• The Korean Journal of Air & Space Law and Policy
• /
• v.26 no.2
• /
• pp.41-68
• /
• 2011

This article deals with the current rules of law of air warfare and its surrounding issues on precautionary action by a military aircraft at air-to-air operation in international armed conflict. However there is no separate and independent legal system to regulate warfare in aerospace in the current system of law of war (or law of armed conflict). In other words, law of air warfare does not exist in a form of a separate treaty. Air warfare has been regulated by international customary law and the relevant provisions in different Conventions, including 1949 four Geneva Conventions and two Additional Protocols, which mainly regulate land and naval warfare. And this makes difficult to make clear a legal term or legal tests on an issue concerned with law of air warfare, which concludes from time to time a dispute on interpretation and implementation of law of air warfare between states. Therefore, this article refers various materials (including 1949 Geneva Conventions and Additional Protocols, San Remo Manual, Harvard Manual, and ICAO Manual on Interception of Civilian Aircraft) for the purpose of defining the current and desirable legal test on precautionary action by military aircraft. In addition to the main purpose of this article, this article tried to show a characteristic of developing mechanism of law of air Warfare taking into account interactions between international air law and law of air warfare.