ABSTRACT
This book illustrates the context of the Iraq War, why the conventional understanding of non-combatant immunity is logically inconsistent and practically impossible. It explains the ethical ambiguities retained in Walzer's foundation of the moral rules of war by highlighting the relationship between ethics as response and war fighting in Iraq and arguing that the killing of combatants in Iraq constitutes an ethical sacrifice. The difficulty in identifying combatants in the context of Iraq highlights a significant problem in adapting Walzer's theory: the problem of universalising rules and norms abstracted from the specific contexts to which they are intended to be applied. Walzer's theoretical justifications for the forfeiture of rights are problematic. He offers two primary justifications for combatant's loss of rights: Simply by fighting, whatever their private hopes, and intentions, they have lost their title to life and liberty, unlike aggressor states, they have committed no crime.
