The death of former U.S. President Jimmy Carter has been met by mountains of praise. Carter is being celebrated as a "humanitarian,” and “advocate for peace.” It is true that, in the years since his term as president (1977-1981), Carter at times spoke out against particularly vicious policies of the U.S., including its total support for Israeli policies against the Palestinians. But while president, Carter carried out atrocities no less monstrous than the “leaders of the free world” who came before, and after him—a fact missing from all of the accolades.  

We are posting four cases from the revcom.us American Crime series that bring the actual truth on Jimmy Carter as U.S. president. These are far from the only blood-soaked crimes committed by Carter. Just to take one example: When the masses of people of Iran rose up against the brutal U.S.-backed ruler, the Shah, in 1978-79, and the Shah responded with bloodthirsty massacres of unarmed protesters, Carter called the Shah to assure him of continued American support. And when the Shah was finally overthrown, Carter allowed him to fly to the U.S. 

American Crime Case #20: The U.S.-Enabled Genocide in East Timor, 1975-1998. 

Jimmy Carter was directly complicit in Indonesia's invasion of East Timor, which became one of the worst mass slaughters relative to population since the Holocaust. From 1975 to 1999, the Indonesian military bombed, massacred, tortured, raped, and brutalized the population of East Timor until nearly one-third of the original population of 650,000 had been killed.

American Crime Case #24: U.S. Proxy War Against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, 1979-1988. 

Carter and his National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski backed anti-regime forces in Afghanistan in order, as Brzezinski put it, “to induce” an intervention by what was then the Soviet Union. The Russian invasion was then turned into a justification for intensifying U.S. rivalry with the Soviet imperialist rivals, including backing of reactionary Islamic fundamentalist jihadists. Between 800,000 and 1.5 million Afghans (along with 15,000 Soviet soldiers) were killed in this proxy war, and nearly half the population was uprooted by the war, with five million Afghans forced to flee the country as refugees. 

American Crime Case #13: South Korea May 18-27, 1980—The Kwangju Massacre. 

Carter secretly gave the OK for the U.S. to support and facilitate the slaughter of 2,000 basically unarmed protesters by the American-backed South Korean regime. The protesters were a part of the student-led Kwangju Uprising against the brutal military regime that had come to power following a coup.

American Crime Case #38: The U.S. Backs El Salvador’s Death Squad Government, 1980 to 1992. 

Days before his term ended in January 1981, Carter ordered $10 million in military aid along with additional American advisers to be sent to El Salvador's military regime headed by the fascist Arena Party and their leader, Roberto D’Aubuisson. Earlier, in March 1980, the Archbishop of San Salvador, Oscar Romero, who had called upon U.S. President Carter—“Christian to Christian”—to end aid to El Salvador’s military, was gunned down inside his church. Death squad executions, military massacres and modern U.S. weapons employed against guerrillas and those suspected of supporting them, led to as many as 75,000 deaths.

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The point is this: whatever Carter’s personal beliefs, anyone who rises to the top of this capitalist-imperialist system MUST initiate and enforce truly monstrous crimes.