Allied atrocities during the Second World War >>MOD WARNING POST 80<<

Shredder66

Is anyone else fed up being forced to listen to the stories about how awful the Germans were during WWII. Is anyone else sick of the hypocrisy that exists. How every war movie portrays the Germans as evil, sly and sadistic but the allies are always (at least more often than not) portrayed as the gallant heroes.

Not many know about the RAF bombing of Dresden, where our new best friends the British burned alive thousands of German civillians. The Katyn massacre where the Soviets butchered thousands of Polish officers and intellectuals or the aftermath of the Battle of Monte Cassino where Maroccan troops committed mass rape and mass murder on the civillian population but we have heard for the six millionth time about the Holocaust.

They say the victor writes the history book but that's not good enough. many awful things happed from both sides of that war and I wish to open a discussion on it. I will be happy to hear people's opinions.

Thank you

getz

Shredder66 wrote: »

Is anyone else fed up being forced to listen to the stories about how awful the Germans were during WWII. Is anyone else sick of the hypocrisy that exists. How every war movie portrays the Germans as evil, sly and sadistic but the allies are always (at least more often than not) portrayed as the gallant heroes.

Not many know about the RAF bombing of Dresden, where our new best friends the British burned alive thousands of German civillians. The Katyn massacre where the Soviets butchered thousands of Polish officers and intellectuals or the aftermath of the Battle of Monte Cassino where Maroccan troops committed mass rape and mass murder on the civillian population but we have heard for the six millionth time about the Holocaust.

They say the victor writes the history book but that's not good enough. many awful things happed from both sides of that war and I wish to open a discussion on it. I will be happy to hear people's opinions.

Thank you

easy answer dont bother reading books or watching war films,

Manach

The Western Allies had their flaws, with incidents as the OP mentioned. But these were not deliberate policies and they maintained a proportionate response to earlier Axis aggression with the bombing policy in response to earlier Axis raids and a means to destroying their capacity to wage aggressive war.Nazi Germany was a criminal regime, whose policies deliberately violated any form of human rights and continued to operated to that effect to the last months of WWII (source, "Germany 1945" - R. Bessel)

johngalway

The Russians also mass raped German women at the end of the war.

All in all, no, I'm not fed up hearing of it. These things need to be remembered, not that it is a fool proof way of never repeating them.

Rarely are warring forces completely innocent in times of war.

Ravelleman

It's difficult to compare the scale of individual 'massacres' - whether or not you could call Dresden a massacre is debatable - to the Holocaust, which represents the bureaucratic attempt at the annihilation of one race and, to a lesser extent, various other sub sections of society.

What is so shocking about the Holocaust is the way that reason and scientific methods, the basis for most of man's achievements in the industrial age, were applied to something so inhumane. After the Second World War you see the currents of this reflected in everything from Proust, to Adorno, to the Terminator films and electronic music.

The Katyn massacre was indeed one of the great tragedies of the Second World War but in general it's quite hard for us, in the west, to glorify or even justify many of the crucial moments during the Stalinist monstrosity.

As for Dresden, Arthur Harris' auto-biography makes a relatively convincing case in justifying the attacks on Dresden - it was a crucial railway centre for German troop movement in the area, for example. On a military level they could certainly allow it to happen. The human level is, of course, much more complex. But in a war that ultimately ended with the detonation of two nuclear weapons there were countless other tragedies that have gone undebated.

mike65

Shredder66 wrote: »

Is anyone else fed up being forced to listen to the stories about how awful the Germans were during WWII. Is anyone else sick of the hypocrisy that exists. How every war movie portrays the Germans as evil, sly and sadistic but the allies are always (at least more often than not) portrayed as the gallant heroes.

Not many know about the RAF bombing of Dresden, where our new best friends the British burned alive thousands of German civillians. The Katyn massacre where the Soviets butchered thousands of Polish officers and intellectuals or the aftermath of the Battle of Monte Cassino where Maroccan troops committed mass rape and mass murder on the civillian population but we have heard for the six millionth time about the Holocaust.

They say the victor writes the history book but that's not good enough. many awful things happed from both sides of that war and I wish to open a discussion on it. I will be happy to hear people's opinions.

Thank you

I'm pretty sure everyone with any understanding of WW2 knows about the the legacy of "Bomber Harris" and his policies, but that wouldn't suit your thesis would it?

Shredder66

johngalway wrote: »

The Russians also mass raped German women at the end of the war.

All in all, no, I'm not fed up hearing of it. These things need to be remembered, not that it is a fool proof way of never repeating them.

Rarely are warring forces completely innocent in times of war.

You're right, and that's my point but all you ever hear of is what the Nazis did. In school I was very good at History but a lot of what I was taught didn't really add up to me, it didn't sit right with me. I did extensive reading on the Axis side and drew my own conclusions and when I tried to debate with my teachers I was very quickly silenced.

Why do they hate you talking about the allied atrocities, this is the whole other half which you don't ever hear of.

Sadly though, the victims in all wars are usually the innocents.

Shredder66

mike65 wrote: »

I'm pretty sure everyone with any understanding of WW2 knows about the the legacy of "Bomber Harris" and his policies, but that wouldn't suit your thesis would it?

Do you think people like Harris should be held up and admired while Hermann Goering is denounced as a villain? Do you not think that's hypocritical? It was Britain and France that declared war on Germany, not the other way round.

Shredder66

Manach wrote: »

The Western Allies had their flaws, with incidents as the OP mentioned. But these were not deliberate policies and they maintained a proportionate response to earlier Axis aggression with the bombing policy in response to earlier Axis raids and a means to destroying their capacity to wage aggressive war.Nazi Germany was a criminal regime, whose policies deliberately violated any form of human rights and continued to operated to that effect to the last months of WWII (source, "Germany 1945" - R. Bessel)

How was Nazi Germany a criminal regime? They were elected democratically. Did the policies of the Soviet regime (which was in fact not democratically elected) not violate human rights? They did and on a scale which dwarfed any Nazi war crimes and Britain, France and the US took the side of the Communists who the Nazis were trying to wipe out.

My point is, bad things happend on both sides and people need to look on the flip side of everything to have a better understanding.

Fratton Fred

Shredder66 wrote: »

Do you think people like Harris should be held up and admired while Hermann Goering is denounced as a villain? Do you not think that's hypocritical? It was Britain and France that declared war on Germany, not the other way round.

poor old Hitler, all he did was invade a few countries, persecute a few minorities/ethnicities/the disabled/the handicapped etc and Britain and France go and declare war on him.

golden lane

a war, where in the beginning the RAF was under orders not to damage german civilian property, ended up with the bombing of DRESDEN....

that is what happens when war goes on and on.....

sitting here in the comfort and safety of the sitting room.....is the last place judgements should be made from.....

the facts are there for all to see......what both sides did, they are not solely in the domain of the victors.....

Shredder66

Fratton Fred wrote: »

poor old Hitler, all he did was invade a few countries, persecute a few minorities/ethnicities/the disabled/the handicapped etc and Britain and France go and declare war on him.

And Britain and France never invaded countries or persecuted minorites? I know of one country not too far from here that Britain invaded and killed many of it's inhabitants. So anyone who says the Brits or the French were noble and just is an utter hypocrit.

Hitler wanted to take back German land that was taken away from them after WWI and in many countries the Germans were welcomed by the locals, particularly in the East.

What then did the great allied heroes do then after they bombed Germany back into the stone age? They turned half of Europe over to bloodthirsty Communists.

Manach

Shredder66 wrote: »

How was Nazi Germany a criminal regime? They were elected democratically.

At the start of their regime (based on reading Burleigh's works) they dismantled wholesale the checks and balances of the state and set up a system that was tribal, patronage being given to those who supported Hitler. That this lead to an disfunctional economy can be seen in Ian Kershaws 'The End'. Finally why criminal?, when all pretence of fairness and justice is jettisoned in the legal system for the sole goal of the survival of the Nazi hierarchy. To ensure that "order" was maintained, they had shot 15,000 troops for desertion. The US/UK combined total was 1.

phoenix999

Try to get your hands on books by the international lawyer Alfred de Zayas. He wrote a number of books documenting the treatment meted out to German civilians and soldiers by the Allies during the war and after. They make for chilling reading.

Carlos Orange

Shredder66 wrote: »

And Britain and France never invaded countries or persecuted minorites? I know of one country not too far from here that Britain invaded and killed many of it's inhabitants. So anyone who says the Brits or the French were noble and just is an utter hypocrit.

What country are you talking about?
I'm pretty sure Britain didn't exist when the Normans were invited into Ireland by Wexfordians (or whatever it is that people from Wexford are called).

blatantrereg

Loads of people know about these things.

Since when did history books suggest the USSR was anything but aggressive, brutal and totalitarian? (before Gorbachev that is). I think at the end of the war in Europe Axis soldiers were fighting to surrender to British/American troops (ie: not Soviet), rather than maintaining any hope of victory.
You left out one of the biggies imo anyway, which is the bombing of Nagasaki. Japan was fervently trying to surrender after Hiroshima, however the USA wanted another chance to play with their new toy (and send a message to the USSR that they were not to be trifled with of course). [Hiroshima was at best highly questionable morally too of course, but I'm putting forward Nagasaki as I dont see how anyone could consider that as justified].

As regards something equal to the holocaust - well just look at the Gulags and political genocide in the Soviet Union.

The funny thing is that Hitler was the one to oppose the USSR, and point it out as the dangerous and destructive force that it was. Opposing the Bolsheviks pouring into europe [or something] was a stated motive for going to war. [He would have been better to have listened to his [kinda] predecessor, Otto Von Bismarck, who said that conquest of the USSR would be impossible because of the size of the land, sizze of the population, and severity of the winters of course]

pontia

have a glance into the ovens and come back to me

mattjack

Shredder66 wrote: »

And Britain and France never invaded countries or persecuted minorites? I know of one country not too far from here that Britain invaded and killed many of it's inhabitants. So anyone who says the Brits or the French were noble and just is an utter hypocrit.

Hitler wanted to take back German land that was taken away from them after WWI and in many countries the Germans were welcomed by the locals, particularly in the East.

What then did the great allied heroes do then after they bombed Germany back into the stone age? They turned half of Europe over to bloodthirsty Communists.

Germany lost about 15% of land after the Treaty of Versailles,that doesn't excuse invading most of Europe and parts of Africa.

juan.kerr

blatantrereg wrote: »

Japan was fervently trying to surrender after Hiroshima, however the USA wanted another chance to play with their new toy (and send a message to the USSR that they were not to be trifled with of course).

That wasn't my understanding. The people maybe, certainly not the leadership.

mattjack

juan.kerr wrote: »

That wasn't my understanding. The people maybe, certainly not the leadership.

I thought that the American military and government couldn't stomach the idea of invading the Japanese mainland because of the amount of casualties they would suffer.

The various islands that they invaded caused so many deaths that an atomic bomb dropped on Japan seemed less costly to the US.

Carlos Orange

mattjack wrote: »

Germany lost about 15% of land after the Treaty of Versailles,that doesn't excuse invading most of Europe and parts of Africa.

I think historically speaking Moscow is considered part of Germany.

blatantrereg

juan.kerr wrote: »

That wasn't my understanding. The people maybe, certainly not the leadership.

Yes I was slightly incorrect I see:

The Japanese government still did not react to the Potsdam Declaration. Emperor Hirohito, the government, and the war council were considering four conditions for surrender: the preservation of the kokutai (Imperial institution and national polity), assumption by the Imperial Headquarters of responsibility for disarmament and demobilization, no occupation of the Japanese Home Islands, Korea, or Formosa, and delegation of the punishment of war criminals to the Japanese government.[84]

The Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov had informed Tokyo of the Soviet Union's unilateral abrogation of the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact on 5 April. At two minutes past midnight on 9 August, Tokyo time, Soviet infantry, armor, and air forces had launched the Manchurian Strategic Offensive Operation. Four hours later, word reached Tokyo that the Soviet Union had declared war on Japan. The senior leadership of the Japanese Army began preparations to impose martial law on the nation, with the support of Minister of War Korechika Anami, in order to stop anyone attempting to make peace.

So they were not fervently trying to surrender as I put it, but they were in the process of deciding to surrender (probably with the terms referred to above). Nonetheless, they knew that they needed to surrender, and dropping the second bomb only three days after the first was not justifiable. They were already defeated.

clashburke

Shredder66 wrote: »

Do you think people like Harris should be held up and admired while Hermann Goering is denounced as a villain? Do you not think that's hypocritical? It was Britain and France that declared war on Germany, not the other way round.

Goering is denounced mainly due to his anti-Semitic stance that the upper echelons of Nazi Germany prescribed to and not due to his bombing campaign's.( although it is of course a factor).

His pilfering of Europe's museums and private art collections using soldiers and murder would also put him in a different category to Harris.

juan.kerr

mattjack wrote: »

I thought that the American military and government couldn't stomach the idea of invading the Japanese mainland because of the amount of casualties they would suffer.

The various islands that they invaded caused so many deaths that an atomic bomb dropped on Japan seemed less costly to the US.

I don't disagree but I don't agree with the suggestion that the Japanese leadership wanted to surrender earlier.

juan.kerr

blatantrereg wrote: »

They were already defeated.

Yes, but as we saw with Germany, many lives were lost between the point where Germany was defeated and their actual surrender.

mattjack

juan.kerr wrote: »

I don't disagree but I don't agree with the suggestion that the Japanese leadership wanted to surrender earlier.

I agree with you, I think Japanese leadership had no intention of surrender.. Bushido code ? The emporer was viewed as a God.

juan.kerr

Shredder66 wrote: »

Is anyone else fed up being forced to listen to the stories about how awful the Germans were during WWII. Is anyone else sick of the hypocrisy that exists. How every war movie portrays the Germans as evil, sly and sadistic but the allies are always (at least more often than not) portrayed as the gallant heroes.

Not many know about the RAF bombing of Dresden, where our new best friends the British burned alive thousands of German civillians. The Katyn massacre where the Soviets butchered thousands of Polish officers and intellectuals or the aftermath of the Battle of Monte Cassino where Maroccan troops committed mass rape and mass murder on the civillian population but we have heard for the six millionth time about the Holocaust.

They say the victor writes the history book but that's not good enough. many awful things happed from both sides of that war and I wish to open a discussion on it. I will be happy to hear people's opinions.

Thank you

OP, it is quite clearly the German 'extra carricular' activities that are the problem.

Here's a good example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einsatzgruppen

They didn't fight a 'conventional' war in the East.

blatantrereg

juan.kerr wrote: »

Yes, but as we saw with Germany, many lives were lost between the point where Germany was defeated and their actual surrender.

The Japanese governmnt was already coming to the decision to surrender though. Aside from the fact that using atomic bombs against civilian targets is in itself horrific, three days was not enough time to demonstrate anything but enthusiasm on the part of the USA.

eirator

blatantrereg wrote: »

Yes I was slightly incorrect I see:


So they were not fervently trying to surrender as I put it, but they were in the process of deciding to surrender (probably with the terms referred to above). Nonetheless, they knew that they needed to surrender, and dropping the second bomb only three days after the first was not justifiable. They were already defeated.

Would the US also have been trying to prove to Stalin that they had more than just the one bomb?

juan.kerr

blatantrereg wrote: »

The Japanese governmnt was already coming to the decision to surrender though. Aside from the fact that using atomic bombs against civilian targets is in itself horrific, three days was not enough time to demonstrate anything but enthusiasm on the part of the USA.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrender_of_Japan#Divisions_within_the_Japanese_leadership

Not sure of the exact timing of this:

For the most part, Suzuki's military-dominated cabinet favored continuing the war.

There were two camps......... and the hardliners who favored fighting one last "decisive" battle that would inflict so many casualties on the Allies that they would be willing to offer more lenient terms.

blatantrereg

eirator wrote: »

Would the US also have been trying to prove to Stalin that they had more than just the one bomb?

Yes I think the second bomb was more about the Soviet Union than Japan. I took it as a simple display of chest-thumping in that regard, but you're right that it would have been about proving they had more than one bomb as well as just showing they weren't afraid to use them.