[Milsurplus] Re: Red Cross Packages?

[Hue Miller]

David, thanks for opening the path on this. I was immediately thinking
of posting along the same lines, but wondered how it might be 
received.
One could argue that the Third Reich represented pure evil, therefore
any means to destroy it, was valid. To some limit this was in fact the
rule, with firebombing of civilian areas, strafing passenger trains, etc.
being acceptable. ( My mother only survivor of a strafed German
passenger train, and an uncle disappeared at firebombed Dresden;
while this makes me more aware of the evils of warfare, i have no 
special bias for the civilian population there: sow the wind, expect to
reap the whirlwind. )
Maybe a ground rule is, how can the enemy retaliate, if we do this?
In dealing with POW or survivor matters, you might want to behave 
circumspectly, and as you hope to be treated. 
Imagine the uproar if German "care packages" to POWs in the USA 
were found to contain similar materials. ( Of course,
probably Germany could not afford to spare anything anything. )
If POW care packages are fair game, why not moving ordnance via 
ambulance vans? If that happens, are all ambulances fair targets?
( I know this happened, yes; and more so from the Axis side. )
If the materials were discovered in US care packages to POWs,
that probably would have been the end of it. On the other war
theater, there really wasn't much chance to escape anyway; but
what if care packages to US prisoners of Japan had been found to
contain contraband? And the supply cut off? Most of those Red
Cross packages were apparently never delivered anyway, but it's
not hard to imagine the POW death rate being increased if even 
the paltry fraction of packages delivered, were instead held back.
I don't feel entirely comfortable with boasting about the success of
this clandestine operation. Yes, it happened, successfully, and it
needs to be reported, and remembered.
Radios in Red Cross packages? I'd have to admit i'm more amenable
to that idea. Harder for me to have a rigorously pure attitude about
that, naturally. Probably one could argue that a radio worked for
better prisoner morale = better health in general, but it still may have
been potentially grounds for the Nazis to cut off all packages, or
root thru them and remove things.  -Hue Miller  K7HUE
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