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[Dunamisdeos]

1) Robert Bales was sentenced to Life without Parole for a massacre in Afghanistan. This was under President Nixon. This is the ONLY instance I found of a soldier being tried and convicted for actual war crimes rather than being given, say, a discharge.

Minor note. Robert Bales would have been about 1 year old when Nixon left office. Relevant events all occurred under the Obama admin.

Oh, I'm a jackass and accidentally searched his birth year. Got it.

You right.

Point is, this is an America thing, not a party thing. Also we are hardly the only first-world nation to have this problem, though we do certainly seem to be the most adamant about ignoring responsibility. And I understand that the concept of a war-crime is reasonably recent, but I also don't think that "raping and murdering hundreds of civilians" is something we didn't know was wrong before the term existed. Only thing that's changing, as usual with humanity and our sense of right and wrong, is that we can now be held accountable via consensus.

(added significant edits)

[smjjames]

1) Robert Bales was sentenced to Life without Parole for a massacre in Afghanistan. This was under President Nixon. This is the ONLY instance I found of a soldier being tried and convicted for actual war crimes rather than being given, say, a discharge.

Minor note. Robert Bales would have been about 1 year old when Nixon left office. Relevant events all occurred under the Obama admin.

Heh, I wondered what Nixon had to do with Afghanistan.

1) Robert Bales was sentenced to Life without Parole for a massacre in Afghanistan. This was under President Nixon. This is the ONLY instance I found of a soldier being tried and convicted for actual war crimes rather than being given, say, a discharge.

Minor note. Robert Bales would have been about 1 year old when Nixon left office. Relevant events all occurred under the Obama admin.

Oh, I'm a jackass and accidentally searched his birth year. Got it.

You right.

Point is, this is an America thing, not a party thing. Also we are hardly the only first-world nation to have this problem, though we do certainly seem to be the most adamant about ignoring responsibility. And I understand that the concept of a war-crime is reasonably recent, but I also don't think that "raping and murdering hundreds of civilians" is something we didn't know was wrong before the term existed. Only thing that's changing, as usual with humanity and our sense of right and wrong, is that we can now be held accountable via consensus.

(added significant edits)

Its more likely that it got applied selectively, sometimes with racism involved, and there wasn't really any kind of international system to enforce things.

While avoiding accountability goes along with it, the reasoning given is that the US government doesn't want it's sovereignity violated (ironic, I know) and that only Americans can investigate or charge Americans with war crimes.

It should also be noted that Russia pulled out of the ICC when it accused them of aggression after the invasion of Crimea. International bodies like the UN and the ICC only have power as long as others cooperate because they don't have any sort of force to add real teeth to them, as the powers that be (the permanent 5 on the security council) want it that way.

In other news, it's a sad thing when national security is threatened by a Presidents psychological hangup.

[sluissa]

Another issue is that the government tends to let the military deal with its own problems. And while it does occasionally do so appropriately, often the punishments, where they're handed out, are much more lenient than similar civilian punishments. (And often lessened years after the issue is off the radar.)

This is a trend that continues as you go deeper into the military structure.

In other news... Canada on the brink of war?

[smjjames]

In other news... Canada on the brink of war?

I suspect he isn't talking about a shooting war, but rather war in the 'no more mr. nice guy' sense. Also, isn't there a Canada politics thread around here somewhere?

[hector13]

When has he ever been a nice guy?

[sluissa]

I was under the impression that Canada fell under the Ameripol thread. Deserves to be here more than New Zealand anyway... not that I'm complaining about that... just seems silly to leave them out.

[Kagus]

What you're looking for is this:
https://undocs.org/S/RES/2467(2019)

Which, at the time of this post, is a page that hasn't been populated yet. The final document hasn't been publicly uploaded as of now.

Link actually works now, and resolution 2467 is available for viewing. Gonna take a peek at it later on today when I get some time.

EDIT: And yeah, so far as I can remember Canada has always had a place they can call their own in the Ameripol thread. What would America be without its hat?

[The Ensorceler]

It would be unfair for the public to not get the impression that we were all a bunch of rapists after we worked so hard to serve our country raped so many people

Fixed it, I guess... Goddamn is it hard to get the US to hold itself accountable for anything it does.

[McTraveller]

Fixed it, I guess... Goddamn is it hard to get the US to hold itself accountable for anything it does.

This is true of any "alpha" power - the only way "alpha" powers are accountable is if they choose to hold themselves accountable or if there are other equally powerful entities.

This is true on a playground, in a household, in a city, or in the international stage.

I think in the context of the USA, the idea is that "the USA" is ultimately supposed to be accountable to the population of the USA - not to the world stage.

So if there is an accountability issue with the USA, we need to look at ourselves (for those of us who are US citizens) to fix it, not to have some external body fix it.

ASIDE:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

In general there is a characteristic of this generation, especially within the USA, of trying to assign blame for the circumstances and then coerce/force others to fix it, rather than to fix problems ourselves.  Much of this is due to the massive frustration that younger demographics have at the current state of things - the frustration overshadows the "entrepreneurial spirit" that founded the country to fix problems ourselves.

Now, there is a balance, but even in issues like minimum wage or health care, the cry of this generation is "the government must fix it" rather than "we need to fix it".  It's a very subtle difference.  It even creeps in to ideas like "if only we would elect Person, they would be able to fix it" - it's putting all our hopes in one (or a few) heroes to fix things, instead of working together collectively.

[SalmonGod]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

In general there is a characteristic of this generation, especially within the USA, of trying to assign blame for the circumstances and then coerce/force others to fix it, rather than to fix problems ourselves.  Much of this is due to the massive frustration that younger demographics have at the current state of things - the frustration overshadows the "entrepreneurial spirit" that founded the country to fix problems ourselves.

Now, there is a balance, but even in issues like minimum wage or health care, the cry of this generation is "the government must fix it" rather than "we need to fix it".  It's a very subtle difference.  It even creeps in to ideas like "if only we would elect Person, they would be able to fix it" - it's putting all our hopes in one (or a few) heroes to fix things, instead of working together collectively.

That we're growing up under the most overbearing surveillance police state apparatus in history that bludgeons us mercilessly as older generations cheer anytime we try to do anything may have something to do with it.

[smjjames]

Biden has now jumped in the race for reals.

[Frumple]

Bleeeh. Not close enough to the primaries to think about who to vote for, but I'm not voting for a goddamn 70 year old in them.

[The Ensorceler]

Well, there's no way I can prosecute a war crime case by myself. The only thing I can do is get people to think about things until prosecuting war crimes is feasible. By sheer scale of many problems, organizing faciltating and communicating are the only way to accomplish more than jerking yourself off in a fit of self-righteous gardening. It's not that gardening is bad, it's generally good. It's that collectively stopping bad ecological practices at a global scale is too important to stick to gardening, and it's vastly preferable to address the big issue than to make sure you have a garden when you're running out of effort and have to choose.

I might have misunderstood your point, but if it was meant to describe me specifically, that's why I do what I do up there^. Disclaimer: I'm tired and may have misarticulated my own points.

[nenjin]

Yeah guys. Just fix the police state, police brutality, rampant corporate greed backed by government support and international policy yourselves. Stop blaming people and just make a difference!!111

Sorry, I find that attitude to be just as obnoxious as "nothing really matters." Like the power of positive thinking is going to fix things we have no ability or authority to change. Making America not suck is not the same as picking up trash on the side of the road.

[The Ensorceler]

Yeah guys. Just fix the police state, police brutality, rampant corporate greed backed by government support and international policy yourselves. Stop blaming people and just make a difference!!111

Sorry, I find that attitude to be just as obnoxious as "nothing really matters." Like the power of positive thinking is going to fix things we have no ability or authority to change. Making America not suck is not the same as picking up trash on the side of the road.

I'm very confused now. Are you saying voting doesn't matter and even collective solutions shouldn't prioritize it? I agree that there's also a lot to do besides voting and get-out-the-vote efforts (I can't do as much as I'd like...) , but I wouldn't say there's anything we have no power or ability to change.

Ugh, I can't tell what anyone means. You could be saying the exact opposite. I'm not responding to anything else until I've slept. Apologies to everyone if I've only made things more confusing.