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konadora
Singapore66062 Posts
This reminds me of the time they sent a letter asking for reparations for breaching copyrights to a dead grandmother.
They should stop following the law every single time so senselessly *cough KeSPA cough* and see what is the most appropriate measure. At least drag the guy out after he's been completely proven to be guilty >__>
Oh, you guys might want to try the movie "Philosophy of a Knife". It's about Japanese crimes against humanity in China by performing human experiments unimaginable. Downright sickening too.
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On May 12 2009 13:07 R3condite wrote:Show nested quote +On May 12 2009 09:45 Sanity. wrote: hes not gonna do anything else. leave him alone imo. agreed... vengeance isn't wat we should be seeking esp since he's already so far in.... just leave him be, i bet if he was a guard he feels bad about it himself
I would bet that if it was a japanese man on trial for war crimes agaisnt koreans, regardless of his age your pipe would be playing a different tune.
edit: im not trying to attack you, but trying to make a point on how people can be indifferent when things dont personally affect them or their country.
I for one believe he should be fully prosecuted for his crimes agaisnt humanity.
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Osaka27089 Posts
On May 12 2009 12:58 {88}iNcontroL wrote:Show nested quote +On May 12 2009 12:53 Manifesto7 wrote:On May 12 2009 12:40 {88}iNcontroL wrote:On May 12 2009 12:26 Manifesto7 wrote: So with that line of thought Inc, how about the case of American soldiers who were given orders to torture Iraqi prisoners, despite the fact that it was illegal. Should they be held accountable as well? They were following orders given to them from someone higher up, but those orders were against international law.
I think you underestimate the duress that was put on people during the war. I don't believe the common grunt should have any legal culpability in cases like these. Decision makers, yes. Grunt forced to electrocute somebody's nuts, no.
And finally, the world has seen plenty other examples of what the Nazis did. The Nazis just made the best movie bad guys for our generation. They were held accountable iirc? They were fired etc.. but if you are asking ME the answer is YES. Torturing prisoners the way they did is bad especially without the argument of a "ticking timebomb." But that is a bad analogy. America wouldn't kill their families if they didn't do this. They'd lose pay and maybe serve a small sentence for refusing to do an order. As far as Obama is concerned, those who made the decisions to torture are not being prosecuted. I am talking about the sanctioned torture, not the prison controversy from Abu Garhib (sp?). I don't think the analogy is flawed at all. In fact, I think it is an interesting observation that faced with far less consequences, the American soldiers made the same decision that the German soldiers had to make. Maybe, if anything, this speaks to the culture of the army as the reason it is so difficult to examine this issue. You spend years saying "yes sir!", years training to kill people, years eating sand (or French grapes) and shooting people, and then at one point you have to say "whoa whoa whoa, this crosses the line"? You might think it looks good on paper, but I think those are pretty tough expectations. Anyway, I have always found this dilemma interesting to think about, because there is surely no right or wrong answer. It is just an illustration of the horrors of war, in all its manifestations. It is a bad analogy (imo) because A. the severity of the soldiers situation is FAR less. B. The severity of the order is FAR less. C. The war time scenario is completely different. etc etc But YES I think they should be prosecuted.. so I don't know if you were thinking I'd think they shouldn't because they are American? This isn't a nationalistic thing for me..
I wasn't suggesting anything nationalistic. I was just asking your opinion of the same situation in a modern environment. I think the two cases are nearly identical, with the only difference being one person was on the losing side and the American soldiers were (more or less) on the winning side. We are willing to convict an 89 year old cripple because he was part of the Nazi war effort, yet willing to dismiss the actions of soldiers who did the same thing in the American army last year.
Personally, I believe that neither should be convicted. I don't think that the groups that push for justice 60 years later do themselves any favors by ripping off the scabs of war. It just exacerbates the negative feelings and provides a hollow sort of justice. I also don't think that any foot soldier is responsible for his actions when placed under the duress of the military machine. This goes triple for anyone in a drafted army under the European tradition of 1940's Nazi Germany.
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Consider this thought experiment.
Assume Nazi Germany is a perfectly tyrannical state. Hitler is a thousand feet tall, is the baddest motherfucker on the face of the planet and knows what every german soldier is doing all the time and will personally come over and kill you if you refuse his orders to kill jews. And since Hitler wants every Jew dead, your two choices are to kill jews or die yourself. Not much of a choice.
But Nazi Germany wasn't a perfectly tyrannical state. Hitler wasn't a thousand feet tall, wasn't the baddest motherfucker on the face of the planet, didn't know what every German soldier was doing all the time, and (more importantly) relied on a massive military bureaucracy to make sure any German soldier that disobeyed orders.
This military bureaucracy was made up of other German soldiers. If you want to blame "coercion" for the actions of people, consider this. Every German soldier that disobeyed an order and was shot was shot by another German soldier. Therefore its not just "the Nazis" that coerced people; when you're saying that people were coerced into doing committing war crimes, its really German soldiers coercing other German soldiers (into coercing other German soldiers etc.). Where do you draw the line? Is one man choosing to kill Jews versus dying himself because he was coerced by other Germans really any worse than the next guy along the chain who had the choice between coercing the prison guard into killing Jews or dying himself?
This also causes problem for the coercion theory, since what incentive does everybody have for coercing everybody else into doing things for Hitler? Somebody somewhere wasn't coerced into doing it, and those are the people that are ultimately responsible. As we know, there were plenty of people that willingly believed in the Nazi ideology. These people are the truly evil ones, not the ones coerced into doing it or the ones that were apathetic about it and went about their daily lives, possibly even as guards at death camps.
So in a sense I think the "we were just following orders" excuse is somewhat valid, but only for some people. And then you get into a giant fucking mess trying to figure out who was a willing Nazi and who wasn't.
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On May 12 2009 09:43 JinHyunKim wrote: Its .. Its OVER NINE-THOUSANND only TL and 4chan would think of holocaust casualties like that =]
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Omfg this is really gay for obvious reasons. People have already stated it's not his fault he was conscripted and forced to do that stuff. I'm not going to type out a whole paragraph re-stating what was already said, so in conclusion I agree with LR and a majority of the others.
I'm not one to usually rage, but this would really get to me if he is found guilty. My grandfather was in the war(germany's side) and if this happened to him I would probably have to fucking threaten to kill myself if they were going to find him guitly. That shit doesn't fly with me.
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On May 12 2009 09:45 Last Romantic wrote: Mildly ridiculous. Even if he were guilty, this is simply accelerating the process of natural death by what? a decade, at the absolute upper limit?
To think of the massive costs of flying him around and providing medical care for him and the legal representation of both sides... it's simply not worth it for one damn prison guard.
In general I think it is a matter of principle, so balancing idealism with pragmatism, one could argue about the sense of this whole thing but I tend to support to whole trial. Be that as it may, it is quite astounding to me that they needed so long to actually find this guy and take action. I mean, he is not somewhere in Argentina hiding in the mountains or something like that.
It would be such a huge PR blow if the trial were lost though, so the prosecution takes quite a risk here.
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On May 12 2009 14:53 Schnake wrote:Show nested quote +On May 12 2009 09:45 Last Romantic wrote: Mildly ridiculous. Even if he were guilty, this is simply accelerating the process of natural death by what? a decade, at the absolute upper limit?
To think of the massive costs of flying him around and providing medical care for him and the legal representation of both sides... it's simply not worth it for one damn prison guard. In general I think it is a matter of principle, so balancing idealism with pragmatism, one could argue about the sense of this whole thing but I tend to support to whole trial. Be that as it may, it is quite astounding to me that they needed so long to actually find this guy and take action. I mean, he is not somewhere in Argentina hiding in the mountains or something like that. It would be such a huge PR blow if the trial were lost though, so the prosecution takes quite a risk here.
He's already been charged, in 1986, this is the continuation of charges pressed in 2001. source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Demjanjuk
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On May 12 2009 10:30 {88}iNcontroL wrote: Yes yes yessssssss WE GET IT people follow orders.. that doesn't mean you fucking spare them when those orders are illegal or fucking grotesque. That means you punish the people who issued the orders most severely, than punish the people who executed the orders to a lesser degree. I'm sorry but it has never/will never be ok to justify atrocious actions with "he ordered me to do it." You are still accountable.
So every soldier of the US Army fighting in Iraq should be brought to an international court since this war is illegal according to multiple international laws and treaties? Should the guantanamo guards all be prosecuted too? This is the logic you're using here.
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Oh yeah, and as a disclaimer, I don't know what the shit happened, so i can only guess. : \
I just want to say this thread was somewhat nice to read. I have to say...
1. he did what he could to survive. thumbs up 2. what he did is say his family but he ended up murdering many people, regardless of his position, thumbs down 3. He made no one happy but himself and possibly his family, he caused a shit load of suffering. thumbs down. 4. he violated the right of every person he killed, taking their lives unwillingly. 5. He was his job, he did what he was suppose to do. thumbs up 2/3 not good enough, what he did was morally wrong, based off the dota guys thread lol
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On May 12 2009 15:16 frankbg wrote:Show nested quote +On May 12 2009 10:30 {88}iNcontroL wrote: Yes yes yessssssss WE GET IT people follow orders.. that doesn't mean you fucking spare them when those orders are illegal or fucking grotesque. That means you punish the people who issued the orders most severely, than punish the people who executed the orders to a lesser degree. I'm sorry but it has never/will never be ok to justify atrocious actions with "he ordered me to do it." You are still accountable. So every soldier of the US Army fighting in Iraq should be brought to an international court since this war is illegal according to multiple international laws and treaties? Should the guantanamo guards all be prosecuted too? This is the logic you're using here.
If they do or assist in some illegal shit, then yes. What's so complicated about that?
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On May 12 2009 15:18 Juicyfruit wrote:Show nested quote +On May 12 2009 15:16 frankbg wrote:On May 12 2009 10:30 {88}iNcontroL wrote: Yes yes yessssssss WE GET IT people follow orders.. that doesn't mean you fucking spare them when those orders are illegal or fucking grotesque. That means you punish the people who issued the orders most severely, than punish the people who executed the orders to a lesser degree. I'm sorry but it has never/will never be ok to justify atrocious actions with "he ordered me to do it." You are still accountable. So every soldier of the US Army fighting in Iraq should be brought to an international court since this war is illegal according to multiple international laws and treaties? Should the guantanamo guards all be prosecuted too? This is the logic you're using here. If they do or assist in some illegal shit, then yes. What's so complicated about that?
You don't seem to grasp the point. Torture is ILLEGAL. If you want to discuss principle (like Inc is doing) then that falls under things you should prosecute for. Degree does not matter in this case, illegal Torture carries a HEFTY prison sentence with it. This war currently is illegal.. period... but they wont be prosecuted. You want to know why?
Winners in wars are rarely held accountable for illegalities... it's the losers that bare the brunt of it.
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On May 12 2009 14:00 General Nuke Em wrote: Consider this thought experiment.
Assume Nazi Germany is a perfectly tyrannical state. Hitler is a thousand feet tall, is the baddest motherfucker on the face of the planet and knows what every german soldier is doing all the time and will personally come over and kill you if you refuse his orders to kill jews. And since Hitler wants every Jew dead, your two choices are to kill jews or die yourself. Not much of a choice.
But Nazi Germany wasn't a perfectly tyrannical state. Hitler wasn't a thousand feet tall, wasn't the baddest motherfucker on the face of the planet, didn't know what every German soldier was doing all the time, and (more importantly) relied on a massive military bureaucracy to make sure any German soldier that disobeyed orders.
This military bureaucracy was made up of other German soldiers. If you want to blame "coercion" for the actions of people, consider this. Every German soldier that disobeyed an order and was shot was shot by another German soldier. Therefore its not just "the Nazis" that coerced people; when you're saying that people were coerced into doing committing war crimes, its really German soldiers coercing other German soldiers (into coercing other German soldiers etc.). Where do you draw the line? Is one man choosing to kill Jews versus dying himself because he was coerced by other Germans really any worse than the next guy along the chain who had the choice between coercing the prison guard into killing Jews or dying himself?
This also causes problem for the coercion theory, since what incentive does everybody have for coercing everybody else into doing things for Hitler? Somebody somewhere wasn't coerced into doing it, and those are the people that are ultimately responsible. As we know, there were plenty of people that willingly believed in the Nazi ideology. These people are the truly evil ones, not the ones coerced into doing it or the ones that were apathetic about it and went about their daily lives, possibly even as guards at death camps.
So in a sense I think the "we were just following orders" excuse is somewhat valid, but only for some people. And then you get into a giant fucking mess trying to figure out who was a willing Nazi and who wasn't.
This is a flawed argument. So you're assuming that just because a soldier will carry out the orders to shoot another soldier, that it's the soldier who followed orders who is responsible?
Here are some technical points that are missing:
1) Soldiers who carry out executions for treason probably have little to no knowledge of the crimes of the accused. 2) To a patriotic soldier it would be illogical not to shoot another soldier guilty of treason. 3) People who committed high treason in Nazi Germany were executed, along with most of their friends and family.
So just from a technical standpoint you're argument seems to depend on a potentially neutral soldier deciding to torture and kill himself, his close friends, the soldiers close to him and his family, just to save one man who may have committed a generally abhorrent act. You sir, haven't thought about the realities of the situation very carefully.
Now here's my take on things:
Well if you're going to arrest everyone involved in the holocaust you're going to have a rather difficult time....
Just being a guard of a concentration camp isn't really enough to justify punishment today imo. It's a kind of controversial view I suppose but you've got to look at the media hysteria created by the Nazis, which is almost unparralleled in 20th century history. You have 10 years of media barraging you with anti-semitic propaganda, you probably hold some genuine anti-semitic beliefs yourself (I mean lets face facts, they don't have a particularly good track record historically speaking) and you're probably genuinely patriotic, having watched your country come out of the Depression as a world power.
So all things considered it's difficult to completely judge the individual in these cases. Even though we can look back now and see the horror of the holocaust in lots of case studies and ugly pictures, the real reason why the Germans (and polish, and french, and italians and...) got so fully behind the holocaust is one of the most debated parts of 20th century history. I mean there are stories of polish towns killing their entire Jewish population independent of any SS or Nazi interference, simply on the weight of propaganda and hysteria.
So I guess my point is that it's totally ridiculous to put a man to trial today for these atrocities because it's impossible to fully understand the situation at the time - as well as it being impossible to find an unbiased jury.
Food for thought - should we begin trying American soldiers involved in Iraq for murder? I mean it would seem to me that there were some pretty clear war crimes involved there. (It was a military coup de tat after all) I mean "Yes" the pilot carpet bombed a city for no strategic reason, but should he be tried for not contesting the order?
Or what about the allies that bombed Dresden? I mean I understand that these weren't acts of systematic genocide on behalf of the countries involved, but from the soldiers perspective there's little real difference - their actions are directly causing the deaths of innocent people and they face punishment (although not death in todays world) if they disobey.
(Oh and lol at people saying that the soldiers should have stood up for what was right - that just shows complete ignorance of the state of Germany during that period)
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On May 12 2009 15:21 Jayme wrote:Show nested quote +On May 12 2009 15:18 Juicyfruit wrote:On May 12 2009 15:16 frankbg wrote:On May 12 2009 10:30 {88}iNcontroL wrote: Yes yes yessssssss WE GET IT people follow orders.. that doesn't mean you fucking spare them when those orders are illegal or fucking grotesque. That means you punish the people who issued the orders most severely, than punish the people who executed the orders to a lesser degree. I'm sorry but it has never/will never be ok to justify atrocious actions with "he ordered me to do it." You are still accountable. So every soldier of the US Army fighting in Iraq should be brought to an international court since this war is illegal according to multiple international laws and treaties? Should the guantanamo guards all be prosecuted too? This is the logic you're using here. If they do or assist in some illegal shit, then yes. What's so complicated about that? You don't seem to grasp the point. Torture is ILLEGAL. If you want to discuss principle (like Inc is doing) then that falls under things you should prosecute for. Degree does not matter in this case, illegal Torture carries a HEFTY prison sentence with it. This war currently is illegal.. period... but they wont be prosecuted. You want to know why? Winners in wars are rarely held accountable for illegalities... it's the losers that bare the brunt of it.
Wait wait, I think I'm missing something here. How does your point relate to mine again? If not, then why are you quoting me.
It's my opinion that if you do illegal things in a war, regardless of what side you're on, you shouldn't get away with it just because "you were ordered to". So what is the point I'm not grasping here?
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(Oh and lol at people saying that the soldiers should have stood up for what was right - that just shows complete ignorance of the state of Germany during that period)
Or a complete ignorance of how the military works. "Sir I won't do it sir" is not a valid answer to the orders, its grounds to be shot. Following orders is human nature. People do what they are told.
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On May 12 2009 13:13 konadora wrote: This reminds me of the time they sent a letter asking for reparations for breaching copyrights to a dead grandmother.
They should stop following the law every single time so senselessly *cough KeSPA cough* and see what is the most appropriate measure. At least drag the guy out after he's been completely proven to be guilty >__>
Oh, you guys might want to try the movie "Philosophy of a Knife". It's about Japanese crimes against humanity in China by performing human experiments unimaginable. Downright sickening too.
indeed thing is the only time you hear about this is when it concerns "jews" or "holocaust". Imagine dragging 70 year old US veteran to Vietnam for shooting up some village back in a day. Impossible, isnt it? "Justice" prevails
edit: oops someone pointed this out already!
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On May 12 2009 14:00 General Nuke Em wrote: Consider this thought experiment.
Assume Nazi Germany is a perfectly tyrannical state. Hitler is a thousand feet tall, is the baddest motherfucker on the face of the planet and knows what every german soldier is doing all the time and will personally come over and kill you if you refuse his orders to kill jews. And since Hitler wants every Jew dead, your two choices are to kill jews or die yourself. Not much of a choice.
But Nazi Germany wasn't a perfectly tyrannical state. Hitler wasn't a thousand feet tall, wasn't the baddest motherfucker on the face of the planet, didn't know what every German soldier was doing all the time, and (more importantly) relied on a massive military bureaucracy to make sure any German soldier that disobeyed orders.
This military bureaucracy was made up of other German soldiers. If you want to blame "coercion" for the actions of people, consider this. Every German soldier that disobeyed an order and was shot was shot by another German soldier. Therefore its not just "the Nazis" that coerced people; when you're saying that people were coerced into doing committing war crimes, its really German soldiers coercing other German soldiers (into coercing other German soldiers etc.). Where do you draw the line? Is one man choosing to kill Jews versus dying himself because he was coerced by other Germans really any worse than the next guy along the chain who had the choice between coercing the prison guard into killing Jews or dying himself?
This also causes problem for the coercion theory, since what incentive does everybody have for coercing everybody else into doing things for Hitler? Somebody somewhere wasn't coerced into doing it, and those are the people that are ultimately responsible. As we know, there were plenty of people that willingly believed in the Nazi ideology. These people are the truly evil ones, not the ones coerced into doing it or the ones that were apathetic about it and went about their daily lives, possibly even as guards at death camps.
So in a sense I think the "we were just following orders" excuse is somewhat valid, but only for some people. And then you get into a giant fucking mess trying to figure out who was a willing Nazi and who wasn't.
Mostly bs, but one part about willingly believing in Nazi ideology is interesting. I find it important to note that those people who truly believed were least responsible. They didn't do it thinking it was wrong, it was right according to their set of values at the time. It's like judging cannibals for eating each other or some people in eastern europe for killing gypsies 100 years ago. They did believe they were evil and had to be killed or bad things inevitably would happen. You can only apply "justice" if you can extrapolate your system of values on them. Right now this german guy probably knows that it was wrong, but back then he had no way of knowing.
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On May 12 2009 15:31 seppolevne wrote:Show nested quote +(Oh and lol at people saying that the soldiers should have stood up for what was right - that just shows complete ignorance of the state of Germany during that period) Or a complete ignorance of how the military works. "Sir I won't do it sir" is not a valid answer to the orders, its grounds to be shot. Following orders is human nature. People do what they are told.
True. Like that study where 80% or something of participants gave what they thought to be lethal elctric shocks to people
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iNcontroL do you think we should prosecute every american who dropped napalm over vietnam with no other intention then to cause pain and anguish?
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