Should war criminals always be prosecuted?

I am just wondering, whether war criminal should always be prosecuted or only those, which are from minor far away countries?
Social media is now hunting Joseph Kony, and "The Hague" is good at hunting and judging the Yugoslavian war heads, but when it comes to the Iraq War, everyone appears to have forgotten, that this war was started, based on a lie and cost so many innocent people their lifes.
So why is it that the World Tribunal Court in The Hague is not asking for Bush, Blair and Howard to be extradited and to stand trial?
In your opinion, should those three guys be jugded by the Hague?
I was writing two emails to the UN in Australia and the UN headquarter in NY, asking them why those guys go unpunished, and guess what never received an answer.......
Is this institution (The Hague) only looking at those not within our ranks?

 

I also believe Blair, Bush and Howard have questions that need to be answered reagrding the lies that saw Irqa invade by these three men, but the UN will never investigate these questionaly individuals.

 

should war criminals always be prosecuted?

Always!

Starting with the biggest war criminals of them all since Hitler ie. Tony Blair, George Bush and John Howard.

AND

If 9/11 and 7/7 were indead inside jobs then Blair and Bush should be imprisoned for life and stripped of their wealth.

 

I hope they will be tried eventually. Amazing that everyone is talking about Kony and his Lords Resistance Army which hardly even exists anymore, but ignoring Bush, Blair and Howard, who are responsible for every single death in Iraq.

 

Yes, if they violated international law they should be held to account.

The Kony Campaign is very interesting.

It's supported by Luis Moreno Ocampo, Chief Prosecutor for the ICC.

Kony was the first to be indicted by the ICC in 2005, it will be interesting to see where the US State Department goes from here. Is the US going to set a precedent for backing up ICC indictments with substantial military force?

Seems unlikely, since the US has not ratified the '98 Rome Statute and the ICC does not have any authority to prosecute wars of aggression.

It seems unlikely that Bush, Howard or Blair will ever be indicted. That would require co-operation from the serving governments of their respective nations, which is extremely unlikely. And even if they are indicted, it's very unlikely they will be found guilty.

ICC goes after people who they have a reasonable chance of first of all, bringing to trial, and secondly of course that they can successfully prosecute them.

I really wonder what the point of the ICC is, it has no real power to do anything. Certainly it doesn't have any kind of police force. USA, China, India, Israel and many other nation states have not ratified the Rome Statute and do not intend to, at least not any time soon.

 

The winners get to decide if they want to try their own or not.

 

interesting thoughts, cheers

 

Unfortunately you comment is so true...History shows that the victors determine if a crime is a crime.

If the leaders of a country at war decides to incinerate thousands of non-combatants (men woman and children of all ages ) one would assume after the war is over the people involved will be brought to justice..

But yet, at the end of ww2 two nuclear bombs was dropped over 2 cites in Japan. tens and thousands of people instantly died and the rest over the year by radiation poisoning.

Criminals or Hero's ?

 

When enforcing the law, always apply a uniform standard. This whether it be to a Milosevic, Pinochet, Osama bin Laden, or a Bush.

 

It is very difficult to bring lying scoundrels like Blair to justice, but the threat should always be hanging over them until they die.

 

Legal according to the Hague Convention.

 

What is their crime? Invasion of another state? This is now a crime? Study the history of this world please a little more thoroughly.

 

What the other nazis were tried for, obviously: the crime of making war. If the war is defensive, that is an acceptable defence. Bush and Bliar were simple aggressors, basing their warmaking on deliberate lies, as you know.

 

Nuremberg Trials. Look em up.

 

The ICC lacks the legal authority to prosecute individuals for wars of aggression.

As for the ICJ, it's a bit late to do anything, forces have already mostly been withdrawn from Iraq. In any case the US does not recognise the ICJ.

Then of course the US and UK have veto power in the UNSC, so they're hardly going to enforce an ICJ decision against the war, or to rule it illegal themselves.

And even if that somehow were to happen, so what? So the ICJ and UNSC rules the war illegal, what are they going to do? The US will just ignore them like they always do.

No, it's up to the citizens of the USA, UK, and Australia, and everyone else involved to not allow their leaders to start stupid illegal wars. The UN in reality has bugger all power to stop such actions.

 

Unfortunately due to the events from the past week we now know the U.S Government does not need the consent of it's people (Congress) to declare war on another nation.

I hope the U.K and Aus constitution still allows it's public to decide...Did the Australian pubic have a choice of Wether or not we should be in Iraq and Afghanistan?

 

yes
now
uncertain
can't be bothered

I suppose this "poll" will be recorded in the anals of PC "inteligence", as a credible "study".

PMSL

 

Which "events" are you referring to? Only congress is empowered to declare war. There's a bit of a grey area in what constitutes a "declaration of war" vs the power of the President as Commander in Chief. Bin Ladens assassination for example treads the fine line.

And no, Australia has less checks and balances in place than the USA. By convention I suppose it is the PM & C who make the decision. But even that isn't entirely clear, certainly our Commander in Chief really has nothing much to do with the process. And in any case they are often chosen by the serving PM. Basically, a handful of people including the PM make the decision, at least that's how I understand it. They may and probably do consult with various agencies and parliamentarians, but they're under no legal obligation to do so.

One of the many reasons why we need a new constitution imo.

As for the UK, they don't have a written constitution, though I imagine their process is similar to ours.

And @aussiefree2ride: No one would consider a poll of 9 unconfirmed people on one website as a credible "study", what nonsense.

 

That's what I thought...but after hearing this last week I now wonder.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=5zNwOeyuG84

 

Just as I feared...it seems to be a huge grey area...One would think that in a democracy, we the public will have a choice of whether we should go to war .

 

Thanks for that link, very interesting.

I do not know if implementing a "no fly zone" constitutes an act of war? Certainly if there was to be a large deployment of troops they would need Congress' permission, not only to declare war but also to foot the bill.

In any case, at least the President has a mandate to rule, and to lead the armed forces.

Our PM is not directly elected and neither is our Governor General, who is also the Commander in Chief. Further, the GG is not elected at all, they are chosen by the PM. What actual political power they have is pretty unclear, most people in Australia probably don't even know who our GG is. I doubt the GG would even be consulted, other than as a courtesy.

I suppose the only legitimate "check" we have is the caucus of the party who holds government, or if we've got a minority govt like we do now, independents or possibly opposition support.

It would be nice if we required a joint sitting of parliament to declare war at least.

 

No mate,
we didn't have a choice, the right wing racist warhead Howard just did it.....

 

sorry for the *w* behind the *no*, the wasn't planned.
Apart from that I am not surprised by your comment, as so often meaningless.
I guess you can't even differentiate between *uncertain* and *can't be bothered*....

 

I see. You have created a "how long have you been beating your wife" type poll, And I`m the one posting meaningless material. Somehow, "uncertain" and "can`t be bothered", slip into the equation to replace "no", and the problem is my comprehension skill set.

I can see a pattern here, even if you can`t. Some of us are getting closer to understanding why, if not how, you arrive at some of your conclusions.

 

yeap, you just proved my point...