Germany to remember millions of victims of World War II; the German people
I feel like this is the sort of thing you should expect to happen when you start a world war 25 years after starting the previous world war. Especially when the world war you start sees to the systematic extermination of entire races of people. The literal rape, murder, and scorched earth retreats by the Germans during the war would tend to leave a bad taste in one’s mouth.
Berlin museum centering on Germans expelled after WWII opens
Germany on Monday opened a museum exploring the fate of millions of Germans forced to leave eastern and central Europe at the end of World War II, along with other forced displacements of the 20th and 21st centuries — a sensitive project that has taken years to realize.
The Documentation Center for Displacement, Expulsion, Reconciliation, is opening more than 13 years after Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government gave the plan the go-ahead. Housed in a late-1920s building in downtown Berlin, it features some 700 exhibits over 1,500 square meters (16,000 square feet).
“This center was discussed at length and intensively, in Germany but also with our partners in Europe,” Merkel said in an address to the opening ceremony, welcoming the presence of the Polish, Czech and Hungarian ambassadors. “The discussions about this place really were not always easy, but they were important.”
Merkel said the new center, complete with a library, “fills a gap in our coming to terms with history.” Still, making the project reality was long viewed as “an impossible balancing act,” according to the center’s director, Gundula Bavendamm.
Controversies revolved around one central question, Bavendamm told reporters ahead of the opening: “How can the exodus and expulsion of Germans at the end of and after World War II be portrayed without raising the slightest doubt that this country is aware of its lasting responsibility for the German crimes of World War II and the murder of European Jews?”
The project centers on the millions of Germans who fled from advancing Soviet forces or were kicked out of parts of eastern and central Europe as Germany’s borders were moved westward after the war, “in the historical context” of Nazi crimes, said Bavendamm — the project’s third director.
“Without the Nazi policies of expulsion and annihilation, 14 million Germans wouldn’t have lost their homes as a result of flight and expulsion,” she added. “But that doesn’t change the fact that their expulsion by the Allies and the eastern and central European states in the aftermath of World War II was also an injustice.”
Category: Historical
Don’t want your ass kicked? Then don’t start shit. Much like the Japanese citing the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, while completely ignoring the carnage they unleashed throughout Asia.
Excellent point. I might add don’t go chasing after people that leave
and find a better place to live. I’m looking at you England.
Great point. I think we all have heard certain “groups” here in America say that the use of Nukes on Japan was “racist”, but when your resorting to Kamikaze tactics, you’re probably not willing to discuss surrender. Most of us have no idea about the carnage that was unleashed on East Asia by Japan.
Not only Kamikaze’s, but the manner in which the Japanese forces refused to surrender, fanatically fighting to the last man throughout the many island battles, had to make the Allies fearful of the potential casualties on both sides that would result from an invasion of the homeland.
Imperial Japan was essentially a death cult when you get right down to it. Kids in elementary school were taught that killing the “subhuman” enemies of the Emperor (i.e. anyone not part of the Japanese master race) was their duty, dying for the Emperor (whom they were taught to revere as a god) was the greatest thing they could ever aspire to, and surrender was unthinkable.
The weird thing is the Schrodinger-esque status of the emperor. Policy decisions were predominantly made by Tojo and his cabinet. Hirohito would rubber-stamp them, but whether he could actually refuse is unclear. Tojo was a true-believer in 20th Century Bushido who worshipped the emperor, but was also calling the shots according to his own ambitions. Tojo and Hirohito themselves probably didn’t know how much power Hirohito actually had vs how much he was merely a figurehead for Tojo. And when Hirohito finally put his foot down and ordered the surrender, fanatical Japanese soldiers stormed the palace to prevent his order from being broadcast, steadfast in their belief that they were serving the Emperor by doing so, even as they shot up his residence and engaged his personal bodyguards in a firefight.
I’ve come across a few tofu-heads who subscribe to the effluvia that the USA was “racist” to use the A-bomb against Japan, they quickly shut up when confronted with the Bataan Death March, the Rape of Nanking, their deeds in the Dutch West Indies along with Unit 731 and other things. I’m certain that the use of the A-Bombs saved far more Japanese lives because in the waning days of the War the Military Junta was training and indoctrinating Japanese Civilians to fight to their deaths once the USA invaded.
Since the Imperial Japanese Army didn’t have enough firearms and ammo to arm the entire adult civilian populace, they were arming them with bamboo spears, in preparation for the impending invasion by U.S. troops. Try getting a Prog to tell you how many brainwashed Japanese would have died taking a spear to a gunfight.
Imagine if Operation Downfall had to happen. Five to six times the size of Operation Overlord. Fighting house to house against fanatical civilians, including women and children.
interesting that some of todays armchair generals have said that the bomb shouldn’t have been used because japan was thinking about packing it in. also heard the same stuff years ago.
No one ever remembers to ask why we had such gargantuan stocks of nerve gas and defoliants dating from 1945.
Because there was an alternative plan for invasion, that involved a great deal longer “blockade”, and “preparatory bombardment” with far more than HE and incindiaries. That plan was developed using every available known weapon, but without knowledge of the Manhattan Project.
Better yet, have them look up the anti-tank “lance mines” they were teaching kids to use.
“Now, run up to that Sherman tank and poke it with this wooden stick! The the bomb on the end of it will go boom as soon as it touches the side.”
The nukes were necessary. The only alternative was genocide.
I don’t know about everyone back then, but I can tell you every WW2 era Marine I have ever talked with was ready, willing, and most were desirous of shooting every Japanese they came into contact with once they got there. Before they landed for the occupation, every weapon had to be checked to be sure none of them had surreptitiously loaded them in case the nippos decided they were going to get rowdy.
There was a third bomb, if the first two didn’t convince the Japs that we meant business.
I guess they took us seriously.
Funny, I heard we had enough material for a total of 3. Trinity, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki… had the Japs not surrendered we were SOL for more nukes for 6 months.
Nope, there was enough for exactly one more.
Interestingly, the remaining core is the only atomic weapon that killed anybody in the US. It was called the “demon core” and two US nuclear scientists, Harry Daghlian and Lous Slotin died as a direct result of conducting “criticality experiments” with the core. It was later melted down and used for other weapons.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demon_core
I believe the phrase you are looking for is “it pays to be a winner”.
Tiger Man McCool might argue that point.
“And that woman, she gets uglier, and meaner every day. But I got her!”
Maybe someone needs to go over to China and mention to Xi Smallding and remind them that Japan and the US are friends…
“Nanjing…”
If you’re gonna throw a sucker punch, make sure the recipient doesn’t get back up. The US got back up. Ask Hideki Tojo how that turned out.
Hideki Tojo did a “rope Dance” after his conviction of War Crimes!
After a failed suicide attempt. If you’re gonna shoot yourself, don’t use a Type-26 Nambu. It ain’t gonna get the job done.
The Japanese pretend that the atrocities that they committed never happened. While he was in the Navy and stationed in Japan my brother married a Japanese woman. She is very intelligent, speaks 3 different languages, and is highly educated. The first time she had ever left Japan is when she moved to the United States with my brother. When she moved to the U.S. it was the very first time she had ever even heard about the Rape of Nanking and other horrible events perpetrated by the Imperial Japanese Army.
Want to look like a dumbass? Then believe and quote everything about WWII that you learned in high school and from Hollywood.
Not everyone in Gurmanny was a member of, or thrilled with, the Uniparty.
Why is history so damn hard for people to understand?
Remember the important lessons:
—Wars always leave innocents in its wake, occasionally via genocide.
—Not everyone in the loser nations’ population is ‘bad’.
—Not everyone on the ‘winning team’ is good.
—Main point: history is muddier than you’ll ever know, and no matter how you feel about it, it ain’t changing.
By fighting against its own history got Germany wrapped up (and f’ed up) pinning its stupidity on others. Happens a lot to formerly-great nations….
Just sayin
Dietrich Bonhoeffer (and others of his ilk) comes to mind.
As part of the occupation forces my father was housed with a future Chancellor of Germany who was under house arrest by the Nazis because he did not support Hitler, but was somehow too influential to be killed outright.
War does terrible things to societies.
Dumb sh*t has consequences.
I admire the Director’s sensitivities to what they are trying to recognize but it sounds too much like prisoners complaining about their plight (small room, no privacy, limited internet access, etc.). While they completely ignore the reason they are in this situation…i.e. they committed a heinous crime, and broke the law!
Like Hack Stone said…If you don’t want to do the time, don’t commit the crime!
BOY, I take off for a LONG weekend and this place goes to actual SHIT!!!
Jesus, do I have to do everything around here?!?!?
(STFU I Missed you guys (and gals!) 😀 😀 )
Like Hack Stone said…If you don’t want to do the time, don’t commit the crime. i thought robert blake aka barreta or his parrot used to say that on his tv show 1975-1978
Had to check IMDB to see if Robert Blake is still with us. He is. Kind of ironic that his catch phrase was “Don’t do the crime if you can’t the time”, given that whole Bonnie Blakely incident. If he didn’t kill, there was a long list of victims that she screwed over who wouldn’t mind putting a few rounds into her.
Do stupid shit
Win fun prizes
At least we didn’t go back and nuke Germany after the fact, just, well, because….
“I’m looking at you Dresden…”
(Goofy interesting read about the possibility there was a leak about the US’s atomic capabilities to use a nuke against Germany and Dresden.”)
http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2013/10/11/heisenbergs-dresden-story/
The trains did not drive themselves, nor were rail schedules produced by Nazi AI.
Surprising. Third time I’ve been stationed in Germany. They’ve erased WWII. I went on a staff ride a while back. The historian leading it told me that on his previous staff ride, in Aachen, he talked to an older adult from the city who had no idea that Aachen was the scene of major urban combat during the war, which leveled the city. I recently went to Wesel, the site of OPN Varsity, the biggest airborne operation in history and there’s not one indicator of it. Etc. etc. etc. There are, however, memorials to the German war dead in every town.
Japan has whitewashed all of their misdeeds as well.
IIRC, there was a unit of doctors who specialized in NBC weapons that vivisected conscious USAAF POWs.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731
Indeed, and they ain’t the only ones.
Red China today insists that Mao led a brave resistance against the Japanese throughout the war. The truth is that he and the commies found a rock to hide under when the japs showed up. It was Chiang’s nationalist KMT army that kept the pressure on the invaders, while Pedo Mao (he had a thing for 9-year-olds) was happy to collaborate with the IJA the whole time, and only turned on them when Stalin’s tanks came south from Siberia in the final week of the war.
Speaking of Stalin, the Rooskies still don’t like to talk about things like Katyn Forest, nor do they admit just how heavily dependent they were on Lend-Lease for *everything*. The fact that the US strategic bombing campaign pulled a major chunk of the Luftwaffe away from the Eastern Front is another inconvenient truth. And there seems to be a large movement in Russian academia who, in true Holocaust Denier fashion, wants to claim that the Holodomor, the Purges, and gulags were not so bad, and if they were, it was all just an accident and certainly not because Stalin was an evil, bloodthirsty midget with an axe to grind.
I wonder how the new german microwave that seats 12 is going to go over? Let’s not forget how they made Patton sit outside Berlin so the Rooskies could get all the glory?
The German Soldiers were beating feet West and surrendering in droves to the Brits and Americans for…reasons.
The Polish Soldier…”Which enemy do you kill first, the German or the Russian?”
The Germans. Business before pleasure.
It is a myth that Germany started WW1. Russia started it with general mobilization. Given Russia intent, Germany and Austria-Hungary would have been fools not to mobilize as well. Russia’s mobilization was the first act of war.
Stalin killed more Russians than Hitler did, lots more.
Everything I read about Stalin tells me that he and Hitler were the modern figures of Satan himself…
If you believe in a Higher Power, you damn sure better believe in a lower power every bit as ugly and evil as anything ever written about by any fiction writer.
WWII is the best history lesson on good vs. evil in the history of mankind.
We came so close to losing that war it is not even close.
The Battle of Midway was the turning point for the Pacific Theatre whereas D-Day was the real turning point in the European Theatre.
Read all you can about it and leave your books to your kids, maybe they will read them and help sound the alarm about history repeating itself…..
I know, pontificate, pontificate, pontificate…..
DOOOOOMMMMMEEEEDDDDD !!!!!
That is true. It’s also true that Kaiser Bill wanted *a* war, just not the war he got. He wanted overseas conquests to feed the massive inferiority complex he had towards the British (he was King George V’s first cousin and Queen Victoria’s grandson), and had his eye on China and the US as targets. That’s why he put so much money into building a blue-water fleet from scratch (that and his ongoing dick-measuring contest with Cousin Georgie): he wanted to be able to project force across the ocean for his Winterarbeit plan.
When I was a kid, and was feeding my love of military history with every book I could lay my hands on, my dad made this remark to me.
“Mike, not every German was a Nazi, just like every Nazi wasn’t a German”.
He didn’t elaborate any further, as I learned more I understood what he meant.
Fixed it….Duh fat fingers.
“Mike, not every German was a Nazi, just like not every Nazi was a German”.
I’m going to play Devil’s Advocate here for a minute.
The numbers are around 12-14,000,000 ethnic Germans in south and central Europe. These were not the Nazis who came in set up occupation government. These were people who had lived there for generations. Go look up the Volga Germans. Who ended up in Siberia.
And yeah Adolf and his boys were shitbags. But that doesn’t excuse the shitbaggery of the Czechs, Russians, Magyars and others.
If it wasn’t for the Occupation of Germany by the Allies and eastern Europe by the Soviets, the whole damn continent would’ve looked like 1990s Yugoslavia.
AND if expulsion of the ethnic Germans was justified, why the hell is Kalingrad still a thing? After the collapse of the Soviet Union every country would be totally justified in telling the Russians “Pack your trash and head back to the motherland.” Especially the Baltic states. Because Putin is doing the exact same shit Hitler did, “protecting” ethnic minorities outside of Russia. Sudeten Germans ring any bells?
That’s just me
Doomed I say !!!!!!
DOOOOOOOMMMMEEEEDDDD !!!!!!