Introduction: The ICC Facing Unprecedented Headwinds
Since its establishment over two decades ago, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has been confronted with huge difficulties. On Feb. 6, 2025, the U.S. administration under President Donald Trump imposed sanctions on the Court, characterizing its investigations into the actions of the United States and Israel as “illegitimate and baseless.” By July 2026, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio expanded upon this rhetoric, labeling the ICC an “intolerable threat to U.S. sovereignty” and launching a campaign to dismantle its influence. Further, on Aug. 18 2026, ICC President Tomoko Akane of Japan and ICC Senior Trial Lawyer, Abdoulaye Seye of Senegal were added as additional targets of sanctions.
In response, ICC President Judge Akane made a statement on the Day of International Criminal Justice, July 17, 2026, that the international court “must always remain independent and free from political influence and coercion.” On Sept. 3, 2027, the current and former Presidents of the Assembly of States parties, in the pages of Just Security, wrote, “Now is the time to strengthen the institutions that uphold international law, not dismantle them. Defending the International Criminal Court is … is about preserving the international legal order.”
There remains strong support for the ICC in response to these moves against it. On Feb. 7, 2025, 79 States Parties to the Rome Statute — including Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom — issued a joint statement reaffirming the importance of the ICC and expressing their continued support for the Court.
Japan, the ICC President’s home country and this author’s home country as well, also supports the Court. On Jan. 7, 2026, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, following a courtesy call by President Akane, stated that “even amid severe international circumstances, Japan places great importance on the rule of law and the Government of Japan will robustly support the ICC and President Akane so that the Court can perform its functions.” After ICC President Akane was added to the sanctions list, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement on Aug. 19, 2026 that “the announced measures are very unfortunate,” and that Japan “has consistently supported the ICC” and “will remain committed to strengthening the rule of law in the international community, while maintaining communication with related countries.”
It would be too quick to conclude that the ICC is in decline based solely on this political confrontation. This article offers a perspective that reconceptualizes the ICC not merely as a retrospective judicial body but as a “strategic weapon” that States committed to the rule of law can employ to safeguard their own legitimacy and to maximize the costs of a hegemon’s aggressive actions. This article focuses solely on the ICC’s strategic effectiveness and does not address the Court’s origins, functions, or cases.
1. Beyond the Critique of Politicization: Strategic Alignment
The most common critique of the ICC is its perceived “political” nature. Critics argue that when the Prosecutor initiates investigations proprio motu (on their own initiative), the Court is acting as a political actor rather than a judicial one.
Yet, from a strategic perspective, that “political” facet of the ICC is precisely where its utility lies. In international relations, the pursuit of national security is increasingly inseparable from the maintenance of the international legal order. The crimes within the ICC’s jurisdiction—genocide, war crimes at a certain scale, crimes against humanity, and aggression—are almost always the byproducts of efforts to destabilize the international order. By making illegal conduct visible through formal indictments, the ICC aligns the judicial process with the strategic interests of States seeking to maintain stability. The Court does not “politicize” justice; rather, it “legalizes” the international response to destabilizing violence.
2. Institutional Asymmetry: The Perpetrator’s Dilemma
The Rome Statute creates a unique form of institutional asymmetry that tends to systematically disadvantage the aggressor. Unlike many international treaties that rely on the mutual consent of all parties involved in a dispute, the ICC’s jurisdictional reach is designed to be a “one-way street” against violators.
The ICC’s jurisdiction is based on territoriality and “active personality.” Under Article 12, the Court can exercise jurisdiction if either the State on whose territory the conduct occurred or the State of the suspect’s nationality is a Party. This means that an aggressor from a non-State Party remains legally vulnerable the moment their forces cross the border into a State Party.
Furthermore, Article 12(3) allows non-member States to bridge this gap by making an ad hoc declaration accepting the Court’s jurisdiction. Ukraine’s 2014 declaration is a paradigmatic precedent. It allowed the ICC to investigate crimes on Ukrainian soil long before the 2022 full-scale invasion, effectively “weaponizing” the territory’s legal status against the invader.
The “effects doctrine” further expands this strategic geography. In the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar, although Myanmar is not a State Party, Bangladesh—to which the Rohingya fled—is a State Party. An ICC chamber of three judges found that the Court therefore had jurisdiction over forcible transfers related to Myanmar and authorized the Office of the Prosecutor to investigate. For policymakers, this suggests a powerful deterrent: an aggressor faces legal risk not only from the target of its invasion but from neighboring State Parties that suffer direct spillover effects of the conflict.
3. Complementarity: The Shield of the Law-Abiding State
The principle of complementarity which is foregrounded in the Preamble and Article 1 of the Statute—the rule that the ICC only intervenes when national systems are “unwilling or unable” to investigate or prosecute—is generally understood as a firm limit on the Court’s power.
For States that maintain robust military justice systems especially if including an effective Judge Advocate General (JAG) corps, the ICC acts as an external “certification” of legitimacy. By maintaining the capacity to investigate their own forces, these States effectively “shield” themselves from ICC intervention under Article 17, which operationalizes the unwilling or unable condition.
Conversely, if genuine investigations and prosecutions are not carried out domestically, the likelihood of ICC intervention increases. Thus, while the ICC poses a risk to States that engage in destabilizing violence such as atrocity crimes, for States that have appropriate legal systems and the willingness to punish core crimes, accession to and support for the ICC functions as a form of external “certification” that their military conduct and judicial processes meet international standards.
4. The Triple Impact: Deterrence, Legitimacy, and Pressure
The disadvantages the ICC imposes on perpetrators are not confined to courtroom proceedings. The ICC operates in three ways: psychological and material deterrence against national leaders; securing an advantage in “cognitive warfare;” and international pressure exerted through the network of States Parties.
4.1. Psychological and Material Deterrence
First, by creating the possibility of individual criminal responsibility, the ICC produces psychological and diplomatic deterrence against leaders contemplating aggressive conduct that involves criminal acts. Article 89 of the Statute imposes on States Parties an obligation to cooperate in arrest and surrender. Under this institutional framework, a suspect is likely well aware of the risk of arrest upon entering a State Party. With 125 States Parties today, the Court places substantial constraints on diplomatic and political activity. It is not a failsafe system, but it is formidable.
The fact that even a State’s highest leaders can be prosecuted for international crimes creates pressures different from the traditional State‑centered international order. An indictment or arrest warrant, even if it does not result in immediate detention, limits travel to States Parties, narrows diplomatic activity, and undermines political legitimacy both domestically and internationally. President Putin’s designation of ICC judges as wanted illustrates how seriously these arrest warrants can affect powerful actors. There are also cases of former heads of state being arrested after leaving office, as with former Philippine President Duterte, who remains under detention in The Hague. For leaders who have governed tyrannically, legal risk may be low at the height of their power but rises sharply after departure from office; this temporal, inescapable pressure serves as a psychological constraint on decision‑making by authoritarian leaders.
Even if a leader is not immediately arrested, the existence of an arrest warrant clearly signals that the leader is regarded as a war crimes “suspect” or similar by the international community. That perception builds a public understanding for viewing the leader with deep suspicion, increasing the burden of justifying policies to their domestic audiences. As discontent over war costs and casualties grows, a leader may face the question “why continue a war that has led to an international arrest warrant?” and cast a stigma on the country, and the foundations of their hold on power can be undermined.
4.2. Securing the “Cognitive Advantage”
Second, the ICC can provide the international community with a legally grounded, impartial assessment amid the tangled cognitive warfare during armed conflict. NATO explains that in cognitive warfare an “adversary is influencing our cognition and behavior to gain advantage on multiple levels: Societal level (democratic rule of law values and social contract), Group level (destabilizing trust and creating polarization) [and] Individual level (attitudes, decision making and behavior).” In wartime, parties disseminate favorable information and disinformation across social media and other channels and portray the opponent as unlawful, making facts and legal assessments easy targets for propaganda. For example, the UK has described Russian operations that “create fake websites and use social media and bot accounts to undermine democratic elections and spread deliberately misleading narratives in support of Russia’s illegal war in Ukraine,” and, in response, the UK has coordinated responses with the EU regarding such Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI). In this environment, ICC investigations, prosecutions, or the issuance of arrest warrants clarify which side’s conduct is wrongful amid reciprocal cognitive warfare that can make blame ambiguous. Because ICC involvement is perceived as a determination arising from an international judicial process rather than from any single State’s claim, it substantially strengthens the credibility and legitimacy of those determinations. In short, the ICC is not only a body for punishing criminals but, by impartially identifying who has gravely violated international law, can grant its supporters a “cognitive advantage.”
4.3. Leveraging the States Parties Network
Third, the ICC generates international pressure through the network of States Parties. In the Ukraine case, beginning with Lithuania’s referral of the situation on March 1, 2022 (Lithuania referred to Article 14 of the Rome Statute for an investigation into the situation in Ukraine), referrals were made by 43 States Parties, which led to the opening of an investigation and ultimately to the issuance of arrest warrants against President Putin on suspicion of war crimes (unlawful deportation and transfer). With the UN Security Council’s malfunctions, the gathering of States under the ICC in this manner can transform a collective demand for justice into legal proceedings and concrete action rather than a series of individual judicial choices. Strategically leveraging this States Parties network can corner perpetrator States in a dimension distinct from physical military force.
5. Closing the Aggression Gap: The Baerbock Proposal
The final frontier for the ICC as a strategic weapon is the “crime of aggression.” Currently, the jurisdictional requirements for aggression are more restrictive than for war crimes, crimes against humanity, or genocide, requiring both States to be members or else a Security Council referral (Article 15bis).
The 2023 proposal by German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock to amend the Rome Statute is a game-changer. By allowing the ICC to exercise jurisdiction over aggression whenever the victim State is a member, the international community would close the loophole of the lawless.
For States that have no intention of launching a war of aggression, this amendment poses zero risk. However, for a leader contemplating a “land grab” or a “regime change” operation in manifest violation of the UN Charter, it represents a monumental increase in personal risk. The acceleration of this debate in 2025 and 2026 signals a fundamental shift: the international community is no longer willing to allow the “supreme international crime” to go unpunished simply because its potential perpetrators refuse to join the Court.
Conclusion: Supporting ICC as Hard-Headed Security Policy
Supporting the ICC is not a matter of “blind idealism.” It is a pragmatic, hard-headed security policy. In a world where the rules-based order is under assault, the ICC provides a mechanism to impose costs on those who would rule by force.
For the Asia-Pacific region—where ICC membership remains low—the strategic utility of the Court must be urgently re-evaluated. The rule of law constitutes a fundamental pillar of Japan’s national security strategy. In a region facing growing maritime and territorial tensions, expanding the ICC network is a non-kinetic way to strengthen regional deterrence and solidify the “rule of law” as a defensive wall.
The ICC is the most sophisticated strategic weapon yet devised by States that respect the law. It is a weapon of legitimacy, visibility, and accountability. By understanding the Court in these terms, we recognize that justice is not just a moral outcome—it is a strategic necessity for a just and safer world.
The views expressed in this article are personal and not necessarily the views of any organization with which the author is affiliated.
