ABSTRACT

Readers should be familiar with the concept of “dirty hands,” or the willingness to use deception and fraud for supposedly good ends (Shugarman and Rynard, 2000, p. 87). Sometimes, killing or intentionally exposing (a government’s own) civilians to potentially lethal danger falls into this categorydepending what we understand as good ends. In that sense, international intervention can be deemed as a good end if it helps bring a party in conict closer to its goals. Although there was no known victimization of its own civilians, it is generally considered a good thing for British citizens to have had the United States (US) enter the Second World War in order to support the United Kingdom’s (UK) ght against Nazi Germany. Sometimes, however, to receive such international support, parties seek to support the conditions in which civilians become the victims of vicious crime(s). This is especially the case when conditions make it difcult for an actor to nd support or even allies in the international system. When a party intentionally seeks to be victimized, particularly when it allows its own civilians to become victims of violent events, in order to receive external benets, we refer to this as “moral hazard.” Although readers may be familiar with some episodes of victimization of civilians throughout history, whether episodes occur in order to draw international support is not entirely clear.