The execution of Anton Dostler is of utmost importance to those trying to understand ww2 as it set up the precedent necessary in order to accept uncorroborated hearsay as the evidence necessary to prove guilt later on at Nuremberg.
What happened:
United States O.S.S. (equivalent to CIA today) troops (13 enlisted men and two officers) had landed in Northern Italy far behind German lines. They were NOT in uniform, Dostler claimed, but were disguised as Italian civilians. Their mission was to bomb the access routes in the mountains between Austria and Italy, in order to cut off supplies to German troops. They were captured by the German troops in a brigade commanded by German Brigadier General Almers. The Germans at first thought that they were Italian civilian saboteurs (the disguise succeeded). Report of the capture was sent to the headquarters of General Dostler. Dostler ordered that they be executed, at which point the captured soldiers revealed that they were in fact Americans. This fact was eventually established by a German intelligence unit. Dostler then withdrew his order of execution and informed his superior, General Albert Kesselring, commanding general of all German forces in southeast Europe. Anton Dostler's adjutant officer reported to him that Kesselring, in response, had instead ordered the soldiers to be executed. Dostler told his adjutant to inform General Almers of Kesselring's decision, and Almers then carried out the execution.
By international convention, captured soldiers are beneficiaries of all of the provisions pertaining to prisoners of war provided they are dressed in uniform and can be easily recognised as "enemy combatants." If they are not so dressed, or disguised in their enemy's uniform, their protection under the convention is not assured.
This presented an enormous dilemma to the legal officers charged with the case. For months, the Roosevelt administration in Washington, D.C., assisted especially by Mr. Henry Luce of Time-Life magazines, had been promising the American people that "not a single German officer guilty of war crimes would be set free." Obviously, should the first German officer tried in an allied war trial be exonerated and released, it would be an embarrassment for the Roosevelt administration.
"Lacking standard evidence, hearsay will be accepted as evidence in the trial." This decision established a precedent for the subsequent war trials in Nuremberg. Thus General Dostler was convicted on the "hearsay" testimony of a turned-informant in U.S. custody, otherwise unverifiable, asserting that the captured troops had been in uniform, and that Dostler had directly issued the order. General Dostler was executed by a firing squad on 12 October 1945. It was an ashen-faced prosecuting officer who presented Washington's response to Kent Emery (Dostler's defense attorney) with this comment: "Hope to God we never lose a war." Both officers understood the dangerous consequences of the precedent just set in their trial: Captured soldiers could now be tried according to a very low standard of evidence; after the fact, soldiers were liable to be found guilty for carrying out the orders of their superior commanders, as all soldiers are required to do; an ancient maxim would now apply, "Justice is what the Winners say it is."
Letter from Kent Emery, Jr. (The son of Dostler's US trial defence attorney):
>As a college student in the late 1920s, my father, Cecil Kent Emery, served in the Reserve Officers Training Corps (R.O.T.C.), receiving his commission as an officer in the U.S. Army Reserves upon graduation. He married my mother at the beginning of the Great Depression; throughout the Depression my mother and he lived with her parents. A few months before the attack on Pearl Harbor, my father formed a new law firm with two other lawyers, each of whom died before the war was over (one in combat, the other in an automobile accident). On the day itself of the Pearl Harbor attack, my father was moving into his and my mother's first home. That afternoon he received the call summoning him to serve as an officer in World War II. My father was then 37 years old, called to serve at such an advanced age because of his training in R.O.T.C. and his commission in the reserves.
>My father was first commissioned in the Second Division of the U.S. Cavalry, which fought in the North African campaign. With the Fifth Army troops he landed in Italy at the Anzio beachhead, where he survived that great battle. Thereafter he was part of the allied occupation forces in Italy, until they reached Rome. At that point, as an experienced attorney, he was transferred to the Judge Advocates Office of the U.S. Army. Soon afterwards he was given a grave assignment that affected his understanding for the rest of his life: he was appointed as the defense counsel for the German four-star general, General Anton Dostler, in the first allied war trial in World War II, which took place in the Palace of Justice at Rome, 8-10 October 1945. That trial, for better or worse, was also intended to establish precedents for the war trials that would follow in Nuremberg.
>According to an international convention, captured soldiers are beneficiaries of all of the provisions pertaining to prisoners of war provided they are dressed in uniform and are therefore recognizable as "enemy combatants." If they are not so dressed, or disguised in their enemy's uniform, their protection under the convention is not assured. The Bush administration has appealed to this particular convention, among others, concerning the al-Qaeda suspects captured in Afghanistan, who were not in the uniform of regular forces, and who have not been afforded any of the regular rights established for prisoners of war by the Geneva Convention.
>Here is the event for which General Dostler, an officer in the regular German army and not of any Nazi "special forces," was tried. United States O.S.S. troops (13 enlisted men and two officers) had landed in Northern Italy far behind German lines. They were not in uniform, Dostler claimed, but were disguised as Italian civilians. Their mission was to bomb the access routes in the mountains between Austria and Italy, in order to cut off supplies to German troops. They were captured by the German troops in a brigade commanded by German Brigadier General Almers. The Germans at first thought that they were Italian civilian saboteurs (the disguise succeeded). Report of the capture was sent to the headquarters of General Dostler. Dostler ordered that they be executed, at which point the captured soldiers revealed that they were in fact Americans. This fact was eventually established by a German intelligence unit. Dostler then withdrew his order of execution and informed his superior, General Albert Kesselring, commanding general of all German forces in southeast Europe. Dostler's adjutant officer reported to him that Kesselring, in response, had instead ordered the soldiers to be executed. Dostler told his adjutant to inform General Almers of Kesselring's decision, and Almers then carried out the execution.
>At the end of the War, the captive General Dostler was accused of carrying out an "illegal order" in this affair. Dostler maintained that he did not issue the order, but only told his adjutant to inform General Almers of the supreme commander's order.
>As should be evident, there were several legal weaknesses in the case against Dostler. First, it was not clear that executing captured enemy soldiers disguised by not being in uniform violated any convention pertaining to prisoners of war. Second, it could not be established that Dostler had in fact issued the order of execution. Indeed, the prosecutor, my father and other legal advisors involved in the case determined that the charges against Dostler would need to be dropped for lack of evidence, according to the standard rules of evidence in the law, which pertained as well in the Military Code until that time. This presented an enormous dilemma to the legal officers charged with the case. For months, the Roosevelt administration in Washington, D.C., assisted especially by Mr. Henry Luce of Time-Life magazines, had been promising the American people that "not a single German officer guilty of war crimes would be set free." Obviously, should the first German officer tried in an allied war trial be exonerated and released, it would be an embarrassment for the Roosevelt administration.
>For that reason, the prosecutor and my father sent a wire to Washington, informing the administration of the situation. Shortly thereafter, the prosecuting officer received the reply: "Lacking standard evidence, hearsay will be accepted as evidence in the trial." This decision established a precedent for the subsequent war trials in Nuremberg. Thus General Dostler was convicted on the "hearsay" testimony of a turned-informant in U.S. custody, otherwise unverifiable, asserting that the captured troops had been in uniform, and that Dostler had directly issued the order. General Dostler was executed by a firing squad on 12 October 1945.
>It was an ashen-faced prosecuting officer who presented Washington's response to my father, with this comment: "Hope to God we never lose a war." Both officers understood the dangerous consequences of the precedent just set in their trial: Captured soldiers could now be tried according to a very low standard of evidence; after the fact, soldiers were liable to be found guilty for carrying out the orders of their superior commanders, as all soldiers are required to do; an ancient maxim would now apply, "Justice is what the Winners say it is." Hope to God we never lose a war.
>Whatever the actual truth in this murky affair, two things are clear: the lawyers involved in the case originally judged that there was insufficient evidence for convicting General Dostler, according to the normal canons of evidence; however evasive or passive he may have been in doing so, General Dostler obeyed the order of his superior officer. Are we expected to believe that officers in the U.S. military are encouraged to disobey the orders of their superiors whenever they think that the command is morally dubious?
>After further service in preparing war trials, my father, seemingly trusted by his commanding officers, was sent to Romania, where he was charged with extracting a woman spy who had served the Russians and Americans during the war, but whom American officials were now worried would fall into the hands of our new Communist enemy. Having successfully completed that mission, my father finally returned home in late 1946 (or early 1947). He entered the war as a first lieutenant, exited as a major, was soon promoted to colonel in the reserves, and just before retiring from his reserve service in the National Guard was proposed for promotion to one-star general. Above all, however, as a civilian my father was a man of law. He often said to me: "Son, the American political experiment is extremely volatile. The nation brings together people from every corner of the globe, with different historical experiences, different (sometimes contrary) religions, different understandings of what is honorable and dishonorable, etc. The only thing that binds us together is the willingness on the part of each to abide by a rule of law." Precisely according to that principle, until the end of his life he was deeply disturbed about the dark implications of the trial of General Anton Dostler.
The difference is that one was fighting the international jew and tried to free europe from the cancer the allies were simply tricked into fighting their brothers.
Fucking idiot Dostler was...he was dead either way. If the Russians captured him or the US got him. He did enough shit to get himself killed regardless of this incident. He should have took the only proper way out
Yup. War was goinf to be declared on germany for nationalizing the banks and making a new economy a lot of shit wad inevitinel1.
Joshua Gutierrez
Bump
Carson Howard
Bump
Brandon Carter
But how did they find this shit out in the first place? Said Americans were found, and executed while in disguise. Sure the allies might ask "hey why didn't we receive any contact from our covert unit" but how'd they determine all that happened? Snitch?
Read up on the False Flag at the 1940 World’s Fair. We should have sent the 8th Air Force to bomb London.
Angel Hughes
There’s no question we quit taking SS prisoner after Malmedy. My uncle told me a guy in his platoon was sent to the rear with some SS prisoners and handed a Thompson to “guard” them. He was told “be back in half an hour.” HQ was two hours away. He was back in half an hour.
Blake Cook
only normies think otherwise
Elijah Price
not finding anything about a false flag or even an incident at the 1940 worlds fair.
I don’t get it. Roosevelt died in April, 1945... before VE Day. > This presented an enormous dilemma to the legal officers charged with the case. For months, the Roosevelt administration in Washington, D.C., assisted especially by Mr. Henry Luce of Time-Life magazines, had been promising the American people that "not a single German officer guilty of war crimes would be set free."
Jayden Gonzalez
>Only the Allies were evil. This is demonstrable, at this point. You’re rather simpleminded, fren.
Owen Russell
It was still his government. Truman was just taking over.
Gavin Reed
>Nuremberg was a shit show, a drumhead court-martial, they beat the living fuck out of them to reach confessions etc. If they didn't confess to whatever the narrative was or even if they had 0 proofs they executed them anyway.
Brayden Nelson
True. But Truman was VP and immediately became President.
Dylan Gonzalez
At least the "good guys" are finally getting what they fought for.
Civilians engaging in sabotage makes them partisans.
Ayden Rodriguez
I watched the Hellstorm documentary tonight. We've been lied to for 70-odd years. Thank God, the true history of this period in history is finally coming out
Well its not like they have an option to wear a uniform
Tyler Jones
Doesn't matter.
Easton Wood
I suggest you watch Hellstorm and read about Other Losses to learn how Eisenhower used little semantic tricks like calling german pows as "disarmed enemy forces" in order to avoid having to treat them as pows under the Geneva convention and be considered a war criminal, effectively starving them to death just for kicks if he was a German he would hang in Nuremberg for sure instead he gets called a hero.
Nathaniel Phillips
Bump fuck burgers, eternal anglos, ivans, and more than any of the mentioned, jews. Jews shall be skinned alive in front of their families and let them have children so they also can get tortured. No amount of jews suffering and dying will recover the wounds they caused, but it'll satiate the thirst for revenge
Brayden Peterson
What is seldom if ever acknowledged is that if it wasn't for the Nazis the Bolsheviks would of taken the whole of Europe and the bloodbath would of made WW2 look like a tea party >even in defeat Hitler saved Europe
