Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
- Publication Year
- Publication
- Publication Type
Articles 1 - 29 of 29
Full-Text Articles in Law
The Theory And Practice At The Intersection Between Human Rights And Humanitarian Law, Monica Hakimi
The Theory And Practice At The Intersection Between Human Rights And Humanitarian Law, Monica Hakimi
Reviews
The United States is more than fifteen years into a fight against terrorism that shows no sign of abating and, with the change in administration, appears to be intensifying. Other Western democracies that have historically been uneasy about U.S. counterterrorism policies have, in recent years, shifted toward those policies. And armed nonstate groups continue to commit large-scale acts of violence in multiple distinct theaters. The legal issues that these situations present are not entirely new, but neither are they going away. Recent publications, like the three works under review, thus provide useful opportunities to reflect on and refine our thinking …
Contemporary Practice Of The United States Relating To International Law, Kristina Daugirdas, Julian Davis Mortenson
Contemporary Practice Of The United States Relating To International Law, Kristina Daugirdas, Julian Davis Mortenson
Articles
In this section: Congress Enacts Sanctions Legislation Targeting Russia • United States and Qatar Sign Memorandum of Understanding over Terrorism Financing • Trump Reverses Certain Steps Toward Normalizing Relations with Cuba • United States Announces Plans to Withdraw from Paris Agreement on Climate Change • President Trump Issues Trade-Related Executive Orders and Memoranda • United States, Russia, and Jordan Sign Limited Ceasefire for Syria • Trump Administration Recertifies Iranian Compliance with JCPOA Notwithstanding Increasing Concern with Iranian Behavior
Contemporary Practice Of The United States Relating To International Law, Kristina Daugirdas, Julian Davis Mortenson
Contemporary Practice Of The United States Relating To International Law, Kristina Daugirdas, Julian Davis Mortenson
Articles
In this section: • United States Abstains on Security Council Resolution Criticizing Israeli Settlements • United States Sanctions Russian Individuals and Entities After Accusing Russian Government of Using Hacking to Interfere with U.S. Election Process; Congressional Committees and Intelligence and Law Enforcement Agencies Continue to Investigate President Trump’s Connections to Russian Officials • Second Circuit Overturns $655 Million Jury Verdict Against Palestine Liberation Organization and Palestinian Authority • New Legislation Seeks to Confirm Immunity of Artwork and Facilitate Cultural Exchange • United States Confronts China over Seizure of Unmanned Drone in the South China Sea • International Criminal Court Prosecutor …
Rescuing Policy And Terror Victims: A Concerted Approach To The Ransom Dilemma, C. Elizabeth Bundy
Rescuing Policy And Terror Victims: A Concerted Approach To The Ransom Dilemma, C. Elizabeth Bundy
Michigan Journal of International Law
Part I of this Note will analyze the current framework governing hostage situations to determine the permissibility of ransom payments under international law. Part II will examine the two dominant positions that have developed among states and identify the justifications and shortcomings of each. Part III will conclude, firstly, that for states to develop a multilateral approach to hostage situations, they must take the lead within their respective domestic spheres and, secondly, that the option to negotiate for ransomed release should be preserved as an essential tool for confronting terrorist organizations.
Contemporary Practice Of The United States Relating To International Law, Kristina Daugirdas, Julian Davis Mortenson
Contemporary Practice Of The United States Relating To International Law, Kristina Daugirdas, Julian Davis Mortenson
Articles
In this section: • U.S. Supreme Court Upholds Law Facilitating Compensation for Victims of Iranian Terrorism • Russia Argues Enhanced Military Presence in Europe Violates NATO-Russia Agreement; United States Criticizes Russian Military Maneuvers over the Baltic Sea as Inconsistent with Bilateral Treaty Governing Incidents at Sea • U.S. Secretary of State Determines ISIL Is Responsible for Genocide • United States Blocks Reappointment of WTO Appellate Body Member • U.S. Department of Defense Releases Report of Investigation Finding That October 2015 Air Strike on Doctors Without Borders Hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, Was Not a War Crime • United States Expands Air …
Identifying The Start Of Conflict: Conflict Recognition, Operational Realities And Accountability In The Post-9/11 World, Laurie R. Blank, Benjamin R. Farley
Identifying The Start Of Conflict: Conflict Recognition, Operational Realities And Accountability In The Post-9/11 World, Laurie R. Blank, Benjamin R. Farley
Michigan Journal of International Law
On December 19, 2008, the Convening Authority for the United States Military Commissions at Guantanamo Bay referred charges against Abd al-Rahim Hussein Muhammed Abdu Al-Nashiri for his role in the October 2000 bombing of the U.S.S. Cole. The charge sheet alleged that al-Nashiri committed several acts—including murder in violation of the law of war, perfidy, destruction of property—”in the context of and associated with armed conflict” on or about October 12, 2000 in connection with the bombing. At the time of the attack, the statement that the United States was engaged in an armed conflict would have been a surprise …
Contemporary Practice Of The Untied States Relating To International Law, Kristina Daugirdas, Julian Davis Mortenson
Contemporary Practice Of The Untied States Relating To International Law, Kristina Daugirdas, Julian Davis Mortenson
Articles
In this section: • Iran Nuclear Framework Agreement Reached; Congress Seeks to Influence Negotiation • United States Lifts Some Cuba Restrictions and Explores the Possibility of Normalizing Relations • United States Responds to Alleged North Korean Cyber Attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment • Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Releases Executive Summary of Its Study of CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program • President Obama Seeks Statutory Authorization for the Use of Military Force Against ISIL
Contemporary Practice Of The United States Relating To International Law, Kristina Daugirdas, Julian Davis Mortenson
Contemporary Practice Of The United States Relating To International Law, Kristina Daugirdas, Julian Davis Mortenson
Articles
In this section: United States Objects to Russia’s Continued Violations of Ukraine’s Territorial Sovereignty, Including by Convoys Purporting to Provide Humanitarian Aid • United States and Afghanistan Sign Bilateral Security Agreement • United States Announces “Changes and Confirmations” in Its Interpretation of the UNConvention Against Torture • United States and China Make Joint Announcement to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Bolstering Multilateral Climate Change Negotiations • United States Deepens Its Engagement with ISIL Conflict • NATO Affirms that Cyber Attacks May Trigger Collective Defense Obligations
Beyond The Battlefield, Beyond Al Qaeda: The Destabilizing Legal Architecture Of Counterterrorism, Robert M. Chesney
Beyond The Battlefield, Beyond Al Qaeda: The Destabilizing Legal Architecture Of Counterterrorism, Robert M. Chesney
Michigan Law Review
By the end of the first post-9/11 decade, the legal architecture associated with the U.S. government’s use of military detention and lethal force in the counterterrorism setting had come to seem relatively stable, supported by a remarkable degree of cross-branch and cross-party consensus (manifested by legislation, judicial decisions, and consistency of policy across two very different presidential administrations). That stability is certain to collapse during the second post-9/11 decade, however, thanks to the rapid erosion of two factors that have played a critical role in generating the recent appearance of consensus: the existence of an undisputed armed conflict in Afghanistan, …
Targeting And The Concept Of Intent, Jens David Ohlin
Targeting And The Concept Of Intent, Jens David Ohlin
Michigan Journal of International Law
International law generally prohibits military forces from intentionally targeting civilians; this is the principle of distinction. In contrast, unintended collateral damage is permissible unless the anticipated civilian deaths outweigh the expected military advantage of the strike; this is the principle of proportionality. These cardinal targeting rules of international humanitarian law are generally assumed by military lawyers to be relatively well-settled. However, recent international tribunals applying this law in a string of little-noticed decisions have completely upended this understanding. Armed with criminal law principles from their own domestic systems — often civil law jurisdictions — prosecutors, judges and even scholars have …
Detention Debates, Deborah N. Pearlstein
Detention Debates, Deborah N. Pearlstein
Michigan Law Review
Since the United States began detaining people in efforts it has characterized, with greater and lesser accuracy, as part of global counterterrorism operations, U.S. detention programs have spawned more than 200 different lawsuits producing 6 Supreme Court decisions, 4 major pieces of legislation, at least 7 executive orders across 2 presidential administrations, more than 100 books, 231 law review articles (counting only those with the word "Guantanamo" in the title), dozens of reports by nongovernmental organizations, and countless news and analysis articles from media outlets in and out of the mainstream. For those in the academic and policy communities who …
Dionysian Disarmament: Security Coucil Wmd Coercive Disarmament Measures And Their Legal Implication, James D. Fry
Dionysian Disarmament: Security Coucil Wmd Coercive Disarmament Measures And Their Legal Implication, James D. Fry
Michigan Journal of International Law
This Article provides the first comprehensive legal analysis of the Security Council's coercive disarmament and arms control measures involving weapons of mass destruction (WMD). In the process of providing this legal analysis, it presents a fresh perspective on a variety of widely held beliefs about disarmament and arms control law, as well as about U.N. law.
"Change Direction" 2006: Israeli Operations In Lebanon And The International Law Of Self-Defense, Michael N. Schmitt
"Change Direction" 2006: Israeli Operations In Lebanon And The International Law Of Self-Defense, Michael N. Schmitt
Michigan Journal of International Law
This Article explores and assesses the Israeli justification for Operation Change Direction. Did the law of self-defense provide a basis for the operation? If so, defense against whom-Hezbollah, the State of Lebanon, or both? Were the Israeli actions consistent with the criteria for a lawful defensive action: necessity, proportionality, and immediacy? Did Operation Change Direction unlawfully breach Lebanese territorial integrity?
Prologue To A Voluntarist War Convention, Robert D. Sloane
Prologue To A Voluntarist War Convention, Robert D. Sloane
Michigan Law Review
This Article attempts to identify and clarify what is genuinely new about the "new paradigm" of armed conflict after the attacks of September 11, 2001. Assuming that sound policy counsels treating certain aspects of the global struggle against modern transnational terrorist networks within the legal rubric of war, this Article stresses that the principal challenge such networks pose is that they require international humanitarian law, somewhat incongruously, to graft conventions-in both the formal and informal senses of that word-onto an unconventional form of organized violence. Furthermore, this process occurs in a context in which one diffuse "party" to the conflict …
The Unresolved Equation Of Espionage And International Law, A. John Radsan
The Unresolved Equation Of Espionage And International Law, A. John Radsan
Michigan Journal of International Law
This Essay, in order to offer up something to that appetite, is divided into five parts. After this introduction, the author, A. John Radsan, describes a Hegelian impulse, the perpetual drive to find unity in disorder. That impulse, for better or worse, creates the train and the track for many of the academy's journeys. Radsan then defines what is meant by "intelligence activities" for purposes of this Essay, after which Radsan surveys the scholarship that existed before this symposium on the relationship between espionage and international law. As the number of pages written on this topic suggests, scholarship on espionage …
Keynote Address, Jeffrey H. Smith
Keynote Address, Jeffrey H. Smith
Michigan Journal of International Law
This afternoon, I want to touch briefly on a number of issues rather than discuss one or two to death. I chose this approach because it seemed an appropriate way to open a conference. I also chose it because I hope I can convince you that intelligence and international law interact in a way that simultaneously strengthens the law and improves intelligence; that law matters, especially in time of war; and that both good intelligence and good law have one common core value: integrity. So that you will have a sense of the perspective that I bring to this, I …
What's International Law Got To Do With It? Transnational Law And The Intelligence Mission, James E. Baker
What's International Law Got To Do With It? Transnational Law And The Intelligence Mission, James E. Baker
Michigan Journal of International Law
This Article describes a continuum of contemporary threats to U.S. national security, with a focus on nonstate terrorism. Part III addresses the role of intelligence and national security law, and in particular law addressed to process, in combating these threats. Good process advances the liberty and safety interests embodied in the concept of national security. Good process improves the quality of decision. It also enhances accountability, which in turn improves decision. Where good process is defined in law to include executive directive, it is better insulated from the immediate imperatives of secrecy and speed.
Checks And Balances In Wartime: American British And Israeli Experiences, Stephen J. Schulhofer
Checks And Balances In Wartime: American British And Israeli Experiences, Stephen J. Schulhofer
Michigan Law Review
Three years after an attack that traumatized the nation and prompted massive military and law-enforcement counter-measures, we continue to wrestle with the central dilemma of the rule of law. Which is more to be feared - the danger of unchecked executive and military power, or the danger of terrorist attacks that only an unconstrained executive could prevent? Posed in varying configurations, the question has already generated extensive litigation since September 11, 2001, and a dozen major appellate rulings. Last Term's Supreme Court trilogy - Rasul v. Bush, Hamdi v. Rumsfeld and Rumsfeld v. Padilla - clarified several important points …
Preemptive Strategies In International Law, Michael N. Schmitt
Preemptive Strategies In International Law, Michael N. Schmitt
Michigan Journal of International Law
This Article explores the appropriateness of preemptive strategies in international law. Are preemptive actions approved by the international community lawful? Can States act unilaterally or in a coalition of the willing to preempt terrorism, the development and transfer of WMD, or other threats? If so, under what circumstances and based on what quantum and quality of evidence? When can preemptive actions be taken against non-State actors such as terrorists who are based in other States?
Insuring Against Terrorism -- And Crime, Saul Levmore, Kyle D. Logue
Insuring Against Terrorism -- And Crime, Saul Levmore, Kyle D. Logue
Articles
The attacks of September 11th produced staggering losses of life and property. They also brought forth substantial private-insurance payouts, as well as federal relief for the City of New York and for the families of individuals who perished on that day. The losses suffered during and after the attacks, and the structure of the relief effort, have raised questions about the availability of insurance against terrorism, the role of government in providing for, subsidizing, or ensuring the presence of such insurance, as well as the interaction between relief and the incentives for taking precautions against similar losses in the future. …
Antiterrorism Military Commissions: The Ad Hoc Dod Rules Of Procedure, Jordan J. Paust
Antiterrorism Military Commissions: The Ad Hoc Dod Rules Of Procedure, Jordan J. Paust
Michigan Journal of International Law
While the article Antiterrorism Military Commissions: Courting Illegality was set for publication, the Department of Defense formally issued its first set of Procedures for Trials by Military Commission of Certain Non-United States Citizens in the War Against Terrorism. The President's November 13th Military Order had set up several per se violations of international law. Instead of attempting to avoid them, the DOD Order of March 21, 2002 continued the violations, set up additional violations of international law, and created various rules of procedure and evidence that, if not per se violative of international law, are highly problematic. This is a …
Antiterrorism Military Commissions: Courting Illegality, Jordan J. Paust
Antiterrorism Military Commissions: Courting Illegality, Jordan J. Paust
Michigan Journal of International Law
On November 13, 2001, President Bush issued a sweeping and highly controversial Military Order for the purpose of creating military commissions with exclusive jurisdiction to try certain designated foreign nationals "for violations of the laws of war and other applicable laws" relevant to any prior or future "acts of international terrorism." The Order reaches far beyond the congressional authorization given the President "to use all necessary and appropriate force," including "use of the United States Armed Forces," against those involved in the September 11th attack "in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by …
Post-Cold War International Security Threats: Terrorism, Drugs, And Organized Crime Symposium Transcript, Michigan Journal Of International Law
Post-Cold War International Security Threats: Terrorism, Drugs, And Organized Crime Symposium Transcript, Michigan Journal Of International Law
Michigan Journal of International Law
Symposium transcript.
New Era, New Threats: Wrestling With Interstitial Actors, Joshua A. Levy
New Era, New Threats: Wrestling With Interstitial Actors, Joshua A. Levy
Michigan Journal of International Law
Hopefully, the symposium will spark meaningful action toward creating such desperately needed solutions in the intersecting fields of law and national security policy as well as the study of international security law in law schools world-wide. Without such education, continued dialogue, and action, we mark the beginning of the end. With them, however, this world may continue on its road toward becoming a collection of secure democracies, held fast by the rule of law.
Catastrophic Terrorism- Thinking Fearfully, Acting Legally, Barry Kellman
Catastrophic Terrorism- Thinking Fearfully, Acting Legally, Barry Kellman
Michigan Journal of International Law
The time has come to move beyond howls of alarm to a public discussion of what policies should be adopted or reformed. That discussion should proceed even as crucial questions remain only partially answerable: How realistic is the possibility of catastrophic terrorism? How easy is it to make a catastrophic device that actually works? Why would any person or group want to kill hundreds, thousands, or tens of thousands of innocent victims?
The Potential Contribution Of The Chemical Weapons Convention To Combatting Terrorism, Cecil Hunt
The Potential Contribution Of The Chemical Weapons Convention To Combatting Terrorism, Cecil Hunt
Michigan Journal of International Law
This paper includes an identification and brief assessment of features of the CWC that could be helpful in dealing with the danger of use of chemical weapons in terrorist activity. They are presented under six headings which should be viewed as theses. For some of these theses this paper can offer little support, but points, instead, to missed opportunities and to the need for further efforts.
Bellum Americanum: The U.S. View Of Twenty-First Century War And Its Possible Implications For The Law Of Armed Conflict, Michael N. Schmitt
Bellum Americanum: The U.S. View Of Twenty-First Century War And Its Possible Implications For The Law Of Armed Conflict, Michael N. Schmitt
Michigan Journal of International Law
After describing Bellum Americanum at some length, the article turns to the "stressors" it presents for the current law of armed conflict. The term stressors is used to suggest that law evolves as it is stressed by changing circumstances. Much as water seeks a constant level, law inevitably moves to fill normative lacunae. Correspondingly, law loses its normative valence when it no longer serves "community"-a relative concept-ends. Thus, law is contextual and directional. It is contextual in the sense that it is understood and applied based upon the specific social, economic, political, and military milieu in which it operates. …
Extraterritorial Jurisdiction And Jurisdiction Following Forcible Abduction: A New Israeli Precedent In International Law, Michigan Law Review
Extraterritorial Jurisdiction And Jurisdiction Following Forcible Abduction: A New Israeli Precedent In International Law, Michigan Law Review
Michigan Law Review
An Israeli military court recently convicted Faik Bulut, a twenty three-year-old Turkish citizen, of the offense of belonging to Al-Fatah in Lebanon and Syria and sentenced him to seven years in prison. Bulut was captured in February 1972 during an Israeli raid 100 miles into Lebanon. Ten fedayeen, who were captured in Lebanon later in 1972, were scheduled to follow Bulut into court to be tried for the same offense. These are the first cases to be tried under a 1972 amendment to the Israeli Penal Law (Offenses Committed Abroad), which states in part: "The courts in Israel are competent …
Constitutional Law-Saboteurs And The Jurisdiction Of Military Commissions, George T. Schilling
Constitutional Law-Saboteurs And The Jurisdiction Of Military Commissions, George T. Schilling
Michigan Law Review
The jurisdiction of military tribunals in the United States has troubled political and legal writers since the days of the Revolution. Decided cases are not numerous. The boundaries separating military and civil jurisdiction are not precise. Observations of the plight of oppressed peoples in other lands as well as the conception of total war and the course of action necessary for survival warrant a reexamination and reappraisal of our constitutional guarantees, which were in part based upon and reflect a fear of tyrannical military rule. A pronouncement of the Supreme Court of the United States in this field is, therefore, …