Ironically, one of the nations in WWI that was used to coin the modern moralist take on Propaganda, Belgium, was involved in one of the most hideous genocides in history in the Congo River Basin and the “Rape of the Congo.”
http://www.moreorless.au.com/killers/leopold.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopold_II_of_Belgium
And the legacy of the orgy of violence continues today in the world’s bloodiest post-WWII conflict:
The ‘no war crimes until after WWII’ argument has been taken up in our courts.
The Perth man accused of a World War II war crime has appeared before the Full Bench of the Federal Court to argue against his extradition.
Hungary wants to extradite Charles Zentai to answer claims that he allegedly killed a Jewish man during the war.
Zentai was a soldier in the Hungarian Army when Peter Balazs was murdered in Budapest in 1944. Some witnesses have claimed that Charles Zentai killed him.
He’s now 87 and he’s been fighting against the extradition for four years.
…
Charles Zentai is arguing that there was no such thing as a war crime until after World War II and he shouldn’t be sent to Hungary to face a charge that has retrospective effect.
The court has reserved its decision.
…
DAVID WEBER: [Radio interviewer] It seems that one of the central parts of the case is to challenge the very legal basis of the Nuremberg trials and all of the tenets of law that flowed after that regarding war crimes?
ERNIE STEINER: [Charles Zentai’s son] That’s right. The Nuremberg trials brought into the realm the idea of retrospective legislation which is again being questioned for my father’s case.
And it’s also relevant because it’s in the terms of the treaty that it had to be a crime at the time.
DAVID WEBER: And a war crime wasn’t.
ERNIE STEINER: A war crime wasn’t, no, as opposed to a murder. But of course we are saying that my father is totally innocent so that is a very important point for our family and we all believe that. It’s just that it’s terrible that it’s come this far.
http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2008/s2666665.htm
It would take one ballsy judge/jury to rule a sentence that pretty much discredits Nuremberg…
The view that war crimes is a concept that only started about 70 years ago is incorrect.
Here is an article on The evolution of individual criminal responsibility under international law
http://www.icrc.org/eng/resources/documents/misc/57jq2x.htm
Peter von Hagenbach was executed for war crimes in 1474 after the tribunal rejected his “superior orders” defence.
When did war crimes start ? As soon as war was invented.