I am aware that the framers of the Protocol are not in accord with these views. In their opinion, the presumptions of Article 10 establish "an automatic procedure which would not necessarily be based on a decision of the Council." They say that where a presumption has arisen and is not unanimously rejected by the Council, "the facts themselves decide who is an aggressor" and otherwise that "the Council has to declare the fact of aggression." I can only say that their conclusions, while perhaps admissible as a mere matter of language and nothing but language, take no account of the inevitable certainty that there will always be at least two views of what the facts are; to put it from a legalistic viewpoint, tribunals do not deal with facts; they deal with what lawyers call facts, but which are merely conclusions based on such evidence as is available. This sort of a "fact" is arrived at only after a hearing or a trial of some kind; and to suppose that the Council could ever conduct such a hearing, and at the same time come to a unanimous and immediate conclusion is to suppose a contradiction in terms.[12] So while from the language of Article 10 of the Protocol difficulty may arise in determining an aggressor under its provisions (for there might in any case be a disputed or doubtful question of fact; and the Council under the provisions of the Covenant would in general have to act unanimously) the Protocol provides a solution of any such difficulty by saying that if the Council does not immediately determine the aggressor, it _must_ {62} (the language is mandatory) proceed to enjoin an armistice, to fix its terms and to supervise its execution, acting for these purposes by two-thirds majority. Then the Protocol provides that any belligerent which refuses the armistice or violates it shall be the aggressor. These provisions regarding an armistice seem to me to meet any possible objection that might be raised to the absence of a more complete and detailed system of determining in fact and in law what State is an aggressor. No matter what the presumptions were or even what procedure was laid down, it is clear that, after hostilities in any given case had actually commenced, there would be enormous difficulty for any tribunal whatever in laying down conclusively which State was the aggressor. After all, the vital thing is to prevent war; and the opening of hostilities, to be immediately followed by an armistice, would not be very much of a war. So I regard these provisions as to an armistice as the most ingenious [Transcriber's note: ingenuous?] and, except its statements of principle, the most important of all the provisions of Article 10 of the Protocol.