What Do Almost All War Criminals And Dictators Have In Common?

Mickey Z.

Vice President Dick Cheney in Iraq. March, 2008. By soldiersmediacenter (iraq) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

For many people, the term “war criminal” means swastikas and concentration camps. Give it further thought and the more open-minded among us may recall grainy black-and-white images of My Lai. Hear the word “dictator” and perhaps your mind’s eye conjures up Hollywood-inspired images of Third World “banana republics.”

In reality, however, living under the yoke of relentless necrophilic rule provides an endless supply of despots, war-mongers, and the inevitable atrocities they command and commit. These criminals come from all walks of life, from every corner of the globe, e.g. Mobutu of Zaire, the Shah of Iran, Noriega of Panama, and Marcos in the Philippines -- to name but a few.

Manuel Noriega. By U.S. Marshals Service in Miami, Florida [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

From Harry Truman and his terror bombing of Japan to Saddam Hussein’s mass murders in Halabja. From Suharto’s bloody rise to power in Indonesia to the Contras making Reagan proud in Central America. From Ariel Sharon in Sabra and Shatila to Henry Kissinger’s legacy amongst the Vietnamese, the Kurds, the Chileans, the East Timorese, the Bangladeshis, etc. etc. etc.

From the earliest of recorded history right up to Barack Obama and his drones, his kill list, and his Nobel Peace Prize, ruthless rulers are ubiquitous and seemingly inevitable.

But what do almost all of them have in common?

President Obama. 2009. U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Michael J. Ayotte [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

For starters, the list I offered above is made up of Americans, U.S. allies, and those funded and supported by the Land of the Free™ (I was just checking to see if you were paying attention.) However, I could spend another 1,000 pages discussing the catalogue of thugs that pre-date the founding of God’s Country™. Yes, the Home of the Brave™ is the current king of atrocities but is still merely the latest in a long lineage of murderous monarchs.

War criminals and dictators come in many age ranges, are found in just about every geographical location, and run the gamut of religions, ethnicities, and financial classes. So, if none of these is the most universal marker for recognizing such predators, what is?

Think it over. I’ll wait.

A few more examples, while you ponder: Bill Clinton, Idi Amin, Kenji Doihara, Augusto Pinochet, and Curtis LeMay.

Go ahead. Say it.

Adolf Eichmann, Tariq Aziz, Colin Powell, Kim Jong-Il, and Efrain Rios Montt.

You know what it is, so just admit it.

Kang Kek Iew, Robert McNamara, Charles Taylor, Donald Rumsfeld, and Benjamin Netanyahu.

Do the thing.

Tojo, Hitler, FDR, Stalin, Mussolini, Bush, Pol Pot… I could keep going for days.

Name the problem.

Please. Just name the problem, before it’s too late to address the problem.