Thread: Were the Dresden Bombings Justified?

Originally Posted by britmaveric

Trip to death railway might do a thing to change ones mind.... course I'm sure it will be explained away as imperialist propaganda.

Very few if any POW's were used in the Railway of Death. Mostly civilian Chinese. Another myth.

Originally Posted by Ivor Biggun

Originally Posted by Morden

So, you didn't ever see or speak to a British survivor of a Japanese POW camp then - you know, those prematurely aged guys with no eyelids or torture scars or permanent internal organ damage. Did the website your read not mention the torture? Guys with lids cut of, pegged out spreadeagle fashion in the sun with bamboo shoots growing under them. Or the same trick but with a pistol trigger tied to a growing bamboo shoot and hte barrel pointing at the poor guys head.

You've read to much of the Hotspur or the Vallient.

No, first hand accounts, pal. Where did you get your stories from, Moseley's son?

And to comment on your other post, I'm not saying that any other army was better.

About 180,000 Asian labourers and 100,000 Allied prisoners of war (POWs) worked on the railway. Of these, around 90,000 Asian labourers and 16,000 Allied POWs died as a direct result of the project. The dead POWs included 6,318 British personnel, 2,815 Australians, 2,490 Dutch, about 356 Americans and some Canadians.[1]

Originally Posted by Ivor Biggun

Originally Posted by britmaveric

Trip to death railway might do a thing to change ones mind.... course I'm sure it will be explained away as imperialist propaganda.

Very few if any POW's were used in the Railway of Death. Mostly civilian Chinese. Another myth.

One can only assume that the "biggun" in your nick refers to a brain tumour.

There is a japanes war museum in mehongson. The stroy told on the video is horrific . A apanese soldier felll in love with a thai woamn and they had two kids after the war ended.
He basically lived as a Thai man .
After several years the Thai police arrested him and he was deported.
The Woman has never forgotten him and searched for him without result.
How inhumnan can we get? The tale brought a tear to my eye!

Originally Posted by Ivor Biggun

Originally Posted by Morden

Oh, not to hide the evidence, then! My mistake.

No that is one of the myths of World War 11. Same as the Japs maltreating POW's. What's the point of maltreating them as they were needed for work purposes. It was in the Japs, as well as the Germans interest to keep them fit and healthy. If not why not just kill them instead of building camps for them ? Okay some shit things may have happened but without proper medicines, which there were none, deaths in camps would have been high. These deaths would have been reported as deaths while POW's. Assumtion then being maltreatment. But if the Japs/Germans don't have the medicines how can they treat the POW. Without proper autopsies the death would be atributed to the Japs/Germans. A wrongful conclusion.

I disagree. I think they kept them on subsistence rations so they were strong enough to be herded but too weak to overpower the number of troops assigned to guarding them.

Some prisoners were murdered almost as soon as they arrived at the camps. Others were treated differently:
'The camp commandant, Rudolf Höss, testified at the Nuremberg Trials that up to 2.5 million people had died at Auschwitz. The Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum revised this figure in 1990, and new calculations now place the figure at 1.1–1.6 million,[2][3] about 90 percent of whom were Jews from almost every country in Europe.[4] Most victims were killed in gas chambers using Zyklon B; other deaths were caused by systematic starvation, forced labor, lack of disease control, individual executions, and so-called medical experiments.'

Perhaps it is younger people than I who suggest that this horror has been exaggerated. If humankind is forgetting or preferring not to know about what was done during those few years, please read the full Wiki piece - and don't be ashamed to weep:

Auschwitz concentration camp - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

My parents' lives, families and friendships were ripped apart by that war and then they saw the newsreel brought back in stark monochrome from Europe and wept with anger. After that, crippled and deranged POW's returned from Japanese camps.

Please, no-one insult the memories of those millions of people by denying that it happened or that it could have happened since.

And here's a link that gives a little taste of what went on in the many Japanese POW camps:

World War Two - Prisoner of War Camps in Japan

Originally Posted by britmaveric

About 180,000 Asian labourers and 100,000 Allied prisoners of war (POWs) worked on the railway. Of these, around 90,000 Asian labourers and 16,000 Allied POWs died as a direct result of the project. The dead POWs included 6,318 British personnel, 2,815 Australians, 2,490 Dutch, about 356 Americans and some Canadians.[1]

Provide a Link please Brit.

Burma Railway - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Originally Posted by attaboy

I disagree. I think they kept them on subsistence rations so they were strong enough to be herded but too weak to overpower the number of troops assigned to guarding them.

Exactly. It's what you think which is the opposite to me. We have a difference of opinion.
You can be more or less be sure that the guards on the Railway of death were in fact Thai recruits. Combat soldiers left to guard prisoners is a no no, they're more inportantly needed else where.. Secondly, where are the prisoners going to escape to ? Thailand sided with the Japs so escaped prisoners would have soon been rounded up easily.
Soldiers that were captured at the fall of Singapore were never actually incarcerated. The Japs never felt a need to because they knew there was no where for them to go. They were allowed to live outside the prison and one of their pastimes was growing vegatables. Only civilians were incarcerated behind Changi walls, mostly women and children, for their own protection. Go visit the museum, if it's still there. I think the prison is now defunked.

seems that sTroller and Dr.Bob is one and the same dude, about the same mentality and same posting style,, Damn got that one figured and both seem to back up the Raghead and kraut bad habits.

Originally Posted by Ivor Biggun

Only civilians were incarcerated behind Changi walls, mostly women and children, for their own protection. Go visit the museum, if it's still there. I think the prison is now defunked.

I have. Plenty of soldiers were incarcerated there, along with civilians.

The prison has now moved to a new location over the road.

Originally Posted by EmperorTud

I have. Plenty of soldiers were incarcerated there, along with civilians.

I watched National Geographic last week which took some folk back to Changi prior to it being knocked down. It was clearly stated, on that programm, that "no soldier POW's were incarcerated inside the walls".
We've gone completely off topic now. No I don't think the bombing of Dresden was justified. In fact I don't sanction any bombing of civilians but when one has military targets inside civilian areas, what can one do ?

Originally Posted by Ivor Biggun

It was clearly stated, on that programm, that "no soldier POW's were incarcerated inside the walls".

Try telling that to James Clavell. He wrote a novel based upon his experiences in Changi.

Originally Posted by Ivor Biggun

His book "King Rat" was fiction.

I know, which is why I said....

Originally Posted by Marmite the Dog

He wrote a novel based upon his experiences in Changi.

Originally Posted by paulsmithson

neither has it ever been proven that the gas cghambers are anything other than post war propaganda.

Good thing that Eisenhower was aware of that happening. He told the people under his command (and that was a handful) to take as many pictures as possible, because one day in the future some idiot would claim that it never happened...

I began to search the internet for evidence of the use of gas chambers to kill men, women and children; images, testimony, something. I found nothing - websites on the subject are blocked in the country where I'm now working. However, I found this Wiki piece about denial:

Criticism of Holocaust denial - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Perhaps someone in a country that is a bit more open than this one can find something. I have no reason to disbelieve reports and images from the time but I'm willing to listen to evidence one way or the other. mere denial is not enough.

The kilnproducer is -TOPF und SOEHNE- a company locatet in Erfurt, eastern germany.

The name of the sad product is -DOPPELMUFFELOFEN-

Originally Posted by Marmite the Dog

I know, which is why I said....

I apolgise.

Of course it was justified.

They bombed our Cathedral. The bastards.

As you were.