In 1837, British troops attacked an American ship, the Caroline, that was suspected of aiding Canadians in attacks against the Brits. What evolved was the practice of customary international law on what constitutes an imminent threat:
In order to act in preemptive self-defense, a country must be faced with an overwhelming threat, that leaves no moment for deliberation.
I don’t think in any universe can it be believed that bellicose and disgusting language, such as that offered by Iran, constitutes an overwhelming threat that doesn’t leave Israel with any choice of what to do.
In fact, this standard was discussed in the context of the UN Charter when Israel attacked Iraq in 1981 to destroy a nuclear reactor that could be used to build nuclear weapons. The UN Security Council unanimously condemned that act as being “unnecessary” and an act of “aggression.”
Therefore, the legal principle of sticks and stones breaking bones but words never hurting is in effect.
Thanks, RM - yes, those do seem useful precedents. Out of interest, what is the general consensus regarding the international legality of Israel’s 1967 war in which it was responding to a blockade and clear materiel buildup along the border?
Generally speaking, the debates over what constitutes an imminent threat are debates of degrees rather than of the concept of not needing to wait until someone else strikes the first blow. For example, if 10,000 tanks are lined up on your border, there’s no doubt an attack is imminent. But what about 200 tanks? 100? 10? (Caveat: some scholars and nations do believe that a country must wait to be struck first, but they do represent a minority opinion.)
But anyways, to answer your question, the 1967 is often held as a textbook case of a nation’s reasonable exercise of anticipatory self defense.
*"In Madrid, Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos summoned Iran’s ambassador to protest Ahmadinejad’s comments. Moratinos said he rejected the remarks in the strongest possible terms.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Baptiste Mattei also condemned the remarks “with the utmost firmness.”*
They’re trembling in Tehran.
In this case, what could Israel do? Start a bombing campaign? I don’t think their jets can get that far without refueling. And if the U.S. were to help them . . . that doesn’t even bear thinking about.
No, I think I whooshed myself, which is not easy, but I manage it. :smack:
Saddam was Sunni, yes? So the Iranians are happy that he was deposed and the Shi’ite majority has come to power. So the invasion was a good thing (in their eyes), because now they will form a united front against Israel and the US. But they blame the invasion (of Iran by Iraq) on the Sunni Saddam. Yes?
It still doesn’t make a lot of sense, but this is the Middle East we are talking about. (insert frog and scorpion joke here.)
As I mentioned in another thread, Iran is a part of the world where you score political points by planning to blow up the neighbors.
The phrase is not mentioned in the UN Charter. As far as I recall, the UN has only twice authorized the use of offensive military force against a country: in Korea and in Kuwait. The text of UNSCR 678, which authorized the war in Kuwait/Iraq, says, in part, “[The UNSC] authorizes Member States cooperating with the Government of Kuwait… to use all necessary means to uphold and implement resolutions 660…” [That’s the resolution calling for Iraq to quit Kuwait.] So there ya go.
FWIW, the Korean resolution reads that the UNSC “recommends that members of the United Nations furnish such assistance to the Republic of Korea as may be necessary to repel the armed attack and to restore international peace and security to the area.”
Article 51 says “self-defence shall be immediately reported to the Security Council and shall not in any way affect the authority and responsibility of the Security Council under the present Charter to take at any time such action as it deems necessary in order to maintain or restore international peace and security.”
As RM says, the precedent for allowing military action is a resolution specifying all means necessary in order to maintain or restore international peace and security.
What about The six days war? It also was preceded by very belligerent talk by Nasser. As well as a military build up close to the border and UN peacekeepers send packing, closing of the Straits of Tiran etc. all pointing to an imminent attack, but no actual formal outbreak of hostilities (unless you count closing of the Straits of Tiran such). Did Israel break international law by pre-empting the expected Egyptian attack?
The 1967 war is a slightly different story. A legitimate cause for war is only neccessary when two nations are at peace, and in 1967 Israel and Egypt were already at war - a war put on hold by the 1956 (I think) ceasefire. By closing the Straits of Tiran and moving heavy forces into the Sinai, Egypt was violating the terms of the agreement, making war pretty much inevitable.
This whole deal may be about internal politics or about Iraq, but it’s also about Iran’s ally, Syria. The Harriri investigation is making Damascus very nervous, and Iran is responding to an American threat to its friend by threatening America’s friend, and by reminding Muslims who their real enemy is, supposedly. Furthermore, Teheran might be worried that Lebanese nationalism and reproachment with the West may lead to the weakenng of its proxy, the Hizballa, whose sole stated purpose nowadays seems to be the destruction of Israel. By rallying the Islamic world behind its cause Iran hopes to give the Hizballa a shot in the arm, thus maintaining its Lebanese power base.
Incidentally, Shimon Peres has asked the Foreign Minister to demand that the UN suspend Iran’s membership. Much as I dislike the old fart, I have to admit he has a sense of humor.
Israel has F-15Is capable of reaching deep into Iranian territory, medium-ranged ballistic missiles, and (non-nuclear but still long-ranged) submarines. Other than that, its capabilities for direct attack are very limited. There are rumors of IDF special forces operating in Kurdistan (Israel has always been very friendly with the Kurds) near the Iranian border. If true, that may be one reason Teheran is acting nervous.
Besides that, nobody around here is really all that worried Iran’s proclimation. In the words of a great Jewish sage, you wanna shoot, shoot. Don’t talk.
Rune, the Egyptian actions you’re referring to were all breaches of the 1956 truce. Even if someone might not think of them as acts of war had they been the FIRST indication of hostility, the fact that they represented the breaking of a truce made them a resumption of prior hostilities…clearly, Israel couldn’t be expected to take no action on that.
Basically, yes. The thing is that Muslim Iraq and its government have never divided neatly into a Sunni /Shi’a dichotomy. The major influences seem to fall into roughly four subcategories:
Iranian Shi’a theocrats disliked Saddam both for his secularist Ba’ath ideology and for his Sunni affiliation, both of which contributed to his anti-Shi’ism. I’m not sure whether they blamed his invasion of Iraq more on his Ba’athism, his Sunnism, or his ties with the US “Great Satan”.
Iran was uneasy about the US invasion of Iraq at first, because of course their own government is heartily disliked by a lot of its citizens who are less theocratic-minded and more pro-Western. So the leaders feared a possible “democratic domino effect”, as well as the prospect of a post-Saddam Iraq closely allied with the US and strengthened by aid from it.
However, now that it looks as though Iran is more likely to “theocratize” Iraq than Iraq is to “democratize” Iran, the Iranian leaders seem to be feeling pretty positive about the Iraq situation, and are working it for all it’s worth (see below).
Oh, I think it makes a hell of a lot of sense. The Iranians seem to be handling the situation very shrewdly indeed:
With the recent adoption of the Iraqi constitution and the stabilization of the Shi’a-dominated, Iran-linked Iraqi government, Iran is sitting even prettier for increasing Shi’a power and influence across the Middle East. The biggest potential fly in the ointment is conflict with Sunnis, especially those radical al-Qaeda-type Sunnis who consider Shi’as heretics. (One sign of this tension was seen earlier this month when one of Iraq’s Shi’a politicians, representing the Iran-backed SCIRI party, responded to Saudi concerns about Iranian influence in Iraq by disparaging the Saudi minister as a "Bedouin riding a camel ".)
Solution? Go after the “common enemy”, of course. Whip up resentment against the Israelis and Americans in a show of Muslim solidarity, and perhaps by the time the rhetorical dust settles the Iraqi majority will have comfortably consolidated its power and be ready to do business with its good friend Iran.
Oh yes, I think the Iranians are being extremely sensible about this, so sensible that it hurts, in fact. I really do not enjoy contemplating the prospects of a power struggle between militant fundamentalist Sunni-extremist terrorists on the one hand and nuke-seeking hardline Shi’a theocrats on the other. I mean, who do you root for in a case like that?
You can’t support either one, you certainly can’t hope that they find common ground for cooperation, and you can’t even hope that they just destroy each other like Kilkenny cats, because the suffering will be mostly borne by innocent civilians.
We can only hope that democratically-minded moderates end up running the show and taking a strong stand against violence. But given the polarization and radicalization of the Middle East political climate, I’m not sure that that’s the most likely option.
Oh yes. In fact, if the Iraqi Shiites ever vote for unification with Iran, the US will effectively have handed Baghdad to Iran to have as its second city. Which will presumably make Iran very happy indeed.
Really? In the past we’ve discussed options for dealing with Iran’s nuclear program, and the consensus was that it would not be practical for Israel’s air force to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities the way it did Iraq’s Osirak reactor. The main reasons were (1) the difficulty of finding the facilities where the work is being done; (2) the bomb-hardening of such facilities; (3) the necessity of flying over Jordanian or Syrian air space. But I could have sworn sheer distance was also considered an obstacle.
IMHO Iran should be very glad that America is in Iraq, That’s all that’s there to stop the Israelis. Otherwise, if the Israelis chose to act, the Syrians couldn’t stop them.
If America decides to ground its AWACS over Iraq ‘for maintenance’, then the Iranians should be very afraid.
It’s also worth noting that the Iranians aren’t ethnic Arabs - they’re Persians, so there’s not going to be much ethnic solidarity.
OTOH this could actually be a very positive sign: the Iranian theocracy might be about to fall and this is an attempt to maintain power.
Yeah, but this will never happen. You don’t see Afghanistan voting to become part of Pakistan, or Morrocco voting to become part of Algeria, or Kuwait voting to become part of Saudi Arabia, even though all pairs of countries have the same religious and ethnic makeup. You don’t even see Canada voting to merge with the US or Austria voting to merge with Germany or Belgium voting to merge with France, despite shared history, language and religions and all being liberal democracies.
The trend has been for states to break apart along ethnic lines into smaller states, although there are also counter-trends like the EU. I see no reason to suspect that Arabian speaking Iraqi Shiites would voluntarily unify themselves with Persian speaking Iranian Shiites just because they share a religion.
Of course, an Iraq dominated by Iran is a possibility–along the lines of Syrian domination of Lebanon.
