Combattant immunity for one’s own soldiers replaced non-combatant immunity as the top norm.

Evidence

What had emerged here, very clearly, was the preeminence of a tacit normative principle that was alien to the law of armed conflicts but implicitly regarded as superior to it, namely a sui generis principle of the immunity of imperial combatants. Elshtain went on, “We violated the norm of discrimination in a strange up-ended kind of way by devising a new criterion, it seems: combatant immunity ranked higher as a consideration than did non-combatant immunity for Serbian—or Albanian Kosovar—civilians, with our determination to keep NATO soldiers—in other words, American soldiers—out of harm’s way, we embraced combatant immunity for our own combatants.” — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 435

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the ‘sui generis principle of immunity of imperial combatants’ that overturns the classic combatant/non-combatant distinction.
• XREF: connects to: A sui generis principle of imperial-combatant immunity emerged above the law of armed conflict; Combatant immunity emerged as a de facto norm alien to just war law; Hyperprotecting soldiers shifts the burden of risk onto civilians — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 300 (+1 more)

Related

• Combatant immunity emerged as a de facto norm alien to just war law (similarity 0.93)
• A sui generis principle of imperial-combatant immunity emerged above the law of armed conflict (similarity 0.93)
• Israel formally codified combatant-immunity doctrine first developed in the 1990s (similarity 0.80)
• US ground forces in Afghanistan and Iraq also privileged soldier protection over civilians. (similarity 0.80)
• Soldiers’ lives were redefined as citizens deserving protection above enemy civilians. (similarity 0.79)
• Hyperprotecting soldiers shifts the burden of risk onto civilians (similarity 0.79)
• Removing risk reduces the soldier to a mere executioner in need of new victimhood (similarity 0.79)
• Drones abolish the condition of combat that makes combatants identifiable. (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Hyperprotecting soldiers shifts the burden of risk onto civilians #expands (0.55) — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 300
• Removing combat exposure reduces soldiers to mere executioners #complicates (0.40) — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 367