One of the most important ways in which humane societies struggle to deter outbreaks of mass violence is by working to pursue justice, so that would-be war criminals might think twice about their actions after seeing that perpetrators of such crimes are being aggressively pursued and held to account for their crimes.
DOJ Criminal Division Chief, Lanny Breuer, boasting of the formation of the Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section at DOJ, while speaking at a Holocaust Remembrance Program held by the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington.
I don’t, in any way, mean to equate the war crimes committed by our own government in the last decade with the Holocaust. I do, however, mean to remind those in a position to do something about “pursuing justice” that more recent war crimes remain virtually unexamined.