‘Unjust Enemy’ or ‘Monster Dilemma’ Revisited. On the Conditions and the Paradox of a Theological Fiction

Abstract

The text once more reconstructs the perennially fashionable “figure” within public and international law, as well as a theologized construction: an evil-doer who must be destroyed in the conflict or war. The “unjust enemy”, always mutually recognized and often indicated as the other side in every conflict (and particularly ambiguously and obscurely in the current war between Russia and Ukraine), should satisfy certain conditions for them to be linked to “evil” and “the alliance of all against evil”, in the production of world peace and infinite restraint from war. By classifying various forms of hostile protocols, my intention is to show the substantive incompleteness and weakness of the term “enemy”, and thus the impossibility and myth of a symmetric use of force.

U tekstu jos jedanput rekonstruišem jednu uvek u modi „figuru“ javnog i međunarodnog prava, ali istovremeno i teologizovanu konstrukciju zlog zločinca koga treba uništiti u suko bu ili ratu. „Nepravedni neprijatelj“, uvek međusobno prepoznat i često imenovan od obe strane svakog sukoba (posebno dvosmisleno i opskurno u aktuelnom ratu između Rusije i Ukrajine), trebao bi da zadovoljava određene uslove koji bi onda opravdali analogiju i vezu „zla“ i „saveza svih protiv zla“, u proizvodnji svetskog mira i beskonačnog uzdržavanja od rata. Namera mi je da klasifikujući različite oblike hostilitetnih protokola, pokušam da pokažem supstancijalnu nedovršenost i slabost termina „neprijatelj“, a onda i nemogućnost i mit o si metričnoj upotrebi sile.