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Während im alltagssprachlichen Verständnis jede absichtliche Auslöschung von nicht-pflanzlichem Leben (z.B. der Schuss des [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_%28lion%29 Jägers auf einen Löwen]) als '''gezielte Tötung''' bezeichnet werden kann, versteht man unter dem Fachbegriff "[[Targeted Killing]]" die Liquidierung von | Während im alltagssprachlichen Verständnis jede absichtliche Auslöschung von nicht-pflanzlichem Leben (z.B. der Schuss des [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_%28lion%29 Jägers auf einen Löwen]) als '''gezielte Tötung''' bezeichnet werden kann, versteht man unter dem Fachbegriff "[[Targeted Killing]]" eine Methode des bewaffneten Kampfes, die in der Liquidierung von entweder individualisierten oder namentlich nicht identifizierten, aber allgemein als geeignete Zielpersonen eingeschätzten Personen oder Personengruppen mittels geplanter Einzelaktionen besteht. Im letztgenannten Fall spricht man von [[Signature Strike|signature strikes]]. | ||
Für gezielte Tötungen kann man sich speziell ausgebildeter Scharfschützen (Heckenschützen, sniper) oder Killer-Kommandos bedienen. Häufiger werden neuerdings Raketen aus der Luft abgefeuert: sei es von Apache-Kampfhubschraubern oder von Predator- oder Reaper-[[Killer-Drohne|Drohnen]]. | |||
Den Anspruch, dass gezielte Tötungen nicht als Mord, sondern als legitimes Mittel staatlicher Anti-Terror-Politik anzusehen seien, erhob zuerst die Regierung Israels unter Ariel Scharon. Während die USA diese Politik zunächst noch als illegal und illegitim kritisierten, schwenkten sie nach dem 11.09.2001 erst de facto und dann de jure auf die israelische Linie ein. | |||
Den Umschlagspunkt markierte das Jahr 2012. Schon im September 2011 waren mit Anwar al-Awlaki und seinem 16-jährigen Sohn die ersten US-Bürger per Drohne gezielt getötet worden. Am 30.04.2012 umriss John O. Brennan als Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism die Politik der gezielten Tötung. In seiner Rede über "The Ethics and Efficacy of the President's Counterterrorism Strategy" gab Brennan erstmals die Tötung von Al-Kaida-Mitgliedern durch Drohnenangriffe der USA zu. | |||
Das war Tage, nachdem Präsident Obama die CIA und JSOC ermächtigt hatte, auch Ziele lediglich aufgrund ihrer Verhaltensmuster anzugreifen ("signature strikes"). | |||
In seiner Rede konnte Brennan auf Überlegungen von Hongju Koh und Eric Holder sowie Jeh Johnson und Obama selbst aufbauen, der den Einsatz von Drohnen außerhalb von "heißen Kampfplätzen" wie Afghanistan ausdrücklich erlaubt hatte. | |||
Als staatliche Praxis mit Legitimitäts- und Legalitätsanspruch werden gezielte Tötungen hauptsächlich - und seit 2001 immer häufiger - von Israel und den USA angewandt. Aufgrund des Einflusses dieser beiden Staaten auf die Rechtsauffassung wird die Kritik an gezielten Tötungen, die sie einst einhellig als rechtswidrige Akte zu verurteilen pflegte, immer leiser. Seit 2015 scheint die normative Kraft des Faktischen [[Georg Jellinek) die Oberhand zu gewinnen. Subtile Steuerungen des rechtlichen Diskurses ("lawfare") können diesen Prozess unterstützen. Im Grunde genügt aber die langfristige Praxis durch mächtige Akteure. In den Worten des hochrangigen israelischen Militärjuristen Daniel Reisner aus dem Jahre 2009: | |||
:"If you do something for long enough, the world will accept it. The whole of international law is based on the notion that an act that is forbiddeen today becomes permissible if execjuted by enough countries." | |||
Semantische Veränderungen zeigen die Art des Wandels in der Rechtsauffassung. | |||
Die UN hatten zunächst Diktaturen in der Dritten Welt im Blick. Sie ließen Bericht erstatten über "extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions", und "lethal autonomous robotics", sog. LARs, waren Teil der Beobachtung und Kritik. | |||
:1977 kam Avraham Karem, der sich mit den Israeli Aircraft Industries überworfen hatte, nach Kalifornien; hatte mit seiner Firma Leading Systems bei der Navy erst einmal Pech, wurde dann mitsamt seiner Firma von General Atomics aufgekauft und durfte seine Drohne "Predator" entwickeln und taufen - dabei kamen ihm die Entwicklung von GPS und der Kommunikationstechnologie insgesamt zupass. Im Kosovo-Krieg von 1998/99 wurde Predator erstmal getestet und trotz zunächst geringer Präzision (er konnte nur 1/3 seiner Ziele finden) als vielversprechend eingeschätzt. | |||
:Im Jahr 2000 begannen die USA, die Drohne als Abschussort für Raketen zu nutzen. Bei der Suche nach Bin Laden im Herbst 2000 zeigte ein von Usbekistan eingesetzter Aufklärungs-Predator Bilder einer weißgekleideten Person, in der man Bin Laden zu erkennen glaubte. Jetzt ging die Entwicklung schnell: im Januar 2001 begannen Testflüge einer mit einer Hellfire-Rakete bestückten Predator-Drohne. Monate später konnte ein in Nevada stationierter "Pilot" per Fernbedienung einen tausend Meilen entfernten Predator "fliegen" und von ihm aus schießen. | |||
:Die Zweite Intifada von September 2000 bis Februar 2005 war für Israel der Anlass zur Entwicklung einer Taktik der gezielten Tötungen. Ende 2000 sprachen israelische Medien von einer "liquidations policy"; im Januar 2001 sprachen "Israeli officials" von "targed assassinations". Nachdem die Liquidierung des Zahnarztes Thabet Kontroversen ausgelöst hatte, bezeichnete Ephraim Sneh, damals Vize-Premier, die Politik als "effektiv, präzise und gerecht". Die Washington Post schrieb von einer Ausweitung der israelischen Politik von unmittelbaren Tätern auf mögliche Hintermänner. Im Februar 2001 verurteilte das US-Außenministerium die israelischen Aktionen; Colin Powell wandte sich gegen die "policy of targeted killings" und das State Department bedrängte Israel trotz guter Worte von Senator Joseph Biden, diese Linie nicht weiter zu verfolgen. | |||
Der 11. September 2001 verhalf der israelischen Position zum Durchbruch. Sie wurde in den USA von Vize-Präsident Dick Cheney verfochten und durchgesetzt. Im September 2001 gab er ein Interview und erklärte, nun müsse man sich auch auf die dunkle Seite einlassen. Dazu gehörte die Entwicklung von Folter und gezielten Tötungen. | |||
:[http://www.tagesspiegel.de/medien/folter-made-in-usa-die-dunkle-seite-der-macht/4305996.html Beschränkungen für Geheimdienste dürfe es nicht geben]. Nun ist es in der Geschichte etwa der CIA immer recht schattig zugegangen. Doch die Regierung von George W. Bush hatte sich im „Krieg gegen den Terror“ durch ein besonders trauriges Beispiel von Schreibtischtäterei hervorgetan: der Legalisierung von Folterpraktiken. Man kann es auch so sehen wie CIA-Agent Michael Scheuer. Der antwortet im Film „Folter – Made in USA“ auf die Frage, ob „Waterboarding“, also das simulierte Ertränken, Folter sei: „Natürlich nicht. Es war vom Präsidenten genehmigt und von US-Juristen gebilligt." Im Frühjahr 2009 hatte US-Präsident Obama den Agenten und Verhörspezialisten Straffreiheit zugesichert, aber zugleich zahlreiche Regierungsdokumente freigegeben. Insofern enthüllt der Dokumentarfilm von Marie-Monique Robin keine Neuigkeiten. Die Memos der Juristen im Pentagon, im Justizministerium und im Weißen Haus liefen 2003 auf eine von Verteidigungsminister Rumsfeld unterzeichnete Liste empfohlener Verhörtechniken hinaus. Spätestens seit ihrer Veröffentlichung sechs Jahre später war klar, dass die Fotos aus dem irakischen Gefängnis Abu Ghraib von 2004 nicht durchgeknallte Einzeltäter zeigten, sondern eine von oben abgesegnete Praxis. | |||
Unmittelbar nach 09/11, am 21.09. 2001 legalisierte Präsident George W. Bush den gezielten Einsatz von Killerdrohnen: "President George W. Bush signed a secret 'Memorandum of Notification" giving the CIA carte blanche to hunt down and kill high-value Targets in the al-Qaeda leadership. Bush also approved a list of about two dozen people whom the CIA was authorized to kill or capture without further presidential Review and allowed the Addition of names to that list with no permission necessary. On the day he signed the document, Bush spoke with Reporters at the Pentaton saying: 'I want justice, and there's an old poster out West, as I recall, saying WANTED, DEAD OR ALIVE'. Reporting on the presidential 'kill list', the New York Times noted: ' Despite the authority given to the agency, Mr. Bush has not waived the executive order banning assassinations, officials said. The presidential authority to kill terrorists defines operatives of Al Qaeda as enemy combatants and thus legitimate targets for lethal force". | |||
Die erste Killer-Drohne wurde am 1. Oktober 2001 in Afghanistan eingesetzt; sie galt einem Toyoto Corolla, in dem man den Taliban-Führer Mullah Omar vermutete. Sie traf letztlich ein anderes Fahrzeug. November 2001: die erste Tötung eines "hochwertigen" Ziels, Mohammed Atef, Schwiegersohn von Osama Bin Laden, gemeinsam mit sieben weiteren Personen, in Jalalabad, Afghanistan. Am 3.11.2002: Drohnentötung von Salim Sinan al-Harithi, einem Al-Quaida-Führer im Jemen. "It was the first assassination by drone in a country with which the United States was not at war (unlike the Afghan hits). In the more innocent days this was cause for shock to many People, including Asma Jahandir, the UN Special rapporteur on extrajudial, summary, or arbitrary executions, who thought the development 'truly disturbing'". Tatsächlich hat sie in ihrem Report vom 13.01.2003 als "clear case of extrajudicial killing" bezeichnet. | |||
2004: Scheich Yassin. | |||
September 2011: "Hassprediger" Anwar al Awlaki "killed by a CIA drone" im Yemen. | |||
Early one morning in September 2011, Abdulrahman set out from our home in Sana by himself. He went to look for his father, whom he hadn’t seen for years. He left a note for his mother explaining that he missed his father and wanted to find him, and asking her to forgive him for leaving without permission. | |||
A couple of days after Abdulrahman left, we were relieved to receive word that he was safe and with cousins in southern Yemen, where our family is from. Days later, his father was targeted and killed by American drones in a northern province, hundreds of miles away. After Anwar died, Abdulrahman called us and said he was going to return home. | |||
That was the last time I heard his voice. He was killed just two weeks after his father. | |||
A country that believes it does not even need to answer for killing its own is not the America I once knew. From 1966 to 1977, I fulfilled a childhood dream and studied in the United States as a Fulbright scholar, earning my doctorate and then working as a researcher and assistant professor at universities in New Mexico, Nebraska and Minnesota. | |||
I have fond memories of those years. When I first came to the United States as a student, my host family took me camping by the ocean and on road trips to places like Yosemite, Disneyland and New York — and it was wonderful. | |||
After returning to Yemen, I used my American education and skills to help my country, serving as Yemen’s minister of agriculture and fisheries and establishing one of the country’s leading institutions of higher learning, Ibb University. Abdulrahman used to tell me he wanted to follow in my footsteps and go back to America to study. I can’t bear to think of those conversations now. | |||
After Anwar was put on the government’s list, but before he was killed, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for Constitutional Rights represented me in a lawsuit challenging the government’s claim that it could kill anyone it deemed an enemy of the state. | |||
The court dismissed the case, saying that I did not have standing to sue on my son’s behalf and that the government’s targeted killing program was outside the court’s jurisdiction anyway. | |||
After the deaths of Abdulrahman and Anwar, I filed another lawsuit, seeking answers and accountability. The government has argued once again that its targeted killing program is beyond the reach of the courts. I find it hard to believe that this can be legal in a constitutional democracy based on a system of checks and balances. | |||
The government has killed a 16-year-old American boy. Shouldn’t it at least have to explain why? | |||
"Over fifteen days in the summer of 2013 the United States hit Yemen with nine strikes, killing as many as forty-nine people, including up to seven civilians, three of whom were children." Clearly in 2013 "things had come a very long way since George Bush had begun crossing out names in the list he kept in his desk drawér. A well-funded bureaucratic mechanism to service the 'Disposition matrix' as the kill list had been euphemistically relabeled, was centred at the national Counterterrorism Center, whose 500-strong staff was charged with, among other things, collating the various lists crafted by the CIA and JSOC and others. (As noted, the president liked to have the very last word. 'Turns out I'm really good at killing People,' he remarked the day Awlaki dies. "Didn't know that was gonna be a strong suit of mine'.) | |||
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===Entstehung=== | ===Entstehung=== | ||
Der Einsatz von Scharfschützen, um einzelne Feinde gezielt zu töten, ist sehr viel älter als der sicherheitspolitische Begriff der "gezielten Tötung". Der Begriff der gezielten Tötung hängt zusammen mit der Tatsache, dass die israelische Armee (IDF) als Reaktion auf die sog. zweite Intifada im Jahre 2000 begann, Scharfschützen für diese nunmehr systematisch angewandte Anti-Terror-Taktik auszubilden und einzusetzen. Für ihre Politik, Personen, die ganz oben auf der Fahndungsliste stehen, zu liquidieren statt zu verhaften, hatte sich die israelische Regierung ausdrücklich "auch auf den Kampf gegen den Terror berufen, wie ihn der amerikanische Präsident Bush vorantreibe. Mit dieser Einordnung reagierte Ministerpräsident | Der Einsatz von Scharfschützen, um einzelne Feinde gezielt zu töten, ist sehr viel älter als der sicherheitspolitische Begriff der "gezielten Tötung". Der Begriff der gezielten Tötung hängt zusammen mit der Tatsache, dass die israelische Armee (IDF) als Reaktion auf die sog. zweite Intifada im Jahre 2000 begann, Scharfschützen für diese nunmehr systematisch angewandte Anti-Terror-Taktik auszubilden und einzusetzen. Für ihre Politik, Personen, die ganz oben auf der Fahndungsliste stehen, zu liquidieren statt zu verhaften, hatte sich die israelische Regierung ausdrücklich "auch auf den Kampf gegen den Terror berufen, wie ihn der amerikanische Präsident Bush vorantreibe. Mit dieser Einordnung reagierte Ministerpräsident Scharon auf internationale Vorbehalte gegen die Ermordung des islamistischen Terroristen Muhanad al Taher, der am Sonntag im Schusswechsel mit israelischen Soldaten vor seinem Fluchthaus in Nablus getötet worden war" (FAZ 02.07.2002: 6.). | ||
===Abgrenzung zur Hinrichtung=== | ===Abgrenzung zur Hinrichtung=== | ||
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Diese Vorgehensweise bringt es mit sich, dass nicht nur die Zielperson getötet wird, sondern häufig auch weitere Personen in Mitleidenschaft gezogen werden. | Diese Vorgehensweise bringt es mit sich, dass nicht nur die Zielperson getötet wird, sondern häufig auch weitere Personen in Mitleidenschaft gezogen werden. | ||
Hinrichtungen werden gegenüber "gewöhnlichen" und gegenüber "politischen" Tätern durchgeführt, gezielte Tötungen hingegen gelten als Mittel gegen | Hinrichtungen werden gegenüber "gewöhnlichen" und gegenüber "politischen" Tätern durchgeführt, gezielte Tötungen hingegen gelten als Mittel gegen gefährliche politische Gegner. | ||
==Erscheinungsformen und Häufigkeit== | ==Erscheinungsformen und Häufigkeit== | ||
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== Weblinks und Literatur == | == Weblinks und Literatur == | ||
*[http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/18/opinion/the-drone-that-killed-my-grandson.html?_r=0 Al-Awlaki, Nasser (2013) The Drone that Killed My Grandson, NYT] | |||
*[http://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article106405037/Barack-Obama-der-Herrscher-ueber-die-Todesliste.html Becker, Jo & Scott Shane (2012) Barack Obama, der Herrscher über die Todesliste. Die Welt 02.06.)] | *[http://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article106405037/Barack-Obama-der-Herrscher-ueber-die-Todesliste.html Becker, Jo & Scott Shane (2012) Barack Obama, der Herrscher über die Todesliste. Die Welt 02.06.)] | ||
*[http://www.ejiltalk.org/on-preventive-killing/ Bhuta, Nehal (2015) On Preventive Killing, in: EJIL: Talk!] | *[http://www.ejiltalk.org/on-preventive-killing/ Bhuta, Nehal (2015) On Preventive Killing, in: EJIL: Talk!, 17.09.] | ||
::If we wait for threats to fully materialize, we will have waited too long. We must take the battle to the enemy, disrupt his plans and confront the worst threats before they emerge. In the world we have entered, the only path to safety is the path to action. And this nation will act. - George W. Bush, 17 September 2002. | |||
:It seems to me that there are two different ways of understanding the targeted killing of UK citizens Reyaad Khan and Ruhul Amin by a Royal Airforce-piloted drone on 21 August 2015, in Raqqa, Syria. (Khan was the target of the strike, and Amin was also killed by it. Both Khan and Amin are described as “ISIL fighters.”)- The first poses some difficult constitutional and public law questions for the UK government, but does not require any kind of radical re-interpretation of international law governing the use of force. | |||
:The second way of understanding the strike amounts to a sea change in the UK’s legal position, and indeed aligns it with several US legal positions in the “war on terror” which, hitherto, no European state has formally embraced. Prime Minister David Cameron’s statement is ambiguous about the exact legal basis of the strike. However, in contrast to the seemingly deliberate admixture of jus ad bellum and jus in bello rationales offered by leading Obama administration officials (Koh 2010 ASIL Speech; Holder 2012 Northwestern University speech), Cameron clearly uses the language of Article 51 of the UN Charter. He refers to the UK’s “inherent right to self-defence” and “clear evidence” that these two individuals were “planning and directing armed attacks against the UK … [which were] part of a series of actual and foiled attempts to attack the UK and our allies.” Finally, Cameron contends that the strike was authorized because “there was no alternative.” | |||
:Let me first turn to a way of understanding this strike which does not raise exceptionally controversial legal issues (although nothing seems very settled these days!). As Dapo points out in his post of 11 September, from an international law standpoint, the UK is already in a non-international armed conflict with ISIL, as part of a collective self-defence action on behalf of the Government of Iraq. To the extent that this conflict spills over into Syrian territory and Syria has effectively lost all control over some parts of its territory governed by ISIL (and Raqqa would meet that test), it seems to me that one does not need any additional ad bellum justification, specific to the UK, to attack ISIL fighters in their Syrian stronghold. | |||
:On the collective self-defence theory, what matters is not whether these individuals pose a specific threat to the UK, but simply whether ISIL members directly participating in hostilities can be directly targeted on Syrian territory, because Syria is unable to prevent ISIL from launching armed attacks on Iraq from its territory. (While the “unable or unwilling” test remains very controversial, few states appear to have contested the specific extension of strikes against ISIL in Syria (and indeed, Syria has not protested vigorously either)). On this argument, the two UK citizens killed exercised a continuous combat function rendering them targetable in the on-going armed conflict between the coalition of states assisting Iraq and ISIL, which has been extended to Syrian territory on the grounds that Syria cannot any longer control that territory and prevent ISIL attacks. The point is that the UK does not have to bear that particular argumentative burden alone. In its letter to the Security Council explaining its use of force, the UK in fact relies on both the claim of individual self-defence and the claim of collective self-defence on behalf of Iraq. | |||
:Cameron’s language concerning the UK’s inherent right to self-defence, and the necessity and proportionality of this specific strike, could perhaps be best understood as intended to overcome the serious UK domestic constitutional law problem that the Parliament voted to authorize UK participation in strikes against ISIS only in Iraq, and not in Syria. During the debate on that vote, on 26 September 2014, the Prime Minister sought to reserve to the government a discretion to strike within Syrian national territory “if there were a critical British national interest at stake or there were a need to act to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe”. In those circumstances, “you could act immediately and explain to the House of Commons afterwards. I am being very frank about this because I do not want to mislead anybody.” (Hansard, 26 September 2014, column 1265). Thus, Cameron’s elaboration now of a self-defence argument seems tailored to satisfying the House of Commons and the British public that he was acting properly within the discretion reserved to the executive to act in response to an urgent threat emanating from Syrian territory, even if this action exceeded the authorization granted by the Parliament in its vote of 26 September. | |||
:Whatever his political calculations, the legal argument implied by Cameron’s justification for the targeted killing of a UK citizen and the ancillary killing of another, takes us down a much more controversial route: it aligns the legal position of the UK closely with a subset of legal arguments made by the Obama administration (continuing in important respects a posture adopted by the George W. Bush administration). Let us parse a little further the wording of Cameron’s statement: | |||
:Both Junaid Hussein [killed in a US airstrike on 24 August] and Reyaad Khan were British nationals based in Syria who were involved in actively recruiting ISIL sympathizers and seeking to orchestrate specific and barbaric attacks against the West, including directing a number of planned terrorist attacks right here in Britain, such as plots to attack high profile public commemorations, including those taking place this summer. … There was clear evidence of the individuals in question planning and directing armed attacks against the UK. These were part of a series of actual and foiled attempts to attack the UK and our allies. … Mr. Speaker, our intelligence agencies identified the direct threat to the UK from this individual. They informed me and other senior ministers of this threat … [W]e agreed that should the right opportunity arise, then the military should take action. | |||
:This statement seems crucially ambiguous on whether the individual was targeted because he was currently directing an armed attack in the process of being executed, or whether, because he had consistently planned (foiled) attacks in the past (“including those taking place this summer”), he constituted by his profile and record of activity an on-going threat to the UK. Similarly ambiguous is whether what was “disrupted” by the strike was another developing attack, or more simply, the individual’s life and thus any future opportunity to plan an attack. Finally, as seemingly implied by the phrase “should the right opportunity arise,” it appears that the RAF were pursuing the target for some time before finding the right window to strike. It is also reported that other UK citizens have been placed on a “kill list,” including Mohammed Emzawi, the alleged “Jihadi John” responsible for decapitating ISIL hostages in several Islamic State propaganda videos. | |||
:It does not require an intellectual historian to trace the lineages of this legal rationale. It bears a close resemblance to the arguments advanced by former Foreign Office Legal Advisor Sir Daniel Bethlehem in his 2012 note in the American Journal of International Law. Bethlehem himself maintained that his Note was an attempt to synthesize and clearly formulate principles which were to be derived from counter-terrorist practice of governments, ‘largely away from the public gaze.’ It is not clear which and how many governments are engaged in practices conforming to such principles, and in his Note Bethlehem draws on public statements only from the US and the UK. But the lineaments of Cameron’s rationale would appear to conform to some of Bethlehem’s formulations, and also certain key arguments made by the Obama administration in its justification for the targeted killing of US citizen Anwar al-Awlaki (the so-called Department of Justice White Paper) | |||
:'''The first concerns the extended concept of “armed attack,”''' to include a series of planned terrorist attacks, imminent or actual, which cumulatively are deemed to amount to an armed attack (imminent or actual) giving rise to a right to armed action in self-defense against those “actively planning, threatening, or perpetrating armed attacks” (AJIL Note, 775). Bethlehem points out that some support has gathered for the so-called pin-prick theory of armed attack, in the context of state’s cross-border use of force against non-state armed groups (referring in particular to Christian Tams’ important EJIL article from 2009). | |||
:As Wilmhurst and Wood (AJIL 107:393-4) observed in response to Bethlehem’s note, the pin-prick theory remains controversial. But the framing of a series of planned terrorist attacks – far removed in this case from any territorially proximate armed conflict with a non-state armed group on the borders of the state claiming self-defence – is an extended version even of the pin-prick theory and goes beyond the concrete type of situation in respect of which it was invoked. As is well-known, the pin-prick theory had its origins in attempts by the US, Israel, Portugal and South Africa to justify what might otherwise have been a disproportionate use of force against national liberation movements or armed guerilla fighters operating across an adjoining international border (the US invoked this argument in respect of its claim to be engaged in collective self-defence on behalf of South Vietnam). To divorce the pin-prick theory from any dimension of territorial proximity and delimitation, seems to me to radicalize it in a way that dissolves any distinction between a domestic criminal act of terrorism (such the July 7, 2005 bombings in London or the 11 March, 2004 bombings in London) and a contribution to a casus belli under the jus ad bellum. Distinguishing between these two categories would become, then, a question of closely held intelligence about actual, planned, or perhaps even inchoately hoped-for attacks, making a state’s claims difficult if not impossible to objectively evaluate and verify. | :As Wilmhurst and Wood (AJIL 107:393-4) observed in response to Bethlehem’s note, the pin-prick theory remains controversial. But the framing of a series of planned terrorist attacks – far removed in this case from any territorially proximate armed conflict with a non-state armed group on the borders of the state claiming self-defence – is an extended version even of the pin-prick theory and goes beyond the concrete type of situation in respect of which it was invoked. As is well-known, the pin-prick theory had its origins in attempts by the US, Israel, Portugal and South Africa to justify what might otherwise have been a disproportionate use of force against national liberation movements or armed guerilla fighters operating across an adjoining international border (the US invoked this argument in respect of its claim to be engaged in collective self-defence on behalf of South Vietnam). To divorce the pin-prick theory from any dimension of territorial proximity and delimitation, seems to me to radicalize it in a way that dissolves any distinction between a domestic criminal act of terrorism (such the July 7, 2005 bombings in London or the 11 March, 2004 bombings in London) and a contribution to a casus belli under the jus ad bellum. Distinguishing between these two categories would become, then, a question of closely held intelligence about actual, planned, or perhaps even inchoately hoped-for attacks, making a state’s claims difficult if not impossible to objectively evaluate and verify. | ||
:The second debt to the Bethlehem principles (Principle 8) and the DOJ White Paper evident in the Prime Minister’s statement is an extended concept of imminence. The necessity of striking Khan is explained as the “only feasible means of effectively disrupting the attacks planned and directed by this individual.” Self-evidently, killing Khan was not the only way of disrupting his planned attacks because British security services are also stated to have foiled more than one attack on the UK or its allies. So the concept of imminence here is not in the sense of “interception” of an unfolding plot. Rather, the Prime Minister’s language intimates that killing Khan was necessary because it was the only way to stop him trying again. As such, evaluating the “imminence” of the threat posed by Khan would appear to be in the nature of a probabilistic risk assessment of his (high) propensity to plan and direct another terrorist attack in the UK; by virtue of his pattern of activity, his very continued life constituted an imminent risk. Also included in this extended concept of imminence is whether other opportunities to kill the target will present themselves, should he not be targeted now. The language of the DOJ White Paper is perhaps more explicit about this than the Bethlehem principles, but in my view they boil down to the same position: | :The second debt to the Bethlehem principles (Principle 8) and the DOJ White Paper evident in the Prime Minister’s statement is an '''extended concept of imminence'''. The necessity of striking Khan is explained as the “only feasible means of effectively disrupting the attacks planned and directed by this individual.” Self-evidently, killing Khan was not the only way of disrupting his planned attacks because British security services are also stated to have foiled more than one attack on the UK or its allies. So the concept of imminence here is not in the sense of “interception” of an unfolding plot. Rather, the Prime Minister’s language intimates that killing Khan was necessary because it was the only way to stop him trying again. As such, evaluating the “imminence” of the threat posed by Khan would appear to be in the nature of a probabilistic risk assessment of his (high) propensity to plan and direct another terrorist attack in the UK; by virtue of his pattern of activity, his very continued life constituted an imminent risk. Also included in this extended concept of imminence is whether other opportunities to kill the target will present themselves, should he not be targeted now. The language of the DOJ White Paper is perhaps more explicit about this than the Bethlehem principles, but in my view they boil down to the same position: | ||
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*Cox, Edward L. (2008) The Legality of U.S. Targeted Killings in the War on Terror. aufgerufen am 14.06.08 unter http://blog.left-handedelephant.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/the-legality-of-targeted-killings.pdf | *Cox, Edward L. (2008) The Legality of U.S. Targeted Killings in the War on Terror. aufgerufen am 14.06.08 unter http://blog.left-handedelephant.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/the-legality-of-targeted-killings.pdf | ||
*David, Steven R. (2002) Targeted Killing has its Place. Los Angeles Times, 25.07., S. 13. | *David, Steven R. (2002) Targeted Killing has its Place. Los Angeles Times, 25.07., S. 13. | ||
*[http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/10/how-team-obama-justifies-the-killing-of-a-16-year-old-american/264028/ Friedersdorf, Conor (2012) How Team Obama Justifies the Killing of a 16-Year-Old American. The Atlantic] | |||
*Grayling, A.C. (2007) Among the Dead Cities: Is the Targeting of Civilians in War Ever Justified? Bloomsbury. 5th ed. | *Grayling, A.C. (2007) Among the Dead Cities: Is the Targeting of Civilians in War Ever Justified? Bloomsbury. 5th ed. | ||
*Grossman, David (1995) On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society | *Grossman, David (1995) On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society | ||
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==Filme== | ==Filme== | ||
*Kedar, Nurit (2004) One Shot. (deutscher Titel: Der Todesschuss). Die Regisseurin interviewte mehrere Scharfschützen der israelischen Armee. Der Film berichtet nur aus der Sicht der Scharfschützen, bzw. Heckenschützen, und enthält sich jeglichen Kommentars. Der Film lief am 16.10.04, 10.15 Uhr und am 17.10.04, 22.15 Uhr auf dem deutschen TV-Sender PHOENIX und wurde auf der Cologne Conference im Juni 2004 mit dem PHOENIX-Preis als bester Film der TopTen Nonfiction ausgezeichnet. | *Kedar, Nurit (2004) One Shot. (deutscher Titel: Der Todesschuss). Die Regisseurin interviewte mehrere Scharfschützen der israelischen Armee. Der Film berichtet nur aus der Sicht der Scharfschützen, bzw. Heckenschützen, und enthält sich jeglichen Kommentars. Der Film lief am 16.10.04, 10.15 Uhr und am 17.10.04, 22.15 Uhr auf dem deutschen TV-Sender PHOENIX und wurde auf der Cologne Conference im Juni 2004 mit dem PHOENIX-Preis als bester Film der TopTen Nonfiction ausgezeichnet. | ||
== Siehe auch == | |||
*[[Disposition Matrix]] | |||