It definitely feels very strange to me, too. I’ll try to explain it, it will still feel strange, but hopefully you won’t feel like anyone is getting away with something.
As I sit here in Texas, I’m covered by at least 2 jurisdictional (State/Fed) murder laws. Those murder laws are very strict because murder is one of the worst crimes there is. I’m not allowed to unlawfully intentionally kill anyone. Meaning, unless it’s in self-defense, I can’t intend to kill anyone. This is a good law to have. They exist over every inch of the world during peacetime.
In other places, there is a war going on. It’s not peacetime there. Unfortunately, a different, looser, less strict, set of laws operate in those places. You are allowed to intentionally kill someone in war. You just can’t go nuts with it (Geneva Convention restrictions). Perfectly legal to do it, just you know, make sure the thing you’re blowing up is really necessary, if so, we’ll excuse some minor collateral damage (dead civilians). Those are the laws of war that apply. War crimes only happen in a war.
So, between those to legal frameworks, which would you prefer to apply? Civilians are much more protected from murder in peacetime than they are in a war. Of course, it’s not a choice like Trump is proclaiming (war because I said so!), but determined by the facts. Society has wanted to make it pretty hard to turn off the stricter peacetime laws so not just every little use of the military automatically becomes a war and allows the military to kill as a measure of first resort. It’s takes a bit more military conflict than blowing up drug boats who are not fighting; as bad as that is.
Hope that helps some. Put you’re quote in this thread because my responses in FQ were not really tied to the actual FQ questions anymore.