On Tue, 01 May 2007 17:46:31 GMT, h (Rand
Simberg) wrote:

On 1 May 2007 10:39:34 -0700, in a place far, far away, Allen Thomson
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a
way as to indicate that:

So if a country wanted to claim the right to take what actions it
deemed fit against satellites that flew over its territory it would be
breaking new legal ground (and upsetting a lot of people), but not
violating any existing treaties. Particularly if the satellites in
question were generally recognized as carrying out missions
incompatible with the claimed security interests of the country.

I'm not sure what violating treaties has to do with it. It's not a
violation of a treaty to deliberately sink a ship or shoot down an
aircraft, but it's clearly an act of war.

It's also pretty clearly a good way to get someone killed; even if
the sinking happnes to occur without casualties, it's a pretty clear
indication that you were *willing* to kill people.

Are there any historical examples of a war where casus belli was
claimed on the basis of property damage alone? Traditionally, acts
of war have involved one or more of A: explicit treaty violation,
B: territorial incursion, and/or C: people getting killed, or placed
at serious risk of getting killed. I think it would be precedent-setting
at least to go to war over just the destruction of property situated
outside a nation's geographic border.

Which means anyone not already inclined to go to war, will just deny
the self-proclaimed new precedent. And anybody who *is* inclined to
go to war, will probably find an excuse one way or another.


And yes, now that we have UAVs, we'll probably have to revisit the
question of whether shooting down an aircraft automatically constitutes
an act of war.


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