Targeted killing and the law of armed conflict.

There is no consensus definition "targeted killing" in the law of armed conflict or in case law. (1) A reasonable definition is: the intentional killing of a specific civilian who cannot reasonably be apprehended, and who is taking a direct part in hostilities, the targeting done at the direction and authorization of the state in the context of an international or noninternational armed conflict.

In the second year of the Redland-Blueland war, an armed conflict between two states, a Redland sniper squeezed the trigger of his rifle, the crosshairs of the scope unmoving on his target: a uniformed Blueland soldier. The weapon fired, and five hundred meters away the enemy combatant fell to the ground, dead. Was this a "targeted killing"?

The Redland-Blueland war continued. After months of planning and the training of a team of disaffected Redland nationals, Blueland was ready to implement an operation against the enemy. Days later, two clandestinely inserted Redland nationals, trained in Blueland and wearing Blueland army uniforms, planted an explosive charge under a bridge located inside Redland. Later, as the limousine of the president of Redland passed over the bridge, the charge was detonated and the target killed. The president, elected to office when he was a college professor, had been a thorn in the side of the Blueland government, with his anti-Blueland rhetoric and verbal attacks on Blueland policies. Now, Blueland's most hated critic was dead, silenced by Blueland agents.

Was this a "targeted killing"?

During World War II, in April 1943, Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, commander in chief of the Japanese Combined Fleet, was on an inspection tour hundreds of miles behind the front lines. Having broken the Imperial Japanese Navy's message code, U.S. forces knew his flight itinerary and sent sixteen Army Air Forces P-38 Lightning fighter aircraft to intercept him. Near Bougainville, in the northern Solomons, the American pilots shot down their target, a Betty bomber, killing all on board, including Admiral Yamamoto.

Was this a "targeted killing"?

First, consider the Redland sniper. On the battlefield the killing of combatants--uniformed members of the army of one of the parties to the conflict--by opposing combatants is lawful. The sniper, a lawful combatant, killed a lawful enemy combatant in the course of armed conflict between two high contracting parties to the Geneva Conventions. To kill the enemy in a lawful manner was the sniper's mission; it was expected and required of him. A combatant taking aim at a human target and then killing him is not what is meant by the term "targeted killing." "The [1907] Hague Regulations expressed it more clearly in attributing the 'rights and duties of war.' ... [A]ll members of the armed forces ... can participate directly in hostilities, i.e., attack and be attacked." (2) 1977 Additional Protocol I, which supplements the 1949 Geneva Conventions, repeats that formulation. (3) The status of "combatant" is crucial, because of the consequences attached to it. It is the mission of every state's armed forces--its combatants--to close with and destroy the enemy. Soldiers who do so are subject to no penalty for their acts. (4) This was not a targeted killing.