The Use of Force in International Law

A Case-Based Approach

Edited by Tom Ruys, Olivier Corten, and Alexandra Hofer

Provides coverage of a range of international incidents, from well-known military interventions to lesser known targeted strikes and hostage rescue operations
Develops our understanding of state practice by evaluating what the parties to a conflict believed the law to be at the time of the conflict
Surveys key methodological approaches to the area
Expertly written chapters allow the reader to compare and contrast major conflicts of recent history

The Use of Force in International Law

A Case-Based Approach

Edited by Tom Ruys, Olivier Corten, and Alexandra Hofer

Description

The international law on the use of force is one of the oldest branches of international law. It is an area twinned with the emergence of international law as a concept in itself, and which sees law and politics collide.
The number of armed conflicts is equal only to the number of methodological approaches used to describe them.

Many violent encounters are well known. The Kosovo Crisis in 1999 and the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 spring easily to the minds of most scholars and academics, and gain extensive coverage in this text. Other conflicts, including the Belgian operation in Stanleyville, and the Ethiopian Intervention in Somalia, are often overlooked to our peril. Ruys and Corten's expert-written text compares over sixty different instances of the use of cross border force since the adoption of the UN Charter in 1945, from all out warfare to hostile encounters between individual units, targeted killings, and hostage rescue operations, to ask a complex question. How much authority does the power of precedent really have in the law of the use of force?

The Use of Force in International Law

A Case-Based Approach

Edited by Tom Ruys, Olivier Corten, and Alexandra Hofer

1:Introduction, Tom Ruys, Olivier Corten, and Alexandra Hofer
2:The Caroline Incident - 1837, Michael Wood
1 - The Cold War Era (1945-1989)
3:The Korean War - 1950-1953, Nigel White
4:The Suez Canal Crisis - 1956, Alexandra Hofer
5:The Soviet Intervention in Hungary - 1956, Eliav Lieblich
6:The U-2 incident - 1960, Ki-Gab Park
7:The Belgian Intervention in The Congo - 1960 and 1964, Robert Kolb
8:The Indian Intervention in Goa - 1961, Tom Ruys
9:The Cuban Missile Crisis - 1962, Alexander Orakhelashvili
10:The Gulf of Tonkin Incident - 1964, Douglas Guilfoyle
11:The US Intervention in the Dominican Republic - 1965, Christian Walter
12:The Six Day War - 1967, John Quigley
13:The Intervention in Czechoslovakia - 1968, Gerhard Hafner
14:The USS Pueblo Incident - 1968, Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg
15:The Indian Intervention into (East) Pakistan - 1971, Dino Kristiotis
16:The Yom Kippur War - 1973, François Dubuisson and Vaios Koutroulis
17:Turkey's intervention in Cyprus - 1974, Oliver Dörr
18:The Mayaguez Incident - 1975, Natalino Ronzitti
19:The Entebbe Raid - 1976, Claus Kreß and Benjamin K. Nußberger
20:The Larnaca Incident - 1978, Constantine Antonopoulos
21:The Vietnamese Intervention in Cambodia - 1978, Gregory H. Fox
22:The Ugandan-Tanzanian War - 1978-1979, Kenneth Chan
23:Operation Litani - 1978, Myra Williamson
24:The Lebanon War - 1982, Myra Williamson
25:The Soviet Intervention in Afghanistan - 1979-1980, Georg Nolte and Janina Barkholdt
26:The US Hostage Rescue Operation in Iran - 1980, Mathias Forteau and Alison See Ying Xiu
27:The Iran-Iraq War - 1980-1988, Andrea de Guttry
28:Israel's Air Strike Against Iraq's Osiraq Nuclear Reactor - 1981, Tom Ruys
29:The US Intervention in Nicaragua - 1981-1988, Jörg Kammerhofer
30:The Falklands/Malvinas War - 1982, Etienne Henry
31:South African Incursions into Lesotho - 1982, Theresa Reinold
32:The US Intervention in Grenada - 1983, Nabil Hajjami
33:The Israeli Raid Against the PLO Headquarters in Tunis - 1985, Erin Pobjie, Fanny Declercq, and Raphaël Van Steenberghe
34:The Killing of Khalil al-Wazir by Israeli Commandos in Tunis - 1988, Erin Pobjie, Fanny Declercq, and Raphaël Van Steenberghe
35:The US Strikes Against Libya - 1986, Maurice Kamto
36:The US Intervention in Panama - 1989, Nicholas Tsagourias
2 - The Post-Cold War Era (1990-2000)
37:The ECOWAS Intervention in Liberia - 1990-1997, Ugo Villani
38:The Gulf War - 1990-1991, Erika de Wet
39:Intervention in Iraq's Kurdish region and the Creation of the No-Fly Zones in Northern and Southern Iraq - 1991-2003, Tarcisio Gazzini
40:The Intervention in Somalia, Terry D. Gill and Kinga Tibori-Szabó
41:The Intervention in Bosnia and Herzegovina - 1992-1995, Pierre Klein
42:The US Air Strike Against the Iraqi Intelligence Headquarters - 1993, Paulina Starski
43:The ECOWAS Intervention in Sierra Leone - 1997-1999, Susan Breau
44:The US Strikes in Sudan and Afghanistan - 1998, Enzo Cannizzaro and Aurora Rasi
45:The Eritrean-Ethiopian War - 1998-2000, Sean D. Murphy
46:The Great African War and the Intervention by Uganda and Rwanda in the Democratic Republic of Congo - 1998-2003, James A. Green
47:The Kosovo crisis - 1999, Daniel Franchini and Antonios Tzanakopoulos
3 - The Post 9/11-Era (2001-)
48:The Intervention in Afghanistan - 2001-, Michael Byers
49:The Iraq War - 2003, Marc Weller
50:Israeli Air Strikes in Syria - 2003 and 2007, Lindsay Moir
51:The Israeli Intervention in Lebanon - 2006, Christian J. Tams and Wenke Brückner
52:The Turkish Intervention Against the PKK in Northern Iraq - 2007-2008, Kimberley N. Trapp
53:'Operation Phoenix' - the Colombian Raid Against the FARC in Ecuador - 2008, Mónica Pinto and Marcos Kotlik
54:The Conflict in Georgia - 2008, Christine Gray
55:Israeli Military Operations Against Gaza: Operation Cast Lead (2008-2009), Operation Pillar of Defense (2012) and Operation Protective Edge (2014), Christian Henderson
56:The NATO Intervention in Libya - 2011, Ashley Deeks
57:US Extra-Territorial Actions against Individuals: Bin Laden, Al Awlaki, and Abu Khattalah, David Kretzmer
58:The Intervention in Côte d'Ivoire - 2011, Dire Tladi
59:The Intervention of the Gulf Cooperation Council in Bahrain - 2011, Agatha Verdebout
60:The Ethiopian Military Intervention in Somalia - 2011, Jean-Christophe Martin
61:The Intervention of France and African Countries in Mali 2013, Karine Bannelier and Théodore Christakis
62:Threats of and Actual Military Strikes against Syria - 2013 and 2017, Anne Lagerwall
63:The Crisis in Ukraine - 2014, Mary Ellen O'Connell
64:The Military Operations against the 'Islamic State' (ISIL or Da'esh) - 2014, Olivier Corten
65: The Saudi-Led Military Intervention in Yemen's Civil War - 2015, Luca Ferro and Tom Ruys
66:The ECOWAS Intervention in the Gambia - 2016, Mohamed S. Helal

The Use of Force in International Law

A Case-Based Approach

Edited by Tom Ruys, Olivier Corten, and Alexandra Hofer

Author Information

Edited by Tom Ruys, Professor of Law, University of Ghent, Olivier Corten, Professor of Law, Université Libre de Bruxelles, and Alexandra Hofer, Doctoral Researcher, University of Ghent

Olivier Corten teaches public international law at the Université Libre de Bruxelles, and is co-director of the Revue Belge de Droit International. He is the author or co-author of ten books and of more than one hundred and fifty articles.

Tom Ruys studied Law and International Relations at the Universities of Ghent, Nottingham, and Leuven. He joined the faculty of law at the University of Ghent as a tenure-track professor within the department of public international law. Tom Ruys is the author of several publications and has been awarded the Lieber Prize by the American Society of International Law. He is a member of the International Law Association's Committee on the Use of Force, Co-Editor-In-Chief of the Journal of the Use of Force and International Law, and a member of the editorial board of the Revue Belge de Droit International.

Assistant editor Alexandra Hofer is a Doctoral Researcher in the Faculty of Law, in the Department of European, Public and International Law at the University of Ghent.

Contributors:

Constantine Antonopoulos
Karine Bannelier
Janina Barkholdt
Susan Breau
Wenke Brückner
Michael Byers
Enzo Cannizzaro
Kenneth Chan
Théodore Christakis
Olivier Corten
Fanny Declercq
Ashley Deeks
Oliver Dörr
François Dubuisson
Luca Ferro
Mathias Forteau
Gregory H. Fox
Daniel Franchini
Tarcisio Gazzini
Terry D. Gill
Christine Gray
James A. Green
Douglas Guilfoyle
Andrea de Guttry
Gerhard Hafner
Nabil Hajjami
Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg
Mohamed S. Helal
Christian Henderson
Etienne Henry
Alexandra Hofer
Jörg Kammerhofer
Maurice Kamto
Pierre Klein
Robert Kolb
Marcos Kotlik
Vaios Koutroulis
Claus Kreß
David Kretzmer
Dino Kristiotis
Jean-Christophe Martin
Lindsay Moir
Sean D. Murphy
Anne Lagerwall
Eliav Lieblich
Georg Nolte
Benjamin K. Nußberger
Mary Ellen O'Connell
Alexander Orakhelashvili
Ki-Gab Park
Mónica Pinto
Erin Pobjie
John Quigley
Aurora Rasi
Theresa Reinold
Natalino Ronzitti
Tom Ruys
Alison See Ying Xiu
Paulina Starski
Raphaël Van Steenberghe
Christian J. Tams
Kinga Tibori-Szabó
Dire Tladi
Kimberley N. Trapp
Nicholas Tsagourias
Antonios Tzanakopoulos
Agatha Verdebout
Ugo Villani
Christian Walter
Marc Weller
Erika de Wet
Nigel White
Myra Williamson
Sir Michael Wood

The Use of Force in International Law

A Case-Based Approach

Edited by Tom Ruys, Olivier Corten, and Alexandra Hofer

Reviews and Awards

"a rich resource for students and practitioners of the law on the use of force and is likely to remain the standard reference text for examples of "state practice" in this area of law for years to come." - Victor Kattan, Chinese Journal of International Law

The Use of Force in International Law

A Case-Based Approach

Edited by Tom Ruys, Olivier Corten, and Alexandra Hofer

From Our Blog

International law regarding use of force

Through the power of precedent, international incidents involving the use of force help to clarify the meaning and interpretation of jus ad bellum, the corpus of rules arising from international custom and the United Nations Charter that govern the use of force. UN Charter Article 2(4) forbids states from using force in their international relations. Exceptions to this prohibition are acts taken in self-defence under UN Charter Article 51 or under the auspices of a UN Security Council authorization to use force under Article 42. States can also consent that another state use force in its territory, for example to combat rebel or terrorist actors. In certain cases, state practice gives rise to new interpretations of existing rules or novel exceptions emerge.

Posted on November 19, 2018

Read the blog post