WWII+Research+and+Symposium+WVQL

Facts:


 * The Nuremberg Trials stand out as a major achievement in the development of international humanitarian law.
 * The Nuremberg Trials established the principle of individual responsibility: A defendant could no longer claim that he was not a culpable of crimes because he was only following orders from a superior or a government.
 * The objective was to seek justice rather than to seek revenge.
 * The Nuremberg trials led to the creation of a large body of international law designed to prevent similar abuses from recurring and establish mechanisms to punish offenders.
 * Perhaps as much as 12 million people died during the holocaust.
 * At the trials, photographs that showed the horrendous brutality of the Nazis were shown and used to convict Nazi leaders.
 * In Auschwitz 2.5 million people were executed and another 500 thousand victims succumbed to either starvation or disease making the death toll around 3 million.
 * 4 out of five people survived the horrid atrocities happening in Auschwitz.
 * In the summer of 1944 around 400 thousand Hungarian Jews alone were massacred.
 * The United Nations have created international law so that the Holocaust can be prevented from happening again.

Primary Sources:

"I have been constantly associated with the administration of concentration camps since 1934, serving at Dachau until 1938; then as Adjutant in Sachsenhausen from 1938 to 1 May, 1940, when I was appointed Commandant of Auschwitz. l commanded Auschwitz until 1 December,1943, and estimate that at least 2,500,000 victims were executed and exterminated there by gassing and burning, and at least another half million succumbed to starvation and disease, making a total dead of about 3,000,000. This figure represents about 70% or 80% of all persons sent to Auschwitz as prisoners, the remainder having been selected and used for slave labor in the concentration camp industries. Included among the executed and burnt were approximately 20,000 Russian prisoners of war (previously screened out of Prisoner of War cages by the Gestapo) who were delivered at Auschwitz in Wehrmacht transports operated by regular Wehrmacht officers and men. The remainder of the total number of victims included about 100,000 German Jews, and great numbers of citizens (mostly Jewish) from Holland, France, Belgium, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Greece, or other countries. We executed about 400,000 Hungarian Jews alone at Auschwitz in the summer of 1944."

–This is a testimony of Rudolf Franz Ferdinand Hoess. In his testimony he stated that an estimated 2.5 million victims were executed and exterminated by either gassing or burning and another five hundred thousand people succumbed to starvation and or disease, making to total death toll in Auschwitz around 3 million. He even gave a percentage of people who ultimately died in Auschwitz hi happening to be up to 80 %; four out of five people who were sent to Auschwitz died. The also executed 20 thousand Russian prisoners of war which strictly went against all laws determining what a nation can or cannot do to a prisoner of war. In the summer of 1944 alone they executed 400 thousand Hungarian Jews alone in Auschwitz. Such staggering numbers discombobulated the minds of the people at the Nuremberg Trials.

“Unlike the Nuremberg Tribunal, which had associated genocide with war crimes, the United Nations declared that it was a crime whether committed in peace or war, and it established the principle that, even if genocide was perpetrated by a government within its own territory, it was not merely an internal matter but one of international concern. <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The Contracting Parties, Having considered the declaration made by the General Assembly of the United Nations in its resolution 96 (I) dated 11 December 1946 that genocide is a crime under international law, contrary to the spirit and aims of the United Nations and condemned by the civilized world; Recognizing that at all periods of history genocide has inflicted great losses on humanity; and Being convinced that, in order to liberate mankind from such an odious scourge, international co-operation is required; Hereby agree as hereinafter provided. <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; display: block; font-family: 'times new roman',times,serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">ARTICLE 1 <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The Contracting Parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish.” <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">–<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">This is an exert from the Treaty of Geneva. In this treaty it states that any genocide whether in times of war or in times of peace, occurred outside the a nation or within the nation is a crime under international law. This show us that the Nuremberg war trials were really meant to be used as guidelines for internationals law and not just to seek revenge on nations the Allies were once a war with. The have stated genocides punishable by law in other words they can be tried for the law they helped create. They recognize that all periods of history’s genocides have inflict great losses to humanity and to help prevent the Holocaust from repeating itself International has been established.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">–<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-size: 14px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">This is a picture portraying the horrendous brutality of the Nazis. When the Nuremberg trials took place after the war photographs such as this one that shows German civilians removing the dead malnourished bodies of the victims in the concentration camp Gusen. This pictured portrayed just some of the horrid atrocities that the Nazis took part during the war. The German civilians were used to seeing such a noxious sight, proving that these crimes against humanities took place almost everyday during the war.

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