The turbulent post-war situation in Iraq has dominated news agendas around the globe for the past 12 months.

Government leaders in the US and the UK have been consistently in the firing line, and with the end-of-June deadline for the handover of power in the country looming, the media interest shows no sign of abating.

It is not too far off the mark to say that the political futures of both George Bush and Tony Blair hang in the balance over the next few months.

Against that backdrop, the winning entry of this year's Graham Turnbull Essay Competition - written by Clifford Chance trainee solicitor Daniel Rosenberg - could not have been more relevant.

The competition was launched in 1998 by the Law Society's international human rights committee.

It is open to law students and young lawyers in or from England and Wales and it is named after Graham Turnbull, an English solicitor, who did much to promote respect for human rights.

Mr Turnbull was killed in February 1997, aged 37, while working as a human rights monitor on the United Nations human rights mission in Rwanda.

Mr Rosenberg's essay stood out in the judges' minds not only for its obvious relevance, but also for its creativity.

Written in the style of the 1980s television situation comedy, 'Yes Minister', the essay elegantly blends humour with a harsh and complex message about the legality of going to war.

The prime minister's office.

Enter Sir Humphrey.

PM: Ah, Sir Humphrey.

SH: Morning, prime minister.

Have you seen the latest draft of the president's speech?

PM: Somebody mentioned that I should take a look.

SH: Did you, prime minister?

PM: Not yet.

Tell me about it.

SH: Well, it looks as if we're gearing up for war.

PM: Another one?

SH: I'm afraid so.

PM: What am I supposed to do about it?

SH: Something, prime minister.

It won't go away.

PM: (Sighs)

SH: You've got cabinet, followed by PMQs and Paxman.

Somebody's going to bring it up.

PM: Now look here.

I want whatever I do to be legally justified.

The Americans opted out of this International Criminal Court, we didn't.

Persuade me that I'm on safe ground.

SH: Well...

I have had a word with our legal people and can set out the parameters, if that would help.

PM: Fire away.

SH: Well, international law gives you two main legal justifications for war.

The first is in individual or collective self-defence, under article 51 of the UN Charter, the second is under article 42 of the UN Charter, ie, when duly authorised by a UN Security Council resolution.

A third potential justification is in response to an international humanitarian crisis.

PM: Ah yes...

its all coming back.

SH: To quote article 51: 'Nothing in the present charter shall impair the right of individual or collective self-defence if an armed attack occurs against a member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security...

,' ie, if the French bombarded Dover, we could rely on this doctrine.

Without a direct attack on us, or one our allies, we would need to stretch this argument.

PM: Like for Iraq.

SH: Precisely.

We could argue that we were acting in 'anticipatory self-defence', against a future threat.

The UN Charter doesn't cover this one so we need to think...

laterally.

The greater and more imminent the threat, the stronger the 'anticipatory self-defence' argument.

Our response also must be 'proportionate'.

PM: Sledge-hammers and nuts, eh?

SH: Precisely.

The more credible the evidence, the more compelling the argument and, assuming the failure of practical alternatives, the more likely that a proportionate military response is justifiable from a legal, and moral, perspective.

PM: Very rational.

But does it work in practice? Has anyone done a pilot?

SH: The Israelis bombed Iraq's nuclear reactors in 1981, just before the fuel was put in.

They saw the attack as legally justified due to the potential future threat.

The relative lack of destruction, compared to acting later - when the fuel was in the reactor - was their moral justification.

The 'international community' was unimpressed, needless to say.

The UN was ignored, and the attack was seen as unprovoked, particularly in view of the apparent lack of an imminent threat.

The Security Council permanent member helping Iraq build the reactor was not pleased.

PM: Us?

SH: No, we mostly sold 'conventional' kit.

PM: The Germans?

SH: No, chemical stuff.

Not on the Security Council.

PM: America?

SH: No nuclear.

Most other things though.

France, to put you out of your misery.

PM: Cheese-eating surrender monkeys.

Collective self-defence, then.

Who can we defend?

SH: We can't just exercise the right of collective self-defence on our understanding of the situation.

The International Court of Justice, in the dispute between Nicaragua and the USA, said that the state which has been the subject of an armed attack must declare it has been attacked.

And don't antagonise the French.

PM: OK, so assuming nobody has directly attacked us, or any other state, I must rely on this slippery concept of 'anticipatory self-defence in response to an imminent threat', which, depending on the evidence, may prove tricky politically.

SH: Precisely.

The lack of credible evidence created much opposition, on both legal and moral grounds, to the Iraq adventure.

PM: So I recall.

What about article 42?

SH: To put article 42 in context, the UN charter preamble speaks about saving 'succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind...'.

The UN is rather strong on the peaceful resolution of disputes.

PM: I used to be a member of CND, you know.

SH: Yes, I read your file.

Article 1 sets out the UN's purposes, which include to 'maintain international peace end security'.

Article 2(3) states that 'all members shall settle their international disputes by peaceful means...

'.

And article 2(4) states that 'all members shall refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the purposes of the United Nations.'

PM: Get to the point.

SH: Article 42 allows the Security Council, if it considers that non-military measures don't, or won't, work, to 'take such action by air, sea or land forces as may be necessary to maintain or restore international peace and security'.

PM: That's what I wanted to hear.

SH: With Security Council backing for military action under article 42, you're on safe legal ground.

The magic words authorising military action are 'all necessary means'.

They used them for Haiti, Rwanda and Somalia.

So, even if Security Council resolutions exist on related topics, and you think you've got strong moral grounds, without those magic words in the resolution, you lack a legal case for war under article 42.

PM: And about that 'humanitarian' legal justification...

if we get that, don't we have a strong moral case too?

SH: It would be nice to think that 'humanitarian' intervention could make all future wars noble in purpose, and that lives would be saved, not destroyed, in the process.

'Humanitarian' intervention as an idea is perceived as having certain advantages, most notably that it provides a way round article 2(7) of the UN Charter, which prevents interference in a state's domestic affairs.

However, a Security Council resolution is still needed to legalise force in a humanitarian intervention.

You may believe that there are strong moral grounds for intervening to prevent the killing in Chechnya, or the oppression in Tibet, but neither Russia nor China would let those get through the Security Council, so there will be no legal case under international law should you ever want to use force to intervene in those areas.

PM: I don't as it happens.

I'm not really interested in what happens in Chechnya and Tibet.

We've got good trade relations with both, and isn't Chechnya strategically important for...

pipelines? Bleeding heart liberals might think we have a case.

As far as I'm concerned, there's no practical case, and, as you point out, conveniently, no prospect of a legal case.

SH: Should we move on to the moral case?

PM: Isn't it straightforward? We've discussed the legal niceties, but if I'm morally in the right, don't all the legal arguments become irrelevant? I am a politician, after all, judged by electors and history, not courts.

SH: As Milosovic discovered, just because a politician believes starting a war is right, and many of his own people support him, doesn't mean that he won't land up in the dock.

Many Germans didn't see much wrong with Hitler marching into Poland.

He topped himself.

His henchmen had to deal with Nuremberg.

PM: But the Americans are on my side, I can't lose.

SH: You may have inadvertently uncovered the reason why some of our American friends believe now is the time to invade weak states, but you need a better grasp of the moral issues.

There are certainly unjust causes for which wars are fought.

Countless wars have been fought for the rights of groups of people within powerful states to plunder the resources of people from less powerful states.

Alternatively, a moral case for war may well exist, but the war may be fought for 'immoral' reasons.

The moral case may be that a ruthless dictator is systematically starving a particular ethnic group.

However, outsiders may intervene militarily because there are particular natural resources which they would like to get their hands on.

Of course, a just cause does not necessarily make a war just.

To quote Arundahti Roy, people rarely win wars, governments rarely lose them.

Cluster bombs kill people.

Tanks kill people.

Expensive, sophisticated missiles kill people.

Jittery young men thousands of miles from home manning check-points kill people.

Is it right to calculate, to play God? How many people have to be killed to stop a just cause becoming an unjust war? Can anything resulting in death and the destruction of families be just?

PM: Yes, but some of these dictators are animals.

They put people alive into shredders.

SH: Shredders...

weren't you the junior minister when we approved the...

PM: Ahem...

SH: Are you trying to say that, if we have a very limited or no legal basis for intervening in countries internal affairs, due to Article 2(7) of the UN Charter and because nation states want to avoid precedents that could come back to bite them, it is worth contemplating using 'moral' arguments to wage war if the cause is just?

PM: Yes.

What are we supposed to do if people are being oppressed and killed, and are not in a position to change their situation themselves?

SH: Like the Tibetans or the Chechens?

PM: No.

You know what I mean.

SH: You mean countries which repress people at home while funding and providing recruits for terrorism abroad, like Saudi Arabia?

PM: No.

I mean...

let's be serious about this.

While you've made some valid points, and confused me a bit, as you are wont to do, we've been beating around the bush.

What's the moral problem with showing a bit of solidarity with some poor oppressed people in some far-away place run by some tinpot dictator?

SH: And if the 'tinpot' is mates with the US?

PM: Can't I get this through to you, I'm not talking about that sort of a place.

SH: You mean one of 'our boys' who has gone a bit 'off the rails', so to speak, like the one you used to sell...

.

PM: Precisely.

Or someone who never was one of our own in the first place.

SH: In which case, you would certainly be able to argue a persuasive moral case.

To paraphrase a liberation theologist, in the struggle between the powerful and the powerless, to do nothing is to side with the powerful, not to be neutral.

I only have three provisos, from a 'moral' perspective.

The first is you better make sure that you will succeed in your objective, for should you fail many people would have needlessly died.

The second, is that you need to justify, both to yourself, and to others, that all the death and destruction is worthwhile in terms of the end result, and the third is the 'systemic danger' posed by successfully arguing the case for powerful countries to militarily act on their own initiative when they perceive that a wrong is being done somewhere.

Oh, and I have a fourth...

.

PM: Thanks.

That's enough.

I know you're planning to retire, and we have worked well together in the past.

Is there anything you would like me to do for you?

SH: I do understand that that shredder is rather inconvenient, but as you can't put me in the Lords without raising a few eyebrows, and I did get my knighthood a long time ago, I'm not sure what you had in mind.

PM: One other thing.

If the Americans twist everybody's arm for us...

get that Security Council backing...

we have our legal basis...

damned with all this moral philosophising...

fancy a posting to New York?

SH: Haven't we tried that approach before?

PM: Stop arguing.

I'm the boss.

New York?

SH: Yes, prime minister.