vicious cycle

There are those who argue that a murder must be tried where it was committed by the people who suffered the injury. So the 911 terrorists must be tried in the US by Americans. That makes sense, it is almost irrefutable.  Then there is Robert Bales who murdered 16 innocent Afghans, mostly children.  Shouldn’t he then be tried in Afghanistan by the Afghan people? If it’s good for the goose, it should be good for the gander.  But instead he was quickly whisked back to the US to face possible charges in an American court. The victims in the case have no say.  You walk away with the sense of double standards that if a crime is committed against Americans, it is tried by the US and if a crime is committed by Americans it too is tried by the US.

I understand the difference in both those cases and the flaw in the reasoning of that argument.   The difference is that the soldier was placed in that situation by his government, in the service of that same government, and is therefore owed some sort of government protection. While the terrorists were acting of their own volition, not backed by any official government and therefore not entitled to any such protection.  The government is in the situation to protect the country’s interests, the terrorist is just a murderer with no higher ideal.   I understand it, but I wonder if the Afghan father who had to bury his children does.  I wonder if he is now so incensed that he would be willing to fly an airplane into a building, but mostly I wonder where it ends.