| dc.description.abstract | This study emphasizes impacts the current operational context in Afghanistan implies on professional ethics for the Norwegian forces. The study shows that in contrast to earlier international operations, our officers in Afghanistan today are primarily involved in military missions. This, together with preliminaries adjusted to the actual mission resulted in fulfillment of expectations. Rules for use of force had a huge impact on professional ethics, believed to be in coherence with a traditional military mission. The officers described Rules of Engagement (ROE) as robust and flexible. They expressed their satisfaction regarding current ROE`s, because they where instrumental for their own safety. Current ROE`s gave sufficient latitude to commanders. The judgment and decision making was challenging, but necessary because a full exploration of the extended latitude would normally be outside the scope of what was considered ethical justifiable. Ethical predicaments were often related to the balancing of two necessities, resolving the mission and ensuring own safety. Considerations towards the civilian population were important. Taliban as a non uniformed combatant mixing with the non combatant part of the population was ethically challenging. The co-operation with Afghan and American forces could sometimes be problematic, due to a less restrictive attitude towards use of force. The Norwegian officers in this study were still decisive in their loyalty to ROEs, and to follow their own judgment. The respondents in this study emphasizes that a well developed judgment is one of the pillars in the military professional identity, and always decisive in decision making. Norwegian military professional ethics seems to be well integrated in the mission, this believes to have a strong influence on how the officers resolved emerging situations and the total scope of their mission. | en_US |
