When a new process is executed on non windows systems, open files are closed. However on windows files are kept open.

This difference in behaviour was found when fixing JDK-8176717. The fix for JDK-8176717 closes files opened by the logging framework. However, the behaviour of files opened by Java programs remains different between windows and other operating systems. It could be that this should continue to be true (to remain backwards compatible), or maybe it should be changed (to be consistent over platforms). A decision should be made, and if the behaviour is to keep the windows behaviour it would be nice to document the difference.

See linked issues and email thread below:
http://mail.openjdk.java.net/pipermail/hotspot-dev/2018-March/030637.html