Should Old Veterans Forgive Their Former Enemies?

[4th wilts]

cant put down how i feel.

[soldierboy_425]

my opinion on the matter ( from a historian and soldier ) is that once one sets out to point the finger one will find the answer is much more complex than to simply point the finger at germany. russia had the forced labor camps wich were larger in numbers of camps , numbers of dead and were in opporation long before and long after ww2 . and we fought with the russians. further more we as americans are not as honorable, and just as historical propiganda would have you beleave. the A bombs for example were dropped in civilian locations with high surounding mountains to maximize the bombs effect... instead of a military base/fort. look back furthere with the buffelo, Ive seen a photo of a stack of buffelo hids 6 feet tall and Id say 3/4 of a mile long this extensive hunting killed a huge number of native americans, were talkin borderline geniside. and even further back with the trail of tears. rip thousands of people out of there home make them walk a thousand miles to a reservation in the desert.
all and all in my oppinion, shit happens. you can dwell on it or you can lern from it, and help make a better future for us all. to finish up my little novel, if you hate a man for hating than you are not better than he.

[soldierboy_425]

my opinion on the matter ( from a historian and soldier ) is that once one sets out to point the finger one will find the answer is much more complex than to simply point the finger at germany. russia had the forced labor camps wich were larger in numbers of camps , numbers of dead and were in opporation long before and long after ww2 . and we fought with the russians. further more we as americans are not as honorable, and just as historical propiganda would have you beleave. the A bombs for example were dropped in civilian locations with high surounding mountains to maximize the bombs effect... instead of a military base/fort. look back furthere with the buffalo, Ive seen a photo of a stack of buffalo hids 6 feet tall and Id say 3/4 of a mile long this extensive hunting killed a huge number of native americans who relied on buffalo hides, meat and bones , were talkin borderline geniside. and even further back with the trail of tears. rip thousands of people out of there home make them walk a thousand miles to a reservation in the desert, were the was no shelter, no water, and no food
all and all in my oppinion, sh*t happens. you can dwell on it or you can lern from it, and help make a better future for us all. to finish up my little novel, if you hate a man for hating than you are not better than he.

[jason taylor]

Several things must be said.

One is I did not live then so I cannot forgive them for anything except an insult. I am a Philo-semite and a Christian and the Nazis are in the first case insulting my aesthetic judgement and in the second place my religion as it was founded by a Jewish carpenter's son. They were also loathsome bullies and there are few vices I dislike more. Calling my forgiveness cheap is going to far-it would certainly be a serious matter if I did not possess it(for reasons I will give). However it is easier.

I think forgiveness is mandatory and I am religiously obligated to believe that. However it is easier for some and for me to make a bother about it in people who have been in worse situations then me would be garrittrooperish.

One must recognise what forgiveness is. Forgiveness is not denial of justice, it is the trancendance of it. To forgive a Nazi because you really don't think he was all that bad a chap, is not forgiveness it is lack of moral seriousness. Nor is forgiveness in the perogative of the state as the state is there for the purpose of enforcing justice. The state can show magnanimity at times but not forgiveness(I shall have to think more about the difference, but I think there is a difference). To forgive is to deny one's own desire for vengeance. Also to remember that the fact that someone becomes evil is itself a tragedy independant of what he did in the process.

It is sometimes said that it is impudant to forgive what has been done to another. The problem is that no crime is really done to one single person. World War II was not one hundred million random muggings. Every bit of evil done specifically to someone rippled out. Especially as those crimes were often done to people as representatives of a group. It is odd for people to claim that they can feel hatred on behalf of people but not to forgive. And I certainly have the right to forgive what was done to me by reflection.

As I said I am not a veteran, though I have known several. Indeed several I am related to even though I don't really think of my family as a Southern-style "warrior dynasty". But that has left me curiously untouched. Perhaps because I have always considered it rude to open conversation with a vet who hadn't initiated it. Most of what I know about the war has come to me from what I read and that has affected me quite a bit vicariously.
In any case this is a different perspective, and I hope none find it presumptuous. But my main point is that while I theoretically think every individual is obligated to forgive, I stress that that is an abstraction. Going beyond saying that is an individual's concern.

[Ron Goldstein]

Should old veterans forgive their enemies?

On stumbling across this old thread I made the initial mistake of thinking that its purpose was to actually ask only the veterans themselves what they felt about “forgiveness”.

As actual veterans on this site can be counted on the fingers of one hand I then thought “this is going to be a short thread !”.

Eventually I realised the thread had developed into a general free for all in which all categories of members were being invited to give their views on the subject and so I now think I should also put in my two-pennies worth.

Forgiveness ? ….. we need to define terms and so I went to Wipikedia for the “common man’s” understanding of “Forgiveness” which goes as follows.

“Forgiveness is the mental, and/or spiritual process of ceasing to feel resentment indignation, anger against another person for a perceived offense, difference or mistake, or ceasing to demand “

Fair enough, that’s as good a definition as any.

I then moved on to GOOGLE and asked a more specific question
“ Can a Jew forgive the Nazis?” for which I received 27,800 hits.
I will need to come back to these links.

I then looked at Sapper’s emotive responses (those that are still there!) no ambiguity there, Brian will never forgive those who chose to burn the church at Oradour-Sur-Glane and I for one cannot blame him.
The characters that were responsible for this particular atrocity, at any level, can and should never be forgiven.

I finally went to my library shelves and re-looked at Len Baynes “Kept-The Other Side of Tenko” which is all about his shocking existence as a wartime prisoner of the Japanese.

In the e-mail correspondence I have had with him over the years he has been at great pains to try to explain, to an un-comprehending me, why he has completely forgiven his enemies, this from a man who was near death many a time in those terrible years.

So, there are lot’s of opinions as to whether or nor we should forgive our enemies and I’ve kept my own feelings till last.

I cannot, and never will , forgive anyone who knowingly caused to suffer or took the lives of innocent people, for whatever reason.

That’s simple enough for me.

Ron Goldstein

An old veteran

[Gage]

This is so subjective. It depends on the person and what they've experienced.
How could anybody forgive the Russians for the rape of so many German women?
How can you forgive the Holocaust?
How can you forgive the Goebbels for infanticide?
The list is endless........................................... .........................
Nobody wins in war.

[sapper]

Thanks for that Ron my old mate!
I find it difficult to conjure with the idea of forgiving a nation that was responsible for the deaths of 60 million souls! The murders, the tortures.,The gratuitous violence just for the sake of it.

The Concentration camps, and death camps. The murder in cold blood of our men when they captured them in Normandy. Unforgivable. the almost never ending atrocities Orador, Lidisce (Spelling) Tule (again) the names are endless. And so are the atrocities...
All that I hope for? is what I posted before, that those responsible for burning women and little children alive will have to listen to the pitiful screams of little children in agony as their flesh melted. That they will be forced to listen to those sounds... for all eternity. For they were EVIL.
Sapper

[BulgarianSoldier]

I don't think that the germans pray for forgivness anyway.They are on the other side of the front, for them you were the one who are bad.They just done the thing that they are ordered to do, fight for the fatherland, and kill for the fatherland, war is a bad thing.

Dani

[Trincomalee]

When my father revisited the Kwai bridge in 1989 he was asked why he didn't hate the Japanese who were also visiting . He said that they were the grandchildren of the men he had encountered .
He seemed to differentiate between Japanese soldiers who were "fair" in their treatment , and those who were vicious and dangerous .
It was as though , after the war , he ddn't want to waste any more of his life on these experiences .
I don't know whether he forgave . He certainly read and watched anything available on the subject . He drove Japanese cars . He seemed in some way to have detached from bitterness , which was probably healthier for him , but whether that amounted to forgieness ...

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by adrian roberts

...If the cause be wrong, our obedience to the King writes the crime of it out of us/
But if the cause be not good the King himself hath a heavy reckoning to make......
......Every subject's duty is the King's, but every subject's soul is his own

Shakespeare, Henry V, Act IV Scene I (the night before Agincourt)

Discuss (I'm not saying Will S has to be right)

Adrian

This has to be short as I have to get ready to go. Hopefully I can do better latter.

I would say a soldier is responsible for what he has an ability to be responsible for.
It is in the nature of every state that it needs coercive power. As even a tyrannical regime serves the necessary purpose of doing justice and protecting the weak("the police of this land are theives but at least they allow no competition"-Kim, Rudyard Kipling), it is not necessarily wrong to serve such a regime in this capacity. But it can become so. And it is often safest to avoid what one can in such circumstances.
A soldier is seldom told blatantly that he is fighting unjustly. And his limited knowledge of the situation allows him no way of judging it. And in most circumstances it is better to obey as the obedience of those who bear arms to society is usually more important then the possibility that he might be fighting unjustly. However a soldier can tell if a specific order is wrong. For instance a German soldier may not be able to tell that it is wrong to attack Russia. He should know at least that it is wrong to shoot Russian children out of hand.
Being a soldier is like being a lawyer. A lawyer is obliged to assume his client is right in the absence of proof to the contrary. However if such proof does arrive problems do arrive. As that seldom happens, Shakespeare was partially right-but only partially.