On my way to the next liberated camp, I met some advance units of the Red Army that had occupied a German house. Soviet troops were closing in on Weimar in Eastern Germany. I was immediately embraced and pushed into a celebration already in progress. A glass of what I suppose was Vodka, or gasoline, was thrust into my hand. Everyone was stomping and dancing joyfully. A burly Soviet soldier, with pants stuffed into big black boots, grabbed me, lifted me off my feet and started swinging me around the room. It was only when I was put down that I realized that my dancing partner was a woman. The Soviet Army included females as well as males, but it was sometimes hard to tell which was which. One of the Russian soldiers asked me what I did in the American army. I told him I was a war crimes investigator. I explained that I tried to get evidence of what the SS did. “Don’t you know what they did?” he asked. I said that, of course, I did. “So why are you asking them?” he said quizzically. “Just shoot them!” In later years, when it became clear that we could never try more than a very small sampling of the criminals, and that almost all would escape punishment, I often thought of the advice I got from the simple Russian soldier. Being a lawman, I couldn’t accept it, but I often wondered if he was right.
- Investigating Nazi Concentration Camps, Benjamin B. Ferencz
Fuck that hits hard
That whole story is quite the intense read. Thanks for sharing!
No problem, comrade!
Don’t forget Pope Benedict was in the Hitler Youth.
He had no choice
Ratzinger’s family, especially his father, bitterly resented the Nazis, and his father’s opposition to Nazism resulted in demotions and harassment of the family.[20] Following his 14th birthday in 1941, Ratzinger was conscripted into the Hitler Youth – as membership was required by law for all 14-year-old German boys after March 1939[21] – but was an unenthusiastic member who refused to attend meetings, according to his brother.[22] In 1941, one of Ratzinger’s cousins, a 14-year-old boy with Down syndrome, was taken away by the Nazi regime and murdered during the Aktion T4 campaign of Nazi eugenics.
Read something interesting earlier on Folke Bernadotte’s Wiki. Where is it…
In April 1945, Heinrich Himmler asked Bernadotte to convey a peace proposal to Prime Minister Winston Churchill and President Harry S. Truman without the knowledge of Adolf Hitler. The main point of the proposal was that Germany would surrender only to the Western Allies (the United Kingdom and the United States), but would be allowed to continue resisting the Soviet Union.
Right after WWII, the US rehabilitated its “enemies,” Germany, Italy, and Japan, while starting the Cold War with its “ally,” the USSR. Rehabilitating Germany & Japan was important for the US’ containment strategy against the USSR.
If we see that Germany is winning the war, we ought to help Russia; and if that Russia is winning, we ought to help Germany, and in that way let them kill as many as possible […]. — Senator and future president Harry S. Truman, 1941
This piece of shit also wanted the Japanese to kill all the PLA communists even though the Chinese were allies at the time.
Demons, the lot of them.
The politicians that is.
So you’re telling me the Soviets treated Nazi’s like they treated their own people. Curious.
It’s ok bro. You must be 12.
An even more vapid rebuttal then I expected
No he said the West did that.
No? What are you talking about? Getting real tired of liberals claiming to be anarchists that think they can say whatever they want about socialist states, regardless of its validity, and claim it’s simply “anarchist critique.” No, anarchist critique is based on looking at historical truth and evaluating it with an anarchist lens, not making shit up.
Yes, your fall back defense and insult: everyone you disagree with is a “liberal”. As tiresome as it is predictable. Though this is Hardly an Anarchist critique. Anyone with a basic understanding of the history and no ulterior motives could make the point: Prior to Stalin’s death, life was cheap in the USSR. More “good” communists faced execution than Nazis.
More “good” communists faced execution than Nazis.
100 GORRIOLLON NO IFONE
Take your Black Book of Communism nonsense and shove it
I sense Ulterior Motives
Yep, anyone can make shit up, like you just did. 4 million Nazis were killed on the Eastern Front in battle, a number far exceeding even the most outlandish figures liberals came up with for purges, even if we assume 100% of those purged were innocent, which is of course wrong (the vast majority were proven guilty).
Now, in reality, life expectancy doubled while Stalin was in office, and the vast majority of those executed in purges (which wasn’t what happened to most that were purged, usually just party expulsions) were found to be guilty of crimes like murder, terrorism, espionage, sexual assault, and more. We also know that there was good reason for the purges, because the USSR was under constant siege, threat of war, infiltration, sabotage, and more for its entire existence, especially prior to World War II.
You don’t have a critique to make, you’re just repeating Red Scare mythology. Truth for you is less important than wielding the Red Scare like a club against those you disagree with, even if it’s trivial to disprove your claims.
Operation Osoaviakhim was a secret Soviet operation in which more than 2,500 German specialists (scientists, engineers and technicians who worked in several areas) from companies and institutions relevant to military and economic policy in the Soviet occupation zone of Germany (SBZ) and Berlin, as well as around 4,000 more family members, totalling more than 6,000 people, were taken from former Nazi Germany as war reparations to the Soviet Union. It took place in the early morning hours of October 22, 1946
The keywords here being “as war reparations”.
Nazis were put to work for their crimes not given a new name and passport and a high paying and respected career.
I like how the truth about nearly 3,000 Nazi scientists over 4, 000 Nazi regime members in their families were given nice lives in Russia after the war. I like how that little truth breaks everything you’re trying to say.
Probably in a perfect world they all would’ve been sent to the gulags and worked to death in the cold. But what would be materially different about living in that world as opposed to the one where they were forced to do the same thing except it was white collar labor?
It really doesn’t tho
Did these people get promoted to the head of the USSR’s space program or the chief of staff of the Warsaw Pact or the UN Secretary General or the the Head of the Soviet Socialist Republic Commission?
No, the were used for their technical knowledge and allowed to live quiet lives in obscurity, away from any political power.
No, the were used for their technical knowledge and allowed to live quiet lives in obscurity, away from any political power.
A blatant lie. Erich Apel joined the East German party and became head of the GDRs Economics Comission in the Politburo.
Werner Gruner became an emeritus professor at the TU Dresden.
Brunolf Baade joined the Socialist Unity Party in East Germany and led the jet plane industry there, after having done the same in the Soviet Union. He also was director of the Institute for Lightweight construction and the economical use of Materials and a lecturer at Dresden.
In fact, many of the captured German scientists were only in captivity for less than a decade; afterwards the vast majority of them were allowed to return to East Germany and Austria, where most seem to have lived comfortable lives, and a number of them were politically active with high offices. They certainly did not live in obscurity, nor were they kept away from political power.
They were allowed to live they were given a country of refuge in their families were brought with them.
We already agreed on this, so I don’t know what your point is.
I can’t find anything on Walter Hallstein and Adolf Heusinger being nazis or committing war crimes. Looks like the former was an academic drafted in the army and the latter a high-ranking officer who began his career before the nazis.
I get that Heusinger can be seen as complicit (he must have known for whom he worked and didn’t quit), but what about Hallstein?
Wikipedia gives plenty on Adolf Heusinger’s involvement in the Nazi party and millitary.
Here’s a link for Hallstein.
But perhaps the most shocking thing of all about this speech is that Hallstein stated one of the most important laws to be introduced in the annexed countries was the “Law for the Protection of the German Blood, and the German Honour.” In other words, he advocated the imposition of the Nuremberg Race Laws as a top priority in “Greater Germany.” These laws excluded German Jews from Reich citizenship and prohibited them from marrying, or even having sexual relations, with persons of German or related blood.
Thanks for reading more carefully than me!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Hallstein
In 1935, Hallstein attempted to start a military career alongside his academic duties.[17] In 1936, he managed to integrate a voluntary military service in an artillery unit.[17] In the years between 1936 and 1939, he attended several military courses[18] and was made a reserve officer.[17]
Hallstein was a member of several nominally Nazi professional organizations,[g][19] but he was not a member of the Nazi Party
Not the worst nazi but the voluntary military service under the Nazis seals the deal for me. Definitely a Nazi.
Funny how Russia’s Operation Osoaviakhim did the exact same thing, they were just worse at it. This thread is Russian backed propaganda.
Operation Osoaviakhim did the exact same thing
Cope, no it didn’t. The US gave ex Nazis leadership positions, the soviets did the pragmatic thing and only extracted useful knowledge and executed them if they refused
You live in a larp world where everyone who disagrees with you is a Russian government agent lmao
