Last week, I attended Professor Ohlin’s talk at the Becker and Rose Café Series.  It was an intense discussion about who is defined as a war criminal, what actions define a war crime, and the current war criminals in the world today.

What I found interesting was the idea of collateral damage.  Killing a target with collateral damage is considered lawful because it always happens.  International law allows collateral damage as long as the number of civilian killed is not disproportioned like blowing up an entire hospital.  The proportion is determined by the importance of the target and the value of the target relative to the lives of many.  This is basically saying “how many citizens are you entitled to kill?”, which is an ethical question that is a grey area in the law.

Another interesting topic is international law that prevents people from hunting down big threats.  For example, many people believe that the President of Syria, Bashar Hafez al-Assad, is a war criminal for attacking his own citizens.  However, international law prevents others from going after Assad as a humanitarian intervention due to international law.  This is also another controversial self-defense law.

I enjoyed listening to Professor Ohlin’s lecture on war crimes and the lively discussion that ensued.  It was certainly thought provoking.