Legality of Iraq war

[ddt]

Oh dear, not this old chestnut again. Let's be clear people, there is no international law that defines the circumstances of "legal warfare". The entire notion of an "illegal war" is a complete fabrication.

I don't agree with that, and in fact, you contradict yourself. While there may be a grey area, there are clear-cut cases of legal and illegal warfare.

As to legal warfare, there's a very simple case. It's legal for a country to wage war to defend its territory or its sovereignty.

The closest we have is a prohibition on "Wars of Aggression", however there is no internationally established definition of what constitutes a "War of Aggression", making this prohibition completely meaningless.

As such, there is only one way, currently, in which a war can be determined to be illegal, and that is by the UNSC declaring it to be illegal under Chapter VII of the UN Charter.

There you have it. When the UNSC says it's a war of agression, it is. And you've defined at least one way in which a war can be illegal.

Likewise, the UNSC can authorize the use of force under Chapter VII, and thus declare that a war is legal.

Further, you cannot simply talk of the "Iraq War". There are two distinct stages to the Iraq War, and each has enormously different legal status.

Agreed.

Firstly, there is the invasion stage, which in my opinion should be considered a War of Aggression, and therefore illegal. However lacking a definition for a War of Aggression, such a legal finding cannot be made. I'd like to see an international treaty drafted up which defines such an act in specific terms.

As you noted yourself above, the UNSC is currently the arbiter on this, but in many cases it won't pass judgement. I agree it would be better if a real court, e.g., the ICJ, would be arbiter and when a sound set of criteria would be developed. A treaty alone would not suffice, as it could only name such criteria in broad terms and interpretation by a court would still be needed in each particular case.

And I agree with your assessment that the invasion in March 2003 was a war of aggression. It also shows that such a legal finding is not easy. Proponents of the invasion claimed that Iraq had WMD and was an imminent danger. It has taken quite some time for various inquiry commissions around the world to establish that such claims were false. When you want to include "imminent danger" as a criterion that a war would be legal, this shows that a court cannot reach a swift decision, which would certainly be needed to be swift in case of a claim of imminent danger.

Secondly, there is the occupation stage of the Iraq War, which constitutes the overwhelming majority of the duration of the conflict, the overwhelming majority of the casualties (on both sides) and draws the overwhelming majority of criticism.

The occupation of Iraq is mandated by the UN Security Council, and is not illegal.

Let that sink in, for a moment, please.

The occupation is a legal military operation sanctioned by the International Community. Indeed, the authorisation for this operation is itself international law.

Yes. And to be clear: the assessment of the Dutch commission was about the invasion, not the occupation.

When Bush in 2002/2003 built up to the invasion, the Dutch (caretaker) government Balkenende-1 decided to support the invasion politically (but not militarily). This has been a sore point in Dutch politics ever since.

When the occupation started, the Netherlands provided some troops in 2003-2005 for the stabilization force. This has been a much less controversial point in Dutch politics (GreenLeft and Socialist Party were against, but Labour not) and is not anymore part of the political discourse with the end of the Dutch participation in SFIR.

 

[INRM]

Does the invasion being sanctioned count if the reasons for it's sanction were deceptive?

 

[FireGarden]

You are at odds with some simple facts, yet again. The UN Security Council and the UN member nations. That is who explicitly must contribute forces to, material and money to, and enforce UNSC sanctions.

Please don't play the idiot and attempt to use this nebulous concept of "international community" when I was specific for a good purpose. That UN and UNSC member America chose to undertake the expense and trouble, and take the lead on supporting and enforcing most of the 1991 sanctions. Funnuily enough, others of "the international community" lost interest, which gutlessness is a condemnation of the bulk of these twats you worship in this chimera called "the international community," not America.

It was America who was being the good international citizen, not the slackers who dropped out. So maybe it's a good thing that America isn't the "international community." No point in the US also being a bunch of useless wankers.

DR

You are losing your rag for no good reason.
It's telling that you refuse to address the quote I've given three times already. The use of military force was not authorised by the UN. Any claim that America had the authority to act on behalf of the UN to enforce UN resolutions is crap.

That the UN does not represent some kind of ghostly action at a distance (so individual nations, even individual people, act to enforce UN resolutions) is neither here nor there.