Evening star., 1948-12-04
Genocide and War

After two years of study and negotiation
in various committees, the General As
Sembly of the United Nations now has
before it a convention outlaWing the hid
eous crime of genocide Although the
Soviet bloc and Britain have abStained
from approving the final text submitted
to the U. N the undertaking undoubtedly
will be supported by an overwhelming vote.
After that, just as soon as it is ratified by
twenty countries, it will become formally
effective, and the world will be able to
claim at least a little bit of additional
progress in the age-old task of civilizing
itself
The crime in question is not new. HUI
manity has been afflicted by it at all pc
riods of history. But 1t was nameleSs
until Hitler came along and made 1t an
undisguised instrument of governmental
policy, particularly in his incredibly evil
and fiendishly calculating mass extermi-
nation of the Jews of Germany and Eu-
rope. For want of better word-no word
is adequate to sum up the indescribable
physical and spiritual horrors involved
it has been called genocide. AS defined
by the new u N convention, it means acts
deliberately designed Ito destroy, in whole
or in part, a national, clinical, racial or
religious group" either by outright sys-
tematic slaughter, by slow starvation, by
sterilization, by forcible large-scale trans
fers of children from one land to another,
or by similar means consciously contrived
to remove from the face of the earth, or
reduce to the vanishing point, any given
people.
Under the U. NJ convention-When rati-
fled by the required number-international
law will establish it as fixed fact in the
political life of the world that any one
guilty of genocide, or of conspring to
commit it, or of being otherwise directly
or indirectly party to it, will be subject
to strict punishment To bring such in
dividuals or groups to justice prospective
victims or their qualified protectors will
be able to appeal both to national courts
and to the special tribunals of the United
Nations. The accused, moreover, whether
private persons or public officials, will not
be entitled to seek sanctuary in the sig
natory countries----For those countries will
be expressly forHdden~ to grant them
asylum and will be pledged instead to ex
tradite them for trial on the charges filed
against them. Thus, for the first time in
history, the crime will be specifically
banned and supraffstfonal legal process
will exist to deal with it.
Obviously. to the extent that 1t may
help to prevent repetition of mass
determination programs of the sort carried
out by Hitler the u. N. convention on
genocide represents a wholesome advance
in the development of international law,
which in turn serves to promote better
civilization in the world. With that said,
however, the fact remains that the under
taking, noble though it is in purpose, can
have little more than an idealiStic or
academic meaning at this time. For the
truth is wholly apart from the question
Of enforceability that it will offer scant
tions continue to be as divided as they
are now on the most fundamental and
most pressing Of human iSsues-namely,
the issue of working out an enduring
system of collective security for all peoples
Actually, If men and their governments
are to be frank with themselves, they
must recognize that this new convention
merely scratches the surface. We are
living in an age when our race is at least
theoretically capable of totally annihilat-
ing itself. Fine as it is, therefore, the out
lawry of mass determination as defined
by the U. N. must be viewed as merely a
minor step in the right direction. 1t still
leaves untouched and uncontrolled the
forces of war itself. If those forces-the
atom, psychological weapons supersonic
rockets, etc.-are Unbiased on an all-out
basis in another twenty years or so then
there will be the genocide to end all geno-
eide, with perhaps too little of humanity