Search: self-defense
06 Feb Bobby Chesney on Targeting Al-Awlaki
...conflict characterization over the naked self-defense characterization, is on firm ground. It would in my view be on firm ground either way. However, I remain fully committed to the view that self-defense as an independent category remains available as a legal rationale, and that it will be necessary and appropriate in future circumstances. With respect to pure human rights law, outside of armed conflict law, I would emphasize a couple of things. One is that I am not especially convinced that the international human rights law of extrajudicial execution is...03 Sep Washington Post Stories on the CIA and JSOC – and My Prediction of Harold Koh’s Legacy as Legal Adviser
JordanPaust Response... Yes, Harold has emphasized that such general principles condition decisions whether in the context of war (the war paradigm and the expanded theatre of the international armed conflict into Pakistan) and/or the context of self-defense (the self-defense paradigm that has set up disagreement among some textwriers -- see my article at http://ssrn.com/abstract=1520717 Future scholarship should address the role of robotic conduct under the self-defense paradigm and the limits of the reach of permissibility under UN art. 51. What I find most unconvincing is Harold's ploy that we are...18 Dec How to Increase “Maximum Pressure” on North Korea By Reconsidering Options at Sea
[Lieutenant Commander Yusuke Saito is a legal advisor in the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) and a military professor at Stockton Center for International Law, United States Naval War College. The views expressed in this article are of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect the stance of the U.S. Naval War College and Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force.] Introduction The U.S.–North Korea High Level Meeting scheduled for November 8, 2018 was suddenly postponed. Although the reason for the suspension was unclear, reportedly, North Korea has not been willing to...
02 Feb The Abduction of a President: Shock, Illegality, and the Implications for Human Rights Law
...of the invasion itself is disturbing, the administration’s contorted legal justification is particularly alarming. The administration points to much-derided 1989 memo written by William Barr claiming the executive may ignore the UN Charter as a “non-self-executing” treaty, reasoning that since these treaties do not create a private right of action in federal court, they are not enforceable. This pretext is expertly unraveled by Ryan Goodman, who rightly points out that non-self-executing treaties are indeed legally binding on the President – whether a treaty obligation is justiciable in court is irrelevant...12 Apr Self-Publishing Legal Scholarship
I read with great interest Professor Bainbridge’s post a few weeks ago about self-publishing legal scholarship. The discussion Bainbridge linked to in that post by Joe Konrath and Barry Eisler about self-publishing (and expanded upon here) is even more interesting. (Eugene Volokh’s posts from 2009 are also quite useful.) Self-publishing of fiction appears to be the wave of the future. On the other hand, self-publishing non-fiction works, including academic scholarship, is just now on the horizon. SSRN is the first great wave of self-publishing legal scholarship, but it complements rather...16 Feb The Modern Doctrine(s) of Non-Self-Executing Treaties
the 1990s. This doctrine is essentially the same as the private right of action doctrine, but it also prohibits a private litigant from invoking a non-self-executing treaty as a defense. The fourth and final modern version of the doctrine is the no judicial enforcement doctrine. Its origins can be traced to the Medellin decision rendered by the Supreme Court in 2008. This doctrine posits that non-self-executing treaties are the Law of the Land for purposes of the Supremacy Clause but that judges are powerless to enforce them irrespective of whether...15 Nov Genocide and Battlestar Galactica
...science-fiction shows before it, BSG concerns itself with the porous membrane between humanity and barbarism. Unlike most of its predecessors, however, it has the benefit of an open-ended, real-life war as its backdrop, making its lessons about barbarism unavoidably resonant. This year, BSG is going many steps further. Season 2 ended with the Cylon invasion of the new, dusty, human homeworld, New Caprica, and the self-serving capitulation of President Gaius Baltar. The invasion forced the Galactica into space—meaning humanity is without its defenses and possibly without hope. Season 3 finds...14 Mar Acquitted British Soldiers and the Defense of Superior Orders
H Lime Kevin, Good post, but I have to disagree with your ultimate conclusion. The burden under the U.S. system is that the prosecution has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defense didn't exist. In a case like this where the prosecution's own witnesses (before the defense case even began) supplied the defense, I have to assume that the prosecution didn't do enough to rebut that defense, in the form of some proof that a reasonable person would have known the actions violated the Geneva Conventions or other...02 Apr Kosovo, South Ossetia, and Crimea: the Legal Rhetoric of Intervention, Recognition, and Annexation
Jordan Setting forth a "conception of international law to serve its foreign policy needs" and that is not one that is "generally accepted"? How shocking. Perhaps Russia might consider using the Obama doctrine on self-defense, claiming (contrary to the text of UN art. 51 and generally accpeted meaning) that a state can engage in use of force in self-defense if there is merely an "imminent threat" of an armed attack, i.e., that there is not even a present threat, merely an alleged imminent threat (and not that the laughable Bush...31 Dec Legality Is Not Morality
because the point about killing innocents is easily shown to be a red herring from jus ad bellum point of view since the drone program is obviously understood, and understood plausibly, as a form of self defense against an ongoing threat by al Qaeda given AQ's relentless series of attacks against American homeland ( the printer cartridge bombs, 2 underwear bombers et ). In other words there is a strong moral case that the drone program against alQaeda is justified because it is a genuine case of self defense. So,...