by James Corbett
corbettreport.com
February 23, 2019
As a well-known adage holds: "To the victor go the spoils." But it might well add: "Meanwhile, the losers go to the gallows."
This is the logic of victor's justice. It is the logic of the Treaty of Versailles, which demanded unpayable reparations from the vanquished German nation. It is the logic of the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal, where perpetrators of war crimes pronounced judgement on the war crimes of the defeated. It is the logic of Abu Ghraib, where the US military tortured and killed its enemy captives.
Throughout human history, victorious nations have gone too far in exacting revenge from their defeated foes. The entire notion of "international law"—from the Geneva Conventions to the International Law Commission to the International Criminal Court—has been sold to the public as a check against this unfortunate tendency to impose victor's justice on the fallen. But just as history is written by the winners, so, too, is justice decided by the victors, and the case of the International Criminal Court is the prime example of that.
Think of international war crimes in the recent era and what comes to mind? America's wars of aggression in Iraq and Afghanistan based on premeditated lies about weapons of mass destruction and 9/11? The indefinite detention of captives at Camp X-ray, Guantanamo, or other military prisons that resulted from those illegal wars? Israel's use of white phosphorous in its 2009 massacre of civilians in Gaza? Saudi Arabia's campaign of genocide in Yemen (made possible by Uncle Sam's unwavering support)?
Well, let's compare that list of violations of international law to the list of "situations" that the International Criminal Court has investigated since its formation in 2003. Notice anything? Like how not a single one of those glaring war crimes we just noted are anywhere on the list? Or how every single one of those investigations (save one) targeted an African conflict?
No justice for Afghanistan. No justice for Iraq. No justice for Palestine. No justice for Yemen. No justice for any victims of any Western-allied aggression. Make no mistake: These "omissions" are not by accident but by design.
The most recent demonstration of this fact—as if another demonstration were needed—came late last month when senior ICC judge Christoph Flügge resigned in disgust over American meddling with the court's activities. Actually, "meddling" is the way many of the headline writers chose to frame America's interference with the ICC, but that word doesn't quite do justice to the situation, if you'll pardon the pun.
Let's put it as plainly as possible: Judge Flügge resigned because the US had directly threatened ICC judges and prosecutors for even threatening to look into the possibility that Americans had violated international law in Afghanistan.
I know, I know: You need a minute to recover from this shock.
The story starts in 2017, when the ICC's chief prosecutor conducted a preliminary investigation into US war crimes in Afghanistan, finding "a reasonable basis to believe that war crimes and crimes against humanity" were committed in the country by US military personnel. Logically, the prosecutor followed up by announcing that she would formally request an investigation by the ICC into the charges. Apparently, this particular prosecutor hadn't received the memo that the ICC is only to be used to prosecute African despots in kangaroo courts, and that Americans are off limits.
To make sure that everyone did have the memo, Trump's national security adviser, John Bolton, hand delivered it during his very first speech after joining the Trump administration. "The United States will use any means necessary to protect our citizens and those of our allies from unjust prosecution by this illegitimate court," he warned, adding "we will fight back" against the ICC. And then, just in case the message wasn’t quite clear enough, he added:
"We will not cooperate with the ICC. We will provide no assistance to the ICC. We will not join the ICC. We will let the ICC die on its own. After all, for all intents and purposes, the ICC is already dead to us."
Capisce?
Well, Christoph Flügge got the message, for one. And, having been effectively told that the ICC is a farce and will never be allowed to prosecute the US or any other elephant in the room, he resigned.
The episode demonstrates precisely how the International Criminal Court operates, or, more precisely, how it is allowed to operate by its real rulers. For, you see, the ICC was set up by the Western powers and their allies to put a fig leaf of legitimacy on the concept of victors' justice.
Commenting on Bolton's remarks in his exit interview with the German weekly Die Zeit, Judge Flügge fumed:
"The American security adviser held his speech at a time when The Hague was planning preliminary investigations into American soldiers who had been accused of torturing people in Afghanistan. The American threats against international judges clearly show the new political climate. It is shocking. I had never heard such a threat."
Well, Christoph Flügge might never have heard such a threat before, but Christopher Black certainly has. He's an international criminal lawyer (and previous Corbett Report interviewee) who successfully defended former Rwandan Gendarmerie General Augustin Ndindiliyimana at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. The story of Black's incredible legal journey at the international court is incredible and highlights exactly the types of "shocking" interference that so upset Flügge.
Commenting on Judge Flügge's resignation, Black noted that the intimidation tactics of Bolton are by no means a new phenomenon.
"It goes way back. Ever since the international courts and bodies have been established, the US has tried to interfere and to use them for political purposes. [. . .] Not only was a judge in my case at the Rwanda tribunal pressured but I myself was threatened by the CIA while I was there to stop raising questions and presenting evidence they [the US side] did not like."
While this may not be news to people who have already seen my reporting on international law in general and my reporting on the International Criminal Court in particular, at least it is "news." You know, that socially-constructed concept that is weaponized by the likes of Newsweek and The Guardian and deployed against the public in the ongoing information war.
But, as you might expect, these kinds of cases are only mentioned in the establishment lapdog media because they can be used to further bolster the legitimacy of the ICC. The sleight-of-hand is readily apparent in mainstream coverage of the court, where the ICC's short-comings are used as an excuse to further erode national sovereignty. The problem, you see, isn't the centralized trough of power that is there precisely to be abused by the ruling powers; it's that the centralized trough of power isn't centralized enough.
Of course, Corbett Reporteers know that if the US and Israel and other international pariah states were to become state parties to the ICC they would, at best, allow a show trial of some low-ranking servicemen to demonstrate that the court is "fair and impartial." And then the neocons and their neoliberal friends would resume menacing the world while their ICC lapdog went back to prosecuting Africans.
Victor's justice never went away. It just moved to The Hague and set up court. Literally.
The international law as a whole is written to serve the victors of the WWII, and the violators of the international law are the ones with loudest voices when it comes to minor unproven crimes, mostly they're behind, in calling for investigating, take Syria for example and the chemical attacks. Each time Syria would can for investigating them the request is blocked by the western powers at the UNSC.
A referral by the UNSC is needed for the ICC to work.
Each time a chemical attack is allegedly committed in the country, and due the sake of a media hype and onslaught attack against the government, the western powers scream violation of international law, they don't wait to see what happened and immediately try to punish the Syrian State, but when the dust settle down and reality exposes the real violators, they're the same ones who block any investigation by ICC and other intensively bodies, it's sick and overused already.
And the above is just a small example.
Take a look at the creation and use of ISIS: https://www.syrianews.cc/isis-the-bombshell-interview-to-impeach-obama/
Posted using Partiko Android
We are lead to think the international law is justice for all but really it just protects the business of the powerful nations. How the masses don't see this I never know. One rule for them and another for the powerful if this goes wrong we have the media to fabricate a story too keep the blinkers on. 💯🐒
Bravo James. Continue calling out the criminal cabal and these captured organisations. The truth is right in front of our faces, now more than ever before. They tell us the truth by attempting to dictate what we can and can't talk about.
The complicity of statists at the individual level is a tyranny in itself. This is the Achilles heel of the collective, and is characterized by very pleasant people. Pleasant people and good people are not interchangeable realities. Though the pleasantry of low level functioning statists facilitates avoidance of intolerance, the fracturing of society through digital heroin and identity politics is manifesting a wave of long overdue vengeance.
The arrogance of the elitist psychopathy is the tell that never stops giving, and it's obvious they've embraced the elimination of most the herd propping up the strategic tyranny constructed. However the question of timing will be their downfall. With competing secret societies loyal to nothing larger than the myth of Satan, the notion of their success in procuring comfortable ascendance to transparency of power isn't logical.
The analysis shifts to the individual level where the tyranny of complicity is transparent in daily activities. The timing of strategic vengeance by default arises when cannibalism of statist versus statist becomes intimate, as close as a blade between hand and neck. Though the elite arrogantly brag about the rollout of 5G and the latest false flag prestitute driven war rationalizations, the uncivilzed man watches his neighbor's ego misidentifications starve for lack of utility in feeding them. Does it matter which side of the pyramid bursts into flames first? Not to me, I'm not plagued by the illusion of "time".
It is rational to expect that no self-professed anarchist will lift a finger to impede the cannibalism of statist versus statist. What rationale dictates that an uncivilized man should save pleasant complicit tyrants or arrogant psychopathic tyrants? There's no difference between them but status. Actually I despise the lowest level functioning complicit tyranny worst of all, because they lie to themselves. At least the elite know exactly what they are and why they are doing it, while celebrating their craft. Is it any wonder why they have zero respect for the livestock that serve them complicitly?
Vengeance (justice) will come through intolerance for individual denial of truth, that every vote supports torture and murder around the globe. This is the final decade, and in my opinion long overdue.
Woodchuck Pirate
aka Raymond J Raupers Jr USA
woodchuckpirate.com
In the words of a cool villain from a manga which is surprisingly deeper than people think...
"You say that justice will triumph? Of course it will! It always does! The winner will get to decide what's just and what is isn't. That's why justice always wins! Fuffuffuffu!"