Is it a war crime?

[GlowwormGuy]

Originally Posted by Beery

That's always the case. It's clear that war crimes were committed on both sides, as is often the case. The victor always decides two things - the difference between criminal acts and necessary evils, and the difference between traitors and patriots. Justice is rarely fair to both sides after a conflict. If Britain had won the American War of Independence, George Washington would probably have been hanged as a traitor, and Benedict Arnold may have been hailed as a hero.

Well... if he hadn't been so 'shabbily treated' - considering he was the one who really won the battle of Saratoga instead of that idiot Gates - we'd probably be sailing U.S.S. Benedict Arnold SSNs today.

However that's true - even in wartime. When SBD pilot Fleming crashes his plane into the turret of the cruiser MIKUMA it's heroism worthy of a Medal of Honor. When it's a Japanese pilot crashing his plane into an American carrier its barbaric fanaticism. When its London and Coventry it's savagery, when it's Dresden or Nurenburg - or Tokyo - it's winning the war.

War brings out the evil angels within all of us nuff said.

[GlowwormGuy]

Originally Posted by scandium

... Laconia incident being the most famous, where an American bomber was ordered to attack and sink a Uboat that was undertaking the rescue attempt of several hundred Italian and British survivors despite the U-boats prior repeated broadcasts, in english, to that effect and the large red cross flag draped across the bow of his ship). The Americans considered destroying the U-boat, despite the unavoidable killing of their British allies who were aboard in the process an operationa necessityl and one for which there were no later ramifications.

I'm willing to bet we'll never see a movie of the Laconia incident - or maybe they will make the bomber attacking the sub British for good measure.

Seriously though, the skipper was a bit out of line even if it was an operational necessity. Machine-gunning survivors in a raft or on wreckage isn't kosher.

Then again, this was routinely done by American fighters and bombers after sinking Japanese ships - the Yamato being a case in point. Of course, those guys went home to steak and a heroes welcome.

One of the worst I think is the trial of Tomoyuki Yama****a, Tiger of Malaya and Masaharu Homma, the Anglophilic commander of the Japanese 14th Army. Their official crime - Yama****a, command responsibility for the massacres in Manila 1945 and Homma, ordering the notorious Death March (by the way there were 'death marches' at other times in history such as after the surrender of Kut Al Amarah in WW1 but this was the most famous.) Their real crime: humiliating the American Caesar Douglas MacArthur. Homma beat his army in 1942 and Yama****a held out in the mountains with his army till Japan surrendered and he had to follow suit. Both were hanged by the neck till dead. The ironic thing is Homma was 1) an Anglophile who was Japanese military attache on the Western Front in WW1 2) hamstrung by a tunnel visioned Japanese Imperial General Staff who demanded he capture Manila while destroying the American field army - you gotta choose one or the other 3) never ordered the prisoners maltreated and the many unfortunate incidents were a product mainly of the then prevailing Japanese military culture of brutality, individual decisions by officers and men on the spot and the fanaticism of ideologue Col.Tsuji. As for Yama****a he actually ordered the fanatical Japanese admiral who was planning to defend Manila to the death to withdraw as he was unsupported but because of the separation of Japanese Army and Navy he was ignored.

While the Japanese army did horrific things in the war this was more mean-spirited revenge than justice of any sort.

Mountbatten

[jasondef]

Talk about a can of worms

[dbf574]

I don't know about you but I have found (accidentally) that if you are close enough, they will fire upon you. This includes so-called fishing boats too. I use IUB 1.02 (switching to IUB 1.03). I was normally trying to avoid these so that my posit would not be reported and at one point I got tired of 'running away' from these little guys and decided to take out a fishing boat with my deck gun before it had a chance to report my presence . As I closed on him I was shocked to find this supposedly harmless craft actually taking shots at me . This also had happened to me while running on the surface, in daylight, in heavy fog when I get the word that we are under attack and I run up to the bridge to discover a fishing boat less than 370 m actually taking pot shots at me from what appeared to be a heavy gun and I was not able to fire back because 'we' are not able to use the deck or flak gun in heavy fog (they are disabled in heavy fog). I escaped, but that just ain't right !
So, if you ask me, if they shoot at me then they are HISTORY...