Inspired by the Japanese invasion of China. Anyway so here is the deal. You have your country and it is a peaceful country. Another country near you has 1 Emperor, 10 Commanders, 100 citizens. Total 111 people. The Emperor for some reason wanted to attack your village that has 10000 citizens and torture/murder them in most sadistic and brutal ways possible. So you are unaware of his attack while he attacked your village and tortured/killed everyone in it. When you got informed about attack your army neutralized whole enemy army and took them into custody(None of enemies died). Here is how their attack went. Emperor told Commanders to order soldiers to torture villagers to death if they will disobey they will be tortured to death some captains were evil like emperor but others obey orders cause feared torture and death. Every captain got 10 citizens who were turn into soldiers cause of upcoming war. Every commander told every soldier that he must go in the village and torture everyone to death or he will be tortured to death by his soldiers/commanders. Some soldiers were evil like Emperor others did like commander said cause of fear/thought it was right cause was stupid and fought for his country. So what punishment you would give to those Soldiers, Commanders, Emperor? You don't know which ones of them followed orders by evil or by fear but you know that everyone one of them followed orders from their higher command and participated in the slaughter.
Independent of whatever threat looms over them, civilized people have a conscience and would not follow orders if they felt those orders were inhumane, So they are all equally guilty in my eyes. As punishment, put them together in a large room, providing only water, and invite them to punish each other. Eventually they will die of starvation, or they may eat each other.
So you admonish those people for following their orders to carry out atrocities.... and pick out a form of physical and mental torture as punishment? I'm pro death penalty, but I wouldn't execute them via starvation or random brutal murder. You're even forcing cannibalism if they do want to live in that hell room you've set up. Jazzy my dear, are you some sort of sociopath? I may be in love. <3 Anyways, I agree that the Nuremberg defense doesn't hold water. Here's a much more humane way to take care of of the prisoners.
Such is the nature of all punishment and retaliation. When people in authoritarian positions commit crimes, they tend to weigh up what is gained from the crime vs what is lost from the punishment received. Examples: -- A fine might be affordable if a crime is profitable. -- An illegal war can be worth the punishment if it seizes control of a valuable resource for a nation for decades to come. -- An assassin might sacrifice their own life facing torture and interrogation for years to come, but if they've taken out someone much more powerful than themselves from an opposing faction, to the long term benefit his/her allies, then they may feel it is worth it. Only when punishments are in line with the crime committed do the scales balance in such a way that the crime isn't worth the punishment. And that's how it should be. When the crime is shocking, the punishment needs to be as shocking as the crime.
Exactly, you'd just let your prisoners languish in prison for years, then execute them. And you call that humane? Okay… That sounds even more extreme than "an eye for an eye". Glad you’re not MY dictator!
I'll admit it's similar to the eye for an eye. But most people wouldn't go the extreme of murdering 10000 people in a village! Do take that into consideration. If you only stole some food from a shop, an appropriate punishment under my rule might be to incarcerate you for a week and feed you really basic rations. You steal food, you lose the pleasure of food. That sounds fairer to me than the $1000 fine + cost of item + legal costs, that some jurisdictions do enforce.
I would shoot all of them. I would not torture them or anything. Just kill them instantly. If you torture them it will not undo what they done and it wouldn't make me happy either. Also when you start doing brutal stuff you start becoming like they are which must not happen. The Emperor is the one who started whole thing but others are just as guilty as him cause they were part of it. For example soldiers of Hitler. They thought they fought for their country when in fact they were power of Hitler. Who would Hitler be without soldiers? Just crazy angry man with no power. Hitler had the evil idea but soldiers enforce the evil idea so the soldiers are just as guilty if not worse. Or the american airforce that dropped Agent Orange on the villages of Vietnam which causes mutants to be born for generations to come. One man gave order and other people followed it. They are all guilty. No matter if they followed out of fear or by their will you don't punish people for what they wanted to do or why they did it. You do it for what they did. Also after war they can't do bad things they did so you might as well let them go but it would be weird to let them live in society after all the bad things they done. Keeping them in prison is bad idea because you waste a lot of space and food which can go to poor people. You never know if rehab works or not. Can't take those risks. So shooting them is best idea.
Execute the Emperor and Commanders. Rehabiliate the soldiers, they are just poor people who were threatened/brainwashed into serving the emperor's interests.
Agree with Overmind. Soldiers do not think, they are tools. They do not ponder the moral implications of their orders, they follow their orders to survive. If you hold a gun to someone's head and order them to rob an old lady, who is the guilty party?
