Very interesting post Brian and it answers a question my friend in
Germany has about some of the photos in his possesion. It turns out
that the Germans actually published several huge volumes of legal
testimony by this wehrmacht war crimes bureau which detailed
atrocities committed by soviet forces against German troops in 1941 &
1942. The original volumes were confiscated by the American army in
1945 for use at the Nuremberg Tribunals, but were never used so they
disappeared into the US archives.
They were later returned to Germany (in the 60's I believe) but when
they were returned all the photos that were part of the documentary
evidence were missing. It looks like quite a few of the photos of
atrocities my friend has are some of the same ones that originally
belonged to the wehrmacht war crimes bureau as photographic evidence.
Also, many of the missing photos in question bear signatures of German
service-personnel and civilians.
As you know he decided not to post these photos.
On Fri, 16 Jan 2015 10:28:59 -0600, BRIAN P EHNI <bpehni@gmail.com>
wrote:
>On 2015-01-16 13:07:40 +0000, Harry R Jumpjet said:
>
>> I came across a reference to this bureau some time ago, and discovered
>> that the bureau was set up under the Geneva Convention. It followed a
>> precedent estabished in WW One. There is a mechanism whereby enemy
>> forces can complan that their opponents are not "playing the game",
>> and can make a compant. This is done through a neutral power , and a
>> good example of this is the complaint made in WW One against Germany
>> regarding the use of the "saw-back" bayonet by Imperial German trops.
>> The Bayonet was sunsequently withdrawn from use. In the Second EWorld
>> War, complaints usually referred to atrocities being committed against
>> enemy combatants or prisoners of war. I hope that this post does not
>> result in a gegeral argument about German and/or Russian behaviour in
>> the war - I am simply makig the point that the bureau existed, and
>> investigated allegations of war crimes committed by and against
>> members of the German armed forces.
>>
>> There is an interesting book - see the following internet references:
>>
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wehrmacht_War_Crimes_Bureau,_1939-1945
>>
>> http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=7362616
>>
>>
>> Finally, was it not Churchill who said that if you have to kill a man,
>> it costs nothing to be polite?
>
>I have one of these bayonets. I was given to understand that they were
>issued to "pioneer" troops only for cutting down trees and similar uses.
>
>Brian Ehni
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