It's because of the Geneva Convention (origin of the modern concept of war crimes.)
It's designed to be applied mutually, if only one side does then it's basically non-functioning.
Absolutely not. We already had this argument in regards to Iraq and Afghanistan. War crimes are war crimes. You can get away with some of the more esoteric ones for not fighting a signatory to the Geneva Conventions, but slaughtering civilians en masse is a crime full stop.
I understand that many of the humanitarian safeguards and international law can be disadvantageous when only one side gets things right.
But those are important guarantees, they are even used to differentiate the supposedly "good and civilized", if they are discarded every time they are inconvenient, aren't they just dead letter?
It's because of the Geneva Convention (origin of the modern concept of war crimes.)
It's designed to be applied mutually, if only one side does then it's basically non-functioning.
Absolutely not. We already had this argument in regards to Iraq and Afghanistan. War crimes are war crimes. You can get away with some of the more esoteric ones for not fighting a signatory to the Geneva Conventions, but slaughtering civilians en masse is a crime full stop.
I understand that many of the humanitarian safeguards and international law can be disadvantageous when only one side gets things right.
But those are important guarantees, they are even used to differentiate the supposedly "good and civilized", if they are discarded every time they are inconvenient, aren't they just dead letter?
Oh, war criminal talk. Gotcha.