Hello my question is at the Nuremberg Trials did'nt the Nazi

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Hello my question is at the Nuremberg Trials did'nt the Nazi War Criminals defend themselves by saying they were just following Orders therefor they were not Guilty of Genocide why is following orders not an excuse ? Is it because humans have freewill did the Nuremberg Trials Judges/Courts say this ? Also if low rank Soldiers commit war crimes and or genocide because their military offiers and or generals or heads of state give them these orders to commit murder can these soldiers if taken to court say they were just following orders as an excuse defense to defend themselves ?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superior_orders

The Nuremberg Trials were more a show trial than an actual trial. The laws were basically made up as they went.

What do you think would happen to people in Nazi Germany if they did not follow orders? Even without the threat of imprisonment/torture/death, people tend to follow orders by authority figures. Look up the Milgram experiment that took place in the early 60s.

Does that excuse their actions? I really don't know how I feel about that but I think it explains them.

Well they do hold some part of the collective guilt, some restitution is in order. I'm not for punishing them but they should serve out 10 years in something like the national guard to protect and keep the peace or be some part of a peace corps that same amount of time, or something of the like. Even if you weren't part of the military, it should apply to you, especially everyone 40 or under. Those who gave orders higher up the command should be tortured and publicly hanged. If you committed war crimes that were not orders given, and are caught, you should have the same fate.

American soldiers take an oath to defend the Constitution and obey the orders of the officers appointed over them. However, a soldier is not obligated to follow an illegal order from an officer. Illegal orders are orders to commit murder, torture, steal, and other such illegal acts.

If they accepted it, no one would have been punished

Actually, I remember that at Yalta, Roosevelt and Churchill wanted the chief Nazi rulers shot on capture. It was Stalin who wanted a trial. And in Stalin's trials, there are no acquittals.

As a matter of fact, Andrei Vishinsky was chief prosecutor at Nuremberg and at all three Moscow Trials.

The Court at Nuremberg decided following orders was not a sufficient excuse.

ruveyn

There were cases such as the Einsatzgruppen where people could choose not to participate in shooting duties. We're talking about over a million people shot by people who effectively were volunteers here. Contrast this with someone like John Demjanjuk who was never left alone after his conviction for gassing people at Treblinka was overturned, they then said he was a guard at Sobibor, but even had he been so, he was a Soviet prisoner of war. The life expectancy of a Soviet prisoner of war in Nazi hands was not long at all. Had he not done what the Nazis wanted he surely would have died. They should have left him alone.

While this sounds good in theory, its not a great position to be in if you're given an order which you believe to be illegal, because if you refuse to carry it out then at best you're looking a court-martial where you'll be second guessed and if they don't agree with you that it was illegal, you'll be suffering the consequences.

If the defence of "following orders" was accepted uncritically, then it would have meant that the only person who could have been held accountable killed himself in the bunker.

Hitler was not the Nazi Jesus--dying to wash away the sins of his followers. There were countless many whose actions went beyond what was lawful, even in a time of war--most particularly those whose actions were directed against civilians.

The Nuremburg trials were held between Nov. 20, 1945 and Oct. 01, 1946. That's 66 years ago.

... a little late to drum up support for an appeal...

The victors of any war choose the rules and write the history books.
One day it will be the bully boy USA's turn.

Were it not for the "Bully Boy", most of Europe would be goose-stepping to Deutsch classes ... or the showers ...

The much more relevant question is how the legal principles enunciated at Nuremberg apply to soldiers and civilians engaged in combat today.

The United States has chosen to view Al Qaeda as an organization outside the laws of war, and its members as unprotected by the Geneva Conventions. All well and good. However, if these individuals are not soldiers, then what is the culpability that attaches to military personnel who are engaged in policing activities in places like Afghanistan? If these aren't soldiers in an enemy force, then the rules of war do not apply.

While in the jurisdiction of the United States, it is clear that minimal culpability attaches, unless personnel have gone beyond the scope of their lawfully issued orders. But what of a US verteran of Iraq or Afghanistan who travels to other jurisdictions whose legal systems might not recognize the legality of some of the operations?

This is a real and meaningful legal question for thousands of people, not least of whom are the officers of field rank and above. And neither is it restricted to the United States' military personnel.

Many of the Nazis tried at Nuremberg were found "guilty by association", meaning that they did not commit the actual crime but were guilty in letting it happen.

The precedent established by the Nuremberg trials is that following orders is not a legal defense for war crimes. In other words, insubordination, whatever its consequences, is preferable to committing a war crime.

It should be remembered, not everyone on trial at Nuremberg was convicted. There were some acquittals, as there was not enough evidence, or it was found the defendants in question were innocent.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer