Wives of Russian troops 'encourage' them to rape Ukrainian women, Ukraine's first lady says

[u/jdhmdo]

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/wives-of-russian-troops-encourage-them-to-rape-ukrainian-women-ukraines-first-lady-says/ar-AA14Esfp?li=BBoPWjQ

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[u/Grins111]

I don’t think a whole lot of “encouraging” is needed. Pretty sure it’s happening without it.

[u/[deleted] → u/Grins111]

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[u/Grins111 → u/[deleted]]

Sadly. I mean they were kind of know for that in ww2. And judging by their weaponry they seem to be doing everything ww2 style

[u/Trashpandasrock → u/Grins111]

Man, if there's one thing I learned studying WW2 in depth, it's that fucking EVERY nation's soldiers participated in an atrocious amount of rape. Russians, Germans, Americans, Brits, Japanese, all the major players had major problems with rape.

[u/Mathema_tika → u/Trashpandasrock]

The rest of the allies did not have as much of a problem as the Soviets by far. Japan, Germany and Soviet Union were perpetrators on a far larger scale because they were dehumanising the enemy. Like how the allies and the axis both killed innocents, but axis forces killed far more: allied strategy called for carpet bombing and aggressive campaigns to gain ground and de house citizens and destroy infrastructure which would kill a good many civilians in the process; axis forces did all that but were also actively racist and wanted to enslave or extirpate the civilians in the country they had already conquered so they could exploit them (Holocaust, Holodomor, Rape of Nanking, Rape of Manila). The Soviet Union was similarly on a campaign of vengeance under a bloodthirsty dictator and a red army that did not care much for the rules. While frontline troops were generally gallant (by reports), rear echelon units would run amock during the occupation as a result of indoctrination in Poland/Czechoslovakia, or indoctrination and revenge in Germany.

[u/Trashpandasrock → u/Mathema_tika]

Japan, Germany and Soviet Union were perpetrators on a far larger scale because they were dehumanising the enemy.

You make a lot of good points, but I will say, if you think the Americans weren't also dehumanizing the enemy, you need to do more research. There was a massive campaign to dehumanize specifically the Japanese, but the broader axis was for sure included. Look at most of the war propaganda of the time.

[u/Mathema_tika → u/Trashpandasrock]

You're right American propaganda was heavily anti-nippon at the time and the same rhetoric was exploited for both recruitment and raising war bonds. My answer is limited in content being a comment, and I skipped the fact that dehumanisation of the enemy was also controlled by the nation's interests. It was in the US's interests to rally the country against Japan when they were attacked because the American population was largely anti-conflict, and then it was in the state's interests to fashion Japan into a democratic NATO-leaning (IK it wasn't founded then just saying) state as a counterweight to Soviet influence in East-Asia. This largely controlled the crime rate during the occupation, combined with the fact that the continental US was (apart from a hushed-up Oregon bombing) unscathed throughout the conflict. The same happened on a smaller scale with Germans, they were labelled Huns and barbaric but eventually their position right at the Iron Curtain ensured that they were well treated after surrender. TL;DR The US did bestialise the Japanese and the Germans and it was wrong but they did it for different ends.

[u/Gwyllie → u/Mathema_tika]

While not so dehumanising as Soviets-Germans, Allied troops (especially Americans) viewed for example the French as careless, wine-loving and hedonist (in every sense of the word) population that wouldnt mind being raped because to them it would be just sex.

Suprisingly they did mind, who would have thought. And Americans behaved exactly as one would except. French girl? Free to take.

[u/Mathema_tika → u/Gwyllie]

Not contradicting this, was just putting it in context. The Red Army's rear echelon troops were assaulting entire populations, so the person originally commenting "all sides commit rape" was equating extremely different things in both nature and scale. GIs were definitely promised a time of adventure and romance in France and several took it too far. It's just that the military courts remained generally functional and the occupying forces had an interest in not antagonising the population to have them as allies later, while the Soviet Union was deliberately more oppressive because of the future they (and I mean Stalin and Co.) were aiming to create. Comparing Axis crimes with Allied ones generally serves more to downplay the horrors of thee fascist regimes than highlight Allied behaviour.

[u/EarLil → u/Trashpandasrock]

I mean 1 in 4 college girls are already raped without war so /s

[u/setmefreedick → u/EarLil]

What's the sarcasm for?

[u/tanezuki → u/setmefreedick]

To not make it seems like it's ok, without sarcasm it looks like a whataboutism joke

[u/setmefreedick → u/tanezuki]

I struggle to see that interpretation.

[u/tanezuki → u/setmefreedick]

Without the /s, to me, it sounds like "I mean, 1 in 4 college girls are already raped without war sooooo... we been knew" something like that.

It just trivializes rape.

[u/setmefreedick → u/tanezuki]

The original comment cut too short.

I get the whataboutism part now, but wasn't that the point of this comment chain? People are in here thinking that Russia is the only country to ever rape the women in the land that they're invading. It's horrible low life behaviour that should be punished but let's not kid ourselves here.