Everything will go out of the window the moment the new space race truly begins. Whoever colonises Mars first at a large enough scale (that is self sustaining) has a tremendous first mover advantage. Anything earth can send will not be able to arrive in a timely manner such that it would not be detected. Short of faster than light travel, it is close to impossible to take down a planetary adversary with current technologies (one possibility would be a gravity tractor and slamming a massive asteroid into Mars, but the second and third order effects of doing so is very very dangerous).
Agreements like the Outer Space Treaty primarily bind weak nations. If US, China, (and eventually, India) truly believe that space dominance is critical to national security, then the treaty will become similar to the nuclear weapons agreements, an exclusive club for those who has the power to do so and everybody else will be kept out under threat of war and sanctions.
Lawyers too sleep well at night because of rough men willing to do violence on their behalf, it is just sometimes they forget that the armed enforcers of international law are sovereign powers who can rewrite the very laws should they win.
Agreements like the Outer Space Treaty primarily bind weak nations. If US, China, (and eventually, India) truly believe that space dominance is critical to national security, then the treaty will become similar to the nuclear weapons agreements, an exclusive club for those who has the power to do so and everybody else will be kept out under threat of war and sanctions.
Lawyers too sleep well at night because of rough men willing to do violence on their behalf, it is just sometimes they forget that the armed enforcers of international law are sovereign powers who can rewrite the very laws should they win.