Laos and Cambodia weren't participants in the war but that doesn't really feel like it matters all that much. Whenever I talk about the bombings of Cambodia and Laos with Americans (who - liberals and conservatives alike feel they must always defend) I sometimes here "well we bombed cities in Germany and Japan in WW2 and no one talks about those being war crimes". But were they? I really don't know much about those bombings. My gut says yes they were also war crimes but we just accept them because they were combatant countries?

  • star_wraith [he/him]
    ·
    2 years ago

    Operation Meetinghouse, which was conducted on the night of 9–10 March 1945, is the single most destructive bombing raid in human history.Of central Tokyo 16 square miles (41 km2; 10,000 acres) were destroyed, leaving an estimated 100,000 civilians dead and over one million homeless.

    Jesus Christ yeah, that does sound like a war crime...

    • Frank [he/him, he/him]
      ·
      2 years ago

      Yeah the American attitude towards Japanese life was literally "Kill them all". There was no notion of Japanese civilians as people with a right to life. Absolute dehumanization.