Do you have any reputable links for soldiers that refused orders to commit mass murder and were transferred from those units. I've never heard anything about that.
Alleged SS Auschwitz guard arrested in Germany
- Thread starter Blackleaf
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Do you have any reputable links for soldiers that refused orders to commit mass murder and were transferred from those units. I've never heard anything about that.
No statute of limitations on murder. Or war crimes. If he's convicted, he goes to prison. Got no problem with that.
Good gods, he's 93. Can we really just give it up already and just let these people die? Giving them this last recognition doesn't do anything except ruin the lives of, not them, but the people in their lives who might be good people. You all know damn well the 'shame' these men had by serving Hitler's Germany will be transferred onto them once the names are out.
Let it go already.
Let it go already.
Then expand upon your comment "If he is guilty of anything, it is following orders".
Really no other way to look at it now is there.
Even today here are a number of countries that have not accepted there part in the Genocide of Jews. Some have started but a number have not.
If it was that they'd unearthed a previously unknown war criminal, I'd totally agree.
But, from what I gleaned from the article, they're essentially re-writing the law, broadening the scope of their definitions of war crimes from back in the day, so that they can prosecute a bunch of people who were known to be just guards and lackeys, not leaders and killers.
To me, it kind of smacks of a governmental department grabbing at straws to keep itself relevant before these men all fade into oblivion.
At what point would you recommend "giving it up already?" Fifty years? Forty? Twenty? Two?
I don't know. "OK, you're a brutal, genocidal, mass murderer, but we're worried about hurting your grandkids' feelings, so we'll ignore the fact that you made sure a million people never had grandkids" doesn't quite do it for me.
We will see who's enthusiasm for war crimes trials survive the unfolding war. It's not out of the question that those trials will begin for the period covered by the second world war right up to the cessation of this new war.
My guess is, if the guy has any conscience at all, he's already paid dearly for following orders/saving his skin (your option) in doing whatever it was he is alleged to have done.
Karrie look at the history of prosecutions in Germany after the War- almost nil- this went on for decades- major war criminals were living openly in Germany or EU countries- The culture changed much later- decades later- check on how Austria was always on a high horse as they were "Not Germans" - Same with France and their complicity-Canada and the US are included - these people were known to the Govts- little was done.
Laws evolve.
If the person is near the end of their lives anyway, it's a little late. What is the point of doing anything now to him? Again, he's Ninty-freakin-three. What. Is. The. Point?
His face is out there now, he personally is shamed, his family likely so, what good would putting him in jail do? Unless he comes back with a "It wasn't me" and chooses to go to court over it, really, when would it be enough?
Your point might be more valid had they found him earlier in his life where a trial and conviction - if it came - would have made an impact on him, on society as a whole. At 93 - who cares, he's an old man. What good would putting him to trial do now? He might even keel over during the trial from the stress, which renders the entire process pointless and the money spent for it wasted.
When does it end?
As a 19 year old, he would not be in a position of authority. I'm not quite sure where your confusion lies.
Maybe the point is demonstrating that there's no excuse for being a genocidal mass murderer. And that no excuses will be accepted.
Do you disagree with the prosecution of De La Beckwith more than 30 years after he murdered Medgar Evers? What's the point?
According to the law, it doesn't. That's why there's no statute of limitations on murder or war crimes.
I note that I asked for your recommendation on a limitation period, and you declined to answer.
For God's sake the second world war ended 68 years ago. Can we assume no war crimes were comitted in that time? Surely the biggest war crime was the second world war that Hitler and his henchmen foisted on the world. That bloody war cost the world millions of deaths....hell.....it cost Germany millions of deaths. Surely 68 years is enough to get time off for "good behavior" so let's
quit whining and moaning about bit players like the guy in the OP.
Plenty of war crimes were committed in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan by the US of Aggression. Has anybody been accused? Has there been any trials.
No? I didn't think so. Is that because god is on their side that they can do no wrong?
No? I didn't think so. Is that because god is on their side that they can do no wrong?
OK, so now we have an upper limit of 68 years. Do we have a lower limit?
In what way is that relevant? Are you suggesting that unless we prosecute all war crimes, we shouldn't prosecute any?
Hitler had a lot of help. And not all of it came from Germany. Further, war itself is not a war crime. It is the conduct of people in war that can be war crimes.
So, we shouldn't have prosecuted war criminals because Germany had millions of deaths? Or because it was a long time ago?
Same question to you . De La Beckwith was prosecuted for murdering civil rights activist Medgar Evers 30 years after the fact. Should we have just let that one go?
Is it a war crime when you can't see the people you are killing and they can't see you.....B-52s carpet bombed Viet Nam and Korea and killed millions...didn't even get their hands dirty..
Once again, if we were talking about this guy having killed people, I'd understand why they're pursuing this.
But they aren't making any assertion that he did anything of the sort. They are expanding their definition so that, as a guard, he's complicit in the deaths even though he had nothing to do with them.
A 19 year old guard, who never killed anyone, who'd have died himself if he left the SS. This is who they feel the dire need to go after?
Again, it smacks of some portion of the government attempting to remain relevant, expanding its scope so that it can keep justifying its existence.
The law of accessory to crimes is actually pretty clear. It was devised especially to make it clear that the excuse "I didn't personally pull the trigger" is not an excuse when one fully participated in a crime.
Strategic bombing is not a war crime.
Yes, but it doesn't apply when you are forced to be an accessory at the peril of your own life.
I'm no Nazi sympathizer, but, I do recognize that young men were sent off to war. The notion that this man could have said 'no thanks, I'm gonna go do something else', is obvious to everyone to be impossible. So he served, he did what he was told, and he didn't even kill anyone, not even by the assertion of these charges. The law for the last 60+ years has agreed that there were lackeys who had no choice, who weren't war criminal mass murdering psychos.
To now try to lump them in with the true war criminals... it doesn't speak of justice to me.
Actually it does. Duress is not a defence to murder. Or accessory to murder.
[/quote]I'm no Nazi sympathizer, but, I do recognize that young men were sent off to war. The notion that this man could have said 'no thanks, I'm gonna go do something else', is obvious to everyone to be impossible. So he served, he did what he was told, and he didn't even kill anyone, not even by the assertion of these charges. The law for the last 60+ years has agreed that there were lackeys who had no choice, who weren't war criminal mass murdering psychos.
To now try to lump them in with the true war criminals... it doesn't speak of justice to me.[/QUOTE]
Well, I guess "I vas chust folloving orders" is an excuse now.
Times change.