-Caveat Lector- from: http://www.codoh.com/trials/triamprosnazis.html Click Here: <A HREF="http://www.codoh.com/trials/triamprosnazis.html">War Crimes: American Prosecution of Nazi Milita�</A> ----- CONCLUSION A. Doctrinal Development The prosecution of Nazi officers resulted in several seminal contributions to the doctrinal development of the humanitarian law of war. The trials affirmed that international law imposes personal penal responsibility on combatants. Such liability attaches to both the victors and vanquished. 417 The judges stressed that the excesses of the German Army were traceable to a failure of leadership and command. Nevertheless, the panels rejected the concept of collective bureaucratic culpability. Criminal liability was not solely premised on power or position. Personal dereliction also was required: Criminality does not attach to every individual in [the] chain of command from that fact alone. There must be personal dereliction. That can occur only where the act is traceable to him [the defendant] or where his failure to properly supervise his subordinates constitutes criminal negligence . . . it must be a personal neglect amounting to . . . wanton, immoral disregard of the action of his subordinates amounting to acquiescence. Any other interpretation of international law would go far beyond the basic principles of criminal law as known to civilized nations. 418 The Court, in the High Command Case, ruled that only those at the policy-level who knowingly initiated or waged an aggressive war were liable for the planning, preparation, initiation and waging of such a conflict. Thus, the acts of field commanders and staff officers, below the policy level, in planning campaigns, preparing means for carrying them out, moving against a country on orders and fighting a war after it has been instituted, do not constitute the planning, preparation, initiation, and waging of war or the initiation of invasion that international law denounces as criminal. 419 These lower level officers were understandably required to adhere to the "rigid discipline which is necessary for and peculiar to military organization" and were the mere "instruments" of those positioned at the top of the bureaucratic hierarchy. 420 Officers below the policy level, however, were held legally liable for War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity. A cornerstone of the judgments was the imposition of liability upon the commanders in chiefs of occupied territories for manifestly criminal activity within the scope of their territorial command. Culpability was extended to commanders who knew or should have known of criminal conduct, who participated, acquiesced or neglected to interfere in the commission of such offenses. 421 Knowledge was presumed or imputed in those instances in which an officer issued 422 or transmitted a manifestly illegal order; 423 received reports at headquarters which recorded criminal conduct; 424 and in those cases in which the illicit activity was discussed during meetings, 425 was readily apparent, 426 or was common knowledge. 427 Absence from headquarters was not recognized as a justifiable basis for a lack of knowledge. 428 In the High Command Case, the Court was reluctant to impute knowledge to the defendants. 429 The Tribunal, for instance, failed to find that Wilhelm von Leeb possessed or should have possessed knowledge of the atrocities committed by the Einsatzgruppen. The reports were not routed through the Army Group North and there was no evidence that the killings were called to von Leeb's attention. 430 The prosecution also urged that von Leeb had passed prisoners of war on the highway and must have been apprised of their abuse and neglect. The Court determined that the "condition of . . . prisoners on the road . . . might well have been due to their condition when captured and not to any neglect of their captors at that time." 431 In contrast, in the Hostage Case, the Court appeared more willing to impute knowledge of criminal conduct to field commanders. However, the killing of hostages was an established policy which was exhaustively documented in military reports. 432 A commander of an occupied territory who received actual or constructive notice of illegal conduct was charged with a duty to intervene. Wilhelm List, as Armed Forces Commander Southeast, had received reports of unlawful reprisal killings. The Court, in the Hostage Case, ruled that List had a duty to condemn, prevent, and discipline those responsible for these atrocities. 433 Defendant Walter Kuntze assumed command of the Armed Forces Southeast in October 1941. Although informed of the execution of reprisal prisoners, Kuntze not only failed to take steps to prevent their recurrence but he urged more severe action upon his subordinate commanders. Not once did he attempt to halt these disproportionate reprisals . . . . The orders he issued and his subsequent failure to take steps to end these unlawful killings after they had been reported to him makes him criminally responsible . . . . 434 Hermann Hoth commanded the 17th Army during the Russian campaign and was condemned for having turned prisoners over to the Security Police. "Notwithstanding his knowledge of the character and functions of the SD [Security Police], his possession of the power to curb them and his duty to do so, he washed his hands of his responsibility and let the SD take its unrestrained course in his area of command." 435 The Tribunal, in the High Command Case, approvingly noted that Wilhelm von Leeb, having received information concerning the mass liquidation at Kovno [Latvia], "took action to prevent any recurrence of a similar nature within the area of the 16th Army where Kovno was located." 436 Field commanders also were held liable for the transmittal of an order which "is criminal upon its face, or one which he is shown to have known was criminal." 437 Orders which satisfied this standard were those which, "[b]y any standard of civilized nations . . . were contrary to the customs of war and accepted standards of humanity. Any commanding officer of normal intelligence must see and understand their criminal nature." 438 Staff officers were held criminally culpable in those instances in which they assisted or supervised the drafting or refinement of a manifestly criminal order; or took special steps to distribute such an order. 439 The fact that a field commander was implementing the order of a superior did not constitute a defense. Soldiers only were obligated to obey a lawful command. 440 A subordinate who carried out an illegal order might invoke the defense of duress in those instances in which he or she acted in response to an "imminent, real and inevitable" threat of death or serious bodily harm. 441 In addition, the injury caused by carrying out the illegal order must not have been "disproportionally greater than the harm which would result from not obeying the illegal order." 442 The defense of duress also was not available where the illegal order was a logical step in the "development of a program which he [the defendant] knew to be illegal in its very inception . . . [and] which could have been foreseen by the application of the simple law of cause and effect." 443 The Tribunal, in the Einsatzgruppen Case, in dismissing the defense of duress, cited the case of defendant Gustav Nosske, head of Einsatzkommando 12. In 1944, Nosske successfully protested an order to detain and decimate all remaining "half-Jews" in Duesseldorf. The Tribunal noted that Nosske's action in refusing categorically to obey the order, demonstrated, contrary to the argument advanced throughout the trial in behalf of the various defendants, that a member of the German Armed Forces could protest a superior order and not be shot in consequence. Though it is true the defendant suffered some inconveniences . . . he was not shot or even degraded. 444 Obedience to a criminal order was not justified on the grounds that others may have carried out the command. This was rejected as pure speculation. 445 Defendants were expected to engage in a good faith effort to impede the implementation of an illegal order. However, they were not required, in every instance, to openly oppose or demonstratively defy their superiors. The Commissar Order was distributed by central headquarters to the units under von Leeb's command. Von Leeb communicated his concern to subordinate officers, but neither revoked the order nor resigned. Despite the fact that many were murdered, von Leeb was absolved of responsibility. 446 In contrast, Hermann Hoth's silent opposition did not satisfy his legal obligation to impede the Commissar Order. 447 A central contribution of the cases was the clarification of military necessity. According to the Tribunal in the Hostage Case, military necessity permits damage to civilians and non-military targets which is incidental to an attack on enemy forces. However, innocents may not be targeted for retribution or repression. 448 Although property which may be utilized by the enemy may be destroyed where imperatively demanded by the necessities of war, wanton decimation is prohibited. 449 The Tribunal distinguished between the type of senseless and superfluous slaughter of non-combatants carried out by German troops and the Allies' aerial attacks on strategic sites. The bombardment of factories and railways may have incidentally incinerated civilians, but was intended to effect the surrender of the targeted territory. This, according to the Court, was distinct "in fact and in law, from an armed force . . . entering . . . houses . . . dragging out the men, women, and children and shooting them." 450 The Court, in the High Command Case, observed that the "right to do anything that contributes to the winning of a war . . . . would eliminate all humanity and decency and all law from the conduct of war and it is a contention which this Tribunal repudiates as contrary to the accepted usage of civilized nations." 451 The Germans contended that they lacked experienced troops and that the occupied territories could only be pacified through intimidation and terrorism. 452 The Tribunal, in the Hostage Case, however, held that the "rules of international law must be followed even if it results in the loss of a battle or even a war . . . . If adequate troops were not available or if . . . lawful measures against the population failed . . . the occupant could limit its operations or withdraw from the country in whole or in part, but no right existed to pursue a policy in violation of international law." 453 The Court stressed that "[w]ar at its best is a business but under no circumstances can cold-blooded mass murder . . . be considered as related remotely . . . to the exigencies of war." 454 The Tribunal did recognize Lothar Rendulic's claim of military necessity. Rendulic commanded the German troops which destroyed housing, communication, and transportation facilities in Finmark [Norway] in order to deny these facilities to the advancing Russian troops. The Russians ultimately did not enter Finmark. Nevertheless, "the conditions, as they appeared to the defendant [Rendulic] at the time were sufficient upon which he could honestly conclude that urgent military necessity warranted the decision made. This being true, the defendant may have erred in the exercise of his judgment but he was guilty of no criminal act." 455 The Court, in the Einsatzgruppen Case, dismissed the contention that the killing of Jews and other civilians was an act of self-defense on behalf of an endangered third party, the Reich. The intentional killing of defenseless civilians was contrary to the prohibitive principles of the humanitarian law of war. In any event, the defendants were unable to adequately articulate the imminent threat posed by Bolshevists or the rationale for executing those who did not adhere to the Communist catechism. 456 The ideological interests of Reich thus were not deemed to justify an attack on the citizens of a third party State. Under such a rationale, "any belligerent . . . would be allowed to unilaterally . . . abrogate the laws and customs of war . . . . [T]he rules of war would quickly disappear. Every belligerent could find a reason to assume that it had higher interests to protect." 457 The American judges were mindful that they were susceptible to the charge that the German defendants had been denied a fair trial and were reluctant to plow innovative doctrinal ground. The Tribunal, in the Hostage Case, approved the summary execution of partisans who had failed to comply with the requisites of the law of war. 458 The Court stressed that the obligation of resistance forces to adhere to legal standards applied in those instances in which the partisans confronted an invading aggressor force. 459 While some partisan bands in Yugoslavia and Greece concededly complied with the humanitarian law of war, the Tribunal determined that the "evidence fails to establish beyond a reasonable doubt that the incidents involved in the present case concern partisan troops having the status of lawful belligerents." 460 The Tribunal also approved the seizure of hostages, 461 as a last resort, where required to insure the security of occupation forces and the maintenance of law and order. 462 Some connection was required between the hostages and the crime committed. Thus, [i]f the act was committed by isolated persons or bands from distant localities without the knowledge or approval of the population or public authorities, and which . . . neither the authorities nor the population could have prevented, the basis for the taking of hostages, or the shooting of hostages . . . does not exist. 463 The execution of hostages was to be accompanied by various procedural safeguards, including the proclamation of names and addresses, prior warnings, and an equivalence between the number executed and the severity of the offense. 464 A competent court martial was to certify that such protections had been provided. These concededly flawed procedures were considered to afford some shield against vindictive or capricious killings. 465 The Court, in the Hostage Case, determined that the defendants had failed to meet the requisite requirements and concluded that "[t]hose responsible for such crimes . . . must be held to account if international law is to be anything more than an ethical code, barren of any practical coercive deterrent . . . . The guilt of the German occupation forces . . . casts a pall of shame upon a once highly respected nation and its people." 466 In the end, the lasting contribution of the three prosecutions may have been to affirm that War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity are matters of international concern. The arraignment of German officers before American tribunals conveyed that the defendants' crimes not only victimized the citizens of Eastern Europe, but breached global order and security. The judgments provide precedents for bringing military officials who grossly contravene the humanitarian law of war before the bar of international justice. 467 B. Explanations of Evil The American courts experienced difficulty in locating legal language which adequately captured the defendants' culpability. Genocide became reduced to the vocabulary of common law murder. As noted by the Tribunal, in the Einsatzgruppen Case, "[o]ne million human corpses is a concept too bizarre and too fantastical for normal mental comprehension . . . . [T]he mention of one million deaths produces no shock at all commensurate with its enormity because to the average brain one million is more a symbol than a quantitative measure." 468 The victims became reduced to distant and shadowy figures and only a hint of human pain and suffering penetrated the judicial decisions. This, of course, was the final insult, death without description or distinction. In the end, we are slowly seduced into the sinister stance of the Nazi bureaucrat and imperceptively begin to minimize the immensity of the defendants' crimes. 469 This distant psychological perspective helps to persuade us that the defendants deserved their relatively lenient sentences. 470 Despite the Courts' censorious comments, 471 the judges clearly harbored some sympathy for the defendants. These were professional military men with alleged loose loyalties to National Socialism who were portrayed as faithfully fulfilling their duty to fight for the German Fatherland. 472 The judges also were impressed by the defendants' achievements and attainments. 473 Yet, the descriptions of the defendants' "honesty, good nature, kindness, tolerance and sense of justness" masked that these were cold-blooded killers without whom Hitler "would have remained as innocuous as a rambling crank." 474 SS Lieutenant Adolf Ott, commander of Sonderkommando 7b, blandly recounted the killing of Jews. Q. Some of them refused to talk? A. That is so. Q. And they were shot just the same? A. They had to be shot if they were Jews. Q. Well, then you did shoot some Jews because they were Jews? A. I have already said, . . . every Jew who was apprehended had to be shot. Never mind whether he was a perpetrator or not. 475 Ernst Emil Heinrich Biberstein served as chief of Sonderkommando 6. Biberstein was questioned regarding the fate of Jews who had been apprehended: "If there were any Jews, Mr. Prosecutor, they were shot, just as the other Jews . . . . I believe that it has been made adequately clear . . . that under the order which has been issued there was no scope to hold trials of Jews." 476 Defendant Walter Kuntze, Deputy Armed Forces Commander Southeast and Commander in Chief of the 12th Army, urged his troops to engage in "'unequivocal and harder reprisal measures . . . [n]o false sentimentalities! It is preferable that 50 suspects are liquidated than one German soldier lose his life . . . .'" 477 The defendants willingly subordinated their consciences to Hitler's dictatorial demands. Field Marshal Wilhelm List explained that "[w]e were pledged by our oath and duty of obedience." 478 SS Brigadier General Erich Naumann, who served as Chief of Einsatzgruppen B, recounted that he harbored no moral qualms concerning the Fuehrer Order: "'I considered the decree to be right because it was part of our aim of the war and, therefore, it was necessary.'" 479 SS Lieutenant Colonel Gustav Nosske, commander of Einsatzkommando 12, when questioned as to whether he would have adhered to an order to kill "'500 innocent people, men, women, and children - Jews,'" replied, "'I would have probably done it.'" 480 SS Colonel Walter Blume antiseptically affirmed that he regarded a person who advised a farmer not to assist the occupying German forces as a "saboteur" who was "'worthy of the death sentence.'" 481 The defendants became inured to mass murder. Heinz Hermann Schubert, adjutant to Otto Ohlendorf, the Chief of Einsatzgruppe D, witnessed the arrest, deportation, and murder of a group of Gypsies. He reported to Ohlendorf that "he saw 'nothing unusual.'" 482 The German military meticulously documented their activities. The Court, in the Einsatzgruppen Case, noted that "[t]he reports and the statements of the defendants themselves verify what otherwise would be dismissed as the product of a disordered imagination." 483 Still, the defendants desired to deny their despicable deeds and employed euphemisms to distance themselves from the killing. Willy Seibert served as deputy to defendant Otto Ohlendorf. He was questioned whether "the settlement of the Jewish problem meant the execution of Jews?" A. That did not have to be the case . . . because in the country Jews were not executed . . . they were assigned to labor . . . . Q. Eventually they were executed? A. Yes. That is probably the case . . . . Q. And when you signed the report which contained the phrase, "The Crimea is freed of Jews," you knew what had happened to the Jews? Q. Yes. I knew that. 484 The defendants stressed that German officers possessed a reputation for professionalism and prudence; and that it was incomprehensible that such militarists would have intentionally engaged in criminal conduct. Defendant, General Hermann Hoth, Commander in Chief of the 17th Army, and later of the 4th Panzer Army, observed that the German officer "is a soldier of the finest traditions [who] devoted himself completely to his profession . . . . It was not long before the ordinary soldier came to know him and to admire him . . . he had a warm heart for the soldiers and . . . he constantly endeavored to lessen their suffering." 485 Hoth insisted that German officers were fighters rather than fanatics, combatants rather than criminals. "Just as the decision to begin the war was not made by the army, so the fighting in the East - seen from the point of view of the German Wehrmacht - was not a political ideology, but a purely military matter." 486 Otto Ohlendorf argued that the defendants, like all soldiers, merely pursued the policies of the prestigious and powerful. Therefore, they lacked criminal intent. 487 Although portrayed as malevolent monsters, the defendants argued that they differed little from those who fought on the side of the Allied Powers. Defendant Erich Naumann noted that "[o]n both sides soldiers executed their orders, orders of their highest superiors, even if it was not in accordance with their conscience . . . with the reason that they were necessary in order to reach the war aim." 488 The defendants conceded that, at times, their conduct may have been cruel and inhumane. Yet, their actions were morally indistinguishable from the Allied pilots who by "pushing of a button . . . kill[ed] a much larger number of civilians, men, women, and children, even to hurt them for generations . . . ." 489 Western leaders approved these aerial attacks because, like the Germans, they believed that "through this terror . . . the people could be demoralized and under such blows the military power . . . would . . . also break down." 490 However, in contrast to the Germans, the Allies had been "credited with having acted in good faith, and it is assumed they considered that such an action was militarily necessary." 491 The defendants thus noted that they were not singularly sadistic in their willingness to subordinate the demands of morality and conscience to the dictates of duty. 492 They also alleged that they had been confronted with an aggressive Communist adversary which was willing to adopt any means to achieve global domination. 493 The so-called "eastern man" was described as "capable of . . . fanatical toughness . . . unlimited endurance, and . . . limitless faith. For him the fight . . . was a crusade. The idea of the Bolshevist state of the future was an idol . . . which he worshipped as he did the Icons in former times." 494 Field Marshal Wilhelm List, in the Hostage Case, contended that "[i]f harsh measures entailed . . . [t]he fault rests with those who waged this battle . . . cunningly and cruelly in the Balkan manner. We had only one aim, to pacify the country." 495 The operation of the murderous Nazi military machine was facilitated by the stereotyping of Jews, Gypsies and Slavs. A letter from a leader of the field police to his commanding general queried whether you . . . have also seen in Poland such horrible figures of Jews. I thank the fate I saw this mongrel race . . . We surge ahead without pinges of conscience . . . [n]ow is the time . . . to create for our descendants a more beautiful and eternal Germany. We don't sleep here. Every week 3-4 actions, one time gypsies, the other time Jews, partisans, and other rabble. 496 Women and children were executed along with the men, "so that Jews, gypsies, and so-called asocials would be exterminated for all time." 497 Efficiency rather than humanity was the touchstone. Defendant Ernst Biberstein expressed satisfaction that "'gas execution guaranteed certain death.'" 498 Most defendants were inoculated with the view that Bolshevism was a Semitic ideology whose goal was "Jewish world domination." 499 The defeat of Bolshevist expansionism, in the minds of the German military, required "rendering Soviet Jewry harmless." 500 The defendants thus viewed the extermination of Jews as an act of national defense rather than murder. 501 Franz Six, Chief of Vorkommando Moscow, stated that the "killing of male Jews was proper because they were potential bearers of arms." 502 Defendant Otto Ohlendorf recalled that he witnessed three executions in which the Jews "went to their death singing the 'International' and hailing Stalin . . . . It was absolutely certain that by these persons the call of Stalin for ruthless partisan warfare would be followed without reservation." 503 Ohlendorf later conceded that most of the victims did not pose an immediate threat. However, he cautioned, that does not change the fact that for us it meant a danger insofar as they were determined to be a danger, and none of us examined whether these persons at the moment, or in the future, would actually constitute danger, because this was outside our knowledge, and not part of our task. 504 The German troops were mere messengers of nature. Members of a superior race who were destined to eliminate the demented, disabled and undesirable. Defendant Paul Blobel pointed to the fact that his victims stoically succumbed to slaughter as evidence that the "victim is . . . inhuman while the executioner is to be pitied. . . . To these people 'human life was not as valuable as it was to us.'" 505 The Einsatzgruppen Tribunal observed that the "[t]he so-called Jewish problem was not a problem but a fixation based upon the doctrine that a self-styled 'master race' may exterminate a race which it considers inferior . . . . In fact, if it were not so tragic, the National Socialistic attitude toward the Jews could only be considered nonsensical." 506 Various defendants acknowledged that they had been manipulated by the master magician Adolf Hitler into believing that Germany was threatened by contiguous countries and surrounding States. 507 They portrayed themselves as overpowered by the Fuehrer's force and ferocity. 508 Some explained that it was inconceivable to distrust or doubt the legality of Hitler's directives. Defendant Hermann Hoth, in elaborating his reasons for carrying out the Commissar Order, stated that "it was quite impossible for me to assume that he [Hitler] intended a crime in issuing this order. Even today . . . I know his intention really was to protect the troops against commissars. I do not think that Hitler had any criminal intent." 509 Defendant Walter Warlimont, who signed and transmitted the Commissar Order to officers in the field, noted that "[i]t did not occur to an officer as I who, in 1941 had been a soldier for almost thirty years, that his head of the state and the supreme commander of his armed forces would issue a criminal order." 510 Some also pled that they were intellectually ill-equipped to evaluate the legality of Hitler's directives. Hans Reinhardt, Commander of Panzer Group 3, observed that a Panzer general is not an international lawyer who during the war would be in a position to make investigations lasting several months, or to ask international lawyers for expert legal opinions about the correctness of his conception of law and whether it could also be maintained in face of the consequences of the lost war. 511 In any event, Dr. Rupprecht von Keller, counsel for defendant Rudolf Lehmann, argued that open resistance would have proven futile and likely would have led to severe retribution. A demonic dictator, such as Hitler, certainly would not have been deterred by such dissent. Resignation only would have resulted in replacement by an unscrupulous zealot. The defendants, according to von Keller, chose the most difficult, discerning and demanding course by deciding to remain in their positions and attempting to moderate and undermine the Fuehrer's orders. 512 Dr. von Keller stressed that it was difficult for an American judge to comprehend the complex calculus which confronted German officers. Those who undertake to judge as to whether or not the captain of a ship acted correctly . . . cannot but examine in detail the circumstances to which this man had been subject . . . . He must visualize the roaring of the storm, the turbulence of the waves, the danger of suddenly running ashore, the necessity of immediate decisions . . . [t]he obligation to imagine this situation will be the greater, if he never experienced the force of the elements. 513 Von Keller concluded that, "[n]obody can be punished if, in case of a conflict of duties he chose that way which, weighing seriously all interests concerned, he considered the most just." 514 The Tribunals confined culpability to those with knowledge and authority to halt the commission of War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity. Staff officers, such as Hermann Foertsch, 515 and Kurt von Geitner, 516 who turned a blind eye to murder were exonerated. The Court ruled that, [t]he evidence fails to show the commission of an unlawful act which was the result of any action, affirmative or passive . . . mere knowledge of the happenings of unlawful acts does not meet the requirements of criminal law. He [the defendant] must be one who orders, abets, or takes a consenting part in the crime. 517 The fact remains that all the defendants voluntarily devoted themselves to the furtherance of National Socialism. The extermination programs were a logical extension of Nazi policies. As observed by the Tribunal in the Einsatzgruppen Case, "[o]ne who participated in that program which began with Jewish disenfranchisement and deportation and led, step by step, to deprivation of property and liberty, followed with beatings, whippings, and measures aimed at starvation, may not plead surprise when he learns that what has been done sporadically; namely, murder, now is officially declared policy." 518 Some possessed the resilience to resist National Socialism. They neither acquiesced nor cooperated with Hitler. As noted by the Tribunal in the prosecution of Field Marshal Erhard Milch: Others with more courage and higher principles and with more loyalty to the ancient German ideals rebelled and withdrew from the brutal crew . . . . These men in high positions had the character to repudiate great evil, and if in so doing they took risks and made sacrifices, nevertheless, they made their choice to stand with decency and justice and honor. The defendant [Milch] had his opportunity to join those who refused to do the evil bidding of an evil master, but he cast it aside and his professed repentance now comes too late. 519 C. Summary The defendants in the three prosecutions of German military and police officials prostituted themselves to the Nazi cause and grossly contravened the humanitarian law of war. They pointed their weapons at "protected persons" and performed a principal role in the Nazi's genocidal policies. As a result, these militarists were reduced to the status of murderers. In 1938, General Ludwig Beck resigned as Chief of the Army General Staff. Beck's letter of resignation prophetically predicted that, "'[h]istory will burden these [Army] leaders with blood-guilt if they do not act in accord with their . . . conscience. . . . [M]ilitary obedience has a limit . . . [e]xtraordinary times demand extraordinary measures.'" 520 The American prosecutions of German officers stands as one of the most significant international legal actions initiated against military and police officials. These trials explicitly established that high-ranking officers are liable for violations of the humanitarian law of war and are obligated to resist illegal orders. The High Command Case provided principles for adjudging the legal liability of military field and staff officers 521 and affirmed that various legal protections are to be accorded to civilians and prisoners of war. 522 The Einsatzgruppen Case also elaborated upon the doctrinal shield surrounding civilians 523 and clarified the contours of self-defense 524 and duress. 525 Lastly, the Hostage Case refined the international legal norms regulating occupying powers, 526 partisans, 527 reprisals, 528 and command responsibility. 529 The Tribunals also elaborated upon the scope of the superior orders defense 530 and military necessity. 531 The impact of World War II war crimes trials has faded. The Nazi concept of "total," ideologically motivated warfare unfortunately has become the model for modern conflicts. International law is in danger of degenerating into desuetude and the global community must once again develop the determination to prosecute and punish those who dare to defy the international norms against mass slaughter and genocide. 532 Begin End Notes * Professor, University of Illinois at Chicago, Department of Criminal Justice. (Ph.d., Northwestern; J.D., American; LL.M., Harvard). A portion of this research was undertaken during the author's service as "of counsel" for Bosnia and Hercegovina in its suit against "Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro)" in the International Court of Justice. This article is dedicated with lasting love and devotion to Lidia Janus (June 9, 1958 - January 24, 1991) who lived with humanism, integrity, and passion and who longed for a Poland and a Europe free of perversity, prejudice and hate. Lidia continues to inspire us in death as she did in life. We will never forget . . . 1 . See Matthew Lippman, Nuremberg and American Justice, 5 NOTRE DAME J.L. ETHICS & PUB. POL'Y 951 (1991); Matthew Lippman, Nuremberg: Forty Five Years Later, 7 CONN. J. INT'L L. 1 (1991). 2 . See Matthew Lippman, The Other Nuremberg: American Prosecutions of Nazi War Criminals in Occupied Germany, 3 IND. INT'L & COMP. L. REV. 1 (1992). See also Matthew Lippman, The Nazi Doctors Trial And The International Prohibition On Medical Involvement In Torture, 15 LOY. L.A. INT'L & COMP. L.J. 395 (1993); Matthew Lippman, They Shoot Lawyers Don't They?: Law In The Third Reich And The Global Threat To The Independence Of The Judiciary, 23 CAL. W. INT'L L. J. 257 (1993). ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, All My Relations. Omnia Bona Bonis, Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! 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