Military objects/objectives

Incapacitants are most suitable for consideration in limited warfare situations, eg, when enemy troops are intermingled with a friendly population, or in a city that is a key military objective. The purpose is to capture the enemy without killing the civiUans. Incapacitating agents should produce no permanent after-effects and allow for complete recovery. 

Attackers with a chemical agent may have more problems than the defenders have under a chemical agent attack. If you chose to use a chemical agent to attack a military objective,... 

Uses In aviation for signaling and for illuminating landing fields and military objectives. 

Uses For tracer powder and red-colored flares. In combination with barium nitrate it is used in aviation for signaling and for illuminating landing fields and military objectives. In marine signals, matches, and railroad flares. 

So I had a problem to solve. I d had some idea that it was going to be difficult to move about inside Palestine. It is a little country about the size of Vermont, but it was divided into three parts the Jewish-ruled portion around Tel Aviv, the area occupied by the Arab Liberation Army in north central Palestine and by the Arab groups under the Mufti s nephew Abdel Kader el Husseini around Jerusalem, and such main centers as Jerusalem, Haifa, Lydda and Sarafand, which were still controlled by the British. Nominally, British authority extended over the whole of Palestine. Actually they held only these centers and certain other posts where their troops were stationed. By a sort of tacit agreement they did not move into either Jewish or Arab areas unless in pursuit of a definite military objective, and they were far from being able to guarantee the safety of the roads between the centers they did hold. 

Any use of gas by any axis power, therefore, will immediately be followed by the fullest possible retaliation upon munition centers, seaports and other military objectives throughout the whole extent of the territory of such axis country. l(l7(i i G 71... 

The focus of hostilities, for example, has shifted from battlefields to urban centres over the past century. Fighting that targets military objectives located in densely populated areas or takes place in urban settings where civilian homes and infrastructure are destroyed rarely complies with the IHL principles of distinction, proportionality and precaution. 

The traditional law of naval warfare does not provide a definition of lawful military objectives. It was, however, generally agreed that enemy warships and enemy auxiliaries were lawful targets by nature. This has been reaffirmed by the contempo-... 

Today, the law is clear. Merchant vessels, whether nentral or enany, are liable to attack, if, by use or purpose, they make an effective contribntion to the enemy s military action, and if their destruction offers a definite military advantage. However, a more cautious approach is taken with regard to armed merchant vessels. According to the San Remo Manual, they qualify as lawful military objectives only, if they are armed to an extent that they could inflict damage to a warship . ... 

As regards the first condition, the property must by its function have been made into a military objective. Thus it is the function to which the cultural property is put in the circumstances prevailing at the time, rather than the inherent nature of the property that determines whether it has been made into a military objective. Thus the mere location of cultural property could never turn it into a military objective. Some positive action should be required from the holder of the property before it could become a military objective. The second condition is that there is no feasible alternative available to obtain a similar military advantage to that offered by directing an act of hostility against that military objective. This condition in effect clarifies the requirement of the 1954 Convention that the military necessity has to be imperative , namely, that no other feasible alternative is available. This means that when there is a choice between several military objectives whose total or partial destruction, capture or neutralisation, in the circumstances ruling at the time, woirld offer a definite military advantage but one of them is cultural property, the latter must not be attacked. 

Air and Missile Warfare Commentary 2009, para 3. Similarly, see Crawford 2013, p. 167 ( military necessity has come to mean having a military objective, doing something that is useful to win the war ). See also Canadian Law of Armed Conflict Manual 2001, para 202(2) ( Mflitary necessity is related to the primary aim of armed conflict—the complete submission of the enemy at the earliest possible moment with the least possible expenditure of personnel and resources. The concept of military necessity justifies the application of force not forbidden by International Law, to the extent necessary, for the realization of the purpose of armed conflict ). 

In so far as objects are concerned, military objectives are tiniited to those objects which by their nature, location, purpose or use make an effective contribution to militeuy action and whose total or partial destruction, capture or neutralization, in the circumstances ruling at the time, offers a definite military advantage. 

The term definite has been noted to have no apparent dissonance with the use of obvious found in an earlier articulation of military objective in the 1923 Hague Rules of Air Warfare, which never became binding at law. It has been suggested [t]he thrust is that of a concrete and perceptible advantage rather than a hypothetical and speculative one. ... 

It is Article 57(2)(a)(iii) of Additional Protocol I that sets out the test for assessing if an attack, either against military objects or persons, may be expected to cause collateral casualties or damage which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage to be gained. The meaning of the term concrete and direct has proven difficult to decipher. For the ICRC it is suggested to show ... 

A plain reading of the text of the Protocol highlights that mihtaiy advantage is ordinarily assessed twice when considering an attack on military objects and once for attacks on persons. Figure 13.1 sets out the main factors relevant to such an Additional Protocol I targeting assessment. 

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