The thread regarding the Bali Bombers, along with a story I heard today, made me want to ask a question, what would you have done.

I am strongly against Capital Punishment, so this probably led to the question.

There was a story of a British soldier in WWI. He was wounded on No Man's Land, not to far from him was a German soldier who was even more wounded than him and had no rifle. This British soldier rose his rifle to take the kill but chose not to since he felt he had an unfair advantage if he killed him since he had no rifle.

As the ferocious battle wound down and enemy troops surrendered or retreated a wounded German soldier limped out of the maelstrom and into Private Tandey's line of fire, the battle weary man never raised his rifle and just stared at Tandey resigned to the inevitable. "I took aim but couldn't shoot a wounded man," said Tandey, "so I let him go." [2]

The supposedly escaping soldier turned out to be Adolf Hitler.

The diversity in the two storeys suggest contrivance, but that is not the point, the question is, what would you have done?

Moss

This is an intresting question as there was a different 'war ethic' back then. When the battle raged it was valid to shoot to kill, however, when the battle was over it would be unethical to shoot at the medical people out retrieving the dead and woulded. War technology had moved on but not the war practicalities of two opposing forces advancing on each other across a battle field. Hence the huge casualties as the offensive line got mown down by machine guns in the defending trenches. Then they'd swap sides on the defending force became the offending force - adnauseum!

Oh i really dont like these moral dilemma questions..but thing is..how did anyone know what Hitler was capable of at that time? If you knew what was going to happen, then thats different. Thankfully I have never had the responsibility of killing for my country, or even had to face killing someone in self-defense, or in any circumstance. But, if i was faced with the same scenario, I would undoubtedly let him go also (or, if an option, take him hostage..but that would probably be impractical). I couldnt live with myself having killed a man like that. How I would feel later on, knowing I let go a man who would destroy so much, is another matter. Terrible situation to find yourself in, thats for sure.

Similar to " Saving Private Ryan "

The good guy who let the enemy go , lives to regret it after the same guy kills his friends.

When war is declared unless the flag of truce is raised on the battlefield, duty kicks in to kill the enemy before the enemy kills you ( now or later )

Sounds good, but the basic decency of human nature kicks in and such incidents will happen The question what would you do ( or I ) really depends on the circumstance. If I would have been one of the first into Auschwitz, no wounded guard would have escaped my attention. On a battlefield where the conventions of war were upheld, with a modicum of respect given to each side, different story.

There are many instances of Allied troops summarily executing concentration camp guards on the spot.

Unfortunately most of the original guards had fled and the camps were being guarded by old men and boys from local militia units who had played no part in the atrocities.

Fighter pilots often killed enemy airmen parachuting from shot down planes over enemy territory on the grounds that they would only have to fight them again.

Very few troops seem to take prisoners in the heat of battle; also many military historians say that the "myth" of Japanese soldiers preferring to die rather than surrender was based on the reality that they were rarely given the opportunity to do so.

Not many old German men on the Dutch/German border, I wonder why ?

On the other hand, if you had lived through the trenches in WWI, or some or the more fierce battles in WWII (Band of Brothers) perhaps you would be so jaded by death, killing and violence that the human part no longer functions as it does in you or I.

Perhaps it would be all too easy to have killed both in the examples given above.

Hindsight being 20/20 (i.e. looking back and deciding what should have, or could have, been done is always easier when you have the luxury of being able to review all the known facts, at leisure, long after the fact).

Should that soldier have killed the young Adolph ? Of course, we can all sit back now and say definitely Yes !

But at that time, place and situation, the answer (to the soldier in question) was obviously No.

He had no way of knowing what that person would turn out to be like, or the horrific deeds that would be done on his orders.

Tomorrow, as you go about your regular routine, think about all the people you see during the day. Which of them should be killed in order to prevent another Hitler ? At the end of the day you will most likely conclude that none of them should be killed for the future good of mankind.

Scroll ahead 5, 10, 20 years, and find out that one of those same people got their hands on a nuclear device and destroyed London or LA or Bangkok in an act of terrorism. After the fact, people will say the same thing. "If only someone had killed that person years earlier !"

How could you have possibly known at the time what that person would end up doing some time in the future ?

Most of us would like to believe that, in a kill-or-be-killed situation, we would take the moral high ground and not kill a wounded or vanquished enemy. Some may actually be able to stick to those morals. Those that sit far from danger, but control the lives of those in danger, often assign unrealistic expectations to the people doing their bidding. It's easy to sit in your comfy chair, in your nice office, far from the mud, blood and tears, and expect others to live up to certain standards.

Much harder to do when for weeks, months or even years, you've been living with the fear of death daily, watching your friends die, living in conditions that make slums look like mansions. Knowing that your only chance of possibly surviving is to kill "them" before they kill you.

Some people are able to stick to their principles. Some crack under the stress. Some allow the situation to control them, with results that most of us would consider abhorrent.

It is said that you can't judge a man until you've walked a mile in his shoes. In Western countries, you have the right to be judged by a jury of your peers (most western countries I think).

Yet how do you judge someone unless you've "been there and done that" yourself (i.e. walked in their shoes) ? Unless you've spent weeks in the same conditions, living with the same fears, facing the same dangers, how can you possibly know what it was like for the person being judged at the time.

For example. At the end of a peace-keeping mission in Croatia (spring of '93), the military sent some senior psychologists out to "council" us on what to expect when we returned home. They started into their spiel and then one of the soldiers (not me) asked them if they (the psychologists) had ever had to deal with a family of 8, machine-gunned to death in their vehicle. Or a family that had been burned to death while they slept in their home. Or a comrade that, after returning from a patrol, decided to pull the pin on a grenade and stuff it under his bullet-proof vest.

The psychologist's answer was of course that they had never personally had to deal with anything like that. The soldiers response was "Then how could you possibly know what it has been like for us that have experienced those things ?". Their response was "We've read books about it !"

(Everyone pretty much tuned them out after that.)

There is no easy answer, as every situation will be different, just as every person involved is different. No one can know what they would do in a given situation, until it happens. We may like to think that we will do "the right thing" when the time comes, but you won't know for sure until then.

Thanks for the responses, some interesting view points, considering it was just a personal muse regarding the Bali bombers, my personal disaproval of the death penalty and a story of compassion I had heard that day.

First off, the question was couched deliberately ambiguously, because no one can administer hindsight, so therefore killing because of future atrocities is merely secondary to the compassion the man showed, to what he considered a man at arms, both having served in desperate conditions.

Mainly though, it had me considering my views, before yesterday I was strongly opposed to the death penalty, but after seeing video footage of the bombers in court, there was no room for doubt regarding culpability and absolutely no way they were ever going to be rehabilitated, OK, I don't know that for sure, but there is strong reasoning, to suggest beyond reasonable doubt, that they are not going to fade quietly into the night.

So I am a juror and I help in securing a conviction for 20 years in jail, they survive the 20 years or they escape.

What next?

It my particular view, conviction against the death penalty is waning and the jury is now remaing out, for the forseeable future.

Moss

All failed artists should be shot immediately.

Just in case.

Yo Rob, how have ya been?