Demjanjuk extradited to Germany.

[BravestHibs]

89 year old John Demjanjuck was extradited from the US to Germany to stand trial for alleged warcrimes committed during WWII.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8045543.stm

Is it just me who thinks that to charge an 89 year old man who is, by his own and families account, in constant pain 24 hours a day anyway, is a bit of a futile gesture at best and at worst vindictive and vengeful? If convicted the chances are he's going to die within a year anyway and the only people who are really going to be affected by this are his immediate family who have absolutely nothing to do with anything that happened over 60 years ago.

Personally I'm a strong believer in circumstance, by that I mean that if he'd been born in the UK the chances are he would never have made an effort to go and join the Nazi war effort specifically with a view to becoming a gaurd in a death/concentration/prison camp.

What does everyone think?

[Allant1981]

89 year old John Demjanjuck was extradited from the US to Germany to stand trial for alleged warcrimes committed during WWII.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8045543.stm

Is it just me who thinks that to charge an 89 year old man who is, by his own and families account, in constant pain 24 hours a day anyway, is a bit of a futile gesture at best and at worst vindictive and vengeful? If convicted the chances are he's going to die within a year anyway and the only people who are really going to be affected by this are his immediate family who have absolutely nothing to do with anything that happened over 60 years ago.

Personally I'm a strong believer in circumstance, by that I mean that if he'd been born in the UK the chances are he would never have made an effort to go and join the Nazi war effort specifically with a view to becoming a gaurd in a death/concentration/prison camp.

What does everyone think?


Nah I dont agree with you I'm afraid, I personally wouldnt care if the guy was 99 he should still have to be held accountable for his actions. Just my opinion though

[Beefster]

This was the guy who was sentenced to death, based on concentration camp survivors identification and testimony, by Israel. It was then over-turned when it was shown to be almost certain that the survivors were wrong.

I've no problem with his treatment if he is guilty but if this is another example of mistaken identity, it seems a shame for the guy to have been hounded for the last 35 years of his life.

[Future17]

I suppose the problem is that he's going to suffer considerably PRIOR to it being established whether or not he is guilty.

If he is guilty then there should be no time or age limit on prosecution.

He's no doubt enjoyed many years of a "normal" life and he at least has family members to care about what happens to him......something that was denied his victims.

[LiverpoolHibs]

89 year old John Demjanjuck was extradited from the US to Germany to stand trial for alleged warcrimes committed during WWII.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8045543.stm

Is it just me who thinks that to charge an 89 year old man who is, by his own and families account, in constant pain 24 hours a day anyway, is a bit of a futile gesture at best and at worst vindictive and vengeful? If convicted the chances are he's going to die within a year anyway and the only people who are really going to be affected by this are his immediate family who have absolutely nothing to do with anything that happened over 60 years ago.

Personally I'm a strong believer in circumstance, by that I mean that if he'd been born in the UK the chances are he would never have made an effort to go and join the Nazi war effort specifically with a view to becoming a gaurd in a death/concentration/prison camp.

What does everyone think?

Regardless of whether you think he should be prosecuted at his age (and with his health), that's a mightily dangerous path to go down.

[(((Fergus)))]

89 year old John Demjanjuck was extradited from the US to Germany to stand trial for alleged warcrimes committed during WWII.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8045543.stm

Is it just me who thinks that to charge an 89 year old man who is, by his own and families account, in constant pain 24 hours a day anyway, is a bit of a futile gesture at best and at worst vindictive and vengeful? If convicted the chances are he's going to die within a year anyway and the only people who are really going to be affected by this are his immediate family who have absolutely nothing to do with anything that happened over 60 years ago.

Personally I'm a strong believer in circumstance, by that I mean that if he'd been born in the UK the chances are he would never have made an effort to go and join the Nazi war effort specifically with a view to becoming a gaurd in a death/concentration/prison camp.

What does everyone think?

They say you have to pay for sins when you get to the "other side", however the punishment is less if you have already been punished in this world. If he is guilty, it's in his own interests to pay (at least some of) the price while he can.

[BravestHibs]

This was the guy who was sentenced to death, based on concentration camp survivors identification and testimony, by Israel. It was then over-turned when it was shown to be almost certain that the survivors were wrong.

I've no problem with his treatment if he is guilty but if this is another example of mistaken identity, it seems a shame for the guy to have been hounded for the last 35 years of his life.

It's the palpable vengefulness of the Israelis in this matter that troubles me. I'm in no way condoning the attrocities this man may or may not have committed but I think there were millions of people put into a position that they weren't happy to be in during WWII. I think that after Nuremberg an amnesty should have been declared to draw a line under the horrors of war instead of dragging them out to such an extent. It worked to rebuild Rwanda after the genocide there and I'm no christian but I do think that in situations like this forgiveness is the only way to stop hate and bitterness consuming you.

[BravestHibs]

Regardless of whether you think he should be prosecuted at his age (and with his health), that's a mightily dangerous path to go down.

I do see where your coming from, obviously there's no way of knowing what would have happened in a different life but there's also no way of knowing how you, me or anyone would react in a warzone, particularly a world war like that when you had absolutely no choice as to whether you partook in it. The fact that he was on the losing side also plays a part as by alot of accounts the Soviets were just as bad on the attrocities front but you don't hear about anyone spending 60 odd years chasing them up to pay for their crimes. Alot of good people died on both sides of the war and I think that's forgotten whenever the word 'Nazi' is banded around.

[PeeJay]

I think that after Nuremberg an amnesty should have been declared to draw a line under the horrors of war instead of dragging them out to such an extent.

Disagree with you on this entirely: Germany as a nation has tried (not always succesfully) to come to terms with its past - NOT by hiding from it (as the Japanese do), but by confronting it head on and facing up to its shameful past. I have nothing but the greatest respect for Germany and its people and the course of action they took to make sure everyone here knows what happened, why it happened, who was responsible and to try and make sure that it doesn't happen again. Drawing amnesties and pretending it never happened would have been the wrong way entirely: this is not based on bitterness and hatred, but justice, it's absolutely irrelevant that he's 89.

[Jonnyboy]

Disagree with you on this entirely: Germany as a nation has tried (not always succesfully) to come to terms with its past - NOT by hiding from it (as the Japanese do), but by confronting it head on and facing up to its shameful past. I have nothing but the greatest respect for Germany and its people and the course of action they took to make sure everyone here knows what happened, why it happened, who was responsible and to try and make sure that it doesn't happen again. Drawing amnesties and pretending it never happened would have been the wrong way entirely: this is not based on bitterness and hatred, but justice, it's absolutely irrelevant that he's 89.

:top marks

If he's guilty and I stress if, it matters not that he's 89 and knocking on death's door. For the last sixty odd years he's lived whilst at least 6 million never had that privilege.

[Pretty Boy]

This was the guy who was sentenced to death, based on concentration camp survivors identification and testimony, by Israel. It was then over-turned when it was shown to be almost certain that the survivors were wrong.

I've no problem with his treatment if he is guilty but if this is another example of mistaken identity, it seems a shame for the guy to have been hounded for the last 35 years of his life.

From my understanding since then a lot of documentation has been uncovered which very much points towards his guilt.

Personally i don't give two hoots if the guy is 29 or 89 if he was involved in the holocaust he should be held accountable. The jail sentence might be a bit pointless but at least it would bring us another step closer to closure. He should not be allowed to die having never faced up to his crimes and asked to respond to the accusations levelle at him.

[BravestHibs]

I was listening to radio 5 last night and there was a debate about this exact topic which raised an important question in my eyes. What does jailing this man actually achieve? He'll serve 5 years at the very most as he will be 90 by the time this case goes to trial, if found guilty he will have to have a medical to check that he is actually even fit to serve a sentence, even those with concrete evidence against them at Nuremberg got 15 year sentences and most served half that. He has already served 11 years in an Israeli prison for crimes that he did not commit and he has been hunted by Israel for the last 30 years. He also was a prisoner of the Germans himself if I remember correctly, but I was drifting off to sleep at that point so may have that confused.

He can't have enjoyed his freedom in the same way you or I would enjoy our freedom, maybe time to let him die in peace?

[PeeJay]

What does jailing this man actually achieve?


The trial against Demjanjuk in Munich is NOT one intended to punish him - this trial is solely about documenting the horrendous crimes he perpetrated in his role at the Sobibor concentration camp (KZ). This should not be looked on as a trial against an old, frail man, but rather as a process on behalf of justice and truth: without doubt, the victims are entitled to this.

In all likelihood Demjanjuk will not be given an actual jail sentence as he will probably not be fit enough to undergo detention. We may well have to accept the fact that he will escape a period of detention, but he should no longer be allowed to escape the truth.

[BravestHibs]

The trial against Demjanjuk in Munich is NOT one intended to punish him - this trial is solely about documenting the horrendous crimes he perpetrated in his role at the Sobibor concentration camp (KZ). This should not be looked on as a trial against an old, frail man, but rather as a process on behalf of justice and truth: without doubt, the victims are entitled to this.

In all likelihood Demjanjuk will not be given an actual jail sentence as he will probably not be fit enough to undergo detention. We may well have to accept the fact that he will escape a period of detention, but he should no longer be allowed to escape the truth.

Agreed, of course the victims are entitled to the truth. If they really wanted the truth however, instead of putting him on trial, with the possibility of a jail term, why haven't they offered him amnesty under the condition that he explains his role within Sobibor? As it stands, if found guilty and pending a medical he would face prison. That in my view isn't the best way to extract the truth. Especially as his lawyer is telling him to stay completely silent until at least the time when they have had a chance to process the pages of charges against him. Which obviously isn't unreasonable.

[PeeJay]

Agreed, of course the victims are entitled to the truth. If they really wanted the truth however, instead of putting him on trial, with the possibility of a jail term, why haven't they offered him amnesty under the condition that he explains his role within Sobibor? As it stands, if found guilty and pending a medical he would face prison. That in my view isn't the best way to extract the truth. Especially as his lawyer is telling him to stay completely silent until at least the time when they have had a chance to process the pages of charges against him. Which obviously isn't unreasonable.

As I said, this is not about punishing him, but documenting the truth of what happened, and – I guess – forcing him to face up to a truth that he has hidden from since the end of WWII (assuming he’s guilty, which considering they found his SS ID card, seems most likely, but ...) .
Believe me, here in Germany, there were many Nazis and their sympathisers after the war or after Nuremburg who would have loved to simply sweep everything under the carpet or have an amnesty as you suggest. In my view that would have been the completely wrong way to go. Germany, by facing up to its past and by making those responsible for that past also face up to it, has gone down the only right path. Granted German courts made many mistakes and many wrongdoers managed to escape a trial. As it is however, I cannot see any purpose being served by granting him or any of the few other evil ......... still left alive an amnesty.

As to his being given a term of detention; I think that most unlikely, his lawyer will plead infirmity and he will then be hospitalised or something like that: this is a trial for justice. Assuming he’s guilty, he won’t be gassed, shot, starved, worked or beaten to death or any of the other atrocities SS officer Demjanjuk practised. So let’s face it, he’s being dealt with far more humanely than any of the 29,000 victims for whom he is allegedly responsible: he’s not a victim, he’s one of the guys responsible.

[BravestHibs]

FYI: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8047553.stm

[--------]

As I said, this is not about punishing him, but documenting the truth of what happened, and – I guess – forcing him to face up to a truth that he has hidden from since the end of WWII (assuming he’s guilty, which considering they found his SS ID card, seems most likely, but ...) .
Believe me, here in Germany, there were many Nazis and their sympathisers after the war or after Nuremburg who would have loved to simply sweep everything under the carpet or have an amnesty as you suggest. In my view that would have been the completely wrong way to go. Germany, by facing up to its past and by making those responsible for that past also face up to it, has gone down the only right path. Granted German courts made many mistakes and many wrongdoers managed to escape a trial. As it is however, I cannot see any purpose being served by granting him or any of the few other evil ......... still left alive an amnesty.

As to his being given a term of detention; I think that most unlikely, his lawyer will plead infirmity and he will then be hospitalised or something like that: this is a trial for justice. Assuming he’s guilty, he won’t be gassed, shot, starved, worked or beaten to death or any of the other atrocities SS officer Demjanjuk practised. So let’s face it, he’s being dealt with far more humanely than any of the 29,000 victims for whom he is allegedly responsible: he’s not a victim, he’s one of the guys responsible.


What would you do with the Jewish prisoners who organised the work details for the Nazis, or the others who assisted in the operation of the gas chambers?

[PeeJay]

What would you do with the Jewish prisoners who organised the work details for the Nazis, or the others who assisted in the operation of the gas chambers?

... I must admit I'm at a loss to reply to this statement!

[scott7_0(Prague)]

What would you do with the Jewish prisoners who organised the work details for the Nazis, or the others who assisted in the operation of the gas chambers?

Your really not asking that question are you??

IN your statement I think the word PRISONERS explains it all!:rolleyes:

[BravestHibs]

Your really not asking that question are you??

IN your statement I think the word PRISONERS explains it all!:rolleyes:

Wouldn't the Germans who were there have been prisoners to a certain extant as well? I'm only speculating but if they had refused to follow orders wouldn't they have been killed as well?

[PeeJay]

Wouldn't the Germans who were there have been prisoners to a certain extant as well? I'm only speculating but if they had refused to follow orders wouldn't they have been killed as well?

Maybe this will help you understand?

http://www.deathcamps.org/sobibor/perpetrators.html

[--------]

... I must admit I'm at a loss to reply to this statement!


Your really not asking that question are you??

IN your statement I think the word PRISONERS explains it all!:rolleyes:

Yes, I am.

Demjanjuk is Ukrainian, not German. In 1942 Ukraine was under German occupation. Demjanjuk's family, and the man himself, were under the control of the Third Reich.

What do you think would have happened to him and his family if he had refused to co-operate?

There's plenty evidence that many of the Jewish kapos in Auschwitz behaved as badly to their fellow Jews as the guards did - worse than was necessary to survive. Check out Primo Levi's If This Is A Man, for example.

And what do we make of someone like Mordechai Chaim Rumkowski, the Nazi-appointed head of the Jewish Council in the Lodz Ghetto, who claimed to be doing what he was doing as a means of saving lives, but used his position to protect and provide for his own family and friends, who has been accused by many female ex-prisoners (Jews) of using his position to force them submit to him sexually, and who on one famous occasion persuaded the inhabitants of the ghetto to hand over all the children under 10 years old to the Germans for murder?

In a totalitarian state there are prisoners behind the wire, and prisoners outside the wire, and sometimes it's hard to differentiate between them.

And sometimes the worst of all the perpetrators of crimes like the ones we're talking about walk away because they have friends to help, or talents to sell - Mengele, for example, or von Braun and his team.

[BravestHibs]

Maybe this will help you understand?

http://www.deathcamps.org/sobibor/perpetrators.html

I'm not sure if by posting the link you were trying to back up my previous post but this sentence sums it up for me.

As the war drew to a close, the Nazi command realised that the staff and commanders could incriminate their superiors and they were sent consequently to dangerous areas where some of them such as Wirth were killed. As Stangl said afterwards, "We were an embarrassment to the brass. They wanted to find ways to incinerate us."

[scott7_0(Prague)]

Yes, I am.

Demjanjuk is Ukrainian, not German. In 1942 Ukraine was under German occupation. Demjanjuk's family, and the man himself, were under the control of the Third Reich.

What do you think would have happened to him and his family if he had refused to co-operate?

There's plenty evidence that many of the Jewish kapos in Auschwitz behaved as badly to their fellow Jews as the guards did - worse than was necessary to survive. Check out Primo Levi's If This Is A Man, for example.

And what do we make of someone like Mordechai Chaim Rumkowski, the Nazi-appointed head of the Jewish Council in the Lodz Ghetto, who claimed to be doing what he was doing as a means of saving lives, but used his position to protect and provide for his own family and friends, who has been accused by many female ex-prisoners (Jews) of using his position to force them submit to him sexually, and who on one famous occasion persuaded the inhabitants of the ghetto to hand over all the children under 10 years old to the Germans for murder?

In a totalitarian state there are prisoners behind the wire, and prisoners outside the wire, and sometimes it's hard to differentiate between them.

And sometimes the worst of all the perpetrators of crimes like the ones we're talking about walk away because they have friends to help, or talents to sell - Mengele, for example, or von Braun and his team.

Your point is well made, but the fact that you highlighted Jewish prisoners in your original statement is why I am picking up on this, only the first jewish prisoners who arrived at new nazi camps were picked by the Germans to work as they needed people to run the camps, the rest were sent to there deaths!!

[PeeJay]

Yes, I am.

Demjanjuk is Ukrainian, not German. In 1942 Ukraine was under German occupation. Demjanjuk's family, and the man himself, were under the control of the Third Reich.

Many Ukrainians fought voluntarily for the German occupying forces: the reason is well-know to anyone with knowledge of the period.
Stop trying to place the victims and perpetrators on a level par with each other.

[PeeJay]

I'm not sure if by posting the link you were trying to back up my previous post but this sentence sums it up for me.

As the war drew to a close, the Nazi command realised that the staff and commanders could incriminate their superiors and they were sent consequently to dangerous areas where some of them such as Wirth were killed. As Stangl said afterwards, "We were an embarrassment to the brass. They wanted to find ways to incinerate us."

No - I disagree with you, remember!

I've no particular pity for former SS men to be honest - you did read this part too I take it?

"These men always carried out the murder of hundreds of thousands of men, women and children always loyally and unquestioningly. What is more, they constantly displayed initiative in trying to improve the extermination process. An integral aspect of their duties was that they were also to exhibit cruelty toward their victims, and many of them contributed their own ideas and innovations for various forms of torture that served to entertain them all."

[Betty Boop]

No - I disagree with you, remember!

I've no particular pity for former SS men to be honest - you did read this part too I take it?

"These men always carried out the murder of hundreds of thousands of men, women and children always loyally and unquestioningly. What is more, they constantly displayed initiative in trying to improve the extermination process. An integral aspect of their duties was that they were also to exhibit cruelty toward their victims, and many of them contributed their own ideas and innovations for various forms of torture that served to entertain them all."
Something like what happened with Lyndi England and Charles Grainer in Abu Gharaib then?

[--------]

Many Ukrainians fought voluntarily for the German occupying forces: the reason is well-know to anyone with knowledge of the period.
Stop trying to place the victims and perpetrators on a level par with each other.


And many fought under duress.

The fact is that in both the camps and the ghettoes the Nazis depended on the co-operation of a section of the prison population to assist them in running the system. This is something many people find very hard to come to terms with.

I'm not putting perpetrators and victims on a level par - that suggestion is insulting and is not born out by anything I've posted. I simply asked a question which thus far no one has answered.

And I say again - in a totalitarian state there are prisoners within the wire, and there are prisoners outside it. Everyone except perhaps the very highest of the high command is a prisoner, in fact.

I'm not suggesting for a moment that those who participated in the Final Solution as the agents of the Third Reich should escape justice. If Demjanjuk is indeed the man witnesses have alleged him to be, he carries a huge burden of guilt for what he did.

However, it's very easy for you or me, in the comfort of our homes and in front of our computers, to make wide-ranging declarations about who did what and why. We aren't facing either the moral choices or the oppression that the poeple faced who found themselves under the control of the Third Reich.

So I'll ask another question - how sure are YOU that under the pressure of a horrendously cruel totalitarian system, subject to the indoctrination and media-control such a system entails, and confronted with the choice to either conform to the demands of the dictatorship or to rebel, almost certainly at the cost of your own life and the lives of those you love, how sure are YOU that you wouldn't conform, and then rationalise your decision into an acceptable form afterwards?

Which is what most people caught up in the Final Solution appear to have done.

[Future17]

Many Ukrainians fought voluntarily for the German occupying forces: the reason is well-know to anyone with knowledge of the period.
Stop trying to place the victims and perpetrators on a level par with each other.

So, when it comes to retrospective punishment, what would you say distinguishes SS soldiers in the camps who would've been executed for disobeying orders from prisoners in the camps who would've been executed for disobeying orders?

[--------]

So, when it comes to retrospective punishment, what would you say distinguishes SS soldiers in the camps who would've been executed for disobeying orders from prisoners in the camps who would've been executed for disobeying orders?


Thanks. That was what I was asking. You've put it much better than I did.

:agree:

[Future17]

Thanks. That was what I was asking. You've put it much better than I did.

:agree:


:greengrin

To be fair, the main reason I "re-asked" it is because it's not something I've ever thought about before reading your post and I'm still no closer to deciding what I think myself.

[Jamesie]

Many Ukrainians fought voluntarily for the German occupying forces: the reason is well-know to anyone with knowledge of the period.
Stop trying to place the victims and perpetrators on a level par with each other.

For an interesting Edinburgh perspective on this, read the following book:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Morningside-Mataharis-Douglas-MacLeod/dp/1843410214

[--------]

:greengrin

To be fair, the main reason I "re-asked" it is because it's not something I've ever thought about before reading your post and I'm still no closer to deciding what I think myself.


The BBC did an outstanding mini-series a few years ago, entitled Auschwitz, the Nazis, and the Final Solution.

There were a lot of eye-witness interviews involved - victims and perpetrators. What struck me was that the victims, no matter what they had been made to do, appeared to be both freer in themselves and more open in acknowledging what had happened to them, what had happened around them, and what they themselves had done, than the German and Eastern European former SS, even those not directly involved in the killing process.

IMO the difference lay (in part at least) in the fact that while the guards and camp functionaries gave an inner consent to what they were being ordered to do, the Jewish and Polish prisoners did not. Not at the time, not afterwards. They had no choice if they were to survive; their understanding of the sort of place they had come to was partial, at least at first; if they hadn't done it, they would have been killed, and others would have stepped forward to take their places; they literally had no other ratinal, logical choice in the situation into which they had been placed. And on more than one occasion, groups of "co-operating" prisoners turned on the Nazis with fatal consequences for the Nazis - which demonstrates just how far those prisoners had truly consented to the atrocities surrounding them.

(One elderly Polish gentleman explained to us that if you're going to hit a Nazi on the head with an axe, you should hit him with the back of the axe, not the sharp edge. If you use the sharp edge, it's very difficult to get the axe out of the head in time to hit the next Nazi with it. Make of that what you will.)

But one of the former SS men said something which has stayed with me - he asked the interviewer what right she had to judge him for what he had done in the war when she herself had never been placed under the pressures he had undergone as the subject of a totalitarian regime.

Of course, the answer was that he had given her that right when he agreed to be interviewed - he was a far from attractive character, still justifying his participation in atrocities and showing little if any remorse.

But I don't live in a totalitarian dictatorship - yet. I don't know how I would react if I were presented with the sort of moral choices that were commonplace in Eastern Europe during the years 1939-1945. And I'm aware too that Ukrainians like Demjanjuk were caught between TWO such regimes - Hitler and the Nazis, and Stalin and the Soviet system of state-generated and state-executed terror which was surely as cruel and barbaric as the Nazi system.

So in a sense I was asking the question genuinely for information's sake - what would other people posting here do if they were in that position themselves, and how would they judge those who committed acts we would consider barbaric under such extreme duress?

My guess is that most of us would find some way to rationalise our co-operation with the regime.

[Beefster]

My guess is that most of us would find some way to rationalise our co-operation with the regime.

It's almost certain, especially if my partner and son were at risk of being harmed or killed. As you said, we can all sit with a cup of coffee, central heating and enough food to stop us going hungry and easily state that we could never commit atrocities under any circumstance. At the same time, most folk agree that they'd do anything to protect their loved ones.

By the way, most folk with any interest in the Second World War probably know about this guy but I've found his books to be amongst the best around:

http://www.laurencerees.com/

[PeeJay]

So in a sense I was asking the question genuinely for information's sake - what would other people posting here do if they were in that position themselves, and how would they judge those who committed acts we would consider barbaric under such extreme duress?
My guess is that most of us would find some way to rationalise our co-operation with the regime.

Surely there are universally applicable truths regarding what is right and wrong behavior? How can we just chop and change as the situation demands and simply behave barbarously because a particular situation demands it? Is it not fair to say, one should try to behave in a humane, decent, moral manner at all times – regardless of the circumstances? Sometimes people have to stand up and say no!
If we were to act, as you seem to be asking, as morally upright citizens in morally upright states, but then to accept we may need to act as monsters in totalitarian states (for survival?) what would that make us as human beings ultimately? Why would anyone wish to live in such a world? We would be no better than the Hitlers, Stalins, etc, etc., don’t you think?
Isn’t it a dangerous path to go down: after all, we could always claim we … were following orders, doing what they made me? If we entertain the possibility that it might be OK to act barbarously in certain circumstances (who decides BTW?) then we as humanity are capitulating, and it’s goodbye morality, hello grave new world!

[BravestHibs]

Surely there are universally applicable truths regarding what is right and wrong behavior? How can we just chop and change as the situation demands and simply behave barbarously because a particular situation demands it? Is it not fair to say, one should try to behave in a humane, decent, moral manner at all times – regardless of the circumstances? Sometimes people have to stand up and say no!
If we were to act, as you seem to be asking, as morally upright citizens in morally upright states, but then to accept we may need to act as monsters in totalitarian states (for survival?) what would that make us as human beings ultimately? Why would anyone wish to live in such a world? We would be no better than the Hitlers, Stalins, etc, etc., don’t you think?
Isn’t it a dangerous path to go down: after all, we could always claim we … were following orders, doing what they made me? If we entertain the possibility that it might be OK to act barbarously in certain circumstances (who decides BTW?) then we as humanity are capitulating, and it’s goodbye morality, hello grave new world!



I admire your idealism, however, what you are basically saying there is you'd stand by and watch your loved ones get shot in the face because on principle you wouldn't kill a stranger to save their lives.

I don't believe you.

[PeeJay]

I admire your idealism, however, what you are basically saying there is you'd stand by and watch your loved ones get shot in the face because on principle you wouldn't kill a stranger to save their lives.

I don't believe you.

With all due respect, this is a crass misrepresentation of what I said. I responded to Doddie's question, we are actually talking about people participating in the mass murder of strangers NOT about someone shooting my wife or child in the face!

[Phil D. Rolls]

89 year old John Demjanjuck was extradited from the US to Germany to stand trial for alleged warcrimes committed during WWII.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8045543.stm

Is it just me who thinks that to charge an 89 year old man who is, by his own and families account, in constant pain 24 hours a day anyway, is a bit of a futile gesture at best and at worst vindictive and vengeful? If convicted the chances are he's going to die within a year anyway and the only people who are really going to be affected by this are his immediate family who have absolutely nothing to do with anything that happened over 60 years ago.

Personally I'm a strong believer in circumstance, by that I mean that if he'd been born in the UK the chances are he would never have made an effort to go and join the Nazi war effort specifically with a view to becoming a gaurd in a death/concentration/prison camp.

What does everyone think?

As you say, it's a futile gesture. I suppose, though, there are other families living with the consequences of what happened in the war, so if they feel this is justice, so be it.

Who knows how British people would have acted, had the Nazis won the war? I look at Holland, where they still carry the guilt and shame of their country's colloboration, and I think that we would probably have acted the same.

I saw a programme about holocaust survivors, following the Anne Frank anniversary. What came out there was how quickly people normalise the situation. One woman said on the first day in Auschwitz she was horrified to see a truck piled with bodies go past. On the second she thought to herself "oh there's that truck again". On the third day she didn't even notice it.

I think it is part of our defence mechanism to quickly adjust to situations. It could be that, if we don't then the conflict between what we believe to be right, and being surrounded by what we believe to be wrong, leads to madness.

Personally, I'd like to see a bit more acceptance and forgiveness for what was a breakdown of humanity. However, I can't judge anyone on their opinions, without having experienced it you can't know how you would feel.

I've come across a few prisoners of the Japanese, and what seems to be constant amongst them is the genuine and total hatred they have towards their captors.

[BravestHibs]

With all due respect, this is a crass misrepresentation of what I said. I responded to Doddie's question, we are actually talking about people participating in the mass murder of strangers NOT about someone shooting my wife or child in the face!

I'll admit it is a boiled-down way of looking at it, bare bones if you like, but crass misrepresentation it isn't. I'm not making a point about your wife and child in particular as I'm sure you're well aware, my point is that it's all very well being idealistic now but if you saw with your own eyes how cheap life was, death everywhere you looked, your views on life and death would most certainly change. I myself am happy to admit that if it was between me and a stranger I wouldn't hesitate to despatch them if it meant saving my own life, or, hypothetically of course like everything else on this forum, that of my family. And if you wouldn't be willing to do so it would almost make you as cold as the perpetrators in that it's one thing killing a stranger under pain of death yourself, but to save a strangers life over that of your familys because of a point of principle is about as selfish and unfeeling as you can get in my opinion.

[PeeJay]

So, when it comes to retrospective punishment, what would you say distinguishes SS soldiers in the camps who would've been executed for disobeying orders from prisoners in the camps who would've been executed for disobeying orders?

How about the fact that the SS were holding the guns and had the might of the German army/regime behind them? How about the fact that the SS were willing helpers/volunteers in the final solution and the prisoners held against their will?

Stop placing victims and perpetrators of mass crime on a level par with each other - this revisionism is seriously misguided - unless there's some other purpose behind it, of course????

[--------]

I think you're misunderstanding what I and Future17 are saying.

I'm NOT placing the SS and their victims on the same level, nor am I engaged in revising history or denying the reality of the Final Solution.

But there IS a place where perpetrators and victims may be said to be not on the same moral level, but in the same room? Victims and perpetrators were all members of the human race.

And before you say that no one could do what Mengele or Eichmann (or even Rumkowski) did without forfeiting their place among humanity, what happened in the camps at Auschwitz, and at Sobibor, and Chelmno, and Treblinka, and in the ghettoes in Warsaw and Lodz, and in the "old people's ghetto at Terezin - all that and worse is what human beings do.

What we have done many times in the past, and what we surely will do again many times in the future, I fear.

It's very comforting to say that the perpetrators of mass murder are "monsters", or "sub-human" or somehow in some other way different from the rest of us. It reassures us that WE would never do what they did. It's significant that Steven Green, the private facing the death penalty for murder and rape in Iraq, was invalided out of the US Army as suffering from a "personality disorder" - a disorder not detected when he was being enlisted. This allows the US Army, the American paople, and anyone else who reads about the case to distance themselves from Green. There was something wrong with him. He's not like us. He's a monster.

But the people who organised and carried out Hitler's Final Solution to the Jewish Problem weren't born with the Mark of Cain on them - most of them started off as ordinary men and women, just part of the crowd.

Read Chrstopher Browning's book Ordinary Men - Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland and you may see what I'm getting at.

[Phil D. Rolls]

How about the fact that the SS were holding the guns and had the might of the German army/regime behind them? How about the fact that the SS were willing helpers/volunteers in the final solution and the prisoners held against their will?

Stop placing victims and perpetrators of mass crime on a level par with each other - this revisionism is seriously misguided - unless there's some other purpose behind it, of course????

I think the biggest danger we face is not accepting that the Nazis were humans. Because if we can't accept that humans could do such things, if we just see them as monsters, then it is easy to hide from the fact that any group of people is capable of genocide. Including the Israelis, who seem to learned nothing.

Edit: I hadn't read Doddie's post before I wrote this, but he has said what I was trying to much better.

[PeeJay]

I think the biggest danger we face is not accepting that the Nazis were humans.


Agree wholeheartedly, maybe I expressed myself poorly in my post. What is so particularly frightening was that the perpetrators - for the most part - were normal citizens - and I guess that's even more scary than thinking of them as monsters.


DODDIE

"But there IS a place where perpetrators and victims may be said to be not on the same moral level, but in the same room? Victims and perpetrators were all members of the human race."

You're right, I don't get it. Sorry! So there's me and Adolf in the same room, we're both human beings and ...? Maybe you want me to share his shame, his pain, his evilness? No - why?

BTW: I do not accept the implication in Browning's book whereby "most people placed into a group and given the choice between killing and belonging to the group or not killing and not belonging, will choose the former."

[--------]

Agree wholeheartedly, maybe I expressed myself poorly in my post. What is so particularly frightening was that the perpetrators - for the most part - were normal citizens - and I guess that's even more scary than thinking of them as monsters.


DODDIE

"But there IS a place where perpetrators and victims may be said to be not on the same moral level, but in the same room? Victims and perpetrators were all members of the human race."

You're right, I don't get it. Sorry! So there's me and Adolf in the same room, we're both human beings and ...? Maybe you want me to share his shame, his pain, his evilness? No - why?

BTW: I do not accept the implication in Browning's book whereby "most people placed into a group and given the choice between killing and belonging to the group or not killing and not belonging, will choose the former."


Browning looked at what happened over a period of months within one particular battalion. He isn't proposing a theory out of thin air.

People knew what was going on in Poland and the Soviet Union under German occupation. German people, I mean.

Soldiers wrote home telling their folks what they were doing, enclosing photographs. Many of those people approved of the killings. Many of them kept quiet out of fear. Some may have felt they couldn't speak without compromising their Armed Forces while the fighting was still going on.

Still others - a few - actually spoke out. They all died. Were they the only Germans who weren't "monsters"?

One of the most moving film moments I've experienced comes at the end of Downfall when Traudl Junge, who was Hitler's secretary from 1942 until the end, looks back as an old woman to her time with Hitler and his gang:

"All these horrors I've heard of during the Nurnberg process, these six million Jews, other thinking people or people of another race, who perished. That shocked me deeply. But I hadn't made the connection with my past. I assured myself with the thought of not being personally guilty. And that I didn't know anything about the enormous scale of it. But one day I walked by a memorial plate of Sophie Scholl in the Franz-Joseph-Strasse. I saw that she was about my age and she was executed in the same year I came to Hitler. And at that moment I actually realised that a young age isn't an excuse. And that it might have been possible to get to know things."

The road to hell is paved with good intentions, mate.

[Phil D. Rolls]

Agree wholeheartedly, maybe I expressed myself poorly in my post. What is so particularly frightening was that the perpetrators - for the most part - were normal citizens - and I guess that's even more scary than thinking of them as monsters.


DODDIE

"But there IS a place where perpetrators and victims may be said to be not on the same moral level, but in the same room? Victims and perpetrators were all members of the human race."

You're right, I don't get it. Sorry! So there's me and Adolf in the same room, we're both human beings and ...? Maybe you want me to share his shame, his pain, his evilness? No - why?

BTW: I do not accept the implication in Browning's book whereby "most people placed into a group and given the choice between killing and belonging to the group or not killing and not belonging, will choose the former."

Before the massacres of civilians, soldier were usually given the chance to opt out, very few did. There was also an experiment in the sixties that showed 7 out of 10 people would have no compunction at killing a total stranger if they could do it safely.

Carl Rogers reckoned the human is a benign organism, on the whole I agree with him, but deep in us there is this malevolent streak. I think it is in most people.

[Future17]

Surely there are universally applicable truths regarding what is right and wrong behavior?



I would agree that there is, but knowing what is right and doing what is right are unfortunately not always the same thing.

As Doddie said (i'm para-phrasing), there are circumstances where we would be forced into a choice which could be the hard choice (but the "right" thing to do) or the easier choice (but morally wrong).

I'm sure those of us who would make the easier choice would find some way of justifying it to ourselves.

[--------]

It's been mentioned on another thread, but Michael Portillo's Horizon program this week demonstrates one aspect of what I'm getting at.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00kk4bz/Horizon_How_Violent_Are_You/

The last 15 minutes (the re-creation of the electric shock/obedience to authority experiment from the 1960's is truly terrifying. 9 out of 12 people will contimue to give increasingly severe and painful electric shocks to another volunteer - even with the knowledge that the shocks they are being told to administer are potentially lethal - even when the 'victim' is demanding to be released and registering severe pain.

One girl (a biology student 19 years old) actually asked the 'professor' "Have we killed him?" One guy actually said he carried on because the 'professor' assured him that the demands of the experiment justified doing so. "I was only obeying orders...."

Brian, the Scot who said "No", is a man I'd like to meet.

I think the lesson is that there will usually be someone who finds it in himself or herself to refuse, but the majority of us conform