Justice After War

Justice after War

History Ð'- Wars Ð'- Writing Task

Wartime is definitely a time of much violence and many things happen during this time, but what about after warÐ'...

"The just war tradition is typically evoked when discussing the decision to launch a war (justice of war) and when evaluating the conduct of forces during war (justice in war). But the tradition does not explicitly specify principles for assessing justice after war, nor does it discuss state obligations upon achieving military victory."

This excerpt was taken from an article by Tony Lang and Mary-Lea Cox. Once victory is earned by one side it must take responsibility to pave the road to peace in that country by building a new political system. This is summarized in Thomas L. Freidman's view when he says "you break it, you own it". But maintaining peace in war-trodden country is not easy. There is jealousy from that country, the urge to take revenge; while this is happening the victors have to discuss how to maintain justice. Maintaining the balance between these two is a tedious task. In many conflicts through history the aftermath has been more of a problem to the defeated than the war itself, becoming financially crippled, becoming underdogs of the world, being restricted. These are all problems faced by the dark horse of the battle, after a battle keeping a stability of even-handedness and retribution is a daunting task.

Many trials through time have been subject to comments by critics that have made points that justice had no role in the final judgement. In the Nuremberg Trials, of the 21 defendants that were held in custody 11 were sentenced to death (over 50%), three were acquitted and the rest were subject to heavy jail terms. The Nazi atrocities that they were put on trial for were for good reason, though they had been wishing to give them all a fair trial it is obvious that excessive urges to take revenge caused an imbalance in the balance between revenge and justice.

Those to be prosecuted were done so because of the brutal "war crimes", "crimes against peace" and "crimes against humanity" they had committed. The prosecutors were dominated by a large percentage of Jews, who at this time, excusably, had a fervent hatred for the Nazis, since the Nazis had also had a fervent hatred for them. But this just shows how hard it would have been for these prosecutors to not have had revenge govern their thoughts throughout the trial. The Nazis had murdered over 6 million Jews in a period of 10 years, obviously the prosecutors would not have taken lightly to it, though the terms under which the defendants were prosecuted were very heavy, it could also be argued that they had indeed deserved the sentence that they received even though some of them weren't liable for their actions.

In 1918 a peace settlement was signed by Germany after World War I, though Germany had once again committed atrocities they were forced into a lot of things that could be argued as unjust and unfair, they were forced to sign the treaty of Versailles, which was an unfair treaty to Germany. It is clear that justice wasn't Britain and the other Allies' main concern in the issue. Justice was merely propaganda, as it was clear that all the restrictions placed on Germany were not just so that Britain could bring justice and balance to her. Germany was restricted to an army of merely 100,000 men, barely sufficient to fend off an attacking island! Not only this, but their navy was restricted to 6 ships and no submarines. This threshold placed on the army was merely a puddle in the flood that Britain created to sink Germany. Much land was taken from Germany, specifically the following:

Alsace-Lorraine (given to France)

Eupen and Malmedy (given to Belgium)

Northern Schleswig (given to Denmark)

Hultschin (given to Czechoslovakia)

West Prussia, Posen and Upper Silesia (given to Poland)

And to top this off Britain had inflicted several financial penalties on Germany, almost crippling any attempts to rebuild it. Germany had also been in desperate need of repairs to their country and combined with the financial penalties we can see that it is clear that Britain had no other motive but to bankrupt Germany, the Allies ordered a blank cheque be given to them and they would cash it when they see fit, the amount totalled was ₤6,600 million, well beyond Germany's capability to pay. Germany was also held responsible for starting the war, and for everything that happened during the war.

As all the facts are saying that the Allies' sole achievement in the treaty of Versailles was not to bring justice to Germany and its allies but rather