Many interventions have been undertaken since WWII for familiar reasons such as regime change. They have almost invariably been judged as breaches of the UN Charter prohibition of the interstate use of force and the claimed justifications of self-defence and protection of nationals have been rejected. Examples are the cases of the US interventions in the Dominican Republic (1965), Grenada and Panama (1989) and the Russian interventions in Georgia (2008) and Ukraine (2014 and 2022-). Even Viet Nam’s intervention in Kampuchea (1978) removing the blood-stained Pol Pot regime was judged critically by the UN General Assembly. In 1999, Prime Minister Tony Blair said in a speech that even though the principle of non-interference should not be jettisoned too readily, he queried whether it should not be qualified through ‘a new framework’ to permit action to remove ‘evil’ dictators like Saddam Hussein or Slobodan Milosevic. However, the massive bombings of Kosovo in 1999 undertaken without Security Council approval and claimed to have been for humanitarian reasons have remained controversial and have not been seen as a legal precedent.

Introduction

The 21st century has witnessed economic, political, and normative transformations as a result of protracted economic crises, technological developments used to overcome these crises, shifts in global value chains, and the consequent shifts in power distribution among great powers and leading regions. The relations between the US and China are among the most contentious dynamics in the contemporary world. With the so-called “rise of China” as a result of China’s successful economic reform since the late 1970s, which has turned China into the second largest economy of the world following the US only, scholars and diplomats alike are wondering how the relations between the two powers in our world today will evolve. Many recent developments, such as the revival of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue between the US, Japan, Australia, and India since 2017, the Sino-US “trade war” since 2018, and the US-led “diplomatic boycott” of China’s Winter Olympics in 2022, seem to reveal the emergence of the Sino-US rivalry and the increase of the tension between the two in our international system. In this context of growing Sino-US conflicts, it is both academically and practically important to study their relations in one of the most strategically important regions in our world, the Middle East, which is producing one third of the oil for the whole world.

The Middle East is composed of multiple subregions with distinct political and socioeconomic backgrounds. However, the positions of these subregions in relation to regional and global powers are interconnected, forming the regional relations of the Middle East. Intriguingly, despite the huge strategic importance of the region, the tension between the US and China over the Middle Eastern issues has not been very high. While the US has been actively taking actions to intervene in regional affairs to protect and promote its interests in the region, China has been adopting a hands-off approach toward the region (that is, a less assertive and non-interventionist policy toward the Middle Eastern countries). Many studies that examine China’s responses to such issues as the US invasion of Iraq, the Israeli–Palestinian relations, and the US policy toward Iran even reveal that China has intentionally avoided being too assertive in the Middle East in order to prevent conflict with the US (Lai 2007; Wehrey et al 2010; Chen 2012; Ehteshami et al 2018; Conduit and Akbarzadeh 2019).

This chapter offers an analysis of the challenges for governments and the private sector in cybersecurity governance from a systemic perspective. It first identifies the challenges that the liberal international order, characterised by political liberalism, economic openness, and international cooperation, has faced in the area of cybersecurity governance. It also observes that there have so far been no successful global efforts to harmonise rules or create a unified regime. This chapter then emphasises how the private sector’s essential role as innovators possessing technological expertise is unique to cybergovernance and explains how the interplay of different actors, both public and private, has practical meaning for states and actors.

Peace between states is commonly the result of mutual interests in cooperation and lack of incentives to use force. However, there are also disincentives to the use of force, and several will be discussed in following chapters. This chapter gives an overview and points to the foreseeable losses of lives and resources as the most widely recognized disincentive. Where a potential adversary has strong military force, there is a disincentive to initiate the use of force. When both sides have nuclear weapons, we speak of a mutual deterrence and the risk of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD). Today, the mutual economic dependence of states (MED) may also make ruptures of relations so painful as to be a disincentive to the use of force. Past failures of the use of force should – but do not always – create disincentives. Legal norms, notably the UN Charter, prohibiting the use of force constitute disincentives, but the effectiveness is hard to verify. The same may be said of public opinion.

The interstate use of force aiming at the acquisition of territory has been shown to have been rare after WWII. Interventions – actions without that aim but relying on open or shrouded or subversive use force – have remained common. Are they all illegal under Art. 2:4? Concrete cases are examined of interventions undertaken in circumstances not foreseen at the adoption of the Charter. They show an unwillingness in the UN to find force aimed at decolonization illegal. Contrived justifications for interventions undertaken in pursuit of the Cold War rejected, while understanding is shown for interventions using force in response to terrorism. Attacks – including interventions – that are imminent are deemed to justify use of force in self-defence, but attacks not seen as imminent do not. In line with this thinking, the use of force to destroy a nuclear research reactor that could have produced plutonium for future nuclear weapons was condemned by the Security Council in 1981. Attacks made with similar intentions – by cyber means and by assassinations – have nevertheless been undertaken.

This and Chapter 3 seek to give an idea of the scope of the current use of interstate use of force. Chapter 2 offers brief descriptions of post-WWII conflicts, region-by-region. It covers the paucity of wars in Africa, Europe and the Americas, many conflicts in the Middle East, including Gulf War 1990, Iraq War 2003, Syrian Civil War, and the wars in Yemen and Afghanistan and Iran nuclear deal 2015 (JCPOA), It further describes conflicts in Asia and the Pacific, India/Pakistan conflicts, India/China clashes.

In this chapter, I lay out a theory cataloguing the conditions under which international courts may be expected to issue audacious rulings. This theoretical framework relies on previous literature and insights gathered from interviews with experts in and around the Court. The necessary condition for audacious courts is a wide discretionary space within which they may act without fearing repercussions from states. Yet, such a wide discretionary space is not always given; when it is given, states might still attempt to influence courts through direct or indirect means. Such means include closing down courts’ discretionary space and widespread negative feedback, as well as related threats. International courts, in turn, are compelled to realign their priorities to react to or pre-empt such measures. This is a form of trade-off whereby courts adjust their behaviour to ensure continued access to resources and to preserve their reputation and public image. The chapter also introduces additional factors that increase the likelihood of audacious rulings (i.e., proposed new understandings’ congruence with changing societal needs, legal developments external to the regime, and civil society campaigns).