Holding The Weapons Industry Responsible For War Crimes

The weapons industry’s influence runs deep. It is fueled by campaign donations and a revolving door between government and industry.

By Colonel (ret) Ann Wright

On May 8, 2025, I was honored to speak at the Oxford Union Debates on the topic: “This House Would Hold The Arms Industry Responsible for War Crimes.”  My partner speaking in favor of the motion was Katie Gallagher, an excellent attorney with the remarkable Center for Constitutional Rights.

The following is my presentation at the Oxford Union debates.  At the end of the debate, with Katie and me speaking in favor of the motion and two persons arguing against the motion, twice as many of the Oxford Union students voted that the weapons industry should be responsible for war crimes if their weapons are used in committing war crimes.

Presentation

During my career in the U.S. military, I was assigned to positions in commands in both Europe and Latin America.  In my 16 years in the U.S. Department of State, I was assigned to U.S. embassies in Nicaragua, Grenada, Somalia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Sierra Leone, Micronesia, Afghanistan and Mongolia. Several of those countries were in midst of conflict and fueled by the purchase of weapons.

I ended my career in the U.S. government with my resignation in March 2003 in opposition to the decision of the Bush administration to wage war on Iraq under the guise of Iraq having weapons of mass destruction which the administration knew was a lie. And I will add that the U.K.’s Blair administration went along with the lie.

To address the motion of today’s debate, “This House Would Hold The Arms Industry Responsible for War Crimes,” I will focus my comments on attempting to hold U.S. weapons manufacturers and their officials accountable for the civilian deaths caused by their weapons.

Legal Basis for Accountability

Let’s begin with international law. Under Article 25(3)(c) of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, individuals—including corporate executives—can be held criminally liable if they aid or abet war crimes by providing the means and knowing those means would be used to commit such crimes.

This principle was not born yesterday. It was established after World War II at the Nuremberg Trials, where executives of IG Farben and Krupp were prosecuted for enabling Nazi war crimes. Corporate complicity is not a theoretical idea—it’s a legal precedent.

Treaties That Are Ignored

There are treaties that establish minimum standards for weapons sales that could facilitate serious violations of international humanitarian or human rights law which could be considered as war crimes.

But these treaties are good only if countries implement them… and the United States has not.

The Arms Trade Treaty was adopted by the U.N. General Assembly in 2013 and established minimum standards for global arms sales. It requires states to assess whether a proposed transfer of weapons could facilitate serious violations of international humanitarian or human rights law-including war crimes.

The United States signed the treaty in 2013. But the U.S. Senate did not ratify it.  In 2019, the Trump administration withdrew the U.S. signature completely.

The Biden administration did not reverse the Trump decision, claiming that ratification would infringe on American sovereignty.  What that really means is it would infringe on the U.S. ability to wage war whenever and wherever it wants without concern of human rights or humanitarian law and without accountability.

Another policy that should protect civilians from death and injury from U.S. military weapons is the Conventional Arms Transfer Policy which was enacted in 1977 by the Carter administration.  It highlighted the importance of protecting civilians as a means of distinguishing the U.S. from other weapons providers. The policy stated: “The legitimacy of and public support for arms transfers among the populations of both the United States and recipient nations depends on the protection of civilians from harm,” and the U.S. should distinguish itself from other arms transfers by elevating civilian protection.  The policy imposed a stricter standard to determine whether U.S. weapons might be used to commit atrocities and war crimes.

However, under the Biden administration, this commitment collapsed. The U.S. continues to send overwhelming military support to Israel’s genocide in Gaza and ethnic cleansing in the West Bank, violating the very principles that policy was built on.

And now, even the Office of Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response—the one tasked with reviewing civilian casualty risks—has been targeted for elimination under the Trump administration.

The Scale of the Weapons Industry

In 2023, global miliary spending topped $2.4 trillion.  The top five weapons companies-Lockheed Martin, Raytheon (now RTX), Boeing, Northrop Grumman and General Dynamics—are all American companies.  These weapons are not about defense. They are about profit.

Merchants of Death War Crimes Tribunal

Over the past three years, the Merchants of Death Citizen Tribunal, a grassroots initiative lead by lawyers, scholars and citizen investigators has compiled extensive evidence against Boeing, Lockheed Martin, RTX, Northrup Grumman and General Atomics.

The Citizen’s Tribunal produced 40 one-hour videos of testimony, showing that these companies’ executives knew full well their weapons-including white phosphorus, cluster bombs and weapons manufactured with depleted uranium—would cause widespread civilian suffering and may constitute war crimes.

In January 2025, ten international known experts serving as jurors for the Citizen’s Tribunal found these companies guilty of willfully participating in war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.

Current War Zones

Currently, in Gaza, West Bank, Ukraine, Russia and Lebanon, citizens are dying from weapons made by these companies. Lockheed Martin, RTX, Northrop Grumman, Boeing and General Dynamics supply weapons systems knowingly used in indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks and in genocide.

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Francesca Albanese, reported in March 2024 “There are reasonable grounds to believe the threshold indicating the commission of genocide have been me.”  Her opinion and the opinion of many other experts on genocide are not fringe opinions-they are legal assessments by international authorities.

Political Corruption and the Revolving Door

Weapons sales are not just an international issue—they are a U.S. domestic economic strategy. Weapons are manufactured in nearly every U.S. state to ensure congressional support. The weapons industry’s influence runs deep. It is fueled by campaign donations and a revolving door between government and industry.

Having spent 29 years in the U.S. Army and Army Reserves, including teaching the Law of Land Warfare and the Geneva Conventions at the U.S. Army’s Special Warfare Center to U.S. Special Operations forces and 82nd Airborne units. I retired as a Colonel.

That, plus my 16 years in the U.S. Department of State, I have tracked the careers of policy makers from many countries as they weave in and out from being senior officials of weapons manufacturers to becoming senior officials in presidential war administrations.

Holding the Arms/Weapons Industry responsible for war crimes would mean holding individual officers of the weapons industries responsible for the war crimes.

I have seen first-hand the revolving door for individuals who have been senior officials in both war making decisions of presidential administrations becoming senior officials in the weapons industry that makes millions of dollars from providing weapons for these wars.

If actions in the wars created by the policy makers are deemed to be war crimes, then the officials of the weapons industries, most of whom have come from recent military related government employment, should also be held responsible for war crimes.

Of course, the senior officials of the weapons industry would argue that they are merely in the business of manufacturing weapons and they have no role in the use of the weapons.

But we see from the careers of these senior officials in and out of government and weapons industries that they have great influence on the war policies of every administration, no matter what political party is in power.

A 2021 report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that 1,700 senior U.S. government officials had taken positions in the arms industry over a five year period, an average of well over 300 per year.

And a new report from the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, found that this practice is particularly pronounced among top generals and admirals. In the past five years, over 80% of retired four-star generals and admirals (26 of 32) went on to work in the arms sector as board members, advisers, lobbyists, or consultants.

For example, Boeing recruited the former Chief of Naval Operations Admiral John Richardson following his retirement from government service. The admiral joined the company’s board of directors within two months of his retirement ceremony. Boeing was the Pentagon’s sixth largest contractor in Fiscal Year 2022, with total prime contracts awards amounting to $14.8 billion.

Another prominent example of a four-star officer going to work for a top contractor is retired Marine Corps General Joseph Dunford, who served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff before he retired in September 2019. Five months later Dunford joined the board of directors of Lockheed Martin.

One of the most famous examples of moving from government employment to military industries is Dick Cheney. He held the position of Secretary of Defense in the George H. W. Bush administration and oversaw two major military operations: Operation Just Cause in 1989 and Operation Desert Storm in 1991. While out of office during the Clinton administration, Cheney was the chairman and CEO of Halliburton from 1995 to 2000, a company that made billions of dollars from those operations.

He was elected Vice President of the United States in 2000 and was a key instigator for the George W. Bush administration’s U.S. wars on Afghanistan and Iraq, in which Halliburton again made more billions of dollars supplying the U.S. military with goods and services.

Chemical Atrocities and War Crimes

When we look at the officials of specific industries that shape the way wars are fought, ways that invariably use the weapons systems of their companies, we see that the senior leaders of Monsanto and Dow Chemicals lobbied U.S. government officials to continue using Agent Orange despite its known health risks. These chemicals have contributed to over 500,000 children born with birth defects in countries where the horrific chemical was sprayed particularly in Viet Nam. I have visited hospitals and care facilities where three generations of Vietnamese have suffered the effects of the chemicals.  I visited Viet Nam with U.S. military veterans who themselves and their children were also damaged by Agent Orange.

The makers of Agent Orange as well as those who ordered Agent Orange to be used on humans and animals should be charged with war crimes.

These companies lobbied to continue its use even after knowing the human cost. That is complicity. That is a war crime.

Israeli Bombing of Humanitarian Aid Ship in International Wars Off Malta-a War Crime

For the past two weeks, I have been in the European country of Malta, which was one of the most bombed areas in Europe during World War II.  And it is being bombed again.

Just last week, on May 2, 2025, some type of explosive weaponry was dropped from an aircraft on an unarmed civilian ship called the “Conscience,” which was mere meters outside the territorial maritime boundary of Malta.  The name “Conscience” is an appeal that when crimes such as the genocide of Gaza and the starvation in Sudan are occurring, the conscience of the world must be mobilized to stop these crimes.

To give context to the bombing of the “Conscience,” the “Conscience” is one of the ships of the Gaza flotilla initiative to break the illegal Israeli siege of Gaza. I have been a part of the organization since 2010, when the Israeli government attacked an unarmed civilian vessel named the Mavi Marmara with over 600 persons onboard, killing 10 and wounding 50. I was on one of the ships of the 2010 flotilla and observed the military assault on the civilian ship.

Remarkably, no country, including the State of Malta, has yet called for an investigation of the bombing of the “Conscience” and the use of explosives on an unarmed civilian ship, which is a war crime.  Our informal investigation, which precedes a professional forensic investigation for which we have called, has determined that an Israeli C-130 military aircraft had flown to Malta and was if not in Malta airspace at least in the IFR of Malta. The C-130 aircraft is capable of carrying and dropping various types of weaponry including drones that can carry explosives. The crew on the “Conscience” heard drones near the ship immediately prior to the explosions on the ship.

While the State of Malta sent a surveyor official on April 6, 2025 to determine the seaworthiness of the “Conscience,” professional forensic investigators will piece together the type of munitions used, the manufacturer of the munitions and the method of delivery of the munitions.  The government of Malta has not provided the flotilla coalition with a copy of the surveyors report. News accounts of the report state that no weapons were found onboard, a charge generally made by Israel against all boats that have sailed to break the Israeli siege of Gaza.

The twelve national campaigns of the Gaza Flotilla will demand that the entity that dropped the bombs on unarmed civilian ship and the manufacturer of those munitions be charged with war crimes.

Accountability is Not Optional

Weapons manufacturers are not neutral players. They profit from war, influence policy, and knowingly supply tools of mass death. If we do not hold them accountable, we normalize impunity.

The executives of companies who fuel atrocities should be held to the same standard as those who commit them.

About the Author: Ann Wright served 29 years in the U.S. Army/Army Reserves and retired as a Colonel.  She was a U.S. diplomat for 16 years and served in U.S. Embassies in Nicaragua, Grenada, Somalia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Sierra Leone, Micronesia, Afghanistan and Mongolia.  She resigned from the U.S. Department of State in March 2003 in opposition to the U.S. war on Iraq.  She is the co-author of “Dissent: Voices of Conscience.”