Pros and Cons - Debbie Newman, Ben Woolgar 2014

Non-UN-sanctioned military intervention
Section C. International relations

As a formal matter of international law, military actions not in self-defence must be approved by the United Nations, or they are illegal. This debate proposes changing that position in order to encourage humanitarian interventions. It is worth noting that as sanctions for breaches of those rules are minimal, this debate takes place on the basis that actual sanctions for breach will be rare, although the International Criminal Court (ICC) has now agreed to prosecute the crime of aggression, so that may change in the future. Iraq will obviously loom large in this debate, but there are numerous other examples that are relevant.

Pros

[1] The UN is not the global moral arbiter that it claims to be; the fact is that the UN Security Council is an accident of history, and its permanent members frequently abuse human rights and go to war illegally themselves. It is nothing but the rankest hypocrisy for them to seek to control who may go to war, and on what grounds.

[2] The requirement of UN approval often needlessly delays much-needed intervention in these countries, which in turn costs lives. The UN’s inaction over Rwanda in 1994 left French troops on the ground, powerless to act. Allowing unilateral intervention speeds this up by allowing states to act as soon as they have the relevant logistical capability; this saves lives.

[3] It is wrong to think that the need for the UN’s approval should override the strong moral and cultural links that particular countries have with other regions of the world. For instance, former colonial powers regularly intervene in their former colonies, because they know them well and have strong ties; this leads to effective interventions, as with Britain in Sierra Leone or France in the Ivory Coast.

[4] The UN does not need to authorise an intervention to have some oversight of it. This is the distinction between ius ad bellum (the law of whether going to war is just) and ius in bello (law during war). Abuse can still be prosecuted at the International Criminal Court.

Cons

[1] The UN is imperfect, and the UNSC is in need of reform. But the UN is, as it were, the best moral arbiter available to us. It represents the collective will of the world and an important check on powerful nations. Iraq, an unjust war, is what results when states ignore the UN.

[2] If America had intervened in Libya without the need for Russia not to veto, it would have launched a disastrous ground campaign, rather than its careful, surgical air strikes. The requirement for negotiation and consensus makes interventions better than if they are hot-headedly launched by a single constituency.

[3] The legacy of colonialism is one that should be expunged, not promoted. States intervening in their former colonies are just as likely to provoke resentment and bad memories as to be welcomed. The world should instead strive for a sense of communal responsibility for atrocities and declining spheres of influence.

[4] The UN is not just an arbiter of the law of going to war, but also law in war. In order to effectively prevent war crimes and crimes against humanity, the UN must control the manner of these interventions. One of the reasons that the Iraq war was so brutal was the lack of rules of engagement established by the UN.

Possible motions

This House believes that humanitarian interventions should not require UN approval.

This House would go to war without the UN.

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