Quartermasters can also fight the devils

In addition, in Cohen's book "Weber's Draft Verdict on War Crimes - Another Perspective on the Tokyo Trial Verdict", he made an in-depth interpretation and commentary for the first time on the "verdict" read by Weber, the president of the Far East Military Tribunal, and promoted the resolution of this issue.

You should know that Cohen is the pioneer of Western war crimes trial research and an authority on international criminal law. He founded the Center for War Crimes Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, and served as the director of the newly established International Justice Institute at Stanford University.

During the trial of the Far Eastern Military Tribunal in Tokyo, in addition to the verdict read out at the Far Eastern Military Tribunal, judges from India, the Netherlands, France, Australia and the Philippines also submitted five minority opinions, namely objection, doubt, amendment and supplement. Among them, the well-known Weber opinion was actually just a summary of the opinion written by Weber at the time. In addition to this brief version, Weber also had an unsubmitted detailed version entitled "The President's Judgment".

The biggest difference between Weber's "presidential judgment" and the court verdict is that the verdict read out at the Far Eastern Military Tribunal was mainly a grand narrative about Japan's war responsibility, and the personal verdict part only occupied 66 pages of the 1,211-page original verdict manuscript, accounting for only 5% of the total verdict.

However, in Weber's detailed version of the "President's Judgment", the personal ruling section accounted for 374 pages out of the total 637 pages of the unsubmitted detailed version, which is close to 60% of the total.

There are two key points of contention between Weber's "President's Judgment" and the judgment of the Military Tribunal of the Far Eastern Countries. First, on what evidence and what inferences were drawn from what evidence did the Military Tribunal of the Far Eastern Countries link each defendant to the crime convicted; second, on what theory of responsibility did the judge use to determine that the defendant was responsible.

Weber's "Presidential Judgment" on the judgment of the Far Eastern Military Tribunal failed to provide sufficient substantive evidence for the individual responsibility of the defendants, but made a systematic "factual ruling" on each defendant, providing a basis for evaluating whether the judgment against individuals was supported by evidence, biased or politically manipulated.

Based on Weber's "Presidential Judgment" which analyzed the responsibilities of each defendant for crimes against peace and ordinary war crimes, Weber believed that among the prosecuted Japanese war criminals, except Sadao Araki, all the other Japanese defendants were guilty.

Mr. Cohen believed that if Weber's "Presidential Judgment" could have been made public at the time, the conviction of the accused Japanese war criminals would at least be more powerful. However, Weber himself did not want his opinion to cause the outside world to have an "incomplete" impact on the trial of the Far East Military Tribunal, so he chose to put his "Presidential Judgment" on the shelf.

In addition to the "Judgment" of President Weber of the Military Tribunal of the Far Eastern Countries, the opinion of Judge Pal from India is also particularly famous.

This is because Indian Judge Pal argued in the Far East Military Tribunal that all Japanese Class A war criminals were innocent. Therefore, Indian Judge Pal is a rather special existence in Japan. Japan has built monuments for Indian Judge Pal in places such as the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo, the Ryozen Gokoku Shrine in Kyoto, the Honsho-ji Temple in Hiroshima, and the Toyama Gokoku Shrine.

The lengthy so-called "Pal Judgment" by Indian judge Pal at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East was published in both abridged and complete versions in the year when Japan ended the Allied occupation. After that, the claims of Indian judge Pal at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East were widely cited by the Japanese right-wing as a source of reason and "morality".

Among the numerous works denying the trials of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo, the claims of Indian judge Pal are a must-talk topic in almost every book. In the "Secret Records of the Tokyo Trial", published on the eve of the death of Ichiro Kiyose, deputy head of the Japanese defense team of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, there is even a special section to praise the Indian judge Pal.

However, a careful reading of the "Pal Judgment" of Indian Judge Pal and the defense's arguments in the trial records of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East reveals a close fit between the two.

Take the jurisdictional doubts raised by Ichiro Kiyose, deputy head of the Japanese defense team, at the beginning of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East as an example. The reasons given by Ichiro Kiyose, deputy head of the Japanese defense team, were almost completely taken over by Indian judge Pal.

In fact, it can be said that the agreement between Indian judge Pal and the defendant was just a coincidence. Therefore, there is no need to say that Indian judge Pal was taking credit for others' achievements. However, the Japanese right-wingers deliberately took the Indian judge Pal's claims as unique and clear foresight, making the Japanese right-wingers' mentality of relying on foreign powers to gain respect clearly visible on paper.

However, with the publication of the translated version of Pal's book, the advertising slogan on the cover was very vivid: although he had been buried in the dust of history in his home country India, he was deified as the "great man of the century" in Japan.

The author of this book is Nakazato Nakazato, who obtained his doctorate from the University of Calcutta, where Pal once worked. By consulting a large number of first-hand documents and interviewing Pal's colleagues and descendants, he restored Pal's true face.

Mr. Nakazato's report this time, "India's Judge Pal - Around His Political and Ideological Status," further explored Pal's ideological and political stance, clarified the long-standing rumor that Indian judge Pal was a "Gandhian" who believed in peace, and proved that Indian judge Pal belonged to the right wing in India's domestic political spectrum.

As for the issue of Emperor Hirohito of Japan's war responsibility, it is also an issue that has been repeatedly mentioned by later generations in the history of trial research of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo.

Among them, the report by Mr. Masayuki Yamada of Japan did not draw a clear conclusion on whether or not Emperor Hirohito of Japan was responsible for the war. Instead, it discussed in detail the performance and role of Emperor Showa from the perspectives of culture, history, and the role of the emperor during wartime.

In addition, Mr. Masayuki Yamada's report analyzed the views of various countries on the war responsibility of Japanese Emperor Hirohito. The report put forward many different views from the past, and even some new views that seemed bizarre.

For example, Mr. Masayuki Yamada pointed out in his report that Hideki Tojo's suicide without shooting his heart was a "calculation" because he had to die because he could not violate his own "wartime training" that prohibited him from being captured, but at the same time he had to live because he had to bear the responsibility for Emperor Hirohito of Japan.

Regardless of whether the facts in Mr. Masayuki Yamada's report are so bizarre, this complex perspective can at least provide future generations with a different perspective.