A to Z War Crimes (Article from Mindaview)

A to Z of War Crimes

            What the public should know about crimes of war? Where do you stand  as far as war in general is concerned? I do know that as we live in a civilized world,  how  you wish that there is no such as thing as war and that there should be peace zones that as they engage in war, there are no civilian casualties sacrificed. But let’s accept the hard truth:  sometimes we have to kill to stop the killing, I recall a professor back then in Xavier Univ. supporting  the immediacy of war. Thus, the concept of Jus ad Bellum and Jus in Bello or  that branch of  international law governing the reasons why you fight and how you fight. In affect, the two are inseparable distinct  ways of looking at war with the second concept deserving strict compliance if only to mitigate the prohibitive cost of war.  But have we?.

            The United Nation is even more emphatic on the necessity of war.  Article 2 from the Charter of United Nations declares: “All members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or the use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state . . . and in Article 51: “Nothing in the present charter shall impair the inherently right of individual or collective self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations.”

            “Such branch of law relies the customary law, based on recognized practices of war, as well as treaty laws (such as the Hague Regulations of 1899 and 1907) which set out the rules of hostilities.  Other  principal documents include the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 which protect war victims – the sick and wounded (first); the shipwrecked (second); prisoners of war (third); and civilians in the territories of the countries in conflict (fourth) – and the additional Protocols of 1977, which definite key terms such a s combatants, contain detailed provisions to protect noncombatants, medical transports, and civil defense and prohibit practices such as indiscriminate attack.”

Thus said to what extent have we complied  such criteria? Regrettably, excesses far outweigh the casualties incurred on both sides.  By excesses, I mean those crimes  against humanity incurred in the conduct of war , that irreversible result of crimes of war.

 There are actually only 23 letters in the alphabet but if we sum up all war crimes committed as presented in the book would  give dizzying  figures that cannot be swallowed, let alone, accepted. Add several graphics too gruesome to see as they were presented uncut and you have the worst excesses of atrocities of war crimes of the century.  And the saddest reality of these figures, they are far from stopping as crimes against humanity are still  happening around us, right in our  own backyard, country and the rest of the world.

            Of course, we thought that gone are the days of Holocaust where millions of Jews died courtesy of Hitler’s Superiority of Aryan race; annihilation of  Nagasaki and Hiroshima  and the use of  agent orange and napalm strike leading to  senseless massacre as in My Lai in Vietnam survivors utilized as human mine detectors  as perpetrated by USA. Who too would forget  Pol Pot of Cambodia whose insanity through his dreaded Khmer Rouge’s taking pictures of victims before torturing and killing them led to  killing fields; or   the use of humans as guinea pig in medical experiments for their medical students  as we experienced it in World War II against  the Japanese.

And who thought that war in its ugliest would end after  the Fall of Berlin Wall in Germany paving the way for restoration of democracy not just in Europe, Asia but also China and other countries in the world of the 21’s Century.  Sadly, what once abhorred for its evil and prohibitive cost  has metamorphosed instead into highly dangerous warfare characterized by the use of sophisticated weapons through terrorism and mass extermination, another  name for ethnic cleansing.

This I know after reading the War Crimes edited by Roy Gutman and David Rieff (W.W. Norton & Com. Inc., New York, New York 1999 397 pp). No doubt  that  war happening in the 21st Century is unparalleled in that it is  ruthless, savage and gruesome than those preceding ones.  True enough, truth becomes the first casualty in every war.  Ninoy Aquino’s dictum “In war there are no victors only  victims!” interrelated  facts could be  summarized from the wisdom of the book.  First, numbers of casualties  in crimes against humanity far offsetting  than  the combatants and second; comprehensive excluding none regardless of color, age, creed and religion. Third, its unprecedented as how the warfare was conducted gives you feeling of fear and trembling.  Oh how I wish, there’s Genie in a bottle that would invent more peace than war, unity than division and justice instead of prejudices and discrimination. Of course that would only be true in the mind, just imagined as John Lennon sings. 

Consider the sad reality of  apartheid Nelson Mandela clears as “color lines that all too often determines who is rich  or poor. . . who shall get food, clothing and health care . . . and who will live and who will die.”;  use of biological weapons for ethnic cleansing as in Sarajevo and Bosnia; carpet or area bombing as in Saigon, Vietnam in 1968 giving rise to bomb craters ensuing from B-52 strikes; Iraqi chemical warfare as used by Saddam Hussein against Iran and Kuwait; and  using children as soldiers and killers as in Afghanistan, Liberia, Jordan, Iran, Sri Lanka and Spain; collateral damage and collective punishment typified by Israeli against Palestines. Concentration camps in 1992 ran by Serbs for Bosnians images reminiscent of  Hitler’s Nazi camp, destruction of cultural property and historical landmarks; disappearances, executions and extra-judicial killings; free fire zones, genocides, hostage taking, indiscriminate attack. By far, the graphics of Sept. 11 bombing of World Trade Center as captured by CNN remains indelibly  imbedded in my subconscious but those in the book contributed by different journalists just simply  tell them The list is long and sad it to say that it is still counting.

Incidentally, Philippines had its slice of atrocity featured in the book. One, gov’t. general Sostheno Fernandez, a Cambodian of Filipino ancestry who rose into Chief of Armed Forces was a notorious architect of “new form of psychological warfare “ euphemism for using ethnic Vietnamese civilians as protective shields for his advancing troops into the waiting guns of the Vietcong. Second, several healthy young Filipino prisoners, used as guinea pig used to teach neophyte Japanese physicians the art of surgery  After the lesson is over, proper technique shown, patients would then be shoot by the surgeons for good.

 Living in Mindanao with all those implacable hostilities, hostage taking and terrorism happening around us right before our eyes just send us  trembling down in bone and marrow  far more than we imagine.  Add the senseless beheading by Abu Sayyaf, hostage takings of innocent  International Red Cross personnel, clergy, missionaries, teachers and innocent persons –  constitute too that war crimes against the norms and standard set by Geneva Convention in 1948 and Protocol II.  Hostage taking particularly is so pervasive and unpredictable that it has been so  rampant that it has become  sunshine industry among terrorists.  Add those senseless killings of  men in media industry and you get familiar picture of  crime against humanity. No wonder that we have dislodged Iraq as the most dangerous place in the world for any journalist..

            It’s sad that notwithstanding that those excesses happening  before our eyes,  ending those countless innocent people as additional statistics of  crimes against humanity, there’s hardly collective resolution of addressing them to avert further escalation  of hostilities. Even those related in  drug related-industry, many suspects ended up freed than prosecuted, complained by officers who apprehended them in region 10.

It is just hoped that crimes against humanity this part of the country will soon one day will see daylight. When would that be? You maybe one that could make it happen. As John Lesson sings: I hope someday, you’ll join us and make the world will be as one.