Autobot War Crimes in Transformers Prime 

"Now remember kids, it's not a war crime if you win." -Anakin Skywalker

The decepticon did a better job interrogating rathet than the autobots just want to point it out.

I can't help but feel like trying to fight a "fair war" is over when the enemy starts raising the dead.

The Decepticon miners became combatants when they opened fire. That's how non-combatants become combatants. Their status can change. Look at the Law of Armed Conflict.

They should be thankful Miko was not give a Mech Suit earlier .Her war crime count would be off the charts .

Soundwave being locked in the shadowzone most likely falls under a war crime due to it being a cruel and unusual punishment

Off topic, but I just love how cold Megatron’s stare is at 10:43. Starscream’s begging to be saved, while Megs just responds with an unmoving death stare.

The Autobots greatest crime that they've committed is ruining knockouts paint job

In my opinion transformers prime is great because the autobots and decepticons are realistic. Think about it, you wouldve acted the same as them if you were in their situation. They arent perfect and the story seems to benefit from this

Honestly the thing about Bulkhead is that he’s a wrecker, quite possibly the most unreliable or psychopathic people in the Autobot ranks. The wreckers are simply massively different than normal autobots, they do commit more crimes, they kill far more, they’re mostly placed on the field to destroy everything and everyone in the vicinity. Hell, their guidelines allow them to kill each other if they really want to. In all of the media concerning the wreckers they’re just THE autobots killers so it’s rather fitting they do the most damage and think.

A man once said "it is not a war crime, it is simply denying the enemy potential recruits."

If Soundwave did get chatty during his interrogation instead of wiping his drives I imagine it'd mostly be remixes of Starscream talking since it'd already been established Starscream vents and monologues to Soundwave. Plus it could work nicely off the scene where Starscream raised the concern of Soundwave sharing Decepticon secrets and Megatron's comment of Soundwave knowing when to impart information and keep quiet.

I genuinely love the fact that The Autobots aren’t perfect. I don’t need a Hero to be perfect to root for them. Because they aren’t heroes, they’re soldiers. Soldiers doing what must be done. I dunno, I just, adore this darker side of them.

Honestly, the various versions of Optimus alone have enough crimes behind them for an entire video on their own

Also Bumblebee might be/have been a child soldier. He was in the last generation the Allspark created, during the last stages of the war on Cybertron, and canonically fought in at least Tyger Pax. Smokescreen's case is less clear, but he kind of acts like a teenager.

Actually there is a pretty famous case of realistic torture resulting in lies, which would be how in Star Wars, after being brutally tortured physically and threatened with her planet being destroyed, Leia still lied about Dantoine being the rebel base location.

A really interesting topic i must say. Hell in IDW autobots were also commiting great war crimes as well as the deceptions. For example Arcee commiting genocide until she got to jihaxus to kill him and way later into the mainline story she works as a personal assassin for prowl, killing cons out of spite. Even Optimus is to blame. At way later into the story Optimus started to act shady and autocratic amongst the autobots making them believe he thought himself as the supreme. He put humanity and earth under galactic relations, a huge risky move that could endanger their less scientifically and physically inferior kind, almost kills prowl in a fight and gets him blinded of one eye, kills galvatron mercilessly after having him beg for his own life infront of Arcee and other autobots and so on. Hell in the Transformers Prime comics as well Air raid is a canibal that kills people around him to savor energon and was put down by nova star immediately without first having him imprisoned and locked down. Dinobots also killed a defenseless Insecticon kickback because he was related to shockwave. Hell PROWL, is the ultimate example. Despite being an autobot that guy committed more war crimes than even constructions and combaticons combined. If you want to learn more please go read IDW first continuation before it's reboot you will not be disappointed.

That's why I love aligned and bayverse so much, it's realistic about certain things, I know g1 made autobots flawless heroes for a purpose, to teach kids healthy moral behaviors but approach where good characters can have moments of weakness or an act of violence feels really human, it makes fictional giant robot relatable and interesting.

Yeah we see the torture method backfire with the decepticons,when laser beak captured Fowler and starscream tortured him he ended up knocking him out by accident and I think it made him a bit loopy as well since if my memory serves me right Fowler wasn't exactly in the best shape when they reached him and was talking a bit of gibberish, starscream may not have known the autobots would come looking for Fowler or reach them so quickly but usually getting the information as fast as possible is usually what needs to happen as time is of the essence usually, but instead starscream made his captive fall unconscious and it took to long to wake him back up

Notice how Megatron calls his prisoners “guests” and tries to make them comfortable so they’ll do what he wants? Like having the vehicons remove ratchets cuffs or not adding guards to Orion’s area until later? He even shows Ratchet around to persuade him into doing his bidding. He’s kinda playing with their minds but I don’t think it’s that manipulative. I’m very glad u made this video Emperor Kumquat

I love that TFPrime showed this side of the autobots: the morally-dubious actions, psychological scars & war crimes make them feel more realistic and that they really are the same species as decepticons. Some I could give an excuse but most would need to be addressed after the war on trial. Too bad none of the sequels did this.

9:22 I always found that cruel. Glad I'm not the only one.

“Heh war crimes, you mean doing whatever it takes to win.” - Prowl probably

They really could have done more with the fact they had three children as main characters , keeping their charges grounded morally .But no , a chance wasted .

“It’s one big shade of grey. And the dark kind, I’m afraid to say” -The amazing world of gumball

When Princess Leia was tortured aboard the Death Star (both physically and emotionally) in Star Wars A New Hope, she still gave false information. While this could be interrupted as Leia willfully deceiving the Empire, thus making her lies not a result of her being tortured, it is still an example of a tortured person not giving accurate information even though they are being tortured. Thus, the torture did not yield results.

I'd like to point out that the goal for setting the grenade off on Makeshift was not to take out a ton of troopers or even Starscream. It was to protect the location of their base. Miko had told him flat out that it was just outside Jasper, Nevada. All it would have taken was either a quick scan, some surveillance, or just bombing a 50 mile radius from Jasper Town Hall, which the 'Cons would do in a spark-pulse if it meant that their Autobot problem was over. That grenade was no different than the CIA sniping someone through a window before they can sell state secrets, or blowing up the office of someone who has been selling weapons to the enemy...with them inside it. Distasteful? Yes. Necessary? Also yes. Because had they not, they and the children AND potentially all of Jasper could and WOULD have been annihilated. Also, Arcee itching to pull the trigger on comatose Megatron would be the same as a spy stumbling across a comatose Hitler. There's always a chance he could wake up and pick up exactly where he left off.........which is exactly what he did as soon as he woke up. Which is why you terminate that kind of problem when you have that kind of opportunity. 'Course, that just might be the pragmatic developed through watching things like L&O:SVU, Criminal Minds, and Burn Notice. 🤷‍♀

I think it’s insane how they expect us to root for them. When you think about it , Autobots won’t exactly accomplish their objective of acquiring peace on Cybertron. Unsolved problems, history being written by the victor, discrimination, & etc would just reignite a new war. Just like Beast Wars.

2:46 To be fair, the Vehicons shot first so the Autobots were basically attacking in self-defense.

I guess to engage with the video, I don't know if I agree with calling all of these war crimes - like the miners in the example episode you showed were armed and attacking the Autobots. And furthermore, a lot of these are just the Autobots not liking the Decepticons or Autobots fighting in a war against combatants, I wouldn't call those actions immoral. Arcee contemplating killing a defenseless Megatron I guess comes a teeny bit closer but again, I don't see that as an immoral thought either. A lot of these to me just seem like perfectly acceptable combat, defensive or offensive, or extremely understandable reactions in this post-apocalyptic situation the Transformers find themselves in. Just my thoughts, though, good video.

Your videos on the mistreatment of Decepticons, especially Vehicons, has inspired me to make a comic series on the struggles of a veteran Vehicon who grows disillusioned with the Decepticon cause, and eventually joins the Autobots.

When Bulkhead tore the Spark out of Vehicon's chest, he did it because a Cybertronian is hard to knock out even for a short time, he had no choice but to eliminate him, and unlike the rest of the Bots, he does not have weapons that can do it "carefully", about Starscream, he did it in a state of "passion" because Starscream did so many things and betrayals that if left behind he would do something, about the miners, they lose non-combatant status after they took weapons and opened fire first in terms of brutal combat, Cybertronians experience much less pain and therefore, in order to effectively neutralize them, sometimes you have to dismember them

5:31 That part I can understand Bulkhead killing Starscreams clone, Bulkhead didn't want to fight the clone but was just asking for help to escape the Nemesis, Starscreams clone was the first one to attack and then gloated on the part that he gutted Cliffjumper.

I think when it comes to harming miners, autos don’t attack, yes they will be weapons ready, but if miners are to instigate the attack, they are no longer “workers” they can be considered militia, their intent is to kill the autobots so that they won’t get energon. Tho that’s how I would see it

In you example about Vehicons is the same as Medics in the field. The medic which is a non combatant cannot be harmed during capture phases or actively targeted as he is listed as a non combatant. However the moment he picks up a gun and uses violence even as a means of defending is still considered a threat and is allowed to be treated as one. So when the miners are shooting at the autobots the autobots are allowed to fight and kill them as the miners are considered an active threat.

One thing to point out: Countries in this world probably have the Geneva Convention, but considering how long the Autobots have been at peace and since they had never had to sign a War Crime agreement, to them they try to do good but they aren’t perfect at this.

It's interesting because in war, if a medical officer fires a rifle at the enemy they are no longer seen as a medic and can be shot at. So in a way the same could be said for the workers. If the operation is sanctioned by a military power, any personnel who fires a weapon is considered a standard solider.

Let's be honest though- this only makes this series so much more interesting to analyze.

13:33 the reason Ratchet wasn’t punished for was probably down to him being the only Autobot medic and it’s unlikely they’ll get another medic in time, let alone for one to even still exist

War crimes eh? IDW Prowl would be proud lol

9:22 To be perfectly fair , they had no other form of restraining him and getting out of there .And if they did assist him , they have absolutely no inkling of a hope he will not inmediately attempt to murder them .

The problem with a lot of these is that the Vehicons in most circumstances listed, are what are called “Valid targets”. Shooting them while they’re already incapacitated is a war crime, but bombing or raiding Infrastructure like the mines or actual military installations like their ship is valid. Secondly, the spy; In warfare, Spies are given no quarter. You can do with them as you wish, including using them against their own allies. Thirdly, RC was entirely justified in murdering Starscream on the spot after his numerous fake-surrenders. Perfidy is a war crime in and of itself, and is punishable by death.

Remember when Bulkhead just tore the very spark off a Vehicon, which from a Cybertronian perspective is ripping someone's heart off? Transformers is damn brutal man.

OH MY GOSH THE MINER VEHICONS ARE SO LITTLE!😍😍 We really need keychain plushies of these guys.

16:14 It also bears to note that the predacons were literally unborn babies. (And on that note, Predaking is propably a child soldier because while his body is fully grown, he was grown in a vat and first "woke up" when Shockwave fetched him to Darkmount, and by _Deadlock_ he was a few months old at most.

Wreckers are almost always messed up: the purpose of the group is to take on dangerous, destructive, and downright suicidal missions that fit at the outer fringes of Autobot morals. In IDW2005, some of them are not only disobedient, but psychotic, and prone to substance abuse; Verity Carlo, a human wrecker much like Miko, was a bit more stable, but that's probably just because she joined them at the tail end of the war. Still, being in the visible range of high-profile 'cons like Megatron and Overlord probably didn't help. Whirl on the other hand had sociopathic tendencies before the war started, and may have contributed to it's start by beating up Megatron in prison; after the war, Whirl had "conversations" with the corpses of Sweeps he got... somewhere, which got him into a fight with Cyclonus. It's honestly kind of disturbing when you look past the guy's snarky humor.

Honestly the stuff they commit here is no where near on the same level of some of the war crimes the Autobots commit in IDW

12:50 I still harbor the conspiracy theory that this guy goes on to become Shadelock, the vehicon bounty hunter. Change my mind.

_"Geneva Convention? More like Geneva Suggestion."_ -Optimus Prime, probably

On the topic of vehicons being non-combatants. If the mine is a legitimate target and they attempt to defend the mine then it should stand to reason that if they don't surrender or at least flee then they are combatants.

i think the reason the whole burning the vehicons eyes thing wasn't as big of a thing (horribly enough) is because cybertronians can semi-easily replace things like their eyes, internal structures (like the T-cog) and the likes. meaning to them this is much less of a permanent mutilation and more just something that *should* be relatively easy to fix. that's my theory at the least.

Makeshift knew the location of their base. And as we saw, the base would be easily destroyed if the deceptions knew where it was.

16:59 Also, torture victims will often just say whatever they think the torturer wants to hear, because the torturer will only stop after they receive information they (want to) believe.

Torture isnt the best, good advice, but now I need another way to get my housemates to tell me where they put the cookies. (Jk, although I found that bit enlightening)

Your videos always give me new points of view to consider with TFP. I've never considered this side of the Autobots, although I can sort of understand why despite their idealism they resort to war crimes; after dealing with enemies doing scrap like raising the dead, at the very least some rules of war have probably flown out of the window in favor of (higher chances of) surviving to fight another day. It's too bad that it's not addressed by the human characters (such as Fowler) more, though. It would have made some interesting episodes to have the Autobots confront their hypocrisy.

Meanwhile in the bayverse, optimus is executing sentinel prime and megatron

War doesn't determine who is right Only who is left

Holy shit, a war crime video that actually covers actual war crimes instead of "hurr duurrr Optimus killed a fleeing combatant who has not shown any sign of surrender, war crimez!!1!"

Also in _Predacons Rising_ the Autobots use vehicon POWs as forced labor to rebuild Cybertron, keep them (and Knockout) handcuffed even amongst themselves in a locked room, and when Knockout demands they be allowed to bathe Autobots treat it as some sort of a frivolous demand and don't let them. Knockout is later taken as a defector propably because he has a name, while there's no word on the vehicons and none are seen later in the Aligned continuity (except mercenary Shadelock in RID15 who _might_ be a vehicon).

Ratchet taking drugs in the form of Synthetic Energon is….. yay Ratchet did take drugs

I know it might be a trend for video analysis but aside from the weird deal with vehicons I would excuse every one of these as relatively reasonable, accept for cases that would greatly endanger the team like going for vengence. I really really love that Transformers Prime can just let these dark sides slip with their characters it makes them feel very real, like in their shoes protocol or not you'd feel very similar.

One thing that I had thought quite frequently is, if Megatron was so terrible and evil for all the pain, death and destruction to countless individuals, then what exactly does that make Optimus for allowing it to carry on for such a long period of time, especially when Ratchet made it clear that he had plenty of opportunities to put a stop to it long ago.

2:42 to be fair the miners opened fire first on the Autobots and so lethal force was authorised in defence. In the case of Bulkhead refusing to rescue a deception while that is not nice to do, He does have the right to say he does not want too and does not try to stop the others from attempting it and I think we can all understand how he feels if that was our arch enemy or someone we despised so much. What he did to clone Starscream and that soldier though was overblown murder though and could have been done more cleaner. Wheeljack yeah he was over top and to be fair even the show admits he is an extremist compared to the main team (Bulkhead maybe not included). Megatron and allowing him to terminate Starscream in the mine by Arcee I see as more her accepting that she must keep the humans safe first and being realistic that she can't take Megatron on and likely it would only end in her, Jack's and still Starscream's deaths. Arcee's poor prisoner handling of Starscream was just wrong though. Ratchet was wrong to torture of course, I actually think Without Optimus Prime the team would become like shadows to the Deceptions in methods of warfare and morals. And the Show I think knows that and wants to show that. What's funny is that even with all these wrongful actions and crimes done by the Autobots, they're still moral and good than the Movie versions of themselves in Michael Bay's universe, Optimus especially. But this show does at least show that even good can become tainted and resort to more veil methods in war. War makes monsters of us all sadly. I don't want to sound like a Autobot Defender no matter what, but Optimus pays me too well as a PR man to not defend them.

“War crimes, you say? No matter how many policies you put on paper, in reality, there are no rights and wrongs in war. War itself is a crime. War cannot be justified.” - (Thisuri Wanniarachchi)

"It's not a war crime if you win"

2:42 the moment individual takes weapon to engage you, he becomes a viable target. Eg: medic is not a viable target, but if he starts to shoot/resists capture, you can shoot him. (It's more complicated than that, but you get the point). 6:25 it's not a war crime, it maybe is brutal, but he is still a combatant. 6:39 he was trying to shoot the guy, so no, he is still a target 6:45 it isn't immoral, many soldiers would rather die than get caught if their enemy is known for torture of POWs, taking the enemys who are trying to capture you along is an honorable action I'm not going to continue this list because I'm too lazy, i'll just make a summary: most people don't understand what is a war crime, and that civilian morals don't apply for wartime. Some things may be immoral, but allowed (eg. napalm). Some may be illigal, but morally right (eg. when nazi concentration camps were liberated many american and soviet soldiers would execute the guards after seeing what they did). War is a complicated thing, and sometimes to fight for good you have to make evil things... Why do i start to sound like capitan Price from reboot of modern warfare?

9:00 you go on about arcee killing defenseless Megatron, but just keep in mind Megatron ripped bumblebees voice box out, tried to resurrect undead deceptions. Took the deceased arm of a dead prime, and primus knows how many other war crimes he committed off camera. I side with arcee completely on that one. If the roles were reversed, Megatron would have killed her without a second thought.

Nuremberg trials but Optimus

Not killing Makeshift is like Batman not killing the Joker. We know he is going to come back.

The miners are so tiny and little wish there were plush key chains of them.🥰

IT'S A WAR Of course they're going to kill their enemies, And how the miners aren't combatants when they literally shoot at the autobots every time they see them ?

For a fun little short have you considered doing a decepticon version of this but instead of it being an in depth breakdown its just a Yakaty Sax montage for everytime the decepticons commit a war crime?

10:52 That episode is after Rock Bottom.

I love the ending of Wheeljack committee war crimes with children that made me snort

Hurting any part of Cybertronian body is not that terrible as at humans, they can fix everything on themselves. But I agree, chopping an arm off must be terrible.

In the defence of makeshift’s death, he did know their location thanks to miko. They could have just killed him, yes, but taking out a bunch while securing your base’s location from being leaked is basically 2-birds-1-stone.

i feel like if the autobots followed the geneva convention they wouldnt have made it to earth

"By the Allspark, I was only following orders."

I don't know if Bulkhead should be given a pass or a harder punishment due to his past in the Wreckers... It could be said that him leaving and joining Prime means he is trying to change... But he was in the wreckers the wildcard autobot group taking on jobs the other bots refused to take for one reason or another and this show in Wheeljacks and Bulkheads behaviour.

About the brutality towards vehicons, this is what I believe and it's just a theory I have: Besides that vehicons don't have the plot armor of the other characters, this brutality occurs because of the flawed cybertroninan society, which I believe, it's discriminatory. I mean, if you don't have your own name and a different body than the rest of robots, you don't have the same right as the named people, and they will look at you as inferior. Sadly, the rule involves the Autobots, so they also see the vehicons as servants and soldiers without judgement and personality. They are also seen as allowed casualties, so if it fits their plans, they don't care killing them, because nothing valuable is lost, right? I know, this is making the Autobots look like monsters. But try to be on their shoes. You don't see the autobots having vehicons on their army. And why is that? It surely it's not because of lack of resources. I believe that in the past, whoever created vehicons, did it with the idea that vehicons would be only servants and have no independence as the rest of citizens. They would follow Megatron because of fear or programmation, I don't know. So Autobots, as protectors of freedom, would see vehicons as the tools more than anything, because Autobots have free judgment, and vehicons don't (or that's what they think). For the rest of the video, it's made clear that Autobots were never comic book heroes. They are warriors, soldiers, they take lives to survive and achieve their goal, which is, for all of us, the better way. They may have fun when killing other cons, but as you said, that's how they cope with the war, the one that took their friends' lives.

There is a chance the Autobots might (Keyword: Might) have been more moral during the earlier years of the war, but the longer it went on the more extreme they became due to bitterness and such. Not to mention, it is likely the Decepticons only started doing war crimes of their own when less extreme methods weren't making any changes, so they got more extreme, saw it actually did something, and it just spiraled out of control as they got more extreme, and more deranged and unhinged cybertronians joined them for less noble reasons (Just to inflict harm). While it is a bad thing the Autobots committed their own war crimes, I don't mind it as it makes them feel more 'human' in that they're like us. Lapses of judgement, bouts of hypocrisy, acting in the moment, clouded by emotions, etc. etc.

It’s not a war crime if you win. So therefore the Autobots in the aligned continuity have no war crimes. In the IDW continuity they did define some of the war crimes set up by the Tyrest Accord, they covered some of them during Megatron’s trial and the MTMTE series.

13:27 the orginal script had Ratchet blaming Optimus for Elita-1's death, causing Optimus to lose his cool and beat him. It was changed because the writers ultimately didn't want to pull a Bayverse on Ratchet.

Great video, but I disagree with the idea of imagining this stuff from a human perspective. They have higher pain tolerances and can survive more punishment with less pain such as losing an arm or getting their internals ripped open

WE CAN COUNT HAVING SOMEOME AS ANNOYING AS MIKO IN THEIR FLANKS AS A CRIME?

I was just thinking of making a list of war crimes the Autobot committed in TFP days ago, the timing is just

Ratchet has having a heated gamer moment

Gonna throw it out there, I always root for the Decepticons. All hail Lord Megatron!

I think Optimus didn't punish Ratchet because he was on drugs and not himself

Technically, punching KnockOut is also a war crime since he's a medical personel

I feel like you are failing spectacularly to understand the plight of the autobots: -the decepticons have already destroyed Cybertron, SPECIFICALLY THE DECEPTICONS and are trying to do the same to the Earth -empathy tends to dull down after seeing people under the same insignia killing their friends for four million years -they are less than 10 against an army Also, I think that your point about "blowing up the predacons even if they knew they were people" is wrong, we see Optimus trying to achieve peace with Skyquake, a Megatron fanatic follower that hates the Primes with passion, and 'Bee doing the same with Predaking. As of that moment, the autobots knew the predacons as nothing but rampaging beasts, not sentient beings. That would be like killing a protoform and that is not something the autobots do. Also, generalizing the autobots as mostly priviledged people abusing child labor is wrong, you confuse the old senate with modern autobots and that would be like confusing the Confederates with modern americans. Obviously autobots do bad things, they are FAR from saints or knights in shining armor, but you are charging way too much guilt on them.

"there is no victory without sacrifice. That's all I'm saying. Irl, those who were deemed hero may only appear to be well hero. We don't know tht full story of how they get to be called a hero

I would like to point out that the autobots are greatly outnumbered and they had to make sure that the humans are safe just like their comandres

When you are at war, there is no wrong or right, the only goal is to win so autobots are not totally an exception.

those war crimes are nothing compared to all the things the decepticon have done

I wanna see Rachet do breaking bad Good video btw

All the characters are horribly dehumanizing at the vehicons. I think the vehicons are Aligned's cold-constructs because it makes sense for mass-produced artificial people to look identical. That also explains why they're with the Decepticons regardless of their treatment (it isn't as if the Autobots would be any better to them, and Megatron originally promised them liberation).

You've gotta remember auto bots cant afford to punish thier own due to smaller numbers. And typically charges for war crimes are placed after the war.

When you brought up that ratchet has a obligation to help people even if they are decepticons because hes a medic it reminded me of Flateline a decepticon medic who fixes both autobots and decepticons if he can because in his own words he became a medic to help people not kill them

War crimes are defined by the side that won. That’s pretty much it, for humans and Cybertronians.