Talk:Allied war crimes during World War II

Further reading

Books

• Dower, J.W. War without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War, (London and Boston, 1986)
• Lily, J. Robert, (not yet published). TAKEN BY FORCE; Rape and American Soldiers in the European Theater of Operations, WW2, Palgrave Macmillan June 2007 ISBN 0-230-50647-X
• Ferguson, Niall. Prisoner Taking and Prisoner Killing in the Age of Total War: Towards a Political Economy of Military Defeat, War in History, Vol. 11, No. 2, 148-192 (2004)
• Veale F.J.P. Advance to Barbarism, Appleton Wisconsin: C.C. Nelson Publishing Co., 1953

Articles

• Cobain, Ian. Revealed: UK wartime torture camp, The Guardian, November 12, 2005.
• Drayton, Richard. "An ethical blank cheque" British and U.S. mythology about the second world war ignores our own crimes and legitimises Anglo-American war making, The Guardian, May 10, 2005
• Várdy, Steven Béla and Tooly, T. Hunt: Ethnic Cleansing in Twentieth-Century Europe Available as MS Word for Windows file (3.4 MB) Section: by Richard Dominic Wiggers, The United States and the Refusal to Feed German Civilians after World War II pp. 274 - 288

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Rewriting of the 190.000 Rape Figure Quote

The figure of 190.000 at the end of the Western Allies, War Rape section of the article is heavily disputed and the method used to reach it has nigh to no basis in historical documents. The article from the Spiegel it uses as a source(link number 73) says exactly that in its fourth paragraph. Currently the only part indicating this in the article is the word "believes" in the quote from the second paragraph where they are just talking about the published work itself.

This whould be a simple edit I could do myself, but the article is semi-protected and my account does not meet the criteria for such an edit. It could be writen as a summary, not a quote, on the lines of:

"In 2015, the book "Als die Soldaten kamen" by the German historian Miriam Gebhardt was released sparking discussion on the topic of the image of the "greatest generation" though she also claims that 190.000 rapes were commited in germany by american solders until 1955. The book itself is critisized widely by other historians and journalists like Klaus-Dietmar Henke <"ref>https://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/politische-buecher/sexuelle-gewalt-1945-rechenfehler-und-ungereimtheiten-13587370.html</ref> and the number is commented on by the Spiegel "Gebhardt is unable to present such evidence in sufficient quantity. Another estimate, stemming from US criminology professor Robert Lilly, who examined rape cases prosecuted by American military courts, arrived at a number of 11,000 serious sexual assaults committed by November, 1945 <"ref>https://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/book-claims-us-soldiers-raped-190-000-german-women-post-wwii-a-1021298.html</ref>"

Though at this point it should either be moved to "Portrayal" in a new section titled "recent" or removed in it's entirety as it does not add anything to the core article and negatively spreads misinformation through a out of context quote.

Introduction and lead

I have changed the lead yet again, i have added a few sources for the statements about prosecution of allied war crimes (they were previously unsourced), and i think i have made the lead more "readable"-ish now (more in line with the style used in other articles). I refrained from re-adding all the content i put on last time, as some of it maybe made the lead too lengthy, now i think its decently summarized and still doesnt miss any important information.

I would also like to ask @Aemilius Adolphin about possibly providing a source to the other statement he previously added to the lead, as i think having a source about a specific historian which talked about this specifically would be better instead of a vague-ish statement.

Either way, ill see what i can improve more on, about the infobox, i have so far abandoned that idea for now, unless someone finds a better image to be used, though as said i would prefer one of an crime committed by western forces instead of the USSR (those are already provided extensively in Soviet war crimes.

MySalsa22 (talk) 14:13, 8 April 2026 (UTC)

I have reverted to the previous version which was more concise. I can't see any good reason for most of your changes. For example "There are many reported war crimes involving Allied military forces in World War II" is standard English word order. "During World War II], there were many reported cases of war crimes committed by allied military forces" is an inversion which puts the emphasis on WWII for no good reason. We know from the title of the article that we are dealing with WWII. Your other changes seem to just add more unnecessary words, although perhaps I am missing something. The main substantive addition you make is "although many cases were, for a variety of reasons, either dropped or resulted in no serious punishment for those involved." I don't think the sources you cite support this and to the extent that they do they should be attributed to the authors as their own personal opinion. It might be possible to say that "many alleged cases" were not prosecuted but the phrase "for a variety of reasons" is so vague, it tells us nothing. What were these "variety of reasons". Are they discussed at length in the article? Can we reach a conclusion worthy of summary in the lead. For example, many reports of war crimes were dropped for lack of evidence. Many went to court martial but the accused were found not guilty. Sentences might have been lenient according to some opinions but we weren't there to hear the evidence and question the witnesses. Ninety-five US personnel were executed for war crimes, mostly for rape or murder of civilians. There were 904 reported allegations of rape committed by American personnel during the war, resulting in 461 convictions. Compare this with Nazi war criminals where there were 100,000 arrests and 177 went to trial resulting in 142 convictions and 25 death sentences. On these figures the conviction rate and sentences for US war crimes looks severe. It would be fair to say that that the proportion of estimated and alleged war crimes that went to trial was low. This was especially the case for those alleged war crimes involving shooting POWs and enemy soldiers trying to surrender or escape sunken ships. I would be happy to consider revised wording taking this into account, but I am still checking sources. I think we should revise the lead last when the entire article is in much better shape. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 07:23, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

I have added some compromise wording: "The Western Allies prosecuted a number of war crimes committed by their own forces, but this represented only a small proportion of those the Allies probably perpetrated." I'm still not happy with it though because it ignores Soviet prosecutions of Soviet war crimes which isn't rigorously examined in the article. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 09:27, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

Welp, the main reason i edited the lead was because it felt a bit off to me, might be because im not a native english speaker, but i felt that the way i put it was somewhat more proper, especially with the are-were (are implies something that is current, were implies something that happened before, atleast to my understanding), with the soviet part, i wanted to emphasize more the mass killing and rape, separating it from deportations and forced labour, which happened both on soviet territory and liberated/occupied territories, including after ww2 and done mainly by the NKVD instead of the regular army.

For the punishment part, maybe i put the wrong sources in, my bad, but the case is that most crimes allied courts prosecuted did not result in much serious punishment, only a few resulted in discharge or, in some cases, execution. That was mainly because they didnt want to risk demoralizing the army and creating strife/antagonizing the local population (which actually had the reverse effect in that nazi propaganda emphasized these crimes, especially those done by black soldiers, as a way to make civilians fear or hate allied troops). I dont think these are thoroughly discussed in the article, which is kinda bad, since its an important part really about prosecution of these crimes.

For an example, as you said, soviet courts regularly punished soldiers which engaged in more serious crimes (mostly against civilians, crimes against POWs were usually more tolerated, as in some cases was shooting of alleged civilian snipers or collaborators). If a commander commited the crime, he could be discharged or lose his position, but that wasnt really the "norm", as no quarter orders werent that rare among soviet forces, and mistreatment of POWs and civilians was sometimes tolerated, as stalin (and his commanders) did turn somewhat of a blind eye to abuses a couple times.

For US troops, prosecution was much more severe, but, as said, it was mostly racially motivated, white troops in a LOT of cases did not get properly prosecuted, especially if they were of a higher position (i.e commanders issuing no quarter orders or, as in canicatti or biscari, literally shooting civilians and POWs). i think we can surely get into a compromise, but i just want to get it clear that the reason i included this that way was mostly for summarizing, as explaining each reason would make the lead be too lengthy (a lot of cases were dropped for lack of evidence, others were not really taken seriously, others received light punishments, some received moderate or harsh ones, it wasnt really consistent).

Also, i agree with maybe leaving the lead for last, though id like that some of the arguments i used be taken into consideration, in addition, for the proportionality of prosecutions, as said before, most crimes prosecuted were those done against civilians, POW crimes were usually not even investigated in the first place, unless they were extremely severe. that said, western allied forces were much less "brutal" (not the right word but anyways) than axis or soviet ones, so much less crimes were committed. As for rape, the number of actual rapes VS alleged VS reported VS actually prosecuted is likely very different, there were likely many rapes that were never even reported by the victims, though id argue that some sources allege much more than there probably was? we cant be completely sure though, its a very divisive topic, especially because of recent use of it by neo nazis and holocaust deniers (which put A LOT of emphasis on crimes commited by western allies, especially rape and such done by black or mixed soldiers, as it fits into a narrative of the allies "being just as bad" or something), talking about that, would be good to have some source for the part you talk about historians advising caution and such, as it could be removed if interpreted as a vague statement or unsourced (i personally dont think it is, but sourcing is always good to be on the side of caution).

MySalsa22 (talk) 14:30, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

I will add references to the "moral equivalence" argument. Usually the lead doesn't need sources because we assume it is a summary of the article and the article should contain the citations. We normally only add citations to the lead if editors challenge a statement or it appears controversial. That said, just about everything to do with Allied war crimes is controversial so perhaps we should err on the side of citations. We might need to add in the lead that allegations of Allied war crimes were most common in the Asia-Pacific theatre, eastern front and the ground war in Germany. But we can discuss this when the article and citations are in better shape. Don't worry about your English: it's good. Even native English speakers have disagreements about wording. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:56, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

Alright. the reason i said it is mainly so other non-involved editors dont remove it, especially as it could be considered, as previously said, a vague and unsourced statement, which, even if its part of the lead, should have some source or attribution, especially considering that this topic is VERY controversial nowadays.

For the other things you mentioned, i dont really know how we can summarize this, but yeah, its pretty much known that most allied war crimes were in the asia-pacific and east europe theater, with only italy and western germany being comparable in that case (France and the lowlands did have a few war crimes, but they werent nearly as reported, or even as numerous, as those in italy or germany proper).

By the way, thanks lol, i just thought it mention it again since some things in english may appear odd to me, especially the lead with how its organized currently, but if its the proper way i wont oppose it. MySalsa22 (talk) 23:23, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

United States

Hello all

As with the sections on the Soviet Union and the UK, I have tried to rewrite this section in a summary style with reliable secondary sources. I have checked every citation in the section and I have removed unsourced and poorly sourced information. I have replaced citations to dubious websites with scholarly sources where possible. I have preferred academic sources to newspaper articles in accordance with policy I have added a sub-section on strategic bombing. I have changed the sub-section headings and reorganised some of the content into similar categories to those used for the other major powers. Once again, this is supposed to be a high level summary article. Detail on specific war crimes and alleged war crimes can be found in the main articles on these crimes. Hopefully, we can eventually get this to Good Article status. @MySalsa22 Your comments or suggestions would be especially welcome. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 04:13, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

Nice edits, good to see you removed some of the more non-reliable sources, just a heads up though, id suggest including a paragraph about some of the US bombings in cities like Gorla and Grosseto under the area bombing part, though much more summarized than previously (i.e include both cases in a single paragraph about US area bombing in Italy and such and how some cases were considered to be war crimes in recent years)

Also, for some cases like Jungholzhausen and Lippach, i have seen the articles about them, and, seriously, theres a lot of unsourced information there. From what ive read, it is somewhat "accepted" that US soldiers did execute POWs in both these cases, though some more graphic details such as US troops bashing the heads of german POWs or the alleged rape of 20 women in the city are largely unsourced there, so i dont really know about these inclusions, at maximum they warrant a slight mention with a link to the article, if anything really. Audoville-la-Hubert seems a bit more reliable on its reporting, cant tell really though.

For the alleged cases of Piano Stella and Vittoria, ive seen a couple Italian historians mention these cases (both of which iirc occured in villages around Canicatti), but one of the sources previously used appears to be VERY much non-NPOV (from what ive read it borders on sometimes "supporting" the axis for some reason? like saying that italian commanders "betrayed" their troops in North Africa). The more reliable sources just mention that American soldiers in Piano Stella executed some Italian civilians, because one of them allegedly killed an American paratrooper. For Vittoria, there appears to be even less sources, though ive seen one mentioning that US soldiers allegedly shot Italian civilians accused of spying or killing allied troops, doesnt seem that much notable though.

Maybe also include a brief mention of Laconia incident under the unrestricted submarine warfare part? i think its pretty fair considering the sinking of Japanese hospital ships are included.

Yet again, while i do oppose removing every single mention of specific incidents, i also think that going into too much detail about them is definitely not what this article needs, but im sure we can get into compromises over wording and such.

MySalsa22 (talk) 13:17, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin i have done some edits to the article again, ive so far tried to only add reliably sourced information (i.e i left out lippach and some over the top claims, as well as tried to summarize most information). i also fixed a few sources and wording (use more neutral words for certain cases, as well as attributing claims, such as chester nimitz's claim of unrestricted submarine warfare in the pacific theater).

Yet again, if you dont agree, feel free to maybe revert or re-edit some of these, just please take into consideration some of the additions before removing all of them at the same time.

By the way, i think we should next up maybe look into the "other allies" part (Australia, Canada, Yugoslavia, etc), also maybe include crimes committed by Italian partisans if we are keeping those done by Yugoslavian ones in.

MySalsa22 (talk) 04:03, 15 April 2026 (UTC)

I have removed most of your changes for the following reasons. I am happy to discuss this further once you've had a look at my reasons.

I removed the Bombing of Gorla because 1) We already say that the aerial bombardment of civilian areas was probably not a war crime at the time. 2) There is an issue of undue weight. The killing of 600 civilians is obviously a tragedy, but why should it be included alongside the Bombing of Dresden, the fire bombing of Tokyo and Berlin and the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki? There were hundreds of bombing raids in WWII that killed more people than Gorla; if we include Gorla, why not include every bombing that killed civilians? 3) None of the citations are to a reliable academic source. They are all deadlinks or websites or newspaper articles. 4) None that I could check said it was a war crime. The Mayor of Milan called it an accident. 5) This is a high-level summary article. If readers are interested in the bombing of Gorla they can find the article by following the links to the main article on American war crimes or to the article on the Allied Strategic Bombing Campaign.

I removed the Bombing of Grosseto for similar reasons, although in this case one of the citations looks to be scholarly. However, under policy it needs a English translation of the relevant part. Does the author argue that this is a war crime? The other source is the website "Grosseto Contemporaenia". This is not a scholarly source and states that Grosseto was a legitimate military target and that the children were killed by accident.

The sources you cite also don't actually say they were war crimes. One says "no one was charged" with a war crime but that might mean they weren't war crimes.

Jungholzhausen massacre. I removed this because we already say in the article that US troops sometimes massacred surrendering soldiers and POWs and that SS troops were often targeted. This is a high level article, so rather than include every alleged massacre I decided to concentrate on a few with the highest death tolls and with the best scholarly sources. The cited source for this massacre was a German newspaper article which is not a scholarly source. It actually says 13-30 Germans were reported killed, so less than the ones that I included. The article also refers to "reports and rumours." It doesn't say that massacres were considered commonplace. (PS: one of the sources in the article on this massacre is published by a far-right publisher which has no credibility whatsoever.)

Lippach massacre. I removed this for the similar reasons as above: it's a summary article so I wanted to concentrate on examples with the highest death tolls. In this case 24 Waffen SS men were massacred and 20 women allegedly raped by drunken soldiers. (However, there is one good academic source for this massacre.)

Audouville-la-Hubert massacre The only source for this is Der Spiegel. It's a magazine article, not a scholarly source. The journalist doesn't specify the date or the unit that allegedly did it and doesn't give the source for the allegation. A historian? A rumour? Even if can find a reliable academic source for this, it isn't as deadly or as well sourced as the examples already included.

Laconia incident. Yes, we should include this. The point is that it is a clear war crime to attack an enemy boat/sub that is undertaking a rescue mission so the details are irrelevant and can be looked up in the linked article. That said, I might have cut out too much.

Unrestricted submarine warfare. I'm not sure why you added the stuff about Nimitz and Doenitz: it just looks unnecessary to me. The source already cited says that the US issued an unrestricted submarine and aerial warfare order (in fact only a few hours after Pearl Harbor). My understanding is that unrestricted submarine warfare is a clear cut war crime, so the order was illegal. The issue is that all combatants did it.

As for the "Other allies", yes I intent to work my way through the entire article. My inclination is to remove everything about Partisans because they weren't officially part of the Allies and I am not sure the Geneva Convention etc applied at the time to groups that weren't official combatants.

The POW section shouldn't be there either. It should be incorporated into the rest of the article. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 10:58, 15 April 2026 (UTC)

Seedorf. Biddiscombe states that the villages had indeed hidden bazookamen in their cellars. Not "allegedly". Burning down two houses in these circumstances doesn't seen such a major war crime that it's worth mentioning in a high-level article like this. Does it really add anything to the sentence before? Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 11:36, 15 April 2026 (UTC)

The reason i included gorla and grosseto in was because they were more reliably sourced than other cases, felt it was maybe notable enough? as for audoville and jungholzhausen, the reasons i included them in was because i found some sources to be more reliable (not all of them though) - i know that maybe for audoville it makes sense for not including since it wasnt specified which historian reported it, though der spiegel did mention on the article so felt it made some sense. I personally dont oppose to removing these cases if they are badly sourced, however id suggest including them if they have good sources, even if its just a small mention and a wikilink to the page (like i did in my edit)

For the unrestricted submarine warfare part (which i renamed to unrestricted naval warfare, which is shorter and is in line with the British section), i thought that the wording was a little too vague/non-npov (i could be wrong though), since it outright says that the US did it, while i wanted to attribute the claim to its more-known proponent (chester nimitz was the one who pretty much said it on donitz's trial, which resulted into the order becoming more publicly known). even if there was an explicit order for it, i felt it was notable enough to include that Chester Nimitz (wartime commander of the navy) was the one who initially reported on it.

For the rape part, i thought of changing it because it felt odd, to me it was saying that British soldiers raped German women because they allegedly were willing to trade sex for food (prostitution), which probably wasnt the entire reality/picture (it could pass on the idea to some people that it wasnt rape but, yet again, prostitution, when it most clearly was rape)

Just to make it clear, i personally dont oppose to summarizing information, but i do oppose removing everything, one of my ideas was to include information about specific events with wikilinks (though VERY summarized) so readers could more quickly read about the specific case, without having to go into another article to find it. While i dont think this article needs to include every single case, those that are notable enough to have their own articles make sense.

For the source for British reprisals, i apologize, i think i used the wrong source for that claim, though i usually get a little confused when using sources (i do mix up a lot of sources in some cases, and not all of them i can easily access such as books or so), either way, thanks for fixing that mistake. Also, if they were actually hiding bazookamen, maybe that made some sense, especially if the houses burnt were specifically those that hid them, otherwise it could be considered a crime. I thought of adding it since it expanded upon the previously mentioned part that British troops did destroy/set fire to houses if they housed german troops or weaponry, but maybe its not notable enough.

MySalsa22 (talk) 11:40, 15 April 2026 (UTC)

By the way, for the Jungholzhausen massacre, i want to know which source is the far-right one, if its unreliable i can go ahead and remove it from the article, i already have a suspicion though i dont want to take action before knowing. MySalsa22 (talk) 11:42, 15 April 2026 (UTC)

I have read the spiegel article about the audouville la hubert massacre, it appears to somewhat source beevor for these claims? as well as other claims, i will try and see if i can find anything, but i think that an paragraph about allied crimes in Normandy could maybe work, something like the one you added for the Rhine campaign (i.e Canadian, British and American soldiers killing German POWs after or during D-day, there was previously a paragraph for alleged no quarter during the battle but i think you removed it).

Would definitely be good to look into Beevor's claims by the way, so that we can make the paragraph more in line with the others, while still keeping relevant information that is. I definitely think that its worth it since it mentions quite a couple cases of allied soldiers attacking German POWs, including executions and even brawls/fights being broken up by other allied troops when soldiers tried to attack POWs (or one such case where some soldiers allegedly tried to convince another to hand them the POWs, likely for execution)

Its also definitely important to note that many POWs, as mentioned before, did not arrive to the collection points during D-Day, and that many killings were done so in revenge or in the heat of battle (a LOT of small and separate cases instead of a single mass execution), IMO thats quite relevant to include, dont know though. MySalsa22 (talk) 12:43, 15 April 2026 (UTC)

Audoville-la-hubert. It's not clear to me that the journalist is quoting Beevor. I always prefer scholarly sources over articles in newspapers and magazines because journalist are only interested in new, sensational claims that apparently overturn the scholarly consensus. But wikipedia is supposed to accurately reflect the scholarly consensus. That said, I will try to find a copy of Beevor's book and see what he says. We can always add things to the article later if we find a good source.

Jungholzhausen massacre. This is another newspaper article which is why I am wary of it. Now I can't find the source that was from the far-right Pour la Mérite publishers. I wonder if it was in another wikipedia article. Sorry for that, but I have checked so many citations in the past week I've forgotten which was which. I will keep looking. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 07:23, 16 April 2026 (UTC)

Alright, if you can find information on that specific case from beevor that would be good. As for Jungholzhausen, there was one source there that was made by a far-right holocaust denier guy, i did remove it however so i think thats why you couldnt find it, the article seems to be a bit better now with some edits i did (less emphasis on unsourced claims like the 48 number and the age of the soldiers which for some reason was included? maybe as shock value, i dunno). MySalsa22 (talk) 13:45, 16 April 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for removing that dubious source from the Jungholzhausen article. No wonder I couldn't find it again! Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 21:34, 16 April 2026 (UTC)

No problem, the reason i removed it was because, when i checked who it was (i almost always do this for the sources im using, in case the author is not reliable), it just explicitly said the author was linked with far-right holocaust denial and revisionist discourse. MySalsa22 (talk) 22:03, 16 April 2026 (UTC)

@MySalsa22 I couldn't find anything on Audouville-la-Hubert in Beevor's D-Day or in Atkinson's The Guns at last Light. Both these works give examples of shootings of POWs and surrendering German soldiers, but usually cases of 1 or 2 at a time. No mention of massacres or large numbers of POWs failing to reach collections points. Plenty of mentions of masses of Germans taken prisoner and transferred to cages on the beaches or to landing craft for transport back to England.

Beevor

"There seems to have been a number of cases of soldiers shooting the prisoners taken by others." 68

A Jewish soldier killed two German POWs. 68

A soldier of the 101^st said that when they found the mutilated bodies of American paratroopers, his captain gave the order to take no German prisoners. 68

There were a few cases of troops mutilating the corpses of dead Germans. 68

Paratroopers took 15 Germans prisoner behind Utah beach. When one of the prisoners tried to run away they shot him. P 70

Some GIs shot a wounded German prisoner who was unconscious and dying. 106

American soldiers sometimes shot German soldiers who made sudden movements. 106

The 90^th Infantry Division fired on a column of German prisoners being led to a collection point. (They were green troops and panicked when they thought it was an enemy column.) 162

Private Smith of the 79^th Infantry Division shot several wounded Germans when drunk on Calvados. 220

Atkinson:

On D-Day a lieutenant paratrooper killed three wounded Germans because he felt he couldn't take any prisoners. P 40

I would summarise all this as: "There were numerous reports of American troops killing POWs during the Normandy campaign." Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 08:34, 19 April 2026 (UTC)

Alright then, guess its better to leave Audoville out if theres no reliable sources on it.

As for the other cases, i wont oppose to adding something about D-Day prisoner killings, though maybe adding that most POWs shot were wounded or surrendering (i.e not already captured per se) would make more sense.

Plus, adding that a few cases of no quarter orders occured in response to German executions of POWs, and that some troops mutilated dead bodies, i think thats somewhat notable.

Maybe something like this could work:

"There were numerous cases of American soldiers shooting wounded or surrendering enemy troops during the Normandy campaign. In some cases, commanders issued no quarter orders in response to German massacres of US paratroopers. Some prisoners were also shot while being taken to POW collection points, and there were cases of US troops mutilating dead German soldiers."

MySalsa22 (talk) 14:07, 19 April 2026 (UTC)

Laconia incident. I have rewritten this again. The key relevant facts are that the U-156 was displaying a red cross flag and was clearly carrying survivors of a shipwreck. Therefore the attack on the submarine was a war crime. According to Blair and the German submarine captain one of the B-24's bombs landed "among the life rafts" and overturned them. Neither says that it was a direct hit and that dozens were killed. Nor is there any mention of strafing: just bombing. If Tougias says this I would discount it because the source is dubious. It is a popular book aimed at children, not a scholarly book at all. (I wouldn't use it in any historical article.) I couldn't check the article by Maurer "The origin of the Laconia order" because I don't have access to it. Have you read it? In any event, Blair is a highly respected source so I have given his version. The Americans obviously did not intend to kill anyone in the life rafts: it was a stray bomb and their orders were to sink the sub so that British ships could safely pick up the survivors of the Laconia. The crime was the attack on a sub carrying out a rescue mission. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 06:01, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

Normandy. I would leave it as it is. We already say, "There were a number of incidents where American forces killed surrendering troops and prisoners of war in western Europe." And we already say there were some cases where no quarter orders were given. There is no need to say the same thing for the Battle of Normandy, The Battle of the Bulge and all the other battles in western Europe from June 1944 to May 1945. We are only highlighting a few of the most deadly and well attested examples of such incidents. The details are in the linked articles. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 06:09, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

Alright then, i did read part of the article by Maurer on another site, though part of it was behind a paywall so i couldnt access the entire thing, atleast now the part about Laconia is more in-depth (previously it just said that a bomber was ordered to attack submarines, not that the submarines were displaying red cross flags or anything else) - by strafing i meant the dropping of bombs itself, maybe i misunderstood the meaning/exact word for it - as for Tougias, yeah maybe it isnt that much reliable, i have read part of it and, it doesnt use much neutral wording, also appears to say things that arent exactly referenced in other sources. As for anything else, if its reliably sourced i dont oppose to it.

As for Normandy, i just wanted to emphasize that, not only there were attacks against surrendering and wounded/captured soldiers, but there was the occasional use of no quarter orders in reprisal to German atrocities - and that there was mutilation of bodies and soldiers being attacked or shot in collection points (either as reprisal or as an accident, in one of the cases you mentioned), either way atleast including that there were executions of POWs and wounded soldiers is probably enough for now.

MySalsa22 (talk) 19:25, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

Hello there. Just a few adjustments in wording.

Laconia. It sounds odd to write "the sunken Laconia" as if it sank by itself. Also there was one attack on U-156 by the B-24 consisting of 3-4 bombing runs. The second attack by the B-24 was the following day on a different sub. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:36, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

Oh alright, i was going to add an paranthesis that U-156 sunk Laconia, but i forgot about it lol. About the attacks, yeah i thought that both attacks were against U-156, but apparently it was a different one (4 subs took part in this operation, one of them Italian and 3 Germans). MySalsa22 (talk) 23:17, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin i have added some of the content you discussed here about US soldiers shooting German POWs or wounded during the Normandy campaign, as well as mutilation of dead bodies, i tried to keep the new content more concise like you said, focusing on the main issues.

If you have a better idea, feel free to change that part, just thought id add it since i saw no change has been made to the article in a long time + even i had forgot about this for a while lol.

MySalsa22 (talk) 02:03, 11 June 2026 (UTC)

China

Hello all I have replaced most of the previous content for the following reasons:

1) Most was unsourced or poorly sourced from amateurish-looking websites.

2) None of the incidents mentioned were technically Allied war crimes because they weren't committed by official Chinese forces as one of the Allies and against enemy military or civilians in occupied territories.

3) China only officially joined the Allies in January 1942 (although they were a de facto ally from 9 December 1941 when they declared war on the Axis.)

I have replaced the old content with more relevant and reliably sourced content. The only reliably sourced Allied war crimes committed by China I could find were reports of mistreatment of Japanese prisoners. (However, most of the reliable sources state that the Nationalists and communists generally treated Japanese POWs well.) I have included the instance of "no quarter" shown by nationalist and communist forces during the New Fourth Army incident of January 1941. However, even this is a stretch: although undoubtedly a war crime committing during the period of the Second World War (1939-1945), the Chinese weren't one of the Allies at the time and the crimes weren't committed against enemy forces (the nationalists and Communists were officially in a "United Front" against the Japanese). I have added a short background paragraph explaining when Japan began the war against China, when China officially became one of the allies, and that there were clashes between nationalist and Chinese forces during the war. The links give a fuller background. I have replaced the previous examples of Chinese nationalist and Communist forces killing Chinese civilians and conscripts because these are not technically war crimes. However, they might be crimes against humanity or "democides" as Rummel calls them.

Happy to discuss.

@MySalsa22 Any comments or suggestions welcome Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 03:27, 4 May 2026 (UTC)

Good to see you removed some of the less-sourced information, though i have a question, mainly about the forced conscription and evacuations/plundering of towns in 1943, you did remove them, but from what i saw they were sourced by rummel (which is technically reliable). Dont know if that was an accident or intended anyways.

Though there could be the argument that these crimes were done against their own people (forced conscription and attacks against one's own citizens may not be war crimes, but im not sure) so maybe they shouldnt be included? i dont know though. Either way, i do not oppose the current format of that section. MySalsa22 (talk) 12:16, 4 May 2026 (UTC)

My understanding is that at the time forced conscription, forced evacuations and a scorched earth policy in your own country and directed against your own civilians weren't war crimes. They might be crimes against humanity depending on the circumstances, and probably were ordinary crimes under the laws of China. For example, Rummel is surely correct when he calls acts such as blowing up the dykes on the Yangtze (500,000 to 840,000 killed) as crimes against humanity - a different category from war crimes and, in this case, done in 1938, so during the Sino-Japanese war and not WWII proper, and not when China was one of the Allies. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 21:24, 4 May 2026 (UTC)

well, makes sense yeah, like i said previously, these surely are crimes, but they were done against their own citizens, or else we might just add soviet and german scorched earth policies to their own pages.

and yeah, theres also the fact that a lot of these crimes happened before ww2 arrived in china (1937-42), so they wouldnt make sense to be on this article specifically. MySalsa22 (talk) 22:42, 4 May 2026 (UTC)

France

Hello all

As with the other major Allies, I have tried to rewrite this section in a summary style with reliable secondary sources. I have checked every citation in the section and I have removed unsourced and poorly sourced information. I have replaced citations to dubious websites with scholarly sources where possible. I have preferred English language sources to untranslated foreign language sources where they cover the same information. This is in accordance with policy. I have changed the sub-section headings and reorganised some of the content into similar categories to those used for the other major powers. I have put the French Forces of the Interior into a separate sub-section because they were resistance forces rather than officially one of the Allies, at least before they were officially integrated into the French Army after the liberation of Paris.

Happy to discuss

@MySalsa22 Any comments or suggestions would be much apporeciated Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 01:34, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

I made a small edit to the Abbeville part, especially in regard to wording and such, and i also summarized the part about the prosecutions (it was a tiny bit too large to me, i used some wording which can better and more easily explain this fact)

Either way, i appreciate the other additions, especially the separation of FFI forces from the rest (it makes no sense to me to put an resistance group on par with organized forces, separating is the best middle ground in my opinion)

MySalsa22 (talk) 02:30, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

I agree about resistance forces. The whole section on Yugoslavia is problematic because we have a civil war combined with resistance against Axis invaders. It shouldn't be in a table either. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 02:50, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

In my opinion, Yugoslavia too should be heavily summarized, keeping mostly information about killings/deportations ("repatriations") by partisan forces, instead of post-ww2 information (its allied war crimes *during* world war 2). Also, yeah, it being in a table-like form isnt the best way to do it currently, i suggest a major remake of that section. MySalsa22 (talk) 03:10, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

I have moved the content about the Abbeville massacre to the sub-section on Crimes against civilians. I am now having trouble getting the images in the right place and don't know how to fix it. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 05:08, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

No problem, i have fixed the images, as for Abbevile, yeah, the victims were basically all civilians so makes sense to be under the civilians section. MySalsa22 (talk) 20:16, 15 May 2026 (UTC)