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For instance, in 1981 when Israel bombed Iraq's nuclear site at Osirak, if they had waited much longer the site would have been "radioactively hot" and massive innocent civilian casualties would have been incurred from radioactive releases. It is simply not enough anymore to say a country violates the norm by acting in its ultimate, but not imminent, self-defense. We need new standards for a new age.The new realities of unacceptable risk require new — and lower — standards of certainty before defensive action is permitted.
As we develop a jurisprudence of prevention, we increase the chance of justice and rationality being a bigger part of such crisis decisions that our presidents will be facing for the foreseeable future.
Dershowitz's sound, practical scholarship is commendable. But what I find heartening is the political fact that a prominent scholar of the left has finally entered into a constructive conversation about how to manage our inevitably dangerous WMD/terrorist infested future.
If such as Dershowitz and I can find common ground, there should be space there for a multitude. And from that common ground can grow a common plan for a common victory.
I'm in total agreement with Tony Blankley here, and I applaud Professor Dershowitz way of thinking when it comes to deal with the terrorists.