The farce of Nuremberg trial. (WW2, war, bomb, Mexican)

[paparaciii]

Don't you think this trial was the most cynical and hypocritical process the mankind has expierenced? I mean, there is no doubt that nazis deserved what the got but the most truthful moment of this tribunal was when one of the nazi leaders(possibly Goering) said:'you guys should sit right here next to me', refering to soviet officers.

[Grandstander]

That we fail to right all wrongs is hardly a reason to refuse to try and right a particular wrong.

If your complaint is that the Soviets deserved to subjected to war crimes trials, then your thread should have been "The farce which was the failure to try the Soviet war criminals", not "The farce that was Nuremberg."

And of course the reason why German war criminals were tried and Soviets ones were not, was that the losers don't get to try the winners.

Churchill noted that the lesson of Nuremberg was "Make sure we win the next one as well."

[Mathguy]

Originally Posted by paparaciii

Don't you think this trial was the most cynical and hypocritical process the mankind has expierenced? I mean, there is no doubt that nazis deserved what the got but the most truthful moment of this tribunal was when one of the nazi leaders(possibly Goering) said:'you guys should sit right here next to me', refering to soviet officers.

Don't worry, Stalin probably got quite a few of those officers shortly thereafter.

No question, even Lemay mentioned that firebombing campaigns would have been called warcrimes if we'd lost.

Bottom line, who cares? You are looking at war and expecting rules, fairness? Oh, that's rich.

[markg91359]

The Nuremberg War Crimes trials were the just and right thing to do. Many objections have been made about them and certainly the process was far from perfect. Yet, it was the beginning of establishing personal accountability on the part of a nation's leadership for genocide, starting wars, and failure to adhere to international treaties.

The background of the trials is quite illuminating. Stalin, Truman, and Churchill discussed what to do with the Nazi leadership after the war. Stalin's proposal was simple: He felt that 50,000 Germans should simply be singled out and shot. Churchill and Truman felt differently and insisted that legitimate trials be conducted before anyone was to be put to death or suffer long terms of imprisonment. Out of this dialogue between the victorious powers came the Nuremberg Trials.

There is a certain amount of hypocrisy whenever one side decides to judge the other side in a conflict as "war criminals". For example, the allies engaged in practices during the war that resulted in widespread civilian loss of life. I think of the saturation bombing which occurred over much of both Germany and Japan. Some have argued the dropping of the atomic bombs over Japan was a form of "genocide".

Nevertheless, I see certain facts as virtually irrefutable:

1. Germany and Japan initiated hostilities beginning World War II, not the Allied Powers.

2. Germany's Holocaust of the Jews and other ethnic groups was unique and had to be dealt with not simply for our own sakes, but for the sake of future generations.

3. Unless leaders of nations and militaries are forced to accept some responsibility and bear the consequences for the actions of their country during armed conflict than there will always be indiscriminate murder of civilians, rape of women, and looting of private property. By imposing responsibility on leaders, we encourage them to keep their armed forces in check.

4. Allied bombing killed many innocent civilians, but was directed at military targets. if we had had a way to simply take out the targets (as we do today with precision guided bombs and missiles) we would have done that instead. The civilian loss of life from bombing was collateral, rather than intended damage.

5. Its true that there may not have been specific laws prohibiting war crimes before World War II occurred. However, most of the elements of war crimes were spelled out either in civilian laws or international treaties that pre-dated the war. In the most literal sense, these may have been "ex post facto laws", but you have to start somewhere.

[texdav]

no;there should ahve been many more put on trials. Crime was the policy of both the german and japenese state.Anyone who eqates the allies ewith the germans or japanese is ignorant
IMO.

[paparaciii]

Originally Posted by markg91359

1. Germany and Japan initiated hostilities beginning World War II, not the Allied Powers.

Wrong. USSR invaded five countries(Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland) before WW2 was started. And the fact that Hitler attacked first was rather coincidence than obligatory course of events.

Originally Posted by markg91359

2. Germany's Holocaust of the Jews and other ethnic groups was unique and had to be dealt with not simply for our own sakes, but for the sake of future generations.

Soviet Union's genocide against its citizens was even more unique because the main purpose of it wasn't to exterminate certain groups of people. Yes, there occured some "reasoned" assassinations targeting ethnic minorities(Stalin believed that Soviet people should be melted in a uniform Russian-speaking nation) and those who opposed communism or Stalin himself. But all the evidence show that the main motive was to impose massive and unseen terror on huge masses to create unconditional docility and fear to even think about doubting the regime. Administrative regions were given so called quotas that meant that certain percentage of population had to be exterminated. Anyone could be accused for anything. Quotas had to be fulfiled. That is why Stalin exceeded Hitler in terms of amount of killed people.

Originally Posted by markg91359

3. Unless leaders of nations and militaries are forced to accept some responsibility and bear the consequences for the actions of their country during armed conflict than there will always be indiscriminate murder of civilians, rape of women, and looting of private property. By imposing responsibility on leaders, we encourage them to keep their armed forces in check.

No, this tribunal showed that winner takes it all and if you're stronger and bigger, you can do whatever you want.

Originally Posted by markg91359

4. Allied bombing killed many innocent civilians, but was directed at military targets. if we had had a way to simply take out the targets (as we do today with precision guided bombs and missiles) we would have done that instead. The civilian loss of life from bombing was collateral, rather than intended damage.

Wrong again. Soviet army's actions regularly were turned against civilian population, sometimes even if it wasn't too smart from war tactics perspective and gave Germans some short-term advantages.

[Grandstander]

Originally Posted by markg91359

1. Germany and Japan initiated hostilities beginning World War II, not the Allied Powers.

.

I accept the points which you offered with the exception of the above.

All nations which start wars, do so with the belief that they are justified. The Germans felt that they had been cheated by the Treaty of Versailles, forced to accept 100% of the blame for WW I when clearly that wasn't the case. The Japanese felt that they were being treated as racial inferiors, that even though their behavior could not be distinguished from that of any European colonial power, they were being told that they were overstepping their station.

If simply starting a war makes one into a war criminal, then we would be hard pressed to find non criminal nations, including the US. We started the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, the Mexican War, the Spanish American War, the Vietnam War and the Iraq invasion. Were these all criminal actions meriting post war trials?

I think that war crimes should be limited to actions taken once a war is underway. War crimes are the atrocities which lack a connection to the winning of a war. It is not necessary to be brutal to POWs to win a war, it is not necessary to rape the women of captured towns to win a war...those are war crimes.

There is already a punitive measure in place for issuing justice to a nation which starts a war...it is defeating them. It is ruining their nation and inflicting cruel circumstances on the population until such time as they agree to stop resisting. Germany and Japan were both punished to an incredibly severe degree for starting the wars. Their cities were wrecked, their populations reduced, their economies obliterated. Why would additional punishment be needed?

[Mathguy]

Originally Posted by texdav

no;there should ahve been many more put on trials. Crime was the policy of both the german and japenese state.Anyone who eqates the allies ewith the germans or japanese is ignorant
IMO.

Well, the Russians were pretty bad. No quarter given, none asked on the eastern front...and they were one of the allies.

I do agree however, as I point to the numerous thread about the evil US fireboming or nukes etc., that the Japanese killed 10million Chinese civilians along with how many million others in occupied countries like India, Korea etc.
Did we do bad things? Heck yeah, it was war...get over it....but when you look at the holocaust and other things we pale in comparison.

The japanese in particular got off VERY easily at the end of the war with just a pair of nukings. Imagine if the Chinese had invaded them. To this day the Chinese have some serious bad blood over how Japan treated them and got off pretty easily. If I were China, I'd make the nuclear bombings national holidays with parades. Just a little payback for Japan even refusing to acknowledge thier actions.

[Yorkie Bar]

Could I ask a genuine question?

I've have heard the argument made many times that the allied bombing of Germany (e.g. Dresden) was a war crime. I understand the logic of it but have yet to take that position myself. When it comes to the Nuremberg trials, were any German military personnel put on trial for planning or carrying out the Blitz/Coventry bombings?

If they weren't then I think that undermines the claims that the allies committed war crimes against the Germans by bombing and killing thousands of German citizens. Obviously it was a terrible thing (on both sides) and hopefully it will never be repeated, but if we didn't judge any Luftwaffe personnel for their bombings it seems a little trite to level those accusations against the allies.

[paparaciii]

Originally Posted by Yorkie Bar

Could I ask a genuine question?

I've have heard the argument made many times that the allied bombing of Germany (e.g. Dresden) was a war crime. I understand the logic of it but have yet to take that position myself. When it comes to the Nuremberg trials, were any German military personnel put on trial for planning or carrying out the Blitz/Coventry bombings?

If they weren't then I think that undermines the claims that the allies committed war crimes against the Germans by bombing and killing thousands of German citizens. Obviously it was a terrible thing (on both sides) and hopefully it will never be repeated, but if we didn't judge any Luftwaffe personnel for their bombings it seems a little trite to level those accusations against the allies.

(Mod Cut) Read my original post which quite clearly orientates this thread towards discussing how hypocritical it was to try nazi regime and completely forget about soviets.
I truly believe that, although western allies were to some extent also guilty by their on the take actions in the past, they did everything more or less in a right way, at least what concerns WW2.