Assassinations in International Relations - Essay Example

Assassinations in International Relations The of assassinations is a political issue, which has been very recently in the limelight when the American commando operation coded SEAL got successful in assassinating the extremist leader of al-Qaida, Osama-bin-Laden, hiding in Pakistan. The Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi was also a target, as intentions of the U.S. Senator Lindsay Graham gave a clear-cut indication of the approaching time to “to cut the head of the snake off, go to Tripoli, start bombing Qaddafis inner circle, their compounds, their military headquarters." Senator Joe Lieberman also expressed the same intentions for "going directly after Qaddafi," while stating that "I cant think of anything that would protect the civilian population of Libya more than [his] removal." These aggressive initiatives to kill the enemies of humanity in stead of waging a long war seem to be the popular agenda of the so-called democratic powers in the context of international relations. Such acts by the powerful countries need to be discussed on the parameters of the three theories of international relations, namely realism, liberalism, and constructivism (Wait 2011, par. 1). The theory of realism is based on assumptions. There are two competing branches of realism based on the assumptions about the behavior of the state, one is the neorealist theory of Kenneth Waltz and another is postclassical realism, which is not similar to Waltz neorealist theory. The impact of the theory of realism crosses the threshold to enter the non-realist theories such as liberalism, another political theory based on the positive human values such as right to freedom, favoring democratic rights. So far an exchange between the two theories has not been fruitful because the neorealist theory stresses with sureness that such an interaction would be a useless exercise. Constructivist theory was an attempt to find new means away from the theories of realism and liberalism. A constructivist sees the international relations as “an interactive process in which the ideas and communications among agents serve to create “structures”. These structures, in turn, influence the ideas and communications of the agents.” (Rourke 2007, 30). Seeing the height of extremism in political spheres at global scale, supporters of assassinations find nothing wrong morally to indulge in cutting the head of the dragon itself as there is no other option left using military force on the large scale by waging a prolonged war with no end result in sight. War affects the innocent; the actual culprits cannot be nabbed. The “ethical disconnect,” pervades as stated by Ralph Peters by not making a direct attack on dictators like Saddam Hussein committing atrocities on innocent people; it is devoid of ethical logic. Nonetheless, the norm against assassinations of such scale and kind have been there, which, off late, have been broken by the major super power, the U.S. Actually, this norm has been residing in ethical injunctions of basic moral principles in global politics getting strength from the design of international system (Thomas 2000, 106-7). Discussing the reality aspect of the norm as a concession, Thomas (2000, 123-24) states that states were against the norm to assassinate a foreign leader as it was not worth the effort. Assassination was observed as inefficient tool of foreign policy because of doubt over the success of the assassination, as leaders’ security was unassailable. Another reason of going against the norm of assassinations was not getting the desired outcomes of serving the purpose. Thomas findings on norms and practices related to international assassinations indicate how the assassination norms have shifted greatly over time. According to Thomas, it was a quite common foreign policy tool in old times, but a number of changing material factors and evolving normative principles started strong norm against the killing of foreign leaders because preference was given to fight of the armies on the battle ground and also because war was fought by states, not their leaders, reinforcing the political authenticity of the state, thus, imbibing the culture of not killing the leaders of each other country (Wait 2011, par. 3). With the changing time, the norm not to assassinate the leader is getting eroded for different reasons. One reason has been the huge level of destruction caused by war, compelling states to search other options. Second reason of indulging in assassinations is that extremist outfits randomly make targets on heads of states having enmity with. So, it is the natural and spontaneous reaction of the states to counter it through assassination of the terrorist leaders. Third reason against the norm to assassinate is the assumed moral responsibility of the heads of states to stand accountable for the acts against humanity committed at their command. The establishment of the International Criminal Court is just another proof of changing ethical context for not protecting national leaders found ethically on the wrong side and punish them through assassinations (Wait 2011, par. 4). Another aspect of assassinations in international relations comes face-to-face with the problem of sovereignty and humanitarian interventions. As per the UN Charter, all acts of intervention need to be taken permission by the Security Council. Such a decision of intervening on humanitarian grounds has the support of the masses and other stakeholders including international activists, media support, and political viewpoints of Security Council members. Globally, interventions have not always been for the humanitarian cause as hidden beneath the humanitarian cause could be a political aim. British intervention during the decline of the Ottoman Empire was never objected because of saving the Christian minorities in Muslim Lands but Britain’s intervention in Sudan for targeting the practice of slave trade and responding to the death of General Charles Gordon was not a totally humanistic cause as Britain acted because it was in its political interest. In the 1920s and the 1930s Adolf Hitler intervened to conquer Sudetenland (hrea.org 2011, par. 1-2). The concept of humanitarian intervention has changed after the Cold War ended. Internal conflicts within a state pose a danger to the humanitarian cause and such violations to human rights are taken as a "threat to international security and peace," compelling the use of economic sanctions or force as per the situation. The conventional legal rules of non-intervention no more are applicable, according to Mario Bettati, Professor of International Public Law at the University of Paris, and the French politician Bernard Kouchner. Human rights have been given preference like democracy and rule of law. From the responsibility to protect emerges the notion that it is the task of sovereign states to secure their people from avoidable crisis. If a sovereign state is not capable of or lacks the spirit to save its citizens, then it is the moral responsibility of wider community of states to act through humanitarian interventions (hrea.org 2011, par. 7-8). Regarding the application of ethical principles, amoralist perspectives can not be durable in international relations. Morally a state and its people have a right to defend themselves when a war is waged. Ethical principles have to be considered on how they can be used to statecraft (Perry 2006, par. 2). There is need to differentiate state provoked terrorism from other crimes. Neil Livingstone, a specialist on terrorism and low-intensity conflict, favors assassinations of the terrorists and justifies it if they are "state-sanctioned terminations" because as it is not a crime to kill the opponents in a war, in the same way it should not be counted a crime or morally condemnable act to fulfill the responsibility of safeguarding the citizens from attack by the terrorists and go out of way to enter the boundaries of another state and finish them who are acclaimed offenders of committing mass murders and inflicting injuries to innocent people by operating from a foreign land (Perry 2006, par. 4). Livingstone justifies assassination "only when the potential target cannot be brought to justice in a more conventional manner." His reservation is quite significant one, in part because assassination by definition happens outside the process of law in determining the crime or ingenuousness of the "accused" as well as in using a suitable punishment if and when the crime is proved. On the other hand, the assassin performs all functions by himself, including prosecutor, judge, jury, and executioner; the target is prevented from the freedom to fight out his case in a court of law with the help of a counsel. These relevancies indicate that assassination should be the only option left. Other writers have supported the assassination of foreign government leaders in distinct conditions only (Perry 2006, par. 5). America has accomplished many such assassination missions successfully like killing of extremists and other al-Qaeda ranks who attacked the USS Cole in 2000 and killed 17sailors and later insurgent members of al-Qaeda in Iraq. The success of these missions did not deter some such nations in coming to defensive mode on charges of assassination. Such targeting reduces the risk of conventional conflicts and minimizes the possible attack by targets on mixed populations, making assassinations worthy of attempt. Although it is a “smart” weapon but after committed creates revulsion. It is morally detestable norm to quote M. Spaight in 1911, “the most imperative military necessity, could not justify…assassination” (Gross 2010, 100-1). Right to sovereignty does not belong to tyrants. Therefore, any assassination attempt at them becomes legal, making their right to sovereignty inviolable but a treacherous assassination under the international law and ethical considerations of tyrannicide need to be banned. The treaties, conventions and principles governing assassinations have impressed upon the norm of tyrannicide. The Hague Conventions cover such unlawful and treacherous assassinations (1907: Article 23b). The Geneva Conventions IV (1977: Articles 35 and 37) also include such a ban on assassinations (1977: Articles 35 and 37). Sir Thomas Moore also differentiated between treacherous and non-treacherous assassination while upholding right behavior in warfare. This normative change is rooted in the ban on assassination in the modern international law. The irony is that the same scholars now support killing of the tyrant (Brincat 2009, 80). The change in norm can be understood from the remarks of the former United Nations Secretary-General Annan that ‘[international action to uphold human rights requires a new understanding of state and individual sovereignty’ (quoted in Mandel 2004: 110)) denoting a normative shift toward a greater security of the individual within the state. As it is, there should be no opposing between domestic law of the state and the position of international human rights law, thus paving the way to condemn tyranny. All would agree that tyrants like Hitler and Pol Pot should have been assassinated to save the save nations and people from their wrath. In such a context, tyrannicide could be allowed as right and legal mean to get rid of tyrants (Brincat 2009, 86). In this context any UN intervention needs to be justified, for example if we take the case of UN intervention in Chicago, a city with a high homicide rate, can it be justified that the peace keeping force be deployed, which has become synonymous with the controversies wherever it is sent. As per Article 1 of the UN Charter, it is the responsibility of the UN to secure peace in all states through collaborative measures but the case in Chicago it does not warrant any intervention by the UN forces. It depends on what types of atrocities are being committed by those who are tyrants. The scene in Chicago warrants the role of the state law and order machinery. The use of UN forces here would be waste of resources. Further, Chicago being the largest city in Illinois seems to be a state matter. Although peace keeping is no more a simple function of the UN, as it used to be before the Cold War; it has become “multi-dimensional” or “multifunctional,” the brutal and horrifying wars as going on in cities like Chicago come in the category of intrastate wars, not interstate wars. Such intrastate wars are caused due to deteriorating economies, as in Chicago the persisting high homicide rate is due to chronic gang war problem and budget cut backs that have reduced the strength of patrolling police officers. If the UN forces are called to maintain law and order -- the internal issue howsoever grave, it would downgrade the important role played by the UN in securing peace in more serious and needy countries such as Cambodia where the parties have agreed to stop fighting or in Bosnia where no such compromise between the warring parties seemed possible. There the UN forces have a constructive role to play for humanitarian considerations not in an American city Chicago, how much strife torn it may be due to economic, religious or ethnic causes. Although the blue helmets of the UN forces may reach anywhere without such a request made by a country but under the UN doctrine of “humanitarian intervention” they should reach to save the people dying from starvation from war and where human rights are blatantly attacked, not in Chicago, where it should be the best alternative to let the local administration with the state and federal government help manage the increasing homicide rate, an internal intrastate matter (Moore 1995, 23). The current situation in Libya and the killing of Bin Laden are two diverse situations where the outside force, the U.S. has taken the cudgel to attack the state-sponsored terrorist leader and ruler himself who is Colonel Qaddafi. The current situation in Libya in the perspective of international relations demanded humanitarian intervention on the part of the UN to save the people over there from the state-sponsored atrocities but it is claimed that NATO’s mission took the lives of the family members of the Libyan leader, his son and three grand children although attempt to assassinate Qaddafi did not succeed. The US denied any such attempt on the life of the leader of another country, as it is against the international law but then what was the purpose of the attack, if not assassinate Qaddafi, as he was in the building which was the target of the attack. Killing of Bin Laden could be justified because the worldwide massacres of innocent people were planned by that head of the extremist organization al-Qaeda, and he was being politically and militarily supported and provided shelter by Pakistan. Once again, such assassinations have brought the question of targeted killings in the lime light. Killing of Bin Laden has not provoked any anti-American propaganda in the internal relations; America had been hunting after him for a long time. Such planned attempts at the lives of people like Bin Laden who was an enemy of humanity help in creating a positive environment for killing for a noble cause. Works Cited Brincat, Shannon K (2009): Death to Tyrants: Self-Defense, Human Rights and Tyrannicide– Part II, Journal of International Political Theory, Vol. 5, No.1, pp. 75–93 Gross, Michael L (2010): Torture, Assassination, and Blackmail in an Age of Asymmetric Conflict, Moral dilemmas of modern war. Hrea.org (2011): Crimes of War - Educators Guide: Humanitarian intervention. Retrieved from Moore, Mile (1995): Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Educational Foundation for Nuclear Science, Inc. Vol. 51, No. 2, pp. 22-23. Perry, Dr. David L (May 27, 2006): "Repugnant Philosophy": Ethics, Espionage, and Covert Action(1). Retrieved from Rourke, John T (2007): Chapter 1 Thinking and Caring about World Politics, International Politics on the World Stage, Mc Graw Hill. Thomas, Ward (2000): "Norms and Security: The Case of International Assassination," , International Security, Vol. 25, No. 1, pp. 105-133. Walt, Stephen M (2011): Taking Qaddafi out (and not for dinner). Retrieved from http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/04/25/taking_qaddafi_out_and_not_for_dinner. Read More