World War II POWs
Introduction >World War II took an unconscionable number of lives, but many of these lives were not lost in the midst of battle, but were instead the result of brutality experienced at the hands of captors. Prisoners of war experienced many horrific and brutal situations, which varied dependent upon who the captors were. All the countries participating in the war had camps for the POW’s, but few were humane. As a result, the Geneva Convention was formed, which set forth the rules of war – rules which are supposed to be followed still to this day. However, new military conflicts, such as the war in Iraq, reveal Geneva Convention infractions, and these countries/people will be held responsible for their actions. ... >Prisoners of War and the Camps >World War II was devastating in so many ways, but the treatment of the POW’s was utterly horrific in many instances (World War II - Japans Prisoner of War (POW) Camps). ... prisoners which were held at these camps died at an alarming rate of 37% (World War II - Japans Prisoner of War (POW) Camps). ... prisoners of war who were being held captive by the Germans died at a rate of just 2% while in captivity (World War II - Japans Prisoner of War (POW) Camps). >Escapes from any of the camps were rare, but especially from the Japanese camps (World War II - Japans Prisoner of War (POW) Camps). This was the case primarily because of the difficulty of American POW’s to mingle in amongst their Asian captors based upon such specific physical differences, and therefore escape was nearly impossible (World War II - Japans Prisoner of War (POW) Camps). Furthermore, if the local Japanese people helped any prisoner of war to escape, the punishments to them would be horrific as well (World War II - Japans Prisoner of War (POW) Camps). ... and Allied POW’s were subjected to slave labor, cruel treatment and punishments, and even medical experiments (World War II - Japans Prisoner of War (POW) Camps). In the aftermath of World War II, not much was done in the form of reprisal against Japan for such treatment of POW’s, largely because of efforts to stop Soviet expansion into Asia (World War II - Japans Prisoner of War (POW) Camps).