Reply #11: I would disagree here.

[TayTay]

I still don't think anything was gained by prosecuting Lynndie England. I don't. She was a kid from West Virginia who carried out her orders. She was 19. I don't honestly think that she, in her mind, thought she could do otherwise. I honestly don't.

Also, I am very interested in what Mass brought up: that Kerry in 1971 (who was not a politician as of yet but an activist) said war crimes were committed but that he did not feel those soldiers should be punished. That literally means he does not agree with the Nuremburg Principle, which when I think of it, is stunning. Here is a guy who was called a traitor and a Communist, who was smeared in every possible way to this day, was actually not terribly principled as to the how the Geneva Conventions came into being. In short, he compromised big time here. Really, if soldiers commit war crimes, they should be investigated and when necessary charged with a crime.

John Kerry, in subsequent interviews on the Dick Cavett Show and elsewhere, implicated his behavior as complicit in what he would term war crimes. Would you prosecute him? What would this have done? Would his protests, during service and while assigned on the boats in Vietnam have made any difference?

Yes, there is an absolute on the theory of the Nuremberg Principles and the law of the Geneva Conventions. What does this mean? How do you carry this out in terms of actual combat?

These are serious questions. On the one hand you are balancing actions taking in the theater of war itself. On the other hand, talking about actions taken by people safe from combat and behind desks at the White House and the Pentagon. Does this make a difference in the actual circumstances and determining the nature of guilt here?