The Use of Force in International Law

The international law on the use of force is one of the oldest branches of international law. It is an area twinned with the emergence of international law as a concept in itself, and which sees law and politics collide. The number of armed conflicts is equal only to the number of methodological approaches used to describe them. Many violent encounters are well known. The Kosovo Crisis in 1999 and the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 spring easily to the minds of most scholars and academics, and gain extensive coverage in this text. Other conflicts, including the Belgian operation in Stanleyville, and the Ethiopian Intervention in Somalia, are often overlooked to our peril. Ruys and Corten's expert-written text compares over sixty different instances of the use of cross border force since the adoption of the UN Charter in 1945, from all out warfare to hostile encounters between individual units, targeted killings, and hostage rescue operations, to ask a complex question. How much authority does the power of precedent really have in the law of the use of force?

Auteur

Olivier Corten teaches public international law at the Université Libre de Bruxelles, and is co-director of the Revue Belge de Droit International. He is the author or co-author of ten books and of more than one hundred and fifty articles. Tom Ruys studied Law and International Relations at the Universities of Ghent, Nottingham, and Leuven. He joined the faculty of law at the University of Ghent as a tenure-track professor within the department of public international law. Tom Ruys is the author of several publications and has been awarded the Lieber Prize by the American Society of International Law. He is a member of the International Law Association's Committee on the Use of Force, Co-Editor-In-Chief of the Journal of the Use of Force and International Law, and a member of the editorial board of the Revue Belge de Droit International. Assistant editor Alexandra Hofer is a Doctoral Researcher in the Faculty of Law, in the Department of European, Public and International Law at the University of Ghent.

Contenu

1 Tom Ruys, Olivier Corten, and Alexandra Hofer: Introduction; 2 Michael Wood: The Caroline Incident - 1837; 1 - The Cold War Era (1945-1989); 3 Nigel White: The Korean War - 1950-1953; 4 Alexandra Hofer: The Suez Canal Crisis - 1956; 5 Eliav Lieblich: The Soviet Intervention in Hungary - 1956; 6 Ki-Gab Park: The U-2 incident - 1960; 7 Robert Kolb: The Belgian Intervention in The Congo - 1960 and 1964; 8 Tom Ruys: The Indian Intervention in Goa - 1961; 9 Alexander Orakhelashvili: The Cuban Missile Crisis - 1962; 10 Douglas Guilfoyle: The Gulf of Tonkin Incident - 1964; 11 Christian Walter: The US Intervention in the Dominican Republic - 1965; 12 John Quigley: The Six Day War - 1967; 13 Gerhard Hafner: The Intervention in Czechoslovakia - 1968; 14 Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg: The USS Pueblo Incident - 1968; 15 Dino Kristiotis: The Indian Intervention into (East) Pakistan - 1971; 16 Francois Dubuisson and Vaios Koutroulis: The Yom Kippur War - 1973; 17 Oliver Dorr: Turkey's intervention in Cyprus - 1974; 18 Natalino Ronzitti: The Mayaguez Incident - 1975; 19 Claus Kress and Benjamin K. Nussberger: The Entebbe Raid - 1976; 20 Constantine Antonopoulos: The Larnaca Incident - 1978; 21 Gregory H. Fox: The Vietnamese Intervention in Cambodia - 1978; 22 Kenneth Chan: The Ugandan-Tanzanian War - 1978-1979; 23 Myra Williamson: Operation Litani - 1978; 24 Myra Williamson: The Lebanon War - 1982; 25 Georg Nolte and Janina Barkholdt: The Soviet Intervention in Afghanistan - 1979-1980; 26 Mathias Forteau and Alison See Ying Xiu: The US Hostage Rescue Operation in Iran - 1980; 27 Andrea de Guttry: The Iran-Iraq War - 1980-1988; 28 Tom Ruys: Israel's Air Strike Against Iraq's Osiraq Nuclear Reactor - 1981; 29 Jorg Kammerhofer: The US Intervention in Nicaragua - 1981-1988; 30 Etienne Henry: The Falklands/Malvinas War - 1982; 31 Theresa Reinold: South African Incursions into Lesotho - 1982; 32 Nabil Hajjami: The US Intervention in Grenada - 1983; 33 Erin Pobjie, Fanny Declercq, and Raphael Van Steenberghe: The Israeli Raid Against the PLO Headquarters in Tunis - 1985; 34 Erin Pobjie, Fanny Declercq, and Raphael Van Steenberghe: The Killing of Khalil al-Wazir by Israeli Commandos in Tunis - 1988; 35 Maurice Kamto: The US Strikes Against Libya - 1986; 36 Nicholas Tsagourias: The US Intervention in Panama - 1989; 2 - The Post-Cold War Era (1990-2000); 37 Ugo Villani: The ECOWAS Intervention in Liberia - 1990-1997; 38 Erika de Wet: The Gulf War - 1990-1991; 39 Tarcisio Gazzini: Intervention in Iraq's Kurdish region and the Creation of the No-Fly Zones in Northern and Southern Iraq - 1991-2003; 40 Terry D. Gill and Kinga Tibori-Szabo: The Intervention in Somalia; 41 Pierre Klein: The Intervention in Bosnia and Herzegovina - 1992-1995; 42 Paulina Starski: The US Air Strike Against the Iraqi Intelligence Headquarters - 1993; 43 Susan Breau: The ECOWAS Intervention in Sierra Leone - 1997-1999; 44 Enzo Cannizzaro and Aurora Rasi: The US Strikes in Sudan and Afghanistan - 1998; 45 Sean D. Murphy: The Eritrean-Ethiopian War - 1998-2000; 46 James A. Green: The Great African War and the Intervention by Uganda and Rwanda in the Democratic Republic of Congo - 1998-2003; 47 Daniel Franchini and Antonios Tzanakopoulos: The Kosovo crisis - 1999; 3 - The Post 9/11-Era (2001-); 48 Michael Byers: The Intervention in Afghanistan - 2001-; 49 Marc Weller: The Iraq War - 2003; 50 Lindsay Moir: Israeli Air Strikes in Syria - 2003 and 2007; 51 Christian J. Tams and Wenke Bruckner: The Israeli Intervention in Lebanon - 2006; 52 Kimberley N. Trapp: The Turkish Intervention Against the PKK in Northern Iraq - 2007-2008; 53 Monica Pinto and Marcos Kotlik: 'Operation Phoenix' - the Colombian Raid Against the FARC in Ecuador - 2008; 54 Christine Gray: The Conflict in Georgia - 2008; 55 Christian Henderson: Israeli Military Operations Against Gaza: Operation Cast Lead (2008-2009), Operation Pillar of Defense (2012) and Operation Protective Edge (2014); 56 Ashley Deeks: The NATO Intervention in Libya - 2011; 57 David Kretzmer: US Extra-Territorial Actions against Individuals: Bin Laden, Al Awlaki, and Abu Khattalah; 58 Dire Tladi: The Intervention in Cote d'Ivoire - 2011; 59 Agatha Verdebout: The Intervention of the Gulf Cooperation Council in Bahrain - 2011; 60 Jean-Christophe Martin: The Ethiopian Military Intervention in Somalia - 2011; 61 Karine Bannelier and Theodore Christakis: The Intervention of France and African Countries in Mali 2013; 62 Anne Lagerwall: Threats of and Actual Military Strikes against Syria - 2013 and 2017; 63 Mary Ellen O'Connell: The Crisis in Ukraine - 2014; 64 Olivier Corten: The Military Operations against the 'Islamic State' (ISIL or Da'esh) - 2014; 65 Luca Ferro and Tom Ruys: The Saudi-Led Military Intervention in Yemen's Civil War - 2015; 66 Mohamed S. Helal: The ECOWAS Intervention in the Gambia - 2016