Does killing innocent Iraqis make you a war criminal?

[ProSense]

Even the soldiers who want to come home are killing innocent Iraqis. Are they war criminals?

General Petraeus did what Bush told him to do as a military officer.

The entire military should walk off the job and disobey orders if that what it takes to end the war, but since that is friggin unrealistic, let's stick to reality.

These are the people who should be held accountable:

THE ARCHITECTS OF WAR

The face of this war is Bush's. He should be the focus, not the pawns he hides behind.

[pwb]

1. If they are innocent, Yes it does make you a war criminal.

With no identifiable army to stand and fight against, it makes it hard to tell, but a soldier usually knows. i think.

[whistle]

2. Does killing innocent Iraqis make America safer?

:yoiks: I do not feel safer as the result of 800,000 dead Iraqis and nearly 3.0 million Iraqi refugees created by Bush's War!

[MNDemNY]

3. Better to kill them there, so they don't follow us home.

:sarcasm:

[wtmusic]

4. What about killing the ones guilty of defending their own country? nt

[IndianaJones]

5. not always. nt.

[Squatch]

6. How would a soldier know if they're "innocent" or not?

From a soldier's POV, EVERYBODY in a combat zone is potentially the person who puts you in your grave.

[atreides1]

8. I guess Lt Calley was innocent then?

As were the Das Reich Division!!!!!

[Squatch]

9. LT Calley killed Iraqis?

Holy crap, that guy gets around.

[tuckessee]

16. So that gives them an excuse to kill anybody & everybody? n/t

[atreides1]

7. Justice is blind for reason!!!

"Even the soldiers who want to come home are killing innocent Iraqis. Are they war criminals?"

In a word yes, especially if they know they are killing innocents, but here is a better explanation:

Jus in bello (laws governing the conduct of war) thinking, on the other hand, drove the prosecution of crimes against the laws of war, which were defined in the Nuremberg Tribunal Charter as ‘murder, ill-treatment, or deportation to slave labour or for any other purpose of civilian population of or in occupied territory, murder or ill-treatment of prisoners of war or persons on the seas, killing of hostages, plunder of public or private property, wanton destruction of cities, towns, or villages, or devastation not justified by military necessity’.

If they are told to shoot first and ask questions later, does that exonerate them?


"General Petraeus did what Bush told him to do as a military officer."

Here's a list of names of men who were also following orders, were they war criminals?

Hermann Goering
Joseph Goebbels
Heinrich Himmler
Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel
General Alfried Jodl
Admiral Erich Raeder
Admiral Karl Doenitz

So, in accordance with recent history, not only should those who were the architects of war be considered war criminals, but those who carried out their orders, should be considered just as guilty!

The excuse of "I was following orders" didn't work for these men, why should US military personnel be held to a lower standard?

[Kelly Rupert]

10. What do you mean by "kill?"

If you mean shooting them deliberately point-blank, knowing them to be civilians, yes.
If you mean shooting them, believing them to be combatants, no.
If you mean shooting them on reasonable suspicion of being combatants, likely no.
If you mean shooting them because there is a possibility that they might later be a combatant, yes.

If you mean ordering them deliberately targeted, yes.
If you mean ordering operations in which civilian death is likely and preventable, very possibly.
If you mean ordering operations in which every reasonable care is taken to prevent civilian death, no.

Then we have more-difficult issues:

What if you do not intervene in a sectarian genocide happening in territories under your military control?
What if you take sides in a sectarian conflict between militias?
What if you order operations which are unlikely to kill civilians, but which are also militarily unnecessary?
What if you order operations likely to kill civilians, but which you believe necessary to prevent an impending genocide?

It isn't cut-and-dried.

[truebrit71]

11. Yes. It is called 'murder'

.

[leftofthedial]

12. yes

[Marrah_G]

13. I understand what you are saying but

Posts like these always just end up being a big flamefest where we are told our loved ones are murders and rapists by a select few jerks.

[Dr. Strange]

14. An interesting question...

What about the soldiers who killed innocent Germans and Japanese in the "good" war? Were they war criminals?

[Zodiak]

15. I adhere to the Nuremberg principle

"Just following orders" is not an excuse, and never will be.

IF our soldiers participated in war crimes, then they are war criminals. We already know of more than a few glaring examples from this war (Abu Ghraib, Haditha). But not all soldies are like that...many are just support troops that do not get involved in the fighting at all. Others have no idea that the orders they were given were illegal.

But if they follow an order they know to be illegal and people die, then yes, they are war criminals. The fact that they are your sons and daughters does not change that, and the brass does not cover their asses by giving out the orders, either.

The Nuremberg principle is blind to emotional entreaties.

[ProSense]

17. The quesiton wasn't if they participated in war crimes,

it was if they're being killed. Aren't the Iraqis being killed by American bombs and gun fire innocent? Dead is dead.