Why the U.S. doesn’t prosecute its war criminals

The Peace Palace at the Hague, Netherlands, home to the International Court of Justice primary judicial branch of the United Nations. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International. Author: Lybil BEr.

Why doesn’t the U.S. prosecute its war criminals? This has been on my mind for a long time, and I’m reminded of it anew after seeing Donald Trump’s threat to prosecute/jail Hillary Clinton should he become president, not to mention the chants of “Lock her up” at Trump rallies.

One bulwark against fascism in the U.S. has been our cultural adherence to “insure domestic tranquility” in the preamble to the Constitution. That adherence has in turn become part of our political culture. In particular, elections in the U.S. are ways to change leaders and policies without violence; unlike in other countries the winners in the U.S. are not expected to threaten to jail or execute the losers. Or prosecute them by bypassing the presumption of innocence. Absent these protections, history shows that not only leaders but also their followers leap to civic violence when elections do not turn out as they like.

It may be true that we carry the political custom of insuring domestic tranquility too far. I’d certainly like to see the U.S. join the International Court of Justice. I’d like to see Henry Kissinger, for example, brought before it. But as a matter of justice, not the result of an election.

So of all the things I don’t like about Trump’s candidacy, the one that’s most frightening is that a great deal of his constituency seems to believe that the fascism embodied in his statements to jail his opponent is OK. I hope that this doesn’t turn out to be an eerie replay of the destruction of the Weimar Republic. I don’t usually panic by claims that, say, electing a warmongering president will destroy the country; the country seems to get through these things, at least domestically. But now I worry that even if Trump fails, what will those fellow citizens who agree with him do? And what should reasonable citizens do to discourage the dangerous extremism of Trump and his excitable followers, who after all are our neighbors?

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Ed Agro, an occasional contributor to Engaging Peace, is administrator of the online war tax resisters online forum wtr-s. The above essay is a slightly edited version of the one that recently appeared in that forum.

 

A truly patriotic American is….

 

Photo of a peace flag by the US Capitol during the peace march on 2007-01-27.
Image by Rrenner at English Wikipedia and licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license.

In my view, a truly patriotic American is an activist dedicated to the goals outlined in the Preamble of our Constitution.  This entails the effort to “form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity…”

I also believe that anyone who enjoys any benefits from living within a country purporting to be a democracy and providing at least some access to a democratically-based political process has the obligation to participate in that process—in particular by voting.

So, how do you become a patriotic activist in the United States? First of all you need to evaluate the current state of our system.  Ask yourself some questions: is everyone in the country treated justly?  If not who commits the injustices? Who suffers from the injustices?  What will it take to reduce injustices—better laws? Reform of the judicial system? Who has the power to make those changes?  How can you influence those power-holders?

And how about domestic tranquility?  Is the United States aglow with domestic tranquility right now? If not, what individuals and groups are dividing Americans against themselves?  What can be done to bring people together?

When today’s politicians use the word “defense,” are they really talking about defense or is the term “defense” a euphemism for terms such as conquest, imperialism, hegemony, domination? Do current governmental defense programs help or undermine the goal of defense?  And would not the ultimate defense be living in peace?

And then we have the “general welfare” and “blessings of liberty”? Does having a higher level of income inequality than all other “developed” nations contribute to the general welfare of people in this country? In the long run, can it contribute to your welfare? How about racist, sexist, ethnocentric language, or attacks on people of color, or Jews, or Muslims, or Catholics, or immigrants? Do they contribute to the general welfare? Do they secure the blessings of liberty for you, your children, your grandchildren?

If not, then pay attention to the promises of this year’s candidates for political office.  Do they offer adequate solutions to the challenges of democracy? Do some seem more tuned in to the problems than others?  Think carefully, but act too.  Vote.