"The guiding practice of past war crimes prosecutions has been that crime is something that can only be charged against a loser. Perhaps this explains why successive presidents have felt so intensely anxious not to loose their war in Vietnam." - Daniel Ellsberg
From the rice paddies of My Lai to the sands of Haditha, the specter of injustice looms over the moral authority of the United States. No U.S. Commander-in-Chief has ever been prosecuted in an international court for war crimes. The allegation itself would seem absurd to most Americans living at any point in our nation's history. So, what is a war crime? If it is not the murdering of innocent civilians facilitated through military aero-technology from the sky above, then would a "face-to-face" killing of an innocent civilian constitute a war crime? And if so, how come so few American combatants have been prosecuted and sentenced for such crimes? So few have gone before a judge even when we are certain of many instances of deplorable acts of violence perpetrated by members of the U.S. Military.
Even after excluding the heinous effects of mass bombing campaigns on civilian populations, it seems that very few Americans have been brought to justice for war crimes, in the traditional sense of a "face-to-face" murder.
"It will be difficult, politically, to extend the notion of "crimes against humanity" to include Anglo-American wartime triumphs of firepower against civilians, as in Dresden, Tokyo, Hiroshima, and now the free-fire zones of South Vietnam. Yet it would be shocking and perverse to condemn only rape and murder in wartime while continuing to tolerate the strategic bombing of noncombatants." - Daniel Ellsberg