Laurie Blank

• Juris Doctor
• Professor at Emory University

The most prevalent hostilities in the last several decades have not been between states, but between states and organized armed non-state groups. These asymmetrical hostilities often do not resemble conventional armed conflicts, but may consist of hostile engagements of varying intensity, duration, and frequency. Forcible state responses to them ne...

This chapter explores the consequences for effective discourse about the Law of Armed Conflict (LOAC) compliance of new technologies that intentionally or effectively mask the effects of an attack, the location or identify of the attackers, or even the very existence of an attack during armed conflict. The emergence of new weapons technologies that...

Once the domain of a few spacefaring nations, outer space has exploded with new actors, state and private, in recent years. New actors and activities bring new potential threats and concerns for new and existing actors alike. In this complex environment, where mistrust and misunderstanding often prevail, international law can play an important role...

The United States Department of Defense Law of War Manual - edited by Michael A. Newton January 2019

Cambridge Core - International Relations and International Organisations - The United States Department of Defense Law of War Manual - edited by Michael A. Newton

Underlying ongoing and intensive efforts to understand how the law of armed conflict (LOAC) does, could, and should apply to the use of new technologies is an equally comprehensive effort to understand precisely what these new weapons are and how they work. Many new technologies introduce unique questions for human understanding, often driven and e...

Just war theory focuses primarily on bodily harm, such as killing, maiming, and torture, while other harms are often largely overlooked. At the same time, contemporary international conflicts increasingly involve the use of unarmed tactics, employing 'softer' alternatives or supplements to kinetic power that have not been sufficiently addressed by...

An examination of the growing literature on the topic of the geography of armed conflict suggests that the differences of opinion, between and among academics, policymakers and military lawyers, for example, are nearly intractable. Statements about the propriety of a certain target under the law of armed conflict are often met by pronouncements reg...

This book addresses maritime piracy by focusing on the unique and fascinating issues arising in the course of domestic piracy prosecutions, from the pursuit and apprehension of pirates to their trial and imprisonment. It examines novel matters not addressed in other published works, such as the challenges in preserving and presenting evidence in pi...

Law school clinics focused on international humanitarian law (IHL) enable students to participate directly in the development and application of IHL through concrete “real world” work - from training to research and fact-finding, litigation to high-level advocacy, and many spaces in between. These opportunities do far more than just contribute to t...

An examination of the growing literature on the topic of the geography of armed conflict suggests that the differences of opinion, between and among academics, policymakers and military lawyers, for example, are nearly intractable. Statements about the propriety of a certain target under the law of armed conflict are often met by pronouncements reg...

The recent proliferation of external investigations into military operations raises important questions for the conduct of military operations and the interpretation and implementation of international law. The impact of such investigations and their reports, however, extends beyond how they influence the military and the implementation of the law...

The law of armed conflict provides the authority to use lethal force as a first resort against identified enemy belligerent operatives. There is virtually no disagreement with the rule that once an enemy belligerent becomes hors de combat — what a soldier would recognizes as “combat ineffective” — this authority to employ deadly force terminates. R...

This essay explores an interesting opportunity for the president in the foreign policy arena: the role of educator on international law and its central principles, for both the president and his surrogates in the executive branch. In the current environment in which the United States is engaged in extensive, wide-ranging, and challenging military o...

This Essay, written as a response to Professor Jennifer Daskal's thought-provoking article on the geography of the battlefield, addresses the debate over the geographical parameters of armed conflict through a focus on the operational consequences of efforts to draw geographical lines setting the parameters of conflict.The question of geographical...

Within the realm of law applicable to and governing cyber activity, a host of legal regimes are relevant, including, most notably, domestic criminal law, national security law, and international law. The nature of today’s globalized and interconnected world combined with the extensive reliance on technology, computer systems and internet connectivi...

This chapter provides an introduction to the two main bodies of law governing the use of force: jus ad bellum, which governs when states can use force; and jus in bello (or the law of armed conflict), which governs the conduct of hostilities and the protection of persons during armed conflict.

Since the advent of the 1949 Geneva Conventions, the international community has steadily expanded and reinforced the application of the law of armed conflict to these situations to regulate state and opposition conduct during such conflicts for the clear and imperative purpose of protecting the victims of these hostilities. Today, it is simply axi...

The U.S. drone program has sparked extensive and intense public commentary – academic, policy-oriented, and media – regarding targeted killing of terrorist operatives using armed drones. However, such attacks are only a small portion of how drones are used and how they can be used. Drones are used extensively for intelligence, surveillance and reco...

On November 4, 2011, the International Humanitarian Law Clinic at Emory Law School convened a group of military operational law experts with extraordinary breadth and depth of experience in applying and enforcing IHL. The meeting was convened to analyze the broader legal issues in and implications of the recent judgment of the International Crimina...

Modern conflicts and stability operations pose complex challenges for both military and civilian actors tasked with promoting the rule of law during conflict and stability operations. Military operations can occur both during armed conflict and in situations that do not qualify as armed conflict, such as disaster relief or humanitarian intervention...

The nature of recent conflicts and the “civilianization” of the battlefield has led many to question the effectiveness of distinction going forward, in essence challenging the very foundations of the law of armed conflict. But is distinction truly on the defensive, or do we simply need to rethink how we approach this most fundamental protective pri...

Policymakers have used the rhetoric of “war” throughout the past century to describe a major governmental or societal effort to combat an evil that threatens society, national security or other communal good. It is both a rhetorical tool and a resource mobilization, and above all a coalescing of authority to meet the challenge, whether poverty, dru...

This collection of scholarly works from both academia and uniformed service personnel provides PME institutions, the operating forces, and civilian academics a resource of thought-provoking material on the challenging ethical and legal considerations facing Marine leaders and encourage discussion of these issues in an open forum. The project stems...

The claim that a just cause erases any wrongs committed in war is an old story, just like the opposite claim that an unjust cause renders all acts unlawful. International law has traditionally reinforced a strict separation between jus ad bellum – the law governing the resort to force – and jus in bello – the law governing the conduct of hostilitie...

This article focuses specifically on the appropriateness of indefinite detention under the laws of war that the Obama Administration is establishing for certain detainees currently at Guantanamo, and possibly others in the future. In particular, this article argues that the indefinite detention regime ongoing and proposed for the future diverges in...

Targeted strikes – predominantly using drones – have become the operational counterterrorism tool of choice for the United States over the past few years. Targeted killing can be used both within armed conflict and in the absence of armed conflict, as a means of self-defense, usually as operational counterterrorism. Indeed, this duality lies at the...

Detention at Guantanamo, targeting of individuals with drones, use of civilians to warn the targets of military operations, use of military commissions – courts in the United States and abroad have grappled with these and other questions extensively over the past decade and more. These issues, and others that arise in the course of armed conflict a...

Operation Cast Lead, the Israeli military operation in Gaza that began on December 27, 2008, demonstrated anew the challenges international humanitarian law faces in contemporary conflict. The Goldstone Report presented an opportunity to examine critically how the law applies in complicated modern warfare and how the law might be used to solve diff...

The nature of today’s conflicts has led many practitioners and scholars to suggest that the traditional battlefield – once populated by tank battles and infantry – has been replaced by a more complex environment – sometimes called the zone of combat. When many argue that the United States in engaged in a global war against Al Qaeda and other terror...

Civilian deaths in Gaza often seem to produce immediate conclusions regarding Israeli war crimes and other violations of international law. We often now see similar statements in the aftermath of U.S. or allied attacks leading to civilian deaths in Afghanistan. The increasing use of law as a tool of war - a practice termed “lawfare” - offers a like...

U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan in 2010 follow two consecutive years of dramatically increased drone activity within Pakistan. Despite a high degree of interest in the United States’ use of drones in Pakistan, little attention has been focused on whether the U.S. is engaged in an armed conflict in Pakistan, as defined and categorized by internationa...

Gone are the days of soldiers facing off across large battlefields, tanks shelling tanks, and fighter jets engaging in dogfights. Armed conflict now takes place everywhere--in cities, refugee camps, and other historically nonmilitary areas--and involves or impacts nearly everyone in the area. The law of armed conflict (LOAC)--codified in times of m...

Current strategy in Afghanistan starkly illustrates the extraordinary challenges new warfare poses for commanders on the ground. U.S. forces fight the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, but must do so while above all protecting Afghan civilians from both enemy attacks and the effects of U.S. counterinsurgency operations – a difficult and complica...

We continue to see an urgent need for ways to prevent abuses by military personnel during armed conflict. The Geneva Conventions obligate every country to provide training to military personnel in the laws of war - laws designed to protect combatants, prisoners and civilians alike. But many countries lack the knowledge or the resources to provide l...

International financial institutions are increasingly involved in conflict situations and countries in which violations of international humanitarian law are widespread and devastating to the civilian population and the countries’ economic prospects. Many argue that structural and political concerns pose obstacles to the development of a role for I...

International humanitarian law distinguishes between international armed conflict and internal, or non-international, armed conflict and sets forth the rules and obligations of parties to each type of conflict. Throughout history, states have recognized that different rules apply to their behavior in internal conflicts than to actions in internatio...

In the four years since the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990, the United Nations has imposed sanctions on target states seven times, in contrast to only three uses of sanctions in the previous 71 years by the United Nations and the League of Nations. Sanctions are penalties for violations of norms of international law, penalties intended to induce...

This Article addresses the identification of military objectives in a variety of non-international armed conflict contexts, including conflicts with terrorist groups operating transnationally and conflicts with non-state actors located outside the state’s borders. In particular, the nature of non-international armed conflict can alter how the basic...