German or Nazis?

[mikewint]

Pbehn - Let's make sure that we are using our terms correctly: Even though nearly every politician, teacher, journalist and citizen believes that our Founders created a democracy, it is absolutely not true. The Founders knew full well the differences between a Republic and a Democracy. They repeatedly and emphatically said that they had founded a Republic.
Article IV Section 4, of the Constitution "guarantees to every state in this union a Republican form of government".... Conversely, the word Democracy is not mentioned even once in the Constitution. Madison warned us of the dangers of democracies with these words,
"Democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths...",
"We may define a republic to be ... a government which derives all its powers directly or indirectly from the great body of the people, and is administered by persons holding their offices during pleasure for a limited period, or during good behavior. It is essential to such a government that it be derived from the great body of the society, not from an inconsiderable proportion or a favored class of it; otherwise a handful of tyrannical nobles, exercising their oppressions by a delegation of their powers, might aspire to the rank of republicans and claim for their government the honorable title of republic." James Madison, Federalist No. 10, (1787)

"A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority. There is but little virtue in the action of masses of men." Henry David Thoreau

 

[pbehn]

Pbehn - Let's make sure that we are using our terms correctly: Even though nearly every politician, teacher, journalist and citizen believes that our Founders created a democracy, it is absolutely not true. The Founders knew full well the differences between a Republic and a Democracy. They repeatedly and emphatically said that they had founded a Republic.
Article IV Section 4, of the Constitution "guarantees to every state in this union a Republican form of government".... Conversely, the word Democracy is not mentioned even once in the Constitution. Madison warned us of the dangers of democracies with these words,
"Democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths...",
"We may define a republic to be ... a government which derives all its powers directly or indirectly from the great body of the people, and is administered by persons holding their offices during pleasure for a limited period, or during good behavior. It is essential to such a government that it be derived from the great body of the society, not from an inconsiderable proportion or a favored class of it; otherwise a handful of tyrannical nobles, exercising their oppressions by a delegation of their powers, might aspire to the rank of republicans and claim for their government the honorable title of republic." James Madison, Federalist No. 10, (1787)

"A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority. There is but little virtue in the action of masses of men." Henry David Thoreau

Fair comment Mike. By democracy I mean where you have one man one vote in a free and fair election. The founders of the USA were writing around the time of the French Revolution when the UK was an oligarchy. I have worked for a long time in France and the French say routinely "Vive la Republic" however the French and USA republics apart from having a President have little in common. Our old friend Saddam used to get 99% approval in his elections, the names mean nothing if the general will and freedom isnt there.

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Several of my buddies (Army and Marines) said they were encountering a good number of Syrians, Jordinians and even some Chechens along with some ex-Iraqi army mixed in with locals

Yes eventually, but not at first. 2003-2005 it was largely an Iraqi power struggle. Eventually the foreigners joined the "cause". In the end it was still a lot of people both Iraqi/Foreign.

In the end why where the foreign fighters there? Because we where there. We caused the insurgency. Don't take me wrong. I supported the war in Iraq, and firmly believe he had WMD's based off of things I saw with my own eyes. Fact remains however that our piss poor planning caused the chaos known as Iraqi "Freedom".

 

[mikewint]

pbehn, agreed and I also agreed with much of what you posted. The US had been working for 200+ years at becoming a republic before the Revolution. Not to mention many more hundreds of years of English traditions and common laws that were already a part of the colonies. Throwing out Saddam was never in doubt but there was no plan to win the peace. With Saddam gone there was a power vacuum and you cannot wave a wand and create a republican government where one has never existed before.
As Jefferson said: "The government you elect is the government you deserve." "When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny.

 

[stona]

A British general who opposed Churchill would be removed, if he plotted to assassinate Churchill he would be hanged.

Same for a German General. If he was prepared to stand by his morals he could, without fatal consequences. Many Germans justified their blind obedience (orders are orders) by the oath they had taken to Hitler, but some did draw a moral line and it did of course impinge upon their career.

Goldenhagen cites one SS officer who refused to take part in the massacre of a (I think from memory) Polish village (thought it might have been one of the Baltic states). He instead put in command of the detachment securing the perimeter, not exactly innocent but he had drawn a moral line. That man later commanded one of the SS training colleges.

Until WW2 both the US and British military put the onus of an unlawful order on the officer giving the order, but after Nuremberg this changed, putting a soldier in an almost impossible situation of having to make a legal/moral judgement of any order and then decide whether he should follow it or not.

There were examples in WW2 where unlawful orders were not followed. Anthony Miers, who finished up a Rear Admiral with a Victoria Cross, when in command of the submarine HMS Torbay, ordered two men, his second in command Lt. Paul Chapman and then a Corporal Sherwood of the Special Boat Section (now Service), to machine gun German survivors and both refused. The survivors were disposed of one way or the other, probably just thrown into the sea. Miers got away with it, but so too did Chapman and Sherwood. This was not the only atrocity committed by Miers.

British officers, under Queen's Regulations, are required to "prevent breakdowns in standards, ethics and the law."

Sometimes this didn't happen and sometimes such a "breakdown" might be purposeful. A German soldier testified that the infamous Malmedy massacre came as a result of a meeting of his commanders at which it was decided that "we should act towards the enemy in such a way that we create amongst them panic and terror and that the reputation for panic and terror should precede our troops." Any officer in any army would like his men to act in that way. The German officer(s) were only convicted on a technicality, that they had not given specific orders concerning the disposition of prisoners and had thus allowed the decision to be made by subordinates as to how to dispose of prisoners in a manner that would not jeopardise their mission.

Nothing is black and white.

Cheers

Steve

 

[pbehn]

Sometimes this didn't happen and sometimes such a "breakdown" might be purposeful. A German soldier testified that the infamous Malmedy massacre came as a result of a meeting of his commanders at which it was decided that "we should act towards the enemy in such a way that we create amongst them panic and terror and that the reputation for panic and terror should precede our troops." Any officer in any army would like his men to act in that way. The German officer(s) were only convicted on a technicality, that they had not given specific orders concerning the disposition of prisoners and had thus allowed the decision to be made by subordinates as to how to dispose of prisoners in a manner that would not jeopardise their mission.

Nothing is black and white.

Cheers

Steve

The post I made was about Rommel, what was specifically Nazi about his actions in North Africa and Europe I thought he was a good General who conducted his campaigns on sound military principles. Rommel gained the Iron cross second class in 1914 and firt class in 1915, I would imagine the political fanatics and "hitler youths" were as alien to him as they were to our forefathers, he was a professional soldier.

 

[stona]

Does being 'a professional soldier' justify fighting for a regime, whose excesses you are most certainly aware of? I'm sure Rommel was aware of the genocidal nature of the regime towards European Jewry, though how much detail is debateable. I know absolutely that he was aware of atrocities committed on the Eastern front, because other officers told him about them. Despite this he chose to hide behind an oath to his Fuhrer and the cloak of a 'professional soldier' something in which he was certainly aided by the British who had their own reasons for maintaining his reputation.
I'm not saying that this makes him better or worse than other German officers or even officers in other armies. I'm saying that to continue fighting for the devil, even if you signed up to fight for a saviour, once that devil has revealed himself, raises some serious moral questions. Everyone has choices, they may be unpalatable (ending an illustrious career for example) and most don't have the courage to make them.
Cheers
Steve

 

[mikewint]

On 14 Aug 1934, after the death of Hindenburg, a plebiscite was held. The question was to approve the combining the offices of President and Chancellor. By a vote of 89.9% in favor Hitler became: Führer und Reichskanzler
On August 20, 1934, the cabinet decreed: Gesetz über die Vereidigung der Beamten und der Soldaten der Wehrmacht A new oath for all soldiers and civil servants.
The oath was not a Hitler idea. It was written by Defence Minister General Werner von Blomberg and General Walther von Reichenau in an effort to tie Hitler closer to the military and away from the NSDAP. After the war Blomberg stated that he had not quite thought the whole thing through.
THE OATH
"Ich schwöre bei Gott diesen heiligen Eid, daß ich dem Führer des Deutschen Reiches und Volkes Adolf Hitler, dem Oberbefehlshaber der Wehrmacht, unbedingten Gehorsam leisten und als tapferer Soldat bereit sein will, jederzeit für diesen Eid mein Leben einzusetzen."
The Wehrmacht Oath of Loyalty to Adolf Hitler, 2 August 1934
"I swear by God this sacred oath that to the Leader of the German empire and people, Adolf Hitler, supreme commander of the armed forces, I shall render unconditional obedience and that as a brave soldier I shall at all times be prepared to give my life for this oath."
Thousands called in sick to avoid the oath but on their return they were forced to take the oath. By swearing loyalty to the person of Adolf Hitler rather than the nation or the constitution, the officers and men of the armed forces found themselves honor-bound to obey him, even after Hitler had set Germany down the path to war and ordered the Wehrmacht to commit war crimes.

 

[stona]

That oath was used as a defence or justification by may officers.

A British officer swears an oath of allegiance to the Queen, but I'd hope that if the Queen somehow ordered him to murder hundreds of thousands of British subjects, who might even have a different religion to most of us, he would feel free to break that oath.
Nazism disorientated the moral compass of an entire nation.

It's easy to sit here seventy years later and pass retrospective judgement on the difficult choices faced by Germans at the time, but to deny that there were choices is not helpful either. The 'I'd have been shot/sent to a KZ if I hadn't done it' defence does not generally hold up in the face of the evidence.

Think of this. Otto Hahn, the great German physicist, was overheard saying in one of the Farm Hall transcripts that he loved his country, and that is why he had hoped for its defeat. He was not the only one who felt this way.

Cheers

Steve

 

[mikewint]

Yes, there are indeed brave men who draw a moral line and stand by it. Just as in Vietnam there were those who ran to Canada to avoid the draft, those who stood firm and went to federal prison, and those who took the easy road and were drafted regardless of their beliefs. Here I make no mention of those who willing joined to support their country right or wrong. While Federal Prison is not a country club it is nothing as to the punishments German's faced for refusing.
To name just a few:
Karl Barth (Swiss theologian); Consequences: loss of professorship
Kurt von Fritz (university professor); Consequences: forced relocation to retirement
Martin Gauger (probationary judge as a state prosecutor in Wuppertal); Consequences: forced retirement of his position as a state prosecutor
Franz Heckenast (Austrian Officer of the Army), after the connection of Austria to the German Reich; Consequences: forced retirement
Franz Jägerstätter (Austrian conscientious objector); Consequences: execution in 1943
Erica Küppers (theologian in Hessen); Consequences: forced retirement
Josef Mayr-Nusser (from Bozen), after call-up for duty in the Waffen-SS; Consequences: Death penalty, died on the way to the Dachau concentration camp
Franz Reinisch (Pallottines padre from Austria), after call-up for duty in the German Wehrmacht; Consequences: execution by beheading in 1942
Theodor Roller (Member of the Young Men's Christian Association from Tübingen); Consequences: compulsory hospitalization in a psychiatric hospital
Joseph Ruf (de) ("Brother Maurus" of the Christkönigsgesellschaft (rel.)), Consequences: Death penalty followed by execution
Rudolf Towarek (major general of the Austrian Army), after the connection of Austria to the German Reich; Consequences: forced retirement
Ernst Volkmann (Guitar maker from Bregenz), after call-up for duty into the German Wehrmacht; Consequences: Death penalty followed by execution
Ludwig Walz (mercantile man and burgomaster), after call-up for duty into the German Wehrmacht; Consequences: Death penalty followed by execution
Heinz Welke (theologian from Frankfurt), refused enrollment as a student in a university
Ingeborg Willrich (teacher); Consequences: forced retirement without being entitled to get retirement pension

 

[pbehn]

The idea that everyone who served in the commonwealth forces was loyal to the king is laughable, many wanted independance from British rule but saw common cause. My father was anti royalist to the day he died but served in the Pacific and was proud to say Mountbatten was his C/O.
Before the second world war kicked off Communism in Russia was already well known for mass exterminations many saw the war as fascist against communist and there are no good guys in that fight.

So far as Rommel is concerned, in N Africa when the position was hopeless he tried to get Hitler to understand the situation he was replaced and the Afrika Corps ordered to fight to the last man and bullet. At what point should Rommel "resign" and do you think he would ever be allowed to live? As it was he was obliged to take his own life 18 months later.

 

[pbehn]

A British officer swears an oath of allegiance to the Queen, but I'd hope that if the Queen somehow ordered him to murder hundreds of thousands of British subjects, who might even have a different religion to most of us, he would feel free to break that oath.
Nazism disorientated the moral compass of an entire nation.

Please read about the Peterloo massacre and Bloody Sunday, there were actually two bloody Sudays both involving Troops opening fire on civilians one in Derry NI 1972 in my lifetime and the other in Liverpool in 1911.

 

[stona]

Please read about the Peterloo massacre and Bloody Sunday, there were actually two bloody Sudays both involving Troops opening fire on civilians one in Derry NI 1972 in my lifetime and the other in Liverpool in 1911.

There are many more instances when British forces have committed massacres against civilians. The same goes for every army that ever fielded troops. We all have more than one My Lai or Amritsar (Jallianwala Bagh) in our history. That is not the same as implementing an official genocidal government policy in the 20th century.

Genocides may have been committed one way or another by Europeans against other races in the Americas and elsewhere from Pizarro and Cortez (unintentionally) to Tasmania (possibly less unintentional, though again disease was the major killer).

The penalty for any kind of active resistance in Nazi Germany was death, almost invariably. The penalty for soldiers, particularly officers, who tried to draw a moral line was almost invariably not. A forum answer is hardly the place to trawl through the conclusions of the Nuremberg trials, but the evidence is there.

British historian Andrew Roberts has summed it up nicely:

"Every German general knew that the war in the east was to be one of extermination rather than a conventional military engagement; the oral and in some cases written orders, and indeed the very notion of Lebensraum, brooked no alternative explanation.

... the reasons why so many outwardly dignified professional officers served the Nazis so efficiently and seemingly enthusiastically were many and complicated. Their fathers and grandfathers had shot French francs-tireurs without mercy in the Franco-Prussian War and had ill-treated Belgian and French civilians in the Great War, so the supposedly noble Prussian military tradition was always something of a myth. The oath they swore to Hitler personally could not excuse them. Their motives included natural ambition, criminal complicity, genuine patriotism, lack of an alternative, professional pride, an understandable desire to protect their loved ones from Bolshevik vengeance, a desperate hope for unexpected victory, Nazi faith in many cases, but probably above all simple loyalty to their men and brother officers.

Yet the German generals who argued with, stood up to or even disobeyed Hitler were not particularly ill-treated, unless of course they had been involved in the Bomb Plot. They were dismissed, reassigned or retired for a few months, but they did not face the ultimate sanction, as anyone who displeased Stalin certainly did.

... Just as no one was shot for refusing to execute a Jew, so German generals put only their jobs, rather than their lives, on the line when they crossed Hitler on a point of military principle. Very often they were brought back from enforced retirement to serve again, as happened to Rundstedt three times. They might therefore have been 'only obeying orders', but they were not doing so out of a well-founded fear for their lives."

Cheers

Steve

 

[mikewint]

Agreed but besides fear how about that other great motivator of men, Fame and Fortune(Greed).
On 19 July 1940 Hitler created 12 Field Marshalls, Germany's highest rank. German Field Marshals received a salary of $200,000 (in 2000 money) PLUS large tax-free sums to buy estates. Von Rundstedt and Keitel, for example, initially received $1 million tax-free and later on another $3 million. Von Rundstedt lived for over two years in a huge villa, St-Germain-en-Laye just outside Paris. The old field Marshall oversaw the occupation of France but really had no decisions to make as all was controlled by Hitler. The cynical von Rundstedt wrote that he, "could not even change the guard at his door without the approval of the "Bohemian Corporal". Ritter von Leeb received $500,000. Hans Guderian received a 947 hectare estate in east Germany. Hitler even bought his furniture and farm machinery. Major Generals received salaries of $100,000 at a time when a German factory worker made $140 per month. By 1944 there were 2,242 Generals not counting 150 Luftwaffe and senior commanders of the Waffen-SS
Now all was not roses for these Field Marshals and Generals. By 1944 over 500 had been killed or captured. 35 Corps and Divisional commanders had been sacked after Moscow in 1941. In fact, the sacking of a General was an almost weekly occurrence. If lucky they lived to return to their families in disgrace with no jobs or funds. Those who really displeased Hitler went to prison but none were killed until after the Bomb Plot in 1944. 35 Generals, who were not lucky enough to commit suicide were convicted in a show trial of treason, stripped naked, and hung with piano wire while being filmed. After that Hans Guderian was made OKH Chief of Staff and personally urged his fellow Generals to stay loyal.

 

[pbehn]

Agreed but besides fear how about that other great motivator of men, Fame and Fortune(Greed).
On 19 July 1940 Hitler created 12 Field Marshalls, Germany's highest rank. German Field Marshals received a salary of $200,000 (in 2000 money) PLUS large tax-free sums to buy estates. Von Rundstedt and Keitel, for example, initially received $1 million tax-free and later on another $3 million. Von Rundstedt lived for over two years in a huge villa, St-Germain-en-Laye just outside Paris. The old field Marshall oversaw the occupation of France but really had no decisions to make as all was controlled by Hitler. The cynical von Rundstedt wrote that he, "could not even change the guard at his door without the approval of the "Bohemian Corporal". Ritter von Leeb received $500,000. Hans Guderian received a 947 hectare estate in east Germany. Hitler even bought his furniture and farm machinery. Major Generals received salaries of $100,000 at a time when a German factory worker made $140 per month. By 1944 there were 2,242 Generals not counting 150 Luftwaffe and senior commanders of the Waffen-SS
Now all was not roses for these Field Marshals and Generals. By 1944 over 500 had been killed or captured. 35 Corps and Divisional commanders had been sacked after Moscow in 1941. In fact, the sacking of a General was an almost weekly occurrence. If lucky they lived to return to their families in disgrace with no jobs or funds. Those who really displeased Hitler went to prison but none were killed until after the Bomb Plot in 1944. 35 Generals, who were not lucky enough to commit suicide were convicted in a show trial of treason, stripped naked, and hung with piano wire while being filmed. After that Hans Guderian was made OKH Chief of Staff and personally urged his fellow Generals to stay loyal.

That just seems like good management, keep generals sweet until they become a threat then replace the carrot with a stick.


Why are the same metrics not used for Italian generals and admirals? Russian generals and admirals. Somehow 70 years after the event it seems to come down to Rommel. If the vast majority of the Italian nation and a huge part of French society including their military were not initially sympathetic to the Fascist cause and they all knew what its aims were then Rommel would never have got to Africa. Von Rundstedt went to St Germaine en Laye, I didnt know, how appropriate, thats is where James II of England exiled himself all despots behave like the royals they replace. I am no apologist for any Nazi General but I refuse to go along with a history that says only Germans were responsible.

 

[pbehn]

"Every German general knew that the war in the east was to be one of extermination rather than a conventional military engagement; the oral and in some cases written orders, and indeed the very notion of Lebensraum, brooked no alternative explanation.

... the reasons why so many outwardly dignified professional officers served the Nazis so efficiently and seemingly enthusiastically were many and complicated. Their fathers and grandfathers had shot French francs-tireurs without mercy in the Franco-Prussian War and had ill-treated Belgian and French civilians in the Great War, so the supposedly noble Prussian military tradition was always something of a myth. The oath they swore to Hitler personally could not excuse them. Their motives included natural ambition, criminal complicity, genuine patriotism, lack of an alternative, professional pride, an understandable desire to protect their loved ones from Bolshevik vengeance, a desperate hope for unexpected victory, Nazi faith in many cases, but probably above all simple loyalty to their men and brother officers.

Yet the German generals who argued with, stood up to or even disobeyed Hitler were not particularly ill-treated, unless of course they had been involved in the Bomb Plot. They were dismissed, reassigned or retired for a few months, but they did not face the ultimate sanction, as anyone who displeased Stalin certainly did.

... Just as no one was shot for refusing to execute a Jew, so German generals put only their jobs, rather than their lives, on the line when they crossed Hitler on a point of military principle. Very often they were brought back from enforced retirement to serve again, as happened to Rundstedt three times. They might therefore have been 'only obeying orders', but they were not doing so out of a well-founded fear for their lives."

Cheers

Steve

Hitler as a leader was probably the man who has the most unsuccessful assassination attempts against his name. Hitler needed to keep his military sweet because so many wanted to kill him. After the bomb plot mentioned he pretty much retreated to his bunker and insanity. Please remember Hitlers military from 1939 to 1941/42 were all conquering a huge part of Europe threw in their lot with him without a serious fight. All very well to explain what lebensraum means, the generals knew what it meant and so did the citizens of Germany who supported Hitler.

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

I still think it comes down to this...

It is really easy to judge and condemn 70+ years later. People today can pretend to know what they would have done, tell people what they would have done, but in the end unless you where there to experience it you don't know.

 

[stona]

Roberts didn't mention money as a motive but everyman has his price. A $200,000 salary plus perks seems to have been the going rate for a Field Marshall.

It would be easy to pass judgement today. There were nonetheless some men who did choose not to blindly follow and a few more who were prepared to attempt to change things. For this the latter group paid with their lives. The former group took no such risk.

Jodl claimed at Nuremberg that the German military leaders didn't "serve the powers of Hell and they did not serve a criminal, but rather their people and their Fatherland." Nobody believed him and he was hanged anyway.

There is some idea prevalent that the Wermacht in some way was not complicit in the atrocities committed, particularly against European Jewry. Unfortunately a lot of evidence to the contrary exists. I will give just one of the dozens of documented examples available. The Germans were excellent book keepers.
Franz Walter Stahlecker of Einsatzgruppe A wrote in September 1941 that Army Group North had been exemplary in co-operating with his men in murdering Jews and that relations with the Fourth Panzer Army commanded by General Erich Hoepner were "very close, almost cordial".

Manstein got away with a light prison sentence at the end of the war. He did have an issue about the actions of the Einsatzgruppen in his area in 1941, but not what one might expect. In a letter to Otto Ohlendorf he complained that since his men were so helpful in assisting Ohlendorf's men with murdering Jews it was unjustifiable that the SS should keep all the wrist watches of the murdered Jews for themselves instead of sharing with the Army.
That's one way of serving 'the people and Fatherland.'

Nearly 60% of all the casualties of WW2 were 'allied', that is non-Axis, civilians. Axis civilians comprised about 5% of total casualties. That takes some explaining and can only be explained in terms of the genocidal, racial, war waged by Germany and her Allies. That war was directed, knowingly, by Germany's military leaders and they were all complicit to a greater or lesser extent in the results.

An estimated 3.5 million Soviet PoWs perished at the hands of who? The Wermacht. I suppose that's another way of serving 'the people and Fatherland.'

German? Nazi? It's not a distinction that could easily be made seventy years ago and is no easier to make today.

Steve

 

[yulzari]

Though we like to think that we would have acted as would be right for those with a 21st century model conscience, if we had been born into a time when we were called up for the German army the reality is that most of us would have acted as they did. Germans are, and were, no different to the rest of us. That is no excuse for the atrocities of WW2, nor those of the French Army in taking Algeria nor the cruelties of enslavement by Algerians over generations. If we were born into those societies at those times we, sadly, would have acted as they did.

This does not excuse anyone. It was ordinary non front line Wermacht soldiers who took away the White Russians living in our village in 1942 and turned the Priory into an army brothel. Old villagers recalled that the German soldiers actually said that they were being taken away to be killed so they knew what they were doing.

Identify, blame and punish the perpetrators but do not forget that, but for an accident of birth, you might have been one of them. I like to think that I would have bravely stood up for the innocent but I fear that I would have meekly followed the herd.

Germans or Nazis? One could be both or neither. You can recruit concentration guards and death squads from any nation on earth.

The condemnation must be of the individual or we fall into the same trap as the guilty of treating people as members of a group. Not as individuals. I fear that Americans are falling into that trap regarding Muslims. In the terrorist attack in France a little while ago there were as many Muslims risking their lives to save the innocent as were perpetrators. In Tunisia hundreds marched in Sousse to condemn the attack of one man.

People are guilty or not as individuals. Not as groups. Nazis or Germans is not the question. Guilty or Innocent is.

BTW. At a time of the 200th Anniversary of Waterloo (why name a battle after a railway station?) I want record my thanks to the men of the Kings German Legion who were Britain's best allies and troops in the fight to liberate Europe.

 

[stona]

It was ordinary non front line Wermacht soldiers who took away the White Russians living in our village in 1942 and turned the Priory into an army brothel. Old villagers recalled that the German soldiers actually said that they were being taken away to be killed so they knew what they were doing.

A Police Battalion (Ordnungspolizei)? Usually composed of older men not called up for front line service (at that time). Usually married men, with children and rarely members of the NSDAP. Were they Nazis? They were certainly carrying out the objectives of the Nazi state, objectives both immoral and illegal by any normal standards.

A very difficult question.

Steve