"Unless you can find the exact page of the Geneva Convention that makes dropping werewolves into enemy territory illegal, I am free to go." I said, confident they would not be able to find anything even close to forbidding it.

Ms Summers, the prosecutor, replied, “It’s not in the Geneva Convention.”

“Then I will be leaving.” I stood and began moving towards the door.

The two guards blocked my path.

“As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, it’s in the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.”

The two guards seized my arms and forced me back into my seat.

“Article 6, section c defines ‘genocide’ as deliberately inflicting on a national, ethnical, racial or religious group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part. Would you consider a werewolf infestation ‘destructive’ to the local population, General Kirby?”

“Well… yes, but I meant for them to destroy the rebels, not the civilians… so it wasn’t calculated?” I said, slumping down in my seat.

“Article 7, paragraph 1, section k defines ‘crimes against humanity’ as including other inhumane acts of a similar character intentionally causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or to mental or physical health when committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack. Would you consider indiscriminate werewolf attacks every full moon for two years to cause great suffering or serious injury to the local civilians, General Kirby?”

“It wasn’t intentional! They were only supposed to go after the rebels!”

“Article 8, paragraph 2, section b, subsection iv defines ‘Intentionally launching an attack in the knowledge that such attack will cause incidental loss of life or injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects or widespread, long-term and severe damage to the natural environment which would be clearly excessive in relation to the concrete and direct overall military advantage anticipated’ as a war crime. Did you or did you not know that the werewolves would attack civilians?”

“Well… I… uh…?”

“Yes or no, General?”

“Yes, I knew they would attack civilians.”

“Did you or did you not have a plan to remove them after the war?”

“I was going to use dog whistles.”

Judge Boon blinked at me, “...Are you saying your plan to remove fifty werewolves, plus however many then turned, from a two thousand square mile forest was to whistle at them?”

“It sounds stupid when you say it like that.”

The Judge said “Then please, explain it in a way that doesn’t sound stupid.”

I paused for a moment. This was not a line of questioning I had anticipated. “I was going to send remote bombs in with dog whistles attached. They really rile up werewolves, they can’t help but attack. And when they did? Boom.”

Ms Summers spoke again, “I will concede that is an effective means of removing werewolves from an environment, assuming that you tested it in an environment where the werewolves could simply… move out of earshot?”

“I… I never thought of that.”

“Would you consider the impact of werewolves upon the local wildlife to constitute widespread, long-term and severe damage to the natural environment?”

“Yes.”

“Article 8, paragraph 2, section b, subsection xxvi defines ‘conscripting or enlisting children under the age of fifteen years into the national armed forces or using them to participate actively in hostilities’ as a war crime. Would you consider the twenty-two under fifteens turned by your werewolves active participants in hostilities?”

“I didn’t conscript them!”

Ms Summers sighed, “But your werewolves, released into the area by your command, with no controls or oversight, turned them. They then went on to participate in werewolf attacks, which you had clearly intended those turned to do.”

I thought long and hard, ignoring both the prosecutor and the judge as they demanded a response. Then I said “Can I change my plea to guilty?”

He was astonished. The American government had always been more shifty then the KGB when it came to containing the supernatural outbreaks, but if this report was to be believed, the American government had used teams of monsters during the Vietnam war. Not just in Vietnam either, but in just about every war since Korea, and possibly earlier.

The general had gotten a report from a mole in the FSB, including a bunch of documents that were a holdover from the KGB, at least what wasn't burned after 1991.

The report from a KGB operative in Indochina indicated that during the Vietnam war, a team consisting of a Werewolf, a Minotaur and a Half-siren had made a mess of just about every operation the KGB had going for them in the area.

Of course the general was read in, you didn't get to a position of such authority without a read-in on the supernatural, and the reason the governments of the world agreed to keep a lid on the truth of it. He had heard rumors about things the Soviet Union and American governments had done during the Great Patriotic War, and even heard third hand about an experiment from an American weapons program from that era breaching containment and destroying one of those massive casinos in the Las Vegas, but was under the impression that the US had learned from their mistake.

If the US could use the supernatural, then God damn it, he could too. And so the order was given out, and the order to capture every Werewolf in the Ukraine, instead of putting a silver bullet through their chest, was given.

The pack was ready, and the underground railroad was open direct to Moscow. Try and fight a war of attrition when your capital was beset by lycanthropes, assholes. The full moon arrived over Moscow in a few days after they were sent, and all hell broke loose. Especially when the US government, who heard about the operation came knocking on his door at three in the AM, and dragged him screaming into the night.

"What were you thinking?" The tall man in front of him demanded. He was tall and buff, like all American warriors, but did not carry himself like military, he was CIA.

"The same thing you were thinking when you used a Werewolf in Vietnam," the general spat back. He was not about to take shit from these hypocritical assholes.

"You let loose new werewolves on a full moon, you endangered innocent civilians-" the general cut the CIA man off.

"You think Putin gives a shit about innocent civilians? Do you not watch news?"

"I don't care how bad you think bombs are, they ain't werewolves. You should have known better. I don't care how important you think your war is, the more people who know the supernatural exists, the more will inevitably try to use it for their own ends, like you. Maybe when some crazed necromancer who got introduced to the real world by one of your doggies opens a portal to hell in Kyiv on orders from the Kremlin you'll understand why part of the UN conditions for entry is agreeing to the first reason."

That night,the pack turned on their human handlers. All pretenses of attacking important Russian military targets went out the window and the pack descended on the people of Moscow. The outbreak was contained by Russian authorities soon enough.

"We should just kill him and leave. Everyone will assume the Russians did it." The mysterious woman on the phone was adamant. She did not want anything coming back to haunt her if the UN Congress on Unearthly Forces found out the task force knew and didn't eat on the Ukrainian government, defensive war against an international menace be damned.

"The door has been opened, his successor will inevitably try the same thing, and you know Putin will do the same. It'll be decision week all over again."

They decided. Task force operatives were sent to Kyiv, and a Ukrainian equivalent was set up under the supervision of the United States government. The Kremlin set up their own task force, and it went about as well as anything the Kremlin ever did. The great Siberian Zombie Apocalypse made the Russian Mafia, who happened to run most private Monster Hunting operations in Russia, an absurd amount of money.

"Remember Mr. Zelensky," the mysterious American woman said, leaving the president's office, "everybody knows there's no such thing as unicorns."

(MHI fanfic because this prompt was clearly intended for MHI fanfic)

As explosions tore through the city, I yet again cursed the day I stepped into the Peace Palace.

I thought I was so smart about it too.

Ever since the fighting stopped and the UN imposed ceasefire lines, our war with Latveria had been frozen solid. Now both our countries were stagnant backwaters that had been forgotten by the world.

We didn't forget though. Year after year, we jostled with each other for some military advantage, some way to obtain that final victory. But we were always evenly matched, both sides straining at the perpetual stalemate.

Compound X changed everything.

When the time came to strike, we had been meticulous in covering ourselves legally. Our government and military lawyers had pored through every source of international law - the Geneva Conventions, the Rome Statute, UN resolutions, ICC and ICJ decisions and advisory opinions... even those bloody panel of experts guidelines.

Compound X was carefully refined to suppress the werewolf's irrational and predatory instincts while retaining the size, stamina and strength that allowed them to dominate on the battlefield. Months of work was done to ensure that the werewolf's bite was sterile, with no chance of transmission.

We crafted the perfect provocation, taking lessons from the Japanese and the Russians. When we attacked, our operations were ruthless but surgical. The werewolves were controlled and trained to abide by the laws of war. Military units and bases were obliterated, while cities and villages were left untouched - not that any civilian dared to try anything that would draw the attention of what they saw as slavering, ferocious beasts.

And when the ICJ inevitably came calling, I was ready. For each potential violation of international humanitarian law, I had an answer. I had all the evidence to prove these werewolves obeyed orders, committed no atrocities against civilians, and inflicted no unnecessary suffering on other combatants.

So of course we won. There was no case. The way we took our hated enemy down was superhuman, yes, but not illegal.

Unfortunately, the world didn't seem to agree. You'd think that with generations raised on Twilight, Harry Potter and X-Men, they would be a bit more accepting, but I guess the fear runs deep.

It took all of two months for almost every country to sign onto the Latverian Protocol on the Prohibition of Augmented Canine Combatants. Unbelievably fast for such a fractious and plodding bunch, but probably irrelevant now that the werewolves are mostly dead at the hands of the UN multinational force.

I suppose it is some achievement to the be the target of the first fully-supported UN police action. It was a Russian initiative too! The day after the ruling, they signed an immediate and unconditional ceasefire with Ukraine, and trotted up with a draft resolution to the Security Council ready to go and backed by every European member of the Council.

The Germans are the ones in charge of the multinational force though. Fascinating to see how motivated they are to fight us over here given how much they've dragged their feet about the clusterfuck on their own continent. Less fascinating was the discovery that all of their small arms used silver bullets. Almost like they've done this before...

In any case, now that the werewolf army is gone, Ruritania is just another tinpot dictatorship. I'll probably get the firing squad for this, but hey at least I'll never have to set foot in that bloody court again.

====

Cheers to Famous-Olive-7868 for the inspiration

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