Last Update - Mon Feb 24 2025
Sydney Mini 2024: Grand Final
Jack Story
CO | OW
80+/FBS [FBS/Finals Best Speaker]
IR
Youtube Link (Time Stamped): HERE There are three different possible contingencies in this debate. The first is the most likely, which is that this task force doesn't even get attempted to be deployed—like the ICC doesn't break because they make the task force, and then they never send it into conflict, never try to do anything with it. The second is if the task force is deployed and OO are correct, and the ICC implodes. The third is it is deployed and keeps being deployed, as Government Bench would like it to be. I'm going to deal with each in turn, but with each, we are the team that wins the debate. Scenario 1: ICC deploys the force Closing Government's attempt to say the missions would get deployed is that this would be a replacement for domestic police forces, ergo the state would consent. But firstly, that does not resolve all the prior issues—because all those issues are independent of state consent. This is like why no one internationally ever gets involved with this body. But secondly, Matt explains that this is unpopular when he explains that this is something that would lead to backlash in terms of, like, it's anti-colonial—like the West is intervening in you, this is imperialist. It'll be a disaster for any democratic government to ever impose this, and any authoritarian one that did would suffer an uprising because they're allowing people to violate their sovereignty in egregious ways. So nothing ever happens. Scenario 2: ICC doesn’t do anything Yeah, I think you neatly explain why you guys have no delta debate, which is that you'd be strategic about it only when it's good. But as literally everyone else points out, it is never good. So to be strategic would mean to create this body, and then there just would not be the point. And you have the fiat to create the body, you have the fiat to set up this institution; you do not have the fiat to support its continued use, to support the continued cooperation with other countries in providing support and resources for this body. That is not something in your fiat. Scenario 3: ICC gets Deployed but eventually dissolves ICTY:The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) was a body of the United Nations that was established to prosecute the war crimes that had been committed during the Yugoslav Wars and to try their perpetrators. The tribunal was an ad hoc court located in The Hague, Netherlands.The indictees ranged from common soldiers to generals and police commanders all the way to prime ministers. Slobodan Milošević was the first sitting head of state indicted for war crimes. Other "high level" indictees included Milan Babić, former president of the Republika Srpska Krajina; Ramush Haradinaj, former Prime Minister of Kosovo; Radovan Karadžić, former President of the Republika Srpska; Ratko Mladić, former Commander of the Bosnian Serb Army; and Ante Gotovina (acquitted), former General of the Croatian Army. Here I'm going to deal with Closing Government, who says we would intervene in a special way, which is that we would do it in replacing domestic police forces. Firstly, they just don't get to solvency in proving that they actually succeed. Firstly, they don't prove these people don't know that the ICC is coming for them, which is implausible because it's a very hard mission to do. It's pretty hard to do this in secret, so these people will flee. Secondly, they don't prove they've got no places to flee to. Thirdly, they don't prove sufficiently that they don't have at least some power—like if this is a 3,000-person police force, the Lord’s Resistance Army, which is the one that's running around Uganda, has 12,000 people. Not clear how you've got enough power to overpower those people. Fourthly, they don't prove sufficiently they are locatable. But even if you could arrest them, it's actually not clear it's better than domestic police forces. They have four stabs at it. Firstly, they say it causes division, but in fact, the division is far worse because when you control the police force democratically that has been deployed, at least you feel like you have some input in the way that the police force has been deployed to arrest them. But this is just some bumfuck country you don't know, whose people you've never met, who are probably totally different from you, showing up and arresting, and your country is allowing it to happen. That causes far more division. Secondly, they say it racializes it. But firstly, this racialization is symmetric—the vast majority of UN peacekeepers, in fact, come from Africa, and the vast majority of arrests that happen are within Africa. To the extent that there is racialization, it's far better for that racialization to be against people you have contact theory reasons to like, as opposed to, like, Nigeria, who you fucking hate, who you now cooperate with far less in the African political scene. Thirdly, they say it distracts from political issues. What's the harm? Many of these political issues are bad; you don't prove talking about those issues actually leads to good results. Fourthly, they say it galvanizes support for bad actors. I do not understand this claim, but the claim is it would give support for bad actors. But now the bad actors can position themselves as opposition to the ICC and the West and the imperial colonial actors. Obviously, this supports them. So that explains why CG is out, and it explains why in the possibility where we intervene in a way that causes the ICC to collapse, they don't get a delta. We are the team that actually gets a delta by explaining the other useful things the ICC does that are unrelated to trying to arrest criminals. Scenario 4: ICC deploys it with full capacity Secondly, OO says this causes conflict, and the conflicts they describe—check your notes—are firstly speculative crackdowns and secondly deaths as part of the mission. What we explain is a separate set of conflicts, which are conflicts like the invasion of The Hague Act, conflicts like the United States imposing sanctions on the ICC, imposing sanctions on the Netherlands for the reason they... The only claim we get from this is from CG, who says they would never do it. This is the counterfactual that they would do it. But I would also note, if they're never doing it against the United States government, that deletes CG’s principle because CG’s principle is we're being fair. Now the United States doesn't need to leave because the United States would never get targeted. So whatever you believe happens in this debate, we win.
First, what happens if it is not even attempted to be deployed—like they make the thing, as the motion says, and then they just don't send it out? They just don't approve any missions. This is by far the most likely contingency in the debate for a couple of reasons. Firstly, OO weighs themselves out of the debate because OO explained a series of incredibly bad harms if this literally ever happened, right? They're like, one, there'd be a bunch of conflicts; secondly, you just wouldn't get them. So it's like, why would they ever approve a mission where you're not going to get them? Plus, it would just cause a bunch of war—probably unlikely to happen. Secondly, you need to build support for the mission in a series of ways that are very difficult.
Firstly, you need to get police forces to volunteer to do this pro bono. Secondly, you need to get things like funding for the quite expensive—like I know it's like just 3,000 people, but they've got to have like a lot of guns, and that's pretty expensive. Thirdly, you don't just teleport there—you need airbases, you need the capacity to logistically fund these missions, and you need to be there often for a long period of time to hunt them down. And all the people that are providing those resources are countries, and those countries are not particularly incentivized to annoy the country they are intervening in by approving all of that stuff, by paying for the police officers, and by allowing the use of their airbases for these missions. So it's pretty unlikely this mission ever gets deployed.
What happens if nothing ever happens? Well, Opening Opposition has nothing to say because their extension—which is that it seems overbearing and imperialist, and everyone pulls out—is entirely reliant on the ICC actually using this task force. It is entirely reliant on them being deployed because if this is just like something they could theoretically do but they don't deploy, like the rest of the shit the ICC could theoretically do but never do, like indict George Bush or something. So, it's probably unlikely that OO has any ground in that debate. Nor does anyone else, because they rely on the ICC doing something.
But in that contingency, which is the most likely part of the debate, we do have an argument: that is the UN peacekeeping forces would actually be deteriorated by this for the reason that the UN peacekeeping forces, who would be theoretically on standby to be used, whose resources are being diverted to setting up the logistical and organizational infrastructure of this mission, whose soldiers are being trained to do one mission or another—trained to do things like patrolling around, resolving issues, or doing incredibly targeted sun searches for individual people, both of which are very different missions. You have an opportunity cost in funding, you have an opportunity cost in personnel deployment, and you have an opportunity cost in training. So the UN is less able to do the kinds of important peacekeeping missions we describe by Udai(MO). That is a delta in when no one else has a delta in the most likely version of this debate.
The only positive material left standing by the end of the debate
POI
Yes, Open OO “as Opening Government models we be strategic about when these arrests happen—we may arrest in the US, but we need and probably wouldn't. Prime Minister explains the task force is more politically neutral than those of domestic governments, and deters turns harboring criminals a sweet spot between something and nothing.”
Second contingency: What if it's deployed, and it deletes the ICC? Opening Opposition says everyone leaves the ICC. Pretty fairly, everyone else points out the ICC does pretty little anyway. What we do is advance Opening Opposition there in two regards. Firstly, we say the ICC does domestic tribunals—things like the ICTY, things like the extraordinary mechanisms. Those are incredibly useful for helping people in post-conflict scenarios experience redistributive justice. But secondly, we explain it supports domestic legal systems like that of Uganda—that is enormously helpful. So we actualize OO there.
Finally, what happens if it gets deployed to the maximal extent? There are a couple claims in the debate. Firstly, OG says you bring individuals to justice. OO says you can’t get them. Let's charitably explain why even if you could get them, you're not going to get justice. Firstly, they can do legal defenses. They can explain that they were arrested illegally. They can contest the legality of the defense. Secondly, because they are dictators, they have lots of money, so they can fund those expensive lawyers. Thirdly, because they are dictators, they've ruled the country and destroyed evidence, so there's no ability to get a conviction. Fourthly, even if you get a conviction, they don't prove that seeing that person convicted actually fills the holes in people's hearts.