82RedLeg,
My interest in war is psychological and sociological, not political. Therefore, I define war as a natural human activity, not a political activity.
While some may disagree with the exact point in our history that humans started to conduct war as a social activity, there is little doubt that groups of humans have made war on other groups of humans since at least 15,000 years ago, long before anything like politics had come into being. When looking at war as a natural activity, particularly in anthropology, one of the defining charactersitics is that there are deaths, or the reasonable probability of death, as a result of the activity.
(For arguments that war is not a natural human activity, see Fry, D. P. (ed.) (2013). War, Peace, and Human Nature: The Convergence of Evolutionary and Cultural Views. New York: Oxford University Press; for arguments for war being a natural human activity see Gat, Azar (2006). War in Human Civilization. New York: Oxford University Press)
As a natrual, social activity conducted by one group of humans against another, a couple of prerequisites have to be met. The first is that there are two distinct groups - an "us" versus "them." The second is that the killings are seen as morally acceptable, if not morally laudible, by the party making war. This is where my question originates, not in any political aspects.
When a killing of a "them" by an "us" is part of a war, it is morally justified (at least by "us"), and therefore not murder. But the responsibility for defining the "them" is left to the leadership of the group. When you shift the responsibility for defining the "them" to the Soldier on the ground (based on conditional rules of engagement like ""an imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury"), it can be much more difficult to clearly segregate a morally sanctioned killing from a murder. In WWII, if an American Soldier kills a properly uniformed German Soldier, this is morally justifiable. The Soldier never has to question its morality. When the Soldier himself makes that determination, I believe it shifts the requirement for morally justifying the killing to the Soldier. Does that help?
The use of the term "murder" was used to show how an otherwise illegal act would be justified by society. It was the shortest way of phrasing it I could think of.
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