The case is the murder of the injured Taliban fighter by his captor, the British Marine soldier. Clearly the soldier was guilty of murder and the argument has been on whether he should be granted anonymity to guard his family from retaliation.
As an aside.
I find it difficult to reconcile the idea that when the State orders you to kill its acceptable, even if the conflict is born of the filmiest political reason and yet deeply held animosity based on genuine ills between people have the full weight of the States Law brought down on them, but I digress.
There are a number of issues which arise. The first is the context. Whether we fully understand the distortion that war brings to a persons understanding of what is right or wrong ?
1. The Idealist would say that there are no conditions which condone violence particularly the killing of an unarmed man and we often use the term in "cold blood" to differentiate a crime of passion whereby the act of killing is deemed to be due to a person who has become unbalanced and therefore they are not in control of themselves.
2. The Pragmatist would point to the battlefield condition, particularly when the war is fought against unidentifiable contestants where every man and women in the street is a potential foe. They would suggest that the soldier through combat is pushed into a mentally unbalanced state, especially if he has just witnessed the killing of a friend or colleague or seen the dismemberment of other troops as warning. When life or death is all around, when the civilised world has become grotesque, who will be the first to throw a stone ?
The second issue is the danger the family it is claimed, are under by supporters of the Taliban in this country. What a sad state we are in when we have to acknowledge that the danger lies within as much as without and that our national concept of homeland and the intrinsic security that being at home should bring, has been demolished by our obsession of being all things to all people.
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