As a followup to my criticism of The American Conservative’s position on Iran, The National Review’s David French http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/292767/legal-case-striking-iran-david-french states:
There has, in fact, been an “armed attack” against the United States. Iran has been waging a low-intensity war against America and Israel — both directly and by proxy — for more than two decades. Iran’s Quds Force has planned and directed attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq and on Israelis in Israel and abroad. Iran has directly supplied our enemies with deadly weaponry in Iraq and Afghanistan, and is responsible for hundreds of American military deaths — including the Marine barracks bombing in Beirut and the Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia.
In other words, Iran attacked us long ago, and our forbearance to this point is neither required by international law nor does it bind us to continued forbearance. In fact, when a declared and hostile enemy escalates its military capabilities dramatically, that presents a direct challenge to American security and the security of our allies.
The Left is attempting to delegitimize the classical legal framework for the laws of war. In their view, military action is to be viewed as a set of discrete responses to discrete acts — more like law enforcement than warfare. In other words, Iran’s long history of terrorist acts don’t constitute casus belli (a justification for war), they merely represent just cause for, say, an attempt to capture the specific terrorists responsible. Yet international law has never required this level of national restraint, and such restraint is not required under the U.N. Charter.
So, while my libertarian friends may argue with me, I ask them to understand that my understanding of freedom is not based upon the presumption of non-violence. It is based on the presumption that property rights are created and maintained through the application of organized violence. And that markets were made by intention, and freedom a systemic desire of the manorial warrior system. My work is to propagate aristocratic liberty, not proletarian liberty. They need not be incompatible. The state is the enemy, not violence.