The Peacekeepers War

There are some who abuse this office, and slay and smite needlessly, for no other reason than because they want to; but that is the fault of the persons, not of the office, for where is there an office or a work or any other thing so good that self-willed, wicked people do not abuse it?

~ Martin Luther, Whether Soldiers, Too, Can Be Saved? p. 10

A man can go to war for the sake of his love of death. He can go out to steal, destroy, murder, and rape. And then there are warriors of an altogether different kind. These are those whose highest aspiration is the love of life. He goes out, under the banner of God’s established authority, to oppose the thief, to save those that are defenceless, to oppose with lethal force those who bring lethal force against those God has given to him to love and protect.

The sword itself is not an evil. For the man who picks up the sword to slay another is slain by the very sword he picks up (Genesis 9:6).

For if the sword is a wrong thing when used for fighting, it would also be a wrong thing when used for punishing evil-doers and keeping the peace; in a word everything it does would have to be wrong. For what is just war, except the punishment of evildoers and the maintenance of peace?

~ Martin Luther, Whether Soldiers, Too, Can Be Saved? p. 12