. Edited by Robert Cowley and Geoffrey Parker.)“Military action is presented by Sun Tzu in an implicitly Taoist frame of reference. The idea that terrain, weather, and enemy morale in effect have contours, through which the successful general finds the best ways (tao), thereby using the force inherent in them to support his purposes, is basically Taoist, as is the recurrent theme of transformation, from one state to another, as in the interplay he discusses between regular (cheng) and irregular (ch’i) forces.”“Sun Tzu writes about warfare within a single culture, wherein secret agents are difficult to detect and enemy thought processes differ little from one’s own. One might question therefore the relevance of Sun Tzu in modern conditions, in which states are robust and force abundantly available, and in wars between nations, in which ethnic differences make spying difficult and enemy thought processes difficult to assess. Such concerns were probably more persuasive in the era of era of Carl von Clausewitz than they are today. For one thing, nuclear weapons have meant that the traditional Western road to victory–the application of massive, industrialized force–is now closed against a nuclear-armed adversary, and hence strategists must consider once again how to win without fighting, or at least without fighting too much. Force, as Vietnam showed, cannot alone win victory.”
Machiavelli
Analogy
Real politik: rejection of morality concerns
and “ought to be” in political
thinking
Virtue and fortune Will and necessity
Truth of reality Value of experience
Concrete rather than pessimistic realism chapter 17 and the need of evil
Naturalistic view of human nature always assume the worst when it
comes to human nature BUT
Preeminence of voluntas (will)
Fortune consists
of events
of the world around us
Virtue is
prudent human conduct
Historical examples
Fortune and human affairs
Key to our
understanding of Machiavelli:
Truth of reality essential value of experience (balancing/grounding purely deductive principles and the knowledge he
gathers at “the ancient courts of ancient men” “Letter to Francesco Vettori” p.138)
Centrality of the concept of necessity
Concrete rather than pessimistic realism chapter 17 and the need of evil
Naturalistic view of human nature always assume the worst when it comes to human nature BUT… Preeminence of
voluntas (will)
VIRTUE as WILL –
perhaps we could refer to VIRTUE in Machiavelli as agency (one who behaves virtuously is
one in control of his own agency - one who is prudent because he has foresight) –
Virtue is
prudent human conduct
FORTUNE as NECESSITY
(That which necessarily occurs in the world - independent from your will/ beyond your
agency…)
Fortune consists
of events
of the world around us
Walzer
ius in bello
jus in bellum
Supreme Emergency
legalist paradigm
Aggression
Humanitarian intervention
Territorial integrity
Theory of Realism
command responsibility
the war convention
Geneva Conventions
pre-emptive strike
Principle of Nonintervention
