Military
708 Articles
George H.W. Bush’s Persian Gulf War: Victory, With Tragedy
Most tributes on the passing of George H.W. Bush from across the American political spectrum have used some variation of the word “honorable” or “decent” to describe the…
U.S. Lethal Operations in Somalia Are On the Rise. But Are They Effective?
A deep-rooted ideology cannot be defeated with bombs dropped from the sky. What is needed is a real shift in strategy.
The Pentagon Put Someone in Charge of Its Civilian Casualty Policy. Now What?
For all the time and attention that the Defense Department has rightly spent addressing civilian casualties, no single official at the Pentagon has ever been formally charged with…
How Dangerous—and How New—Is the Defense Department’s “Collective Self-Defense” Theory?
The Defense Department’s reliance on a broad interpretation of “collective self-defense” appears to authorize military operations further removed from congressional approval…
Letter to the Editor: How About Some Regulation of the Mercenary Industry?
Following Sarah Knuckey and Ryan Goodman’s post on U.S. mercenaries in Yemen, I’d like to provide a bit of international legal background to the urgent discussion of whether…
Bolstered EU Force Could Help Stabilize Bosnia, as Russia and Elections Close In
On Oct. 7, Bosnia will hold its most contentious and divisive elections since the war that killed 100,000 people in the 1990s. The risk of state disintegration in the immediate…
The Risks of Permanent War
In a widely shared opinion piece published in the New York Times on September 11th, U.S. Army veteran Joe Quinn observed that for “the past 17 years in Afghanistan, we’ve tried…
To Undermine the ICC, Bolton’s Targets Extend Way Beyond the Court
If the U.S. pressures states to sign new bilateral agreements shielding American personnel from the ICC, officials and civil society in those countries have options other than…
Condolence Payments for Civilian Casualties: Lessons for Applying the New NDAA
The new National Defense Authorization Act can help improve the way the U.S. responds to civilian casualties. FOIA requests and interviews with DoD officials, U.S. soldiers, judge…
Letter to the Editor: Why Larger Defense Budgets Don’t Need to Come at the Expense of “Soft Power”
In his recent post (“The National Security Threat of Trump’s Defense Budget”) Bishop Garrison argues that the Trump administration’s proposed increases to the defense budget…
OLC’s Formal (and Remarkably Broad) Defense of the April Syria Strikes
This morning, the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel posted a formal, 22-page opinion, concluding that the April 13 airstrikes on Syria were lawful.
The South China Sea’s Muddled and Increasingly Militarized Future
The Chinese Air Force recently landed a number of bombers on a heavily disputed “island” in the South China Sea. The military landings follow the placement of three anti-ship…