1937- WAR CRIMES AND OTHER STUFF.

In the aftermath of the Benghazi debacle [the U.S. putting an embassy in the middle of an unsecured area- with known militants roaming the land- and then pulling out their security]. There were voices [including the president] that condemned the killing of the ambassador as acts of terror- or on the same grounds as a war crime.

The president used language like ‘bring them to justice’.

When one nation declares war on another [or in this case- a specific group- Al Qaeda]- then the killing of actual representatives of the other side- when that side is dumb enough to plant them like sitting ducks- is actually considered a legitimate military target [compared to the killing of an ordinary citizen who holds no official capacity].

Now- before I lose my conservative readers- listen clearly.

I of course condemn the killing of ambassador Stevens- and the 3 other Americans.

After watching/reading the stories about this incident over the past couple of weeks- I fault the U.S. administration for failing to properly protect the area.

We now know that that the U.S. watched the attack unfold- over a period of 7-8 hours- and did nothing.

There are conflicting stories- our people on the ground said they requested help- multiple times.

They said that help was denied.

We had a brave young Navy seal who took it upon himself to try and save the ambassador- he was killed in the attempt.

And we had the president say- that as soon as he heard of the attack- he immediately made ‘the call’ to increase security around the world- and start the steps to bring the attackers ‘to justice’.

What our guys needed was ‘real time’ help- we had a drone filming the thing- some possibly armed- and we watched our guys get killed for 7 hours- and did nothing.

Now- this was a debacle in no uncertain terms- and the loss of our guys is tragic.

But- when you declare war- and put an official representative of the opposing side smack dab in the middle of those we declared war on- what the ‘heck’ do we expect?

War crimes.

Right now in the media- this term is often used against those we deem ready for removal.

It makes no difference to us whether the side doing the removal are Al Qaeda- we simply refer to the leaders as having committed ‘war crimes’ or ‘crimes against humanity’.

We did this with Gadhaffi- doing it with Assad [Syria] and will probably keep doing it from now on.

When you see one side as having committed ‘crimes against humanity’ in general- then it justifies the other side- no matter how bad they are.

The whole concept of holding people responsible for war crimes arose after world war 1- yet it wasn’t until WW2 that we really had the concept down.

After the war was over- there were trials held in Germany- the most famous being Nuremburg- and we tried the German military men who committed ‘war crimes’.

Some of the criteria for a war crime simply said ‘if the losing side did it- and the winning side did not- then that’s a war crime’.

Sounds a little like Jeff Foxworthy type stuff.

But this is true- some of the German submarine captains actually used as there defense- that the allies [our side] did the same thing- and that was enough to say ‘okay- not a war crime’.

As you can see- war crimes- or ‘crimes against humanity’ are in the eye of the beholder.

Now- in the entire history of the world- the biggest one [or 2] day killing of civilians- that is a targeting of civilians for a military/political goal- was the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Yes- out of all the nations on the planet- the U.S. killed more civilians- on purpose- in these 2 attacks- then in any other single bombing in history.

We had our reasons for sure- but the immediate deaths were around 200 thousand- not counting the many women and children who died many years later- from the long tortuous process of radiation cancer.

These types of deaths- especially on many of the thousands of young kids who suffered extreme agony- great fear in their deaths- were not considered ‘crimes against humans’.

Yet- the water boarding of a terrorist- an actual enemy who is in our custody- is considered tortuous- and meets the criteria of a war crime.

See how messed up this is?

Now- in the past 2 years the U.S. has worked closely with the state of Israel in monitoring/spying on Iran- to see how far along they are coming with their nuclear program.

We share intelligence- and have even ‘partnered’ with them in some clandestine op’s.

The famous Stuxnet virus- a computer virus that was launched to disable Iran’s nuclear reactors- was a joint program between the U.S. and Israel.

Okay- one of the other secret operations that has been going on is the killing of civilian scientists who are working with Iran’s nuclear program.

These scientists are not military targets- they are civilians- who are deemed ‘worthy’ targets because of their role in the nuclear program.

I have heard no one call these killings ‘crimes against humans’ or ‘war crimes’ even though these scientists are civilians.

No- in the reports about their killings- there is a sense of ‘hooray’.

In the past 3 years there has been a collection of various bomb parts- dropped by the U.S. - in the mountainous region between Afghanistan and Pakistan.

There are legal teams on the ground- representing the families of kids and women who have been killed by our nonstop use of Drones in the area.

We- the U.S.- have a military objective- to root out the Taliban [who were ‘created’ by the U.S. govt. when we aided them against the Russians]. In the process of this rooting out- we have killed- and keep on killing- Muslim women and kids.

Now- do we ‘mean’ to kill them?

Of course not.

But we are making the military/political calculation that so many kids and women will indeed be killed- we know this.

So- we are basically saying ‘look- we really don’t want to kill these kids- but this does happen from time to time’.

Can we help it?

Of course- stop using the ‘darn’ drones- solved.

The whole point I’m making in this post is we- the citizens of the world- are often manipulated by the way a story is told- by the way the media show us stuff.

I know of no U.S. citizen who even thinks twice about calling the killing of the Japanese- and thousands of kids- with radiation poisoning- a very tortuous death-  a war crime.

Yet many see the water boarding of a terrorist as a war crime.

Does this make any sense at all?

All killing- all war- is wrong.

What?

You mean our response to 9-11 is wrong?

I mean that when humans resort to killing other humans- because they see no other way to resolve the problem- then it’s wrong.

I don’t like hearing the words ‘this guy committed a crime against humans’.

When you put a bullet in another human- and kill that person- it is never a just act- not in my book.

Yes- there are people who have committed terrible crimes- and I- like everybody else- also think ‘that so and so needs to die’.

But as a society- we should be able to deal with them [life without ever getting out] without having to kill them.

Over the next few weeks we will see the outcome of what really happened in Libya- but when I hear words like ‘we will bring them to justice’.

I don’t truly get it- if we [the U.S.] declare war on a group- we then need to be more responsible about where we put official rep’s of the U.S.

Our official Rep’s are deemed ‘justified’ targets- they represent the U.S. govt. in an official capacity.

The U.S. needs to respond to attacks on them as an act of war.

I heard Leon Panetta say ‘we couldn’t put our troops at risk in an unknown situation’.

No- you say that if it’s some type of rescue operation of non U.S. citizens- but when it’s an attack by those we have declared war on- and they are attacking our official U.S. rep on the ground- no- we do indeed put our troops at risk to go in and do what needs to be done.

That’s war.

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