The governments of the German Empire and Nazi Germany (under Adolf Hitler) ordered, organized, and condoned a substantial number of war crimes, first in the Herero and Namaqua genocide and then in the First and Second World Wars. The most notable of these is the Holocaust, in which millions of European Jewish, Polish, and Romani people were systematically abused, deported, and murdered. Millions of civilians and prisoners of war also died as a result of German abuses, mistreatment, and deliberate starvation policies in those two conflicts. Much of the evidence was deliberately destroyed by the perpetrators, such as in Sonderaktion 1005, in an attempt to conceal their crimes.
In total, from 24,000 up to 100,000 Herero and 10,000 Nama died.[7][8][9][10][11] The genocide was characterized by widespread death by starvation and thirst because the Herero who fled the violence were prevented from returning from the Namib Desert. Some sources also claim that the German colonial army systematically poisoned wells in the desert.[12][13]
World War I
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Aerial photograph of a German gas attack on the Eastern Front of World War I. Lethal poison gas was first introduced by Germany and subsequently utilized by the other major belligerents in violation of the Hague Convention IV of 1907.
Documentation regarding German war crimes in World War I was seized and destroyed by Nazi Germany during World War II, after occupying France, along with monuments commemorating their victims.[14]
In August 1914, as part of the Schlieffen Plan, the German Army invaded and occupied the neutral nation of Belgium without explicit warning, which violated a treaty of 1839 that the German chancellor dismissed as a "scrap of paper" and the 1907 Hague Convention on Opening of Hostilities.[18] Within the first two months of the war, German occupational troops killed thousands of Belgian civilians and looted and burnt scores of towns, including Leuven, which housed the country's most prominent university. The Germans explained these acts as being in retaliation for Belgian guerrilla warfare, (see francs-tireurs). These actions were in violation of the 1907 Hague Convention on Land Warfare provisions that prohibited collective punishment of civilians and looting and destruction of civilian property in occupied territories.[19] Additional acts of oppression took place throughout the occupation, administered by the General Government of Belgium.
Bombardment of English coastal towns
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The raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby, which took place on December 16, 1914, was an attack by the Imperial German Navy on the British seaport towns of Scarborough, Hartlepool, West Hartlepool, and Whitby. The attack resulted in 137 fatalities and 592 casualties. The raid was in violation of the ninth section of the 1907 Hague Convention which prohibited naval bombardments of undefended towns without warning,[20] because only Hartlepool was protected by shore batteries.[21] Germany was a signatory of the 1907 Hague Convention.[22] Another attack followed on 26 April 1916 on the coastal towns of Yarmouth and Lowestoft but both were important naval bases and defended by shore batteries. [citation needed]
Unrestricted submarine warfare
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Unrestricted submarine warfare was instituted in 1915 in response to the British naval blockade of Germany. Prize rules, which were codified under the 1907 Hague Convention—such as those that required commerce raiders to warn their targets and allow time for the crew to board lifeboats—were disregarded and commercial vessels were sunk regardless of nationality, cargo, or destination. Following the sinking of the RMS Lusitania on 7 May 1915 and subsequent public outcry in various neutral countries, including the United States, the practice was withdrawn. However, Germany resumed the practice on 1 February 1917 and declared that all merchant ships regardless of nationalities would be sunk without warning. This outraged the U.S. public, prompting the U.S. to break diplomatic relations with Germany two days later, and, along with the Zimmermann Telegram, led the U.S. entry into the war two months later on the side of the Allied Powers.
World War II
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Chronologically, the first German World War II crime, and also the very first act of the war, was the bombing of Wieluń, a town where no targets of military value were present.[23][24]
as far as wartime actions against enemy nationals are concerned, the [1948] Genocide Convention added virtually nothing to what was already covered (and had been since the Hague Convention of 1899) by the internationally accepted laws of land warfare, which require an occupying power to respect "family honors and rights, individual lives and private property, as well as religious convictions and liberty" of the enemy nationals. But the laws of war do not cover, in time of either war or peace, a government's actions against its own nationals (such as Nazi Germany's persecution of German Jews). And at the Nuremberg war crimes trials, the tribunals rebuffed several efforts by the prosecution to bring such "domestic" atrocities within the scope of international law as "crimes against humanity."
Ardenne Abbey massacre, one of the Normandy massacres; June 1944 Canadian soldiers captured by the SS and murdered by 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend. SS General Kurt Meyer (Panzermeyer) sentenced to be shot 1946; sentence commuted; released 1954[26]
Wereth massacre. 17 December 1944, soldiers from 3./SS-PzAA1 LSSAH captured eleven African-American soldiers from 333rd Artillery Battalion in the hamlet of Wereth, Belgium. Subsequently, the prisoners were tortured, shot, and had their fingers cut off, legs broken, eyes gouged out, jaw broken and at least one was shot while trying to bandage a comrade's wounds.
Wahlhausen massacre, January 1945, United States POWs from the 28th Infantry Division captured by German troops were summarily executed.[27]
The campaign of extermination of Slavic population in the occupied territories. Several thousand villages were burned with their entire population (e.g., Khatyn massacre in Belarus). A quarter of the inhabitants of Belarus did not survive the German occupation.
Commando Order, the secret order issued by Hitler in October 1942 stating that Allied combatants encountered during commando operations were to be executed immediately without trial, even if they were properly uniformed, unarmed, or intending to surrender.
In addition, more than 90 villages and towns are recorded from the Hellenic network of martyr cities.[34] During the triple German, Italian and Bulgarian, occupation about 800,000 people lost their lives in Greece (see World War II casualties).
Italy
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A body lies in the via Rasella, Rome, during the round up of civilians by Italian collaborationist soldiers and German troops after the partisan bombing on 13 March 1944.
Lake Maggiore massacres, September–October 1943, Lake Maggiore, Murder of 56 predominantly Italian Jews by the 1st SS Panzer Division despite strict German orders not to carry out any violence against civilians
Caiazzo massacre, 13 October 1943, Caiazzo, Mass killing of 22 civilians by the German 29th Panzergrenadier Regiment occupation troops under Lt. Richard Heinz Wolfgang Lehnigk-Emden
Serra di Ronchidoso massacre (Gaggio Montano, Emilia-Romagna; over 100 civilians killed on 28–29 September 1944)[35]Three men executed by public hanging in a street of Rimini, 1944
Man showing corpse of a starved infant in the Warsaw ghetto, 1941A column of Polish civilians being led by German troops through Wolska Street in early August 1944
^ abSteinhauser, Gabriele (28 July 2017). Tucker, Emma (ed.). "Germany Confronts the Forgotten Story of Its Other Genocide". The Wall Street Journal. New York City. ISSN 0099-9660. OCLC 781541372. Archived from the original on 1 August 2017. Retrieved 7 March 2023.
^Olusoga, David and Erichsen, Casper W (2010). The Kaiser's Holocaust. Germany's Forgotten Genocide and the Colonial Roots of Nazism. Faber and Faber. ISBN 978-0-571-23141-6
^Levi, Neil; Rothberg, Michael (2003). The Holocaust: Theoretical Readings. Rutgers University Press. p. 465. ISBN 0-8135-3353-8.
^Mahmood Mamdani, When Victims Become Killers: Colonialism, Nativism, and the Genocide in Rwanda, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2001, p. 12
^Cooper, Allan D. (2006-08-31). "Reparations for the Herero Genocide: Defining the limits of international litigation". Oxford Journals African Affairs. Archived from the original on 2009-08-30.
^"Remembering the Herero Rebellion". Deutsche Welle. 2004-11-01.
^Colonial Genocide and Reparations Claims in the 21st Century: The Socio-Legal Context of Claims under International Law by the Herero against Germany for Genocide in Namibia, 1904–1908 (PSI Reports) by Jeremy Sarkin-Hughes
^Empire, Colony, Genocide: Conquest, Occupation and Subaltern Resistance in World History (War and Genocide) (War and Genocide) (War and Genocide) A. Dirk Moses -page 296(From Conquest to Genocide: Colonial Rule in German Southwest Africa and German East Africa. 296, (29). Dominik J. Schaller)
^The Imperialist Imagination: German Colonialism and Its Legacy (Social History, Popular Culture, and Politics in Germany) by Sara L. Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Lennox, and Susanne M. Zantop page 87 University of Michigan Press 1999
^Walter Nuhn: Sturm über Südwest. Der Hereroaufstand von 1904. Bernard & Graefe-Verlag, Koblenz 1989. ISBN 3-7637-5852-6.
^Marie-Aude Baronian, Stephan Besser, Yolande Jansen, "Diaspora and memory: figures of displacement in contemporary literature, arts and politics", pg. 33 Rodopi, 2007,
^Samuel Totten, William S. Parsons, Israel W. Charny, "Century of genocide: critical essays and eyewitness accounts" pg. 51, Routledge, 2004,
^Dan Kroll, "Securing our water supply: protecting a vulnerable resource", PennWell Corp/University of Michigan Press, pg. 22
^France: the dark years, 1940–1944 page 273 Julian Jackson Oxford University Press 2003
^Taylor, Telford (November 1, 1993). The Anatomy of the Nuremberg Trials: A Personal Memoir. Little, Brown and Company. ISBN 0-3168-3400-9. Retrieved 20 June 2013.
^Thomas Graham, Damien J. Lavera (May 2003). Cornerstones of Security: Arms Control Treaties in the Nuclear Era. University of Washington Press. pp. 7–9. ISBN 0-2959-8296-9. Retrieved 5 July 2013.
^Haber, L. F. (2002). The Poisonous Cloud: Chemical warfare in the First World War. pp. 248–253. ISBN 9780191512315.
^Spencer C. Tucker; Priscilla Mary Roberts (October 25, 2005). World War I: A Student Encyclopedia. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO. pp. 1074. ISBN 1-8510-9879-8.
^Marshall, Logan (1915). Horrors and atrocities of the great war: Including the tragic destruction of the Lusitania: A new kind of warfare: Comprising the desolation of Belgium: The sacking of Louvain: The shelling of defenseless cities: The wanton destruction of cathedrals and works of art: The horrors of bomb dropping: Vividly portraying the grim awfulness of this greatest of all wars fought on land and sea: In the air and under the waves: Leaving in its wake a dreadful trail of famine and pestilence. G. F. Lasher. p. 240. Retrieved 5 July 2013. German Navy December 1914 Hague Convention bombardment.
^Chuter, David (2003). War Crimes: Confronting Atrocity in the Modern World. London: Lynne Rienner Pub. p. 300. ISBN 1-58826-209-X.
^Willmore, John (1918). The great crime and its moral. New York: Doran. p. 340.
^Kulesza, Witold (2004). ""Wieluń polska Guernica", Tadeusz Olejnik, Wieluń 2004 : [recenzja]" ["Wieluń Polish Guernica", Tadeusz Olejnik, Wieluń 2004 : [review]] (PDF). Rocznik Wieluński (in Polish). 4: 253–254.
^Gilbertson, David (14 August 2017). The Nightmare Dance: Guilt, Shame, Heroism and the Holocaust. Troubador Publishing Limited. p. 27. ISBN 978-1-78306-609-4.
^Telford Taylor "When people kill a people" in The New York Times, March 28, 1982
^"Home - Veterans Affairs Canada". Vac-acc.gc.ca. 2012-03-29. Archived from the original on 2008-03-29. Retrieved 9 July 2012.
^[1] GERMAN ATROCITIES DURING THE SECOND WORLD WAR
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^Kozlica, Ivan (2012). Krvava Cetina [Bloody Cetina] (in Croatian). Zagreb: Hrvatski centar za ratne žrtve. p. 155. ISBN 978-953-57409-0-2.
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^Ivan Kovačić; Vinko Šepić Čiškin; Danica Maljavac (2014). Lipa pamti. Rijeka: Naklada Kvarner, Općina Matulji, SABA Primorsko-goranske županije. p. 189.
^"Lüneburg (Massacre on 11 April 1945)". KZ-Gedenkstätte Neuengamme. Retrieved 2 April 2024.
^Δήμος Λαμιέων: Δίκτυο μαρτυρικών πόλεων & χωριών της Ελλάδος | Δήμος Λαμιέων, accessdate: 19. Oktober 2015
^ abcdefghijkBuzzelli, S.; De Paolis, M.; Speranzoni, A. (2012). La ricostruzione giudiziale dei crimini nazifascisti in Italia: questioni preliminari. G. Giappichelli. p. 119. ISBN 9788834826195. Retrieved 14 February 2017.
^ abcdefg"Crimini di guerra". criminidiguerra.it. Retrieved 14 February 2017.
^ abcdeBiacchessi, D. (2015). I carnefici. SPERLING & KUPFER. ISBN 9788820092719. Retrieved 14 February 2017.
^"www.anpi.it/storia/212/strage-di-boves". anpi.it. Archived from the original on 2 February 2016. Retrieved 14 February 2017.
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^"Complete tabulation of executions carried out in the Einsatzkommando 3 zone up to 1 December 1941". Holocaust-history.org. Retrieved 4 May 2012.
^"Gesamtaufstellung der im Bereich des EK. 3 bis zum 1. Dez. 1941 durchgeführten Exekutionen". Holocaust-history.org. 2002-09-28. Retrieved 4 May 2012.
^Muzeum Powstania otwarte, BBC Polish edition, 2 October 2004, Children accessed on 13 April 2007
^O Powstaniu Warszawskim opowiada prof. Jerzy Kłoczowski, Gazeta Wyborcza – local Warsaw edition, 1998-08-01. Children accessed on 13 April 2007
^Księga pamięci żołnierzy Armii Krajowej Obwodu Ostrów Maz. 1939-1944 (in Polish). Warszawa. 2007. pp. 21–22.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
^Hamerska, Małgorzata (2012). "Miejsca pamięci narodowej w powiecie chojnickim". Zeszyty Chojnickie (in Polish). No. 27. Chojnice: Chojnickie Towarzystwo Przyjaciół Nauk. p. 72.
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^"19 Октября 1943 г." www.army.lv (in Russian). Archived from the original on 2011-07-22. Retrieved 2018-04-20.
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum – Article Children during the Holocaust; and online exhibitions Life in the Shadows; and Give Me Your Children
Holocaust Memorial Album Honoring more than 1.5 Million Souls Under 12 years of age that never returned ... from Holocaust Survivors and Remembrance Project: "Forget You Not"
Children and the Holocaust
Nazis kidnap Polish children
The War Crimes of Dr Josef Mengele
German War Crimes of World War I
The Reich's forgotten atrocity
Bartniczak, Mieczysław (1974). "Eksterminacja ludności w powiecie Ostrów Mazowiecka w latach okupacji hitlerowskiej (1939–1944)". Rocznik Mazowiecki (in Polish). No. 5.
Datner, Szymon (1968). Las sprawiedliwych (in Polish). Warszawa: Książka i Wiedza.
Sudoł, Tomasz (2011). "Zbrodnie Wehrmachtu na jeńcach polskich we wrześniu 1939 roku". Biuletyn Instytutu Pamięci Narodowej (in Polish). No. 8-9 (129-130). IPN. ISSN 1641-9561.
Wardzyńska, Maria (2009). Był rok 1939. Operacja niemieckiej policji bezpieczeństwa w Polsce. Intelligenzaktion (in Polish). Warszawa: IPN.
Media (on-line)
Poland under German occupation 1939–1945 on YouTube
The Atrocities committed by German-Fascists in the USSR
Stills from Soviet documentary "The Atrocities committed by German Fascists in the USSR" ((1); (2); (3))
Slide show "Nazi Crimes in the USSR (Graphic images!)"