The War on Terror Then and Now: Twenty Years After 9/11

The United States announced a Global War on Terror in the wake of the attacks on 11 September 2001, which has taken various shapes over the last twenty years. This conference will reflect on the ethical dimensions of the history of this war, its current state, and its possible futures. Ethically (and pragmatically) there seem to be limits to what military power can do regarding terrorism. What is its appropriate role? And what is not? What is the proper end state and what is military power’s relation to it? Does terrorism generate special moral permissions for those combating it? Who might share responsibility for terrorist acts beyond terrorists themselves? Does international law effectively address terrorism? These are among the possible questions to be taken up at our conference on 13-15 October 2021 at West Point.

Keynote Speakers:

Secretary Robert M. Gates, 22nd U.S. Secretary of Defense

General (Retired) Martin Dempsey, 18th U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

Plenary Speakers:

Saba Bazargan-Forward, University of California, San Diego

Yitzhak Benbaji, Tel Aviv University

Susanne Burri, London School of Economics and Political Science

Claire Finkelstein, University of Pennsylvania Law School

Helen Frowe, Stockholm University

David Luban, Georgetown Law Center; Stockdale Center, U.S. Naval Academy

Mary Ellen O’Connell, University of Notre Dame Law School

David Rodin, Principia Advisory; Oxford Institute of Ethics, Law, and Armed Conflict

Victor Tadros, University of Warwick School of Law

Suzanne Uniacke, Charles Sturt University

Jeremy Waldron, New York University School of Law

Stephen Woodside, U.S. Military Academy

Undergraduate papers will also be presented at the conference.

Registration (both in-person and online) is now open via a link on the website below.