October 9, 2006VOL. 44, NO. 17Oakland, CA

Chaplains help troops make decisions
in moral no man’s land

By Agostino Bono
Catholic News Service

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- In an era when terrorists mingle among civilians, U.S. troops often must make split-second decisions in a moral no man’s land, juggling the protection of innocent civilians with the need for self-defense.

If a missile sails out of a hospital filled with innocent patients, do you fire back? Do you shoot at a gunman using a child as a human shield after he starts firing at innocent civilians? When does the aggressive interrogation of a prisoner cross the line into torture?

But the dilemmas do not stop after an action is taken, said Father Mark Reilly, a Navy chaplain who served with the Marine Corps in Iraq from mid-December to mid-May.

“Then the question becomes: ‘Did I do the right thing?’” said Father Reilly, a priest of the Diocese of Ogdensburg, N.Y., and currently a lieutenant in the Navy Reserve.

In combat zones like Afghanistan and Iraq -- which the Bush administration sees as key battlefields in the war against terrorism -- such questions are daily life-and-death issues as U.S. forces face insurgents dressed as civilians.

“The bad guys don’t wear uniforms,” said Father Reilly.
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To help U.S. troops prepare for these situations, military chaplains discuss possible scenarios with enlisted men and officers before they go into battle, providing moral and ethical guidelines.

The aim is that troops will have thought through these issues and have had some training before they have to face real combat situations, said retired Rear Adm. Thomas Connelly, a layman and vice chancellor of the U.S. Archdiocese for the Military Services.

These scenarios supplement military courses on the “law of war” and the “rules of engagement” which give guidance on the legal and tactical aspects of war.

Franciscan Father Louis V. Iasiello is a rear admiral who recently retired as chief of Navy chaplains. He is president of Washington Theological Union. CNS PHOTO/PAUL HARING

An Iraqi man suspected of having explosives in his car is held after being arrested by the U.S. Army near Baquba, Iraq, last Oct. 15. In his message for World Peace Day 2006, Pope Benedict XVI said that even in the midst of war basic human rights must be respected.
CNS PHOTO/REUTERS

The emphasis is on “what would you do and what should you do,” said Father Reilly.
The priest said he often goes on a “road show” to naval and marine bases to give joint presentations with a military lawyer.

Father Reilly uses the scenario of the missile launched from a hospital.

Normally a hospital, as it houses innocent civilians, would have protected status, he said.
“If the missile is a threat to you, your unit and other innocent civilians, then the protected status of the hospital is compromised,” he said.

The moral principle of the double effect would allow for attacking the hospital to end the missile-firing because “I am not directly intending harm to the civilians in the hospital but I’m trying to neutralize a threat to me, my unit and other civilians,” said Father Reilly.

One of the scenarios used by Auxiliary Bishop Joseph W. Estabrook of the military
archdiocese during his 27 years as a Navy chaplain regards prisoners of war who are being marched from one place to another.

The question posed is: If the path brings you to the edge of a minefield, do you send the prisoners through the field first or do you safeguard their lives by shooting ammunition into the field to destroy the mines?

Legally and morally, prisoners have rights, said Bishop Estabrook, who taught chaplains how to guide troops in handling such scenarios.
Safeguarding prisoners’ rights can be difficult because there is an “occupational hazard” in being a guard, he said.

“There is a natural tendency by guards to look at prisoners as less than human,” said Bishop Estabrook.

The military once had a program by which armed forces personnel who were friends would simulate being guards and prisoners but it had to be ended when the people playing the guards began taking advantage of those playing the prisoners, he said.

The chaplains said that there are no right or wrong ways to answer a lot of the scenarios and that many of these quick battlefield decisions have to be made by youngsters in their late teens and early 20s, leaving lasting impressions.

There are “many gray areas” in making these decisions, said Bishop Estabrook.

The approach is to teach general principles and “hope when they go into battle they can keep their wits about them,” he said.

There is a natural tendency to react emotionally in combat situations, he said.

The purpose of the scenarios is to help troops avoid the initial emotional response and “make ethically grounded decisions,” he said.

The chaplains emphasized that one of the key lessons of the Vietnam War was that the life-or-death decisions made in combat remain with troops emotionally and psychologically.
“The choices they made were not left in Vietnam,” said Father Reilly.

The problem is called post-traumatic stress disorder.

After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks the Marine Corps started a program, called Warrior Transition, to help members of the armed forces deal with such stress and better reintegrate into civilian society, said Franciscan Father Louis V. Iasiello, who helped develop the program.

Father Iasiello, a Navy chaplain on active duty from 1983 until he retired earlier this year, said a main element of the program is to get troops about to return home into group sessions where they can talk about their experiences “in a constructive way.”

This helps them figure out how they are going to discuss their combat experiences with their family and friends back home, said Father Iasiello, who in July became president of the Washington Theological Union, a graduate school of theology and ministry.

The program also works with the family members of returning Marines.

“One of the unstated yet critically important missions of a chaplain is to help warriors retain their humanity and deal with their visible and invisible wounds” once they have stopped fighting, he wrote in a 2004 article in the Naval War College Review.

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