World War II War Crimes

The purposeful bombing of civilians as a wartime strategy has oftentimes been used to bring about the end of a war, but controversy has sparked up about the ethicality of this practice because of its mass destruction of human lives. This tactic goes against human nature’s aversion to intentionally cause harm without a reasonable basis. Is the bombing of innocent people justified if it ultimately brings an end to the war? This ethical question arises when considering the issue of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II.

World War II began in 1939 and ended in 1945. This war killed more people and destroyed more property than any other war with fifty-nine countries being involved in(2). Pearl Harbor, the first sneak attack by another country on US soil was a pivotal beginning to the war for the United States. There were many reasons for the United States to get involved into the war and help its allies, but it was Pearl Harbor which forced us into it. Because of Pearl Harbor, Hitler and the crimes against humanity that he committed it justified United States entry into the war.

-Firebombs set fire to and burned to death 100,000 Japanese civilian children and women in Tokyo. (The Fog of War 34 minutes)

Picture that you are waking up and preparing for your daily routines as you do every other day. As you are going about your routines, you hear air raid sirens sounding off. Next thing you know, a bomb has been dropped; BOOM! Suddenly, a massive explosion occurs, buildings are on fire, big mushroom clouds arise, purple-gray smoke, and individuals being vaporized by the heat intensity of the bomb. Imagine, searching for your loved ones and only being able to find sandals or other personal items, but no body. People are panicking and the city is chaotic due to individuals looking for loved ones, medical assistance, or trying to escape the “fire storms that engulfed many residential areas” (Lemay and Paul). Imagine, everything that you have ever known is gone. Some witnesses stated, “The feeling that I had was that everyone was dead. The whole city was destroyed. I thought this was the end of Hiroshima of Japan of human kind. This was God’s judgement on man” (Lemay and Paul). Therefore, I am against the bombing of Hiroshima. The bombing took the lives of many innocent people, created long-term effects for those who witnessed and survived the bombing,

The bombs should not have been dropped because the lives of so many civilians were

This policy changed however when in August 1940 Luftwaffe night-bombers accidentally dropped bombs across London, pushing Churchill to order a retaliatory raid against Berlin. This enraged Hitler and made him order his men to start intense raids on London and around it. These acts of attacking civilian positions by both sides while not specifically in the Geneva Convention at the time, is considered a war crime today with article 51-54 of Protocol I added in 1977 declaring that “directly attacking civilian targets and also using technology such as biological weapons, nuclear weapons and landmines, whose scope of destruction cannot be limited.” is a war crime. Because of these war crimes committed by the allies they did not include the “bombing of London, Warsaw and Rotterdam as a war crime” in the Nuremberg trials against the Nazis. This act of not prosicuting the Nazi’s for their bombings of allied cities in their war crime trials due to the allies committing the same acts on Axis cities shows us how the Allies did infact commit war crimes by directly bombing innocent german civilians in their raids of german

World War II was the most destructive and deadliest war in history. There were about eleven million people killed just in the holocaust. World War II started on September 1st, 1939 after Germany invaded Poland. Three days later Britain and France declared war on Germany, at the time the U.S. was neutral. Through 1941, germany controlled most of Europe and was a very big threat.

World War II started on the first day of September in 1939. The ending of World War I is thought to have greatly contributed to the upcoming of the second world war. Adolf Hitler, a German politician, is the man that promoted most of the deaths and destruction that the war had to offer. Despite how complicated the war was, the fighting was split into two general groups, the Axis and Allied Powers. The Allied Powers consisted of the United States, Britain, France, and many other countries. Germany, Italy, Japan, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria made up the Axis Powers. Despite not having as many nations join them in battle, the Axis Powers did a great damage to the world's population. Hitler was the

World War Two was one of the major influential events of the twentieth century, with nearly thirty nine million deaths in Europe alone. Huge amounts of capital were destroyed as well as going through six years of constant ground battles. Many Citizens were forced to leave or give up their owned property without compensation and they had to move on to new lands. Hunger periods become more and more common even Western Europe. Many families were separated for long periods of time especially from the male figure. Several people and children would personally witness the catastrophic events and bombing that took place in the areas where they lived. Huge crimes against the word were committed. Due to World War Two political and economics system in a lot countries would be altered eternally.

World War II in Europe began on September 3rd, 1939, when the Prime Minister of Britain, Neville Chamberlain, declared war on Germany. Thanks to the Allied and Axis powers systems, many of the world’s countries were involved in this massive war. Germany’s unprovoked attack on Poland was the start of World War II. The war was six years long, resulted in over 60 million deaths, and involved Germany, Italy and Japan on the side of the

Roughly a year into World War Two, German bombers flew over the streets of London where they began dropping highly explosive bombs in a series of aerial raids. The bombs were being released by the Axis Powers above residential areas in an attempt to create mass hysteria in the city. For fifty-seven straight days, bombs were raining over London, killing citizens and destroying homes. During this time, Londoners attempted to live their normal lives while frequently taking refuge in one of the many underground bomb shelters. Sebastian Junger looks further into the specific psychological effects the London Blitz had on the Londoners in his book Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging. Junger claims that the goal of the bombings, which was to cause further

World War II is considered a war of ethics, and oppression against liberty. The Nazis murdered 20,946,000. In addition, the Japanese killed 5,964,000. The Allies, however, were even worse. The U.S.S.R. killed 42,672,000 citizens; China killed 10,214,000. Finally, Britain was responsible for the deaths of 816,000 in the 20th century near the end of its conquests. British area bombing missions were specifically calculated to destroy as many homes as possible. Both sides were mass murderers.

The conflict between the Allies and the Axis was a horrific and deadly one, which consisted of genocide and mass bombings. Innocent citizens were killed with the estimated sixty million casualties, which lead to the question as to the morality of the different actors—Germany, Japan, England and America— in WWII. In order to truly assess their guilt, meaning their moral innocence, each country will be measured upon the morality of their intent and execution of the different controversial mass killings that Germany (the Holocaust), Japan (Nanking), and the Allied forces (Dresden and Hiroshima) took part in. This hierarchy of evil can be judged upon how Japan’s tyranny and the Allies’ area bombing compare to the genocide performed by Germany. Similarly, these countries will be judged on the whether these different acts were premeditated versus in response to another act, as well as the proportionality to which these acts were carried out. This measurement of evil places each party on an overall scale, which depicts the total guilt that each country or countries deserve. WWII exemplifies that while war is an unavoidable aspect of human nature, there is no such thing as a just war. Similarly, while there is a definite hierarchy of morality between the different actors of WWII, each of the countries at play are immoral in their intent and execution of the attacks on opposing countries.

In the mid-1930s, new Chancellor, Adolf Hitler, began militarily expanding, remilitarizing Germany and it’s territories, violating the Treaty of Versailles. Eventually declaring war and violating all treaties with neighboring countries, engaging in a three front war, from the north, east and west, between the Axis Powers and the Allies. The Axis Powers consisted of Germany, Italy and Japan, while the Allies consisted of the United States, France, Britain, Russia and more. Notably, throughout the war, and in light of Hitler’s Arian beliefs, millions of Jews and other civilians were brutally worked, starved and exterminated, resulting in the approximate death of 11 million undesirables. And by 1945, with German cities in ruins, millions murdered

The atomic bombing of Japan was an unjustified decision that many considered was inhumane. Through the use of atomic bombs, many innocents were harmed in one way or another. Berger described the atomic bombing of Hiroshima as "a terrorist act" and that it was "evil". While Berger 's argument was extreme, the U.S. still remains unjustified because they did not know exactly how much damage the bomb would actually cause. Bombing Japan, the U.S. harmed thousands of civilians and displayed the effectiveness of the atomic bomb despite having other options to end the war.