The Obama "To Make Important Middle East Speech" MEGATHREAD

[Slargos]

 

You should come here more often, Bluebook.

[Viking]

Oh well, good thing Im not a lawyer then.

However, I believe my point still stands, all states are bount by certain parts of "international law", regardless wether they want to or not.

International Law is the law that countries are willing to enforce on others. Basically while binding on paper, it is a mere honor code followed in fear of sanctions.

[OttoVonBismarck]

There is actually often arbitration in international law, although typically in the realm of trade disputes. In many cases of course the disputes go on for more than a decade and little is resolved either way (that's not totally out of line with domestic laws, though--Exxon Valdez was litigated for a long time.)

Some international law can essentially be enforced if one party decides to enforce it. For example if you lose a WTO dispute hearing they can authorize sanctions against your country. The sanctions are much more powerful than a traditional "fine", with a fine you basically have been told "pay this!" If you're fined by the State as a private citizen the consequences of non-payment can lead to imprisonment, garnished wages, liens on real estate, and other methods. With WTO sanctions they essentially just allow a certain amount of tariffs to be levied against the offending country, and because of that method of enforcement there is little the sanctioned country could do to prevent it. If the sanctioned country decides they are willing to pay the price, then it basically just goes on for as long as they want. President Bush enacted the idiotic 2002 Steel Tariffs essentially out of purely political reasons, in an attempt to secure Pennsylvania and other Rust Belt states for the 2004 election. I think that move cost us around $2bn in WTO sanctions and the President basically just shrugged and let it happen, in a case in which he valued his reelection chances at ~$2bn out of our economy.

[CountDeMoney]

Oh well, good thing Im not a lawyer then.

However, I believe my point still stands, all states are bount by certain parts of "international law", regardless wether they want to or not.

Iran is a signing party of the NPT--it's just that you wouldn't know it, since they've been in violation and non-compliant for almost 10 years.  That's the problem.

[Viking]

Israel, Pakistan and India are the three countries that did not sign the NPT and did develop nuclear weapons.

[Razgovory]

North Korea was party to that treaty once.  Also I think South Africa (which no admits to building nuclear weapons).

[Martinus]

There is law enforcement in states but not between states, and that means you can break international law all you want! Awesome!

Exactly, see the word "want" in your sentence? That's precisely the case, and precisely how it tends to go down, too. Sometimes the international response can compel a change in behavior sans military action, but if not, and if the international community is not willing to respond militarily, then it isn't any kind of law that matters. Laws on paper or treaties signed with fancy $500 pens aren't worth a damn if they don't have real force backing them up.

If you want a happy relationship with the international community you shouldn't just ignore treaties you sign, political agreements, standing international arrangements and etc. It's no different than two businesses that enter into a contract, if one business has a reputation for not holding up its end of its contractual obligations people will be less willing to do business with that company. That's regardless of the fact that you can sue another corporation for breach of contract--if I'm a business person I don't want to have to sue people to get them to hold up their end of our agreements and if I have reason to suspect a company is prone to behaving that way I'd just as soon not do business with them at all. So a country that flagrantly ignores international treaties can find it hard to operate on a range of issues.

So I don't think you should want to ignore international law, but if a country does, the only thing that can change the situation is military force. The police are willing to arrest criminals pretty much universally, the international community is not willing to turn international law into that rigorous form legal system.

This is essentially true (except that the military force is the only way of changing someone else's behaviour - that's untrue, sanctions, ostracism etc. can work very well too). It is however in the states' interest to enforce international law simply because it makes the behaviour of everybody more predictable.

Which is why Obama is right to tell Israel that it won't be getting a carte blanche anymore when it chooses to ignore international law.

But other than that, your point about international law is unhelpful. The point discussed was whether Israel was treating the occupied territories in a way that is inconsistent under the existing international law - so a claim that it doesn't matter because noone will enforce this is not really a matter of debate.

[Martinus]

Final annihilation is no longer as likely an option in a world with humanitarian interventions. Lybia is an example of that. Ceasefire lines are easy to agree on the grounds that they are not the final borders.

I think you are underestimating war exhaustion, even in non "final" situations. Most modern societies would give up the fight long before their final annihilation even if it meant losing some square miles of land.

[Zoupa]

Can an Amerikkkan enlighten as to why the US and Israel have such close ties? US jewish voting population? Cold War history between the two?

I don't see what the US gets out of this special relationship.

[Martinus]

Except in a business relationship you can always go to court or to arbitration in case you disagree on something or in case one of the parties fail to meet its side of the agreement. That is not possible in international relations.

That is not always an option. Gentlemen's agreements are not uncommon in business relationships, and even when some provision of a contract is unenforceable, people who do business rarely exploit that. Reputation is often more important than even compliance with law (which is why for example cartels are so popular).

[Slargos]

[Ed Anger]

Can an Amerikkkan enlighten as to why the US and Israel have such close ties? US jewish voting population? Cold War history between the two?

I don't see what the US gets out of this special relationship.

hot jew chicks.

[Razgovory]

Can an Amerikkkan enlighten as to why the US and Israel have such close ties? US jewish voting population? Cold War history between the two?

I don't see what the US gets out of this special relationship.

There is an unwillingness in the US to let an allied country get eaten up by it's aggressive neighbors.  I understand this is a foreign concept in Europe.

[Martinus]

Can an Amerikkkan enlighten as to why the US and Israel have such close ties? US jewish voting population? Cold War history between the two?

I don't see what the US gets out of this special relationship.

There is an unwillingness in the US to let an allied country get eaten up by it's aggressive neighbors.  I understand this is a foreign concept in Europe.

But how this alliance came to be and is sustained exactly is the question. We know there is an alliance between the US and Israel, but the US does not get a lot out of this alliance, and Israel has been consistently a piss-poor ally (getting into trouble, selling secrets to the Chinese and the Russians etc.).

[Viking]

Final annihilation is no longer as likely an option in a world with humanitarian interventions. Lybia is an example of that. Ceasefire lines are easy to agree on the grounds that they are not the final borders.

I think you are underestimating war exhaustion, even in non "final" situations. Most modern societies would give up the fight long before their final annihilation even if it meant losing some square miles of land.

It's more a case of modern societies being unwilling to conduct the final annihilation regardless of the evil of the enemy. Modern societies win wars against non-modern societies.