Since biblical times, humans have attempted to form regulations which control the conduct of those humans who are fighting with each other. Sections of Deuteronomy admonish warriors who are besieging a city to not kill women, children and aged men, to not kill animals or cut down trees, as much for their own preservation as anything else. Wikepedia states that Muslim law arising in the seventh and eighth centuries demanded just treatment of diplomats, hostages, refugees and prisoners of war; this law states that women, children and non-combatants should be protected; poisonous weapons and destruction of property are condemned. Wikepedia also lists, beginning from the seventeenth century, some 42 international conventions or treaties which address the rules of conduct nations are expected to follow, including the use of missiles and projectiles, treatment of prisoners, maritime warfare, aerial warfare, use of poisons, care of the wounded, protection of civilians, genocide, use of mines, incendiaries, respecting emergency medical personnel, and just about any other aspect of armed conflict one can think of or name. Just about whatever aspect of war you can imagine, has been addressed by rules which attempt to confine violent anger into the semblance of a football game, or some other violent sport.
That is not to say that these attempts are vain, by any means. They are honest attempts by caring individuals to bring reason out of uncontrolled emotion. It is an attempt to limit that conflict to as brief a time as possible, to limit the amount of destruction that conflict entails, to protect those who are not directly involved in that conflict, to show respect for one’s enemies, to care for the wounded and sick as expeditiously as possible, and to bring peace back as rapidly as possible after that conflict. Those are all noble and realistic goals, recognizing that as long as humans have existed, they have fought with each other, for hormonal or political reasons which are not always clear. The sooner those conflicts can all be brought under civil law, the better we all shall be for it.
There are some terrible impediments against these attempts to reduce war to a boxing match, however. Once they arise, hatred, greed, retribution and violent anger have no bounds during the moments of passion. The only object of a war is to win, not to be mindful and nice. Whatever it takes to win is what is right, in the minds of those who are seeing their loved ones killed by bombs and bullets. Both sides bomb and invade rather indiscriminately, regardless of what or who may be in the way. If an objective is in the sights of the soldiers or airmen, they do what they are told. Their superiors afterwards lament that there was “considerable collateral damage” during the action needed to achieve their objective. No mention is made of blind, burned, or limbless children, the torture of men, or the rape of women. Guerillas, in order to achieve their objectives, hide or take over mosques, churches, schools, or, if stymied, simply put down their weapons and melt into the market place. This then become a strategy of doing what it takes to root the “bad guys” out of that market, even though others who are innocent may have to be killed in order to achieve that objective. It is a dirty business, in which both sides violate human morality on a daily and regular basis in order to become the victor.
Nor does this immorality stop once the conflict is over. The Japanese War Crimes Trials, the Nuremburg Trials, and the Kosovo War Crimes Trials, for example, did not at any time address those atrocities committed by the victors in those wars. The dismembering of slain soldiers, the indiscriminate bombing, the use of depleted uranium bombs, the mass killings and mass graves containing civilians, at the hands of the victors, were never addressed. Only the losers were held accountable for not following the international rules of war, and therefore many sentenced to death. There may have been a few human morals in those trials and sentences given, but there was a complete absence of human ethics. Until the victors in wars are asked to answer for their atrocities as well as the losers, we will not have human justice.
What will it take to bring fairness and justice to all human conflicts, including wars? That is terribly hard to say. Getting our religions to get rid of their beliefs which state that any persons who believe differently should be punished or killed, would certainly help. As long as human conflict can be justified by the bigotry and intolerance inherent in our religions, we will have an insoluble problem.