Donald Trump, Mike Pence, and the War Criminals They're Gathering Didn't Come Out of Nowhere...
World Can't Wait's project, WarCriminalsWatch.org, researched war crimes charges against the last 3 U.S. presidents:
To be a President of the imperialist super-power, and commander in chief of the world's largest, most dangerous military = war crimes. The illegitimate "war on terror" of the Bush regime, killing millions and based on lies, and the targeted killing and wave of civilian deaths from Obama's "humanitarian" war on terror, both paved the way for the Trump/Pence regime's threats to use nukes under the fascist rubric of "America First."
When war crimes and war crminials have not been prosecuted, they continue.
Name: Donald John Trump
Born: June 14, 1946 in New York City, New York
Profession: Businessman/Television Personality
DJ Trump Administration Position:
- 45th President of the United States
War Crime Charges:
- The Rome Statute for the International Criminal Court defines the following as war crimes: willful killing; willfully causing great suffering or serious injury; intentional attacks against civilians or civilian objects; and intentionally launching unjustified attacks, knowing they will kill or injure civilians.
- According to data gathered by Airwars, U.S.-led efforts against ISIS have resulted in more civilian casualties during seven months of the Trump administration than 29 months under Obama.
- Trump has dropped some limits on drone strikes and eased combat rules that are in place to protect civilians.
- An air strike in Mosul in March of 2017 killed up to 200 civilians.
- There has also been less transparency when it comes to air attacks on Afghanistan. Since October 2017 there hasn’t been a release of monthly air strike figures, while the air war continues to escalate.
- “The other thing with the terrorists is you have to take out their families, when you get these terrorists, you have to take out their families,” Trump said in December 2015. “They care about their lives, don't kid yourself. When they say they don't care about their lives, you have to take out their families.”
- The United Nations Charter, Article 51 about self-defense states that there must be “a necessity of self-defense, instant, overwhelming, leaving no choice or means, and no moment of deliberation.” The UN charter also prohibits threats and preemptive use of force.
- Threatened to “totally destroy North Korea.” If carried out, this threat would amount to genocide, crimes against humanity, crimes of collective punishment, and would violate the principles of proportionality and distinction.
Associations:
- The Trump Organization, which is a holding company for all of its business ventures, including Trump Golf, Trump Hotels, Trump International Realty, and Trump Winery. It also “lists involvement in 515 subsidiaries and entities with 264 of them bearing Trump's name and another 54 including his initials.”
Name: Barack Hussein Obama
Born: August 4, 1961 in Honolulu, HI
Profession: Attorney, U.S. Senator
Obama Administration Position: 44th President of the United States
War Crime Charges:
- The Obama administration didn't prosecute any members of the Bush regime for any alleged war crimes, preferring to "look forward" rather than backward. This provided a bridge for the continuation of many Bush administration war crimes to continue during the Obama administration and then continue and be expanded on during the subsequent Trump administration. Obama refused to declassify the nearly 7,000-page torture report of the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee.
- In late 2009, Obama ordered a surge of U.S. troops into the ongoing illegitimate war on Afghanistan, a country which had not attacked the United States. This led to an immediate increase in civilian deaths. For one example, U.S. military forces killed a family of five near the city of Gardez, Afghanistan on February 12, 2010. Eyewitness reports state that U.S. Special Forces killed them and then dug their bullets out of the women’s bodies to destroy evidence. U.S. officials have admitted that the family was killed in their home. However, there were no consequences for those involved.
- A leaked video showed U.S. troops firing on an unarmed party in Iraq in 2007 and firing on those who attempted to rescue them. Despite the death of 12 Iraqi citizens, accompanied by a monstrous chatter recording in the cockpit, there were no charges against the U.S. soldiers because “they were under stress” and “must be supported.” Those who leaked the video were targeted as national security threats.
- Three reported suicides in Guantanamo in 2006 were likely homicides carried out by U.S. personnel. No investigation was carried out.
- Obama claimed the right to assassinate U.S. citizens whom he suspected of terrorism. He ordered the assassination of a U.S. citizen, Anwar al-Awlaki, with no trial or other judicial proceeding.
- The Obama Administration expanded the use of unmanned drone attacks. In 2013, the Obama administration promulgated a Presidential Policy Guidance for targeted killing "outside areas of active hostilities." The guidance allows the targeting of a person who poses a "continuing, imminent threat" not just to "U.S. persons" but also to "another country's persons." A 2011 Department of Justice white paper, leaked in 2013, said a U.S. citizen could be killed even when there is no "clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future," a mockery of the "imminent threat" requirement. There is presumably an even lower bar for non-citizens. In addition, the guidance requires "near certainty that an identified HVT [high-value target] or other lawful terrorist target" is present before using lethal force. The Obama administration mounted "signature strikes" that don't necessarily target individuals, but rather all males of military age present in an area of suspicious activity. Based on estimates of the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, more than 10,000 people may have been killed by U.S. drones in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen since the U.S. drone war began in 2001. The majority of these people were killed under the Obama Administration. The total does not include those killed by U.S. drones in Libya, Syria, Iraq or the Philippines, all nations that came under attack during the Obama presidency. The U.S. drone wars violate a variety of rights enumerated by the International Declaration of Human Rights and related international human rights law.
Post-Obama Administration Associations:
- The Obama Foundation, a nonprofit organization that oversees the creation of the Barack Obama Presidential Center, runs the My Brother's Keeper Alliance, a program Obama began while President, and operates a scholarship program through the University of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy
Name: George Walker Bush
Born: July 6, 1946, New Haven, Connecticut
Profession: Businessman
GW Bush Administration Position:
War crime charge(s):
- Crime against peace – planning and carrying out a war of aggression.
- Complicity in the commission of a war crime – wanton destruction of cities and villages, devastation not justified by military necessity, ill-treatment of civilian population of or in occupied territory.
- Complicity in the commission of a war crime – torture, ill-treatment of detainees. Approved waterboarding and other torture methods.
- Signed an order (Feb. 7, 2002) stating that terrorists were not entitled to protections under the Geneva Conventions.
Primary Association:
- George W. Bush Presidential Center at Southern Methodist University
6425 Boaz Lane, Dallas TX 75205
214-768-2000
Downloadable printable war criminal posters on the above three presidents are available for your use.
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