Catholic Church Quotes
Governments cannot be denied the right to legitimate self defense once every means of peaceful settlement has been exhausted.
Catholic Church, Second Vatican Council, The Church in the Modern World, December 1965
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
The United States should be One major problem at the time was that the Soviet Union was supporting and instigating revolutions in many parts of the world. When most nations of the UN wanted to provide peace keeping troops to quell the conflict, the Russians would veto and block the effort, Vandenberg wanted the UN to change the rules regarding the veto. The original right of veto for the major nations was originally included at the insistence of the United States and many Americans did not want to give it up or have any exceptions lest there be more. The Russians at that time also did not want to give up any of their veto powers. Another method that Vandenberg wanted to solve the Russian peacekeeping blockage problem was for America to engage in more collective security pacts so that action could be taken without UN Security Council unanimity by going around the UN.
English law and United States law are different. The George W, Bush administration has argued that regime change—removing Sadaam Hussein from power and control of Iraq—would be legal under U. S. law. This belief was never tested in the American Courts during the Iraq War.
This is a very important quotation in that there are some who believed—then and now—narrowly that self defense is limited to responding to only physical attacks on the United States per se. Kellogg made it clear that it includes attacks on the United States and any of its possessions. Most important it allows response to any “danger” to the United States. By this definition, for example, if Saddam had been developing weapons of mass destruction in the Iraq war, the pre-emptive attack would have been self-defense. Since the claim of weapons development was bogus, it was not self defense. The key variable a reasonable danger. Nations determine that by what others do and say. In 2011, if Iran were developing nuclear weapons the U. S. could attack as an act of self defense because the Iranian highest level officials have called for “death to the United States”. When they just had the intention to harm us, there was no danger. But when they add the means to harm us to the intention, that is a danger. Likewise other nations may act in self defense if a potential enemy threatens to endanger them and has the means to carry out the threats or desires.
The Catholic Church, often referred to as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with approximately 1.3 billion baptised Catholics worldwide as of 2019. As the world's oldest and largest continuously functioning international institution, it has played a prominent role in the history and development of Western civilisation. The church consists of 24 particular churches and almost 3,500 dioceses and eparchies around the world. The pope, who is the Bishop of Rome (and whose titles also include Vicar of Jesus Christ and Successor of St. Peter), is the chief pastor of the church, entrusted with the universal Petrine ministry of unity and correction. The church's administration, the Holy See, is in the Vatican City, a tiny enclave of Rome, of which the pope is head of state.
