Key Issues: Ethics: Issues: The Nuclear Crucible: The Moral and International Law Implications of Weapons of Mass Destruction
In the realm of international law versus political expediency and technological justification/rationalization, the human memory can be short. Historical memory, however, recalls us to the Declaration of St. Petersburg. The declaration was the result of a conference of European military officers who met to take action on a new type of bullet that expanded on entry into the body, causing painful wounds that were hard to treat medically. While an agreement was reached forbidding the use of any projectile of a weight below 400 grams which is either explosive or charged with fulminating or inflammable substance,” (Friedman, Vol. I, 1972, p.192), the conferees also adopted more general principles, which would have a lasting effect upon the development of the laws of war. The Preamble to the Declaration of St. Petersburg specifically prohibits, as contrary to the laws of humanity, the use of weapons which cause unnecessary and excessive suffering. In principle part, it states:
“Considering that the progress of civilization should have the effect of alleviating as much as possible the calamities of war; That the only legitimate object which States should endeavor to accomplish during war is to weaken the military forces of the enemy; That this object would be exceeded by the employment of arms which uselessly aggravate the sufferings of disable men, or render their death inevitable; That the employment of such arms would therefore be contrary to laws of humanity” (“Declaration Renouncing the Use in War of Certain Explosive Projectiles (1868),” in Friedman, Vol. I, 1972, p.19
