A moral analysis of military medicine

This paper offers a brief examination of the moral status of military medicine. Military physicians assume one set of obligations as physicians, including obligations of beneficence, nonmaleficence, and respect for autonomy. They assume another set of obligations as members of an armed service, such as maintaining combat readiness and maximizing the fighting strength of the force. These different obligations may come into conflict, but so may the obligations of civilian physicians in a variety of practice settings. In military service, however, both patients and physicians give up a greater measure of autonomy over their choices and actions than they do in most other settings. Because of both their increased risks and their decreased ability to make choices, military personnel can be viewed as a vulnerable population. Military physicians' ability to act on their behalf, however, is limited by the physicians' obligations to pursue military goals and to obey the lawful orders of superior officers. A physician's decision to enter military service is thus a morally weighty one that bears reflection on the practices of the military service to which one is pledging obedience.