by Thom McKee

Just this last summer, my 11 year old son asked me if there were rules to war. The question didn’t just come out of thin air. We were watching a World War II movie where the “Geneva Convention” was mentioned. He had no idea what this was, but the idea of rules to war seemed amusing to my son.

“Dad, does anyone follow rules for war?” he asked me.

I kind of laughed and pointed out that the rules mostly dealt with what you could do with prisoners of war and what types of weapons you could use, but that the Allies (in WW2) really tried to obey the rules. Then he asked me if the atomic bomb was against the rules. I told him