SamSpade
Well-Known Member
Yeah, well - *RUSSIAN*.
One article I read compared the Germans to the Mongols - who historically had no problem whatsoever massacring men, women and children by the tens of thousands.
It largely had to do with how the civilization evolved and the differing cultures. I don't think that's Eurocentric bias. I think you can HAVE a culture where slaughtering people isn't regarded as ultimately barbaric by the people - otherwise it wouldn't occur quite so much. I suppose if you live in a society where executions are public and commonplace, and people kill women and children often - you can be inured to it.
The German leaders had learned their own soldiers would balk at it if they had to personally kill the people. Generally, POWs tended to survive German prison camps - they were no picnic, but you went home alive.
My grandfather survived the Japanese death camps, where the survival rate was less than 40%. In many campaigns, the Japanese would round up whole villages and kill them all.
At the end of the war, those in charge of the death camps were burning the prisoners alive.
It amazes me to think that comparatively - the Nazis were more humane than the Japanese - at least as far as POWs were concerned. They had a concept where surrender was honored - the Japanese did not.
