This is who we are: The role of military ethics, culture, and religion in disseminating international humanitarian law to the armed forces

Abstract Although there is one law, there are many motivations for complying with it. This was one of the key findings of the Roots of Restraint in War study published in 2018 by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). Building on this insight, this article examines a few recent accounts of international humanitarian law (IHL) violations and two general categories of psychological states which may have given rise to them. It then explores the modern-day value of warrior codes and martial notions of honour, and reviews the ICRC’s recent work to find convergences between IHL and various religious or traditional value systems. The article offers some important caveats which should be kept in mind when undertaking work which compares morality, ethics and the law, before finally presenting some implications of this work for IHL integration and dissemination activities. Civilian IHL practitioners do not need to embed themselves into military life in order to understand military perspectives on IHL, but it would be helpful for them to consider the many ways in which troops internalize norms and how to incorporate extra-legal concepts into IHL integration and dissemination activities in an appropriate way.