Today I visited Italy's most important and sacred World War II memorial. At this site, 335 Italian citizens were shot and, after being dumped in several caves of the Fosse Ardeatina area outside Rome, buried by the Nazis. These were "revenge executions." Hitler ordered that 10 Italians (many were priests, religious, and seminarians but others were randomly chosen from the streets) be killed for every one of the 32 Nazis killed by the Italian Resistance. That would have made 320 executions; however 15 more were added for "good measure." The Nazis responsible for carrying out the executions were eventually tried for crimes against humanity at the Nuremburg Trials upon the completion of WWII. However, their crime was not the execution of the 320 innocent Italians. Their only crime was that they exceeded their orders and killed an additional 15. Truly amazing...man's inhumanity to man. God help us! God save us!
Today I visited Italy's most important and sacred World War II memorial. At this site, 335 Italian citizens were shot and, after being dumped in several caves of the Fosse Ardeatina area outside Rome, buried by the Nazis. These were "revenge executions." Hitler ordered that 10 Italians (many were priests, religious, and seminarians but others were randomly chosen from the streets) be killed for every one of the 32 Nazis killed by the Italian Resistance. That would have made 320 executions; however 15 more were added for "good measure." The Nazis responsible for carrying out the executions were eventually tried for crimes against humanity at the Nuremburg Trials upon the completion of WWII. However, their crime was not the execution of the 320 innocent Italians. Their only crime was that they exceeded their orders and killed an additional 15. Truly amazing...man's inhumanity to man. God help us! God save us!
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