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Books > Social sciences > Warfare & defence > Other warfare & defence issues > War crimes
Scholars have devoted considerable energy to understanding the history of ethnic cleansing in Europe, reconstructing specific events, state policies, and the lived experiences of victims. Yet much less attention has been given to how these incidents persist in collective memory today. This volume brings together interdisciplinary case studies conducted in Central and Eastern European cities, exploring how present-day inhabitants "remember" past instances of ethnic cleansing, and how they understand the cultural heritage of groups that vanished in their wake. Together these contributions offer insights into more universal questions of collective memory and the formation of national identity.
The Routledge History of Genocide takes an interdisciplinary yet historically focused look at history from the Iron Age to the recent past to examine episodes of extreme violence that could be interpreted as genocidal. Approaching the subject in a sensitive, inclusive and respectful way, each chapter is a newly commissioned piece covering a range of opinions and perspectives. The topics discussed are broad in variety and include: genocide and the end of the Ottoman Empire Stalin and the Soviet Union Iron Age warfare genocide and religion Japanese military brutality during the Second World War heritage and how we remember the past. The volume is global in scope, something of increasing importance in the study of genocide. Presenting genocide as an extremely diverse phenomenon, this book is a wide-ranging and in-depth view of the field that will be valuable for all those interested in the historical context of genocide.
Memory Art in the Contemporary World deals with the ever-expanding field of transnational memory art, which has emerged from a political need to come to terms with traumatic historical pasts, from the Holocaust to apartheid, colonialism, state terror and civil war. The book focuses on the work of several contemporary artists from beyond the Northern Transatlantic, including William Kentridge, Vivan Sundaram, Doris Salcedo, Nalini Malani and Guillermo Kuitca, all of whom reflect on historical situations specific to their own countries but in work which has been shown to have a transnational reach. Andreas Huyssen considers their dual investment in memories of state violence and memories of modernism as central to the affective power of their work. This thought-provoking and highly relevant book reflects on the various forms and critical potential of memory art in a contemporary world which both obsesses about the past, in the building of monuments and museums and an emphasis on retro and nostalgia in popular culture, and simultaneously fosters historical amnesia in increasingly flattened notions of temporality encouraged by the internet and social media.
Why was there such a far-reaching consensus concerning the utopian goal of national homogeneity in the first half of the twentieth century? Ethnic cleansing is analyzed here as a result of the formation of democratic nation-states, the international order based on them, and European modernity in general. Almost all mass-scale population removals were rationally and precisely organized and carried out in cold blood, with revenge, hatred and other strong emotions playing only a minor role. This book not only considers the majority of population removals which occurred in Eastern Europe, but is also an encompassing, comparative study including Western Europe, interrogating the motivations of Western statesmen and their involvement in large-scale population removals. It also reaches beyond the European continent and considers the reverberations of colonial rule and ethnic cleansing in the former British colonies.
In the aftermath of the Second World War, the British military held 46 trials in Hong Kong in which 123 defendants, from Japan and Formosa (Taiwan), were tried for war crimes. This book provides the first comprehensive legal analysis of these trials. The subject matter of the trials spanned war crimes committed during the fall of Hong Kong, its occupation, and in the period after the capitulation following the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but before the formal surrender. They included killings of hors de combat, abuses in prisoner-of-war camps, abuse and murder of civilians during the military occupation, forced labour, and offences on the High Seas. The events adjudicated included those from Hong Kong, China, Japan, the High Seas, and Formosa (Taiwan). Taking place in the same historical period as the more famous Nuremberg and Tokyo trials, the Hong Kong war crimes trials provide key insights into events of the time, and the development of international criminal law and procedure in this period. A team of experts in international criminal law examine these trials in detail, placing them in their historical context, investigating how the courts conducted their proceedings and adjudicated acts alleged to be war crimes, and evaluating the extent to which the Hong Kong trials contributed to the development of contemporary issues, such as joint criminal enterprise and superior orders. There is also comparative analysis with contemporaneous proceedings, such as the Australian War Crimes trials, trials in China, and those conducted by the British in Singapore and Germany, placing them within the wider history of international justice. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in the development of international criminal law and procedure.
Pertinent to contemporary demands for reparations from Turkey is the relationship between law and property in connection with the Armenian Genocide. This book examines the confiscation of Armenian properties during the genocide and subsequent attempts to retain seized Armenian wealth. Through the close analysis of laws and treaties, it reveals that decrees issued during the genocide constitute central pillars of the Turkish system of property rights, retaining their legal validity, and although Turkey has acceded through international agreements to return Armenian properties, it continues to refuse to do so. The book demonstrates that genocides do not depend on the abolition of the legal system and elimination of rights, but that, on the contrary, the perpetrators of genocide manipulate the legal system to facilitate their plans.
A leading genocide scholar explores the history of Zionism, Israel’s lurch towards extreme oppression and violence, and why it stands accused of crimes against humanity Professor Omer Bartov was born on a kibbutz, grew up in Tel Aviv and served in the Israel Defence Forces during the Yom Kippur War. He went on to become an expert on the German army and the Holocaust, before turning his attention to his native country. In Israel: What Went Wrong?, Bartov explores the transformation of Zionism from a movement of Jewish emancipation and liberation into a state ideology of ethno-nationalism, exclusion and violent domination of Palestinians. He traces the process whereby Israel – whose establishment in 1948 received international support in the aftermath of the Holocaust – now faces accusations of war crimes and genocide. What are the implications of Israel’s near total impunity for the post-1945 regime of international law? And how do we understand the widespread support for these policies by Israel’s Jewish citizens? The result is a searing and urgent critique that addresses today’s debates over Zionism, genocide, and the future of Israel with rigour and depth.
Massacres and mass killings have always marked if not shaped the history of the world and as such are subjects of increasing interest among historians. The premise underlying this collection is that massacres were an integral, if not accepted part (until quite recently) of warfare, and that they were often fundamental to the colonizing process in the early modern and modern worlds. Making a deliberate distinction between 'massacre' and 'genocide', the editors call for an entirely separate and new subject under the rubric of 'Massacre Studies', dealing with mass killings that are not genocidal in intent. This volume offers a reflection on the nature of mass killings and extreme violence across regions and across centuries, and brings together a wide range of approaches and case studies.
In July 1995, the Bosnian Serb Army commanded by General Ratko Mladic attacked the enclave of Srebrenica, a UN "safe area" since 1993, and massacred about 8,000 Bosniac men. While the responsibility for the massacre itself lays clearly with the Serb political and military leadership, the question of the responsibility of various international organizations and national authorities for the fall of the enclave is still passionately discussed, and has given rise to various rumors and conspiracy theories. Follow-up investigations by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and by several commissions have dissipated most of these rumors and contributed to a better knowledge of the Srebrenica events and the part played by the main local and international actors. This volume represents the first systematic, comparative analysis of those investigations. It brings together analyses from both the external standpoint of academics and the inside perspective of various professionals who participated directly in the inquiries, including police officers, members of parliament, high-ranking civil servants, and other experts. Evaluating how institutions establish facts and ascribe responsibilities, this volume presents a historiographical and epistemological reflection on the very possibility of writing a history of the present time.
Unlike their condemnations of Nazi atrocities, contemporary Western responses to Soviet crimes have often been ambiguous at best. While some leaders publicly denounced them, many others found reasons to dismiss wrongdoings and to consider Soviet propaganda more credible than survivors' accounts. Blissful Blindness: Soviet Crimes Under Western Eyes is a comprehensive exploration of Western responses to Soviet crimes from the Bolshevik revolution to the Soviet Union's final years. Ranging from denial, dismissal, and rationalization to outright glorification, these reactions, Darius Tołczyk contends, arose from a complex array of motives rooted in ideological biases, fears of empowering common enemies, and outside political agendas. Throughout the long history of the Soviet regime, Tołczyk traces its most heinous crimes—including the Red Terror, collectivization, the Great Famine, the Gulag, the Great Terror, and mass deportations—and shows how Soviet propaganda, and an unmatched willingness to defer to it, minimized these atrocities within dominant Western public discourse. It would take decades for Western audiences to unravel the "big lie"—and even today, too many in both Russia and the West have chosen to forget the extent of Soviet atrocities, or of their nations' complicity. A fascinating read for those interested in the intricacies and obstructions of politics, Blissful Blindness traces Western responses to understand why, and how, the West could remain willfully ignorant of Soviet crimes.
Why was there such a far-reaching consensus concerning the utopian goal of national homogeneity in the first half of the twentieth century? Ethnic cleansing is analyzed here as a result of the formation of democratic nation-states, the international order based on them, and European modernity in general. Almost all mass-scale population removals were rationally and precisely organized and carried out in cold blood, with revenge, hatred and other strong emotions playing only a minor role. This book not only considers the majority of population removals which occurred in Eastern Europe, but is also an encompassing, comparative study including Western Europe, interrogating the motivations of Western statesmen and their involvement in large-scale population removals. It also reaches beyond the European continent and considers the reverberations of colonial rule and ethnic cleansing in the former British colonies.
Why did the Armenian genocide erupt in Turkey in 1915, only seven years after the Armenian minority achieved civil equality for the first time in the history of the Ottoman Empire? How can we explain the Rwandan genocide occurring in 1994, after decades of relative peace and even cooperation between the Hutu majority and the Tutsi minority? Addressing the question of how the risk of genocide develops over time, On the Path to Genocide contributes to a better understand why genocide occurs when it does. It provides a comprehensive and comparative historical analysis of the factors that led to the 1915 Armenian genocide and the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, using fresh sources and perspectives that yield new insights into the history of the Armenian and Rwandan peoples. Finally, it also presents new research into constraints that inhibit genocide, and how they can be utilized to attempt the prevention of genocide in the future.
From one of the most prominent nationalist voices in late twentieth-century Europe comes this controversial volume on the persistence of violence from past eras into present-day. Franjo Tudjman was once the face of Croatian democracy and sovereignty-a position complicated by his roles as general, president, and historian, and his role in the Bosnian War. Here he examines the Yugoslav Communist creation of a Croatian "black legend" and assesses the nature and scope of the crimes committed by the Ustasha puppet government, particularly at the Jasenovac death camp. He chronicles the systematic use by the Yugoslav regime of Jasenovac and the Ustasha terror as a tool in its attempt to eliminate Croatian aspirations towards independence. Readers of this book will have a candid insight into the mind of a notable and notorious player in contemporary European history. With this book-at once a memoir, a political document, and a broad historic philosophical survey-Tudjman proposes a foundation upon which to build a new creative framework of peace-oriented relationships for the twenty-first century. Horrors of War provides an unparalleled view on the history of national violence from the perspective of a man who played a key role in both the Croatian War of Independence and the later Bosnian War; a sometimes hero, sometimes villain.
Gareth Jones (1905-1934), the young Welsh investigative journalist, is revered in Ukraine as a national hero and is now rightly recognised as the first reporter to reveal the horror of the Holodomor, the Soviet Government-induced famine of the early 1930s, which killed millions of Ukrainians. Gareth Jones - Eyewitness to the Holodomor is a meticulous study of the efforts made by the the Aberystwyth and Cambridge-educated journalist, a fluent Russian-speaker, to investigate the Soviet Government's denials, that its Five Year Plan had led to mass starvation, by visiting Ukraine in 1933 and reporting what he saw and witnessed: `I walked along through villages and twelve collective farms. Everywhere was the cry, "There is no bread. We are dying"'. Determined to alert the world to the suffering in Ukraine and to expose Stalin's policies and prejudices towards the Ukrainian people, Jones published numerous articles in the UK (The Times, Daily Express and Western Mail) and the USA (New York Evening News and Chicago Daily News) with headlines such as `Famine Grips Russia. Millions Dying', but soon saw his credibility and integrity attacked and denigrated by Soviet sympathizers, most famously by Moscow-based Walter Duranty of the New York Times. Gareth Jones was killed by bandits the following year, on the eve of his 30th birthday, whilst travelling in Japanese-controlled China. There remain strong suspicions that Jones' murder was arranged by the Soviets in revenge for his eyewitness reporting which brought global attention to the Holodomor.
A masterclass in cat-and-mouse espionage suspense - and the last lost novel - from the iconic Number One bestselling author of A SONG FOR THE DARK TIMES 'Ian Rankin is a genius' Lee Child It always starts with a small lie. That's how you stop noticing the bigger ones. After his friend suspects something strange going on at the launch facility where they both work - and then goes missing - Martin Hepton doesn't believe the official line of "long-term sick leave"... Refusing to stop asking questions, he leaves his old life behind, aware that someone is shadowing his every move. The only hope he has is his ex-girlfriend Jill Watson - the only journalist who will believe his story. But neither of them can believe the puzzle they're piecing together - or just how shocking the secret is that everybody wants to stay hidden... A gripping, page-turning suspense masterclass - experience the brilliance of the iconic Ian Rankin.
In July 1995, the Bosnian Serb Army commanded by General Ratko Mladic attacked the enclave of Srebrenica, a UN "safe area" since 1993, and massacred about 8,000 Bosniac men. While the responsibility for the massacre itself lays clearly with the Serb political and military leadership, the question of the responsibility of various international organizations and national authorities for the fall of the enclave is still passionately discussed, and has given rise to various rumors and conspiracy theories. Follow-up investigations by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and by several commissions have dissipated most of these rumors and contributed to a better knowledge of the Srebrenica events and the part played by the main local and international actors. This volume represents the first systematic, comparative analysis of those investigations. It brings together analyses from both the external standpoint of academics and the inside perspective of various professionals who participated directly in the inquiries, including police officers, members of parliament, high-ranking civil servants, and other experts. Evaluating how institutions establish facts and ascribe responsibilities, this volume presents a historiographical and epistemological reflection on the very possibility of writing a history of the present time. Isabelle Delpla is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University Montpellier III. Her research focuses on international ethics and justice and the relationships between philosophy and anthropology. She has conducted fieldwork in Bosnia with victim associations, Hague witnesses, and convicted war criminals. Xavier Bougarel is Researcher at the French Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris. He is currently researching the wars of the 1990s and their aftermath in the former Yugoslavia and the transformations of Islam in the post-Communist Balkans. Jean-Louis Fournel is Professor at the University of Paris VIII. His research focuses on the history of warfare, political thought, and the rhetoric of the Italian Renaissance. Between 1997 and 2001, he directed several European cooperation programs with universities in Bosnia- Herzegovina. In 1994, while the city was under siege, he co-organized the initiative for a sister relationship between his university and that of Sarajevo.
"This book by Vahakn Dadrian and Taner Akcam, one Armenian, one Turkish, both noted scholars of the Armenian Genocide] stands as a monument of original scholarship on the facts of the Genocide. The wealth of specific citations, the multiplicity of sources surveyed make this volume an invaluable and fundamental source for any future study." . The Armenian Mirror-Spectator Turkey's bid to join the European Union has lent new urgency to the issue of the Armenian Genocide as differing interpretations of the genocide are proving to be a major reason for the delay of the its accession. This book provides vital background information and is a prime source of legal evidence and authentic Turkish eyewitness testimony of the intent and the crime of genocide against the Armenians. After a long and painstaking effort, the authors, one an Armenian, the other a Turk, generally recognized as the foremost experts on the Armenian Genocide, have prepared a new, authoritative translation and detailed analysis of the Takvim-i Vekayi, the official Ottoman Government record of the Turkish Military Tribunals concerning the crimes committed against the Armenians during World War I. The authors have compiled the documentation of the trial proceedings for the first time in English and situated them within their historical and legal context. These documents show that Wartime Cabinet ministers, Young Turk party leaders, and a number of others inculpated in these crimes were court-martialed by the Turkish Military Tribunals in the years immediately following World War I. Most were found guilty and received sentences ranging from prison with hard labor to death. In remarkable contrast to Nuremberg, the Turkish Military Tribunals were conducted solely on the basis of existing Ottoman domestic penal codes. This substitution of a national for an international criminal court stands in history as a unique initiative of national self-condemnation. This compilation is significantly enhanced by an extensive analysis of the historical background, political nature and legal implications of the criminal prosecution of the twentieth century's first state-sponsored crime of genocide. Vahakn N. Dadrian was director of a large Genocide Study Project with sustained support by the National Science Foundation and the H. F. Guggenheim Foundation. The project's first major achievement was the publication of an extensive volume, "The History of the Armenian Genocide: Ethnic Conflict from the Balkans to Anatolia to the Caucasus" (Berghahn Books 1995), now in its 8th edition, which has been translated into Arabic, French, Greek, Italian, Russian, Spanish and Turkish. In 2005, he received four separate awards for his lifetime contribution to genocide studies. He taught at the State University of New York (SUNY) system (1970-1991) and has been Director of Genocide Research at the Zoryan Institute since 1999. Taner Akcam was born in the province of Ardahan in the northeast of Turkey. As the editor-in-of a political journal, he was arrested in 1976 and sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment. One year later, he escaped and fled to Germany as a political refugee. He is the first Turkish scholar to have drawn attention to the historicity of the Armenian Genocide and has been persecuted by the Turkish state for it. In April 2006, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts presented him with a distinguished award for his outstanding work in human rights and fighting genocide denial. Currently, he is Associate Professor of History and the Kaloosdian/Mugar Chair in Armenian Genocide Studies at the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Clark University"
Winner of the 2021 National Jewish Book Award for Contemporary Jewish Life and Practice Finalist for the 2021 Kirkus Prize in Nonfiction. A startling and profound exploration of how Jewish history is exploited to comfort the living. Renowned and beloved as a prizewinning novelist, Dara Horn has also been publishing penetrating essays since she was a teenager. Often asked by major publications to write on subjects related to Jewish culture―and increasingly in response to a recent wave of deadly antisemitic attacks―Horn was troubled to realize what all of these assignments had in common: she was being asked to write about dead Jews, never about living ones. In these essays, Horn reflects on subjects as far-flung as the international veneration of Anne Frank, the mythology that Jewish family names were changed at Ellis Island, the blockbuster traveling exhibition Auschwitz, the marketing of the Jewish history of Harbin, China, and the little-known life of the "righteous Gentile" Varian Fry. Throughout, she challenges us to confront the reasons why there might be so much fascination with Jewish deaths, and so little respect for Jewish lives unfolding in the present. Horn draws upon her travels, her research, and also her own family life―trying to explain Shakespeare’s Shylock to a curious ten-year-old, her anger when swastikas are drawn on desks in her children’s school, the profound perspective offered by traditional religious practice and study―to assert the vitality, complexity, and depth of Jewish life against an antisemitism that, far from being disarmed by the mantra of "Never forget," is on the rise. As Horn explores the (not so) shocking attacks on the American Jewish community in recent years, she reveals the subtler dehumanization built into the public piety that surrounds the Jewish past―making the radical argument that the benign reverence we give to past horrors is itself a profound affront to human dignity.
Although the Genocide Convention was already adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1945, it was only in the late 1990s that groups of activists emerged calling for military interventions to halt mass atrocities. The question of who these anti-genocide activists are and what motivates them to call for the use of violence to end violence is undoubtedly worthy of exploration. Based on extensive field research, Anti-genocide Activists and the Responsibility to Protect analyses the ideological convictions that motivate two groups of anti-genocide activists: East Timor solidarity activists and Responsibility to Protect (R2P)-advocates. The book argues that there is an existential undercurrent to the call for mass atrocity interventions; that mass atrocities shock the activists' belief in a humanity that they hold to be sacred. The book argues that the ensuing rise of anti-genocide activism signals a shift in humanitarian sensibilities to human suffering and violence which may have substantial implications for moral judgements on human lives at peril in the humanitarian and human rights community. This book provides a fascinating insight into the worldviews of activists which will be of interest to practitioners and researchers of human rights activism, humanitarian advocacy and peace building.
Katyn- the Soviet massacre of over 21,000 Polish prisoners in 1940 - has come to be remembered as Stalin's emblematic mass murder, an event obscured by one of the most extensive cover-ups in history. Yet paradoxically, a majority of its victims perished far from the forest in western Russia that gives the tragedy its name. Their remains lie buried in killing fields throughout Russia, Ukraine and, most likely, Belarus. Today their ghosts haunt the cultural landscape of Eastern Europe. This book traces the legacy of Katyn through the interconnected memory cultures of seven countries: Belarus, Poland, Russia, Ukraine, and the Baltic States. It explores the meaning of Katyn as site and symbol, event and idea, fact and crypt. It shows how Katyn both incites nationalist sentiments in Eastern Europe and fosters an emerging cosmopolitan memory of Soviet terror. It also examines the strange impact of the 2010 plane crash that claimed the lives of Poland's leaders en route to Katyn.Drawing on novels and films, debates and controversies, this book makes the case for a transnational study of cultural memory and navigates a contested past in a region that will define Europe's future.
One of the key mission objectives of the UN Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) was to disarm and repatriate foreign combatants in the eastern region of the country. To achieve this, MONUC adopted a "push and pull" strategy. This involved applying military pressure while at the same time offering opportunities for voluntary disarmament and repatriation for armed combatants of the elusive but deadly Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) - a predominantly Rwandan Hutu armed group in eastern DRC. As part of its "pull" strategy, MONUC embarked on one of the most sophisticated Information Operations (IO) campaigns in UN history with the core objective of convincing thousands of individual combatants and commanders of the FDLR to voluntarily disarm and join the UN's Demobilization, Disarmament, Repatriation, Resettlement and Reintegration programme (DDRRR). This book is derived from studies of the narratives, coordination and effectiveness of the UN's IO in support of DDRRR and how the UN has integrated IO as part of its Mission peace support operations. This book advances contemporary understanding of the relative importance of communication models and their interactions within conflict settings. It provides instruments with which conflict and communication analysts can compare predictions and rationalize Information impacts for future conflicts. About the author Dr. Jacob Udo-Udo Jacob teaches Communications & Media Studies at the American University of Nigeria. He earned his PhD in Communication Studies from the University of Leeds, United Kingdom
Thanatourism, or dark tourism, is an increasingly pervasive feature of the contemporary tourism landscape. Travel to have actual or symbolic 'encounters with death' is not a new phenomenon and is now one of the fastest growing areas for debate and research in the study of Tourism. Thanatourism is an important new overview of the growing field. It introduces more rigorous scholarship, new philosophical perspectives and a wealth of empirical material on the contemporary and historical consumption of death with case studies designed to stretch and challenge current discourse. Contexts presented in the book will include- * well known religious sites * battlefield locations * genocide camps *lesser known exhibition centres and a plague site. It takes a broad methodological approach and discusses both research and teaching approaches in thanatourism as well as acknowledging its emotive nature. It is an essential new resource for all those who research or teach in the area as well as for upper level students.
While much of the international community regards the forced deportation of Armenian subjects of the Ottoman Empire in 1915, where approximately 800,000 to 1.5 million Armenians perished, as genocide, the Turkish state still officially denies it. In Denial of Violence, Fatma Muge Goecek seeks to decipher the roots of this disavowal. To capture the negotiation of meaning that leads to denial, Goecek undertook a qualitative analysis of 315 memoirs published in Turkey from 1789 to 2009 in addition to numerous secondary sources, journals, and newspapers. She argues that denial is a multi-layered, historical process with four distinct yet overlapping components: the structural elements of collective violence and situated modernity on one side, and the emotional elements of collective emotions and legitimating events on the other. In the Turkish case, denial emerged through four stages: (i) the initial imperial denial of the origins of the collective violence committed against the Armenians commenced in 1789 and continued until 1907; (ii) the Young Turk denial of the act of violence lasted for a decade from 1908 to 1918; (iii) early republican denial of the actors of violence took place from 1919 to 1973; and (iv) the late republican denial of the responsibility for the collective violence started in 1974 and continues today. Denial of Violence develops a novel theoretical, historical and methodological framework to understanding what happened and why the denial of collective violence against Armenians still persists within Turkish state and society. |
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