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Murder is the intentional killing of an innocent person. In the context of war, murder is the intentional killing of a non-combatant. Any military action that results in the deaths of non-combatants is therefore murder. And, since it is impossible to conduct war in the modern age without killing non-combatants, a just war cannot exist.

War is evil. That being said, sometimes war is the lesser of two evils. For the record, I would have given the order to firebomb Tokyo, Osaka, and the other cities of Japan, just as Gen. Curtis LeMay did. I would also have given the order to nuke Hiroshima and Nagasaki, just as Truman did. However, I would have done so with the full awareness that I was committing murder by doing so. LeMay, the man behind the firebombings of Japan that killed so many innocent civilians, refused to attempt to weasel his way out of what he had done. In an interview conducted after the war, LeMay famously said that "killing Japanese didn't bother me very much at that time... I suppose if I had lost the war, I would have been tried as a war criminal.... Every soldier thinks something of the moral aspects of what he is doing. But all war is immoral and if you let that bother you, you're not a good soldier."¹

All war is immoral. LeMay didn't punk out and try to paper over his deeds with a thin tissue of patriotic self-righteousness. He murdered hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians and he lived with it. He faced up to the reality of his deeds like a man.

I'm with him. When war comes, let's get it over with as quickly as possible, and then let's beg God for His forgiveness for the sin of taking innocent lives.