The Law of War

Hungarians
Hungarians became POWs of the Western Allies. Some of these were, like Germans,
used as forced labour in France after the cessation of hostilities. After the war the
POWs were handed over to the Soviets, and after the POWs were transported to the
USSR for forced labour. It is called even today in Hungary malenkij robot—little work.
András Toma, a Hungarian soldier taken prisoner by the Red Army in 1944, was
discovered in a Russian psychiatric hospital in 2000. He was probably the last prisoner
of war from World War II to be repatriated.
Japanese
Although thousands of Japanese were taken prisoner, most fought until they were killed
or committed suicide. Of the 22,000 Japanese soldiers present at the beginning of the
Battle of Iwo Jima, over 20,000 were killed and only 216 were taken prisoner. Of the
30,000 Japanese troops that defended Saipan, fewer than 1,000 remained alive at
battle's end. Japanese prisoners sent to camps fared well; however, some Japanese
were killed when trying to surrender or were massacred just after they had surrendered
(see Allied war crimes during World War II in the Pacific). In some instances, Japanese
prisoners were tortured by a variety of methods. A method of torture used by the
Chinese National Revolutionary Army (NRA) included suspending the prisoner by the
neck in a wooden cage until they died. In very rare cases, some were beheaded by
sword, and a severed head was once used as a football by Chinese National
Revolutionary Army (NRA) soldiers.
After the war, many Japanese were kept on as Japanese Surrendered Personnel until
mid-1947 and used as forced labour doing menial tasks, while 35,000 were kept on in
arms within their wartime military organisation and under their own officers and used in
combat alongside British troops seeking to suppress the independence movements in
the Dutch East Indies and French Indochina.
Italians
In 1943, Italy overthrew Mussolini and became a co-belligerent with the Allies. This did
not mean any change in status for Italian POWs however, since due to the labour
shortages in the UK, Australia and the USA, they were retained as POWs there.
Cossacks
On 11 February 1945, at the conclusion of the Yalta Conference, the United States and
the United Kingdom signed a Repatriation Agreement with the USSR. The interpretation
of this Agreement resulted in the forcible repatriation of all Soviets (Operation Keelhaul)
regardless of their wishes. The forced repatriation operations took place in 1945–1947.
Transfers Between the Allies
Page 104 of 265