Suppose that the Nazi government found that the Jews living within German-held territory opposed the Nazi war effort, and were doing everything they possibly could to thwart it. Would you feel the Nazi government had a legal right to exterminate this Jewish population every bit as vigorously as the Allies were working to exterminate the German people?
War between nations and quelling insurgencies are not really analogous, thus the question isn’t correct.
Let just say, I don’t believe in “universal human rights.” I know that’s not popular these days. But I really don’t see any basis for their existence other than aspiration, i.e. they are “good” so they must be. People at best have only natural rights, which are secured and augmented by government. If you live in the state of nature and someone kills you, well too bad. If you live in society governed by law then you are protected by the criminal law. If one segment of society, say the Jews, start blowing up your railroads or whatever, then they would be prosecuted as criminals. I guess your criminal law could be as harsh as you want. I suppose that’s a matter of taste. But that really isn’t relative to two nations at war.
If you don’t feel that such an act would have been legal, then please explain why the Allies were allowed to target and exterminate civilians, and why the Axis wasn’t allowed to do so.
Ok, I think this is where the confusion lies. War and law can only exist in the absence of the other. One negates the other. The reason is axiomatic and self-evident. If someone attempts to dominate you by force, no law, by itself, is going to help you, especially if the attacker doesn’t care. Once war is unleashed winning is all that matters. Sure, I guess you can try to stipulate that you won’t do X destructive thing if your enemy doesn’t etc. But that is also unenforceable. There was no real reason why Germany couldn’t have used poison gas in WWII. The Germans just thought better of it, and I guess took the chance others wouldn’t do it, which paid off in the end. But there is no reason they couldn’t have.
As for bombing, I am not condemning anyone for it, Axis or Allies.
As for the atomic bombing of Japan: the Japanese government had agreed to a conditional surrender months before the bomb was dropped. The bomb was not necessary for the U.S. to win the war–we’d done that already. The only reason the bomb was “necessary” was because “unconditional surrender” made better propaganda than the phrase “we let them surrender with some dignity.”
Yes, I am aware of that history. I had to write an essay on it in High School about if the A-bombs were justified in light of Japanese peace feelers. Again, who cares?! If I am in a total war situation with a deadly opponent, and they start saying TO OTHER PEOPLE, “maybe I’ll surrender if blah blah blah” – why should I do anything but continue to blow them away? The allied terms were set. The Japanese did not accept them. EVEN AFTER TAKING 1 A BOMB. It took 2.
In the postwar era, a Japanese court correctly found that the atomic bombings had been illegal, because conditions 2) and 3) had not been met.
Who cares.
Treaties are NOT laws, no matter how hard you pound the table. The only real penalty for breaking a treaty is war. So you’re back to bombing civilians in the name of stopping the bombing of civilians.
I mean, it’s a little ridiculous. The Allies bomb the hell out the Axis, then turn around AFTER the war and start saying oh, that was bad, but then adopt as THE cornerstone of national defense policy to totally annihilate their enemies with nuclear bombs, building thousands…
It just goes to show you that all this hysteria about “BOMBING CIVILIANS” is just frankly silly. Yes, it is mean, and it shouldn’t happen in a nice world. But when the going gets tough, the bombs got to fall. Sorry.
Have a nice day : :-D