Nelliepara10
Aka
My late husband was Jewish. He fought in WWII in Burma.
I remember asking him what he thought about Hitler and the Germans in general. He replied that when a country is not doing well the best way for someone who is after power to realise their goals, is to give the people something/someone to hate.
Because his family originally came from Russia and also he was not involved in any action in Germany he never thought badly of them as a race. Hitler he obviously abhorred but he reckoned that he had whipped up a hatred of the Jews for ambitious reasons. He once shocked me by saying the same could have happened in other European countries including the Uk. When the Balkan War was going on, I could see his point.
However, the only time I saw my husband cry was when we were watching a documentary showing POW's released by the Japanese. He was in Burma when this happened and said he had never thought that any human being could treat others so cruelly. He also said that there were rumours that some of the soldiers families were informed that their relative was 'missing in action'. This was due to some of the pow's being chronically sick and suffering from severe mental health issues. He did not think this could be true but was never sure.
The Japanese were, of course, not the only people to treat others appallingly in the war. This was one of many examples of inhumanity on an almost unbelievable scale. War has a terrible corrupting effect, but in Japan, where surrender was regarded as the worst thing a man could do, the mistreatment of POWs had a cultural explanation for the indifference and cruelty inflicted. Many POWs were reported as missing in action and if the Red Cross could not verify their prisoner status, that was the category they would be given until other evidence became available.
