102nd Infantry soldiers later discovered the bodies in the still-smoldering barn and in nearby trenches.

In the Pacific, Americans and Japanese troops generally believed their own culture was superior. The Japanese saw Americans as lazy and dishonorable. U.S. propaganda often showed the Japanese as animals. These ignorant perceptions contributed to the brutality of war. In Europe, both sides were capable of cruelty. Elliott Goldstein, an infantry officer, remembered finding the sexually mutilated bodies of U.S. soldiers who had surrendered to German forces: “… Our troops got so angry that I had a hard time keeping them from killing [German] prisoners.”