Laws of War
107 Articles
An Enduring Impasse on Autonomous Weapons
Are existing international laws sufficient or are new legal rules needed to codify the “human element” in the use of force?
Extrajudicial Executions from the United States to Palestine
Israel’s “shoot-to-kill policy,” based on racialization and dehumanization of Palestinians, and the militarized U.S. response to Black uprisings, are the manifestations of…
Oxford Statement on the International Law Protections Against Cyber Operations Targeting the Health Care Sector
In advance of Friday, May 22 Arria-Formula meeting of the United Nations Security Council.
Accountability in the Time of COVID-19: Syria & Iraq
The coronavirus crisis has dominated the global news coverage, but the war in Syria has not gone away. The ceasefire brokered by Turkey and Russia in March 2020 remains fragile,…
NATO Recognizes Space as an “Operational Domain”: One Small Step Toward a Rules-Based International Order in Outer Space
(Editor’s Note: The absence of a comprehensive analysis of the legal framework for military operations in outer space represents a troubling deficiency in the understanding of…
The Yemen Project: Open Source Investigations and the Law of War
An unprecedented open source investigation aids the legal analysis of allegedly unlawful strikes by the Saudi-led coalition, but also has limits in reaching legal conclusions under…
Proportionality and 150 Iranian Lives: Do They “Count”?
General (ret.) Ken Watkin explains why assessing civilian casualties in the jus ad bellum proportionality analysis is the right approach.
Post-9/11 Veterans Have Mixed Feelings About Trump’s War Crimes Pardons
In order to better understand how to think about this controversial decision, Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) conducted a flash poll this week, with over 1,600…
“ISIS Widows” and “Boko Haram Wives”: Overlooked Abuses in Iraq and Nigeria
Thousands of displaced women in Iraq and Nigeria have been arbitrarily branded as affiliated with IS or Boko Haram, and subjected to abuse as a result. Almost 400 in-depth interviews…
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.
Salisbury Response Option: Take Putin to Int’l Criminal Court
What legal options are open to the United Kingdom in its response to the alleged Russian assassination attempt in Salisbury? A separate piece at Just Security will discuss whether…
Trump’s Explanation for His Administration’s Use of Military Force Due Today
As I discuss in a piece over at Defense One, today is the deadline for the Trump administration to provide a detailed explanation to Congress on its legal and policy basis for…