ISBN : 2296008666

MILITARY INTERVENTIONS AND THE CONCEPT OF THE POLITICAL


The "global war against terrorism" is the overarching rationale, if not the main motivation, of two major, international, but US-led, military interventions in Afghanistan since 2001 and in Iraq since 2003. These antiterrorist interventions, although they both have been justified discursively or legally by "exceptional circumstances", have in many ways challenged and changed our common understanding of the place of interventionist behaviour in international politics. But what is less frequently highlighted, is that these interventions have seen major developments in military practices on the ground. Indeed, the shift from "wars between states" to "wars within states" has highlighted the importance of the relation between intervening forces...