: how you "cut" it. "They" NEVER DID anything
: criminal. They hired and still hire
: mercenaries/employees to carry out their
: ideas and opinions.

...which, in various countries, is recognized as either "solicitation", "incitement", or in some cases "conspiracy" to commit a criminal act.

It can be argued that the act itself is the more grievous offense, but it does not leave the originating party free from guilt in the committing of the act.

Realize, too, that the instigators may have been fully cognizant of the criminal nature of the act they were were seeking to see committed, while the one who accomplishes the act may have done so with misguided but nobler intentions, less of a "guilty mind".

Then let's multiply "solicitation" or "incitement" perhaps a million-fold for the multiple offenses we're contemplating. We're met with a tally of considerable guilt, sometimes in association with the most heinous of acts, rightly laid at the feet of the instigators.

Add myriad counts of "depraved indifference", "conspiracy to defraud", etc., and the sum grows large indeed.

--hobie