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A war crime is a violation of the laws of war that gives rise to individual criminal responsibility for actions by combatants in action, such as intentionally killing civilians or intentionally killing prisoners of war, torture, taking hostages, unnecessarily destroying civilian property, deception by perfidy, wartime sexual violence, pillaging, and for any individual that is part of the ...
This article contains a chronological list of incidents in the military history of the United States in which war crimes occurred, including the summary execution of captured enemy combatants, the mistreatment of prisoners during interrogation, the use of torture, the use of violence against civilians and non-combatants, rape, and the unnecessary destruction of civilian property.
During World War I (1914–1918), belligerents from both the Allied Powers and Central Powers violated international criminal law, committing numerous war crimes. This includes the use of indiscriminate violence and massacres against civilians, torture, sexual violence, forced deportation and population transfer, death marches, the use of chemical weapons and the targeting of medical facilities .
Under international law, war crimes were formally defined as crimes during international trials such as the Nuremberg Trials and the Tokyo Trials, in which Austrian, German and Japanese leaders were prosecuted for war crimes which were committed during World War II .
Perfidy constitutes a breach of the laws of war and so is a war crime, as it degrades the protections and mutual restraints developed in the interest of all parties, combatants and civilians .
Under the 1949 Geneva Conventions, collective punishment is a war crime. By collective punishment, the drafters of the Geneva Conventions had in mind the reprisal killings of World War I and World War II. In the First World War, the Germans executed Belgian villagers in mass retribution for resistance activity during the Rape of Belgium.
The International Criminal Court ( ICC or ICCt) [2] is an intergovernmental organization and international tribunal seated in The Hague, Netherlands. It is the first and only permanent international court with jurisdiction to prosecute individuals for the international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression. The ICC is distinct from the ...
The War Crimes Act of 1996 is a United States federal statute that defines a war crime to include a " grave breach of the Geneva Conventions ", specifically noting that "grave breach" should have the meaning defined in any convention (related to the laws of war) to which the United States is a party. The definition of "grave breach" in some of ...