Preventive war

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A preventive war is term given to kind of war whose public justification is proclaimed as "self-defense." The concepts of preventive war and preemptive war differ only in the certainty of an attack —the latter concerns an imminent attack, while the former requires no military provocation. The rationale for preventive war is the claimed prevention of a possible future attack, which international law considered to be indistinguishable from a forbidden war of aggression. The term preventive war arguably belongs more to political rhetoric than to diplomatic and legal language. In contrast, "preemptive" (if it is understood as anticipatory self-defense) has a strict and universally accepted legal meaning enunciated by Daniel Webster in the Caroline Case, requiring a degree of certainty in the imminence of an attack and no time for deliberation. In political language these terms are often applied subjectively by defining an "imminent threat" by an extremely variable spectrum, which can blur their meanings.

Contents 1 Examples 1.1 World War I 1.2 World War II 1.3 The Bush doctrine, Iraq and Afghanistan 2 Eisenhower on Preventive War 2.1 Up to 1953 2.2 1954 2.3 1958 3 References 4 External links

[edit] Examples

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[edit] World War I

Leaders of Imperial Germany were concerned that Russia was becoming more powerful and believed that war was inevitable, so sought to provoke a war with Russia as soon as possible.

[edit] World War II

Germany's attacks on some neutral countries in the spring of 1940 are often given as examples of preventive wars aiming at preventing Germany's chief enemy Britain from occupying their territories, which would have harmed Germany:

• Through the occupation of Jutland (Operation Weserübung), Germany could build up an invasion defense far above the level the Danes were capable of – or interested in.
• Through the occupation of Northern Norway (Operation Weserübung) access to ice free winter harbors for deliveries of Finnish nickel and Swedish iron ore was secured against a planned British invasion (the British campaign in Norway).
• Through the invasion of the Benelux countries a British invasion over the North Sea using weakly defended neutral territories was prevented.

Moreover, the Japanese Empire explained the Attack on Pearl Harbor (1941) as a preventive war action. Japanese officials were convinced that their plans of attack on the French and British colonies in South-East Asia would cause a strong reaction by the United States of America, traditional ally of France and UK and owner of the nearby colonies of Philippines and Guam.

[edit] The Bush doctrine, Iraq and Afghanistan

Former United States Attorney General under Lyndon Johnson, Ramsey Clark, has drawn up Articles of Impeachment of President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney that includes the wars against Afghanistan and Iraq as "Violations and subversions of the Charter of the United Nations and international law" consistent with discussion of the "rationale for preventive war" above.^[1] MIT Professor Noam Chomsky argues the preventive war in Iraq is a supreme crime as defined by Justice Robert H. Jackson, chief prosecutor for the United States at the Nuremberg Trials.^[2][3]

Preventive war has been described as an important element of the Bush Doctrine, although the U.S. government uses the term preemptive in a way which is partly consistent with international usage. It was argued that Iraqi missiles already threatened the United States, although only biological and chemical weapons were yet ready for use. Based on this justification the 2003 invasion of Iraq should have been a possible example of a preemptive war. The Iraqi missiles, while unable to target the United States directly, were in violation of the cease fire agreement following the 1991 Gulf War (see below). Their development was one of many alleged cease fire violations cited in support of resumption of hostilities and therefore do not necessarily fall under either preventive or preemptive war definitions. However, the purported threat of Saddam Hussein possibly handing off chemical or biological weapons to terrorist groups that might use them against the United States or merely evincing "nothing more than the intent and ability to develop WMD" would be an example of a reason used for a preventive war.^[4]

However, President George W. Bush has claimed, on occasion, that the invasion of Iraq was justified on the grounds that Saddam Hussein may have someday been able to develop nuclear weapons. Based on this justification, the invasion would constitute a preventive war, since there was no impending attack by Iraq. The Bush administration, however, argues that the 1991 Gulf war was never officially finished, and that the invasion was a continuation of that conflict. Of course, many modern wars are never formally declared or finished, and critics of administration policy view this as an attempt to find a legal loophole. However, a cease fire agreement was made after the 1991 Gulf War and certain stipulations were set in place as a condition of that cease fire. If the United Nations Security Council had found continued violation of those stipulations it would have provided a legal basis for resumption of hostilities. Finding none, they did not, however, as Colin Powell told the World Economic Forum, "When we feel strongly about something we will lead, even if no one is following us."^[5]

Additionally, some critics of the Bush administration argue that the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan was another example of preventive war. This is due to the fact that the government of Afghanistan did not actually attack the U.S. Rather, Al-Qaeda is widely believed to be responsible, and the President's policy is to attack any country which is believed to be "harboring terrorists."^[6]

Proponents of the invasion argued that the September 11 attacks constituted a sufficient reason for an attack on Afghanistan. In support of this, they assert that Afghanistan's Taliban government was assisting Al-Qaeda and this is equivalent to an act of aggression against the U.S. The intricacies of this argument hinge on one's definition of an attack or act of aggression. The Bush doctrine of preventive war still presents unresolved questions: for example, if applied universally it could mean that the United States government (via support of various groups) actively attacks other states on a regular basis, an instance of which is former Cubans in south Florida running operations against Cuba, with US support.

Alternatively, some argue that the U.S. did not actually initiate a war at all, but simply supported one side (the Afghan Northern Alliance) in a civil war. Critics, however, have responded that Afghanistan was not actually engaged in a civil war. Those, including the UN, who officially recognised the Taliban government as the legitimate government of Afghanistan are examples.

The United States position towards Afghanistan following the September 11, 2001 attack by Al Qaeda terrorists was that the government of Afghanistan was harboring the leader of an organization that executed attacks on them. They also asserted that the Taliban, as the current government of Afghanistan, did not prevent and continued to provide the terrorist organization with the freedom to run multiple camps to train more terrorists who would then be sent to attack the United States. Considering Osama Bin Laden's declaration of war against the United States, the Bush administration considered this support a hostile act in support of Al-Qaeda. From this point of view the war in Afghanistan was neither preventive nor preemptive.

[edit] Eisenhower on Preventive War

[edit] Up to 1953

"When people speak to you about a preventive war, you tell them to go and fight it. After my experience, I have come to hate war. ... War settles nothing."^[7]

[edit] 1954

Q. Ray L. Scherer, National Broadcasting Company: Mr. President, there seem to be increasing suggestions that we should embark on a preventive war with the Communist world, some of these suggestions by people in high places. I wonder, sir, if you would care to address yourself to that proposition.

THE PRESIDENT. "All of us have heard this term 'preventive war' since the earliest days of Hitler. I recall that is about the first time I heard it. In this day and time, if we believe for one second that nuclear fission and fusion, that type of weapon, would be used in such a war--what is a preventive war?

I would say a preventive war, if the words mean anything, is to wage some sort of quick police action in order that you might avoid a terrific cataclysm of destruction later.

A preventive war, to my mind, is an impossibility today. How could you have one if one of its features would be several cities lying in ruins, several cities where many, many thousands of people would be dead and injured and mangled, the transportation systems destroyed, sanitation implements and systems all gone? That isn't preventive war; that is war.

I don't believe there is such a thing; and, frankly, I wouldn't even listen to anyone seriously that came in and talked about such a thing."

Q. Chalmers M. Roberts, Washington Post and Times Herald: Mr. President, in answering that question about preventive war, you confined yourself to military reasons against it. Did you wish to leave the impression that that was the only basis of your opposition to the idea?

THE PRESIDENT. "Well, let me make it this way: if you remember, I believe it was Conan Doyle's White Company, there was a monk that left the church; he said there were seven reasons, and the first one was he was thrown out; they decided there was no use to recite the other six.

It seems to me that when, by definition, a term is just ridiculous in itself, there is no use in going any further.

There are all sorts of reasons, moral and political and everything else, against this theory, but it is so completely unthinkable in today's conditions that I thought it is no use to go any further."^[8]

[edit] 1958

"I am really amazed now to be told by Soviet leaders, who have never even been near this country, that there are in the United States those who, in your words, "utter the dangerous call for preventive war"; and conduct "unrestrained propaganda for war." If any such persons exist in the United States, I do not know of them; nor do I know of any "imperialist ruling circles" that are supposedly eager to plunge the world into war in order to make financial gains."^[9]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Chomsky: Preventive War 'the Supreme Crime'
• The Myth of Preemptive Self-Defense (ASIL Task Force Paper)
• The Caroline Case : Anticipatory Self-Defence in Contemporary International Law (Miskolc Journal of International Law v.1 (2004) No. 2 pp. 104-120)
• The American Strategy of Preemptive War and International Law