods of fighting are independently judged by ethics. Michael Walzer in Just and Unjust Wars (1977) expresses this with the distinction between two dimensions: the right to go to war and the right in war – and emphasizes that the legitimacy of starting a war does not bring legitimacy to every method used in it.

Nagel clarifies this with a revolutionary definition of “innocent” in war:

“The term innocent here means ‘currently harmless.’ If the criterion were moral innocence, then killing the enemy’s evil but non-combatant barber would be permissible, and killing the conscripted soldier who drives his tank toward us with the deepest regret would not be permissible.”

– Thomas Nagel, War and Massacre, 1972

From this principle arise two fundamental criteria:

Discrimination: Killing someone who is currently and actually creating a threat is different from killing the harmless – and blind, mass defense that targets civilians is morally murder.

Proportionality: The response must be proportionate to the threat. Destroying infrastructure, bombing residential areas, and using prohibited weapons – chemical, white phosphorus, cluster bombs – all fundamentally violate the principle of discrimination.

Ethical Defense in Practice: Lessons from the Iran-Iraq War

One of the outstanding examples of observing ethical principles in defense is the eight-year Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988). The Ba’athist regime of Iraq clearly violated ethical principles in this war: bombing Iranian civilian cities including Tehran, Isfahan, and Shiraz in the “War of the Cities”; extensive use of chemical weapons in Halabja and on the battlefields, which killed thousands of civilians and soldiers; and deliberate destruction of civilian infrastructure.

But Iran, despite these pressures and heavy human costs, refused to retaliate in the same way. The Islamic Republic of Iran, although it had the ability to use chemical weapons, did not do so. Despite the bombing of its cities, it did not systematically and extensively target Iraqi residential areas. This approach was based on Islamic ethical principles that allow fighting only to the extent of repelling aggression but do not permit retaliation in the form of the same crime — even when one has the capability.

In the recent war and aggression by the United States and Israel against Iran (2026), a great deal of attention was also paid to ethical principles. While the United States deliberately targeted a primary school with 169 children in the city of Minab in southern Iran with a missile, killing all of them, and constantly and purposefully bombed residential areas in Iran, Iran refused to attack people’s homes and kill civilians.

This historical example shows that observing ethics in defense is not merely a theoretical ideal — it is also possible in practice, even in the most difficult conditions. And this itself is the strongest answer to those who say “ethics has no meaning in war.”

The Psychology of War: Tactical Lies or Fundamental Lies?

War is also morally important from a psychological perspective. A distinction must be made: military deception is considered legitimate by military tradition. But structural lies — creating false narratives to justify the entire war — are a direct violation of ethics. The attack on Iraq based on the lie of weapons of mass destruction is a classic example of this type of lie, which itself counts as an independent crime.

Hannah Arendt in The Origins of Totalitarianism shows how propaganda machines make killing digestible by dehumanizing the enemy. This process is inherently anti-ethical because it violates human dignity — the foundation of primordial ethics. Jonathan Shay speaks of “moral injury”: the psychological damage to soldiers who were forced to commit acts that conflicted with their deep moral values — a sign that even the winning side can be a moral victim of war.

6. Islamic Ethics and Law: Precise Rules for Every Aspect of Defense

Islamic ethics — both in its philosophical and jurisprudential dimensions — is one of the richest traditions for regulating the ethics of war and defense. This tradition has established precise rules for every single dimension and aspect of defense so that any excess is prohibited — rules that are based not on contracts, but on ethics and reason.

1. A) Before War: Absolute Priority of Peace

In Islamic jurisprudence, armed defense is the last option. The Holy Quran is clear: “And if they incline to peace, then incline to it” (Surah Al-Anfal: 61). Ibn Rushd (Averroes) in Bidayat al-Mujtahid considers this principle to be of absolute priority. A legitimate peace offer must be accepted; rejecting it is itself a violation of ethics.

1. B) During War: List of Protected Persons

Islamic jurisprudence has defined a precise list of protected persons: children, non-combatant women, the elderly, the sick, worshippers in places of worship, farmers, and merchants. The Prophet of Islam (peace be upon him) explicitly forbade killing these groups. The Prophet gave ten instructions to his armies, including: “Do not cut down fruit trees, do not destroy buildings, do not kill animals without reason.” These rules were established a thousand years before the Geneva Conventions.

1. C) Regarding Prisoners and After War

A prisoner of war in Islamic jurisprudence enjoys full rights. Torture is absolutely forbidden. Killing a surrendered prisoner is prohibited. Imam Ali (peace be upon him) writes in his famous letter to Malik al-Ashtar: “Beware of shedding the blood of the innocent, for this is the greatest cause of the withdrawal of blessings and the fall of the state.” This warning is both moral and political: governments that shed the blood of the innocent destroy the foundation of their own legitimacy.

It should also not be overlooked that what was presented as the violent terrorist group ISIS by the United States and turned into a tool for Islamophobia in the world for years had no connection to Islam.

7. Silence in the Face of Aggression: The Ethics of Indifference

Can not defending against aggression, or remaining silent in the face of it, itself be a moral act? The answer of primordial ethics is clear: silence in the face of oppression is not neutrality — it is a choice that in practice benefits the oppressor and harms the oppressed.

Nagel expresses this from an analytical perspective. Absolute pacifism comes with the implicit acceptance of a terrible outcome:

“If hostile behavior toward another always violated the condition of treating him as a human being, then no further distinction among hostile acts would be possible. This view at the level of international relations leads to the position that if complete pacifism is not accepted, no restrictions are necessary and we can kill as much as we deem expedient.”

— Thomas Nagel, War and Massacre, 1972

Elie Wiesel, Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace Prize winner, said in his 1986 speech: “Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” The Rwandan genocide in 1994 — 800,000 killed in 100 days while the international community watched — showed that silence comes at a heavy price. General Roméo Dallaire, who received orders not to intervene, later wrote that with minimal intervention, hundreds of thousands of lives could have been saved.

8. Defense: Not Only a Right, but a Duty and a Sign of Virtue

Ethics not only permits proportionate defense against an aggressor, but considers failure to defend proportionately as a sign of lacking virtue. This position has profound consequences.

1. A) Defense in Virtue Ethics

Aristotle in Nicomachean Ethics considers courage a virtue that is the mean between fear and recklessness. Someone who surrenders to a real threat out of fear or weakness shows not the virtue of patience but the vice of cowardice. When the power to defend exists, failure to defend proportionately is a sign of lacking several basic virtues: courage — the ability to stand up for correct values; civic courage — accepting the cost of defending collective dignity; self-respect — the feeling of worth for what we have; and responsibility toward others — because the surrender of a nation to an aggressor makes the aggressor bolder.

1. B) Defense in Islamic Ethics: From Right to Obligation

In Islamic moral philosophy, defense of life, honor, and land is not only a right but, in certain conditions, an obligation. The Holy Quran is explicit: “Do not weaken and do not grieve” (Surah Al-Imran: 139). Thomas Aquinas in Summa Theologica argues that surrender to aggression when the power to defend exists is not a virtue but the abandonment of a duty.

1. C) The Moral Limit of Defense

Nagel writes with rare honesty:

“I am not sure why we are justified in killing those who are trying to kill us — instead of merely stopping them with force, even if this stopping leads to their death.”

— Thomas Nagel, War and Massacre, 1972

Nagel’s doubt is not a doubt about the legitimacy of defense, but a reminder of its moral weight. Defense is legitimate because its goal is to stop oppression, not to satisfy anger. As soon as defensive means become incompatible with this goal — revenge against civilians, torturing prisoners, destruction beyond necessity — the moral legitimacy of defense comes into question. Ethical defense is proportionate, purposeful, and stops the moment the threat is removed.

Conclusion and Outlook

War and ethics are always in tension. War is the most complex test for any ethical system, because in it the most fundamental values — life, justice, freedom, and human dignity — appear simultaneously and in conflict with one another. From what has been said, several enduring principles emerge:

• Initial aggression in any form or under any title is morally unjustified, and no calculation of instrumental reason can justify it.
• Proportionate defense is not only a right but, when power exists, a moral duty. Failure to do so is a sign of lacking virtues such as courage, bravery, and self-respect.
• Islamic ethics, and subsequently its law, has established precise rules for every aspect of defense so that any excess is prohibited. The eight-year Iran-Iraq War showed that adherence to these principles is possible even in the most difficult conditions.
• Silence in the face of oppression is not neutrality — it is a choice that in practice benefits the oppressor and harms the oppressed.
• Freedom and democracy are the product of culture, dialogue, and internal reform. The tree of freedom does not grow in the swamp of war.
• Human rights is a valuable achievement but not the source of ethics — it must be nourished by primordial ethics and completed on its basis.
• Finally, a warning for the future: with the rapid progress of technology — autonomous drones, artificial intelligence weapons, cyber weapons, and new-generation biological weapons — the scope of war possibilities is expanding in such a way that traditional ethical principles alone are no longer sufficient. If thinkers, philosophers, and jurists do not take the issue of war and ethics seriously and do not take steps to popularize these discussions, technology will go its own way — and future wars could be far more unethical than past ones. Human moral conscience must keep pace with the speed of technological progress; otherwise, this technology in the hands of the conscienceless will become a tool for an aggression for which we have no name.

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