Legitimacy of US military actions questionable: China Daily editorial
China DailyA plane takes off from an unidentified location, as the US launches airstrikes on targets linked to Iran's Revolutionary Guard and the militias it backs, in the screen grab from a handout video released on Feb 2, 2024. Robert Wood, the US alternate representative for special political affairs at the United Nations, defended these actions as being "necessary and proportionate", citing a country's "inherent right of self-defense" under Article 51 of the UN Charter. While State Department spokesman Vedant Patel claimed that Iraq and other regional countries "understood" the US' actions, which were in response to the deaths of three US soldiers, the criticism of the strikes expressed by Syria, Iraq and Iran contradicts this assertion and highlights the unilateral nature of the US' actions. Rather than being acts of self-defense, the air strikes can be seen as retaliatory measures for the deaths of the US military personnel, as indicated by President Joe Biden's statement: "If you harm an American, we will respond." Moreover, the distance of the initial attacks from the US military personnel and the broader historical context of US military involvement in the region suggest a pattern of escalating tensions rather than genuine self-defense.
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China's military taking dangerous actions to deter US forces in Asia-Pacific: Report
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