WAR AND MURDER

It may seem odd to think about murder when you are talking about war. After all, the whole point of war is to kill people, and to kill them with intent, isn't it? Yet since time immemorial, people have been wrestling with this issue. In mediæval times jurists tried to square violent behaviour with the very clear biblical prohibition "thou shalt not kill"; the result was the concept of the "just war", which handily covered anybody who wasn't Christian. In more modern times, the bible has been replaced by conventions, regulating behaviour. It is OK to kill people, but not in every circumstance. Civilians, the wounded, and soldiers who have surrendered are covered by these rules; killing them is not an accepted part of a soldier's life, but murder.

I am sure that throughout history there have been a lot of deaths in war, which legalistically would be classed as murder. People run on adrenalin in a firefight; judging when the fighting has stopped or whether the guy who was just trying to kill you has in fact surrendered must be extremely difficult. And even if you get that call right, there must be a terrible temptation to finish the job, to make sure that your opponent not only loses today but never has the opportunity to attack you again. I have never been in that situation, but I can well imagine that it happens.

Armies have muddled through with these problems for the past 100 years or so. However, in recent times, a new element has come into the mix, namely the technological development known as the battlefield camera. Brilliant at allowing people far behind the lines to see what is going on up-front (and so bring in air support, artillery or other things), it also records incidents that in the past would not have been recorded. Soldiers have to be aware that what they can see, so can others.

I have been thinking about this because of the conviction for murder this week of a British marine sergeant, who shot a badly wounded Afghan fighter. The fight was over, the threat was over. This was an execution, as the sergeant himself recognised; turning to his colleagues, he said "I just broke the Geneva Convention". Unfortunately for him, the incident was recorded on one of those colleagues' helmet-mounted cameras, setting in train what eventually led to a prosecution. Murder in the U.K. carries an automatic life sentence; though when it comes to sentencing, he will probably end up serving a lesser term than whole life.

What is interesting is that the marine was not convicted by civilian judges with no idea of the realities he faced. This was a Court Martial board, in which seven officers and NCO's - his peers - judged his conduct and found it wanting. As the head of the marines said succinctly, murder is murder; the judgment this week shows that this is true, even in war.

Walter Blotscher