Comment by ridiculous_leke
5 years ago
> But culpability? For resident nationals? Unless you were a dissident or in the opposition, yes, you absolutely bear culpability. I wouldn't even go so far as to say in a moral sense. Not automatically. But at least to one's ability to interact with other countries' economies.
Maybe you are right. But holding ordinary citizens accountable doesn't always work the way we want. That's exactly what the West did with Germans after World War 1.
It depends on what you mean by "holding accountable"
Germany was financially crippled and mostly demilitarized after WW1 which of course hugely affected the population. But in terms of _actually_ holding people personally accountable, there was a much stronger and organized effort after WW2, see e.g. [0]. I think that worked out rather okay. So I don't think it's quite as simple as saying it doesn't work.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denazification