Military Ethics Research Paper

Throughout the world, many accidents happen concerning the military. However, are these military accidents ethical or unethical? To what extent is it ethical to take action if a team member is shooting at you in combat because they think you are the enemy? Friendly fire is “weapon fire coming from one’s own side, especially fire that causes accidental injury or death to one’s own forces” (oxforddictionaries.com). Within military combat, accidents happen where a soldier may hurt, injure, or kill another soldier on the same team because you think they are the enemy, or vise versa. But, is killing someone on accident considered ethical or unethical? Well, this depends on many factors such as how, when, where, why, and what. Also, you must know …show more content…
Immanuel Kant, a german philosopher, has a theory that involves murder, theft, and lying. According to Kant, he “believed that certain types of actions (including murder, theft, and lying) were absolutely prohibited, even in cases where the action would bring about more happiness than the alternative” (csus.edu). For example, if you kill someone who is planning to kill 1000 people, you would still be ethically wrong. In military battle, friendly fire always ends in death or injury. Based on Kant’s theory of ethics, friendly fire would be considered unethical. Based on the fact that friendly fire always leads to harming someone whether on purpose or accident, it would be against Kant’s theory of ethics. This theory of ethics “is an example of a deontological moral theory–according to these theories, the rightness or wrongness of actions does not depend on their consequences but on whether they fulfill our duty” (csus.edu). No matter how wrong or right you believe your action is, if you are harming someone else, it is considered unethical according to philosopher …show more content…
In Iraq and Afghanistan they have many precautions for friendly fire. These two countries have different systems that they use to make sure friendly fire does not happen. For example, “airplanes talk to each other using a system known as Identification Friend or Foe, a call-and-response technology similar to that used by air traffic control. An "interrogator" device on one plane sends a coded signal to a transponder aboard another aircraft. If the plane replies, it is considered friendly” (slant.com). This system that was implemented by the countries of Iraq and Afghanistan help in preventing friendly fire. Another system is “called Blue Force Tracking, takes advantage of satellite communications to map out all the friendly units in a certain area, but doesn't refresh in real time” (slant.com). These solutions really do make a difference in the way friendly fire is treated and how to stop it from