I‘ve just finished watching the docu-drama series called ‘Nazis On Trial’ by Professor Richard Overy. This focused on the accusations made against Goering, Hess and Speer and the major incidents whilst they were held in custody.

Winston Churchill wasn't too happy about the trials and proposed that a list of Nazi war leaders be prepared for summary execution, but would this have gained them martyrdom status. Indeed Goering made a mockery of the proceedings, using his wit to expose the hypocrisy of the accusers. At one stage he pointed out that France accuses Germany of stealing art treasures, England accuses Germany for planning aggressive war, Russia accuses Germany for Genocidal crimes, whilst America pays the bill for the whole charade. You must admit he had a point!

Who could have convicted them? It is well known that Switzerland and Sweden hoarded stolen gold and supplied weapons for the war. Denmarks shame is less well known. In 1945 Medical assistance was consistently denied to German refugees by Danish medical authorities and the Red Cross. As a result 13,492 died in the camps. This included around 7,000 children under the age of five.

Whilst I have no doubt that most of the defendants were guilty and should have been punished, it seems the attitudes that predominated in Germany at that time lie dormant in the genes of all of us. To learn anything from the sufferings of WW2 we need to recognise this and take steps to avoid them arising again.

With Saddam Hussein under trial and Bin Laden wanted for war crimes its a bit like deja vu. I wonder what Goering would have said if the British, French and Americans initially supported Germany and supplied him with weapons as well? Of course Russia did, in terms of raw materials.

In my opinion, they should have just lined them up against the wall and shot them. When they were in charge, there was no due process of the law and they should have been given a taste of their own medicine.

Are you saying you would have shot them without a trial? In that case the defendants found innocent would have been shot too.

Would you have shot other 'minor' defendants found guilty such as Eric Von Manstein so beloved of military strategists, and whose Russian prisoners preferred captivity under him than going back to their own side?

Isn't hanging a more appropriate for a war criminal. Goering requested to be shot and took poison when refused. Shooting gives the offence a sort of military authenticity but most of the crimes were non-military.

But their were military accusations that of waging or planning an aggressive war (an interesting term, what wars are not aggressive?) and how do the subsequent antics of the US and Britain compare with this?

The whole point of Nuremberg was to demonstrate to the world that war crimes had been committed and the defendants found guilty were to be punished for that reason, not because they were the losers. Allowing those found innocent to go free gives a degree of authenticity to this principle, and avoids subsequent generations seeing them all as martyrs to the ‘mistreatment’ of Germany by the allied powers.

Of course having the Russians in the same court and the subsequent behavior of Stalin as well as their, commanders and troops tends to make a mockery of it. Far less so Britain, France and America in my view, any atrocities they committed in recent history to Nuremberg (and they did) were mild in comparison.

Originally Posted by perseus

Are you saying you would have shot them without a trial? In that case the defendants found innocent would have been shot too.

Would you have shot other 'minor' defendants found guilty such as Eric Von Manstein so beloved of military strategists, and whose Russian prisoners preferred captivity under him than going back to their own side?

Isn't hanging a more appropriate for a war criminal. Goering requested to be shot and took poison when refused. Shooting gives the offence a sort of military authenticity but most of the crimes were non-military.

But their were military accusations that of waging or planning an aggressive war (an interesting term, what wars are not aggressive?) and how do the subsequent antics of the US and Britain compare with this?

The whole point of Nuremberg was to demonstrate to the world that war crimes had been committed and the defendants found guilty were to be punished for that reason, not because they were the losers. Allowing those found innocent to go free gives a degree of authenticity to this principle, and avoids subsequent generations seeing them all as martyrs to the ‘mistreatment’ of Germany by the allied powers.

Of course having the Russians in the same court and the subsequent behavior of Stalin as well as their, commanders and troops tends to make a mockery of it. Far less so Britain, France and America in my view, any atrocities they committed in recent history to Nuremberg (and they did) were mild in comparison.

Excellent question, Perseus. The creation of a balanced perspective is, however, going to require some time. I have collected a few good links that might help.

In general, the NT failed: "The Nuremberg trials did not, however, fulfill the grandest dreams of those who advocated them. They have not succeeded in ending wars of aggression. They have not put an end to genocide. Crimes against humanity are with us still".

Orwell's view:

AS I PLEASE, by George Orwell
Tribune, November 15, 1946

"...There is one question which at first sight looks both petty and disgusting but which I should like to see answered. It is this: In the innumerable hangings of war criminals which have taken place all over Europe during the past few years, which method has been followed — the old method of strangulation, or the modern, comparatively humane method which is supposed to break the victim's neck at one snap?

A hundred years ago or more, people were hanged by simply hauling them up and letting them kick and struggle until they died, which might take a quarter of an hour or so. Later the drop was introduced, theoretically making death instantaneous, though it does not always work very well.

In recent years, however, there seems to have been a tendency to revert to strangulation. I did not see the news film of the hanging of the German war criminals at Kharkov, but the descriptions in the British press appeared to show that the older method was used. So also with various executions in the Balkan countries.

The newspaper accounts of the Nuremberg hangings were ambiguous. There was talk of a drop, but there was also talk of the condemned men taking ten or twenty minutes to die. Perhaps, by a typically Anglo-Saxon piece of compromise, it was decided to use a drop but to make it too short to be effective.

It is not a good symptom that hanging should still be the accepted form of capital punishment in this country. Hanging is a barbarous, inefficient way of killing anybody, and at least one fact about it — quite widely known, I believe — is so obscene as to be almost unprintable.

Still, until recently we did feel rather uneasy on the subject, and we did have our hangings in private. Indeed, before the war, public execution was a thing of the past in nearly every civilized country. Now it seems to be returning, at least for political crimes, and though we ourselves have not actually reintroduced it as yet, we participate at second hand by watching the news films.

It is queer to look back and think that only a dozen years ago the abolition of the death penalty was one of those things that every enlightened person advocated as a matter of course, like divorce reform or the independence of India. Now, on the other hand, it is a mark of enlightenment not merely to approve of executions but to raise an outcry because there are not more of them.

Therefore it seems to me of some importance to know whether strangulation is now coming to be the normal practice. For if people are being taught to gloat not only over death but over a peculiarly horrible form of torture, it marks another turn on the downward spiral that we have been following ever since 1933...."

My Personal View: Some people bring up the fact that the international laws like those against waging a war of aggression did not exist in 1939. How could you then accuse the Nazi elite of breaking laws that did not exist? For the reasons outlined in other posts, I do not hold much merit in these arguments. I (and there are not many people in my camp) do not subscribe to the view that the Nazis planned and executed a war of aggression against either Britain, France or the United States (or Holland, Belgium, Denmark, etc.). I would not even argue that Japan waged a war of aggression against the United States. The Axis and Allies were responding to particular events from a particular perspective. That is all. War was an acceptable foreign policy tool. It still is. Think about the American invasions of Afghanistan, Iraq or even Vietnam.

In any case, I find any attempt at "judging" state behaviour in terms of morality a collosal absurdity. Stalin's judges helped convict the Germans after 1945. For what? Stalin instituted the world's greatest rearmament drive in the 1930s. Stalin and Hitler divided Poland between them in 1939. Stalin invaded Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Romania prior to summer 1941. Stalin's hacks also instituted murderous policies against virtually every occupied people...policies of ethnic cleansing that bordered on genocide.

I do not want to concentrate too heavily on comparitive "politics". A large number of Hitler's henchmen committed extensive atrocities that had nothing to do with military action. These were "normal" crimes of murder. In my opinion, these men should have been tried according to German law, found inevitably guilty, and punished accordingly. These crimes against humanity were crimes...pure and simple.

Documents:

http://deoxy.org/wc/wc-nurem.htm
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/imt/imt.htm
http://nuremberg.law.harvard.edu/php...&text=overview
http://library.law.columbia.edu/ttp/body.html

Secondary:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Trials
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...371452,00.html
http://www.fpp.co.uk/books/Nuremberg/
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/trials12.htm

[The text by Irving, despite the repugnant views he holds, is not as bad as orthodoxy makes out. And it's free].

Part of the reason for holding the trial was there had to be the semblance of justice if not justice for the war did not end when the armistice was signed. For another 5 years after the "end" of WWII there was a Nazi resistance (the Nazi Wolf Packs as they were known) that continued to fight. To have held summary executions or expanded the list of those charged would have fueled their cause. It would have been too much of a kick in the teeth, the very thing that Europe did to Germany after WWI that set the stage for WWII. You have to leave the vanquished some dignity or your progeny will pay the price in spades. There is a fine line between punishment and vengeance.

Originally Posted by Ollie Garchy

In any case, I find any attempt at "judging" state behaviour in terms of morality a collosal absurdity. Stalin's judges helped convict the Germans after 1945. For what? Stalin instituted the world's greatest rearmament drive in the 1930s. Stalin and Hitler divided Poland between them in 1939. Stalin invaded Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Romania prior to summer 1941. Stalin's hacks also instituted murderous policies against virtually every occupied people...policies of ethnic cleansing that bordered on genocide.

It's really quite simple and of course you know this. The victors can get away scot-free with actions that the losers are condemned for. Most people are aware that Stalin was a Soviet dictator, but his name is not synomonous with evil as the name of Adolf Hitler is. Both states committed mass murder on a gigantic scale. If we want to talk numbers the Stalinist regime was worse than the Nazi regime. Yet you rightly point out that Stalin got away with annexing most of Eastern Europe, at least until the 'Iron Curtain' fell.

On the subject of David Irving as a serious historian I have to argue that his treatment of Adolf Hitler, accusations about no knowledge of the Holocaust aside, are well regarded in academic circles. I haven't read 'Hitler's War', probably his seminal work, but I will one of these days. As an examination of how Adolf Hitler ticked there can be few more noteworthy works. Irving was one of the first to debunk the infamous Hitler Diaries as fake for example. It's just a pity that he holds the personal views he does.

Originally Posted by bulldogg

Part of the reason for holding the trial was there had to be the semblance of justice if not justice for the war did not end when the armistice was signed. For another 5 years after the "end" of WWII there was a Nazi resistance (the Nazi Wolf Packs as they were known) that continued to fight. To have held summary executions or expanded the list of those charged would have fueled their cause. It would have been too much of a kick in the teeth, the very thing that Europe did to Germany after WWI that set the stage for WWII. You have to leave the vanquished some dignity or your progeny will pay the price in spades. There is a fine line between punishment and vengeance.

1. No "Wolfpacks": Will you guys please stop with this "wolf pack" stuff. The Nazi plan to use irregulars after Allied physical occupation was never translated into reality. Take a look at Ziemke's book on the German occupation. The German irregulars only operated during wartime and in any case only conducted a few missions such as killing the German mayor of Aachen for collaborating with the Americans. (The German plan was supposedly called "Werwolf" anyway, although this might only have been the name given by Psych Ops).

There are authors out there who write as if armed guerilla actions actually characterized the occupation of Germany. This is just irresponsible trash. Armed actions by the Deported Peoples (DPs) was, on the other hand, a real problem. Armed gangs of Poles, for example, attacked American miltary installations or even killed the military police sent to stop them raping and pillaging. (Records of OMGUS).

The evidence points out clearly that armed German resistance stopped in summer 1945. The only real post-hostilities fighting was conducted by German forces in the east such as in the Breslau pocket. These soldiers did not surrender because they knew they would die in Soviet captivity. Over 90% did (according to Stephen Ambrose).

2. Tens of Thousands of Germans were Exectued for War Crimes: "Many of those who were tried for offenses relating to the conduct of the war in Europe were brought before tribunals that were established by or in countries that had been occupied by Germany or who had been allied against her. British military tribunals were convened in Italy to prosecute those who were responsible for the committal of crimes against the Italian population after the Italian capitulation. Tribunals in Denmark, Greece, Holland, Norway, Poland, USSR and Yugoslavia tried large numbers of civilian, military, police, and SS personnel for atrocities and crimes committed during the German occupation."

The above quotation wisely neglects to mention how many were killed. Tens of thousands of Germans were hanged (Russia, Poland, Netherlands, France, etc.) as a result of trials in the occupied territories. Many of these "trials" were utterly farcical without the slightest pretence of a German defence. The Soviets rounded up hundreds of thousands of people (including children) and transported them to Gulags without trial...where they died.

3. The Postwar Occupation was "Carthage Revisited": The Potsdam agreement (and all of the other official elements of pre-1947 postwar policy) made Versailles look like the Marshall Plan. (Take a look at the work of Naimark or Beevor).

Ziemke: http://www.army.mil/cmh/books/wwii/Occ-GY/

Crap: http://www.findarticles.com/p/articl...13/ai_n8693890

Other Stuff: http://www.ess.uwe.ac.uk/genocide/overview_trials.htm

looks like you are condoning or agreeing with nazi germany and imperial japan actions through out the 1930s and 1940s , what are your political sympathies now a days ? My point is that even tho a law was not made of "crimes against humanity" or whatever they were charged during their time ,it does not give them the right to kill millions of innocent civilians, they had to be brought to justice, under the title of "nuremburg trails" or not.

On the subject of David Irving as a serious historian I have to argue that his treatment of Adolf Hitler, accusations about no knowledge of the Holocaust aside, are well regarded in academic circles. I haven't read 'Hitler's War', probably his seminal work, but I will one of these days.

I have part 2 of this book chronicling from around 1943 to the last events in his bunker. This was read before I knew anything about Irving's views but I didn't find anything particularly strange or biased in his writings.

I think his views regarding Hitlers knowledge is less controversial than his opinion that the holocaust never happened, at least not to the extent it probably did. It seems that once a scholar takes a view they cannot change it irrespective of how much evidence to the contrary emerges. I understand he is in jail in Hitlers home country for these views, quite a bizarre turn of events, and perhaps one that suggests that Nuremberg did have positive results. If his anti-Semitic views that the Holocaust was overdone has any basis it is that they distract too much from all the other atrocities committed in WW2, against Slavs, Chinese and other ethnic groups in particular.

Originally Posted by perseus

I have part 2 of this book chronicling from around 1943 to the last events in his bunker. This was read before I knew anything about Irving's views but I didn't find anything particularly strange or biased in his writings.

I think his views regarding Hitlers knowledge is less controversial than his opinion that the holocaust never happened, at least not to the extent it probably did. It seems that once a scholar takes a view they cannot change it irrespective of how much evidence to the contrary emerges. I understand he is in jail in Hitlers home country for these views, quite a bizarre turn of events, and perhaps one that suggests that Nuremberg did have positive results. If his anti-Semitic views that the Holocaust was overdone has any basis it is that they distract too much from all the other atrocities committed in WW2, against Slavs, Chinese and other ethnic groups in particular.

I agree. There are no thought crimes, though.

Originally Posted by ill be damed if i know

looks like you are condoning or agreeing with nazi germany and imperial japan actions through out the 1930s and 1940s , what are your political sympathies now a days ? My point is that even tho a law was not made of "crimes against humanity" or whatever they were charged during their time ,it does not give them the right to kill millions of innocent civilians, they had to be brought to justice, under the title of "nuremburg trails" or not.

What do you think? If you are going to accuse me of something, why not assemble the facts and make a case.

The past is whatever the Party chooses to make it....
If the facts say otherwise then the facts must be altered.

Originally Posted by Doppleganger

It's really quite simple and of course you know this. The victors can get away scot-free with actions that the losers are condemned for. Most people are aware that Stalin was a Soviet dictator, but his name is not synomonous with evil as the name of Adolf Hitler is. Both states committed mass murder on a gigantic scale. If we want to talk numbers the Stalinist regime was worse than the Nazi regime. Yet you rightly point out that Stalin got away with annexing most of Eastern Europe, at least until the 'Iron Curtain' fell...On the subject of David Irving as a serious historian I have to argue that his treatment of Adolf Hitler, accusations about no knowledge of the Holocaust aside, are well regarded in academic circles. I haven't read 'Hitler's War', probably his seminal work, but I will one of these days. As an examination of how Adolf Hitler ticked there can be few more noteworthy works. Irving was one of the first to debunk the infamous Hitler Diaries as fake for example. It's just a pity that he holds the personal views he does.

Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs
Iin one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them.

(sorry for all the Orwell today)