The Pentagon’s recent decision to open up combat roles to women has led legal scholar Gerard Magliocca wonder whether our current system of male-only draft registration is still constitutional. Conservative commentator Dave Carter predicts that the courts will rule that it is not, and women will be made subject to the draft. In the 1981 […]
Archive | War and Armed Conflict
Hans Kelsen on Occupation of Non-sovereign territory
By Eugene Kontorovich on January 29, 2013 6:09 pm in International Law, Israel, Treaties, Uncategorized, War and Armed Conflict
The Geneva Convention is generally thought to apply to Israel’s occupation of the West Bank – that portion of the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine previously occupied by the Jordan. This is important because the legal argument against settlements is that they violate Art. 49(6) of the Fourth Geneva Convention, a provision which did […]
Charles Rangel’s Case for Conscription
If the Pentagon’s recent decision to open up combat positions to women leads conservative Dave Carter to worry that women will be drafted, liberal Democratic Rep. Charles Rangel embraces the idea and calls for the establishment of a draft that applies to both men and women: Since January 2003, at the height of the debate […]
Women and the Draft
By Ilya Somin on January 26, 2013 4:45 pm in Conscription, Sex Discrimination, War and Armed Conflict
The Pentagon’s recent decision to abolish most restrictions on women serving in combat leads conservative commentator Dave Carter to worry that women will now be subject to the military draft: It was 22 or 23 years ago, I think, that I wrote in the Air Force Times a cautionary article on the combat exclusion that […]
John Kerry Tries to Distinguish Obama’s Bombing of Libya from Richard Nixon’s Bombing of Cambodia
In this interesting exchange from John Kerry’s confirmation hearings for the position of Secretary of State, Republican Senator Rand Paul presses Kerry on the contradiction between his longstanding view that President Richard Nixon’s bombing of Cambodia during the Vietnam War was unconstitutional because it lacked congressional authorization, and his defense of President Obama’s 2011 bombing […]
France’s Mali War & International Law
By Eugene Kontorovich on January 18, 2013 4:36 pm in Global Governance/World Government, International Law, National Security, Uncategorized, War and Armed Conflict, War on Terror
France is fighting a rather serious war in Mali. What does international law say about this go-it-alone incursion into a foreign country? Given the controversy over recent interventions with mixed motives, such as the U.S. war in Iraq, it is worth consider the international legal basis for the assault and its conduct. I. Security Council […]
Treaties, the Law of Nations, and Foreign Commerce
By Eugene Kontorovich on January 13, 2013 3:50 pm in Commerce Clause, Constitutional Law, International Law, Textualism, Treaties, War and Armed Conflict
I’m delighted to see Rick Pildes will be guest-blogging, and the exchange with Nick on the Treaty Power will be a treat. I would invited them to consider an aspect of the question that has long interested me: What is the relationship between the Offenses Power, the Treaty Power, and the Foreign Commerce power? All […]
War & Treaty Powers Applied to al-Shabab Fighters
By Eugene Kontorovich on January 9, 2013 10:29 am in Constitutional Law, Counter-Terrorism Policy, International Law, National Security, War and Armed Conflict, War on Terror
Continuing the analysis of possible Art. I authority for applying the Material Support of Terrrorism statute to three Somali nationals fighting on behalf of al-Shabab in Somalia, with no identifiable link to the U.S. – other than being brought here for trial. War Powers The U.S. is not at war with Shabab. They are at […]
Foreign Commerce Authority for Universal Jurisdiction over Terrorists
By Eugene Kontorovich on January 9, 2013 8:00 am in Alien Tort Statute, Constitutional Law, Counter-Terrorism Policy, Criminal Law, International Law, National Security, Necessary and Proper, Terrorism, Uncategorized, War and Armed Conflict, War on Terror
The government is prosecuting three foreigners for the participating in “combat operations” in a foreign civil war. The indictment apparently alleges no connection to America, or even foreign commerce (unlike a similar 2011 case that lacked an apparent connection to the U.S.) The defendants are Somalis who fought in Somalia. In a previous post, I […]
Material Support Statute: A Neutrality Act for Everyone
By Eugene Kontorovich on January 8, 2013 11:01 am in Constitutional Law, Counter-Terrorism Policy, International Law, National Security, Uncategorized, War and Armed Conflict, War on Terror
In the next few days, I’ll discuss possible sources of Art. I authority for the the federal prosecution of three foreigners for fighting on the side of al-Shabab in Somalia, and brought forcibly to the U.S. for trial. Previously, I’ve argued that this prosecution cannot be sustained under the Offenses Clause. But first lets put […]
The Offenses Clause & Universal Jurisdiction Over Terrorists
By Eugene Kontorovich on January 2, 2013 2:53 pm in Alien Tort Statute, Constitutional Law, Criminal Law, Global Governance/World Government, International Law, National Security, Terrorism, Uncategorized, War and Armed Conflict
A few days before Christmas, the U.S. indicted three men at the Federal District courthouse in Brooklyn for plotting suicide bomb attacks. This is an extraordinary, almost unique case: none of the people or conduct has any connection to the U.S. The defendants are foreign nationals, captured by some African government ont their way to […]
The Military Rationale for Affirmative Action in College Admissions
By Ilya Somin on October 11, 2012 12:40 am in Affirmative Action, Fisher v. University of Texas, War and Armed Conflict
In the recent oral argument in Fisher v. University of Texas, and in his amicus brief on behalf of the United States, Solicitor General Donald Verrilli emphasized the military rationale for affirmative action. Without racial preferences in college admissions, we will not have an adequate supply of minority officers in the armed forces, which would […]
Obama’s Reversals on Executive Power
By Ilya Somin on June 24, 2012 7:06 pm in Executive Branch, Obama, War and Armed Conflict, War on Terror
New York Times columnist Ross Douthat has an interesting column describing some of President Obama’s evolving positions on executive power. He now engages in many of the same practices that he and numerous other liberal Democrats denounced as unconstitutional in the days of the Bush Administration: When George W. Bush was president of the United […]
D-Day thoughts
In a column from 2000, I examined what military historians suggest might have happened if the D-Day landings had been repulsed. Or what if they had taken place in 1943 instead of 1944? The short answers are that if D-Day had failed, Stalin would have ended up occupying almost all of German, which would have […]
Rick Santorum’s Army of Celibates
By Ilya Somin on January 5, 2012 12:27 am in Don't Ask, Don't Tell (DADT), Gay Rights, War and Armed Conflict
Since Rick Santorum’s unexpected success, his extreme social conservatism has gotten a lot of attention. In some cases, it goes beyond what even most conservative Republicans would be willing to support. My personal favorite extreme Santorum quote hasn’t yet gotten as much play as some of the others. In a September GOP debate, Santorum responded […]