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

Shredder66 · 22-07-2012 1:26pm

juan.kerr wrote: »

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.

I was wondering who'd bring this up

I know a fair bit about the Einsatzgruppen, I know they committed a number of mass executions in East but often when they turned up for work they had found that the locals had already began their work and they were instructed not to interfere. The people in the East hated the Jews because of the high number of Jewish Commissars that were terrorising their countries, using much more brutal methods than the Germans. Of course the innocents didn't deserve to die but innocents are killed in every war on every side and that's what I'm trying to highlight. Thanks for your point.

golden lane · 22-07-2012 1:28pm

Shredder66 wrote: »

Absolutely! Ask a ten year old who were the "baddies" in the second world war and they'll promptly answer "the Germans". Not the Communists, certainly not the Americans, even though they used nuclear bombs.

I can't emphasise enough, I know bad things happend on both sides but do an experement, make 2 lists: one of Hollywood movies, television documenteries and books that portray the Axis in a negative way and the Allies in a positive way and then on the other list do vice-versa. If you're lucky you might think of about three or four movies showing the Germans not as evil sadists.

there are many oppotunities for the people who were victims of the allied atrocities, to make them known.......as you are aware of them, they must have been published....

but, do you think that they will be on everybodys list of...."must find out"....
so i can see that the germans were not all that bad.....

movies, documentory's, books etc........are made for profit.......

juan.kerr · 22-07-2012 1:28pm

OP, you clearly have an agenda and are choosing which posts respond to to suit that agenda, ignoring anything that doesn't suit. Smell you later.

Shredder66 · 22-07-2012 1:31pm

nuac wrote: »

So Hitler was only "reclaiming" much of France, the Channel Islands, Denmark, Holland, Belgium, Norway, and of course Poland?

Hitler's army entered the Rhineland which was taken from them. He annexed the Sudetenland and Austria. He invaded Poland to take back more German territory but was necessary as Stalin was invading from the East. He only invaded France when France and Britain declared war on Germany.

Seanchai · 22-07-2012 1:35pm

jonniebgood1 wrote: »

Anti British hysteria does not wash well in terms of WWII where they were commonly accepted as the lesser evil! There is a certain irony of them going to war to protect polish independence claims while they still ruled over their imperial empire. This was not lost on the Americans, particularly Roosevelt during the war.

If I recall correctly, JJ Lee accurately described this as, among other things, a "happy coincidence" that the state which began the 20th century killing tens of thousands of women and children in the British concentration camps of the Boer War ended on the morally superior side at the end of WW II.

Nobody should forget, either, the extraordinary savagery and mass murder of the British state in 1950s Kenya, starting a mere 7 years after the end of WW II. With up to 1 million people imprisoned in "enclosed villages" (Caroline Elkins, Britain's Gulag: The Brutal End of Empire in Kenya) and some 10,000 people extrajudicially executed having being tortured by an agency of the British state colloquially known at the time as "the Gestapo" (David Anderson, Histories of the Hanged: Britain's Dirty War in Kenya and the End of Empire), the unassailable "moral superiority" of the British can really only be found in the tabloids of British jingoism.

How did they get away with it?

Given this repeated barbarism and inhumanity by the British state and its undereducated, underclass cannonfodder, the notion that the British have been motivated by some moral high ground in their wars in other peoples' countries is cringeworthy in the extreme.

Shredder66 · 22-07-2012 1:37pm

jonniebgood1 wrote: »

A more pertinent criticism of Goering would be his inadequacy at Stalingrad for example.

Stalin was aware of the atom bomb before it was ever used. The soviets were developing their own bomb at this time.

Anti British hysteria does not wash well in terms of WWII where they were commonly accepted as the lesser evil! There is a certain irony of them going to war to protect polish independence claims while they still ruled over their imperial empire. This was not lost on the Americans, particularly Roosevelt during the war.

The British never gave a sh!te about Polish independence, and if they did it would be utter hypocrisy on their part (as you sort of mentioned). Britain got involved in that war as a result of a lot of shady back-room dealings.

Shredder66 · 22-07-2012 1:41pm

juan.kerr wrote: »

13 years? He was living on borrowed time from 1942 onwards for a start and only came to power in 1933.

A few things to bear in mind:

- Ordinary germans had worse rationing that Britain.
- Economically they pillaged the countries they occupied to finance the German war machine.
- They were heavily reliant on slave labour.
- They weren't able to supply the German soldiers on the Russian front e.g. with winter gear. German soldiers were expected to live off the land in Russia.
- Over reliance on horses because the armies weren't sufficiently mechanised.

His regime wasn't sustainable in the long run. He had lost too many soldiers in Russia and the failure to get the Caucaus oil fields was a disaster for the regime.

He made monumentally stupid decisions that ruined Germany's chances of reaching negotiated settlements on each front.

That's not really much to do with my point, I'm not discussing the whole logistics of the war. My whole point is the double standard that exists you know?

senordingdong · 22-07-2012 1:41pm

Didn't we very recently have rememberance services for the people who were killed in Dresden?

golden lane · 22-07-2012 1:42pm

Shredder66 wrote: »

The British never gave a sh!te about Polish independence, and if they did it would be utter hypocrisy on their part (as you sort of mentioned). Britain got involved in that war as a result of a lot of shady back-room dealings.

the irish never gave a shoite about the victims of german oppression....if they did....they would have helped the allies.....

the world is full of people and nations...that don't give a shoite....that is real life.....

Shredder66 · 22-07-2012 1:42pm

senordingdong wrote: »

Didn't we very recently have rememberance services for the people who were killed in Dresden?

Did we? Well that's excellent but I wouldn't say too many knew about it, whereas everyone knows about Holocaust rememberence day...

Shredder66 · 22-07-2012 1:45pm

golden lane wrote: »

i suggest you start a thread on the history of the british empire.....the information on british atrocities is freely available....as is the information on all empires....

but making out the germans in ww2 as the good guys.....is an insult to many people alive today, and to those 44 million people who were killed in that war.....

please get a hold of yourself for decency sake.....

First of all, please don't talk down to me! Second of all, for the one hundreth time - I'm not...that is not saying the Germans were the good guys in the war, I'm saying they were no worse than any of the other sides of the war.

Shredder66 · 22-07-2012 1:52pm

juan.kerr wrote: »

OP, you clearly have an agenda and are choosing which posts respond to to suit that agenda, ignoring anything that doesn't suit. Smell you later.

Of course I have an agenda, otherwise I wouldn't be here

Sorry but I'm getting a large volume of responses and can only reply to so many, especially with such slow broadband

Smell you later too!

Shredder66 · 22-07-2012 1:56pm

golden lane wrote: »

the irish never gave a shoite about the victims of german oppression....if they did....they would have helped the allies.....

the world is full of people and nations...that don't give a shoite....that is real life.....

Why on Earth would the Irish take up arms against the Germans, what did they ever do on us? We took up arms against our wonderful new best friends the British, who gave us centuries of oppression, war, rape and famine and who are still sokind that the insist on staying in six of our counties.

In my opinion we should have backed Germany.

the_syco · 22-07-2012 1:57pm

Germans experimented on people from the german concentration camps, and the english experimented on it's own soldiers.

I'm pretty sure the english tested Mustard Gas on it's own soldiers in the 1940's.

As the victors write history, you'd wonder what they left out?

Seanchai · 22-07-2012 1:58pm

golden lane wrote: »

the irish never gave a shoite about the victims of german oppression....if they did....they would have helped the allies.....

Yes, 16 years after the Irish Civil War over the British-imposed conditions in the 1921 Treaty, and while the sectarian herrenvolk British settler-colonial apartheid state was discriminating against the native Irish in every area of the Occupied Six Counties, you expect the same British state which entirely funded and internationally defended this ignominious subhuman situation to be helped by the Irish state?

PS: That you really believe that the British started WWII to "defend the victims of German oppression" doesn't bode well for your knowledge of history. Embarrassing, actually.

Wibbs · 22-07-2012 2:17pm

Shredder66 wrote: »

I have seen the ovens in Dachau

Point of order and contrary to popular belief, Dachau wasn't a mechanised extermination camp the way Auschwitz was(or more accurately a section of the Auschwitz complex was). Dachau had no gas chambers and the ovens had a small capacity, a capacity that was quickly overwhelmed as people died from overwork, starvation and diseases such as typhus, more than execution. It wasn't a "final solution" camp like others. It's Jewish population was about a third, the majority were Poles, Russians French among others. Belson was similar in nature, having no gas chambers.

Shredder66 wrote:

I know a fair bit about the Einsatzgruppen, I know they committed a number of mass executions in East but often when they turned up for work they had found that the locals had already began their work and they were instructed not to interfere.

Indeed. This is common in such things. New order comes in and scores are settled kinda thing. Treblinka 2 an extermination camp with no other purpose but to obliterate the Jewish people from history had as many non German guards(poles/Hungarians etc) who were considered the worst of those present. When the Soviets recaptured old territory and captured new different scores were settled.

Wibbs · 22-07-2012 2:18pm

the_syco wrote: »

Germans experimented on people from the german concentration camps, and the english experimented on it's own soldiers.

I'm pretty sure the english tested Mustard Gas on it's own soldiers in the 1940's.

As the victors write history, you'd wonder what they left out?

The Japanese set up an entire department to experiment on those under their rule. Medical and weapons experiments and for training of new doctors.

golden lane · 22-07-2012 2:23pm

Shredder66 wrote: »

First of all, please don't talk down to me! Second of all, for the one hundreth time - I'm not...that is not saying the Germans were the good guys in the war, I'm saying they were no worse than any of the other sides of the war.

please don't talk the germans up then.......yes they were the worst in ww2...

if you cannot see that....then i suggest you get reading, and learning...

Fratton Fred · 22-07-2012 2:59pm

Shredder66 wrote: »

Why on Earth would the Irish take up arms against the Germans, what did they ever do on us? We took up arms against our wonderful new best friends the British, who gave us centuries of oppression, war, rape and famine and who are still sokind that the insist on staying in six of our counties.

In my opinion we should have backed Germany.

Why should Ireland have backed Germany?

You are either

A) happy for all Irish Jews, homosexuals and those with disabilities to be carted off to concentration/death camps

an idiot
C) a troll.

My moneys on C.

Fratton Fred · 22-07-2012 3:03pm

the_syco wrote: »

Germans experimented on people from the german concentration camps, and the english experimented on it's own soldiers.

I'm pretty sure the english tested Mustard Gas on it's own soldiers in the 1940's.

As the victors write history, you'd wonder what they left out?

You think wrong then.

You are probably thinking of anthrax experiments carried out on the Scottish island of Gruinard in 1942.

golden lane · 22-07-2012 3:07pm

Seanchai wrote: »

Yes, 16 years after the Irish Civil War over the British-imposed conditions in the 1921 Treaty, and while the sectarian herrenvolk British settler-colonial apartheid state was discriminating against the native Irish in every area of the Occupied Six Counties, you expect the same British state which entirely funded and internationally defended this ignominious subhuman situation to be helped by the Irish state?

PS: That you really believe that the British started WWII to "defend the victims of German oppression" doesn't bode well for your knowledge of history. Embarrassing, actually.

you may not have noticed.......great britain was not the only country fighting the germans.......

your suggestion that i mentioned anything about who started ww2.....proves you really do live in your own supposed world....dream on dear fellow.....they are coming to get you soon.......

Fratton Fred · 22-07-2012 3:12pm

golden lane wrote: »

you may not have noticed.......great britain was not the only country fighting the germans.......

your suggestion that i mentioned anything about who started ww2.....proves you really do live in your own supposed world....dream on dear fellow.....they are coming to get you soon.......

You misunderstand.

Britain put Hitler in power and forced him to invade half of Europe, just so they could declare war.

A European war was the perfect cover under which they could bomb the North Strand. Everything else is incidental.

golden lane · 22-07-2012 3:21pm

Fratton Fred wrote: »

You misunderstand.

Britain put Hitler in power and forced him to invade half of Europe, just so they could declare war.

A European war was the perfect cover under which they could bomb the North Strand. Everything else is incidental.

right say's fred.....

sorry.......i nearly forgot about that, my mum and dad did mention it.....but as southsiders they missed it.......they did mention that houses collapsed in bride street and they thought it was the luftwaffe.....just missed my mam...

but as irish people we missed out on the wehrmacht benevolent society, and many ss street parties.....

indioblack · 22-07-2012 3:23pm

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

Firstly, you are not being forced to listen to these stories about the war - you choose to.
Most movies about the war are entertainment first and history second.
You'd be better off finding reputable and, hopefully, unbiased historical accounts of this period.
Your posts are most definitely not unbiased - your criticism is fundamentally aimed at the British - and as this thread has progressed
others have jumped in - at the moment we are up to Kenya, the South African War - Amritsar, the famine and bloody Sunday may well follow.
The Anglo-American bombing of Dresden has featured in other threads - and has been treated in a more mature and even-handed manner.
I've no objection to considering it again - I think the Allied bombing campaign is morally questionable - that is the ethics of it are open to question. But that is not to automatically assume it was an atrocity.
I believe that threads like these have little to do with a genuine desire to debate history.
I think that most of those who post their anger, ( usually against Britain's past), have no empathy whatsoever with people in 1940's Dresden - or anywhere else this thread may bring up.
It's more to do with a need to generate an artificial sense of outrage.
I've encountered this, sadly, with some of my own relatives in Ireland.
They pick a subject - usually connected with Britain's colonial and imperial past - and claim to be feeling shock and horror over the Bengal famine, or the famine in Ireland - it appears not to matter what the subject is, as long as the British are shown to behave badly.
The reality is that this is not a desire to understand the past - but to claim some kind of unwarranted moral superiority.
With regard to the bombing of Dresden, for example, it should be possible to carefully debate it in some detail - a disturbing part of Britains war against the Third Reich.
Or do you simply want to enjoy the feeling of outrage?

Memory Of 98 · 22-07-2012 3:32pm

All I hear is talk of camps and ovens, I hate to inform you all that the British actually pioneered what we understand as the concentration camp.

Tens of thousands of Boer woman and children exterminated in British concentration camps in South Africa, in an attempt to eradicate the Boer people.

Personally, I think both sides were as bad as each other, just the same side of a large imperialistic coin. But if you boys are going to have a debate, don't slate one side for doing the same thing that your heroes had been doing for decades, learn your history.

And when I say all sides, I mean all sides, throughout history, from French to Spanish.

golden lane · 22-07-2012 3:36pm

Memory Of 98 wrote: »

All I hear is talk of camps and ovens, I hate to inform you all that the British actually pioneered what we understand as the concentration camp.

Tens of thousands of Boer woman and children exterminated in British concentration camps in South Africa, in an attempt to eradicate the Boer people.

Personally, I think both sides were as bad as the other, just the same side of a large imperialistic coin. But if you boys are going to have a debate, don't slate one side for doing the same thing that people you hold up as heroes had been doing for decades, learn your history.

read, your history then.......

Fratton Fred · 22-07-2012 3:41pm

Memory Of 98 wrote: »

All I hear is talk of camps and ovens, I hate to inform you all that the British actually pioneered what we understand as the concentration camp.

Tens of thousands of Boer woman and children exterminated in British concentration camps in South Africa, in an attempt to eradicate the Boer people.

Personally, I think both sides were as bad as each other, just the same side of a large imperialistic coin. But if you boys are going to have a debate, don't slate one side for doing the same thing that your heroes had been doing for decades, learn your history.

And when I say all sides, I mean all sides, throughout history, from French to Spanish.

oh my god, they're all out today.

Memory Of 98 · 22-07-2012 4:05pm

golden lane wrote: »

read, your history then.......

I don't need to, I'm not even going to try advance one side over the other like you. They were all bad, just get the facts straight. There is no such thing as a lesser of two evils, evil is evil.

Humans are humans, and we will continue to kill each other for as long as we inhabit the earth.

jonniebgood1 · 22-07-2012 4:15pm

Shredder66 wrote: »

First of all, please don't talk down to me! Second of all, for the one hundreth time - I'm not...that is not saying the Germans were the good guys in the war, I'm saying they were no worse than any of the other sides of the war.

There is very little fact being used in this conversation. I have no problem with you as the OP trying to make a point but there is on this forum an onus on you to substantiate your opinion with fact. For example if you say that the Germans in WWII "were no worse than any of the other sides of the war" then you need to link to information that shows this. For example was their an allied version of the death camps?

If people continue to spout opinions without relating them to solid fact then the discussion will end. The forum has a charter which explains this in detail and also information of sources. This is a general warning for all parties. As already stated the OP should provide evidence of the allied war crime in WWII that he/she thinks is the equivalent of the death camps. The need for using fact applies to everybody by the way not just the OP.

MODERATOR

johngalway · 22-07-2012 5:20pm

Wibbs wrote: »

The Japanese set up an entire department to experiment on those under their rule. Medical and weapons experiments and for training of new doctors.

It takes a lot to turn my stomach, but I went off earlier in search of what you mentioned above. I found out about Unit 731, some of the information I read came as close as anything ever has.

Shredder66 · 23-07-2012 11:47am

golden lane wrote: »

please don't talk the germans up then.......yes they were the worst in ww2...

if you cannot see that....then i suggest you get reading, and learning...

I can talk up whoever I chose to, I am offending no one and am entitled to have a different opinion than you sir, that what a democracy is. And believe me I do read, not just the mainstream books, I study both sides of everything and make my own mind up, not like you, I don't allow myself to be told what to believe

Shredder66 · 23-07-2012 11:50am

Fratton Fred wrote: »

Why should Ireland have backed Germany?

You are either

A) happy for all Irish Jews, homosexuals and those with disabilities to be carted off to concentration/death camps
an idiot
C) a troll.

My moneys on C.

Really, very clever. i feel so angry and silly now after you just showed me up there, you're to brainy for me with your excellent comments:rolleyes:

Shredder66 · 23-07-2012 11:53am

indioblack wrote: »

Firstly, you are not being forced to listen to these stories about the war - you choose to.
Most movies about the war are entertainment first and history second.
You'd be better off finding reputable and, hopefully, unbiased historical accounts of this period.
Your posts are most definitely not unbiased - your criticism is fundamentally aimed at the British - and as this thread has progressed
others have jumped in - at the moment we are up to Kenya, the South African War - Amritsar, the famine and bloody Sunday may well follow.
The Anglo-American bombing of Dresden has featured in other threads - and has been treated in a more mature and even-handed manner.
I've no objection to considering it again - I think the Allied bombing campaign is morally questionable - that is the ethics of it are open to question. But that is not to automatically assume it was an atrocity.
I believe that threads like these have little to do with a genuine desire to debate history.
I think that most of those who post their anger, ( usually against Britain's past), have no empathy whatsoever with people in 1940's Dresden - or anywhere else this thread may bring up.
It's more to do with a need to generate an artificial sense of outrage.
I've encountered this, sadly, with some of my own relatives in Ireland.
They pick a subject - usually connected with Britain's colonial and imperial past - and claim to be feeling shock and horror over the Bengal famine, or the famine in Ireland - it appears not to matter what the subject is, as long as the British are shown to behave badly.
The reality is that this is not a desire to understand the past - but to claim some kind of unwarranted moral superiority.
With regard to the bombing of Dresden, for example, it should be possible to carefully debate it in some detail - a disturbing part of Britains war against the Third Reich.
Or do you simply want to enjoy the feeling of outrage?

Wow, that was long and boring. Yes, I was force fed ridiculous accounts of the war which is the official story and still is.
when I was a student. And if you dared point anything out they wouldn't debate it, they'd merely smear you by calling you a "Nazi sympathiser".
I am not being biased because as I've already said bad things happened on both sides (but the Germans were certainly the lesser evil in my opinion

Shredder66 · 23-07-2012 12:00pm

jonniebgood1 wrote: »

There is very little fact being used in this conversation. I have no problem with you as the OP trying to make a point but there is on this forum an onus on you to substantiate your opinion with fact. For example if you say that the Germans in WWII "were no worse than any of the other sides of the war" then you need to link to information that shows this. For example was their an allied version of the death camps?

If people continue to spout opinions without relating them to solid fact then the discussion will end. The forum has a charter which explains this in detail and also information of sources. This is a general warning for all parties. As already stated the OP should provide evidence of the allied war crime in WWII that he/she thinks is the equivalent of the death camps. The need for using fact applies to everybody by the way not just the OP.

MODERATOR

Duely noted however I did give numerous examples, ie Dresden, the gulags, the mass rape and executions etc. I didn't elaborate because I'm trying to keep it short and sweet.

Shredder66 · 23-07-2012 12:02pm

golden lane wrote: »

read, your history then.......

Read your history then? Is that your arguement? Ready your history then? oh please:rolleyes:

golden lane · 23-07-2012 12:02pm

Shredder66 wrote: »

Wow, that was long and boring. Yes, I was force fed ridiculous accounts of the war which is the official story and still is.
when I was a student. And if you dared point anything out they wouldn't debate it, they'd merely smear you by calling you a "Nazi sympathiser".
I am not being biased because as I've already said bad things happened on both sides (but the Germans were certainly the lesser evil in my opinion

even the germans don't believe that...........

i don't get the force fed bit.........you believe what you want to believe, don't know where you went for your education....but you should have stayed at home......

Shredder66 · 23-07-2012 12:06pm

golden lane wrote: »

even the germans don't believe that...........

i don't get the force fed bit.........you believe what you want to believe, don't know where you went for your education....but you should have stayed at home......

Oh, I'm just going to ignore you from now on because you are not making any point and you're kind of wasting your time

golden lane · 23-07-2012 12:10pm

Shredder66 wrote: »

Oh, I'm just going to ignore you from now on because you are not making any point and you're kind of wasting your time

so, you spoke to german soldiers after the war......

R.Dub.Fusilier · 23-07-2012 12:24pm

No side in WW2 has clean hands in regard to war crimes it just that each have different levels of them. in the mind of ordinary joe soaps who may not have read much about WW2 the Third reich would come at the top of the list. The Japanese get forgotten for their treatment of Allied POWs and what they did in Singapore etc. IMO the Russian comitted more war crimes and are responsiable for millions more innocent deaths than the Germans.

it is believed that over 750,000 German POWs died of deliberate neglect after WW2

golden lane · 23-07-2012 12:30pm

R.Dub.Fusilier wrote: »

No side in WW2 has clean hands in regard to war crimes it just that each have different levels of them. in the mind of ordinary joe soaps who may not have read much about WW2 the Third reich would come at the top of the list. The Japanese get forgotten for their treatment of Allied POWs and what they did in Singapore etc. IMO the Russian comitted more war crimes and are responsiable for millions more innocent deaths than the Germans.

it is believed that over 750,000 German POWs died of deliberate neglect after WW2

it is also believed that two million russian pow's died the same way....

i think the op is getting mixed up with stalin and hitler....overall stalin wins the killings game....but during ww2....hitler has the upper hand...

Manach · 23-07-2012 12:30pm

R.Dub.Fusilier wrote: »

it is believed that over 750,000 German POWs died of deliberate neglect after WW2

To add to that, the civilian casualties in the 1944/45 upheavals due to population migration amounted to 500,000 according to post-war statistics gathered in the 1950s.

R.Dub.Fusilier · 23-07-2012 12:36pm

Manach wrote: »

To add to that, the civilian casualties in the 1944/45 upheavals due to population migration amounted to 500,000 according to post-war statistics gathered in the 1950s.

i heard a good quote the other day on TV and it goes something like this, " no flag of patriotism is big enough to cover the body of an innocent civilian" probably a bit wrong but if anyone has the correct quote please put it up.

Reekwind · 23-07-2012 12:57pm

Shredder66 wrote: »

Did we? Well that's excellent but I wouldn't say too many knew about it, whereas everyone knows about Holocaust rememberence day...

I don't know why Nazi apologists seem to think that everyone else is equally ignorant. Who hasn't heard of Allied atrocities? Who still thinks that the Soviets were a bunch of cuddly innocents led by Uncle Joe? Even the proverbial man in the street has heard of Dresden

By the time I'd finished Junior Cert history I'd already learnt of the horrors of Bomber Command (Hamburg in particular), Katyn and dekulakisation. Not to mention the GULAG, concentration camps in S Africa and myriad other colonial/Bolshevik crimes. Yet apparently this part of the Junior Cert course is somehow hidden history that's been deliberately glossed over?

The fundamental difference between these crimes and the Holocaust is not that the victors won. Many German crimes are relatively unknown in popular knowledge (hence the persistent myth of the 'good Nazi' or the 'fighting SS man') with Nazi crimes in the East still being a relatively specialist topic

What is unique about the Holocaust, why it has such resonance, is the degree to which it horrifies in its scale, its motive and its execution. These three strands (six million dead, genocide and industrial mass murder) have come together to create what is effectively the benchmark for modern mass murder. Or at least that's my take

What I can assure you that it is not is some (Jewish?) conspiracy to downplay Allied crimes while emphasising those of the Nazis. The latter get more 'press time' simply because they were demonstrably worse

R.Dub.Fusilier wrote:

IMO the Russian comitted more war crimes and are responsiable for millions more innocent deaths than the Germans.

I really hate this claim because it has trickled into popular history (admittedly with the aid of some Cold War academics) while being entirely false. To quote from a very recent thread:

The latest estimates as to the total number that died under Stalinism are approx 8-9 million; 6-7 million of whom died during the famine of the early 1930s (which was not man-made). Even if we take that top figure then the Nazi regime, in a shorter period, killed significantly more civilians than the Stalinists - at least 8 million deliberate killings, without including the tens of millions of Soviet civilians who died under occupation

Perversely, the idea that [anyone] can stand up here and even suggest such a thing is the result of the hysteric and politically tainted Cold War histories that assigned fantastic totals of 20+ million deaths to Stalinism. These figures are unsustainable in the light of archival evidence, as driven by the likes of Wheatcroft, Davies, Ellman, etc. Yet [people] have the gall to charge that Soviet crimes have been 'glossed over' when a generation of largely US academics has been systematically exaggerating them

donaghs · 23-07-2012 1:14pm

Memory Of 98 wrote: »

All I hear is talk of camps and ovens, I hate to inform you all that the British actually pioneered what we understand as the concentration camp.

Tens of thousands of Boer woman and children exterminated in British concentration camps in South Africa, in an attempt to eradicate the Boer people.

They didn't. It shares the name "concentration camp". But it was basically an interment camp, to hold people in one place for monitering, and stop them from aiding the enemy. Clearly this idea wasn't "invented" in 1900 by the British. Some say the earliest recorded use of such tactics was by the Russians in the 18th century against Polish rebels. The US forced relocations of Native Americans to holding areas and Reservations also shares some similarities. Just before the Boer War didn't Spain use similar tactics in Cuba, and the US in the Philippines?

I don't believe there is any evidence that the British planned the camps to exterminate the Boers (or those Black Africans) they interned. Rather, the internment system was very poorly planned, and inadequately supplied. Not nice, but there's still a difference between bad planning and indifference to suffering, and deliberate genocide.

The British camps were setup in Nov. 1900, in Feb 1901 the public outcry in Britain began, including attacks in Parliament against this policy. This is an interesting contrast to the deliberate decision taken by Germany at the same time to exterminate everyone belonging to troublesome tribes in Namibia.

And going back the main topic, the Nazi's committed deliberate genocide. But took a step further than any one else before by industrialising genocide.

Memory Of 98 wrote: »

Personally, I think both sides were as bad as each other, just the same side of a large imperialistic coin. But if you boys are going to have a debate, don't slate one side for doing the same thing that your heroes had been doing for decades, learn your history.

And when I say all sides, I mean all sides, throughout history, from French to Spanish.

I don't follow that sort of "moral equivalence" world-view. Clearly all actions and reactions, whether by empires, nations or indivuals, are not exactly "equal" in their effects.

Shredder66 wrote: »

Hitler's army entered the Rhineland which was taken from them. He annexed the Sudetenland and Austria. He invaded Poland to take back more German territory but was necessary as Stalin was invading from the East. He only invaded France when France and Britain declared war on Germany.

Hitler must have "accidentally" occupied the rest of Czechoslovakia in March 1939.

How did he know Stalin would invade from the East, just after he invaded? Is it because Molotov and Ribbontrop agreed on this, even wrote it all down in a (secret) treaty. Perhaps, like has been suggested with the Holocaust, Hitler never got that memo?

Fuinseog · 23-07-2012 3:54pm

getz wrote: »

easy answer dont bother reading books or watching war films,

some war movies are good and balanced. other have an agenda. the boogey man image of the fanatical SS man stems from movies such as Dirty Dozen

Fuinseog · 23-07-2012 3:57pm

golden lane wrote: »

it is also believed that two million russian pow's died the same way....

i think the op is getting mixed up with stalin and hitler....overall stalin wins the killings game....but during ww2....hitler has the upper hand...

one wonders how Britain and France could have fought a tyrant such as Hitler and work with a tyrant such as Stalin?

Russian POWs received shoddy treatment from the Germans yet when they were 'liberated' they were sent off to Siberia.

Fuinseog · 23-07-2012 4:01pm

Shredder66 wrote: »

Wow, that was long and boring. Yes, I was force fed ridiculous accounts of the war which is the official story and still is.
when I was a student. And if you dared point anything out they wouldn't debate it, they'd merely smear you by calling you a "Nazi sympathiser".
I am not being biased because as I've already said bad things happened on both sides (but the Germans were certainly the lesser evil in my opinion

history is made to measure. calling you a 'nazi' is the usual attempt to get you to shut up. independent thought is dangerous.

Shredder66 · 23-07-2012 4:05pm

Fuinseog wrote: »

some war movies are good and balanced. other have an agenda. the boogey man image of the fanatical SS man stems from movies such as Dirty Dozen

I can't actually think of one, not WWII anyway, I tried but I can't name any

Fuinseog · 23-07-2012 4:07pm

Shredder66 wrote: »

I can't actually think of one, not WWII anyway, I tried but I can't name any

Downfall was interesting. one of the few movies that presented the SS as normal soldiers.

Shredder66 · 23-07-2012 4:08pm

Fuinseog wrote: »

one wonders how Britain and France could have fought a tyrant such as Hitler and work with a tyrant such as Stalin?

Russian POWs received shoddy treatment from the Germans yet when they were 'liberated' they were sent off to Siberia.

That is indeed correct, not very well known but undoubtably true

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

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