'If You Can Keep It': The US, Iran, And War Crimes

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0:25If You Can Keep It, our weekly series on the state of our democracy continues today with questions about the Trump administration's airstrikes in Iran. Specifically, whether the U.S. could be breaking international humanitarian law, the rules that govern how wars are fought. Those laws of war exist to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure, but they only work if someone enforces them. Yet Iranian state media says 322 medical and health care centers and 763 schools have been destroyed by American and Israeli attacks, though those numbers haven't been independently verified, we want to stress.

1:01We do know that the United States blew up Iran's largest bridge. That was on Thursday, a day after the president threatened to bomb the country, quote, back to the Stone Ages, if a deal to end the war wasn't reached. And on Sunday, the president posted on Truth Social, quote, Tuesday will be power plant day and bridge day all wrapped up in one in Iran. There will be nothing like it. Open the F word straight, you crazy bastards, or you'll be living in hell. Just watch. If the president follows through and orders these kinds of attacks, he says starting Tuesday, would they constitute war crimes?

1:37And if they did, what would accountability look like? I'm Jen White. And I'm Todd Zwillick. You're listening to the 1A Podcast. We'll get to these questions and more after a quick break. Stay with us.

1:52This message comes from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, recognizing extraordinarily creative individuals whose ideas, solutions, and discoveries expand people's expectations of what's possible. MacFound.org In the new movie, The Drama, Zendaya and Robert Pattinson are getting married. But maybe they shouldn't? The stars play a couple, and then when a shocking secret is revealed, suddenly their love for one another doesn't seem all that secure. We're unpacking it all on NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour. Listen via the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back to the 1A podcast.

2:30We're talking about war crimes and whether the U.S. could be breaking international humanitarian law. Let's get into the discussion and meet our panel. Joining us from New Haven is Ona Hathaway. She's a professor of international law at Yale Law School. She's also the president-elect of the American Society of International Law. Ona, welcome to the program. Thank you for having me. Joining us in studio is Scott Anderson, a fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution. He previously served as a legal advisor at the U.S. State Department and at the embassy in Baghdad. Welcome. Thank you.

3:02And Missy Ryan. She's a staff writer at The Atlantic who's covered the Pentagon State Department and served as a foreign correspondent in Latin America and the Middle East. Missy, welcome back. Thanks for having me. Ona, I want to start with a letter you published late last week. It was signed by more than 100 experts of international law based here in the U.S. And it warns that our country's rhetoric and military action in Iran could violate the laws of war. And you acknowledge that you have concerns about war crimes being committed on all sides of this conflict, but you focus on the U.S. And you cite a number of statements by the president and administration officials that set off alarm bells.

3:37Here's one of them from Defense Secretary Pete Hexeth. America, regardless of what so-called international institutions say, is unleashing the most lethal and precise air power campaign in history. all on our terms with maximum authorities. No stupid rules of engagement, no nation-building quagmire, no democracy-building exercise, no politically correct wars. We fight to win and we don't waste time. That was Hex. That's speaking at a Pentagon briefing on March 2nd. So, Ona, you hear a statement like that, and what flags does it raise for you? Yeah, it really sets off alarm bells because this is the Secretary of Defense essentially arguing that we should no longer follow international humanitarian law.

4:22He is suggesting that it's appropriate for the military to prioritize lethality over following international law. And the idea that these rules of engagement are quote unquote stupid suggests that he thinks that international law and the rules that the United States has historically abided by are no longer worth following. And so that really set off alarm bells for me and I think for many others, suggesting that Secretary Hegseth is prepared to wage this war without following our legal obligations. And is your concern, and that of other legal experts, that is it about how this war is being fought or whether the war itself is legal?

5:03Well, both are concerns, right? So there are two different bodies of law. One is governed by the United Nations Charter, which prohibits states from resorting to armed force without either seeking the approval of the UN Security Council or acting in their own self-defense in response to an armed attack. Neither of those are present here. There's general agreement among international lawyers and experts that this war was waged unlawfully, that the decision to use military force in the first place was illegal. But then there's the second body of law, as you mentioned in the opening, international humanitarian law, and that's about how the war is conducted.

5:44So this is the rules, for instance, you can't target civilians, that you have to avoid targeting civilian objects, that you can only target military objectives. And so it is both the case that the war is illegal in the first place, but then there are a whole set of rules that govern how you fight, and those independently matter. Scott, what else do we need to know about the core of international humanitarian law beyond what Ona just mentioned there, attacking civilian infrastructure, how you attack troops versus avoiding civilians? I mean, those are really core elements of this. The thing I would emphasize here is that I think with the president's statements, the secretary's statements are immensely concerning.

6:26I agree 100 percent with Ona on that. A lot of the principles that are supposed to enforce the core guidelines of how we fight wars, what is legal, what is not, is baked into military training. Soldiers have been exposed to them. They've been socialized with them. The United States has idiosyncratic views on certain ones of them that a lot of international lawyers will take issue with. But many of the standards are still there. It's not so easy that the Secretary of Defense will just say, OK, start ignoring these rules and warfighters will start ignoring them. But the real problem that we've seen isn't just the rhetoric.

6:55We've also seen the secretary systematically break down the institutions that are supposed to provide the resources available to warfighters, to commanders, to ensure that they can comply by doing things like limiting access to judge advocate generals, limiting training and opportunities, limiting information about these guidelines, and, of course, deemphasizing. We know cases where it sounds like if you start invoking these things, you may face career repercussions. That makes it a lot harder on the officers who say, I want to fight this war. I want to fight it correctly to actually do that task.

7:27Well, you talk about things that have changed. Under Secretary Hegseth, the Defense Department Civilian Protection Center of Excellence was tasked with helping our military avoid civilian casualties, and it was created in 2023. The Secretary shuttered that center in 2025. five. Misty, remind us, why was that center created and why did Haxac shut it down? Sure. So that move related to the Center of Excellence is just one that he's taken that could have an impact. And I think we're seeing that now in Iran, but also in the conflicts we've seen in the Caribbean and elsewhere. So ironically, the Center of Excellence was part of a greater effort to reconcile with the military's legacy of civilian harm that started in the first Trump administration.

8:13It came out of the war against the Islamic State. There were thousands of civilian casualties, you know, unintended deaths that the United States caused in Iraq and Syria. And so there was this kind of big process, internal studies, new regulation that came out, and they set up new structures. The Center of Excellence was housed within the Department of the Army. Its goal was to really disseminate best practices across the military for avoiding unnecessary civilian harm. There were also teams set up at the different combatant commands, including Central Command. They would have people advising targeters to say, you know, you might want to be aware of the patterns of life that this building may have civilians in it for such and such reason.

8:56They had red team people that would go and say, actually, you know, we think that this might not be a good idea. Much of that has been dismantled within the last year. And I think that the reason really goes back to what Hegseth has said quite openly. You played one quote from him. He's also used this term, maximum lethality, not tepid legality. So, you know, he has a history throughout. He was a National Guard soldier who served in Iraq of deriding military lawyers and the role they play and also pushing back on the rules of engagement, which are the kind of tactical directives that are usually layered on top of, you know, the laws that undergird any given conflict.

9:40So he has a real hostility to that. And I think that we're seeing that come to bear in Iran, just as we have in the Caribbean. We got this comment from Bill who says, please clearly distinguish between what has been done and what has been discussed. Also, that school strike was a targeting error, not a deliberate war crime. And he's referring there to one of the most widely reported incidents, a strike on a girls' elementary school in Manab that killed more than 170 people, including over 100 children. And a preliminary military report found it was an accident and that the U.S. was responsible.

10:13But to that point, the department's civilian protection center of excellence, that was the kind of strike they were tasked with helping the military avoid? No, the center of excellence played a different role. They were not operational in the same way that the people who would be embedded in the combatant commands would be in terms of advising targeters. And the people who advised the – who were the civilian harm advisors in the military would be careful to note that they're not imposing any constraints. They don't have the ability to overrule any sort of – any given airstrike, for example. But really, their presence and the regulations that they were associated with, it really created a culture where civilian harm was supposed to be woven into the planning process and the culture where this is something that commanders have to care about.

11:15And there is a complex history within the Defense Department on this issue. During the wars in Iraq and Syria against the Islamic State, there was a lot of pushback from certain commanders who felt like their hands were tied, that the constraints were overdone. And that's something that, you know, I think is part of the story here, too. We got this from Caleb, who writes, if the U.S. does commit war crimes, what then? This administration has shown zero respect for the rule of law or concern for consequences and so far has gotten away with it. Will the international stage be much different? Well, coming up, we talk about what accountability looks like.

11:50That's in a moment.

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12:36Here's a voice note we got. Concerning the concept of war crimes or rules of war, it seems to me that the phrase is oxymoronic. We also heard from another of you who says, is this a serious question? Is the earth spherical as opposed to flat? Has Israel been committing war crimes in Gaza for years with weapons we provide? We have been targeting civilian infrastructure. It may be uncomfortable to admit what we are doing, but that's our problem. There simply is no factual basis for any argument that we are not committing war crimes in Iran. Ona, before the break, Jen mentioned the American strike on the school in Manab in southern Iran that killed 170 people, the majority of them apparently schoolchildren.

13:16That strike appears to be a case of mistaken targeting, although that hasn't been conclusively concluded and made public. But let's say that strike was found to be a targeting mistake. Has anyone been held accountable at the Pentagon? Has the Pentagon or the White House or the defense secretary said anything about holding anyone responsible for that mistake, if indeed that's what it was? How should accountability work in a case like this? Yeah, I mean, not that we've heard. And I think it's important to point out that simply calling something a mistake does not sort of end the discussion. There are often mistakes in war, but sometimes mistakes in war are avoidable.

14:03And if there is a failure to take necessary precautions to ensure that civilians are not killed, if, for instance, there's not review of contemporary maps to take up the fact that this building had been in use as a school for over a decade, if there hadn't been any effort to review pattern of life, if there hadn't been any effort to verify the target, that may be reckless. And recklessness can constitute willfulness. And there can be legal liability for that. That can itself be a war crime. So simply calling something a mistake doesn't necessarily end the discussion. And the department is under obligations to investigate and should tell the American people what's happened because this is one of the worst civilian casualty incidents in U.S.

14:57military, recent U.S. military history. And we deserve to know what steps were taken to ensure that something like this isn't going to happen again. Well, you got this from Stan who says, bombing a bridge is part of destroying infrastructure that is used by the Iranian military. Nobody wants to see civilian schools and hospitals bombed, but they are often located next to military assets or they are also used by the military. That's on them too. War is hell. You fight a war to win and to minimize your own personnel and material losses. This is not a reality show. It is reality. Scott, how do dual-use facilities, infrastructure that serves both civilians and military, complicate perhaps judgments about what might constitute a war crime?

15:42Absolutely. It is one of the more complicated questions you can encounter in this situation because you're inherently weighing, okay, well, what is the military advantage presented by this target, the military usage, versus the cost to civilians, the cost to protected objects that we have to weigh in. The United States and Israel, I think notably, I think generally have taken a slightly more permissive view of what can be done with dual-use objects and have leaned into that in various circumstances. You see similar logic in regard to other objects like revenue-generating objects, things that can generate revenue for an enemy force.

16:15We see that in the context of the maritime strikes in the Caribbean. over the last few months have leaned on that logic. But even under that permissive view, the idea is essentially these are objects where you have to establish there's enough sufficient military advantage there. There's always that sort of gray area. When we hear about these targets being hit, what we want is to have confidence that there is a process, that those factors are being weighed accurately, and that there is an ex-post accountability where there's an open question saying, well, wait, really, this hurts civilians. Can we be confident that we made this decision correctly?

16:44And we have leaders and military officers will be given the opportunity, the resources to go back and make sure that judgment was accurate and take the lessons from that and apply it more effectively in the future. That's why these comments and the breakdown of these processes are so concerning, because the military could be doing everything right, potentially. But precisely because we have this rhetoric, this breakdown in institutions, they are not going to be able to persuade people of that, because their leadership is not backing them up that this is important. They're not helping them signal that message, which traditionally a lot of American war fighters have cared about.

17:14Well, to that point, we got this question from Brian, who asks, what does war law say about putting military positions in hospitals and schools, Ona? Yeah, it's not lawful. That is itself a war crime. So you can't locate military positions within a civilian object, particularly protected objects, but that does not relieve the attacking force of its legal obligations, that is to minimize harm to civilians. And I think it's important to point out there's kind of two different situations we're talking about here when it comes to hitting infrastructure. So there are instances like what you're just suggesting where they're sort of what are traditionally called dual use.

18:01So there might be an electrical plant that is supplying electricity to military forces and being used by the military as well as by civilians. Or there might be a situation where the military is using a civilian building, say an apartment building, or perhaps even a school or hospital, which is prohibited, and that turns it into a military objective. But there's something else that's been going on here with the threats that the president has been making, which is to destroy all the civilian infrastructure, to attack all the electrical plants, to destroy all the bridges. That doesn't suggest that there is this case-by-case analysis being done about whether something is a lawful military objective and whether the harm to civilians is lawful under the circumstances.

18:50That suggests and intent to throw the rule book out altogether and simply use immiseration of the civilian population as a bargaining chip. And that is absolutely, clearly 100 % illegal. Missy, I'm curious how you've tracked the president's rhetoric over the last several weeks. When the U.S. entered into this war, there was a call on Iranians to rise up and overtake their government. There was a promise of support for Iranians who were protesting in the streets earlier in the year. Now we have the president saying, I'm going to just bomb everything. So help us understand the change in the president's rhetoric over the last several weeks and how it aligns with the international response to the war.

19:38Are we seeing him grow more angry as, for instance, European allies say, we don't want to be involved in this? Sure. The administration, the president himself, and then his advisors, including Pete Hegseth, the Pentagon chief, and then Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, have put forward this an array, a panoply of different justifications for the war, different objectives, everything from the president's call suggesting a desire for regime change in the beginning. They've talked a lot about the nuclear program, even though it was allegedly obliterated in the 12-day war last June. And then, you know, now there is what they seem to have settled on over time in terms of the objectives are the military objectives.

20:28And what I sense are really the more narrow scope of things that the military was tasked with doing in this operation that Brad Kruper, who's a CENTCOM commander, is trying to do, which is to degrade the power projection of Iran. That means eroding its ballistic missile capability, its navy, its ability to threaten states nearby. And as time has gone on, there's been a few things happening. You've seen Trump and Rubio really revert back to these more tactical goals in terms of power projection. I think because largely the strategic change objectives, the regime change, a fundamental change in the Iranian state have remained unattainable.

21:11And so I think these are the things that they're now putting forward as potential things that are achievable. And then you've also seen Trump get angrier and angrier as he's been unable to secure a negotiated exit from this conflict. Like the Iranians have really stuck to their guns. The U.S. and Iran have put forward sort of maximalist, dueling maximalist proposals for any sort of negotiated settlement. And as the peaceful outcome has remained elusive, Trump has gotten angrier and he's threatened, as you suggested earlier, these strikes on civilian infrastructure would really move the war into a totally different phase.

21:52And to use those as negotiated leverage would be something unprecedented, at least in my lifetime, of covering these conflicts. And we've heard the brash and violent rhetoric that you described. We heard some at the top of the show from over the weekend. We heard – and later on Sunday, after the post that Jen read at the top of the show, the president said Tuesday will be power plant day and bridge day all wrapped up into one. In Iran, there will be nothing like it. Those are the president's words there. Ona, how much does talk matter here when it comes to the law in establishing intent? When leaders publicly threaten to hit power plants or civilian infrastructure, how does that factor in?

22:36And just to add into the thought, Daphna writes a question that I had as well about comments from Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, some days ago when he said the United States would offer Iran no quarter. No quarter for Iranian troops. All of those things together. Can you explain what no quarter means and more broadly how this violent rhetoric from the top echelons of the American command structure play into assigning intent in international law? Yeah. So yeah, Pete Hegsa threatened to give no quarter. That if it is interpreted as either a threat or as an order to troops, could itself be a war crime because it essentially says we won't accept surrender.

23:23We will use maximum lethal force regardless of whether it's permitted. And that is clearly not allowed. The reason that these threats matter, I mean, someone might say, look, this is just rhetoric. These are just threats. The president might not really do this. I mean, first of all, while we're seeing that he actually is carrying out some of these threats, he makes these threats, and then we do bomb a bridge, it also is suggestive that there is an intent here that is an illegal intent. So when you're assessing whether there's a war crime, you look at the acts. You look at what's happened, and then you have to also establish intent.

24:06So it's not just the act, but you have to know why was the act taken? What was the intent behind it? We've been talking about some of that, right? When we talk about were they trying to strike a military objective? You know, was it an item that by its nature or location purpose makes an effective contribution to military action? Is that what they were actually trying to attack even though they happened to hit a school? So the reason that their rhetoric matters is it gives us a window into the intent. It gives us a sense of what the president and secretary of defense are intending in issuing the orders that they are issuing to the U.S.

24:41military to carry out their attacks. And it suggests a willingness to ignore the international humanitarian law that should govern our conduct. It is not itself, you know, doesn't itself constitute a war crime other than the threat not to give quarter. But it does suggest that the actions that are being taken by the military are not being taken in a way that's consistent with international humanitarian law. And these threats to carry out these massive attacks on civilian infrastructure are threats to carry out war crimes. And, you know, that should trouble us all. And there should be more of a response than there has been, frankly, to these kinds of claims that this is appropriate way for the U.S.

25:25to wage war. Well, I want to turn to the issue of accountability. We got this from one of our listeners. Iran is executing its own people, including children. You denounce the West and are silent on crimes of our enemies. We're focusing on the U.S. because we are in the U.S. We are existing within the U.S. legal structure. But, Scott, who decides if a war is illegal? And what happens if it's found that a war is illegal to the country responsible? So there's a variety of sort of mechanisms and processes that can come into play here. you have situations where you could have the UN Security Council weigh in and make a turn into termination, right?