Srdja Trifkovic (some Serb who obviously has some bones to pick) makes a cogent critique of humanitarian interventionism:
“[H]umanitarian intervention” is a pernicious concept which…undermines the concept of collective security and…undermines international law as a system of commonly respected norms that are binding upon all states. Its arbitrary nature is evident in the failure of its most vocal practitioners to invoke it when the violator is too powerful (e.g. North Korea subjecting its people to famine and terror), or too insignificant (various African despots, in Sudan, Congo, etc.), or considered a partner…Far from being “moral,” humanitarian intervention is inherently a tool of situational morality.
“[H]umanitarian intervention” is a pernicious concept which…undermines the concept of collective security and…undermines international law as a system of commonly respected norms that are binding upon all states. Its arbitrary nature is evident in the failure of its most vocal practitioners to invoke it when the violator is too powerful (e.g. North Korea subjecting its people to famine and terror), or too insignificant (various African despots, in Sudan, Congo, etc.), or considered a partner…Far from being “moral,” humanitarian intervention is inherently a tool of situational morality.
