War crime? Or very hard decision?

O.P. · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 1:40 am

My buddy just gave me a book, "Blood and Bushido", it is about Japanese atrocities at sea. I have not read it yet, but he said it had stuff about submarine sailors shooting survivors of sinkings.

He told me about the book, and talked about the some of the bad stuff the book mentioned.

I differed with him. I said Allied forces shot people in the water every chance they got. I have seen newsreels of B-25's and, I think they were Beufighter's, shooting people in the water, and the news reel guy exclaiming "Great Shot".

I have also read of an instance where a US sub commander surfaced his boat, ordered everyone topside, and told them to shoot everyone in the water. It turned out to be over a thousand japanese soldiers from transports previously sunk. There was pictures of it in the book. Everybody standing topside shooting at dudes hanging on to floating stuff.

There was also the instance of a U Boat CO who order the shooting of a crew in the english channel, or near abouts, to keep from being counterdetected. He was hung after the war.

I have also seen one of America's greatest aces, Hero, say, on TV, that he deliberately killed a man jumping out of his airplane, and his reasoning was, "He was just too good, he would probably kill a less experienced pilot"

I personally do not have a problem with any of this. If I was the US commander, I would have shot all of them so some marine would not have to duck their bullets. If was was the U Boat commander, I would have shot them so they would not give away my position, If I was the pilot, I would have done it too.

I am not sure why I am writing this. I think my friend, who is lifetime military, thought I might be nuts. Or a potential war criminal.

I served on Boats, and nobody in the water is worth not bringing the boat back. I served in the Infantry, and no village is worth not bringing the company back.

I guess I didn't realize that this thinking was not standard, or criminal, now, I guess.

I'll go ahead and read the book........

Curtis Block · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 2:08 am

War Sucks.

Mgawa · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 3:36 am

Matter of view. US pilot regularly killed Me262 on parachute and that was against any war rule. German pilot do the same against Yugoslav pilot in war.

Also it depend on the politics. When some strong country send it force to small country this is threated as "defending of democracy". When people of small country try to fight foreigner forces they are threaten as " war criminals, violating of democracy... terrorist...".

Terror are in air, on water, on land. In some cases this is state of mind but as I state above also politics.

tom d. friedman · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 8:36 am

i've read numerous accounts of japanese atrocities during ww 2 ......... ghastly & barbaric, on the other side of the coin allied troops cutting off ears from the enemy & prying gold fillings from wounded troops mouths. there is a human element in warfare that has been defiled since the practice of war began, i guess those that practiced that element were no better than what they were trying to stamp out in their own visionary philosophy.

k5083 · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 8:54 am

In one of Edwards Park's articles he recalled that in his theatre, USAAF fighter pilots were under specific orders to shoot Japanese pilots under their parachutes. The one time he had the opportunity, he couldn't bring himself to do it.

This could only shock or upset somebody with a very naive, romantic, Hollywood view of war. War is thugs killing each other. Letting guys live who could possibly fight again doesn't make a lot of sense.

August

mustangdriver · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 9:21 am

"When we were fighting the japanese, we did not feel like we were fighting a war, but more that we were exterminating rodents."- WWII vet that I talked to in the NMUSAF. I think if you compare the war crimes committed by the U.S. in WWII and the ones done by the Japanese, we will come out looking like boyscouts.

mustangdriver · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 9:38 am

Also when it comes to shooting a guy in his shoot most guys in the ETO would not do it. But there are times they would. Bud Anderson tod me during an interview, that he and his wing man saw a German pilot that was shooting bomber crews in their parachutes. He said "we got on his tail and chipped away at him until he finally bailed out. When he did, we shot him in his chute."

Bill Greenwood · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 10:58 am

I believe there are provisons in the Geneva Convention which most civilized nations agree to, that shooting soldiers who have surendered is a war crime. One can get into grey areas; were the Japanese in the water still combatants, how about the pilots under chutes? Col. Lindberg wrote about some of the horrors he saw in the Pacific where U S forces shot prisoners. War, all too often brings out the worst in people. I think I might be able to execute Nazi death camp officers or N Vietnamese prison camp ones. I'd rather do it after a public trial than just shooting them in the field. Policy and leadership have to be set at the top, we should have higher standards than the Japanese did. Some of the blackest stains on US honor were the murder of women and children at My Lai and other places, and the shooting of unarmed college students at Kent State and Jackson State under Nixon. It was not just that these things were done, but even worse that Nixon, the govt and the Army tried to cover up the truth of it. If not for reporters with photographs we might not have the real version. Seymour Hersh won a Pulitzer prize for his report on My Lai.

Jack Frost · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 2:19 pm

<If not for reporters with photographs we might not have the real version. Seymour Hersh won a Pulitzer prize for his report on My Lai.>

But these days many folks say "You can't believe that damned biased media"......or can you?

wendovertom · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 3:09 pm

Nothing about war is designed to bring out the best in people.

One way I look at it is, would I prefer to die a protracted death in the water or catch a quick death by bullet?

Like I said, I fail to see where war is designed to bring out the good, beautiful and well mannered.

Tom P.

O.P. · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 4:18 pm

I think Mai Li is a textbook example of the change in warfare since WW2.

You walk by a place for days on end and they shoot at you. Whats wrong with this picture?

Those guys should not have went in there, they should have shelled it for 12 hours straight then sent an arclight on it. Next time VC boy comes to town, the three residents left that walk without a limp report it.

Somebody tell me when it started that war wasn't supposed to hurt people? Soldiers, Armies, ect, cannot operate without local/national support. It takes everyone to make war. Even if it is just keeping your mouth shut, you are complicit, and that, in my book, makes you a potential combatant. If you don't say anything, then don't complain when a TOW comes through the side of your apartment building trying to hit your bonehead neighbors cousin who got "Jihad Fever" last week, and burns the place to the ground.

In my opinion, the worst thing that could have happened to modern history, is precision weapons. It makes folks think this krap is clean. It's not, all it is doing is prolonging the inevitable, and killing a lot more folks, and prolonging suffering, over decades, instead of finishing it permanently in a short period of time.

Ask around, who got the better deal, the Germans and the Japanese, Or the Koreans and Vietnamese, and now, the Iraqis and the whole middle east?

If killing folks to get your way is what you think you gotta do, you better get with the freakin program, otherwise, you are making it a million times worse, on the entire world.

Sorry about that, Mai Li talk always spins me up, rant off.

Oscar Duck · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 4:48 pm

What about Kent State?

oscardeuce · **Joined:** Wed Jul 27, 2005 3:34 am **Posts:** 1021

Kent State?

Setting someone up to fail. No mater the outcome the ONG soldiers were hosed from the beginning.

War sucks, but losing a war sucks more.

I can see the Ace's point killing one to save others. The same rationalization used in dropping the bomb.

O.P. · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 5:13 pm

Kent State? Are you kidding?

What kidda weed you gotta be smoking to taunt and threaten an 18 yo boy with a loaded loaded rifle from east BF farm town?

Evidently, some pretty good weed.

Also, I guess it's OK if you disagree with someone, or everyone for that matter, to occupy buildings, destroy property, make threats, until you get your way. So much for peaceful demonstration.......heheeee

I disagree. If stuff like that was allowed to happen everytime a disagreement happened, well, I guess we would live in Somalia, and I'll tell you what, there ain't no hippies in Somalia, the guys with the rifles and no lawful control, got rid of those pukes on day 1.

Bill Greenwood · **Posted:** Tue Oct 30, 2007 5:26 pm

OP, if I understand your writing, you are saying the murder of civilians (it wasn't "VC boys") at My Lai was ok in response to combat losses there previously. A couple of problems; first "VC boy" did not come over here a la (9-11), nor attack us as Japanese did at Pearl Harbor. We invaded his country and they fought back. Also it was mostly women holding infants and a few old men that our soldiers shot at My Lai. There were no combat VC killed there. If this is ok, then maybe you agree with Muslin terrorists who believe it is justified to plant bombs on school buses since they have had losses from our soldiers or our Israeli allies. Are there no limits on what a "civilized nation" ? does in a war? And from a practical or tactical sense, can you think of any better recruitment for our enemies than atrocites by our troops?

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War crime? Or very hard decision?

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