Soleimani Killing Faces Legal Questions, But Consequences Are Unlikely
Iranian General Qasem Soleimani headed the Quds Force, a division of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Force, until his death (Source)
Discord between Iran and the United States is nothing unusual, but the conflict reached a new intensity after a U.S. drone strike killed Iranian General Qasem Soleimani in Baghdad. The event sent shockwaves throughout the world and started a heated debate both domestically and internationally. Depending on who is asked, the killing was either the region’s most extraordinary event in years or something completely routine.
On one hand, Soleimani was a government official from a foreign country in a time of peace, and widely recognized as one of the most powerful men in Iran. Many consider his death tantamount to an act of war. However, as leader of the Quds Force, a branch of the Iranian military focused on unconventional warfare, Soleimani was far from an ordinary foreign official. During his long tenure, he worked with proxies including Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Assad regime in Syria, and various militias in Iraq which violated human rights and fought against the US and its allies. The U.S. government considered him a terrorist for years, and drone strikes by the United States in the Middle East are a common affair.
Assassination is illegal under international law, and the U.S. government forbade itself from taking part in assassinations through a series of executive orders in the 1970s and 1980s. Since the start of the War on Terror, however, successive U.S. administrations have come up with workarounds to justify strikes against “terrorist” leaders. The most common explanation is self-defense: the subjects of the strikes were imminent threats to U.S. security, so there was no choice but to immediately kill them.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo invoked this justification soon after Soleimani’s killing, saying that the Iranian general was planning an “imminent attack” which would have endangered Americans. However, he has offered no verifiable evidence for this claim. Instead, observers have noted inconsistencies in the administration’s story. Notably, Pompeo seemed to contradict his earlier statements about the imminence of the threat when he said in an interview that “we don't know precisely when and we don't know precisely where” the supposed attacks planned by Soleimani would have taken place. While various other explanations have been offered to justify the strike – such as the blind necessity of disrupting Iranian foreign policy – they have very little legal backing.
Even if Soleimani’s killing was an illegal assassination, however, the next obvious question would be “so what?” Holding the U.S. accountable for any supposed crimes in international law would be extremely difficult, and punishing the president for alleged domestic wrongdoings would rely on sufficient political will in Congress. Within the U.S., debate over the legality of the strike has been muted. This may be due to the view, as stated by former Bush administration official Karl Rove, that the technical justification for Soleimani’s killing does not matter because he was “evil.” In other words, as long as it is deemed morally right in Washington, and pitched to the American people as such, whether it was legal should not be a concern.
This episode reflects a long-standing debate in U.S. foreign policy. In the minds of many policymakers, the framework of international law is too weak to ensure global stability, making it necessary for the U.S. to take unilateral action. Supporters of the strike on Soleimani compare it to the killing of Osama bin Laden — an action that also faced questions of legality, but, they argue, it was nonetheless a net positive for the world. The countering view, most common from leftist and libertarian perspectives, is concerned about the lack of checks, balances, or clear limits in current policy. The U.S. government, they argue, cannot be trusted with the unilateral power to decide who lives and dies throughout the world.
The latter argument occasionally finds its supporters, but the former seems to have prevailed in the debate over Soleimani’s killing. This can be seen even in statements by many of President Trump’s opponents, including Democratic leaders like Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer or presidential candidates like Senator Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg. They have condemned the attack on strategic grounds, arguing that it invites Iranian retaliation and could escalate into a full-out war, but have also made sure to avoid the appearance of sympathizing with a U.S. adversary like Soleimani. This means that they are unlikely to engage in a political fight over the legality of the move. Instead, the leading attitude has been to say what is done is done. While experts will continue to argue over the technicalities of Soleimani’s killing, most others are content to leave it be and question how to deal with the consequences.