Also, if transparency and public scrutiny were of no concern, then why would Chinese authorities go to great lengths to erase evidence of this fellow from the public record?

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-63339816

Dear Fester,

You wrote: “My impression is that the US military is more open to public scrutiny and consequently commits fewer war crimes than say the Russian military. Do you think that public scrutiny makes any difference? For example, do you think that the Chinese military would behave differently were the Tiananmen Square massacre not wiped from Chinese history? I am under the impression that democracy is facilitated if people know what is happening.”

I agree that public scrutiny can make a difference. I also agree that democracy is facilitated if people know what is happening.

One way to look at the actions of any military is to allow the ICC (International Criminal Court) to examine those actions. The following lists the nations who allow the ICC jurisdiction.

https://asp.icc-cpi.int/states-parties

“123 countries are States Parties to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. Out of them 33 are African States, 19 are Asia-Pacific States, 18 are from Eastern Europe, 28 are from Latin American and Caribbean States, and 25 are from Western European and other States.”

Among nations which do not allow the ICC jurisdiction are Russia, China and the US. Public scrutiny makes a difference, and the US avoids it. One example is the case of Julian Assange.

https://truthout.org/articles/julian-assange-is-enduring-unbearable-persecution-for-exposing-us-war-crimes/

“Assange’s indictment is based on WikiLeaks’s 2010-2011 disclosures of U.S. war crimes in Iraq, Afghanistan and the military prison at Guantánamo. Those revelations included 400,000 field reports about the Iraq War; 15,000 unreported deaths of Iraqi civilians; and systematic rape, torture and murder committed by Iraqi forces after the U.S. military “handed over detainees to a notorious Iraqi torture squad.” WikiLeaks also disclosed the Afghan War Logs, which are 90,000 reports of more civilian casualties by coalition forces than the U.S. military had admitted to. And its revelations additionally included the Guantánamo Files, 779 secret reports showing that 150 innocent people had been held there for years and documenting the torture and abuse of 800 men and boys in violation of the Geneva Conventions and the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.”

Hi David,

Civilian deaths are the most compelling argument against war. Jules tends to exploit these deaths for profit in the same way that televangelists exploit Christianity. Well, some deaths, but not the civilians deliberately murdered by his backers. Jules' humanitarianism is for sale, which is what makes him revolting to me. I don't discount any civilian death, but I am unaware of the US military deliberately targeting civilians or infrastructure, nor of them using the civilian population as a shield for their combatants.

For example, in 20 years of war in Afghanistan there were about 70,000 civilian casualties. in itself a great argument against the conflict. So what is the breakdown? How many killed by the Taliban? How many died as a result of being used as human shields? How many were deliberately targeted by the US military? Do you think that the US military deliberately targeted civilians and civilian infrastructure? Did they capture towns, sort through the civilian populations, torturing, murdering, raping and looting as they pleased, using them as human shields, then burying their victims in mass graves? All of that is standard operating procedure for the Russian military, yet it provokes no reaction from Vlad's good friend Jules.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/feb/17/taliban-human-shields

Dear Fester,

You wrote:

For example, in 20 years of war in Afghanistan there were about 70,000 civilian casualties. in itself a great argument against the conflict. So what is the breakdown? How many killed by the Taliban? How many died as a result of being used as human shields? How many were deliberately targeted by the US military? Do you think that the US military deliberately targeted civilians and civilian infrastructure? Did they capture towns, sort through the civilian populations, torturing, murdering, raping and looting as they pleased, using them as human shields, then burying their victims in mass graves? All of that is standard operating procedure for the Russian military, yet it provokes no reaction from Vlad's good friend Jules.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/feb/17/taliban-human-shields

Who is Jules? Unfortunately the US is responsible for many civilian deaths. The US massacred American Indians in the Indian wars and Filipinos in the Filipino-American War which followed the Spanish-American War.

Brown University records the following:

https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/costs/human/civilians
“The U.S. post-9/11 wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Syria, and Pakistan have taken a tremendous human toll on those countries. As of September 2021, an estimated 387,072 civilians in these countries have died violent deaths as a result of the wars. Civilian deaths have also resulted from U.S. post-9/11 military operations in Somalia and other countries.
People living in the war zones have been killed in their homes, in markets, and on roadways. They have been killed by bombs, bullets, fire, improvised explosive devices (IEDs), and drones. Civilians die at checkpoints, as they are run off the road by military vehicles, when they step on mines or cluster bombs, as they collect wood or tend to their fields, and when they are kidnapped and executed for purposes of revenge or intimidation. They are killed by the United States, by its allies, and by insurgents and sectarians in the civil wars spawned by the invasions.”

continued

Not all the deaths mentioned above are a consequence of US actions, but many of them are. The report recommends:

• The U.S. government should include civilian deaths and injuries in public reporting of war deaths, including a tally of children killed.

• The U.S. government should [do] a more comprehensive and thorough job investigating allegations of civilian deaths that result from its drone strikes.

The US deliberately targeted civilian areas. However, the following indicates there has been a change in policy.

https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.7591/9780801454578-005/pdf

United States leaders’ normative beliefs about targeting civilians with conventional strategic bombing and the practices themselves have changed dramatically over the last nearly seventy years. Specifically, before and during World War II, and to a lesser degree in Korea, military and civilian leaders believed that targeting civilians was militarily necessary and effective. Perceptions of military necessity consistently trumped the value of civilian immunity, which itself was an emerging normative belief. It was considered acceptable to deliberately target civilians and to be relatively unconcerned when civilians were harmed incidentally as “collateral damage.” Targeting civilian morale and economic infrastructure generally led to the same consequences as deliberately targeting civilian bodies, since those bodies were often located alongside economic assets. During the long Vietnam War, which I argue constitutes a turning point in U.S. policy, it became less acceptable among military professionals and the public to deliberately target civilians or to strike in ways that could lead to foreseeable harm. Ad hoc procedures put constraints on bombing that could harm civilians. After Vietnam, declaratory policy and operational planning increasingly emphasized protecting civilians and U.S. authorities instituted methods to mitigate civilian casualties. The emphasis on civilian casualty avoidance and its institutionalization is seen in the first Gulf War and U.S. air operations in the Balkans. While there was still a degree of tolerance for

© 2018 Cornell University Press, Ithaca