Introduction

Detonating bombs that over the course of three decades injured, maimed or killed hundreds of people certainly counts as causing harm to others, if anything does, and would prima facie seem to be morally wrong, if anything is. Yet what is morally impermissible in ordinary circumstances may be morally permissible in the extraordinary circumstances of war, which by its very nature involves intentionally harming others. Just as clearly, not everything done in war is morally justifiable. The fact that certain types of actions are by international agreement classified as ‘war crimes’ suggests that there are moral limits differentiating permissible from impermissible wartime acts. Since at least the Middle Ages, philosophers have drawn a distinction between just and unjust wars, and have attempted to identify the conditions under which the resort to war, and sorts of actions undertaken in war, are morally justifiable (Evans 2005). ‘Just War Theory’ formalises these conditions.

From its beginning the Provisional IRA conceived of itself as an army engaged in a morally justified armed struggle against the British occupation of Ireland. On occasion the IRA has asserted that its armed campaign is justified according to the formal rules governing warfare.