XXII. Commentary-Bringing Terrorists to Justice: Manuel Supervielle

• Author: Manuel Supervielle
• Pages: 371

As the Staff Judge Advocate for the US Southern Command, I am exposed to a number of international legal issues occurring in the international community. Interestingly, given my position, I am exposed to the Central and Latin America position on these issues which often causes me to delve deeply into the positions the US government takes.

Mike Newton's thesis is that the decision as to how and where crimes against international law are dealt with is a question of national political will.

To date, this thesis echoes the US position that it has the requisite ability to prosecute the types of crimes that many other nations want the International Criminal Court (ICC) to have jurisdiction over. The United States has the Uniform Code.of Military Justice, a fairly extensive federal criminal code, and supporting state subordinate criminal codes. The United States also has an effective, independent judiciary, which is certainly not true in many areas of the world. However, something I think that is occasionally missed by those 1. Colonel Manuel Supervielle, an Army Judge Advocate, is the Staff Judge Advocate for the US Southern Command. In this position, he provides legal advice on international and operational law issues to US military commands or operations throughout Central and South America.

advocating the US position is that there are many nations that recognize that they do not have the rich history of an independent and impartial judiciary, nor do they have the type of separation of powers to remove bias and corruption from the court systems like the United States does. For these countries, many seem to prefer the ICC in lieu of their own domestic courts as they simply do not trust their own judicial and political systems. Hope has turned to frustration which has turned to despair in such countries and it is accordingly, not surprising that such countries see the ICC as holding out hope for achieving on an international scale, what has proven unattainable on the domestic scale. Recognizing then that the United States does have the rich, independent infrastructure and a proven history of being able to deal with war criminals and the like as well as the political will to handle those accused of crimes against international law, it might nonetheless behoove the anti-ICC advocates to consider that other nations and their citizens do not have the luxury of the same rich history. There may be very logical reasons as to why other countries would...