Troop Crime in Peacetime: Criminality and Accountability of U.S. Troops Worldwide During the Cold War

Abstract

U.S. forces abroad have often faced complaints about crimes committed by troops, yet we lack systematic quantitative information on such crimes. Based on newly discovered data compiled by the Army, this article presents a comprehensive and detailed picture of American troops’ criminal activity worldwide during the Cold War (1954–1970). The data show that troops engaged in significant criminality, with a particularly high rate of violent crime—homicide, rape, and robbery—and a relatively low rate of property crime. Host countries treated offending troops leniently: Prison sentences were rare, and they averaged less than 2 years in duration. The data presented here hold far-reaching implications for our understanding of the relations between U.S. forces and host countries and the legacy of U.S. military deployments.