The Interplay between Neutrality, Qualified Neutrality and Co-belligerency in the Context of U.S. Intervention in the Russia-Ukraine War

Abstract

Summary The United States of America (U.S.), and the European Union (EU) have supplied weapons to Ukraine in the ongoing Russian-Ukraine armed conflict. The Pentagon has pledged thousands of weapons to Ukraine as part of the security/military aid to worn-torn Ukraine. The supply of such weapons by a neutral/non- belligerent state stands in clear violation of the laws of Neutrality which casts a duty on the neutral states to refrain from participating in the hostilities and be impartial in their conduct towards the belligerents. However, the argument of the U.S. government in previous such instances has been that laws of neutrality have been overshadowed by the United Nations (UN) Charter and modern forms of warfare and the U.S. maintains that they fall under qualified neutrality after the 20th century. However, Qualified Neutrality is not recognised either under treaty conventions or customary international law. Similarly, international laws in terms of co-belligerency are also governed by International Humanitarian Laws (IHL) under the Four Geneva Convention of 1949 which lays down rules where military assistance by a neutral state can result in co-belligerency. However, no existing treaty or international law lays down a clear threshold for crossing from a neutral state to a co-belligerent state which has also led to an ambiguity in terms of checks and balances of the lethal weapons supplied to Ukraine by the U.S. currently. This article attempts to define the threshold in terms of severity, effectiveness, and inertia of the intervention. It further argues that the U.S. has crossed its threshold and therefore the existing laws governing violation of neutrality and affixing of state responsibility are now applicable to the U.S.