When one thinks of atrocities committed during the Second World War, the two most obvious
culprits that immediately come to mind are Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.
However, the allied powers, including the United States, were just as culpable in violating
international laws that they held their defeated foes in account to after the war.
Though the allies did not commit atrocities on nearly the scale that the Axis powers did
they nonetheless committed actions that if committed during any other conflict would
have severely tarnished the reputation of the fighting forces and surely brought about
criminal charges.
The main reason why so many of these crimes took decades to come to light is that even
though in the few instances there were investigations, these were typically dropped or hidden away.
This was done so as not to tarnish the reputation of the United States as they attempted to
rebuild relations with their former foes.
After all, if the international community had concrete and complete investigations of
many of these incidents it probably would have hurt the rebuilding process and made
Americans look like hypocrites in the midst of high profile war crimes trials in Germany
and Japan.
But now that there has been almost eighty years for the wounds of World War Two to heal,
local communities in Germany and Japan have been taking a more critical eye of the picture
perfect image cast in the history books as Americans being the sinless liberators.
Here are three examples of cases that took often forty or more years to come to the public
attention.
Number One: The Chenogne Massacre The Battle of the Bulge was the costliest
battle the US Army ever endured and almost won Hitler a war altering victory were it
not for the weather, bad luck, and tenacious defense of US troops.
During the opening days of the invasion, US troops were taken aback and quickly fell back
in the face of the German onslaught.
However, after the first few days, US defenses started to stiffen and inflicted incredibly
high casualties on the advancing Germans.
As a result of high casualties and seeing their last hope for a military victory dashed,
German commanders were furious and wanted revenge.
As a result, there were multiple massacres of captured American troops during the Battle
of the Bulge but the most famous was the Malmedy Massacre.
The Malmedy Massacre occurred on December 17, 1944 and was the brutal execution of 84
defenseless American prisoners of war in a field.
When US troops recaptured the area and found the survivors, word quickly spread and Americans
from Eisenhower on down to the privates were outraged.
Though top American officers never issued such orders, lower ranking officers at the
regimental level and below did in fact issue orders that no prisoners would be taken in
the counteroffensive.
Though the official US army history of the battle recounts that though some units did
in fact issue such orders, it was doubtful that they were ever carried out.
However, one unit certainly did and that unit was the 21st Armored Infantry Battalion of
the 11th Armored Division.
As part of their efforts to push the Germans out of Belgium, on New Year’s Eve 1944,
they along with another unit were tasked with clearing the village of Chenogne of Germans.
However, the attack did not go so well for them.
They were beaten back by stubborn German resistance and ferocious German artillery fire.
The unit suffered heavy casualties and was forced to dig in to await further reinforcements
at daylight.
Early the next morning on January 1, 1945 the attack resumed.
Through sheer will the Americans overcame the resistance and that is when the massacre
began.
Though the Americans were certainly looking to kill members of the Waffen-SS, the Germans
in the village were all regular army soldiers of a Panzergrenadier division.
Nevertheless, these were the first Germans they had taken prisoner since the new order
and several men in the unit elected to execute that order.
According to men who witnessed the massacre, groups of 25 to 30 Germans were led away into
the snow covered fields and shot without warning.
In total, it was estimated that 80 Germans were executed in this fashion.
Once their deeds were done, the unit moved out the next day on its push towards Germany.
Number Two: The Dachau Executions Without a doubt the scenes that greeted anyone
who witnessed a recently liberated concentration camp must have been horrible.
Decaying corpses, walking skeletons, the burning sensation of ash and fumes in the air combined
with the putrid smell of death would have made even the most hardened soldier turn white.
For troops of the battle hardened Third Battalion of the 157th Infantry Regiment of the 45th
Infantry Division, this scene was more than enough to break the discipline forged during
some many months of brutal combat.
On the morning of April 29, 1945, the unit was tasked with capturing the infamous Dachau
concentration camp.
Though not a death camp, it housed at the time approximately 40,000 half-dead prisoners
and had been the final resting place of tens of thousands of people for over the past decade.
The men expected fanatical resistance from the several hundred SS guards who would rather
die than face inevitable punishment for their crimes in the last week of the war.
After fighting through some light resistance, the men of Third Battalion reached the camp
by the late morning and were greeted with machine gun fire from some of the towers.
After these guns were silenced, it seemed as though the spirit of German resistance
in the camp was broken and those not killed in the assault were eager to escape with their
lives.
However, for some of the guards they would not do so even after they surrendered.
There are many different versions of the events that took place after the Germans had surrendered
which is probably due to the chaos and limiting individual culpability.
What is known as the most famous event of the massacre were the events surrounding the
infamous coal yard picture.
In this picture, a young American machine gunner was photographed shortly after shooting
about 16 SS guards while they stood along a wall.
Several of their comrades that survived the initial volley can be seen with their arms
still raised in surrender.
It was this photograph that helped expose the greater portion of the events that unfolded
that day.
This still unknown soldier is one of many who shot captured SS troopers that day.
According to eyewitness testimony, one soldier shot four SS men as they cowered inside of
a train car and then stepped into the car to give each man a finishing shot to the head
to make sure they were dead.
Another man allegedly shot several Germans as they came out of a guard tower with their
hands raised in surrender.
Still what was more shocking were the reprisals wrought by the former inmates on their captors
under the watchful eye of American soldiers.
Seeking their revenge, camp survivors allegedly murdered dozens more SS guards by beating
them to death with shovels and stomping them to death.
The American troops, understandably, did not intervene since they undoubtedly could not
even imagine the horrors these survivors had gone through.
Once news got out of the massacre, General Patton, who had become military governor of
Bavaria where the camp was located by this point, ordered an investigation.
This investigation, which was not released publically until 1991, detailed the flagrant
violations of international law at the hands of US troops.
However, he decided not to press charges as he did not see this as being helpful to the
US cause.
Even today, it is safe to say that though the killings themselves were illegal they
got a much better death than what their victims did.
Number Three: No Prisoner Policy April 1945 Not only did the Waffen-SS face indiscriminate
execution in the final days of World War Two, but so did the regular German army.
After US forces crossed the Rhine river in March of 1945, it was common that many units
issued their own take no prisoner orders as had been common in the aftermath of the Malmedy
Massacre in 1944.
However, the reason why many of these units issued such orders or at the very least tolerated
this kind of behavior was due to multiple factors.
The first one was the confirmed reports of concentration and death camp survivor testimony.
These reports had slowly started to filter into the mainstream media especially as the
Red Army made its advances into Poland and eastern Germany where many of these camps
were located.
US troops, who had either seen firsthand evidence or witnessed the footage, were incensed at
these atrocities and vowed to punish those responsible.
Another contributing factor to the take no prisoner attitude in March and April 1945
was the fact that in the American point of view the war was over and those still fighting
were those most guilty of war crimes who were seeking to avoid punishment.
Therefore, if they encountered any sort of resistance, especially in the face of their
inevitable defeat, it was assumed that those resisting must be SS or guilty of some sort
of crime who would rather die in battle than face justice.
Though many SS troopers and similar guilty parties did just that there were in fact large
numbers of regular German troops in the field who did resist only because of the lies fed
to them by their government.
It was this tenacious resistance in the waning weeks of World War Two in Europe that would
be their downfall.
Atrocities committed by individuals were commonplace, famed historian Stephen Ambrose claimed of
the 1000 veterans he interviewed one-third said they saw executions take place, these
countless murders were embodied in large scale shootings in places like Jungholzhausen and
Treseburg.
During the battle for Jungholzhausen on April 15, 1945, the men of the 254th Infantry regiment
suffered heavy casualties.
Though this was a combined action by the regular German army and Waffen-SS, the army soldiers
were eager to surrender as reported by the local townspeople.
However, it seems as though because of the heavy casualties inflicted by the SS, the
surrendering soldiers were treated just the same.
In one of the most notable instances of the massacre, thirteen German soldiers who had
dug a trench behind a barn surrendered as soon as they saw the Americans.
However, when the farmer’s son went to check on them the morning after the battle he found
all thirteen men were killed with a shot to the back of their neck while on their knees.
Yet another villager witnessed an American soldier gun down four captured SS men when
he told them to run away from him.
Several other witnesses came forward that they were ordered to dig a mass grave for
the victims, which numbered around 30.
In the town of Treseburg on April 19, 1945, a similar yet sadder story unfolded.
Members of the 18th Infantry Regiment of the 1st Infantry Division took very heavy casualties
in the battle to take Treseburg with around 60 Americans confirmed being killed, including
a battalion commander who the Americans claimed was shot by a sniper wearing civilian clothes.
As a result, the Americans were incensed and wanted to take revenge.
They found their opportunity when they stumbled upon a group of ten Hitler Youth sent to the
area.
According to local historians, these young boys all around the age of 14 had just graduated
infantry training at a nearby camp and were ordered to the frontline.
As they were making their way forward, they were surprised and captured by the Americans
on the road.
One of the boys managed to run away and hid thus providing testimony for the villagers
to reclaim the bodies of the boys after the American troops shot them.
Soon after, the villagers had the boys buried with several German soldiers killed in action
and in 1951 had them exhumed to prove their murder with the medical examiner confirming
each boy had been shot in the back of the neck.
These three crimes are just a highlight of the violations of international law committed
by US forces during World War Two.
Unfortunately, the US military was not very interested in investigating and much less
prosecuting war crimes either during or after the war.
In fact, most of the records and testimony actually come from sources outside the United
States like the German Army War Crimes Bureau that investigated reports of crimes against
Germans by the allies.
Unfortunately, there are undoubtedly untold stories of more crimes committed by US forces
that may never see the light of day but hopefully further scholarship in this area will set
the record straight that not all Americans who served in World War Two did so with honor.