International law and Bin Laden’s death
Now comes Thomas Darnsté¤dt in Spiegel with the predictable European take on Bin Laden’s death, which is that it was most likely an illegal violation of international law:
Claus Kress, an international law professor at the University of Cologne, argues that achieving retributive justice for crimes, difficult as that may be, is “not achieved through summary executions, but through a punishment that is meted out at the end of a trial.” Kress says the normal way of handling a man who is sought globally for commissioning murder would be to arrest him, put him on trial and ultimately convict him.
And on and on it goes in similar vein to explain why Osama should not have been killed but instead tried in a court of international law: Bin Laden may not even have been an operational leader of al Qaeda anymore; it’s “questionable whether the USA can still claim to be engaged in an armed conflict” with al Qaeda anyway; it’s not certain what “theater of operations” this was part of; and a sovereign state (Pakistan) had its territory infringed.
So much blather. If the law is an ass, then international law is one of the biggest asses of all, unless confined to the very specific situation of two parties who have agreed to submit to it.
International law is a toothless, irrelevant, and sometimes counterproductive and destructive tiger with no force whatsoever except by that consent. As I wrote some time ago:
To be “bound” by a certain law, one (or both) of two things need to be true: (1) the “bound” entity has to agree to the authority of those administering the law; (2) the authority has to have the power of enforcement over that entity.
And consider this (in which I’ve substituted “Osama” for “Saddam” and “Spiegel” for “the Guardian” in the original):
[Spiegel], along with much of Europe, doesn’t seem to know what to do with outlaws. [Osama] was an outlaw from international law. It’s as though Europe thinks of the world as a sort of tea party, and that anyone knocking on the door and wanting to come in would quite naturally play by tea-party rules: pick up a cuppa, grab a cucumber sandwich, sit down and chat a while.
But it’s no tea party, it’s an armed world of high-stakes power struggles, with vicious and tyrannical killers such as [Osama]…Then the European tea party breaks down, and the lawmen have to be armed. And sometimes outlaws have to be taken out…
Kenneth Anderson has this to say at the law blog Volokh:
International law is grounded in the practice of states, and the practice of some states matters more than others. One might think that wicked or unjust or what have you, but if one wants international law to be something more than law professor fantasies, it has to be grounded in how states behave. International law can get a little bit ahead of where states want to go, but not very far ahead…
But the US government’s pragmatic view ”” long at the center of State Department legal approaches, including the one that authorized the killing of Bin Laden as a lawful attack against a lawful target in an armed conflict ”” is best seen as protecting this important, but fragile, category called international law … from itself. From its most enthusiastic supporters, who are always willing to purify it into a form of law suitable only for uninhabited planets or maybe heaven.
Terrorists such as Bin Laden inhabit (or, in his case, used to inhabit) this earth. So does the United States. And on this earth, when private citizens declare war on a country and its private citizens, and murder nearly 3,000 unarmed people in cold blood for political reasons, those perpetrators can be considered fair game for as long as they live, wherever they hide out, and however long it takes.
That may not be international law, but as even President Obama said, it’s justice.
[ADDENDUM: Victor Davis Hanson on the subject (hat tip: commenter Bill West).]
And who better to make sanctimonious pronouncements about “international law” than Germans?
There are distinctions to be made between justice, just deserts, and vengeance. OBL’s death was just, and it was vengeance, but it was not a product of justice.
Forgive the quibble.
Occam’s Beard: aside from the special relation Germany has to international law post-WWII (and, by the way, the Nuremberg trials were not under the auspices of international law per se, but were under military law, since they were military tribunals run by the victorious Allies), Europe has another special interest in elevating international law. Since WWII, Europe has lost real power—hard power, as it were—in the military realm. But if international law can rise in influence, Europe rises in influence, too, since they’re the big experts on it.
Screw them.
Tom:
If you really want to quibble, depends how you define justice:
“Justice” is not just a courtroom thing.
Neoneocon,
I submit that the reprise of your own quote above makes the point.
International law is an oxymoron. There can be international agreements that are in place, but only as long as parties abide by the agreement. There can never be international “law” because it is subject to being ignored at the whim of any govt of state. Those govts have shown that they will do just that the instant it is to their advantage to do so. Adolph Hitler is a distant example of this; Sadam Hussein a more recent one Syria, OTOH, has yet to play out.
Neoneocon,
I also agree with your response to Occam’s Beard, and I think that it’s a particularly perceptive comment.
Europe needn’t be the most powerful force on earth, it just needs to pull the strings of the country that is. It sums up Obama’s foreign policy; voluntarily relinquishing control of the strings to “our betters.”
Neo, you’re right, of course.
I’m of the view that until the Thousand Year Reich would have expired, all Germans can pretty much STFU about human rights, international law, and such.
Any Germans out there offended by that? Good.
In essence, Europeans try to position themselves as the arbiters of right and wrong, and as those whose approval is needed before we take any action. It is, as you pointed out, neo, a way of exercising power without actually having any.
Europe sees itself as the brains, and the US as the muscle. How they consider themselves the brains, given their lamentable history, is anyone’s guess.
Occam’s Beard,
I think a simpler way of phrasing this is that Europe considers itself the “old money” while they see the U.S. as the upstart noveau riche. I think it essentially boils down to some sort of organ envy.
sorry that’s “nouveau riche”
The inimitable VDH nails it again:
http://www.city-journal.org/2011/eon0502vdh.html
1. I have two words for you, Darnsté¤dt and Kress. The second one is ‘you’.
Do you want another hint?
2. From its most enthusiastic supporters, who are always willing to purify it into a form of law suitable only for uninhabited planets or maybe heaven.
Would these be the same enthusiasts who don’t notice rapes and “honor” killings by immigrants to their countries? Who wish to stifle freedom of expression so that religions (unspecified, of course: the only thing at issue is abstract justice, of course) are not insulted?
3. A Leftist tactic for creating a transnational government is to act as though that government already exists and we are bound by it.
T, good point.
4. And how do the Euros fit the Libyan intervention into their legalistic scheme? By making stuff up, of course: the right to protection or whatever they call it.
I find it a bit strange that the left has been so quiet. Had Bush sent a commando team into a foreign country to execute someone, they would have become unhinged. On the face of it I don’t see how this mission is much different from some black bag job where some agent in a foreign country gets a bullet in the back of the head. Hitting Gaddafy’s houses is similar.
Don’t get me wrong, but it’s a case of might makes right. I’m all for OBL getting whacked, but would have liked Bush and Obama to have declared a state of war exists with AQ and Muslim terrorists.
O.B.@1:41-
Your 1st paragraph holds the essence of liberalism.
Sure, let’s use international “justice”. Slobodan Milosevic was on trial for four years and died of a heart attack before the trial could even finish, let alone render a verditct. It was a textbook example of the uselessness of international law.
Tom, yeah, it does, now that I think about it.
Don’t get me wrong, but it’s a case of might makes right.
One of the more exasperating aspects of liberals is their refusal to grasp that, while we aspire to the principle that might shouldn’t make right, we also recognize that practice often falls short of principle.
To choose a no longer emotive example, consider the history of England. The Celts doubtless thought that they had right on their side, but the Angles and Saxons had the muscle. The Anglo-Saxons, for their part, thought that they had right on their side until that unpleasantness in October 1066, when the Normans showed that they had the muscle.
Similarly with the other tribes of Mesoamerica vis a vis the Aztecs, and then the Aztecs vis a vis the Spaniards.
In each case, the victors write the history books. Whether they were considered to be in the right or not at the time is a historical footnote.
Mr. Frank: see the Hanson piece I linked in the addendum.
Mr. Frank,
It is not strange that the left is quite about this “black op.” It’s another example of thier mask slipping and revealing their true nature.
You’re quite right; had the Bush administration done this it would be evidence that the Bush-Hitler comparisons were accurate all along. That Obama, one of their own, does this, is not only tacitly accepted (the quiet of which you speak) but it is actually lauded by the left and members of the MSM.
I repeat, it’s just another daily example of the left revealing itself as a fraud to independent minded Americans. That’s grrrreeeaat!
“It is not strange that the left is QUIET. . . .”
Sorry!
Slightly off-topic, but WSJ reports the photo of OBL dead won’t be released, allegedly ‘cuz Baraq fears doing so would harm American “interests” in Muzzieland. You just gotta admire his courage and forthrightness, no?
The Somali pirates would disappear if 1) they were killed and 2) their villages decimated.
I find it very annoying that “international law” is cited to “prove” that violent acts against the pirates are verboten. Those who cite “international law” in this instance do not cite actual chapter and verse. At least I haven’t seen any cited.
It might be argued that such violence against the pirates would be counterproductive, but at least that argument would have more validity than citing “international law.”
For the inanity of “international law,” consider the United Nations, with Syria, of all countries, on the Human Rights Council.
Neo,
The link did not work for me. I think this is probably the one: http://www.victorhanson.com/articles/hanson050311.html
Just like Nixon could go to Red China, Peace Prize winner Obama can wield military power with impunity.
Mr. Frank: I fixed the link above. It’s this one.
Unions have the muscle. The taxpayers have the cash. Guess who’s going to decide what happens.
The Left knows “exactly” what might makes right means. They use it all the time.
Neo,
My VDH link picks up nicely from yours. Obama is all teflon now.
T:
International law is an oxymoron. There can be international agreements that are in place, but only as long as parties abide by the agreement.
Well put!
There will truly exist ‘international law’ when there is a world government, answerable to the governed, able to enforce laws and repeal them. Until then, the phrase has no meaning, and wishing won’t make it so.
(I do think that wishing is behind the cries of many for international law — if we act as though it exists, it will exist! Call it the Tinkerbell Principle. Then along comes someone who doesn’t want to play nice, and the fraud is exposed for what it is. We saw a serious well-meaning attempt in the formation of the UN and its “peacekeeping forces”; that’s how Truman felt about the Korean War, an attempt by an international force to halt aggression, under the direction of an international body. But the UN isn’t answerable to anyone, and it became clear very quickly that it’s a toothless debating society, in spite of the best of intentions.)
As Charles de Gaulle once said: “Treaties are like flowers and young girls. They last as long as they last.”
Law is a tribal habit elevated and worshipped to make it more endurable. Nothing wrong with it, but it applies only to the tribesmen, not to strangers. So “international law” is contradiction in terms: since different cultures have very different habits, they have too little in common to make a law comprehensive and detailed enough to be meaningful. World is not a polity. But EU strife to make illusion that all peoples and cultures are “equal”, that is, basically the same. It is an attempt to stealthy create a world government, the favorite liberal utopia.
Daniel in Brookline,
You have also touched on the traditional principle of liberalism – wishing it were so.
If we act as though utopia is possible, it will be!
If we act as though govt spending will counteract the recession it will!
If we act as though our burgeoning debt is economically unimportant it will be so!
If we believe that “diversity” can be achieved simply by a proportional distribution of skin color, it will be!
The list is endless and consistently wrong.
Liberals haven’t learned that wishing your flat tire were no longer flat doesn’t make it so. Change the damned tire and be done with it!!
OB @ 2:30 –
I would add the classical statement of the conflict between might and right, namely, the Melian Dialogue from Thucydides, Book Five, ch. 84-116.
Re: International Law –
If anybody is interested, Eric Posner (Richard’s son) has written two magnificent books on the subject:
“The Limits of International Law” (with Jack Goldsmith)
and,
“The Perils of Global Legalism.”
Highly recommended, both of them.
Occam’s,
The German Gutmenschen frequently justify their overbearing morality by saying that they (in contrast to the ignorant uncouth Americans, I presume) have learned the lesson of WWII–that war is not the answer. What they love to do is sit in cloud cuckoo land discussing how many angels can fit on the head of a pin. They redefined their national identity from éœbermenschen to Land of the Dichter und Denker–Land of Poets and Thinkers–which is, of course, just another way of saying éœbermenschen.
I was somewhat relieved to read a few opinion pieces today in which the OBL mattter was dealt with realistically, and there was also some resonance in the comments. Unfortunately, these writers get little play in the mass media and are quickly hit with the right wing (read Nazi) card. The international law/UN/environment set gets all the attention here. And no one notices that the people so alarmed about radiation levels in Japanese spinach can completely ignore German companies trading with Iran. Nor did they notice the oil for food crooks. It’s so much more comfortable to rest on the moral high ground where one can devote resources to coming up with a symbol to represent human rights.
The German Gutmenschen frequently justify their overbearing morality by saying that they (in contrast to the ignorant uncouth Americans, I presume) have learned the lesson of WWII—that war is not the answer.
Nothing like getting your ass kicked a couple of times to speed the learning process, I guess.
It seems that the Germans went from the Dichter und Denker (in the 18th and 19th centuries) to éœbermenschen (20th century) and are now back to Dichter und Denker (21st century). Sorta Goethe -> Goering -> Goethe again.
Just out of curiosity, where does Honecker & Co. fit into their paradigm?
The nice thing about Denker is that they can choose what to think about, and they don’t seem to think much about him anymore. I rarely hear his name. I guess he has been written off even by the GDR commie remnants as one who did not implement the flawless marxist theory properly. The defences I have heard of the GDR have more to do with the society itself– that people were less concerned about money and material goods. When I visited Leipzig shortly after the wall came down, I was appalled that so many beautiful old buildings had been left to rot, while people were being housed in cheesy concrete boxes. I can’t believe that didn’t get to the people. But these were probably the people who participated in the Monday protest marches.
The nice thing about Denker is that they can choose what to think about, and they don’t seem to think much about him anymore.
Oh, so they ignore any contrary evidence. Nice.
I visited East Berlin in Sept 89 (just before the Wall fell), and was shocked at how many bombed out buildings were still to be seen there. It seemed as though whole districts had yet to be rebuilt, almost half a century later.
Re Leipzig, I had the same reaction to Odessa (during the USSR era, at least). It was obviously once a beautiful city, but badly run down. The whole place was in desperate need of repair and a coat of paint, but with that could again be a resort town, as it once was (IIRC).
OB:
In re: Dichter und Denker…
That Good Commie Bert Brecht once amended it to: “Hecker und Henker” (IIRC) = “Killers and Hangmen”.
A much better fit, ja?
Wretchard has a great comment on moral purists:
http://pajamasmedia.com/richardfernandez/comment/157151/
Brecht oughta know. Didn’t he support the crackdown of 1953?
T,
“International law is an oxymoron. There can be international agreements that are in place, but only as long as parties abide by the agreement. There can never be international ‘law’ because it is subject to being ignored at the whim of any govt of state.”
Quoted for being the gosh-darned truth.
To “at the whim of any govt of state” should be added, “…and non-state actor.”
It’s not only that international law fails on principle, it’s also that international law as it currently stands is like an early 20th-century Encyclopedia Britannica. Just as you wouldn’t look up the 1911 Britannica to learn about computers (except maybe Charles Babbage’s failed attempts at constructing one), international law in its current form is useless because it completely fails to take the Islamic way of warfare into account.
As a refresher, the Islamic way of warfare has never maintained a distinction between civilians and combatants, such a distinction never having existed in 7th-century Arabia (it was tribe against tribe, and the victor would treat the vanquished tribe as a lion would the mate and offspring of the defeated male enemy: Taking the former for his own after killing all the latter).
In modern times, the Islamic way of warfare is coupled with their working of a complicit media. In brief, civilians are placed in the line of fire to create a win-win scenario: Either the non-Muslim enemy refrains from firing, for fear of hurting the civilians; or they fire regardless, and when civilians are inevitably hurt, the Muslims use the dead bodies both as propaganda and as exhibits to be presented before the courts of international “law.” For which reason, besides morality, a non-Muslim army would often hold fire in the first place.
Forgive my being pompous, but I have to declare: Whereas international law does not take the Islamic way of warfare into account; Whereas international law does not take the cynical use of civilian casualties into account; Whereas international law hands the Islamic imperialist enemy its victories on a silver platter, aiding and abetting the Islamization of the world; Be it therefore enacted, that all rules of warfare as stipulated by international law are henceforth null and void, retired in favor of the necessities of survival.
I wish to see that declaration proclaimed by people in positions of power one day. The sooner the better.
I don’t trust Leftist “Black Panther and police acted stupidly” laws in the US. Why would I trust Leftist laws made by the international community. Do I have more influence and power there than our own nation’s DC? *snorts*
OB: In a play by Gunther Grass about Brecht and the 1953 Berlin riots “The Plebeians Rehearse the Uprising”, Brecht gives private support to the rioters by making sarcastic remarks about the regime and its leaders, but does an about face when confronted with threats.
Somewhat like Brecht’s take on Galileo “Life of Galileo” in one of his better plays. Coward when it counts…
we are now finding out WHY they didnt get him earlier..
pretty much all the reasons that someone like me would be called names for putting forth..
the minute i heard it… i KNEW it is going to be a clusterfck…
a nuclear brain fart…
a humongous S.N.A.F.U.
but not in ability, but in strategy and tactics in the big picture…
if you can see the big picture, your either not socialist, or your a socialist inner circle leader using people…
the rest are “tools”
wait… wait…
we also lost new stealth tech..
why didnt they get a CH-53 Sea Stallion, or a CH-53E Super Stallion to go in, and airlift all the stuff?
they had situational control… only one man was armed… so why leave top secret samples for your ‘friends’ in global socialism?
for a man who calls himself a christian, he sure dont understand the power of making martyrs..
and for a man whose code name is renegade, from renegado, apostate from christianity to islam, he may understand the power of martyrdom…
and so… protected in ambiguousness..
the reason for the bow to saudi now is clear…
you bow to who you SERVE…
[just as the inane idea of feminists claiming women serve men (and that it wasnt the other way around)… that in their world, slave holders of the south would have to stand when a slave entered the room. have to remove ones hat in the presence of a slave. have to hold the door open for the slaves… have to speak clean and politely in mixed company. and to die defending the slave from harm if need be.
sounds right and correct, no? kind of inverted, eh?]
the WAY it was handled made it so ambigious that every wild idea is on the table. in fact, there is no reason to think that he is dead at all… it may be that they reached a deal, and like a witness protection program, faked the death, disappearance of the body., etc..
perhaps he has moved to Astoria queens,where two of his friends who flew planes into buildings operated from, and perhaps he now goes to the same mosque
if Stalin’s daughter can be a Wisconsin cheese head..
anything is possible.
[including him locked away in a prison cell forever, and no one knowing. that too is a page out of the soviet play book]
regardless of which…
obama played out stalins maxim…
no man, no problem…
If Obama tried to capture OBL and had plans to give him protection, it is likely word would have filtered down to the SEAL teams involved and the whole of SOCOM would have had to do some serious thinking and planning. And many might not have wished to go along with the plan, hence the technical difficulties.
Oh, the Germans! Puleeeze, give me a break!
There’s nothing more bullshitty than a German intellectual giving the US instructions on how it should act. When their interests are involved, the modern-day Germans as just as ruthless as their fathers and grandfathers. Remember GSG-9 in Somalia? Remember how all the Red Brigaders in German prisons all were suicided on the same day?
Germans! Hah!
The old “he needed killing” defense doesn’t seem quite so mockable these days, does it?
the advantage to self appointed judges, is that they are not litigants… period… / second advantage is that they decide, not the litigants…