1/ Whatever the legality of the strikes as a whole, this incident is very clearly a war crime (if you accept that these are combatants).
https://twitter.com/AlexHortonTX/status/1994458955666329641
2/ Specifically under the 1949 Geneva Convention:
"Rule 47. Attacking persons who are recognized as hors de combat is prohibited. A person hors de combat is:...
(b) anyone who is defenceless because of unconsciousness, shipwreck, wounds or sickness...
"Rule 47. Attacking persons who are recognized as hors de combat is prohibited. A person hors de combat is:...
(b) anyone who is defenceless because of unconsciousness, shipwreck, wounds or sickness...
3/ "... provided he or she abstains from any hostile act and does not attempt to escape."
I expect that Hegseth and others involved will get a preemptive pardon from Trump eventually, but they might want to avoid travelling outside America for the rest of their lives.
I expect that Hegseth and others involved will get a preemptive pardon from Trump eventually, but they might want to avoid travelling outside America for the rest of their lives.
4/ It also helps to explain why Admiral Alvin Holsey resigned so suddenly from SOUTHCOM and why Trump has gone so bananas over reminders about not obeying illegal orders.
5/ Note also that giving no quarter has been forbidden since 1899, well before the Geneva Conventions. Article 23 of the Hague Convention of 1907 states specifically that "it is especially forbidden [...] to declare that no quarter will be given".
6/ Under Article 8(2)(b)(xii) and 8(2)(e)(x) of the Rome Statute establishing the International Criminal Court, “declaring that no quarter will be given” is explicitly listed as a war crime in international and non-international armed conflicts.
7/ This isn't just theoretical. Those prosecuted for giving no quarter have included the SS men responsible for the 1944 Malmedy massacre of US soldiers, a German U-boat commander, a Japanese admiral overseeing the occupation of the Philippines, and Bosnian Serb war criminals.
8/ Given how the US military works, there will be documentary evidence as well as witnesses to the orders given in this incident. They will certainly be available to the next US administration and likely under subpoena by Congress. "Legally perilous" is an understatement.
9/ Here's a case in which a Nazi U-boat commander and his subordinates were prosecuted and executed for killing the survivors of a ship that he sank. The issues here aren't legally ambiguous; they've been black-letter law for decades.
https://x.com/The_Lookout_N/status/1994484875693625635?t=_JVXOqThmDhOlcUpF6k2FA&s=19
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