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American War Crimes
Go Unpunished
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Terrible things often happen to innocent people during a war. Until after WWII rules of war were mostly included in treaties. After WWII the International Humanitarian Law (IHL), or the law of armed conflict, was agreed to and signed by almost 200 countries - including the USA. It is better known as the Geneva Conventions. One of the laws main intent is to protect non-combatants. That is, innocent civilians who are not taking part in, or assisting, the fighting.
This rules of war have often been ignored by many of the signing countries but that does not make it OK for the USA to also do so. Following are just a few examples of war crimes committed by the USA since WWII.
Yes, Saddam Hussein was a terrible dictator but there are a lot of terrible dictators in the world and that was not a justifiable reason for the Iraq war. The George W. Bush administration used lies and deceit to get us into that war. Then they used illegal torture method on prisoners. Why weren't Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld charged with the war crimes they committed. Now we see Obama continuing the same types of crimes.
Under Obama we continue to see the same disregard for innocent civilian life in Afghanistan. It has recently become widely known that the use of drones in Afghanistan has included the intentional bombing of civilians that attempted to help those killed by an original drone attack. Drones have also been used to kill civilians that attended the funeral of a person killed in the original drone attack. Drone attacks that target know enemy fighters and leaders certainly can be considered proper military procedure even if there is some collateral killing. Unavoidable collateral civilian deaths are not a war crime, but it is a war crime to kill civilians coming to the aid of those injured by the original attack and then those attending the funeral.
It is troubling, that it does not seem to bother most Americans that our troops have massacred a great many civilians in all the wars in which we have been evolved. In fact, some whole heartedly approved. During WWII I we used the words "Kraut" and "Jap", during the Korean war it was "Chinks", during the Vietnam war is was "Gook", and now "Arabs". All of these terms are meant to dehumanize the people, to think of them as pests that deserve to be exterminated.
You would think that the more educated western societies would be wise enough to realize that what our government is doing in the process of executing a war is wrong. Unfortunately, a higher level of book learning and economic success does not seem to correlate with higher morals and more common sense. Instead most chose to agree with the actions of our leaders, or just ignore the problem. There should be loud cries for justice and demands that our government and military leaders be tried for the war crimes they have committed, and continue to commit.
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