Chomsky Accuses Postwar US Presidents of Indictable War Crimes

Chomsky's Philosophy

Applying Nuremberg legal standards strictly would convict every post-World War II American commander-in-chief for state terrorism, unlawful invasions, and complicity in mass atrocities.

AI-assisted summary of Noam Chomsky - The Crimes of U.S. Presidents — original source. Check the original for full context.

Source published: 2014-10-07

Key ideas

Applying the Nuremberg principles strictly would result in every single post–World War II U.S. president being indicted as a war criminal across administrations from Eisenhower to Clinton. (0:00)
Presidential foreign policy actions frequently breached international law through direct military invasions, orchestrated coups, and proxy warfare that cost millions of lives across Latin America, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East. (1:33)
Bipartisan administrations systematically subverted international bodies, from Daniel Patrick Moynihan neutralizing the UN over East Timor to Ronald Reagan vetoing UN resolutions endorsing the World Court's condemnation of the Contra war. (3:29)
Post-war diplomacy and economic maneuvers frequently obscured severe human tolls, including the deliberate destruction of civilian infrastructure in Iraq and the fatal bombing of Sudan's Al-Shifa pharmaceutical facility. (7:18)

Detailed notes

## Background Published on YouTube by the channel Chomsky's Philosophy on October 7, 2014, this 2003 interview clip features Noam Chomsky examining the foreign policy crimes of post-World War II American presidents. As summarized in the description, Chomsky reviews the historical record to evaluate whether each post-war administration engaged in indictable offenses.

## TL;DR Evaluating post–World War II American foreign policy under the legal standards established at Nuremberg, Noam Chomsky argues that every modern U.S. president is guilty of indictable war crimes. Running through the roster chronologically, he surveys Eisenhower's coups in Iran and Guatemala alongside covert terror in Indonesia, Kennedy's direct aggression in South Vietnam, Johnson's Indochina escalation, and the active complicity of Ford and Carter in the East Timor atrocities. He continues through Reagan's World Court-condemned Contra war, George H.W. Bush's deliberate targeting of civilian infrastructure in Iraq, and Clinton's lethal missile strike on Sudan's Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory paired with record expansion of illegal West Bank settlements. In doing so, Chomsky presents a systematic indictment demonstrating that major state terrorism and violations of international law were bipartisan constants across decades.

## Atmosphere & style The discussion carries an austere, clinical intensity, driven by Chomsky's trademark low-key, dispassionate cadence and encyclopedic recall of historical episodes. In response to the interviewer's quick prompts, Chomsky dismantles conventional presidential legacies in a cool, matter-of-fact monotone, avoiding heated rhetoric in favor of precise legal definitions, casualties, and state records. Watching the exchange feels like sitting through an unrelenting, rapid-fire prosecutorial debrief, where the calm delivery contrasts sharply with the staggering scale of violence and geopolitical devastation being recounted.

## Bulletin - [00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=0s) Applying the Nuremberg principles strictly would result in every single post–World War II U.S. president being indicted as a war criminal across administrations from Eisenhower to Clinton. - [01:33](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=93s) Presidential foreign policy actions frequently breached international law through direct military invasions, orchestrated coups, and proxy warfare that cost millions of lives across Latin America, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East. - [03:29](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=209s) Bipartisan administrations systematically subverted international bodies, from Daniel Patrick Moynihan neutralizing the UN over East Timor to Ronald Reagan vetoing UN resolutions endorsing the World Court's condemnation of the Contra war. - [07:18](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=438s) Post-war diplomacy and economic maneuvers frequently obscured severe human tolls, including the deliberate destruction of civilian infrastructure in Iraq and the fatal bombing of Sudan's Al-Shifa pharmaceutical facility.

## Key takeaways - [00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=0s) Under Nuremberg legal standards, every U.S. president since World War II committed clearly indictable war crimes. - [00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=0s) Dwight D. Eisenhower directed illegal coups in Iran and Guatemala, ending democratic governance and installing decades of violent dictatorship. - [00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=0s) Eisenhower instigated an armed covert terror campaign in Indonesia's outer islands to break up the country and cripple its democratic system. - [01:33](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=93s) John F. Kennedy launched a direct invasion of South Vietnam in 1962, deploying disguised U.S. air strikes, napalm, chemical crop destruction, and strategic hamlets. - [01:33](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=93s) Kennedy mounted a massive campaign of international terrorism against Cuba that directly contributed to the 1962 missile crisis. - [01:33](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=93s) Lyndon B. Johnson escalated the Indochina war to a death toll of 3 to 4 million while invading the Dominican Republic to halt a democratic revolution. - [03:29](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=209s) Gerald Ford authorized the Indonesian invasion of East Timor, supplying counterinsurgency weapons while Daniel Patrick Moynihan neutralized UN intervention. - [03:29](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=209s) Jimmy Carter circumvented congressional human rights bans by arranging Israeli transfers of U.S. Skyhawk attack jets to Indonesia as atrocities peaked. - [03:29](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=209s) The Camp David Accords directed over half of all U.S. foreign aid to Israel without Palestinian protections, precipitating the 1978 and 1982 invasions of Lebanon. - [07:18](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=438s) Ronald Reagan's administration was officially convicted by the International Court of Justice for unlawful use of force in Nicaragua and subsequently vetoed UN resolutions upholding the ruling. - [07:18](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=438s) George H.W. Bush invaded Panama to capture former CIA asset Manuel Noriega, leaving an estimated 3,000 Panamanian civilian casualties. - [07:18](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=438s) U.S. forces in the 1991 Gulf War intentionally destroyed civilian water, sanitation, and electrical infrastructure, functioning as a form of biological warfare. - [09:44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=584s) Bill Clinton authorized the 1998 cruise missile strike on Sudan's Al-Shifa pharmaceutical plant, resulting in tens of thousands of indirect civilian deaths. - [09:44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=584s) Under Clinton, the State Department dismissed UN resolutions on Palestinian rights as obsolete while Israeli settlement expansion reached a record post-1992 high.

## Detailed walkthrough ### [00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=0s) Eisenhower: Coups in Iran and Guatemala, and Covert War in Indonesia

The discussion opens with an interviewer reminding Noam Chomsky of his famous thesis: if the Nuremberg principles were applied strictly, every single post–World War II American president would be indictable as a war criminal. Chomsky agrees, noting that the premise is accurate, prompting the interviewer to challenge him to quickly run down the post-war roster starting with Dwight D. Eisenhower. Chomsky immediately points to Eisenhower’s role in orchestrating military coups against sovereign governments. In 1953, the Eisenhower administration overthrew the conservative nationalist government of Iran, installing a brutal dictatorship that lasted twenty-five years until the 1979 revolution. The following year, Eisenhower directed the military coup and invasion of Guatemala, destroying the nation’s first and last democratic government and unleashing massive, sustained atrocities that continue nearly half a century later.

Beyond Latin America and the Middle East, Chomsky brings up a lesser-known clandestine operation in Southeast Asia: Eisenhower’s major covert terror operation aimed at fracturing Indonesia. Viewing Indonesian democracy as a fundamental threat because it was too open and permitted an increasingly popular political party of the poor to participate, the administration sought to dismember the country. Eisenhower supported and instigated an armed military rebellion across the outer islands in an effort to strip away Indonesia's primary natural resources and sabotage its democratic framework. Summing up this opening record, Chomsky says, “These are all indictable offenses.”

- Overthrew Iran’s nationalist government via military coup, yielding 25 years of dictatorship. - Invaded and overthrew Guatemala's democratic government, initiating decades of mass atrocities. - Launched major post-war covert terror operations to break up Indonesia and exploit its resource-rich outer islands.

```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: Post-War Presidencies and Major Indictable Offenses accDescr: A structural summary of the key foreign policy crimes and interventions charged by Chomsky across post-WWII administrations.

subgraph ColdWarEarly["Early Cold War Interventions"] IKE["Eisenhower"] -->|"Coups & Terror"| IKE_CRIMES["Iran (1953), Guatemala (1954), Indonesia destabilization"] JFK["Kennedy"] -->|"Direct Aggression"| JFK_CRIMES["South Vietnam invasion (1962), Operation Mongoose / Cuba terror"] LBJ["Johnson"] -->|"Escalation"| LBJ_CRIMES["3–4M dead in Indochina, Dominican Republic invasion"] end

subgraph ProxyAtrocities["Proxy Wars & Covert Backing"] FORD["Ford"] -->|"Diplomatic Cover"| FORD_CRIMES["East Timor invasion clearance, Moynihan UN obstruction"] CARTER["Carter"] -->|"Bypassing Bans"| CARTER_CRIMES["Skyhawks to Indonesia, Camp David militarization"] REAGAN["Reagan"] -->|"Unlawful Force"| REAGAN_CRIMES["Nicaragua Contra war (ICJ condemnation)"] end

subgraph GulfAndBeyond["Gulf War Era to 1990s"] GHWB["George H.W. Bush"] -->|"Invasions & Warfare"| GHWB_CRIMES["Panama invasion (Noriega kidnapping), Iraq infrastructure bombing"] WJC["Clinton"] -->|"Strikes & Settlements"| WJC_CRIMES["Al-Shifa pharmaceutical bombing, Record West Bank expansion"] end ```

---

[01:33](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=93s) Kennedy and Johnson: Escalation in Indochina and Regional Aggression

When asked about John F. Kennedy, Chomsky rejects the romanticized legacy of Camelot, stating plainly: “Kennedy was one of the worst.” He explains that Kennedy launched an outright invasion of South Vietnam. The groundwork had been laid under Eisenhower, who blocked the scheduled 1954 political settlement and helped install a Latin American–style terror state that slaughtered an estimated 60,000 to 70,000 people. When the resulting popular domestic resistance grew beyond the internal control of the client regime, Kennedy deployed direct military force. By 1962, approximately one-third of all bombing sorties in South Vietnam were flown by the U.S. Air Force using planes painted with South Vietnamese insignia but operated by American pilots. Kennedy authorized the use of napalm, initiated chemical warfare to destroy food crops, and forced millions of rural peasants into strategic hamlets that functioned effectively as concentration camps. Chomsky points out that Kennedy also directed a massive campaign of international terrorism against Cuba that pushed the world to the brink of nuclear destruction during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Turning to Lyndon B. Johnson, Chomsky highlights the catastrophic escalation of the war across Indochina, which ultimately left three to four million people dead. Outside Southeast Asia, Johnson deployed military forces into the Dominican Republic in 1965 to crush an emerging democratic revolution, and he actively supported the expansion of the Israeli occupation in its earliest phases after the 1967 war.

- **Kennedy's 1962 escalation**: Direct air strikes by disguised U.S. aircraft, introduction of napalm, chemical crop destruction, and forced population relocation. - **Cuba**: Comprehensive campaign of covert sabotage and terrorism culminating in the 1962 missile crisis. - **Johnson’s toll**: Expansion of the Indochina war causing 3–4 million deaths, invasion of the Dominican Republic, and backing the 1967 Israeli military occupation.

---

[03:29](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=209s) Ford and Carter: Complicity in East Timor and Middle East Realignment

When the interviewer moves chronologically past Richard Nixon, Chomsky quips that Nixon's criminality is so obvious that “we don't even have to talk about” it, moving directly to Gerald Ford. Though Ford spent only a short time in the Oval Office, Chomsky emphasizes that it was long enough to give the green light to the Indonesian invasion of East Timor, an assault that escalated into one of the closest approximations of genocide in the modern era. While public posture feigned opposition, the U.S. covertly accelerated weapons shipments, specifically sending counterinsurgency equipment so Indonesian forces could consummate the conquest. Chomsky cites U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who candidly boasted in his memoirs that his explicit White House instructions were to render the UN completely toothless in halting the invasion. Moynihan proudly recorded that he succeeded, noting immediately afterward that roughly 60,000 Timorese were killed in the opening months alone. Chomsky summarizes the brief presidency: “That's just a short period in office but that's indictable, seriously, in fact.”

Jimmy Carter continued and expanded this backing. As Indonesian atrocities in East Timor reached their absolute peak in 1978, Carter dramatically increased military hardware deliveries. When an emergent human rights coalition in the U.S. Congress imposed legal embargoes to block advanced arms transfers to Jakarta, Carter worked through Vice President Walter Mondale to coordinate an end-run, arranging for Israel to transfer U.S.-supplied Skyhawk attack jets to the Indonesian military. This weaponry enabled Indonesia to complete a campaign that wiped out roughly a quarter of East Timor’s population.

Chomsky also dismantles Carter's celebrated diplomatic legacy, arguing that the Camp David Accords were not a peaceful breakthrough but a geopolitical disaster. At Camp David, the U.S. and Israel finally agreed to terms Egypt had originally offered in 1971—terms Washington had dismissed at the time—except the delayed agreement now excluded provisions for the Palestinians. To secure Israeli acquiescence, Carter escalated foreign assistance until military and financial aid to Israel accounted for more than half of all U.S. foreign aid worldwide. Israel immediately capitalized on this blank check and security buffer, launching invasions of Lebanon in 1978 and 1982 while aggressively integrating the occupied Palestinian territories.

- Daniel Patrick Moynihan acknowledged executing orders to ensure UN inaction as tens of thousands were slaughtered in East Timor. - Carter administration circumvented congressional weapon bans by using Israeli Skyhawk transfers to sustain Indonesian assaults. - Camp David Accords shifted over 50% of total U.S. foreign aid to Israel, precipitating the 1978 and 1982 invasions of Lebanon.

---

[07:18](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=438s) Reagan and George H.W. Bush: State Terrorism, Panama, and the Gulf War

Chomsky dismisses Ronald Reagan's record just as curtly as Nixon's, pointing out that Reagan holds the unique distinction of heading an administration officially convicted by the International Court of Justice. The World Court ruled against the United States for the “unlawful use of force”—the international legal term for state-sponsored terrorism—regarding the covert Contra war against Nicaragua. When the United Nations Security Council voted on two separate resolutions endorsing the World Court's judgment, the Reagan administration vetoed both.

Turning to George H.W. Bush, Chomsky begins with Operation Just Cause, the December 1989 invasion of Panama: “The invasion of Panama, which according to the Panamanians killed about 3,000 people.” Chomsky underscores the absurdity of invading an entire country to capture Manuel Noriega, a client strongman who had performed his worst crimes while on the CIA payroll, only to be hauled to Florida for trial after falling out of favor.

In the Persian Gulf War, the elder Bush systematically dismissed viable diplomatic options for a negotiated Iraqi withdrawal from Kuwait. Chomsky laments that the American press completely buried these diplomatic possibilities, with the sole exception of the Long Island newspaper *Newsday*, which reported the diplomatic maneuvers accurately. When the air war commenced, coalition forces deliberately struck civilian infrastructure, obliterating power generation, water purification, and sewage systems. Chomsky contends that wiping out a modern city's electrical and sanitation grids operates as a de facto form of biological warfare under international law. This military destruction was then paired with a sweeping sanctions regime that began under Bush, devastating ordinary Iraqi society while leaving Saddam Hussein firmly in power.

- Reagan's administration was formally condemned by the International Court of Justice for international terrorism in Nicaragua. - Panama was invaded to abduct a long-time CIA asset, leaving an uninvestigated death toll estimated by locals at 3,000. - Long Island *Newsday* was the only domestic newspaper to report the diplomatic settlement offers rejected prior to the 1991 Gulf War. - Intentional targeting of civilian water, sewage, and power infrastructure in Iraq amounted to functional biological warfare.

---

[09:44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc&t=584s) Clinton: The Al-Shifa Missile Strike and West Bank Cantonization

Chomsky moves on to Bill Clinton, demonstrating that the human cost of his presidency is often obscured by sanitized domestic accounts. He highlights what mainstream observers often minimize as a minor incident: the August 1998 cruise missile strike on the Al-Shifa pharmaceutical facility in Sudan. Chomsky stresses that this was not an intelligence error; the administration knew precisely what facility they were striking. Based on on-the-ground assessments from the German ambassador to Sudan and the regional director of the Near East Foundation, the resulting loss of vital medicines caused several tens of thousands of Sudanese civilian deaths. As Chomsky observes: “If somebody did that to us, we’d regard it as bad news, and again we can continue.”

Chomsky similarly scrutinizes Clinton's handling of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Clinton administration began by dismissing foundational UN Security Council resolutions on the occupied territories as “obsolete and anachronistic,” effectively discarding established international legal frameworks. Under the cover of the prolonged Oslo peace process, illegal Israeli settlements expanded continuously with direct American taxpayer subsidies, diplomatic cover, and military aid. Rather than slowing construction, settlement growth peaked during Clinton's final year in office, reaching its highest rate since 1992. The Palestinian territories were systematically carved up, segmented into isolated enclaves, and hemmed in by bypass roads and infrastructure projects. Chomsky concludes that this ongoing military occupation and dispossession constitutes an unambiguous crime that would never be tolerated if committed by an official adversary.

- Single missile strike on Sudan’s primary pharmaceutical plant yielded estimates of tens of thousands of indirect deaths. - State Department declared prior UN resolutions on Palestinian rights "obsolete and anachronistic." - Israeli settlement expansion funded by U.S. aid hit a post-1992 high in 2000, formalizing the cantonization of the West Bank.

## Mentioned Noam Chomsky, Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Jimmy Carter, Walter Mondale, Ronald Reagan, International Court of Justice, United Nations Security Council, George H.W. Bush, Manuel Noriega, Central Intelligence Agency, Newsday, Saddam Hussein, Bill Clinton, Al-Shifa pharmaceutical facility, Near East Foundation

## Video description Chomsky goes through some of the crimes of the post-war presidents. From 2003.

[Source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BXtgq0Nhsc)

中文简报

乔姆斯基指控二战后历任美国总统犯有可被起诉的战争罪若严格适用纽伦堡法律标准，二战后每一位美国三军统帅都将因国家恐怖主义、非法入侵以及串通参与大规模暴行而被定罪。诺姆·乔姆斯基根据纽伦堡确立的法律标准评估二战后的美国外交政策，认为每一位现代美国总统都犯有可被起诉的战争罪。他按时间顺序梳理名单，历数了艾森豪威尔在伊朗和危地马拉发动的政变以及在印度尼西亚的秘密恐怖行动、肯尼迪对南越的直接侵略、约翰逊在印度支那的军事升级，以及福特和卡特在东帝汶暴行中的积极串通共谋。他接着指出了里根遭到国际法院谴责的“康特拉”战争、乔治·H·W·布什蓄意将伊拉克民用基础设施作为攻击目标，以及克林顿对苏丹阿什法制药厂的致命导弹袭击，外加约旦河西岸非法定居点的创纪录扩张。乔姆斯基借此提出了系统性的控诉，表明数十年来重大国家恐怖主义和违反国际法的行为一直是跨越两党的常态。若严格适用纽伦堡原则，从艾森豪威尔到克林顿政府，二战后无一例外的每一位美国总统都将作为战争罪犯被起诉。 (0:00) 总统的外交政策行动经常违反国际法，包括直接军事入侵、策划政变和代理人战争，导致拉丁美洲、东南亚和中东数以百万计的人丧生。 (1:33) 两党政府系统性地破坏国际机构，从丹尼尔·帕特里克·莫伊尼汉在东帝汶问题上使联合国失去效力，到罗纳德·里根否决支持国际法院谴责“康特拉”战争的联合国决议。 (3:29) 战后的外交与经济手段常常掩盖严重的人员伤亡，包括蓄意破坏伊拉克的民用基础设施以及对苏丹阿什法制药厂的致命轰炸。 (7:18)

Original transcript

[0:00] You said that if the Nuremberg [0:01] principles were applied, every post-World [0:03] War II president would be indictable. [0:06] It’s probably true. -Can we run down them real fast? [0:09] What did Eisenhower do that would [0:11] indict him? -Eisenhower overthrew the [0:15] conservative nationalist government of [0:17] Iran with a military coup. He overthrew [0:21] the first and last democratic government [0:24] in Guatemala by military coup and [0:29] invasion, leading to years of… In Iran it [0:34] led to 25 years of brutal dictatorship, [0:36] finally overthrown in 79. In Guatemala it [0:40] led to massive atrocities which are [0:43] still continuing. That's after almost 50 [0:46] years. In Indonesia, [0:49] this was not known until recently, but he [0:53] conducted a major clandestine terror [0:57] operation of the post-war period, up [1:00] until Cuban and Nicaragua, in an effort to [1:03] break up Indonesia and strip off the outer [1:05] islands where most of the resources are, [1:08] and undermine what was then [1:12] considered as the threat of Indonesian [1:14] democracy. Indonesia was too free and [1:17] open. It was allowing a political party [1:20] of the poor to participate. They were [1:22] gaining a lot of ground, so [1:26] Eisenhower supported and helped [1:28] instigate a military rebellion in the [1:30] outer islands. This is just for starters. [1:33] These are all indictable offenses. -What about Kennedy? [1:37] Kennedy was one of the worst. [1:39] Kennedy, first of all, invaded South [1:42] Vietnam. During the Eisenhower [1:44] administration they had blocked a [1:47] political settlement in 1954, and [1:50] instituted a kind of Latin American- [1:52] style terror state which had killed [1:55] maybe 60 or 70 thousand people by the [1:58] end of the Eisenhower period, and it had [2:01] instigated a response, a reaction that [2:06] Kennedy recognized couldn't be [2:08] controlled internally, so he simply invaded. [2:12] In 1962, about a third of the bombing [2:18] missions were carried out by the US [2:20] Air Force in the South by US planes with [2:26] South Vietnamese insignia but US pilots. [2:28] He authorized napalm. He began [2:31] the use of chemical weapons to destroy [2:35] food crops. They began programs which [2:40] drove millions of people into what [2:43] amounted to concentration camps. [2:45] That's aggression. In the case of Cuba it was [2:48] just a massive campaign of international [2:50] terrorism which almost led to the [2:53] destruction of the world, led to the [2:54] missile crisis, and we can continue. [2:58] Again, these are all indictable offenses. [3:01] Johnson? -Well, Johnson expanded the war [3:04] in Indochina to the point where he [3:06] ended up probably leaving three or four [3:10] million people dead. He invaded the [3:14] Dominican Republic to block what looked [3:17] like a potential democratic revolution there. [3:19] He supported the Israeli occupation [3:23] in its early stages. Again, we can go [3:26] around the world. [3:29] Take, let’s say Carter. -I’ll get there but Nixon’s next. [3:32] Nixon we don't even have [3:33] to talk about. We can skip that one, OK? [3:36] Ford then. -Well, Ford was [3:40] only there for a short time but long [3:43] enough to endorse the Indonesian [3:46] invasion of East Timor which became [3:49] about as close to genocide as anything [3:52] in the modern period. They pretended to [3:55] oppose it, but secretly supported it, in fact [3:59] not so secretly. Immediately [4:04] after the invasion the US did join the [4:08] rest of the world in formally condemning [4:11] it at the Security Council, but [4:13] ambassador Moynihan [4:16] was kind enough to explain to us in his [4:19] words that his instructions were to [4:22] render the United Nations utterly [4:25] ineffective in any actions it might take [4:28] to counter the Indonesian [4:30] invasion and he says proudly that he did [4:34] this with considerable success, and his [4:36] next sentence says in the next few [4:39] months it seems that about sixty [4:41] thousand people were killed and then he [4:43] goes off to the next topic. That's the [4:46] first few months. It went on to probably [4:48] hundreds of thousands. Formally the [4:51] US announced the boycott of weapons [4:54] but secretly it increased the supply of [4:58] weapons including counterinsurgency [5:00] equipment so that the Indonesians could [5:02] consummate the invasion. That's just a [5:06] short period in office but that's [5:10] indictable, seriously, in fact. [5:12] That’s a major war crime. -Carter? Carter increased, [5:16] as the Indonesian atrocities were [5:18] increasing — they peaked in 1978 — Carter's [5:22] flow of weapons to Indonesia increased. [5:25] When Congress imposed human rights [5:28] restrictions — by then there was a human [5:31] rights movement in Congress to block the [5:34] flow of advanced weaponry to Indonesia [5:38] — Carter arranged through Mondale, the vice [5:42] president, to get Israel to send US [5:45] Skyhawks to Indonesia to enable [5:49] Indonesia to complete what turned out to [5:53] be near genocide, killing maybe a quarter [5:56] of the population or something. [6:00] In the Middle East, Carter had just won the [6:03] Nobel Prize. His great achievement was [6:05] the Camp David agreements. The Camp David [6:08] agreements are presented as a diplomatic [6:11] triumph for the United States. In fact, [6:14] they were a diplomatic catastrophe. [6:17] At Camp David the United States and Israel [6:20] accepted finally Egypt’s 1971 offer which [6:26] the US had rejected at the time except that [6:30] now it was worse from the US-Israeli point [6:34] of view because it included the [6:35] Palestinians. In order get [6:39] Israel to accept Egypt’S 1971 offer, [6:42] after a major war and atrocities and so [6:45] on, Carter raised military and other [6:49] aid to Israel to more than fifty percent of [6:54] total aid worldwide. Israel used it at [6:57] once in exactly the way they said they [6:59] were going to do, as every sane person [7:01] knew, as an opportunity to attack their [7:04] northern neighbor, first in 1978 then in [7:07] 1982, and to increase integration of the [7:11] occupied territories. And that's for [7:14] starters. We can continue. -Reagan? -I don't [7:19] think we have to talk about that one, either. [7:20] I mean Reagan is the first president to [7:23] have been condemned by the International [7:26] Court of Justice for what they called [7:28] the unlawful use of force, meaning [7:30] international terrorism, in the war [7:33] against Nicaragua. Again, that's just for [7:35] starters. The Security Council [7:39] endorsed it in two resolutions, both of [7:42] which were vetoed by the United States. [7:44] [George H.W.] Bush? -Well, we can begin with the [7:51] invasion of Panama. The invasion of [7:54] Panama, which according to the [7:56] Panamanians killed about 3,000 people. [7:58] Since it's never investigated, who knows [8:00] if that's true or not. This was done [8:03] in order to kidnap a disobedient thug [8:08] who had been supported by the United [8:10] States right through his worst [8:11] atrocities. -Noriega. -Noriega, who was [8:14] brought to Florida and tried for crimes [8:16] that he had committed mostly on the CIA [8:18] payroll. [8:19] OK, that's aggression. You could go into [8:22] the details of the war in Iraq, but there [8:27] were plainly opportunities for… they [8:29] might not have worked, [8:31] but there were opportunities for [8:32] diplomatic settlement which the Bush [8:34] administration refused to consider, and, [8:36] incidentally, the press would not report, [8:39] with a single exception: Long Island [8:42] Newsday, which did report the whole [8:44] story throughout accurately, and it is the [8:47] only newspaper in the country to have [8:49] done so. The Bush administration then did [8:54] attack and the attack was carried out [8:57] and in a manner which is criminal under [9:00] the laws of war. They attacked [9:04] infrastructure. If you attack New [9:06] York City and you destroy the electrical [9:09] system, the sewage systems and [9:12] so on, that amounts to biological warfare, [9:14] and that's the nature of the attack. [9:18] Then came a sanctions regime, which was [9:21] mostly Clinton, but began with Bush, [9:23] which by conservative estimates [9:26] killed hundreds of thousands of people [9:27] while strengthening Saddam Hussein. [9:30] That takes us off to Clinton. That's the [9:34] beginning. That's by no means the end. [9:37] We could run through it. [9:39] That one case suffices, but there are [9:42] plenty of others. -[GW] Bush? [9:44] Let’s go on with Clinton. One of Clinton's [9:46] very minor escapades [9:49] was sending a couple of cruise missiles [9:51] to the Sudan to destroy what they knew [9:56] to be a pharmaceutical plant. There was [9:58] no intelligence failure. According to the [10:00] only estimates we have from the German [10:03] ambassador and the regional [10:07] director of Near East Foundation, which does [10:10] field work in Sudan, both of them [10:13] estimated several tens of thousands of [10:15] deaths from one cruise missile. [10:19] Very serious. If somebody did that to us, [10:21] we’d regard it as bad news, and again we can [10:24] continue. In the Middle East, for [10:27] example, Clinton began by declaring [10:32] past UN resolutions, [10:36] in the words of his administration, “obsolete [10:39] and anachronistic” because we're finished [10:42] with that. No more international law. [10:45] Then comes a period called a peace [10:47] process except that during the peace [10:50] process Israeli settlement, [10:55] which means settlement paid for by the [10:56] US taxpayer and supported by US military [11:00] aid and diplomacy, continually increased. [11:03] The most extreme year was Clinton's last [11:06] year: the highest level of settlement, the [11:09] highest since 1992. [11:11] Meanwhile the territories were cantonized [11:14] and broken up into small regions with [11:18] infrastructure projects and new [11:20] settlement. I don't know what you call [11:23] that, but it's under military occupation, [11:24] and if anyone else was doing it, we would call [11:28] it a crime, and again we can continue.