August 15, 2025
Russian president Vladimir Putin is meeting with the president of the United States on US soil as we speak. You can see him walking with president trump on that red carpet at the US joint military base in Alaska.
But you may be wondering how it’s possible that a man accused of literal war crimes by the international criminal court with active ICC warrants for his arrest could feel safe enough to step one foot on US soil. Well I’m going to explain why it’s even possible in this video.
First – let’s start with the facts. In march of 2023 the international criminal court issued a war crimes arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin because of his alleged crime of ripping children from their homes in Ukraine without their parents’ permission and taking them to Russia.
Because Putin has this war crimes arrest warrant from the powerful international criminal court hanging over his head that means — if he steps foot in another country he risks being arrested, taken to the Hauge to be tried, probably convicted of these crimes and maybe even imprisoned. Obviously his own people in Russia won’t and honestly can’t arrest him but — if he shows up in a European country or in certain Latin American countries or African countries they will roll him up and get him to the Hauge to answer for these war crimes charges. That’s why we haven’t seen Putin leave Russia very often in the last few years. He’s a pariah on the world stage – especially in wealthy modern countries.
Except – Putin felt safe enough to show up in North Korea last year and now – he felt safe enough to show up in the United States. How could that be? Isn’t the United States the wealthiest, most modern country in the entire world? Absolutely however – generally the United States also does recognize the authority or jurisdiction of the international criminal court.
The ICC was set up in 2002 to prosecute war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. The ICC is a court of last resort, they say they take on cases when national authorities are unwilling or unable to prosecute war criminals. The international criminal court does not have its own police force so it relies on cooperation from supporting countries to execute those arrest warrants on their behalf. 123 countries were part of the formation of the court. The United States participated in the original negotiations but we are not a member. Us politics have dictated our national posture toward the ICC. To put it bluntly — when it’s politically beneficial the United States supports the ICC and when it’s not, we don’t. For the record Russia is also not a member of the ICC.
So then what power does the ICC really have? Since its founding the ICC has only conducted a few dozen trials and has only found a handful of those suspects guilty of war crimes. The punishments can be prison sentences or reparations or both. But the ICC can only put a suspect on trial in the Hague if they are arrested and physically there. Under ICC rules, suspects cannot be tried in their absence.
So – because the United States is not a signatory to the treaty that established the ICC nor do we recognize its authority or jurisdiction– — Putin feels absolutely safe coming to the United States to meet with the leader of the free world without fear of being arrested. And president trump clearly believes the possibility of ending the war outweighs the optics of having an accused war criminal like Putin in Alaska.
War Crimes Warrant for Putin here.
Watch Putin & Trump here.
