mike0305 said:
Alte Schule said:
Unfortunately in war atrocities against non combatants will occur. Unless the persons committing such heinous crimes are caught in the act you will never know whom or what side is responsible.
I can get there are incidents of a few bad actors doing bad things to a small number of people in war. They should be prosecuted to the fullest extent.
This is in a totally different ball park.
I really don't like writing or talking about Viet Nam but it's the only military conflict in which I have personal knowledge. The technology available today does make it "a totally different ball park" but it's surely not unprecedented within the last 100 years but it's surely nothing the world has seen since the Bosnian war and probably Afghanistan and Iraq, The true number of Chines civilians killed by the Japanese Army will never be known but it's estimated over 15 million.
In 1968 American Soldiers killed over 500 unarmed civilians. This wasn't reported for over a year. The commander got off with a slap on the wrist. No I wasn't there but it still was being talked about when I arrived three years later.
"The My Lai massacre was one of the most horrific incidents of violence committed against unarmed civilians during the Vietnam War. A company of American soldiers brutally killed most of the people women, children and old men in the village of My Lai on March 16, 1968. More than 500 people were slaughtered in the My Lai massacre, including young girls and women who were raped and mutilated before being killed. U.S. Army officers covered up the carnage for a year before it was reported in the American press, sparking a firestorm of international outrage." History Channel
