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Discusses difference of opinion between the US and other permanent members of the UN Security Council as to whether SC resolution 1154 (1998) authorizes use of armed force against Iraq to compel it to allow access by UN weapons inspectors to sites where biological or chemical weapons might be stored.

This article explores the controversial interpretations of UN resolutions with respect to the use of unilateral military force in Iraq for enforcement of binding resolutions. Dispute broke out over the interpretation of "severest consequences" as military action, without specific authorization by the Security Council. The non-use of force is a UN Charter principle as well as customary law, although justification of force exists in self-defense or in cases where the UN authorizes force in the breach of peace. Binding resolutions generate legal obligations & cannot be enforced by a third state at its own initiative, & the situation Iraq is more a question of disarmament & arms control than self-defense. Although the US seems to believe that even resolutions prior to that of 1154 justified threats of military action, authorization by the Security Council remains the only legal avenue. In spite of the dangers of Iraq's conduct, unilateral action is not capable of resolving the issues & may be counterproductive. Additionally, such arbitrary interpretations of Security Council resolutions in the pursuit of political interests set a dangerous precedent for other Council members. L. Kehl

The answer of the Attorney-General Lord Goldsmith to a question in the House of Lords and a paper produced by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office explaining the United Kingdom's position on the legal basis for the use of force against Iraq are reproduced immediately below (from the 'Latest News' section, 18 March 2003, of the Foreign & Commonwealth Office website, www.fco.gov.uk). Contextual documentation and comment will be provided in the next Current Developments: Public International Law section in January 2004.

Only days into their operational tour in the US sector of Iraq, four soldiers & an interpreter of the British infantry regiment, the Black Watch, were killed in several well planned attacks. Grim news, but there are reasons why this particular mission may attract more than its share of hostile attention. Military experts have understated the significance of the disparity between American & British approaches to counter insurgency in Iraq & also failed to anticipate the unfortunate ramifications for the troops on the ground of recent media attention at home. Adapted from the source document.

IN AN EFFORT TO ENFORCE CONDITIONS IMPOSED AFTER THE GULF WAR, U.S.-LED COALITION FORCES BOMBED IRAQI AIR DEFENSE MISSILE, RADAR, AND COMMUNICATION SITES AND NUCLEAR-RELATED FACILITIES IN JANUARY 1993. U.S. PLANES ALSO ATTACKED INDIVIDUAL AIR DEFENSE SITES IN THE NORTHERN AIR EXCLUSION, OR NO FLY ZONE. SADDAM HUSSEIN FORCED THE CONFRONTATIONS WITH ALLIED FORCES IN WHAT MANY EXPERTS VIEW AS A CHALLENGE TO INCOMING PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON AND A FINAL SNUB TO OUTGOING PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH.

Tensions are rising to new levels in the Middle East. Iran responded to Israel's assassination of Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah by launching 180 missiles into Israel. And more recently, Israel's bombing and subsequent invasion of Lebanon has plunged the region further into a wider ranging conflict that began with Hamas' Oct. 7 attack on Israel and Israel's subsequent invasion of Gaza.
Before these recent escalations, the United States had announced in September a plan to gradually withdraw American troops from Iraq. This plan reportedly would start with the removal of hundreds of troops by September 2025, with an unspecified number staying in the country, primarily in the northern Kurdish region of Erbil until at least 2026.
An administration official recently conditioned the report, saying "to be clear, the United States is not withdrawing from Iraq." According to the official, the relationship between Iraq and the United States will supposedly move "towards the type of productive long-term security relationship that the United States has with partners around the world."
Given the recent escalations between the so-called "Axis of Resistance" and Israel, combined with President Biden's order to send more troops to the Middle East, some experts question whether the U.S. will withdraw American forces in Iraq on the specified timetable. "I will believe our troops in Iraq are coming out when I see it," said Defense Priorities senior fellow Danny Davis. "This painfully slow withdrawal schedule is suspect, because it gives so much opportunity to the administration to 'delay' it later. These troops are nothing but a strategic vulnerability for our country and should be fully withdrawn, in three months, not two years."
Davis adds that U.S. troops remain vulnerable for longer than necessary with the two year timetable.
This vulnerability is especially important to consider right now, as Tyler Kotesky, policy director at Concerned Veterans for America points out. "The risks of a regional war in the Middle East are acute," he told RS. "The United States has more important priorities elsewhere and should be reducing, not increasing its military footprint in the region." "Keeping our troops deployed now only gives Iranian proxies more ability to target them than otherwise," Kotesky adds.
Indeed, American forces in Iraq and Syria are thin, fairly spread out, and exposed.
"As the conflict between Israel and Iran escalates, the U.S. currently has thousands of troops spread across dozens of isolated and exposed bases in Iraq and Syria that can be easily attacked by Iranian-proxies seeking to punish the U.S. for its support of Israel," says public policy advisor at Defense Priorities, Dan Caldwell. "It would appear that the only reason some policy makers want U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria to remain in place is to serve as a tripwire for a larger conflict with Iran."
Despite warnings from some experts, others are more optimistic that the United States may be forced to follow through with its proposal. Michael DiMino, public policy manager at Defense Priorities, said that because risks of keeping forces in Iraq and Syria are high, he does believe that the Iraq withdrawal plan will likely go forward.
"While these deployments increase the exposure for the U.S. to more violence, I actually don't think they will get in the way of the agreement," he said. "Washington cannot overcome the stark reality that our presence in Iraq is fundamentally no longer tenable, which is why — begrudgingly — the Biden administration acceded to a deal in the first place."
DiMino added, "The Iran-aligned PMF and Shia militias which now run Iraq — as a direct result of 20 years of schizophrenic U.S. foreign policy — will simply not allow American troops to remain beyond 2026."
While experts differ on just how much the current escalations in the Middle East may affect troop drawdown plans, it is clear that American soldiers in Iraq and Syria serve no cogent strategic purpose, as the Quincy Institute's Middle East deputy director Adam Weinstein notes, "The real risk is that U.S. troops become targets in an escalatory retaliation cycle."

Hard cases make notoriously bad law, and they also make a bad basis for asserting that there is no law. Ihe US-led war against Iraq, and disagreements about it in the UN Security Council, do not mean that the twentieth-century attempts to subject the use of force to the rule of law have collapsed. In the Iraq crisis, the US and UK asserted a strong legal basis for their resort to force, namely, existing Security Council resolutions. More generally, both within the Security Council and beyond, a wide variety of grounds for intervention in states has been recognised in international practice. However, attempts to develop doctrines of pre-emption and humanitarian intervention have not commanded broad support, since most states still value the non-intervention norm. Disagreements between states on the legitimacy of certain uses of force remain serious and need to be addressed. (Survival / SWP)

What impact will the Iraq war of 2003 have on international law governing the use of force and on the future of the United Nations Security Council? Some commentators have proclaimed that the military intervention led by the United States amounted to the "death" of the UN Charter and the end of "the grand attempt to subject the use of force to the rule of law." The Security Council's failure to reach agreement—in die face of French-U.S. antagonisms—spells the end, they argue, of an effective Council role in addressing major threats to peace and security. My own view is that it is premature to pronounce the "death" of the UN Charter or to give up on future prospects for Security Council agreement on the use of force. We are, nevertheless, at a difficult and precarious transitional moment in the international legal system governing the use of force, and the stark tensions reflected in the differences over Iraq are symptomatic of hard problems that may persist for the foreseeable future. Both the rules and the system need refining and reform. Success in doing so will require imagination and much greater willingness by policy makers to consider law's potential role, not as a barrier to necessary action, but as a means to enhance global security in the face of emerging threats. In seeking such reform, it will be important to build upon the realism of the Charter's founders, who combined rules governing the use of force with a clear commitment to credible enforcement action in response to threats to peace and security.