Source: https://www.hrw.org/reports/2005/us0405/10.htm
Timestamp: 2019-04-23 03:19:51+00:00

Document:
The first and most significant U.S. case involving command responsibility was that of General Tomoyuki Yamashita, commander of the Japanese forces in the Philippines in World War II, whose troops committed brutal atrocities against the civilian population and prisoners of war. Gen. Yamashita, who had lost almost all command, control, and communications over his troops, was nevertheless convicted by the International Military Tribunal in Tokyo based on the doctrine of command responsibility. The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the decision, holding that General Yamashita was, by virtue of his position as commander of the Japanese forces in the Philippines, under an affirmative duty to take such measures as were within his power and appropriate in the circumstances to protect prisoners of war and the civilian population.361 General Yamashita was executed by hanging.
1. There must be a superior-subordinate relationship.
2. The superior must have known or had reason to know that the subordinate was about to commit a crime or had committed a crime.
.Liability may also attach to a commander even if he did not actually know about the acts of subordinates but ought to have known about them and his failure in this respect constituted a dereliction of duty on his part, for example, if he is put on notice but fails to do anything about it.
 In Re Yamashita 327, U.S. 1, 16 (1946).
 In Re Yamashita; The Prosecutor v. Delalic et al. (Celebici Case), Case No. IT-96-21-T, ICTY TC, November 16, 1998 [online], http://www.un.org/icty/celebici/trialc2/jugement/main.htm. More recently, several decisions under the Torture Victim Protection Act of 1991 (28 U.S.C.S. § 1350) have applied the doctrine of command responsibility. See Hilao v. Estate of Ferdinand Marcos, 103.F.3d 767, 777-78 (9th Cir.1996); Kadic v Karadzic, 70 F.3d 232, 239, 242 (2d Cir. 1995); Paul v Avril, 901 F.Supp. 330,335 (S.D.Fla. 1994); Xuncax v. Gramajo, 886 F.Supp. 162, 171-172 (D.Mass. 1995). In Ford v. Garcia, 289 F.3d 1283 (11th Cir. Fla. 2002), for example, family members of victims of atrocities committed by members of the Salvadorian National Guard, filed a case in a Florida federal court against a general and the former minister of defense. The judge directed that the two generals could be held responsible for the crimes of their subordinates if the defendants were in effective command and if they knew or should have known that persons under their effective command were committing such crimes.
 Department of Defense, Military Commission Instruction No. 2, Crimes and Elements for Trials by Military Commission, April 30, 2003 [online], http://www.defenselink.mil/news/May2003/d20030430milcominstno2.pdf.
 Henckaerts and Doswald-Beck, Customary International Humanitarian Law, 2005.
 United States v. von Weizsaecker, 14 Trials of War Criminals before the Nuremberg Military Tribunals under Control Council Law No. 10 (1952).
Prosecutor v. Nikolic, Case No. IT-94-2-R61, ICTY TC,Oct. 20, 1995.
 In Re Yamashita 327 U.S. 1 .See also Article 86 of Geneva Conventions Protocol I.
(a) actual knowledge, (b) such serious personal dereliction on the part of the commander as to constitute wilful and wanton disregard of the possible consequences, or (c) an imputation of constructive knowledge, that is, despite pleas to the contrary, the commander, under the facts and circumstances of the particular case, must have known of the offences charged and acquiesced therein.
Final Report of the Commission of Experts, Established Pursuant to Security Council Resolution 780 (1992), UN SCOR, Annex, UN Doc. S/1994/674, para. 58 (May 27, 1994).
 Ilias Bantekas, The Contemporary Law of Superior Responsibility, 93 A.J.I.L. 573, 591 (1999).
 Final Report of the Kahan Commission (authorized English translation), 22 ILM 473 (1983).
 See United States v. von Weizsaecker, 14 Trials of War Criminals before the Nuremberg Military Tribunals Under Control Council Law No. 10 (1952).

References: v. 
 § 1350
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v.