What is an illegal war?

[PomonaCA]

I'm just curious. Place your vote and then tell us what you voted. Be careful, some posters might be intolerant of your opinion.




WARNING!

Intolerance will not be tolerated!

[Ben]

Was The Iraq War Legal, Or Illegal, Under International Law?

"Advantage is a better soldier than rashness." -Montjoy in Wm. Shakespeare's Henry V, 3.6.120

Evan Augustine Peterson III, J.D.

09/17/04 "ICH" -- During a BBC radio interview on Wednesday, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan created a controversy by reiterating his long-held position that the Iraq War was illegal because it breached the United Nations Charter. [1] On Thursday, the imperial leaders of the "Coalition of the Willing" retaliated by vehemently arguing that their Iraq War was, to the contrary, legal. [2]

Obviously, this dispute raises a legal question: "Whose opinion is correct, and whose is incorrect?" Additionally, we should be asking ourselves: "Who decides? (i.e., 'Whose jurisprudential opinion shall be dispositive for purposes of resolving this dispute?')"

It seems eminently reasonable -- even for the disputants -- to conclude that the optimal source of guidance on this question of international law would have to be the world's foremost experts in the field of international law. Hence, the UN's chief and the coalition's leaders need to know how the world's top international law experts would resolve their jurisprudential dispute. And we, the people, need to know who's right and who's wrong here.

Realistically, one cannot seriously expect the disputants -- much less their national electorates -- to wade through numerous legal documents, most of which contain rigorous and not-occasionally tedious reasoning, to find the correct answer. Thus, it seems prudent to proceed directly to the world's most authoritative answer to our pressing question du jour: "Was the Iraq War legal, or illegal, under international law?"

And The World's Most Authoritative Answer Is ... Among the world's foremost experts in the field of international law, the overwhelming jurisprudential consensus is that the Anglo-American invasion, conquest, and occupation of Iraq constitute three phases of one illegal war of aggression. [3]

Moreover, these experts in the international law of war deem both preventive wars and preemptive strikes to be euphemistic subcategories of outlawed wars of aggression.

And the experts' answer would hold true regardless of whether their governing legal authority was: (A) the UN Security Council Resolutions that were passed to implement the conflict-resolution provisions of the UN Charter; or (B) prior treaties and juridical holdings which have long since become general international law. [4]

Readers who need to "trust but verify" (i.e., to corroborate) for themselves that the experts' overwhelming opinion is exactly as stated above should read a document entitled "15 January 2003." (Find it by scrolling down approximately one-fourth of the way, after you've clicked onto this ES website: http://www.eurolegal.org/useur/bbiraqwar.htm "The Legality Of The Iraq War" .) Why?

That document was drafted and signed by the world's foremost international law experts -- the prestigious International Commission of International Law Jurists -- to provide ultimate proof of their authoritative opinion concerning the legal status of war against Iraq. Furthermore, this large body of eminent international law experts explicitly stated that they'd drafted their legal document in order to advise Messrs. Bush and Blair prior to the invasion: (1) that it would be blatantly illegal under international law for the Anglo-American belligerents to invade Iraq; and (2) that their joint decision as Commanders-in-Chief to commence hostilities would constitute prosecutable war crimes.

Skeptical readers who don't regard this highly-authoritative conclusion as an adequate answer are invited to undertake the legal reasoning for themselves at the ES website. Note that every applicable Article in the UN Charter, and every relevant UN Security Council Resolution, is cited and analyzed therein. And readers who continue to scroll down the ES website will find a succession of articles which summarize the opinions of noteworthy individual experts on international law. These, too, strongly confirm that the invasion of Iraq constituted an illegal war of aggression under international law. [5]

Finally, ambitious readers will learn what non-credible source was most responsible for propagating the fictitious pre-war claim that Saddam Hussein's Iraq was involved in the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the WTC and the Pentagon (hint: yet another uncredentialed neocon think-tanker from the thoroughly-discredited American Enterprise Institute).

Three Conclusions It is the overwhelming consensus of the world's foremost international law experts that: (1) UN Secretary General Annan's opinion is correct (i.e., true) because the Iraq War was, indeed, illegal; and

(2) the opinion of the "Coalition of the Willing's" leaders is incorrect (i.e., false) because their Iraq War was NOT legal.

(3) Therefore, Americans must break free of the neocons' self-delusional groupthink mentality by learning to differentiate between fact and truth, which are all-too-easily confused. For instance, it's an undeniable fact that Messrs. Bush and Cheney have been arguing along the campaign trail that "The Iraq War was legal!" Nevertheless, the mere fact that they've been vehemently arguing that point certainly does NOT make it true! Their argument is flawed by a logical fallacy called an ipse dixit (i.e., "something asserted but not proved"). As we've already seen, their argument is just plain WRONG AS A MATTER OF LAW! Therefore, Messrs. Bush and Cheney are making a false argument (i.e., deceptively asserting something that is untrue).

The Bottom Line Americans should reject the temptation to vote for Messrs. Bush and Cheney, because: (1) both men were advised beforehand that their decision to commence the invasion of Iraq would be blatantly illegal under international law; (2) they invaded nonetheless, and now they're cynically attempting to mislead the public again by falsely arguing that "The Iraq War was legal!"; (3) however, their argument is legally-meritless nonsense -- the current equivalent of their earlier false argument that torture is a legal method for the US military's interrogation of prisoners; (4) they've repeatedly demonstrated their disdain for universal human rights and democratic governance under the rule of law; and

(5) the 21st-century world isn't Tombstone's OK Corral and they certainly aren't Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday -- however much they might wish us to believe that they are!

[Ben]

Ron Paul explicates it pretty well:

[Ben]

The Deputy PM of the U.K. Nick Clegg saying and I quote: "... the ILLEGAL invasion of Iraq."

[Ben]

Only Congress has the power to declare war. It never did with respect to Iraq.
More from Ron Paul.... On certain things, well, Ron Paul is very good. On other things, well, he befuddles me. But he knows his stuff here...

[russtafa]

any war that america gets involved with because they lack the guts to see it till the end.china would win any war it started .china does not have a bunch of hippies waveing banners or they would be dead hippies

[Silcc69]

any war that america gets involved with because they lack the guts to see it till the end.china would win any war it started .china does not have a bunch of hippies waveing banners or they would be dead hippies

They also don't have the type of military equipment we have.

[yosi]

is there such a thing as Legal war?

innocent poeple are getting killed for REAL in any kind of war..........

[PomonaCA]

is there such a thing as Legal war?

innocent poeple are getting killed for REAL in any kind of war..........

Can you define 'legal'?

[russtafa]

no war is legal until the victor wins and then it becomes a righteous war