ABSTRACT
The prospect and actuality of war can lead to the amplification of many good and bad human tendencies. Amongst the latter is the tendency to use medical knowledge, technology and intervention in ways that damage human beings. The use of biological and chemical agents in warfare has been occurring on a regular basis for thousands of years. Such agents have been used as a means of directly harming and killing individuals and large groups and have also in some cases been used to target the environments that they rely on. The German World War II programme of experimental atrocities can be characterized as having two distinct aspects: firstly, volunteers were used to carry out tests on chemical agents. In considering the moral and legal legitimacy of the Tribunal’s actions in relation both to this specific trial, one of the issues that needs to be addressed is whether the counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity were legally justifiable.
