Get ready for more pardons of war criminals
According to the Daily Beast, Trump is yearning to let some more monsters out on the streets. One of his aides explained that “there are more warriors out there who he believes have been treated unfairly and whose [cases] need another look.” Not all of them are military war criminals.
The Daily Beast has learned that Trump is still quietly weighing pardoning at least one employee of the private army Blackwater, Nicholas Slatten. Convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life imprisonment, Slatten, a former U.S. Army sniper, took part in the contractor’s infamous 2007 massacre at the Nisour Square traffic circle in Baghdad. Blackwater was founded by Trump ally Erik Prince, who has insisted for over a decade that the company was railroaded after Nisour Square by an American left gone insane.
Pardoning that monster who was convicted of participating in the murder of 10 men, two women and two boys who were unarmed and simply going to work. It’s one of the most famous cases of murdering civilians in cold blood during the Iraq war.
Gary Solis, a retired Marine judge advocate, ex-West Point law professor and Vietnam combat veteran, said there “can be no good reason, legal or humanitarian, for exercising clemency in a case like Nisour Square and those who were involved in it.” Solis said Trump “knows nothing about these individuals, or what goes on on the battlefield. We’re talking about a multiple 4F-er,” referencing Trump’s Vietnam draft deferments, “and yet he wants to play the general and the Fox News hero.”
He got that right. It may be that the impending middle east war will compel Trump to put these pardons of war criminals on the back burner for now. On the other hand, he may just be so stimulated by the power that he does it anyway. I don’t think anyone can say it would surprise them if he did.
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