Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a baldfaced act of aggression, replete with war crimes. It is rightly being condemned as such by large numbers of people and nations across the globe.
From the beginning of this crisis, Russian President Vladimir Putin has exploited the past bombing campaigns of the U.S. and NATO to frame his own warped justification for his murderous campaign in Ukraine.
But the fact that Putin is trying to justify the unjustifiable does not mean that we must ignore the U.S. actions that fuel his narrative. The laws of war and international law should apply not only to the declared bad guys of the moment or to parties that unilaterally attack other nations, but also to every nation — including our own.
The corporate media has always found it much easier to express outrage at the actions and crimes of a foreign autocrat than to confront the conduct of its own government.
I co-founded The Intercept eight years ago in large part to fill a desperate need for critical analysis and independent reporting on U.S. militarism. Today, I continue to see an entrenched double standard that permeates the consistently hypocritical U.S. response to the actions of its enemies.
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In recent days, U.S. and NATO officials have highlighted Russia’s use of banned weapons, including cluster munitions, and have said that their use constitutes violations of international law. This is indisputably true. What goes virtually unmentioned in much of the reporting on this topic is that the U.S., like both Russia and Ukraine, refuses to sign the Convention on Cluster Munitions.
The U.S. has repeatedly used cluster bombs, from the war in Vietnam and the “secret” bombings of Cambodia to a 2009 attack in Yemen that killed 55 people under President Barack Obama. Despite the ban, which was finalized in 2008 and went into effect in 2010, the U.S. continued to sell cluster bombs to nations like Saudi Arabia, which regularly used them in its attacks in Yemen.
It is also relevant that to this day there has been no accountability for the crimes committed by the U.S. in its invasion and occupation of Iraq, its 20-year war in Afghanistan, the post-9/11 CIA torture and kidnapping program, or the killing of civilians in drone and other airstrikes in numerous countries. The U.S. has systematized a self-exoneration machine. And Russia and every nation on Earth knows it.
There are actions that the U.S. and other Western countries could take to bolster the legitimacy of their denunciations of Putin’s actions. They could end support for Israel’s aggression against Palestine and recognize Palestinians’ legitimate right to self-defense. The U.S. could immediately end all support for Saudi Arabia and “make it a pariah,” as President Joe Biden promised. The U.S. could stop its drone strikes in Somalia and elsewhere. But that’s not what’s being talked about on cable news or in the halls of power.
The Intercept is one of the few news outlets with the courage and independence to go against the grain in times of war and point out these uncomfortable truths. As a nonprofit news outlet, we rely on member donations to continue this bold, independent coverage.
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