Defending Destruction

What happens when a nation's defense becomes the destruction of its own people?

This book provides a rigorous legal and scholarly analysis of self-inflicted mass harm in modern warfare. Drawing on international law, demography, historical precedent, and leadership behavior, it explores the conditions under which continued armed engagement-despite clear evidence of catastrophic national loss-may raise serious legal and ethical questions.

Defending Destruction is an objective, neutral, and academically grounded investigation into one of the most pressing dilemmas of modern conflict: when does defense cross the line into self-destruction, and what responsibility do national leaders bear? This work is essential reading for scholars of international law, military ethics, humanitarian policy, and modern conflict studies.

Cor P.M. van Houte, Doctor of Laws