Spec Ops: The Failings of Just Cause in the Heat of Battle?

Johan Chang

The military shooter ‘Spec Ops: The Line’ developed by German studio Yaeger Development was one of, if not the most controversial game back in 2012. In quite possibly one of the most widely-talked about scenes in the gaming world, especially in the context of military shooters, players are forced to drop white phosphorus incendiary rounds against a bunch of opponents. Some of which, both you-the-character as well as you-the-player, eventually find out are civilians. The scene is a tough watch.

There is a clear need for iterating something: it was not a good game. The mechanics were awful, the controls were shotty, and the narrative consistently beat you over the head as a player with a giant stick. The feedback online was as critical of it as a game, as it was praising the narrative gamble it took with the story-telling. The developers themselves despised the idea of making a sequel.

Because it was a brutal, painful development & everyone who worked on it would eat broken glass before making another. Also it didn't sell.

— Walt Williams (@waltdwilliams) October 3, 2017

But as a pivotal movement in the game where players start to realize the downfall of the heroic protagonist, the scene started a conversation. In an attempt to talk about the horrors of war and invoking much inspiration from Joseph Conrad’s ‘Heart of Darkness’, the game managed to created discussions, albeit as a concept unbeknownst to most gamers, around the ideas of Just War Theory (JWT), and specifically in this scene, ideas of the ‘proportionality of means’ and ‘non-combatant immunity’.

To be fair, the purpose of developing such storylines within Spec Ops was to cultivate a certain level of moral ambiguity, as to progress is to commit increasingly traumatic war atrocities. It’s a powerful messages on the triviality of war games, those who play them, as well as comment on soldiers’ conduct in war and the idea of “just following orders”.

Justice of, and in, War

In her book ‘War and the Politics of Ethics’, Prof. Maja Zehfuss states the rhetoric around Western military intervention since the end of the Cold War has been: “we’re the good guys”. Protecting civilians from the threat of terrorism, helping dispose dictatorships and autocracies, providing aid and relief, and rebuilding infrastructure are all parts of the core tenets in modern military thinking. Which is the exact scenario players start with. Jus ad bellum, which in JWT relates to why and for what reason force can be used, specifies seven core principles. One principle – just cause – becomes the fundamental driving force behind the main character’s (Walker) continuing the mission despite multiple warning signs as the game progresses.

The plot of Spec Ops offers a U.S. counterterrorism unit sent to Dubai to locate and assist a U.S. regiment that’s gone radio-silent in the wake of a natural disaster. Both Walker, and the soldiers already there, are the good guys. However, as the game continues, you soon realise there’s nothing simple about what happens. Walker’s mission soon goes awry, and due to a lack of understanding about what they’ve gotten themselves into, the unit inadvertently kills civilians, destroys what’s left of the water supply, and become increasingly traumatised psychologically. Perhaps, as allegory for U.S. foreign intervention, the game highlights the risk of well-intentioned military action and raises the question of when, if ever, they are permissible.

Walker’s team refutes his use of white phosphorus, but he says he has “no choice”.

And here is where ideas of jus in bello kick in. As principles of humanitarian law applied to regulate the conduct of military forces, Spec Ops instead offers a complete breakdown of the entire concept. In his failed attempts to save Dubai and those in it, Walker (and the player) continue onwards hoping for the heroic end drilled into them. From burnt out corpses of collateral damage, other U.S. soldiers as enemies, to giving a face and backstories to what would normally count as endless masses you gleefully gun down, there’s a disconcerting voice which constantly questions why both players and states take these decisions, both in game and in reality, for granted.

Even the military lingo that’s usual in military shooters start to change as you play. “Tango down” turns into “I got the bastard!’, or “take the turret” changes to “kill that fucking turret!” The execution gameplay mechanic also go from cold efficiency to animalistic brutality. A pistol shot to the head turns into a gun jammed into the mouth of an opponent and fired. As Grant Howitt writes in The Escapist, “…where Captain Walker’s actions were once the subject of the 2-second cutscene that plays out, now the victims take center stage. Their eyes widen, and they shake their heads in fear, and the camera zooms in on their sweat-drenched faces in their last moments.”

Furthermore, the loading screens in the game start questioning ideas of military necessity, legitimacy, use of malum in se weapons such as white phosphorus, and consequentialism.

When players complete the storyline, there’s a Shyamalan twist waiting at the end for both the gamer, as well as Walker. It’s revealed ultimately much of what happens in this game, and the actions taken, are a result of something imagined. In essence, Walker has lost his mind. There’s repetition in the dialogue from earlier in the game, where Walker claims “…we tried to save you”, and “…this isn’t my fault”, as if repeating his justification enough times would absolve him of his sins.

It's a little heavy-handed, but the entire game calls into doubt the idea of JWT. Maybe what might happen in war simply cannot outweigh the justification of entering into war. And like how players question what happens in the game, there are questions to be had about the way the U.S. conducted the recent wars in Afghanistan and other Middle Eastern nations. But there’s no gamer detached from the action able to call out the absurdities of it all.

(For an in-depth assessment of the game's story, CLICK HERE)

As an aside, white phosphorus ignites spontaneously upon contact with air and produces a dense white toxic smoke. It’s considered a toxic substance capable of causing severe injuries to internal organs when absorbed through skin, ingested, or to a lesser degree, when inhaled. When coming into contact with skin, it produces thermal and chemical burns, and because it’s high solubility in fat, it can rapidly burn exposed body areas down to the bone.

All of this is to say it’s a very, very dangerous compound. And yet militaries are still using it. According to the Washington Post, the U.S. military used WP incendiary munition on at least two occasions in densely populated areas of Mosul and Raqqa as recently as 2017. Its use is banned by international humanitarian law over high-civilian areas. Maybe it's high time its use against combatants ought to be banned as well.