it would appear the allies were no angels

OS119

FiSe wrote: »

- The German bombing of London and other UK cities is nothing in comparison to the allied bombing of Germany

not through lack of trying... the only reason that London, Birmingham, Liverpool, Glasgow and Portsmouth didn't get destroyed in way that Hamburg, Lubeck, Dresden or any other German City was destroyed was because of a serious German doctrinal error in not building a fleet of large, four-engined bombers.

no sympathy, the German public was quite happy when its armies were parked over most of Europe, and the German military (a very significant proportion of the German population) did nothing about Hitler when he was happily bombing left, right and centre.

i see the episode as being a salutory note in history about the dangers of parking your tanks on other peoples lawns...

Fratton Fred

FiSe wrote: »

- The German bombing of London and other UK cities is nothing in comparison to the allied bombing of Germany

Yes, but let's be clear, Germany didn't flatten more British cities not because they didn't want to, it was because they couldn't.

Also worth remembering that it wasn't the people of London, Coventry or Hull that were dragging jews, romas and the disablked out of their beds and sending them off to gas chambers.

Morlar

OS119 wrote: »

i see the episode as being a salutory note in history about the dangers of parking your tanks on other peoples lawns...

Not everybody feels that civilian population should be intentionally targetted en masse resulting from their armies actions.

FYI your logic placed in a modern context is not a million miles from that of al qaida as regards israel or the USA.

Morlar

Fratton Fred wrote: »

Yes, but let's be clear, Germany didn't flatten more British cities not because they didn't want to, it was because they couldn't.

Also worth remembering that it wasn't the people of London, Coventry or Hull that were dragging jews, romas and the disablked out of their beds and sending them off to gas chambers.

It is an over simplification to say that the only reason more british civilians did not die in ww2 was because the luftwaffe were unable to get at them.

It's also an oversimplification to accuse the entire german wartime civilian population of personal direct involvement in the deaths of roma or jews etc.

OS119

Morlar wrote: »

Not everybody feels that civilian population should be intentionally targetted en masse resulting from their armies actions.

FYI your logic placed in a modern context is not a million miles from that of al qaida as regards israel or the USA.

and?

Morlar

OS119 wrote: »

and?

There is no 'and' - if there is a part of the post you do not understand then point it out.

OS119

Morlar wrote: »

It is an over simplification to say that the only reason more british civilians did not die in ww2 was because the luftwaffe were unable to get at them.

It's also an oversimplification to accuse the entire german wartime civilian population of personal direct involvement in the deaths of roma or jews etc.

a) no it isn't. they lacked the number of heavy bombers neccesary to undertake strategic air warfare. had the Luftwaffe had 1000 Lancasters in 1940 they would have used them - and probably forced the UK out of the war. they instead chose to concentrate on producing tactical bombers and use them for all missions. bad decision.

b) the unpleasentness of NASDAP was available for all to see long before 1933, not only did lots of Germans vote for them, but the other political parties gave them an easy ride, as did the media, industry, the Armed Forces and most of the churches. so it seems like a pretty large part of 1930's/40's Germany wasn't quite as hostile to them as perhaps they'd later like to make out... it didn't take all 80 million Germans to operate the death camps, but voting for, or being ambivalent towards, their creators and then doing nothing when the policy of subjugation was obvious for all to see, gives German society a very large weight of responsibility.

OS119

Morlar wrote: »

There is no 'and' - if there is a part of the post you do not understand then point it out.

i fully understand the post. hence 'and?'

Morlar

OS119 wrote: »

i fully understand the post. hence 'and?'

Your take on this is that civilian populations are valid targets (ie it is correct to intentionally target them and not as collateral damage but for them to be the actual targets) on the basis of what their governments or armies do - mine isn't.

Yours is the kind of logic that is used by islamists to radicalise muslims into targetting civilians - I do not agree with your take on this either in a modern context or in the context of 1940's Germany. Simple as that.

Morlar

OS119 wrote: »

a) no it isn't.

It plainly is. You are arguing that the german armed forces in ww2 killed as many british civilians as was within their power to do. This is a ridiculous position & one you have not proven.

OS119 wrote: »

...gives German society a very large weight of responsibility.

Saying the German civilian population have a 'weight of responsibility' does not prove your argument that it is valid or moral to intentionally destroy them. German civilians did not have 20/20 hindsight when they last voted in 1933 nor did the international community who by and large were favourable to the NSDAP party over the communists.

Dr Strange

OS119 wrote: »

... not only did lots of Germans vote for them, but the other political parties gave them an easy ride, as did the media, industry, the Armed Forces and most of the churches. so it seems like a pretty large part of 1930's/40's Germany wasn't quite as hostile to them as perhaps they'd later like to make out....

I don't think you quite understood what was happening at that time in Germany. That is evidenced by your throwing this kind of "blanket blame" on the whole of the German population.

OS119

Preusse wrote: »

I don't think you quite understood what was happening at that time in Germany. That is evidenced by your throwing this kind of "blanket blame" on the whole of the German population.

they were dirt poor, their society had fragmented and they had been humiliated by losing a major European land war that they had started, and they wanted to feel better about themselves.

they voted for/were ambivalent towards the guy who said he'd make them feel better - at the expense of everyone who had 'betrayed' them

what have i missed out?

OS119

Morlar wrote: »

It plainly is. You are arguing that the german armed forces in ww2 killed as many british civilians as was within their power to do. This is a ridiculous position & one you have not proven.



Saying the German civilian population have a 'weight of responsibility' does not prove your argument that it is valid or moral to intentionally destroy them. German civilians did not have 20/20 hindsight when they last voted in 1933 nor did the international community who by and large were favourable to the NSDAP party over the communists.

you have evidence that suggests that the Luftwaffe deliberately didn't bring its full force to bear during the Blitz, or that it avoided targets which, though militarily legitimate, would have involved unacceptable (to Germany) civilian casualties?

NASDAP policies - and their way of thinking - was obvious to anyone in the German Political scene of the early 1930's. that is pure, unadulterated fact, not hindsight. even after they secured power in 1933 they were in no way secure - the German military of the time thought they were quite vunerable up until about 1938/39. by 1937 there cannot have been any adult German who did not have an inkling that NASDAP were very bad news indeed - and yet nothing happened...

McArmalite

I remember watching a program about the Battle of britain. In it they stated that the Germans had flying boats clearly painted in red cross colours in order to land on the sea to pick up Luftwaffe pilots who had baled out. The RAF instructed their pilots to shoot down these red cross flying boats as they said they could possibly be used to gather intelligence.
Of course others will disagree, but to me it was a particularly blatant war crime.

FiSe

McArmalite wrote: »

I remember watching a program about the Battle of britain. In it they stated that the Germans had flying boats clearly painted in red cross colours in order to land on the sea to pick up Luftwaffe pilots who had baled out. The RAF instructed their pilots to shoot down these red cross flying boats as they said they could possibly be used to gather intelligence.
Of course others will disagree, but to me it was a particularly blatant war crime.

What was the name of the program, If I may ask?
Since WWI the Red Cross marking was clear identification of 'Shoot here' for both sides of the conflict. Nothing new.

OS119
they were dirt poor, their society had fragmented and they had been humiliated by losing a major European land war that they had started, and they wanted to feel better about themselves.

they voted for/were ambivalent towards the guy who said he'd make them feel better - at the expense of everyone who had 'betrayed' them

what have i missed out?

Yes that's what I've been told in school at the age of 7, but since than I realized that things are more complex.
The problem is, that majority of German population didn't feel like they had loose the war. At the end of the day, it was armistice not surrender.
German society was in utter chaos.
High unemployment, unbelievable state of the economy, unreal inflation, revolutions and contra-revolutions and so on...
It didn't help that Germany, in fact a bankrupt state, had to pay unrealistic reparations to France and Britain.

And at the end of the day if you have to choose from two evils, you choose the less threatening one and if your choice is split between Communists and Nazional Socialists, well I think that your choice is clear.
Apart from that, Nazis were more acceptable for industrialists and, of course military, which played very big part in German society.
Surprisingly, for some, The first few years of Nazi dictature brought stabilization and prosperity. And if you happened to be ordinary German, you'd think, that you've made a good choice...
But it was too late to do anything about it and I'm not disputing the costs of that prosperous years.

You might as well say, that people of Easter Europe are responsible and guilty for the rise of Reds after the war and for the cold war era and that Irish people are responsible and guilty for the rise of crime in Ireland, because they've voted in 'not so straight' party.

BTW I think that it could be good to refresh our memory with the 1932 and 1933 elections to Reichstag, I think that you can clearly see the race between Reds and Nazis:

REICHSTAG ELECTION
NOVEMBER 6 1932
Party vote %
National Socialist 11,737,000 33.1
Social Democratic 7,248,000 20.4
Communist 5,980,000 16.9
Center 4,231,000 11.9
Nationalist 2,959,000 8.8
Bavarian People's 1,095,000 3.1
Other parties 2,635,000 7.6


REICHSTAG ELECTION
MARCH 1933
Party vote %
National Socialist 17,277,000 43.9
Social Democratic 7,182,000 18.3
Communist 4,848,000 12.3
Center 4,425,000 11.7
Nationalist 3,137,000 8.0
Bavarian People's 1,074,000 2.7
Other parties 1,533,000 3.8

McArmalite

FiSe wrote: »

Since WWI the Red Cross marking was clear identification of 'Shoot here' for both sides of the conflict. Nothing new.

The emblem of the International Red Cross is placed on humanitarian and medical vehicles and buildings to protect them from military attack on the battlefield since the Geneva Convention of 1864. To say it was " clear identification of 'Shoot here' for both sides of the conflict " is just bollox.

FiSe

Maybe...

Dr Strange

OS119 wrote: »

they were dirt poor, their society had fragmented and they had been humiliated by losing a major European land war that they had started, and they wanted to feel better about themselves.

they voted for/were ambivalent towards the guy who said he'd make them feel better - at the expense of everyone who had 'betrayed' them

what have i missed out?

I am afraid you have a completely twisted view of what happened at that time. I am not even going into the whole "who started WWII" thing.

Fratton Fred

McArmalite wrote: »

I remember watching a program about the Battle of britain. In it they stated that the Germans had flying boats clearly painted in red cross colours in order to land on the sea to pick up Luftwaffe pilots who had baled out. The RAF instructed their pilots to shoot down these red cross flying boats as they said they could possibly be used to gather intelligence.
Of course others will disagree, but to me it was a particularly blatant war crime.

to you of course it is.

your signature would imply that the british pilots were well within their rights though

"I'll make no apoligies for killing. The only thing I have ever been sorry about is the number that escaped !! Anyman that comes into my house or country and tries to take over, I'm going to kill him, by any means. - Dan Breen"

gross hypocrisy from McArmalite, who'd have thought it eh?

OS119

Preusse wrote: »

I am afraid you have a completely twisted view of what happened at that time. I am not even going into the whole "who started WWII" thing.

so late 20's/early 30's Germany was rich, its society cohesive and it was perfectly happy that its territory had been reduced by 25%, it was forbidden to build submarines, military aircraft and warships over a certain tonnage, and was shelling out massive reparations to those who hadn't defeated it in 1918?

because, you know, i wouldn't want to get it wrong...

OS119

FiSe wrote: »

Yes that's what I've been told in school at the age of 7, but since than I realized that things are more complex.
The problem is, that majority of German population didn't feel like they had loose the war. At the end of the day, it was armistice not surrender.
German society was in utter chaos.
High unemployment, unbelievable state of the economy, unreal inflation, revolutions and contra-revolutions and so on...
It didn't help that Germany, in fact a bankrupt state, had to pay unrealistic reparations to France and Britain.

which part of dirt poor, humiliated (last i looked, having your territory occupied or removed, having your military reduced to two artillery pieces, a tank, a coastal patrol vessel, and then paying massive reparations weren't part of a normal 'nobody won-armistice') and politically and socially fragmented did you have problems understanding?

Dr Strange

OS119 wrote: »

so late 20's/early 30's Germany was rich, its society cohesive and it was perfectly happy that its territory had been reduced by 25%, it was forbidden to build submarines, military aircraft and warships over a certain tonnage, and was shelling out massive reparations to those who hadn't defeated it in 1918?

because, you know, i wouldn't want to get it wrong...

I'm not even going to discuss this with you as your view is so warped and malicious towards the German people that nothing will change it. Just don't come over to the Militaria section and start spouting BS like that over there.

Zulu

Clap. Clap. Clap.
OS119 you've totally missed the point of this thread.
Bravo.

OS119

Preusse wrote: »

I'm not even going to discuss this with you as your view is so warped and malicious towards the German people that nothing will change it. Just don't come over to the Militaria section and start spouting BS like that over there.

point out which one was wrong?

don't worry, you'll not find me polishing SS medals and saying what good soldiers they were...

OS119

Zulu wrote: »

Clap. Clap. Clap.
OS119 you've totally missed the point of this thread.
Bravo.

which was - apart from Brit-bashing obviously?

Dr Strange

OS119 wrote: »

don't worry, you'll not find me polishing SS medals and saying what good soldiers they were...

Good, because if that is what you think a collector does...but I'm not surprised given your vitriolic messages here.

Hope this will end the off-topic part now and we can get back to the actual theme of the thread.

Zulu

OS119 wrote: »

which was - apart from Brit-bashing obviously?

:rolleyes: It wasn't brit bashing. Jeez, not half sensitive are we? The point of the thread (if you read the op) was expressing that the allies forces (of which the brits were an element - not the only people) were involved in some atrocities as well as the axis.

And they were.

McArmalite

Fratton Fred wrote: »

to you of course it is.

your signature would imply that the british pilots were well within their rights though

"I'll make no apoligies for killing. The only thing I have ever been sorry about is the number that escaped !! Anyman that comes into my house or country and tries to take over, I'm going to kill him, by any means. - Dan Breen"

gross hypocrisy from McArmalite, who'd have thought it eh?

Oh God give me patience :rolleyes:

I'm not implying in any way that the shooting of Red Cross boat planes is ok. The Red Cross painted flying boats were not coming to a " country and tries to take over " but involved in a humanitarian mission to rescue pilots who had bailed out over the English channel. Now imagine if it had been the Germans who had shot up the Red Cross boat planes. We know too well who'd be screaming aloud about their moral superiority and the enlightened british sense of fairplay etc against the nasty, brutish bosch.

prinz

Fuinseog wrote: »

"US forces execute German Pows account from WW2"
its very rare you hear such accounts.

Fuinseog wrote: »

when I see movies like 'saving private ryan' and 'band of others', where the americans adopt the moral highground on how they saved the world, I become cynical.

Perhaps you need to watch Band of Brothers again then, in particular be on the lookout for one Ronald Speirs, who according to legend/rumour gunned down a group of German POWS (this incident is included in Band of Brothers) just after D-DAY.

There is a similar incident included in Saving Private Ryan, behind the beaches where surrendering German soldiers are shot, a couple of reasons for this (1) after surviving the hell of landing on the beaches soldiers were psyched up enough to kill anything in uniform that moved and (2) in the opening minutes and hours of storming the beaches taking prisoners was impractical, where were they going to be kept/put?

As for becoming cynical because of movies which are made for entertainment value... if you want a real over view watch a documentary.

FiSe

McArmalite wrote: »

Oh God give me patience :rolleyes:

I'm not implying in any way that the shooting of Red Cross boat planes is ok. The Red Cross painted flying boats were not coming to a " country and tries to take over " but involved in a humanitarian mission to rescue pilots who had bailed out over the English channel. Now imagine if it had been the Germans who had shot up the Red Cross boat planes.

Nobody said it's OK to shoot at the Red Cross bearer, but it did happened more than occasionally and both belligerent sides have done it, read the posts.
I would dispute that 'humanitarian mission' statement as you've put it. The planes and boats picking up the pilots done so with intention to bring those back to the front line asap. And once back in the cockpit, they wouldn't deliver sweets to their enemies.
Picking up pilots in the channel was very dangerous business and both sides knew that, from the other hand both sides were picking-up aircrews no matter on which sides they are on. And, for example, both sides were checking life saving buoys in the channel regularly.

Anyway, before somebody starts picking-up the words from this post.
I am not saying that the allies were saints, I know very well that they were not. But! You can't blame one side without looking at the other. You can't be talking about German atrocities, without mention revenge of the Allies and vice versa.

For example if I will talk about SS HitlerJugend executing Canadian soldiers after D-day, I will mention, the possible reason why they've done it.
If I will talk about, above mentioned, RAF shootong at the German Red Cross marked planes, I can not mention, let's say, Guildford Castle /1918 incident, I know, but that's what sprung into my head/.
If I will talk about German reprisals against Russian population, I will have to mention partisan war...
Hope that you know what I am trying to say here