Is the Attack on Iran Just?

Is America’s and Israel’s attack on Iran a just war?

According to Catholic teaching, to be justifiable a war must 

1. Be in a just cause 

2. Be a last resort 

3. Have a good probability of success 

4. Target an evil worse than war itself 

5. Be waged by legitimate government authority.

Let’s check them off one by one.

Be in a just cause.

Nominally, the war is waged to take out Iran’s nuclear and missile capacity before they develop a nuclear weapon, making them invulnerable. This seems to me just because defensive. Iran has declared its intent to destroy Israel. They have sponsored ongoing attacks by proxy forces—in effect, they are already conducting aggressive war.

Unofficially, the war is also waged to give the Iranian people an opportunity for freedom from an oppressive government.

Be a last resort.

Trump made a show of trying to negotiate an end to the missile and nuclear programs in recent weeks. The Americans claim the Iranians would not concede much.

This might have been window dressing, or a misdirection, but it does not matter. The Americans have negotiated for years, trying to get Iran to stop developing nuclear weapons. The Iranians just kept breaking the deals.

According to the Israelis, the Iranians were within weeks of having a bomb. According to the Americans, the Iranians actually boasted they already had enough enriched uranium to make eleven bombs.

So there was no longer any time left for diplomacy. It was indeed, if these reports are true, a last resort.

Have a good probability of success.

The proof of the pudding is this: the Americans and Israelis have so far indeed been spectacularly successful, in taking out the Iranian leadership, taking out the Iranian air force, taking out the Iranian navy, in just five days of sorties. Success seems in sight.

Target an evil worse than war itself.

The casualty list from this action so far is reportedly about one thousand Iranians. This must be tallied up against Iran’s record of killing about fifty thousand of their own civilians over the last month or so, the tolls from their sponsorship of terrorist attacks throughout the Middle East over the years, and the possible casualties from an eventual nuclear exchange with Israel.

Be waged by legitimate government authority. 

Obviously, Trump and Netanyahu are legitimate government authorities. Doubly legitimate in that they were democratically elected, an so have a popular mandate.