Preventive War and the Lessons of History

Authors

  • Jules Lobel

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5195/lawreview.2006.85

Abstract

In September 2002, as the Bush administration was gearing up for a showdown with Iraq, the White House released its National Security Strategy, which announced a radical shift in American military policy. The United States had previously adhered doctrinally, if not always in practice, to the international rule that a nation may unilaterally launch a military attack against another nation only in strict self-defense, that is, in response to an armed attack or an imminent threat of an armed attack.Any other use of military force requires approval of the United Nations (“U.N.”) Security Council, which must first find that a “threat to the peace, breach of peace, or act of aggression” exists, and then must authorize the use of force to remove that threat. The 2002 National Security Strategy maintained that the threat of catastrophic attacks with weapons of mass destruction by rogue states and/or terrorists demands a new, preemptive approach. The new doctrine insisted that unilateral recourse to war is justified not only to forestall imminent attacks, but to preempt non-imminent threats where the threats are large enough. The United States led invasion of Iraq was widely viewed as the first test of this preemptive war doctrine.

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Published

2006-04-26

How to Cite

Lobel, Jules. 2006. “Preventive War and the Lessons of History”. University of Pittsburgh Law Review 68 (2). https://doi.org/10.5195/lawreview.2006.85.

Issue

Vol. 68 No. 2 (2006)

Section

Articles

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