David Whetham is Professor of Ethics and the Military Profession in the Defence Studies Department of King’s College London. He is the Director of the King’s Centre for Military Ethics and delivers or coordinates the military ethics component of courses for between two and three thousand British and international officers a year at the UK’s Joint Services Command and Staff College. Before joining King’s as a permanent member of staff in 2003, David worked as a BBC researcher and with the OSCE in Kosovo, supporting the 2001 and 2002 elections.

David supports military ethics education in many different countries and has held Visiting Fellowships at the Stockdale Center for Ethical Leadership, US Naval Academy Annapolis, the Centre for Defence Leadership and Ethics at the Australian Defence College in Canberra and at the University of Glasgow. He was a Mid-Career Fellow at the British Academy in 2017-18 and is currently a Visiting Professorial Fellow at the University of New South Wales. He was appointed as the Jeffrey Grey Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Australian Defence College in 2023. David is a founding member of the European Chapter of the International Society for Military Ethics (Euro ISME) which holds an annual conference for military practitioners, academics and defence policy-makers.

In 2020, David was appointed as an Assistant Inspector General of the Australian Defence Force to contribute to the Afghanistan Inquiry into allegations of war crimes committed by Special Forces personnel. His contribution was published as an annex to the Brereton Report in November 2020, with all of the recommendations being accepted by the Chief of the General Staff and Prime Minister. He currently sits on the UK Defence Medical Services Ethics Committee, the UK MoD AI Ethics Panel, the 77X Ethics Advisory Panel, and the Australian Defence Force's International Standing Panel of Experts in Ethics.

David is married with two children, and sits as a Magistrate on the Wiltshire Bench. In his spare time, he plays trombone with the 41º Big Band and enjoys epée fencing.

Research Interests

• Ethical Dimensions of Warfare
• Just War Tradition
• Development of the Laws of War
• Ethics and Technology
• Development of Strategic Thought
• Professional Military Ethics Education and Training

Publications

Books:

• The Ethics of Special Ops: Raids, Recoveries, Reconnaissance, and Rebels. Baker, Deane-Peter; Herbert, Roger; Whetham, David(Cambridge University Press, 2023).
• Cyber Warfare Ethics, Skerker, M., Whetham, D (Howgate, 2021).
• Military Virtues: Practical Guidance for Service Personnel at Every Career Stage, Whetham, D. (ed.), Skerker, M. (ed.) & Carrick, D. (ed.), (Howgate, 2019).
• Making the Military Moral: Contemporary Challenges and Responses in Military Ethics Education Whetham, D. G. (ed.), Connelly, J. (ed.) & Carrick, D. (ed.), (2017, Routledge, 2017).
• When Soldiers Say No: Selective Conscientious Objection in the Modern Military with Andrea Ellner & Paul Robinson (Eds), (Ashgate: 2014).
• Ethics, Law and Military Operations (Palgrave, 2010)
• Just Wars and Moral Victories (Brill, 2009)

Government Reports:

• Special Operations Command: Leadership and Ethics Review: Annex A to Chapter 3.03 of the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force Afghanistan Inquiry Report, Whetham, D., 19 Nov 2020, 28 p. Commonwealth of Australia.

Selected Research Papers:

• Public Drone Perception. Miron, Marina; Whetham, David; Auzanneau, Margaux et al. In: TECHNOLOGY IN SOCIETY, Vol. 73, 102246, 05.2023.
• How Should Access to Military Health Care Facilities Be Controlled in Conflict? Bricknell, M., Sullivan, R., Whetham, D. & Mahoney, P., 2 Jun 2022, In: AMA Journal of Ethics. 24, 6, p. E472-E477 5 p.
• Neuroenhancements in the Military: A Mixed‐Method Pilot Study on Attitudes of Staff Officers to Ethics and Rules. Sattler, S., Jacobs, E., Singh, I., Whetham, D., Bard, I., Moreno, J., Galeazzi, G. & Allansdottir, A., Apr 2022, In: NeuroEthics. 15, 1, 18 p., 11.
• What Senior Leaders in Defence Should Know about Ethics and the Role That They Play in Creating the Right Command Climate.Whetham, David. In: International Journal of Ethical Leadership, Vol. 8, 2021, p. 73.
• A latent core of dark traits explains individual differences in peacekeepers’ unethical attitudes and conduct Linden, M., Bjorklund, F., Backstrom, M., Messervey, D. & Whetham, D., 2019, In: MILITARY PSYCHOLOGY. 31, 6, p. 499-509 11 p.

Selected Book Chapters:

• Vitoria the Universal Thinker: Some Ethical Dilemmas Concerning Space Exploration Lobo Fernandez, F. & Whetham, D., 14 Feb 2022, Military Space Ethics. Howgate Publishing, p. 318-330 13 p.
• Professional Military Ethics Education. Whetham, David; Corbett, Andrew. Educating in Ethics Across the Professions: A Compendium of Research, Theory, Practice, and an Agenda for the Future. ed. Richard Jacobs. Information Age Publishing, 2022. p.169-182.
• Jus ad Vim: War, peace and the ethical status of the in-between, Melgaard, N.& Whetham, D., 8 Nov 2021, National Security Intelligence and Ethic Miller, S., Regan, M. & Walsh, P. (eds.). Routledge, p. 186-198
• The manslaughter charge against British marine, Alexander Blackman, sends a serious message to the military, Whetham, D. G., 16 Mar 2017, The Independent.
• ABCA Coalition Operations in Afghanistan, Iraq and Beyond: Two Decades of Military Ethics Challenges and Leadership Responses, Whetham, D., 18 Apr 2017, Military Ethics and Leadership. Olsthoorn, P. (ed.). Brill Nijhoff, p. 86-103 (International Studies in Military Ethics; vol. 3).

Teaching

Professor Whetham provides PhD supervision in areas relating to the ethics or morality of conflict. However, he is currently at his supervision capacity, and is not currently taking on any additional students.

For a full list of publications, grants, external engagements and activities please see Prof David Whetham's PURE Profile