John Demjanjuk, alleged Nazi death camp guard, goes on trial in Germany

[grandpa]

My response in distinguishing justice and revenge had to do
with this quote from the person above me: "If the
surviving relatives of any of the men women and children
murdered at the nazi death camp are able to derive
just one crumb of comfort from seeing this monster punished,
albeit belatedly, who has the right to deny them that
small victory?"
Their reason for putting this man on trial is merely
for revenge, which is not what a court of law
should up hold.

All kinds of questions emerge in cases like this, such as: Were they orders that he himself issued? Will a trial and punishment solve anything? Does the offender have the right to live (regarding the death penalty, which was applied to other Nazi offenders)?

Before I start backing my position, I'd like to hear more thoughts on these questions.

Grandpa h.

[Chris the Chees]

The holocaust, (and all who perpetrated it), stands out as one of the greatest crimes against humanity ever perpetrated in the entire history of the human race, and we owe it to the victims to persecute every last person who collaborated in it.

But where do you draw the line? Daniel Goldhagen formed the thesis that the entire German people, or vast portions of it, were aware of the holocaust and through their inaction became Hitler's Willing Executioners (which is the title of his book). As it happens I disagree with his thesis, for reasons not really worth going into, but his work does succeed in massively extending the net, so to speak. Then you are faced with the issue of responcibility. Is an indoctrinated soldier, who faces the prospect potentially of death, if he refuses to carry out his orders, guilty of the crime or is it the individual who gave the orders?

[kancer kid]

Nice questions grandpa.

Were they orders that he himself issued?

I doubt this guy actually issued any orders. According to the article :

"Demjanjuk served as a guard for the SS. He is the lowest-ranking Nazi officer to ever face trial."

Will a trial and punishment solve anything?

Probably not. The guy is terminally ill and will probably die soon anyway. Really, what is putting him in prison going to do? If he remorseful for what he did, he will have had to live with that his entire life, a pain few can probably comprehend. If he does not care, well maybe he should be put away from the rest of society. This of course all assumes he actually did it, which has not been proven.

Busch also said that Demjanjuk, who was deported to Germany from the US after living and working as an autoworker in the Cleveland area for over 50 years, was "on the same level" as Holocaust victims because he was forced to work in the camp – an assertion that angered survivors who were present in the courtroom.

Does the offender have the right to live (regarding the death penalty, which was applied to other Nazi offenders)?

If he did it, probably not. Yet, he is terminally ill and suffers through pain the entire trial. If these cases were really trying to set a precedent, trying to show the world what will happen if you commit genocide, well, they aren't working. Genocides have happen since with few repercussions in the end.

[GeminiBrian]

But where do you draw the line?

Maybe there is a reasonable place to draw the line, as when individual murderers in the death camps went out of their way to be sadistic in his or her brutality, as did, say, Mengele - and by all accounts, Demjanjuk was outstanding in this regard. He was notorious for his cruelty. Let them be symbols for all the others of their kind who escaped prosecution and went on to live long lives. Tokenism, if you like - but perfectly justifiable in the broader historical context, I would argue.

Then you are faced with the issue of responcibility. Is an indoctrinated soldier, who faces the prospect potentially of death, if he refuses to carry out his orders, guilty of the crime or is it the individual who gave the orders?

That's a more tricky question, given that experiments have since shown that some people (if not most) are "programmed" to obey orders from perceived 'Authority Figures' - even when it runs counter to their normal ethical instincts.

However, as I pointed out above, when someone who can be demonstrated to have gone way beyond the line required of them (as did Demjanjuk) even by the most brutal authority, it would be a mistake not to single them out for symbolic punishment - if only to slightly appease the surviving victims.

[kancer kid]

Maybe there is a reasonable place to draw the line, as when individual murderers in the death camps went out of their way to be sadistic in his or her brutality, as did, say, Mengele - and by all accounts, Demjanjuk was outstanding in this regard. He was notorious for his cruelty. Let them be symbols for all the others of their kind who escaped prosecution and went on to live long lives. Tokenism, if you like - but perfectly justifiable in the broader historical context, I would argue.



That's a more tricky question, given that experiments have since shown that some people (if not most) are "programmed" to obey orders from perceived 'Authority Figures' - even when it runs counter to their normal ethical instincts.

However, as I pointed out above, when someone who can be demonstrated to have gone way beyond the line required of them (as did Demjanjuk) even by the most brutal authority, it would be a mistake not to single them out for symbolic punishment - if only to slightly appease the surviving victims.

What sources say Demjanjuk went way beyond the line or was brutal?

[1uk45z]

The trial isn't to imprison Demjanjuk and prevent him from doing more harm. Punishing him merely says to the world that "justice" is just retribution. So who benefits?
My impression is that fighting Nazism -- widely perceived as the greatest of all evils -- assuages western guilt about modern wars it's involved in. The moral confusion over Afghanistan, for example, throws our position into doubt. It's nice to re-assure ourselves that we are the good guys: after all, we're fighting the worst evil ever... Nazism! Well done us!
I think that's what it's really about.
Demjanjuk Nazi War Crimes Trial « 1uk45z

[Nono]

I'm struck by the underlying assumption in this thread that D is guilty as charged.
How many times has this guy already been in the dock? There have always been considerable holes in the prosecution's case.

If someone is a genuine war criminal, I agree that he's never too old to stand trial. But this is beginning to look like a bit like persecution.

[Ender]

Does the time that has passed absolve him of his crimes? Of course any soldier Japanese or American who committed atrocities should be prosecuted. Their situation however has nothing to do with this one. We know this man, if the charges are accurate, forced Jews into chambers where they were subsequently gassed to death.

I spoke with a WWII veteran a couple of years ago for a group cataloguing their experiences. He was present during the Malmedy Massacre. With vividness, he described the execution of his fellow soldiers and the fear he would be discovered as he played dead, while other men were shot as they moaned in agony. No one was executed for the crimes and most (if not all) were released from their life sentences. I can assure you this has haunted him to this day.

Just because genocide, murder, rape, and other hideous crimes happen a few decades ago, does not absolve the perpetrator in any way.

[kancer kid]

I'm struck by the underlying assumption in this thread that D is guilty as charged.
How many times has this guy already been in the dock? There have always been considerable holes in the prosecution's case.

If someone is a genuine war criminal, I agree that he's never too old to stand trial. But this is beginning to look like a bit like persecution.

Well, when the guy is practically dying during the trial, what does anyone get from it?

[kancer kid]

This Nazi trial is a mockery of justice

The proceedings, currently suspended because the defendant has a high temperature, are a show trial in which the prosecution and the defence are playing to the gallery. Both are carrying on as if the trial of Demjanjuk is the final act of the second world war and the ultimate reckoning with Nazi crimes, a fallacy that was trenchantly exposed by Antony Lerman in these columns on Thursday.

In one sense, this will be the last major Nazi era trial. It is nothing to boast about, though. The Central Office for the Prosecution of Nazi Crimes, based in Ludwigsberg, seized the chance to try Demjanjuk partly because the case would keep it in business now there are few German Nazis left to investigate. It planned a spectacular trial that would vindicate its otherwise lacklustre record.

[...]

Ulrich Busch, Demjanjuk's lawyer, has thrown a discomfiting spotlight on this warped thinking. He has forcefully contrasted the assiduousness with which the case has been pressed against his client to the half-hearted prosecution of Germans accused of worse wartime crimes. Quite rightly he has asked: why the double standard?

[...]

The prosecution team is playing games, too. They have lined up more than 30 "co-plaintiffs", relatives of the 29,000 Dutch Jews murdered in Sobibor while Demjanjuk was allegedly serving there. None is a direct witness to what Demjanjuk did or did not do. Even Toivi Blatt, one of the last survivors of the Sobibor uprising, cannot identify Demjanjuk personally.

[...]

In any case, if he is found guilty it will be impossible for the Munich court to convict him of more than being an accessory, a crime that carries a moderate custodial sentence. If the judge follows precedent and takes into account the time Demjanjuk has already spent in prison, it will be hard to sentence him to a prison term of more than two or three years. For a man accused of participating in the murder of 29,000 people such an outcome will make a mockery of the proceedings.

It looks like the guy is being put on trial for bad reasons and the sentence he is likely to receive, if even found guilty, will be practically nothing of what he would deserve.

[Shakk]

I can understand why there prosecuting the guy. But what real point will it serve that guy is not going to survive much longer. There is no point in sending him to a jail he probably lives in assisted care by now. I mean yes he did a bad thing many years ago and yes he should have to be punished but honestly there isn't much you can do to him now. I mean he won't live much longer so its not like your taking any sort of life away from him. Plus it says he was Soviet whose to say they didnt blackmail him to get him to do what he did. Who knows if they said they would hurt his family or do something else.

[grandpa]

I can understand why there prosecuting the guy.
But what real point will it serve that guy is
not going to survive much longer.

He was apparently very low in rank, and, as much as I hate to say it, I understand that eye witnesses are unreliable, or can be. I agree we should NOT let this issue die, but a question is: If we're going to hold every low-ranking person accountable, is it a huge leap to start holding old Germans in general accountable? Arguably a great number of the German population acquiesced to the Nazi cause and, although it's nice to think everyone could be equally accountable, are we to have trials until the ends of time for every bit of evil people have been part of somehow?

Grandpa h.