Just War doctrine

[Bren]

Over on the Ship and Equipment thread the question came up of whether Rebels would essentially act as suicide bombers. That led me to think about just war or jus in bello doctrine. Standford http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/war/ has a nice synopis from which I drew heavily for the text below.

Just War - Jus in Bello
Jus in bello refers to justice in war, to right conduct in the midst of battle. Which includes external jus in bello – the rules a state should observe regarding the enemy and its armed forces and internal jus in bello – the rules a state must follow in connection with its own people as it fights war against an external enemy. Since the Rebellion is actually a civil war one interpretation would say there is no true external enemy which would make internal rules apply at least to all the civilian populations of Imperial held systems.
There are several rules of external jus in bello:

1. Obey all international laws on weapons prohibition. Some weapons are too awful to use.
2. Discrimination and Non-Combatant Immunity. Soldiers are only entitled to use their (non-prohibited) weapons to target those who are “engaged in harm.” When they take aim, soldiers must discriminate between the civilian population and those legitimate military, political and industrial targets involved in rights-violating harm.
3. Proportionality. Soldiers may only use force proportional to the end they seek.
4. Benevolent quarantine for prisoners of war (POWs). If enemy soldiers surrender and become captives, they cease being lethal threats to basic rights. They are no longer “engaged in harm.” It is wrong to target them with death, starvation, rape, torture, medical experimentation, and so on.
5. No Means Mala in Se. Soldiers may not use weapons or methods which are “evil in themselves.”
6. No reprisals. A reprisal is when country A violates jus in bello in war with country B. Country B then retaliates with its own violation of jus in bello, seeking to chasten A into obeying the rules.

Internal jus in bello essentially boils down to the need for a state, even though it's involved in a war, nevertheless to still respect the human rights of its own citizens as best it can during the crisis. The following issues arise:

Is it just to impose conscription, or press censorship?
Can one curtail traditional civil liberties, and due process protections, for perceived gains in national security?
Should elections be cancelled or postponed?
May soldiers disobey orders, e.g. refuse to fight in wars they believe unjust?

In my universe, the Rebel Alliance led by Mon Mothma officially follows these rules. But smaller Rebel groups that are not under the Alliance's control may not. And individual Rebels even in the Alliance may violate one or more of these rules.

So how do your Rebels behave? What rules do they follow?

[Kemper Boyd]

In my New Separatists game, the core of the Alliance is rather well-led under Mon Mothma and she keeps the hard-liners in check very efficiently. However, Sector forces or smaller resistance groups which are namely part of the Alliance, aren't always as moral. For instance, the resistance on Botajef uses suicide bombings and attacks Imperial civilian targets indiscriminately.

The Rebel Alliance doesn't have much need for censorship or curtailing the freedom of the press, because they are unable to do so even if they'd want to. There is no formal conscription, the Alliance doesn't operate as a democratic institution for the duration of the Galactic Civil War (remember, this is what drove Garm Bel Iblis away) but this of course is certainly in line with the founding principles of the Alliance, and the Chief of State can be impeached by the advisory council.

Some officers of the Alliance think this binds their hands too much, and as an example, General Airen Cracken in my campaign technically commits high treason several times due to him passing on information to the Federation of Independent Worlds, whenever he thinks Mon Mothma will not allow some specific course of action.

[CRMcNeill]

There is also the Justice Action Network, as mentioned in the Lords of the Expanse boxed set. They oppose the Empire as well, but they fit the definition of a terrorist group, using bombings, kidnappings, assassinations and such.

That brings up a question. Using precision methods (such as sniping) to eliminate an enemy officer makes good tactical sense; killing the enemy commander and as many of his subordinates as possible to throw the enemy force into confusion at a critical moment in battle is an accepted combat technique. IIRC, American military doctrine is to do just that; take out the commander to put his subordinates off balance so that they can be defeated with greater ease.

So, at what point does that become assassination? Is it limited to strictly military personnel? But what if an Imperial governor is about to give an order for genocide operations against an alien population and someone slips poison into his morning caf? At what point in the SWU does a surgical strike against high ranking enemy personnel become an assassination?
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Fallon Kell]

My Rebels fight to win, but they remember why they're fighting. They'll do just about anything to a squad of stormtroopers if they have to, so long as they aren't hurting civilians. Assassinations, kidnappings, piracy, and bombings of military or political targets are on the table, but they won't do something like place a bomb on a parade route to kill a moff, where it will also kill two dozen civilians. Instead, they would be more likely to smuggle a bomb into a moff's office, if they could, in an attempt to eliminate collateral damage.
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Or that excessively long "Noooooooooo" was the Whining Side of the Force leaving him. - Dustflier

Complete Starship Construction System

[garhkal]

Sniping a mil target is IMO different from assassinating a NOn mil target (such as a political figure)..

As to me, i try to run it where the rebels are sworn to this, but some do push the bubble of what is right and wrong..
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[CRMcNeill]

[Fallon Kell]

[garhkal]

That be true..
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[vanir]

ouchie, definitely want to avoid a Dresden debate on an rpg board, as a somewhat military historian I'll get way too involved so will stick entirely to the fictional setting of SWU/Galactic Civil War.

After all, this is my escape from all that real world research, too much of it on any side of any argument or just standing by the sidelines is really depressing. Real lives are involved, the subject breeches Holocaust/historical-atrocity, one should largely reserve the subject for its own dedicated forums. I might suggest the Axis History Forum, it has a lot of very well researched and celebrated experts on the subject. The Luftwaffe Experten board for example specifically prohibits discussion of the holocaust and atrocities in keeping its dedicated technological emphasis without politics involved. You get the idea.

In terms of the Galactic Civil War, one should remember that it is only a civil war in terms of a galactic civilisation, in the same way one might consider any combat between humans IRL to be in fact a civil war within a world community with ultimately common personal goals among individuals, life and an interpretation of liberty, protecting families, etc.

In this sense the theatrical presentation of the galactic civilisation is idealistic the same way Star Trek is idealistic about abolishing monetary economics. In reality, as exhibited by various political leanings worldwide and throughout history, to abolish one industrial system serves only to create a void into which another readily steps in to fill, whether it be a sociopolitical emphasis rather than socioeconomic, or some other.

I infer that individual planetary systems or conglomerates will effectively alienate unwarranted or unlawful government as foreign influences. Ergo to the Rebel Alliance the Galactic Empire represents a totalitarian state imposed by a foreign power.

[CRMcNeill]

Considering we don't know what the rules of war are in the SWU, is it reasonable to assume that they bear some similarity to the rules of the Geneva Convention, as well as the other associated treaties of the "civilized" world?
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Bren]

Rules of war is a topic I find interesting and I’m glad to see other folks have considered what the rules of war look like for the Rebellion. This will be a series of thoughts based on the comments so far.

[cheshire]

[CRMcNeill]

Well, reading from the Rebel Alliance Sourcebook, I can offer a few facts:

1). Mon Mothma, as the head of the Alliance, is diametrically opposed to assassinations, but does approve them on occasion, including several attempts on Darth Vader

2). Alliance interrogators are forbidden by law from using torture as an interrogation technique

3). Imperial personnel captured by the Alliance are generally not killed, and are in stead dropped into isolated POW camps on Alliance safe worlds, far from any Alliance facilities on the planet, and given a bare minimum of supplies to survive on.

4). Alliance Counter-Intelligence's Retrieval division does, on occasion, execute captured Imperial infiltrators, but only when the infiltrator is in possession of information that would be highly damaging to the Alliance, as mindwipe and personality reconstruction are illegal in the Alliance

5). Mon Mothma has strategic command over the Alliance as a whole, but generally leaves tactical operations up to the individual sector groups. (This could mean that individual sector groups have some leeway in operational planning, in that some might sanction bombings and similar assassinations while others do not).
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Bren]

[garhkal]

Also, looting of the enemy troops is ok, looting in general is not!
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!