Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

Da Kine 17, The Contra deal was patently illegal from the beginning. Obama and the Syrian rebels was a decent effort that went wrong. You are both dishonest and disingenuous to say the two cases are equivalent. Though there is some equivalence involved, as the is in most any two of similar such. A more rational and realistic look here.

Legitimacy versus Legality Redux:Arming the Syrian Rebels

Michael N. Schmitt

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d. State Responsibility for the Actions of the Rebel Forces. The United Statesis, of course, responsible for the conduct of its organs with regard to arming therebels.36However, there has been some conjecture regarding U.S. responsibilityfor any international humanitarian law violations that might be committed bythe rebels using arms provided by the United States.According to the International Law Commission’s Articles of State Responsi-bility, “[t]he conduct of a person or group of persons shall be considered an actof a State under international law if the person or group of persons is in factacting on the instructions of, or under the direction or control of, that State incarrying out the conduct.”37This position reflects the ICJ’s finding inNicara-gua.38There, the question was whether the United States bore responsibility foracts contrary to human rights and humanitarian law allegedly committed by thecontras. The Court held that although the United States provided “heavysubsidies and other support” to the contras, “there is no clear evidence of theUnited States having actually exercised such a degree of control in all fields as34. S.C. Res. 2083(1)(b), U.N. Doc. S/RES/2083 (Dec. 17, 2012).35. Bill Roggio,Qatar-funded Syrian rebel brigade backs al Qaeda groups in Syria,THREATMATRIX–ABLOG OF THELONGWARJOURNAL(July 26, 2013), http://www.longwarjournal.org/threat-matrix/archives/2013/07/qatar-funded_syrian_rebel_brig.php.See alsoAnne Barnard & Eric Schmitt,AsForeign Fighters Flood Syria, Fears of a New Extremist Haven, N.Y. TIMES(Aug. 9, 2013), at A1.36. Articles on State Responsibility,supranote 15, Annex, art. 4. The Articles of State Responsibil-ity and the commentary thereon are set forth in THEINTERNATIONALLAWCOMMISSION’SARTICLES ONSTAT ERESPONSIBILITY:INTRODUCTION,TEXT,ANDCOMMENTARIES(James Crawford ed., 2002) [hereinafter AR-TICLES ONSTAT ERESPONSIBILITYCOMMENTARY].37. Articles on State Responsibility,supranote 15, Annex, art. 8.38. Nicaragua,supranote 7, at ¶115. The ICJ held that Article 8 reflects customary international lawin Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Bosn. &Herz. v. Serb. & Montenegro) 2007 I.C.J. 43, ¶398 (Feb. 26).146[Vol. 7:139JOURNAL OFNATIONALSECURITYLAW&POLICY
to justify treating the contras as acting on its behalf.”39In other words, since theUnited States did not exercise “effective control” of the group, it was notresponsible for any unlawful acts of the contras. Applying the same approach tothe Syrian case, the provision of lethal aid to the rebels would not implicateU.S. state responsibility for violations of international humanitarian law byrebel forces, at least absent U.S. control over their activities.II. POSSIBLEINTERNATIONALLAWJUSTIFICATIONS FORU.S. ACTIONS

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