The Crimes

Title 18, Section 2 of the U.S. Code says, "Whoever commits an offense against the United States or aids, abets, counsels, commands, induces or procures its commission, is punishable as a principal." Section 1111 defines murder as "the unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought" and specifically holds that murders perpetrated by any kind of "willful, deliberate, malicious, and premeditated killing" are murders "in the first degree. Any other murder is murder in the second degree."

If Bush willfully and deliberately misled Congress into authorizing him to engage in an unlawful war in which American troops and Iraqis were killed, he is guilty of murder. Not only would such killings be premeditated, but they would also be the legal result of his lies to Congress.

Title 18, Section 1001 prohibits anyone from "knowingly and willfully" making "any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation" in "any matter within the jurisdiction of the . . . legislative . . . branch of the Government." Felony prosecution under the statute was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1955, and a violation of the statute is a crime.

Bush lied to Congress on a number of occasions. Most specifically during his State of the Union address on January 28, 2003, Bush told the following lies to Congress:

• "The International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed in the 1990s that Saddam Hussein had an advanced nuclear weapons development program, had a design for a nuclear weapon and was working on five different methods of enriching uranium for a bomb."
  
• The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."
  
• Year after year, Saddam Hussein has gone to elaborate lengths, spent enormous sums, taken great risks to build and keep weapons of mass destruction."
  
• With nuclear arms or a full arsenal of chemical and biological weapons, Saddam Hussein could resume his ambitions of conquest in the Middle East and create deadly havoc in that region."
  
• And this Congress and the America people must recognize another threat. Evidence from intelligence sources, secret communications, and statements by people now in custody reveal that Saddam Hussein aids and protects terrorists, including members of al Qaeda."
  
• We seek peace. We strive for peace."
  

Ignoring the reports of UN inspectors that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, Bush ordered its invasion on March 20, 2003 because: "the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised" and Iraq "has aided, trained and harbored terrorists, including operatives of al Qaeda." When Bush deceptively ordered American troops to invade Iraq, he and his co-conspirators not only became war criminals under international law, they became murderers of all those who died as a result of their felonious conduct.

It can now be proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Bush was deliberately lying about his justification for war against Iraq, and as of today 4,151 American soldiers and perhaps as many as a million Iraqis have become his victims.

Read further Holding Murderers Accountable: The Case Against Bush, Cheney, et al.