Criminal Responsibility of Commanders in the Age of Algorithmic Warfare; Rereading the Criteria of “Science,” “Effective Control,” and “Prevention” in the Light of International Criminal Law

Ahmadi, Pouria; Alizadeh, Amin

doi:10.48300/jlr.2026.598106.3275

Criminal Responsibility of Commanders in the Age of Algorithmic Warfare; Rereading the Criteria of “Science,” “Effective Control,” and “Prevention” in the Light of International Criminal Law

Articles in Press

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

pouria Ahmadi ¹

Amin Alizadeh ²

¹ M.A. in Criminal Law and Criminology, Semnan Branch, Islamic Azad University, Semnan, Iran.

² PhD student in Criminal Law and Criminology, Faculty of Law and Political Science, University of Tehran Campus, Tehran, Iran.

10.48300/jlr.2026.598106.3275

Abstract

Algorithmic warfare has brought about a fundamental transformation in the place of decision-making on the battlefield; a decision that was once formed in the mind and will of a human commander is now increasingly produced within automated systems and through unpredictable computational processes. This shift in the “center of decision” raises a legal question, the neglect of which jeopardizes the meaning of criminal responsibility in the international arena; in a system where the commander no longer issues explicit orders but rather defines the frameworks within which a system makes independent decisions, what is the role of attributing responsibility to him? The present article, adopting a descriptive-analytical method, seeks to answer the question of whether the framework of criminal responsibility of commanders in Article 28 of the Rome Statute can maintain its interpretative capacity in the face of the challenges of algorithmic warfare or whether it collapses in the face of the reality of autonomous systems

Keywords

Algorithmic warfare

criminal liability of commanders

Article 28 of the Rome Statute

effective control

human agency