Did Nick Fury break the law?

An interesting discussion on if Nick Fury's actions in the Avengers movie to stop NYC from getting nuked were illegal. Of course, as some commentors point out, SHIELD works for the UN, not the US, but it's a fun theoretical question, anyway.

http://io9.com/5922454/were-nick-fur...ally-justified

The order for the nuclear strike was patently illegal. There's this scrap of paper called the Constitution that says, among other things, no American citizen shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process. Even if some wacky "exigent circumstances" argument could be made it would still have been wrong because "the council" hadn't even begun to exhaust all other options. No conventional military forces had been deployed, for instance. And (AFAIK) under the Posse Comitatus and Insurrection Acts the order would have had to come from the President in any case.

Had I been one of the heroes in the "Avengers Initiative" the movie would have ended with me going off on my new mission: find and bring to justice the people who tried to murder ten million American citizens.

Imagine if Vanguard tried nuking Paragon City to deal with the Rikti. Illegal or not, UN or not, Nick Fury made the right call.

The UN does not have legal authority to declare war aside from a vote from the security council, of which the US is a permanent member and no diplomat is ever going to vote willfuly nuke his own country.

Also, the UN doesn't have nukes anyways.

But I'm gonna let it slide because the rest of the movie was excellent.

One would have to define due process as it applies to the situation.

As far as finding alternatives:

1. Fury already stated that the threats they were facing already outclassed their ability to handle those situations by conventional means.

2. He even went as far as to defy his superiors to see the Avengers Initiative through.

3. If I'm not mistaken; conventional means (outside of the local police) were already in play; ie. the Avengers themselves (with cooperation from the NYPD)

Isn't releasing the Hulk into a major metropolis pretty much the same thing as lobbing a nuke? If he's fighting that big a threat, the damage toll would be similar, and yes, he wouldn't kill civilians purposely, but he's not gonna play nice with buildings and cars, which have people inside them.

The order to use the nuke was illegal.

However given the circumstances of Earth being invaded by an alien army and police and Avengers are on scene and victory does not look likely, then comes the concept of "acceptable losses" or "in order to save the city and earth we have to nuke the city". It was an illegal order, imo. It was also cold-blooded in the extreme, but there is the simple fact that if the Avengers/police/military can't stop the invasion then we would be looking at the human race either being conquered or annihilated.

Nuke a city to stop an alien invasion or face being conquered and/or rendered extinct.

Lousy choice to have to make, isn't it?

Take the Magic: The Gathering 'What Color Are You?' Quiz.

I think it should be pointed out that within the various films set within the Marvel Cinematic Universe, as well as in the animated series The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, the acronym stands for Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division.

Sounds more like a U.S. force than a U.N. force.

Break the law? Nick Fury IS the law!

lol, had to reread the question:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Inazuma ...if Nick Fury's actions in the Avengers movie to stop NYC from getting nuked were illegal.

So, the issue is actually (according the OP's wording) if Nick Fury performed an illegal action by violating a direct order from his superiors to nuke NY.


It depends on how the bodies involved would deal with a violation of international decree (extradition and so forth).


And again, what constitutes due process in a situation like this (from both a US and/or UN perspective).

I took the World Security Council to be some sort of United Nations sort of thing (whether the actual world governments knew of its existence is never made clear) and they were taking unilateral action on a sovereign country's home soil. And said country expressly has it in their constitution that they won't use lethal force on their own citizens.

So Nick Fury did break a law, but it was disobeying orders. Now, he presumably answers to this Council, but he also feels confident enough to disobey them and even cut them off during the attack on New York. This suggests he has a lot of authority of his own. I saw it as the head of the military going 'I kind of know the situation here, and you lot are crossing lines of engagement you yourselves set up.'

Obviously he didn't get punished in the end because the Avengers won, but it's clear the World Council doesn't trust him as they had people in place to take this action to begin with. So maybe they're the ones who're treating the law at their own convenience....



S.

It's hard to argue legal ramifications because in our real world, the US would not allow an aerial UN battle cruiser in our air space. So, in the Marvel Universe, there would have had to been some US-UN accord, which may have also included provisions for cauterizing alien-infested earth-wounds.

Enough is enough!
I have had it with these mothereffin' discussions on this mothereffin' thread!