Maybe for no other reason other than that it was just a lousy article. Of course, on the issue of the ICC, what really matters is the risk of the body being used as a political weapon against American Soldiers. Out of 19 paragraphs, only 3 sentences are dedicated to this issue:
Initial U.S. fears that the court would be politically motivated have proved groundless. The court’s respect for the principle that it can exercise its jurisdiction only when national courts prove unwilling or unable to do so has proved unbending. Attempts to bring British forces in Iraq before the court for alleged crimes have been rejected by the prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo of Argentina.
That definitely got my attention, and it's worth considering. But this issue needs to be explored comprehensively to make an informed decision here, and two supporting facts is hardly weighty analysis. The rest of the article? Fluff about how the everyone else is doing it and whining about how unilateral Bush is. Crap we've heard 1000 times before that isn't all that convincing.
For what it's worth, Cohen has a point about us needing to shake the perception that we don't care about international law, because the development of new international rule sets is going to be vital to winning the GWOT. We need to be leading in that area, not be pariahs. But there is a lot more to international law than just the ICC. Right now, the crucial issue in this realm is the UNSC, and that should be painfully obvious to everyone. It's possible that we can make progress with the ICC, but there are serious practical issues that have to be worked out that can't simply be dismissed as "groundless."
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