"The United Nations charter gives every nation the right to self defence, therefore when the American embassies were bombed it was a matter of time before the Americans responded by going for what they suspected were the causes of the attack"

Benazir Bhutto anchors the legitimacy of retaliatory action in Article 51 of the UN Charter, which recognizes the inherent right of self-defense when an armed attack occurs. Bombed embassies qualify as attacks on sovereign premises, so a forceful response is framed as both lawful and politically inevitable. The phrasing suggests less a celebration of force than a realist observation about how states behave when their citizens and symbols are targeted abroad.

The emphasis on “a matter of time” speaks to domestic pressures and the logic of deterrence. Democracies, especially, face intense demands to reassert security and credibility after spectacular violence. Yet her careful reference to going after what was “suspected” to be the cause highlights the gray zone that accompanies terrorism: attribution is difficult, intelligence is often fragmentary, and the line between necessary defense and overreach can blur. International law’s tests of necessity and proportionality loom large here; a right to respond does not absolve a state of the duty to calibrate aims, minimize harm, and ensure that targets are actually connected to the attack.

The historical backdrop is clear: the East Africa embassy bombings prompted U.S. cruise missile strikes against alleged terrorist camps in Afghanistan and a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan, the latter mired in controversy over the quality of evidence. That episode illustrates both the compulsion to act and the risks embedded in acting on suspicion. Effective self-defense in the counterterrorism context requires credible attribution, multilateral consultation when possible, and strategies that disrupt capability without inflaming wider conflict or undermining global norms.

Her words therefore capture a tension at the heart of modern security policy: the coexistence of a recognized right with a heavy responsibility. A response may be inevitable, but its legitimacy and effectiveness depend on evidentiary rigor, legal restraint, and strategic clarity about ends, punishment alone is not a strategy, and defense must guard against perpetuating the very cycles of violence it seeks to deter.