If you read Fighting Power by van Creveld, you find that's not true. Most charges that could be prosecuted that way were charged simply as their civilian equivalent, murder, rape, etc. There's plenty of personal anecdotes, like one in a volume of The 36th Infantry Division Historical Quarterly where an then officer of that division commanding an infantry company brought in a German officer POW to the battalion HQ. The major commanding the battalion ordered the junior officer to escort the German to the rear. The junior officer--the man recounting this as having been that officer--objected as his company was to mount an attack in like an hour and he felt he needed to be there to command. The major overruled him. The junior officer took the German outside the HQ location, shot him dead--and yes, this guy says he did it--and then told the major the German "tried to escape."
The major wanted to do what you say, bring him up as a war criminal and court martial him. The colonel in charge of the regiment, chewed the major out saying that officer was right and needed to be with his company for the attack and it was just too bad about the German. The major was told to STFU and get back to winning the war. The guy says the major soon became more aware of what it meant to be on the frontlines and became a "good officer."
Otto Skorzeny, Hitler's equivalent of the OSS or MI 6 was tried for various war crimes at Nuremburg after the war. His defense lawyer brought in the US and British equivalent officers from the OSS and MI 6 where they testified that they did all the same dirty tricks--like dressing in enemy uniforms, assassinating officers, using torture to get information, etc. Skorzeny's case was thrown out since the Allies would have had to try their own "dirty tricks" guys for the war crimes Skorzeny was accused of.
That's just two of hundreds, if not thousands, of "war crime" stories from WW 2 to be had.
Hegseth wasn't in command. He wasn't giving the orders.
In any case, my argument still stands. The only true war crime is losing.
Hegseth won't be tried. The officers commanding those strikes won't be tried. In fact, if you started trying military officers every time they made some decision to use force that might be questionable, you'd quickly have no officers making such decisions and you'd lose every war you tried to fight.
It is the height of asininity to think that the military is just a police force equipped with better weapons. That sort of utterly imbecilic thinking gets people killed. The military isn't there to "bring the bad guys to justice" or serve a warrant. They are there to kill the enemy, break all their things, and fuck everything and anything the designated enemy has.
Trump has designated these drug cartels as international terrorists. In using the military, he is doing what should be done. The military doesn't give warning commands or read the persons targeted their goddamned rights. They blow the fuck out of them with overwhelming force and kill them all.
You think this is some sort of law enforcement action? It isn't. It's military action short of war and it's something the US, and every other nation on Earth, has practiced since prehistoric times.
