Mr Terence Taylor is a member of the Directing Staff of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) and President and Executive Director oj IISS-US. His main area of work is at the intersection of science technology and international security policy. He is co-director of a project to develop a charter for a code of conduct for life scientists in academic circles and private industry on safe, secure and ethical behaviour. In addition, he is leading a project for the development of concepts and methodologies on risk assessment for high-level policymakers faced with complex emergencies. He is also a member of the Board of Editors of the International Review of the Red Cross.

The article goes back to the early discussions of the morality of city bombing which took place before and during World War II and attempts to analyze both the moral argumentation and its historical context from the 1940s until today. The development of the doctrine of “collateral damage” which recognized that attacking enemy factories was permissible even if it cost the lives and homes of civilians was soon widened beyond its original notion. After the war, the dropping of the atomic bombs became an issue in its own right, to be considered separately from the earlier recourse to conventional bombing — even when conventional bombing achieved equally destructive results. Twin inhibitions have reigned in the issue of what force against civilians was justified: the reluctance of German commentators to seem apologetic for the Third Reich, and the difficulty in the U.S. of seeming to cast any aspersions on those who fought “the good war.”

This article explores the relationship between precision attack and international humanitarian law. It begins by addressing the nature of precision attack, including precision technologies, the combat environment in which it occurs, attacker tactics, and the targeting process. Modern precision attack's greatest impact on international humanitarian law lies in four areas: indiscriminate attack; proportionality; precautions in attack; perfidy and protected status. The author concludes that precision warfare has both positive and negative implications for the interpretation and application of international humanitarian law on the twenty-first-century battlefield.

Momentum is growing around a proposed treaty governing the international transfer of small arms and light weapons. Those promoting the new instrument emphasize the existing obligations of States, under the law of State responsibility, not to aid or assist another State in violating international law. This article explores the extent to which the prohibition of “complicity” is a sufficient basis for requiring States to consider the end-use of the weapons they transfer. It offers suggestions for strengthening the effectiveness of the current draft treaty in a way that places respect for international humanitarian law and human rights at its core.

There is great concern that terrorists could obtain nuclear or radiological weapons and detonate them in a large city. The authors analyse the technical requirements for and obstacles to obtaining such weapons. What difficulties would have to be surmounted? Could these problems be solved by a terrorist organization without direct support from a State possessing nuclear weapons? The authors conclude that nuclear weapons are most likely out of reach for terrorists. However, radiological weapons may well be used by terrorists in the future. The possible consequences of such an attack are discussed.

Nuclear weapons raise fundamental questions which go to the very heart of international humanitarian law and of Red Cross assistance activities. Sixty years after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the author describes the attempts of the International Committee of the Red Cross to deal with these weapons.

At the intersection of new weapon technologies and international humanitarian law, so-called “non-lethal” weapons have become an area of particular interest. This article analyses the relationship between “non-lethal” weapons and international law in the early 21st century by focusing on the most seminal incident to date in the short history of the “non-lethal” weapons debate, the use of an incapacitating chemical to end a terrorist attack on a Moscow theatre in October 2002. This tragic incident has shown that rapid technological change will continue to stress international law on the development and use of weaponry but in ways more politically charged, legally complicated and ethically challenging than the application of international humanitarian law in the past.

The revolution in biology, including advances in genomics, will lead to rapid progress in the treatment of mental illness by advancing the discovery of highly specific ligands that affect specific neurological pathways. The status of brain science and its potential for military application to enhance soldier performance, to develop new weapons and to facilitate interrogation are discussed. If such applications are pursued, they will also expand the options available to torturers, dictators and terrorists. Several generic approaches to containing the malign applications of biology are shown, and it is concluded that success or failure in doing so will be significantly dependent on the active involvement of the scientific and medical communities.

Decree No. 138 on implementing the Law on the use of the red cross and red crescent emblem and other emblems protected under the Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols was adopted on 25 January 2005 and published in the official gazette on 27 January 2005. The Decree regulates the use of the emblem as a protective device by the medical and religious personnel of the armed and police forces and by civilian medical personnel when so authorized by the Ministry for Social Protection. It provides for disciplinary sanctions in cases of misuse of the emblem and requires that measures be taken by the Ministry of National Defence and the Directorate-General of the National Police to spread knowledge of the rules on the use and protection of the red cross emblem and other distinctive signs, and to incorporate those rules into policy and military doctrine.