During the post-war occupation of Japan, war crime trials were conducted[1].
"Soon after the war, the Allied powers indicted 25 persons as Class-A war criminals, and 5,700 persons were indicted as Class-B or Class-C war criminals by Allied criminal courts. Of these, 984 were initially condemned to death, 920 were actually executed, 475 received life sentences, 2,944 received prison terms, 1,018 were acquitted, and 279 were not sentenced or not brought to trial."
These trials remain somewhat controversial in Japan. Many viewed them as "victor's justice". i.e. The perception was that American war criminals went unpunished while Japanese war criminals faced the courts. There have been repeated diplomatic incidents between China and Japan when Japanese officials, even their prime minister, payed respects at shrines dedicated to war criminals[2]. A significant portion of the Japanese public believes, to this day, that soldiers executed for war crimes were no more guilty than American soldiers.
Japanese conduct in China, Korea, etc. was humanity at its worst, and fully qualifies as war crimes and crimes against humanity in my opinion, but I have to admit they have a point when it comes to the lack of Americans being prosecuted for fire bombing or the dropping of atomic weapons. The allies, in general, did not admit to or prosecute their own for what would today be considered war crimes or crimes against humanity. Fire bombing in particular was widely used by the allies (especially the U.S.) in both Europe and Asia and remains one of the most inhuman forms of war ever invented. The shadow of nuclear warfare has allowed those who invented fire bombing to go mostly unnoticed.
It does seem that most war criminals tend to go unpunished if their nations win. WWII is now far enough in the past that there remains little chance of prosecuting war criminals who evaded justice, but opening the books and coming to terms with the past may help us prevent history from rhyming too much. If releasing these records can help prevent more war crimes from being committed in the present or future, releasing them is the right thing to do.
I don’t know that that is true but if so it’s probably because they largely didn’t flee to the west.
Haven’t seen it yet but The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On is an ‘87 doc about a Japanese WWII vet tracking down Japanese war criminals, confronting them and then beating the shit out of them. Here’s Bill Hader talking about it:
It's interesting that we go to great lengths to punish ex-nazis, but do nothing when comes to the soldiers of Stalin and Mao.
Even the ex-Japanese soldiers that participated in horrific war crimes got to live a peceful life afte the war.
During the post-war occupation of Japan, war crime trials were conducted[1].
"Soon after the war, the Allied powers indicted 25 persons as Class-A war criminals, and 5,700 persons were indicted as Class-B or Class-C war criminals by Allied criminal courts. Of these, 984 were initially condemned to death, 920 were actually executed, 475 received life sentences, 2,944 received prison terms, 1,018 were acquitted, and 279 were not sentenced or not brought to trial."
These trials remain somewhat controversial in Japan. Many viewed them as "victor's justice". i.e. The perception was that American war criminals went unpunished while Japanese war criminals faced the courts. There have been repeated diplomatic incidents between China and Japan when Japanese officials, even their prime minister, payed respects at shrines dedicated to war criminals[2]. A significant portion of the Japanese public believes, to this day, that soldiers executed for war crimes were no more guilty than American soldiers.
Japanese conduct in China, Korea, etc. was humanity at its worst, and fully qualifies as war crimes and crimes against humanity in my opinion, but I have to admit they have a point when it comes to the lack of Americans being prosecuted for fire bombing or the dropping of atomic weapons. The allies, in general, did not admit to or prosecute their own for what would today be considered war crimes or crimes against humanity. Fire bombing in particular was widely used by the allies (especially the U.S.) in both Europe and Asia and remains one of the most inhuman forms of war ever invented. The shadow of nuclear warfare has allowed those who invented fire bombing to go mostly unnoticed.
It does seem that most war criminals tend to go unpunished if their nations win. WWII is now far enough in the past that there remains little chance of prosecuting war criminals who evaded justice, but opening the books and coming to terms with the past may help us prevent history from rhyming too much. If releasing these records can help prevent more war crimes from being committed in the present or future, releasing them is the right thing to do.
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[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_war_crimes#War_crimes...
[2]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversies_surrounding_Yasu...
I don’t know that that is true but if so it’s probably because they largely didn’t flee to the west.
Haven’t seen it yet but The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On is an ‘87 doc about a Japanese WWII vet tracking down Japanese war criminals, confronting them and then beating the shit out of them. Here’s Bill Hader talking about it:
https://youtu.be/x2eL-g9O9mc?t=5m10s
Germany chased the nazi war criminals out.
Did Russia, Japan or China chase out their war criminals to the same extent? I doubt it.
Society needs a boogeyman so we can pretend like everyone short of that is squeaky clean.
>soldiers of Stalin and Mao
They settled in Canada too?
[dead]
They didn't leave any large, organized groups of victims alive.