Wrong in so many ways!

If only you had been alive to protest outside the Palace of Justice.

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Ordinarily I ignore it when people take their opinions and, without any justification, state those opinions as if they were “given facts.” However I think I’ll make an exception here due to the nature of the subject, and present a case in support of the Nuremberg Trials.

At the very heart of the matter is the issue of law and justice, and the moral obligation of the one to serve the other. A moral obligation that transcends the limits of any national tradition and culture. A moral obligation that is fundamental to human existence and cannot rightfully be usurped by any cultural legal code.

As an undergraduate I had the privilege of studying medieval history under Dr. Katherine Drew, a notable scholar of the Italian Renaissance. In the course of our studies we inevitably came to the subject of Joan of Arc. Some of the students had difficulty suppressing their feelings of outrage over Joan’s trial and execution. Dr. Drew obviously agreed with their sentiments. But with a smile on her lips she responded to this outpouring of anger by repeatedly saying, “It was a legal trial.”

Remembering all this much later, the answer to Dr. Drew’s response suddenly came to me. “Legal by whose law?” By the law of the English who committed the atrocity? What validity is there in that? If it was morally wrong, how could it be excused and justified by calling it “legal?”

(And as an aside let me say that I have great respect and admiration for the English and for their incalculable contributions to western civilization. But as with all people they too have their moments which do not show them in the best light. The Joan of Arc matter is one of them. Even Winston Churchill had trouble with it in his monumental History Of The English-Speaking Peoples.)

Although there have been many occasions when this moral principal ought to have been addressed, the one time when it was given actual legal status was during the Nuremberg trials. Proceedings conducted on the recognition that there are human rights which governments cannot disregard and deprive people of, and then claim their actions were acceptable and authorized by their “law.” And that those officials who commit such acts can rightfully be held accountable and judged by humanity.

Of course the Nuremberg trials were conducted in response to an extreme and horrendous case of governmental oppression, and that undoubtedly explains why such a reaction took place on this occasion and not at other times in human history. And the trials were made possible only by the fact that Germany was totally defeated and the victorious occupying powers had no restrictions on their ability to enforce their will.

But regardless of that, the moral principle endures. There were no extenuating circumstances for the horrors perpetrated by the German nation, and humanity had every moral right to judge and punish them for it.

The movie questions the legitimacy and usefulness of the Nuremberg trials. It also shows how they were manipulated for political reasons. Both Judge Heywood and Colonel Lawson are 'invited' to be easy on the Germans because in the post-war Col War world the USA will need Germany as an ally.

This world is a comedy to those that think, a tragedy to those that feel.

This film should not be so highly rated, as it praises what it portrays, an illegitimate court that serves a made up justice. If a film was made on the trial of Saddam Hussein's trial that praised it, it would never be seen.

Random One-liners
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HeTMeYzhG8k

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As the General says with unintentional irony "He doesn't understand. He just doesn't understand." It is amazing that you could see the movie, grasp the arguments made, and conclude that the decision was somehow wrong or the court unjustified. I can only assume you are being deliberately obtuse.


"I'll book you. I'll book you on something. I'll find something in the book to book you on."

I have always thought the Nuremburg Trials as a touchstone of justice. Atrocities, horrendous and massive, had been committed by the German State, in the name of the German State. Therefore, the German State abrogated its right to conduct the trials.

Who committed these atrocities? Did they have the right people who committed these atrocities? What is the approriate punishment? When the State takes possession of your body with accusation of a crime, and when the state intends to incarcerate that body or execute that body, the State had best have the right person for the right crime with substantial evidence/documentation that that person did the crime.

The Nuremburg tribunal established that an Atrocity, horrendous and massive, had been committed and Prosecutors did this with Nazi documentation and with filmed footage of the extent and nature of the atrocities. So that others cannot deny that these events occurred and to confirm the extent of these events. (Lord, deliver us from Holocaust Deniers.)And the punishment meted out was appropriate.

The question the film 'Judgment at Nuremburg' raises is the extent of knowledge about these events that the common citizen had. Leni Yahil in THE HOLOCAUST, asserts that people farmed or worked within close proximity of these camps, and could smell the camps from where they worked; hence, knowledge of these camps was more widespread than not.

Should a whole nation be indicted, individuals of that nation be indicted, for what was State Policy regarding extermination of the Jews? And the answer to that question is a resounding "YES!" The film may not go that far, but certainly that is not an illogical conclusion.

There is a general belief amonst scholars, that the vast majority of perpetrators were never tried. Only Nazi leaders were executed. There is a certain sadness knowing that people who supervised on a daily basis the killing of innocent people, were allowed to go home after the war and sleep in comfortable beds knowing that they had been involved in massive killing; and they were never to be tried in a court of law.