Armed Conflict • International Law
Use of Force
936 Articles
What Questions Should Congress Be Asking DoD About Civilian Casualties?
The Trump administration is due to submit today two important reports on civilian casualties—one to Congress and one to the public. Here are the questions Congress should be…
An Opportunity for National Security Transparency in the Trump Era
Hartig and Geltzer--who served in the National Security Council, Defense Department, and Justice Department--examine the benefits of transparency in national security policy, what…
Legal Implications of the Defect in Pentagon’s Civilian Casualty Assessments
Goodman supplements his New York Times Op-ed by discussing two legal implications of a flaw in how the Pentagon counts civilian casualties.
Mapping States’ Reactions to the Syria Strikes of April 2018
Statements, Chart, and Map for every state in the world that has taken a public position on the legality and justification of strikes in Syria conducted by the US, UK, and France.
Brazil’s Robust Defense of the Legal Prohibition on the Use of Force and Self Defense
As the strikes by the United States, the United Kingdom, and France on Syria last week demonstrate, a select group of countries led by the US are asserting an increasingly broad…
If Mattis Meant to Assert Self-Defense for the Syria Strike, He Was Wrong
Since the United States conducted a military strike on various targets associated with the Syrian government’s chemical weapons program last week, prominent voices in the legal…
The Legality of Using Force to Deter Chemical Warfare
We should not be asking whether the missile strikes against Syria's chemical weapons program represent a lawful humanitarian intervention. Instead, we should be asking if – and…
Corker’s Proposal Hands Trump A Dangerous, Open-Ended War Authorization
While the media is focused on the Trump administration’s strikes against Syria, there’s another effort to entrench and expand the U.S. global war posture that’s getting less…
The Real “Red Line” Behind Trump’s April 2018 Syria Strikes
Former State Department Legal Adviser Harold Koh writes that strikes on Syria could be legal, but key unanswered factual questions remain about April's operation. What's also missing…
Bad Legal Arguments for the Syria Strikes
There is no apparent domestic or international legal authority for the airstrikes conducted in Syria on April 14.
Syria, Chemical Weapons, and a Qualitative Threshold for Humanitarian Intervention
An improved legal framework using a qualitative threshold—legitimizing humanitarian intervention against regimes that use chemical and biological weapons (CBW) on civilians—can…
Just Security’s Symposium on the ICC Afghanistan Probe and the US
Just Security is pleased to announce the launch of an online symposium dedicated to the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) probe in Afghanistan and its implications for the…