War crimes follow wars as surely as night follows day.
When you look at the list of things that constitute war crimes according the Geneva Conventions and the Nuremberg Tribunals, you will immediately see that any sustained conflict inevitably leads to actions, such as “Atrocities or offences against persons or property, constituting violations of the laws or customs of war”, “the wanton destruction of cities, towns or villages” or “devastation not justified by military necessity”, that fall into the category of war crimes. So when the US declares that Russian troops have committed war crimes during its invasion of Ukraine, they are undoubtedly right. One major crime is “planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression.”
But what is infuriating is the revolting hypocrisy demonstrated by all the righteous indignation by the US and its allies about Russian war crimes when the long and ugly and incontrovertible history of war crimes by the US is ignored by the US political class and that mainstream media. After all, the US has so many times in the past been involved in the “planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression”, Iraq being merely one of the most recent.
I was trying to formulate a post about this but Chris Hedges pretty much said it all.
The branding of Vladimir Putin as a war criminal by Joe Biden, who lobbied for the Iraq war and staunchly supported the 20 years of carnage in the Middle East, is one more example of the hypocritical moral posturing sweeping across the United States. It is unclear how anyone would try Putin for war crimes since Russia, like the United States, does not recognize the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court in The Hague. But justice is not the point. Politicians like Biden, who do not accept responsibility for our well-documented war crimes, bolster their moral credentials by demonizing their adversaries. They know the chance of Putin facing justice is zero. And they know their chance of facing justice is the same.
We know who our most recent war criminals are, among others: George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, General Ricardo Sanchez, former CIA Director George Tenet, former Asst. Atty. Gen. Jay Bybee, former Dep. Asst. Atty. Gen. John Yoo, who set up the legal framework to authorize torture; the helicopter pilots who gunned down civilians, including two Reuters journalists, in the “Collateral Murder” video released by WikiLeaks. We have evidence of the crimes they committed.
…If we demand justice for Ukrainians, as we should, we must also demand justice for the one million people killed—400,000 of whom were noncombatants—by our invasions, occupations and aerial assaults in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, and Pakistan. We must demand justice for those who were wounded, became sick or died because we destroyed hospitals and infrastructure. We must demand justice for the thousands of soldiers and marines who were killed, and many more who were wounded and are living with lifelong disabilities, in wars launched and sustained on lies. We must demand justice for the 38 million people who have been displaced or become refugees in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, the Philippines, Libya, and Syria, a number that exceeds the total of all those displaced in all wars since 1900, apart from World War II, according to the Watson Institute for International & Public Affairs at Brown University. Tens of millions of people, who had no connection with the attacks of 9/11, were killed, wounded, lost their homes, and saw their lives and their families destroyed because of our war crimes. Who will cry out for them?
…Every effort to hold our war criminals accountable has been rebuffed by Congress, by the courts, by the media and by the two ruling political parties. The Center for Constitutional Rights, blocked from bringing cases in US courts against the architects of these preemptive wars, which are defined by post-Nuremberg laws as “criminal wars of aggression,” filed motions in German courts to hold US leaders to account for gross violations of the Geneva Convention, including the sanctioning of torture in black sites such as Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib.
…This hypocrisy is not new. There is no moral difference between the saturation bombing the US carried out on civilian populations since World War II, including in Vietnam and Iraq, and the targeting of urban centers by Russia in Ukraine or the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center. Mass death and fireballs on a city skyline are the calling cards we have left across the globe for decades. Our adversaries do the same.
The deliberate targeting of civilians, whether in Baghdad, Kyiv, Gaza, or New York City, are all war crimes.
…There will be no prosecution of Saudi Arabian rulers for the war crimes committed in Yemen or for the US military and political leadership for the war crimes they carried out in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Libya, or a generation earlier in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos. The atrocities we commit, such as My Lai, where 500 unarmed Vietnamese civilians were gunned down by US soldiers, which are made public, are dealt with by finding a scapegoat, usually a low-ranking officer who is given a symbolic sentence. Lt. William Calley served three years under house arrest for the killings at My Lai. Eleven US soldiers, none of whom were officers, were convicted of torture at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. But the architects and overlords of our industrial slaughter, including Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, Gen. Curtis LeMay, Harry S. Truman, Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger, Lyndon Johnson, Gen. William Westmoreland, George W. Bush, Gen. David Petraeus, Barack Obama and Joe Biden are never held to account. They leave power to become venerated elder statesmen.
But of course, only the losers of wars ever face any justice.
Interviewed in the documentary, “The Fog of War,” [Robert McNamara who was secretary of defense during the escalation of the Vietnam war by president Lyndon Johnson] was repentant, not only about targeting Vietnamese civilians but about the aerial targeting of civilians in Japan in World War II, overseen by Air Force General Curtis LeMay.
“LeMay said if we’d lost the war, we’d all have been prosecuted as war criminals,” McNamara said in the film. “And I think he’s right…LeMay recognized that what he was doing would be thought immoral if his side had lost. But what makes it immoral if you lose, and not immoral if you win?”
LeMay, later head of the Strategic Air Command during the Korean War, would go on to drop tons of napalm and firebombs on civilian targets in Korea which, by his own estimate, killed 20 percent of the population over a three-year period.
That only the losers ever face justice is something that is well understood by those who commit war crimes, who proceed to commit even bigger war crimes so as to ensure that they do not lose.
I dare say the vast majority of states who ever had ambitions outside their own borders (whether territorial or trade), or dissenting populations within their borders, have had their own version of “Carthago delenda est”, going back to the earliest such states. And most such states had innocent blood on their hands, and unpunished war criminals. There is nothing new under the sun.
A great post and an important post, Mano. However, we Americans must never let our shame, great as it is, mute or muffle our denouncement of Putin’s crimes.
There are tragic events other than wars.
“Integration of poor countries into the global market has meant that areas which were once able to feed themselves are now unable to do so. Neo-liberalism forces them to use energy sources that are life-preservers in the short run but are death machines for their descendants.” -- Don Fitz.
I feel very sad that Sri Lanka has become a prime example for this. A country that depended on international tourism to pay for the import of essential items could no longer do that.
American, British and Canadian soldiers were heroes in WW-2. But not always.
https://allthatsinteresting.com/us-war-crimes-ww2
This should be a war crime:
Horseback-riding goat a hit on B.C. farm
Chris Hedges’ post is well worth reading. No wonder Russia was so peeved when Biden denounced Putin as a war criminal. Such hypocrisy.
file thirteen @6: USA and Russia are both culpable for war crimes, and have swapped accusations for decades. Russia being ‘peeved’ is itself hypocrisy. Fuck them both, but for today, fuck Russia.
Rob #7
Russia is peeved because the US has gone beyond using the term “war crime” (easily ignored) to brandishing the term “war criminal” at the autarch. Now that’s personal!
Yes, fuck them both, right up the jaxie.
I suppose, but that doesn’t make the righteous indignation wrong.
(Arguably, it’s better to condemn others but absolve oneself of some immorality than to absolve everyone for that immorality)
More to the point, to deprecate that indignation on that basis is to weaken the opposition to at least some immorality; what, the USA should not have imposed sanctions over deeds the like of which they themselves did?
(Obs, it does depend on one’s metaethics)
Is there any part of this “special military operation” that *isn’t* a war crime?
@Matt G: They restored water supply to crimea that ukraine was blocking as reaction to the annexation, in the very beginning of the war. But other than that, probably nothing.
@2 moarscienceplz
However, we Americans must never let our shame, great as it is, mute or muffle our denouncement of Putin’s crimes.
Bullshit.
Among other things, the USA has invaded Granada. Panama, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria with basically no reason.
You Americans have never admited the land grab in Mexico back in the 1840’s or so.
At the very least, Russia attacked to prevent possible genocide. Putin seems to be the good guy. President Obama with his hit list of jihadhi- does not
jrkrideau, your persona has become a joke.
It’s all you’ve got. But thanks for the warning.
(And sure, why not bathe in it? It becomes you)
So fucking what.
Russia’s land grab is no different because the USA once did a land grab.
But Russia is doing it right now. And more violently.
Well, yeah.
By invading a peaceful neighbouring country.
By shelling their cities, killing the inhabitants in their thousands.
By devastating infrastructure.
By holding populations hostage.
(Still, for once you’re a truth-teller: “Russia attacked”)
Much like Hitler was the good guy, sure.
Geez, turn your pages forward. Been more than five years since Obama was president, though admittedly Trump was Putin’s puppet. But he’s gone too.
(get with it!)
I mean, how much more obvious could it be?
Russia is invading Ukraine; Ukraine is not invading Russia.
Russia is bombing cities in Ukraine; Ukraine is not bombing cities in Russia.
Russia is waging war, Ukraine is defending itself.
You said it yourself: “Russia attacked”.
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How in the world you imagine an ageing kleptocrat is a good guy for inciting a war of conquest is beyond me.
(And a fucking stupid war, at that. I didn’t believe it would happen, before it did, because it was just such a fucking stupid thing to do. All downside, no upside)
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Anyway, fine. Putin is immiserating Russia on an ego trip, and Russia will pay the price for at least a generation.
(Nobody wins, but Russia loses the most)
jrkrideau, not much for the retorts, are you?
(I know, it’s hard when you’ve got nothing but bullshit. I should pity you)
jrkrideau @13:
If you eagerly swallow everything pumped out by the Russians, yes. Problem with that is the inevitable cognitive dissonance could be fatal. For example, this article by Pepe Escobar (I’ll bet you’ve heard of him), written on Feb 24, describing the Russian victory in Ukraine. It only took an hour! Meanwhile, we’re on week five.
Does Russia have an equivalent to Israel’s hasbara? I hope the pay is worth the loss of dignity.
So, according to jrkrideau, an historical land grab makes any criticism of Putin’s illegal “attack” (jrks word) on Ukraine in 2022 nul and void.
Lets just think about that for a moment shall we?
Which European nation should then be allowed to admonish Putin?
England? Nope.
France?. Mmm mmm, na.
Germany? No.
Belgium? Certainly not.
Holland? Na.
Spain, Portugal….
All guilty of Empire and the assiciated expansions.
Turkey? No, no (the descendents of those Ottomans cannot ever be absolved of the crimes of the old dead Empire).
Italy then? No, that nasty Roman Empire has a lot to answer for. Just what did the Romans ever do for us?
USA then? No. The USA from East coast to West coast and from the great lakes to the Rio Grande is one big land grab.
Ooh, Canada, the second largest country in land area in the world? You, jrk, should know this one. Nope. It is the most massive land grab in history.
New Zealand? They seem an innocent little country a long way away. Nope. Land grab again.
Australia? Sorry again, same deal. Massive land grab. And this is only a small selection.
We can go on and on in this vein. Lots of blood flows in it.
So under jrks logic none of these countries should be allowed to criticise and sanction Putins brutal invasion of Ukraine, now.
I don’t profess to know the history of Russia, but I would suspect somewhere between Moscow and the Bering Straight there have been land grabs and brutal oppression by Russia of local indigenous peoples.
It appears to be the old sins of the father trope you are pushing. What are you a Catholic?
Off topic, but this is what a colonial land grab looks like. https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/map.php
Edit to the above….
Arrrgghhh! countries!
An interesting viev of of the Russia—Ukrainian confict from an Indian perspective. The author in o former Indian ambassador.
https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/comment/dissecting-ukraine-imbroglio-379257
jrkrideau @22:
By “interesting” you mean in line with all the other paid shills of The Russian Ministry of Disinformation, like Gilbert Doctorow, Pepe Escobar, etc.
The author of that article writes for The Cradle, the same propaganda site which published the article I linked to in #17. Please read that article, and comment.
As for the article you linked to, early on it claims;
In Poland? Does he take all of us (apart from you) as utter fools? If you know his source for this rubbish, please provide it.
jrkrideau, hah. What’s interesting is how far off the verifiable reality that bullshit lies.
“An estimated 60,000 Ukrainian troops are under siege and the effort is to make them surrender rather than take the easy route to vanquish them.”
Which is why cities are being reduced to rubble.
Which is why nearly 4 million Ukrainians have had to flee the country, and millions more are internally displaced.
You do know everyone can see the footage of destruction, the refugee columns, and so forth, right?
Also, the perspective of some Indian is not necessarily the Indian perspective.
So, one more laughable claim:
“Mariupol will give the two independent Donbass republics a major port head that would provide them access to the world market, which is hugely significant for future development of that entire resource-rich region, straddling Ukraine’s rust belt. Mariupol is not only a centre for grain trade, metallurgy and heavy engineering but also higher education and business. Sensing Mariupol’s centrality to Russian strategy, the neo-Nazi Azov Brigade has been deployed to the port city. That explains the residual resistance.”
Mariupol is now basically rubble, except for the port and dock areas, since Russia hopes to conquer that. So no, right now it’s not even slightly a centre for grain trade, metallurgy and heavy engineering but also higher education and business.
It’s rubble. You can see it for yourself if you care to look online — drone footage of a once-peaceful and thriving city looking like a scene from WW2.
So yeah, it is true that the only remaining inhabitants are civilians who for whatever reason can’t leave and resistance fighters who are bravely willing to give their lives to protect their country and its citizens.
It’s bleedingly obvious Putin wanted to take the city, and that his forces could not manage it, so that’s why they turned to bombing the shit out of it instead. But even the tottering apartment blocks, the stumps of the buildings, the very streets will have Ukrainian combatants who will make the Russian attack pay a very, very dear price once they commit to, you know, actually attacking with troops instead of shelling from a distance.
It’s only “residual resistance” in the sense that the city is now residual.
When Russia finally concedes to reality and concedes its war failure, it will be rebuilt anew.
(Shame what Russia and its people will have to endure because of Putin’s stupid gambit; the bread queues are already starting)
@22 jrkrideau
From your source,
Conveniently, no mention of the fact that it is to all intents and purposes practically illegal in Putin’s Russia to criticise him.
Fuck me, even in North Korea the Kim dynasty enjoys wide public support, but only beacuse not supporting the regime invokes nasty repercussions a la Stalin.
tuatara @25: The ‘polls’ were supposedly conducted in Poland. That 70% of Poles would approve of Putin (or any Russian leader for that matter) is a sick joke.
tuatara, um, “polls conducted in Poland”.
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It’s another lie, of course.
(https://www.ynetnews.com/magazine/article/b1jgglszc)
Ah JM and Rob. You guys posted yours while I was typing (thumbing) mine so I didnt see them. Sorry.
I would not for a moment believe that 70% of Poles support Putin. So I took it to mean that the pos were conducted from Poland.
My point was that you cannot trust a poll on Putins popularity while opposing him gets you imprisoned or murdered.
And anyway just what the fuck is an “unfriendly” poll in Poland? Perhaps they hold a gun to your head while they ask how much you love Putin?
jrk just seems to post whatever helps him legitimise this awful crime by Putin. It is just fucking grotesque.
tuatara @28: jrkrideau is far from alone. It’s almost like a subculture of westerners who detest the west so much (with some justification), that they go overboard in the other direction. And there are ‘journalists’ who happily toe the Kremlin (or Beijing) party line, whether from ideology or for money.
The weird thing is that even when these ‘journalists’ write stuff that is demonstrably false, the true believers don’t waver. They’re like anti-vaxxers or Qanon followers in this regard. Reality simply doesn’t matter.
Thanks ever so much, Putin.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Ukrainian_refugee_crisis)