No, targeting opposing warfighters (the hackers are certainly such) is not a war crime, even if they attempt to hide among civilian populations. Nor is lying about the specifics of your targeting.
If bombing a hacker's house isn't a war crime, is a Russian missile hitting a mall in LA, because a colonel working in logistics took his kids shopping there also kosher, or..?
I assume the triumphant press release would be something like 'a number of confirmed enemy fighters killed'.
It's always interesting to see warhawks (who have never been the victims of war) do their best to expand the list of who they consider acceptable enemy targets are, with no regard to what this means to them, domestically.
> Russian missile hitting a mall in LA, because a colonel working in logistics took his kids shopping there also kosher
No, because it violates "Proportionality". In this definition, even the very anti-war ICRC admits that it is sometimes necessary to kill civilians to achieve military objectives. https://casebook.icrc.org/highlight/targeting-under-internat... - The law they cite is "expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated".
Where you draw the line is to be litigated. Is destroying the entire apartment block to get a single hacker justified? Probably not. A single-residence home, even if his wife and kids are there? If they're an important enough military target, for sure.
It seems pretty obvious that America is playing by the rule of "We have the power, so you're going to do what we say" when it comes to these scenarios. I find it hard to imagine, for example, an assassination on an American official of rank similar to Qasem Soleimani would result in nearly as timid of a response as Iran gave.
> The Act authorizes the president of the United States to use "all means necessary and appropriate to bring about the release of any U.S. or allied personnel being detained or imprisoned by, on behalf of, or at the request of the International Criminal Court".
> This authorization led to the act being colloquially nicknamed "The Hague Invasion Act", as the act allows the president to order U.S. military action, such as an invasion of the Netherlands, where The Hague is located, to protect American officials and military personnel from prosecution or rescue them from custody.
I don't see how your comment contradicts the statement "The us generally will extradite if your justice system isn't corrupt. There are exceptions, but everyone has them."
The fact that there is a US law to prevent US service members specifically from being detained by the ICC specifically, has little bearing on the statement that "The US generally will extradite".
These are the most meaningful exemptions. Sure, it'll extradite petty criminals, but it absolutely won't extradite politically useful[1] criminals, and will absolutely not allow the latter to have a fair trial.
If that's acceptable and civilized behavior, I don't see why you can complain that Russia won't extradite a politically useful[1] criminal.
[1] In the sense that their crimes are furthering the state's geopolitical agenda.
That's a reasonable argument. I think that the response that comes next is "the Russian geopolitical agenda is bad", but that's a separate topic - I think you've convinced me on this point.
I don't understand how a hacker that's targeting US infrastructure would be considered an "opposing warfighter" in the context of the Russia-Ukraine war?
