The United Nations (UN), International Security and The Just War Doctrine

Abstract

International relations is threatened by recourse to the use of force. The use of force in inter-slate relations is based on just war (jus ad helium) doctrines. The just war tradition provided a moral and legal basis for the causes and conduct of war. The paper depended on secondary data which involved the avalanche of scholarly works by international relations scholars. The study revealed that military interventions of the just war tradition has been used as a smokescreen to legalize wars. This is particularly true of United States and the former USSR (Russia). On the basis of this, the paper then recommended that the United Nations General Assembly should be the only organ vested with the power to declare just war, among others.