Nazis in Atlanta?

[Adebisi]

[ QUOTE ]
So, training attack dogs to kill Jews and other civilians fleeing forced labor, torture, etc., is a good thing?

[/ QUOTE ]

That's a bs argument. Regardless of politics, ideology, morality or anything else, any group of people that attempts to imprison another group of people is probably going to have trained guard dogs. Training dogs to go after escaping prisoners is not a war crime and is completely standard behavior. If you are going to punish this guy, you might as well punish the military cooks, munitions transporters, and communications officers.

[Richard Tanner]

[ QUOTE ]
It sounds like this guy neither has the ability or the inclination to be a threat to anyone anymore. If he had committed the crime more recently, or the extent of his crimes could be proven, or he wasn't so damned old at the moment, or if he wasn't so damned young at the time, I can understand having a different viewpoint. As it is, it's not like he was an officer or anything.

Everyone who feels so self-righteous about this should consider that the huge majority of people will act more brutally than this man and will do so with even less pressure. Consider the Milgram experiment for example
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment

[/ QUOTE ]

Dammit snowball, beat me to it. I bring the ME up all the time in other threads, my pony too slow here.

Yes the answer here is he "was just following orders". He was just a tiny cog in a large inhumaine machine. In that case you punish the men running the machine, not the cogs.

Cody

[DVaut1]

[ QUOTE ]
and the justice system should never be used to enforce moral views

[/ QUOTE ]

This is contradictory on its face; to concede a 'justice system' need exist at all implicitly concedes such things as "wrongs" occur and need to be redressed. But then there's the rub. The justice system -- the act of identifying a wrong, then agreeing (or forcing) some form of restitution or retribution, by nature, is "enforcing a moral view".

Even if very simple acts of 'justice' meted out are completely voluntarily -- for instance, I throw a baseball through my neighbors window, then willingly pay him $10 to replace it -- implicit in this entire transaction is that I was wrong to break the window and am obligated to replace it. Notice the bolded are decidedly moral observations. Even if that compulsion to fulfill my obligation comes not from a threat of violence, it's still patently 'moral' by most definitions of the word. I'm not sure how anyone, even ardent anarchists, can claim the justice system should not "enforce moral views." "Enforcing moral views" is the very purpose of the justice system.

Even if you don't think the justice system 'should' be enforced by a state with guns and prisons -- the very notion of a system which seeks to redress wrongs and harms is clearly engaged in a form of moral enforcement.

[madnak]

[ QUOTE ]
This is contradictory on its face; to concede a 'justice system' need exist at all implicitly concedes such things as "wrongs" occur and need to be redressed. But then there's the rub. The justice system, by nature, is "enforcing a moral view".

[/ QUOTE ]

The justice system is allowing people to function. If everyone is allowed to kill everyone else, the system quickly grinds to a halt. Without a justice system, mob rule and vigilantism become common, people become isolated, and nothing gets done. Thus a justice system is necessary in order for a society to function effectively. There's no need for morality to enter into it.

[DVaut1]

[ QUOTE ]
The justice system is allowing people to function. If everyone is allowed to kill everyone else, the system quickly grinds to a halt. Without a justice system, mob rule and vigilantism become common, people become isolated, and nothing gets done. Thus a justice system is necessary in order for a society to function effectively. There's no need for morality to enter into it.

[/ QUOTE ]

So -- the justice system should only seek redress from killers and rapists because things like murder and rape aren't practical, cause chaos in the 'system', and are detrimental to 'order'?

You're clearly in the very, very distinct minority if this is what you're claiming, so I highly doubt there are many who are going to concede the justice system "should not be engage in enforcing morality".

Even putting that aside, I would posit that claiming things like "the need to get things done" and "maintaining a functioning society" as justifications for the existence of a justice system are patently moral; implicit in the argument is some kind of utilitarian notion that "order" and "things getting done" is good, and chaos and disorder are bad, right?

[SNOWBALL]

[ QUOTE ]

"the huge majority of people will act more brutally than this man and will do so with even less pressure."

I'm not interested in what people would do, but rather what they actually do. A man who would murder in such-and-such situation cannot be punished for his psyche. A man who has committed a murder should be punished.


[/ QUOTE ]

Andy,

How many Americans would you feel comfortable extraditing to Vietnam?

[MidGe]

[ QUOTE ]
Andy,

How many Americans would you feel comfortable extraditing to Vietnam?

[/ QUOTE ]

I know I am not Andy, but I will answer nonetheless!

All those Americans that overstepped the bounds of decency whilst serving in Vietnam, and specially their superiors!

[Goater]

I just cant understand some of the arguaments in this post for not deporting this man.

Whether or not he is a danger to anyone now is not the issue, neither is whether he actually killed anyone. If he was of adult age whilst working there, he was a man and should be held responsible for his actions. This mans role facilitated the actions of the individuals directly involved in a long host of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including horrific medical experiments usually performed with no anaesthetic. Obviously, some people will bring up cooks and other auxiliary staff. However, guarding the camp is a much more direct role and especially as it involved dogs trained to kill (again, anyone who thinks that the dogs may have been trained to merely "catch" escaping prisoners obviously has no idea of how these camps were run, by whom or the utter and total lack of even the most basic concern for the lives of the prisoners).

Over 35,000 people died in this camp complex (10 miles from Munich). Anyone who seriously doubts that a guard at the camp would not have known what was occuring within is either plain stupid or deliberately downplaying the fact that a large number of people knew what was going on (maybe not exact details, but enough to know that horrific crimes were being perpetrated).

It is also clear that he lied to gain access to the USA and that this is enough to deport the man.

As to why regular guards were not tried, that depended on evidence of individual crimes. The reason they were not tried on mass is that the resources and time it would have taken to do this, whilst dealing with much more serious war criminals, would have made this nearly impossible.

DblBarrelJ - many of your points are simply ridiculous. You say

[ QUOTE ]
If he was marching people into gas chambers, get him out

[/ QUOTE ]

whats the difference? 35,000 people died in this camp - whether it was by gas or not is not relevant. I see no difference between the two jobs - a gas chamber orderly who was responsible for the lines of people entering could claim he thought they were showers couldnt he?

[ QUOTE ]
my gf is of Japanese heritage, her grandfather lives in this country, and he served Japan in WWII. I assume he should be deported too?

[/ QUOTE ]

This is beyond idiotic. This man was not a soldier involved in regular combat. He was on the staff of a camp in which the most horrific crimes were committed.

madnak - In my opinion, your posts contain more than a hint of apologism. "Just look at an American when the word 'terrorist' comes up, and you'll see exactly the disposition of the typical Nazi." I disagree with this point and am amazed more americans have not responded to this.

[ QUOTE ]
Even if this guy had killed people, the circumstances would be almost impossible for us to understand.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yep - we should just understand that he was in a tough spot and let him off.

[ QUOTE ]
Was he supposed to conclude based on seeing some emaciated people that he was working in a death factory?

[/ QUOTE ]

"Some"? It is inconceivable that he did not see very large numbers of the 40,000 people housed there. There would have been a huge amount of evidence of this if he was a guard. If wasnt like the guards who worked inside wouldnt have mentioned it - it wasnt a secret between them and anyway, he would almost certainly have been inside the camp itself. Again, to suggest that he had no idea what was going on is incredible.

[ QUOTE ]
Because he told a small lie on his immigration forms?

[/ QUOTE ]

In 1955, skipping the part where he was a guard at Dachau and a member of the SS was not a small lie. And it should be not considered one now.

PLOlover -

[ QUOTE ]
I mean if they used dogs to track or deter or whatever like they do here in the US that is one thing, but if they actually had the dogs kill people he should probably be tried even at this late date.

[/ QUOTE ]

Again, are you not familiar with how these camps were run? Have you ever read the testimony of someone who was there? Taking life was like smoking a cigarette. Torture, starvation, etc... daily. Medical experiments...? The Nazis did not train dogs to detain escapees so that they could return them to the camp.

dachau trials

This link is to page describing the trial of nazis and includes the issue of guards. Incidentally, the use of dogs is also mentioned in an accusation. One that has many examples in many concentration camps.

[ QUOTE ]
you can probably tell if he turned rotten by what he did with his life once he got to the US. I mean, if he became a prison guard then he should just like be summarily executed or something.

[/ QUOTE ]

so youre happy for him to be executed if he bacame a guard in the US upon arrival, but if he bacame a hairdresser, he shouldnt even be deported?

The man should be deported. Whether he should be tried for war crimes is another matter.

[Goater]

use of dogs at dachau

"David L. Israel was a soldier in the U.S. Army in 1945, assigned to an intelligence group which investigated the Dachau camp for war crimes after it was liberated. As part of his duties, Israel interviewed the survivors of Dachau.

The following quote is also from the book "The Day the Thunderbird Cried":

Egon Zill had his dogs trained to react to the raising of his arm. On special amusement days, Zill would have a table of food placed in front of the starving prisoners who stood at attention. Should a person relax his body, the dogs would react automatically. As time went by and Zill became impatient, he raised his arm signaling the dogs into action. They attacked the genital areas of the prisoners until they were dead. At this point the bored commandant would leave the scene."

Whilst this may not refer to the same type of guards, it certainly shows the attitude of some nazis to the use of dogs at Dachau. And who trained the dogs used in this example?

[RedBean]

[ QUOTE ]

All those Americans that overstepped the bounds of decency whilst serving in Vietnam, and specially their superiors!

[/ QUOTE ]

Would you consider training prison guard dogs as "overstepping the bounds of decency"?