Is Cheney Guilty of International War Crimes?

If you don't read the BBC's email newsletter you not only miss much of the important international news, you also miss out on important US news. BBC passes by the Pablum and cheerleading and goes for the red meat. The difference in reporting between the BBC and AP is one of the issues brought out by the BBC interview of Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, former aide to Colin Powell.

But the most important is Wilkerson's statement that Cheney, and some of his and Rumsfeld's group-thinkers may be, I would say probably are, guilty of international war crimes. No wonder they don't like international treaties or courts.

Col Wilkerson has been critical of Mr Cheney in the past
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4480638.stm

A top aide to former Secretary of State Colin Powell has launched a stinging attack on US Vice-President Dick Cheney over abuse of prisoners by US troops.

Col Lawrence Wilkerson accused Mr Cheney of ignoring a decision by President Bush on the treatment of prisoners in the war on terror.

Asked by the BBC's Today if Mr Cheney could be accused of war crimes, he said: "It's an interesting question."

"Certainly it is a domestic crime to advocate terror," he added.

"And I would suspect, for whatever it's worth, it's an international crime as well."

This is an extraordinary attack by a man who until earlier in the year was Mr Cheney's colleague in the senior reaches of the Bush team, the BBC's Justin Webb in Washington says.

Read the BBC article at the above link. Here's the BBC transcript of the interview: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4481092.stm

And that question of detainee abuse - are you saying that the implicit message allowing it to happen was sanctioned by Dick Cheney - it came from his office?

Well you see two sides of this debate in the statutory process. You see the side represented by Colin Powell, Will Taft, all arguing for Geneva.

You see the other side represented by Yoo, John Yoo from the Department of Justice, Alberto Gonzales - you see the other side being argued by them and you see the president compromising.

Then you see the secretary of defence moving out in his own memorandum to act as if the side that declared everything open, free and anything goes, actually being what's implemented.
And so what I'm saying is, under the vice-president's protection, the secretary of defence moved out to do what they wanted to do in the first place even though the president had made a decision that was clearly a compromise.

It is quite difficult to believe though that Colin Powell wasn't aware of what was going on - if this alternative decision-making process was happening as you say - why didn't he do something?

Well you don't know that it's happening.

If what you say is correct, in your view, is Dick Cheney then guilty of a war crime?

Well, that's an interesting question - it was certainly a domestic crime to advocate terror and I would suspect that it is - for whatever it's worth - an international crime as well.

Read it all at the above link.

And for comparison:

Ex - Powell Aide Criticizes Bush on Iraq
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS, November 29, 2005
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Wilkerson-Interview.html

Filed at 6:58 a.m. ET, WASHINGTON (AP) --
Former Secretary of State Colin Powell's chief of staff says President Bush was ''too aloof, too distant from the details'' of post-war planning, allowing underlings to exploit Bush's detachment and make bad decisions.

In an Associated Press interview Monday, former Powell chief of staff Lawrence Wilkerson also said that wrongheaded ideas for the handling of foreign detainees after Sept. 11 arose from a coterie of White House and Pentagon aides who argued that ''the president of the United States is all-powerful,'' and that the Geneva Conventions were irrelevant.

Wilkerson blamed Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and like-minded aides. Wilkerson said that Cheney must have sincerely believed that Iraq could be a spawning ground for new terror assaults, because ''otherwise I have to declare him a moron, an idiot or a nefarious bastard.''

Is the US press incompetent or cowardly? Or both?