A while back, we discussed the vanishing of Dutch, Allied and Japanese WWII warships. They'd gone from the seabed in the Java Sea. Word has it that these war graves were looted by scrappers. Now the Indonisian website https://tirto.id/sindikat-china-penj...-tenggara-cDAg has an update. A horrifying update. According to Tinto, there are signs of mass graves near the harbour town Bodrong.
Try Tinto in Google Translate.
I don't know. I simply clicked on the Indonesian article, Ctr-C, Ctr-V'ed the link on top of my laptop's screen it into Google translate and clicked 'translate'
Bahasa Indonesia is a difficult language; a mix of the Malian language and Dutch, spelled differently.
Menno
https://tirto.id/a-ring-of-naval-wreck-robbers-cDt6
Is this the same information?
I'm using Chrome in W10 and there's an icon at the end of the URL address bar that does the trick:
...or else I right click in the page and use the Translate to English option.
Here is a link to the previous thead: Mystery over WW2 missing ship wrecks. Given the past articles linked in that thread, I expect that the Guardian may pick up on this story.
At the bottom of thieuster's link, there is a link to another page with the basics in English.
https://tirto.id/a-ring-of-naval-wreck-robbers-cDt6
Not quite, I don't think. Looking at the site's home page:
...you can see both stories plus another In Depth article. There are more at the bottom of the page you linked or brought up by the buttons I have highlighted in red. It seems that the OP has found the latest article (22 January) in a continuing series.
Thanks for the update I was the original OP on this subject. Why are our government doing nothing about this??
I honestly don't know. Maybe this is one for your MP?
Edit: You might also try a FoI request to the Foreign & Commonwealth Office and the Minstry of Defence asking about actions they have taken and UK relations with other nations on this matter.
Last edited by PickleB; 22nd January 2018 at 16:21.
Shocking but I doubt anything will be done in that part of the world.
When you think of the sacrifices made only for some scumbags to rob the dead.
Cheers,
Neil.
This feature in the Guardian, 28 Feb 2018, Lost bones, a mass grave and war wrecks plundered off Indonesia...led me to severeal other articles, some of which have already been posted in this thread:
16 Nov 2016 Mystery as wrecks of three Dutch WWII ships vanish from Java seabed
23 Nov 2016 Indonesia to investigate disappearance of WWII shipwrecks in Java Sea
05 Jun 2017 Sunken Australian warship HMAS Perth ransacked by illegal scavengers
03 Nov 2017 The world's biggest grave robbery: Asia’s disappearing WWII shipwrecks
22 Jan 2018 Bodies of second world war sailors in Java sea 'dumped in mass grave'
26 Jan 2018 Dutch call on Indonesia to investigate reports of mass graves and war wrecks
27 Feb 2018 Indonesia: cemetery dug up in search for bones of British and Dutch sailors
07 Mar 2018 UK in talks with Indonesia over missing sunken WWII warships
In a similar vein...POWs sank with the Lisbon Maru - should it be raised?
A Chinese film-maker wants to raise a Japanese ship that was sunk in 1942 with hundreds of British prisoners of war on board. Some of the victims' families back the idea, but one of the survivors says it's a war grave, and should be left where it lies.
What's on the man's agenda? Becoming the Asian version of Cameron in relation to the Titanic?
First thing on my mind: who's responsible for the (war)grave? The Japanse because it was their vessel? Or are former allied nations morally responsible for the war grave, given the amount of allied troops on the ship? In either case, Japan and allied nations (including the Dutch) should never allow this going to happen.
It would seem that the responsibility, if any, is tenuous...see Government fails to honor war dead, campaigners say.
On a slightly different note...Sunken WW1 battleships up for sale on eBay
Four World War One battleships sunk in Scapa Flow in Orkney in 1919 are being sold on eBay - with an asking price of just over £800,000.
The vessels, which were part of the German High Seas fleet, were deliberately scuttled 100 years ago.
When the listing first appeared on online auction site eBay, some assumed the advert was a hoax.
But the seller explained that they had been bought from a defunct salvage company.
The vessels will now be sold to the highest bidder.
NB "They cannot be removed from the seabed."
eBay link
Last edited by PickleB; 19th June 2019 at 14:24. Reason: added eBay link
Originally Posted by Ebay
Sold for £85,000
Four World War One warships sunk in Scapa Flow in Orkney in 1919 have been sold on eBay for a combined total of £85,000.
The Markgraf, Karlsruhe, Konig and Kronprinz Wilhelm are scheduled monuments, which recreational divers are not supposed to enter.
The asking price was over £800,000...
Sadly, it's a hot topic once more: two sunken Dutch subs in Malaysian territorial waters have vanished as well. Despite the agreement between The Netherlands and Malaysia to keep an eye on those war graves. We'd learned from the former tragedy and the Dutch government -knowing where the shipwrecks are located- made agreements with all East Asian countries (when in territorial waters) to protect the graves.
They didn't.
Extra harsh detail is the fact that one of the sunken ships' commander was the grandfather of a minister of the previous cabinet - actually the cabinet that had set up those agreements.
In my book, it's nothing more than grave robbery.
Menno
It's not surprising, though, is it. It was surely naive for anyone to seriously expect them to keep their word: It would require hard work and real money to be spent. They're just not going to do that, no matter what they say. (Then again, politicians seem to make a career out of selective naivety).
I've noticed that, for people in many countries, the expectation is that you make an agreement but then carry on doing exactly what you were doing before. The agreement is just for show. In many cases, they would be genuinely surprised that anyone would care about the substance.
To be clear, I am not defending the grave robbery. It's abhorrent. But unless any agreements related to it are made treaties with real, genuinely enforceable, penalties then the agreements are worthless.
Even sadder that they apparently believed what they were told. :-(
That is exactly what it is.
???
Thing is the steel in those ships has high value for medical applications as it pre dates atmospheric nuclear detonations.
Last edited by PickleB; 11th July 2019 at 07:43.
Serious question, when does it stop being "Grave Robbing" and become 'Archaeology' ..... I'm thinking here of the Mary Rose whose crew are currently on shelves in a museum ......
Good question. And indeed more people have asked the same according to Google. General rule: the difference between 'personal financial benefit' and 'serving the community'. Especially the economical and financial part is the important issue to determine the difference.
Wasn't the Mary rose only raised after the silt which had protected it moved meaning it would rot to nothing if left in place?
The desecration of the ww2 wrecks is disgusting but unsurprising.
That said I watched a documentary on a British company that won the salvage rights to all sunk British ships after the war, they salvaged much of the cargo by opening the hulls and using a grab. I assume some if these wrecks would have been graves too?
I agree, I also queried why it was ok for our government to sanction the recovery of cargo on ships that must have contained human remains.
It seems to be that there is no objectively useful answer to this.
It seems to come down to the passing of time and loss of direct emotional connections. (One might argue that laws have been put in place specifically to protect more modern grave sites but, of course, the laws reflect 'direct emotional connections', not the other way round).
A cynic might just say that the far easterners currently robbing graves/wrecks are just accelerating the process. Ho hum.
Ho hum. Humans are inconsistent.