War Crimes – April 7, 2026

To ask what is a war crime inevitably you are going to land on some variation of “a serious violation of international humanitarian law or treaty” in which the resulting determination could be criminal responsibility.

A more modern definition is codified in Article 8 of the Rome Statute, legal provision that defines war crimes and establishes the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) jurisdiction over them. Boils down to two areas:

• Grave Breaches of the Geneva Convention
• Violations of the Laws and Customs of War

In some regard just about everything imaginable falls into these categories, covering everything from handling prisoners of war to chemical warfare to protections for civilian population. And all violations have the context of international or non-international armed conflicts and the accused perpetrator must have acted with intent and knowledge that the act or acts would violate some provision during whatever armed conflict the act is applied to.

The first rub ends up as a question.

Does the US recognize the International Criminal Court?

Not only does the US no recognize the jurisdiction of the ICC, current conditions between the US and the ICC is nothing short of hostile.

The US initially signed the court’s founding treaty mention above, the Rome Statue, in 2000 but formally withdrew signature in 2002 never ratifying the agreement. This was done under the George W. Bush administration, was deliberate, and the listed reasons were protections from political persecutions, rejection of ICC intentions to claim jurisdiction over non-members, no “checks and balances” by the UN Security Council, and incompatibility with the US Constitution.

Lest we forget, the US was already in Afghanistan in 2002 in response to 9/11 and also already planning going into Iraq in 2003.

Bush, Obama, Trump, and Biden all have had some degree of run-in with the ICC, anything from filings with the ICC, to investigations, to near charges filed. And what you would expect was in the mix. Afghanistan and Iraq wars, our associations with Israel, Obama’s drone strike campaigns, and of course Trump’s various campaigns during his current 2nd term. All in some way catching the attention of the ICC, at least someone complaining to the ICC. On occasion involving the UN “recommending” to the ICC some sort of investigation.

Look at it this way. The ICC has had an “active warrant” for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu since November 21, 2024 and another for Russian President Vladimir Putin since March 17, 2023. Neither one slowing down Russian or Israeli activities to date.

And speaking of Netanyahu, Trump in February 2025 issued Executive Order 14203 to sanction the ICC, largely in response to warrants for Israeli officials. Those being restriction of ICC members and personnel entering the US and possible asset seizure at the discretion of the White House.

Ok, so when we hear of “war crimes” what law handles that?

The short answer is, a combination of US federal criminal law and military law.

Since the US generally speaking ignores both the ICC and UN, whenever the subject comes up of US activities getting attention the real rub is how would it be handled assuming it would ever get that far. And that means an evaluation of various Acts and existing laws on how someone may be subjected to domestic charges of acts of “war crimes.”

But there is another far more important consideration in how these things could get handled, somewhat recent in the context of US history and involves an extension of the conversation on Congressional surrendering of their own authority but also recent Supreme Court decision. Namely Trump v United States.

Long story short, the Supreme Court in the decision in 2024, 6-3 and right down political ideological lines, the result was blanket Immunity for a sitting President for “official acts” involving core Constitutional powers. Because Congress has surrendered so much of their authority in the use of military force it is beyond easy to conclude that it would be virtually impossible to prosecute a President for orders given to he military even if they resulted in war crimes?

WTF, why?!?!

The decision itself set a standard for both official and unofficial acts as President, moreover they also set an evidentiary bar on what any prosecution can use in some future argument that an official act was unofficial. An example in this scenario specifically, if a President were prosecuted for profiting from military engagement the court could not admit records of “official” conversations with advisors in the effort of gathering evidence of intention.

This gets worse. Outside of official acts as determined by the Constitution and various Acts passed over the nation’s history there are “outer perimeter” official acts. For those acts that are considered official but do not fall under core Constitutional powers a former President is entitled to presumptive immunity. Meaning, some prosecution could only move forward with a successful rebut of that presumption. Any prosecution would literally have to prove that applying the criminal statue would pose “no danger of intrusion” on the authority of a President.

Between the two restrictions, that basically removes avenues to obtain and prove in any court the basic concept of motivation.

The ultimate result of all this is when ABC or CNN runs nonstop segments on “war crime” potential from a Trump TruthSocial post on sending Iran back the dark ages they are all ignoring, not even bothering to mention, the near absolute immunity a President has for core functions. Pardoning power, removal of executive officers, discussions with the Justice Department regarding investigations even, and of course the Congressional surrendered function of sending the Military into combat using any number of combinations of Emergency Powers via various Acts.

That is a “total shield” as those actions are beyond the reach of the other branches of the Federal Government, they cannot be “criminalized” by additional Acts from Congress nor can they be adjudicated by the courts.

Sum it up, and ask the obvious can anything be done?

For a command from the President that results in war crimes the avenues are very limited, and it boils down to one area of the US Government.

Congress… sigh.

The only thing the Supreme Court did not remove was the core method and functions of Impeachment by Congress. In the same 6-3 ruling the Court rejected he argument that a former President can only be prosecuted if they were first impeached and convicted. Meaning, the House passes Articles of Impeachment and the Senate votes to convict and remove a President.

Understand, we have had a conversation on this too, that never in history has a US history been completely removed from office through the entire Impeachment Process. Andrew Johnson (1868,) Bill Clinton (1998,) and Donald Trump twice (2019 and 2021) were impeached by the House but all were acquitted by the Senate.

And no, Richard Nixon was never impeached. The House Judiciary Committee did vote and approve three articles of Impeachment against him in July 1974, Nixon resigned from office before the articles hit the floor of the House for a full House vote. Then, Vice President Gerald Ford once becoming President granted Nixon a full pardon for any crimes he may have committed during his time of President.

Perhaps that set the tone for things to come, historians can argue that out.

But anyway, Congress, we are down to two options.

Impeachment by Congress that actually completes both chambers (again never happened in all of US history,) or the current Vice President and Cabinet invoking the 25th Amendment (which still allows the President to dispute this, sending it to Congress, needing 2/3rds vote in both chambers to functionally undo this.) Neither seems all that likely.

Obvious Conclusions.

When we hear Trump saying “I am blowing up everything” or “a whole civilization will die tonight” as a threat against Iran to open the Strait by 8pm ET tonight there are little to no options to stop this.

We already know the current Congress is majority Republican, both chambers, and is likely to not get in Trump’s way too much. Plenty will run off to ABC to FoxNews claiming “concerns” about all this but where the rubber meets the road they are entirely at the mercy of Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) and are already discussed greatly and very weak Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA-4th.)

As of this month, April 2026, the US is facing plenty of serious allegations from “experts” at international law, human rights organizations, even the UN suggesting ongoing Israel and US military operations in Iran might include “war crimes.” At least the UN also mentions Iran is doing the same. Most talking about strikes on civilian structures or infrastructure, and several events resulting in high civilian casualties including Iran’s own retaliation against their own.

On February 28, 2026, a missile strike on an all-girls primary school in Minab killed an estimated 168 to 175 people, including over 110 children. While the US Department of Defense, err… War, is investigating the incident the preliminary evidence analysis suggest US forces were likely responsible.

This is on top of a failure to rescue survivors of naval craft struck and destroyed as potential violations of maritime international law. And of course, Trump’s own mouth and TruthSocial posts suggesting destroying power plants, desalination plants, bridges and major roads, airports and whatever else he can think of until the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz is lifted. Oh, and we almost forgot, Hegseth and his the US does not fight with “stupid rules of engagement.”

All of these things constitute possible war crimes, civilian survivability in the strike and after becomes the concern, but this still boils down in anyone really being able to, or the few that can being willing to, do something about it. It is not ABC or CNN or FoxNews no matter what experts or polling experts are asked to chat about all this, ultimately the list of remedies is getting small.

One takeaway, we may have accidentally made the case that between our inept Congress and likely corrupt Supreme Court we have elevated the Office of President to Autocracy levels. Intended or not, all it took was the right person with the right motivations and perhaps lack of moral code to capitalize on relatively recently issued authority beyond checks and balances.

Another takeaway, these deadlines from Trump may come down to the US on the verge of committing massive war crimes beyond much risk to Trump himself, or Trump does another TACO. Some other cave where the “deadline” goes further out, or something along those lines. Either way we are seeing Constitutional strain on what a President can do, and more importantly what should bound or limit motivations perhaps becoming realized.

Either way, the only fail-safe left is Congress.

Not law and order, not the people, and we should have plenty of doubts on Vice President Vance and the current Cabinet. All we have is Congress suddenly developing a consciousness, and doing something to slow down the the US seeing new levels of international condemnation if Trump instructs the military to send Iran into the dark ages.

None of this conversation should be considered as question on the ethics of our military forces including leadership, they have more than enough on their plate to place them in even more harms way forcing our military to reexamine what is and is not a lawful order on-the-fly. By oath they have to do that anyway, and the last thing we need is another social media video from Congress putting far more views on themselves than really helping our military forces. Assuming Trump goes through with his threats this evening, we are likely to see that conversation be had anyway. But like everything else, that will be a political conversation first and odds are right down party lines, all the while President Trump enjoys being nearly untouchable.

Let that sink in.