The answer is simple. In war there are always different standards for what you can legitimately do to an active enemy in the field, and what you can do to a prisoner at your mercy. That does not necessarily mean the atomic bombing of Hiroshima was not a war crime, but it does mean that the question requires a fundamentally different analysis from that of whether waterboarding an “enemy combatant” is a war crime.
There are prisoners who have been in the Guantanamo detention camp for a decade now. Most of the people taken there were eventually released but they spent years in captivity. If you’re implying that most of the prisoners were just picked up for an interrogation and released after a short stay, you’re wrong and I have no idea where you got that impression.
Incidentally I think today is the 10th anniversary of the arrival of the first 20 prisoners at the Guantanamo facility. I’ll go waterboard a cake.
Apparently you can’t tell the difference between a question and a series of declarative statements.
Here’s a clue-> -> -> -> -> ->You put one of these, “?”, at the end of a question.
Could you provide an example of a court deeming this to be a “war crime?” Probably not, so who says it’s a war crime?
Of course it’s true that targeting civilians with strategic bombing is an awful thing that the Allies did - and not just the atomic bombings, and not just the USA - and nobody was prosecuted for it. The fact that the Allies committed many war crimes and nobody went to jail for them is something that’s been discussed quite a lot. No one denies it. However,
It’s also true, as per BrainGlutton’s note, that there is a substantial difference, legally speaking, between military action taken inthe field and what you do to POWs. By international law and convention some people are *hors de combat
and should not be harmed; POWs, the wounded, shipwrecked sailors, people bailing from stricken aircraft, and the like. A person at your mercy (a good phrase, BG) is not the same thing as a person in a combat zone. There has always been an allowance for SOME collateral civilian death as the result of military action, but killing and torturing defenceless people - civilians or not - is not considered legal by any civilized nation.
Of course, that raises the question as to what constitutes appropriate care for avoiding civilian death. Certainly during World War II, the USAAF, RAF and RCAF deliberately targeted and killed civilians. The Luftwaffe did as well. The Soviets may have too; I’m not super familiar with their strategic bombing efforts.
Very true. WWII was also really the last theatre where soldiers were permitted to engage in behaviours like looting, beating prisoners, etc.. that would get you court-martialed in today’s military. Modern thought on rules of engagement didn’t really begin until after the end of the conflict.
I’m a bit less cynical than others in this thread.
There have been a number of victors’ war crimes judged by the ICC. Unfortunately there has been a lack of will is prosecuting many of them, and the US is big enough to snub the whole thing with no repercussions. But it is not true that the victors get to define or pick war crimes.
I also think the geneva conventions make sense (at least given the reality that humans are an aggressive and tribal species). The mistake some are making is imagining them as an agreement between the two parties at war – they aren’t, they are an agreement between a nation and the international community.
Unrestricted submarine warfare was “banned” by the Second London Naval Treaty, but during WW2, those restrictions were not adhered to by the warring powers.
Practically speaking, international agreements don’t have magical powers of enforcement. They only have power when there is a nation (or group of nations) that have the will and the power to enforce the statutes.
No one has the interest or power to enforce the violations of the Second London Naval Treaty on the U.S. or Nimitz.
A thousand years from now, assuming we still have a global civilization, will they look back at the 20th century wars like we view the Mongol invasions?
“Meh. That’s what those unwashed barbarians did back then. <sniff> We’re more superior now.”
Remember, all previous American administrations also considered it torture, including Republican ones. Even the Bush administration considered it torture – until they wanted to do it after 9/11. It’s not like Bush came into office and immediately instituted waterboarding.
If the OP is near a major airport, we could probably get someone to drop by and waterboard him on an elective basis, just so he’s up to speed on what if feels like.
How about an exception for someone who has waterboarded himself? Anyone with an opinion waterboarding who hasn’t read Scylla’s thread should go read it now.
Probably the latter(should be the latter, certainly); but it appears nobody has yet made a binding definitive ruling; but every international body that has looked at the question says yes.
How about an exception for someone who has waterboarded himself? Anyone with an opinion waterboarding who hasn’t read Scylla’s thread should go read it now.
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Heh exception made. I can’t even begin to imagine doing that yourself…I’d take the tear gas chamber a hundred times over rather than be waterboarded even once again.
