I'm not a pacifist, I feel we should attempt to settle conflict through dialogue and negotiation first, I see war as a final --yet sometimes necessary-- resort.
I often have mixed feelings about Remembrance Day because sometimes it has a tendency to glorify war, and I don't think mass slaughter merits glory. At the same time I think the day serves to viscerally remind us of the atrocities the human animal is capable of...
[url="http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/11/11/acevedo.pow/index.html"]'Let it be known'[/url]
LOMA LINDA, California (CNN) -- Anthony Acevedo thumbs through the worn, yellowed pages of his diary emblazoned with the words "A Wartime Log" on its cover. It's a catalog of deaths and atrocities he says were carried out on U.S. soldiers held by Nazis at a slave labor camp during World War II -- a largely forgotten legacy of the war.
Acevedo pauses when he comes across a soldier with the last name of Vogel.
"He died in my arms. He wouldn't eat. He didn't want to eat," says Acevedo, now 84 years old. "He said, 'I want to die! I want to die! I want to die!' "
The memories are still fresh, some 60 years later. Acevedo keeps reading his entries, scrawled on the pages with a Schaeffer fountain pen he held dear.
He was one of 350 U.S. soldiers held at Berga an der Elster, a satellite camp of the Nazis' notorious Buchenwald concentration camp. The soldiers, working 12-hour days, were used by the German army to dig tunnels and hide equipment in the final weeks of the war. Less than half of the soldiers survived their captivity and a subsequent death march, he says.
Acevedo shows few emotions as he scans the pages of his diary. But when he gets to one of his final entries, the decades of pent-up pain, the horror witnessed by a 20-year-old medic, are too much.
"We were liberated today, April the 23, 1945," he reads.
His body shakes, and he begins sobbing. "Sorry," he says, tears rolling down his face. "I'm sorry."
Acevedo's story is one that was never supposed to be told. "We had to sign an affidavit ... [saying] we never went through what we went through. We weren't supposed to say a word," he says.
The U.S. Army Center of Military History provided CNN a copy of the document signed by soldiers at the camp before they were sent back home. "You must be particularly on your guard with persons representing the press," it says. "You must give no account of your experience in books, newspapers, periodicals, or in broadcasts or in lectures."
The document ends with: "I understand that disclosure to anyone else will make me liable to disciplinary action."
The information was kept secret "to protect escape and evasion techniques and the names of personnel who helped POW escapees," said Frank Shirer, the chief historian at the U.S. Army Center for Military History.
Acevedo sees it differently. For a soldier who survived one of the worst atrocities of mankind, the military's reaction is still painful to accept. "My stomach turned to acid, and the government didn't care. They didn't give a hullabaloo."
It took more than 50 years, he says, before he received 100 percent disability benefits from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
Despite everything Acevedo endured during the war, little had prepared him for his own father's attitude toward his capture. "My dad told me I was a coward," he says.
"I turned around and got my duffel bag, my luggage, and said, 'This is it, Father. I'm not coming back.' So I took the train the following day, and I didn't see my parents for years, because I didn't want to see them. I felt belittled."
For decades, Acevedo followed the rules and kept his mouth shut. His four children didn't know the extent of his war experience. He says he felt stymied because of the document he signed. "You never gave it a thought because of that paper."
Now, he says it's too important to be forgotten. In recent years, he's attended local high schools to tell his story to today's generation.
"Let it be known," he says. "People have to know what happened."
Born July 31, 1924, in San Bernardino, California, Anthony C. Acevedo is what is known in today's parlance as a "citizen child" -- one who was born in the United States to parents from Mexico.
A Mexican-American, he was schooled in Pasadena, California, but couldn't attend the same classes as his white peers. "We couldn't mix with white people," he says. Both of his parents were deported to Mexico in 1937, and he went with them.
Acevedo returned to the States when he was 17, he says, because he wanted to enlist in the U.S. Army. He received medical training in Illinois before being sent to the European theater.
A corporal, he served as a medic for the 275th Infantry Regiment of the 70th Infantry Division. Acevedo was captured at the Battle of the Bulge after days of brutal firefights with Nazis who surrounded them. He recalls seeing another medic, Murry Pruzan, being gunned down.
"When I saw him stretched out there in the snow, frozen," Acevedo says, shaking his head. "God, that's the only time I cried when I saw him. He was stretched out, just massacred by a machine gun with his Red Cross band."
He pauses. "You see all of them dying out there in the fields. You have to build a thick wall."
Acevedo was initially taken to a prison camp known as Stalag IX-B in Bad Orb, Germany, where thousands of American, French, Italian and Russian soldiers were held as prisoners of war. Acevedo's diary entry reads simply: "Was captured the 6th of January 1945."
continued
Chilling Remembrance Day Read..
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dragon wench
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Chilling Remembrance Day Read..
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dragon wench
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For the next several months, he would be known by the Germans only as Prisoner Number 27016. One day while in Stalag IX-B, he says, a German commander gathered American soldiers and asked all Jews "to take one step forward." Few willingly did so.
Jewish soldiers wearing Star of David necklaces began yanking them off, he says. About 90 Jewish soldiers and another 260 U.S. soldiers deemed "undesirables" -- those who "looked like Jews" -- were selected. Acevedo, who is not Jewish, was among them.
They were told they were being sent to "a beautiful camp" with a theater and live shows.
"It turned out to be the opposite," he says. "They put us on a train, and we traveled six days and six nights. It was a boxcar that would fit heads of cattle. They had us 80 to a boxcar. You couldn't squat. And there was little tiny windows that you could barely see through."
It was February 8, 1945, when they arrived. The new camp was known as Berga an der Elster, a subcamp of Buchenwald, the Nazi concentration camp where tens of thousands of Jews and other political prisoners were killed under Adolf Hitler's regime.
Acevedo says he was one of six medics among the 350 U.S. soldiers at Berga. Political prisoners from other countries were held at Berga separate from the Americans. "We didn't mingle with them at all," he says, adding that the U.S. soldiers worked in the same tunnels as the other political prisoners.
"We were all just thin as a rail."
The U.S. prisoners, Acevedo says, were given 100 grams of bread per week made of redwood sawdust, ground glass and barley. Soup was made from cats and rats, he says. Eating dandelion leaves was considered a "gourmet meal."
If soldiers tried to escape, they would be shot and killed. If they were captured alive, they would be executed with gunshots to their foreheads, Acevedo says. Wooden bullets, he says, were used to shatter the inside of their brains. Medics were always asked to fill the execution holes with wax, he says.
"Prisoners were being murdered and tortured by the Nazis. Many of our men died, and I tried keeping track of who they were and how they died."
The soldiers were forced to sleep naked, two to a bunk, with no blankets. As the days and weeks progressed, his diary catalogs it all. The names, prisoner numbers and causes of death are listed by the dozens in his diary. He felt it was his duty as a medic to keep track of everyone.
"I'm glad I did it," he says.
As a medic, he says, he heard of other more horrific atrocities committed by the Nazis at camps around them. "We heard about experiments that they were doing -- peeling the skins of people, humans, political prisoners, making lampshades."
He and the other soldiers were once taken to what Acevedo believes was the main camp of Buchenwald, about 30 miles (48 kilometers) from Berga. They noticed large pipes coming from one building.
"We thought we were going to be gassed when we were told to take our clothes off," he says. "We were scared. We were stripped."
"Rumors were around that this was where the political prisoners would be suffocated with gas." It turned out to be a shower, the only time during their captivity they were allowed to bathe.
The main Buchenwald camp was officially liberated on April 11, 1945. But the camp and its subcamps were emptied of tens of thousands of prisoners as American troops neared. The U.S. troops held at the Berga compound were no exception.
"Very definite that we are moving away from here and on foot. This isn't very good for our sick men. No drinking water and no latrines," Acevedo wrote in his diary on April 4, 1945.
He says they began a death march of 217 miles (349 kilometers) that would last three weeks. More than 300 U.S. soldiers were alive at the start of the march, he says; about 165 were left by the end, when they were finally liberated.
Lines of political prisoners in front of them during the march caught the full brunt of angry Nazi soldiers.
"We saw massacres of people being slaughtered off the highway. Women, children," he says. "You could see people of all ages, hanging on barbed wire."
One of his diary entries exemplifies an extraordinary patriotism among soldiers, even as they were being marched to their deaths. "Bad news for us. President Roosevelt's death. We all felt bad about it. We held a prayer service for the repose of his soul," Acevedo wrote on April 13, 1945.
It adds, "Burdeski died today."
To this day, Acevedo still remembers that soldier. He wanted to perform a tracheotomy using his diary pen to save Burdeski, a 41-year-old father of six children. A German commander struck Acevedo in the jaw with a rifle when he asked.
"I'll never forget," he says.
On a recent day, about a dozen prisoners of war held during World War II and their liberators gathered at the Jerry L. Pettis Memorial Veterans Medical Center in Loma Linda, California. Many applauded Acevedo for his heroics.
"Those of us in combat have our own heroes, and those are the medics. And that's Antonio. Thank you, Antonio," one of the men said.
The men gathered there nodded their heads. Two stood to shake Acevedo's hand.
"The people that are in this room really are an endangered species," another man said. "When they're gone, they're gone. ... That is why they should be honored and put in history for generations to come, because there are not that many of them left."
Donald George sat next to Acevedo. The two were captured about a half-mile apart during the Battle of the Bulge. "It's hard to explain how it is to be sitting with a bunch of people that you know they've been through the same thing you've been through," George said.
"Some of us want to talk about it, and some of us don't. Some of us want to cry about it once in a while, and some of us won't. But it's all there," he said.
"We still like to come and be together a couple times a month," George added, before Acevedo finished his sentence: "To exchange what you are holding back inside."
Acevedo says the world must never forget the atrocities of World War II and that for killing 6 million Jews, Hitler was the worst terrorist of all time. He doesn't want the world to ever slide backward.
His message on this Veterans Day, he says, is never to hold animosity toward anybody.
"You only live once. Let's keep trucking. If we don't do that, who's going to do it for us? We have to be happy. Why hate?" he says. "The world is full of hate, and yet they don't know what they want."
Jewish soldiers wearing Star of David necklaces began yanking them off, he says. About 90 Jewish soldiers and another 260 U.S. soldiers deemed "undesirables" -- those who "looked like Jews" -- were selected. Acevedo, who is not Jewish, was among them.
They were told they were being sent to "a beautiful camp" with a theater and live shows.
"It turned out to be the opposite," he says. "They put us on a train, and we traveled six days and six nights. It was a boxcar that would fit heads of cattle. They had us 80 to a boxcar. You couldn't squat. And there was little tiny windows that you could barely see through."
It was February 8, 1945, when they arrived. The new camp was known as Berga an der Elster, a subcamp of Buchenwald, the Nazi concentration camp where tens of thousands of Jews and other political prisoners were killed under Adolf Hitler's regime.
Acevedo says he was one of six medics among the 350 U.S. soldiers at Berga. Political prisoners from other countries were held at Berga separate from the Americans. "We didn't mingle with them at all," he says, adding that the U.S. soldiers worked in the same tunnels as the other political prisoners.
"We were all just thin as a rail."
The U.S. prisoners, Acevedo says, were given 100 grams of bread per week made of redwood sawdust, ground glass and barley. Soup was made from cats and rats, he says. Eating dandelion leaves was considered a "gourmet meal."
If soldiers tried to escape, they would be shot and killed. If they were captured alive, they would be executed with gunshots to their foreheads, Acevedo says. Wooden bullets, he says, were used to shatter the inside of their brains. Medics were always asked to fill the execution holes with wax, he says.
"Prisoners were being murdered and tortured by the Nazis. Many of our men died, and I tried keeping track of who they were and how they died."
The soldiers were forced to sleep naked, two to a bunk, with no blankets. As the days and weeks progressed, his diary catalogs it all. The names, prisoner numbers and causes of death are listed by the dozens in his diary. He felt it was his duty as a medic to keep track of everyone.
"I'm glad I did it," he says.
As a medic, he says, he heard of other more horrific atrocities committed by the Nazis at camps around them. "We heard about experiments that they were doing -- peeling the skins of people, humans, political prisoners, making lampshades."
He and the other soldiers were once taken to what Acevedo believes was the main camp of Buchenwald, about 30 miles (48 kilometers) from Berga. They noticed large pipes coming from one building.
"We thought we were going to be gassed when we were told to take our clothes off," he says. "We were scared. We were stripped."
"Rumors were around that this was where the political prisoners would be suffocated with gas." It turned out to be a shower, the only time during their captivity they were allowed to bathe.
The main Buchenwald camp was officially liberated on April 11, 1945. But the camp and its subcamps were emptied of tens of thousands of prisoners as American troops neared. The U.S. troops held at the Berga compound were no exception.
"Very definite that we are moving away from here and on foot. This isn't very good for our sick men. No drinking water and no latrines," Acevedo wrote in his diary on April 4, 1945.
He says they began a death march of 217 miles (349 kilometers) that would last three weeks. More than 300 U.S. soldiers were alive at the start of the march, he says; about 165 were left by the end, when they were finally liberated.
Lines of political prisoners in front of them during the march caught the full brunt of angry Nazi soldiers.
"We saw massacres of people being slaughtered off the highway. Women, children," he says. "You could see people of all ages, hanging on barbed wire."
One of his diary entries exemplifies an extraordinary patriotism among soldiers, even as they were being marched to their deaths. "Bad news for us. President Roosevelt's death. We all felt bad about it. We held a prayer service for the repose of his soul," Acevedo wrote on April 13, 1945.
It adds, "Burdeski died today."
To this day, Acevedo still remembers that soldier. He wanted to perform a tracheotomy using his diary pen to save Burdeski, a 41-year-old father of six children. A German commander struck Acevedo in the jaw with a rifle when he asked.
"I'll never forget," he says.
On a recent day, about a dozen prisoners of war held during World War II and their liberators gathered at the Jerry L. Pettis Memorial Veterans Medical Center in Loma Linda, California. Many applauded Acevedo for his heroics.
"Those of us in combat have our own heroes, and those are the medics. And that's Antonio. Thank you, Antonio," one of the men said.
The men gathered there nodded their heads. Two stood to shake Acevedo's hand.
"The people that are in this room really are an endangered species," another man said. "When they're gone, they're gone. ... That is why they should be honored and put in history for generations to come, because there are not that many of them left."
Donald George sat next to Acevedo. The two were captured about a half-mile apart during the Battle of the Bulge. "It's hard to explain how it is to be sitting with a bunch of people that you know they've been through the same thing you've been through," George said.
"Some of us want to talk about it, and some of us don't. Some of us want to cry about it once in a while, and some of us won't. But it's all there," he said.
"We still like to come and be together a couple times a month," George added, before Acevedo finished his sentence: "To exchange what you are holding back inside."
Acevedo says the world must never forget the atrocities of World War II and that for killing 6 million Jews, Hitler was the worst terrorist of all time. He doesn't want the world to ever slide backward.
His message on this Veterans Day, he says, is never to hold animosity toward anybody.
"You only live once. Let's keep trucking. If we don't do that, who's going to do it for us? We have to be happy. Why hate?" he says. "The world is full of hate, and yet they don't know what they want."
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Thanks, DW, I was very touched by this. Especially the concluding sentiments of the man. You can't choose to not be hurt, but you can make a firm resolve not to (try) hurt others. And that resolve actually has the power of our being in it.
Right Speech has four aspects: 1. Not lying, but speaking the truth, 2. Avoiding rude and coarse words, but using gentle speech beneficial to the listener, 3. Not slandering, but promoting friendliness and unity, 4. Avoiding frivolous speech, but saying only what is appropriate and beneficial.
I've heard many horror stories about the Jap's treatment towards both POWs and civilians during WW2, including Burma's Death Railway. Reading that article kind of reminded me of those stories and I sympathise with those people who went through these ordeals.
P.S. My condolences for those who died.
P.S. My condolences for those who died.
''They say truth is the first casualty of war. But who defines what's true? Truth is just a matter of perspective. The duty of every soldier is to protect the innocent, and sometimes that means preserving the lie of good and evil, that war isn't just natural selection played out on a grand scale. The only truth I found is that the world we live in is a giant tinderbox. All it takes...is someone to light the match" - Captain Price
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dragon wench
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I have read much about the Japanese treatment of POWs and civilians as well..
The horrors committed in all of these stories, no matter who is the perpetrator, are beyond anything that should ever be experienced..
But, let us not resort to derogatory names for various nationalities, OK?
It is offensive, and it paints an inaccurate picture.
The horrors committed in all of these stories, no matter who is the perpetrator, are beyond anything that should ever be experienced..
But, let us not resort to derogatory names for various nationalities, OK?
It is offensive, and it paints an inaccurate picture.Spoiler
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testingtest12
I'm at work and have to come back to this, but this is a hobby of mine, and I would like to point out that the victors write the history books. Up until 10-15 years ago there was preciously few accounts of how the "victorious allies" treated their vanquished foes, both military and civilian. There is no justice or humanity in war, no matter what side you're on. Oh, and there was a jubilee for [url="http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/11/11/world.war.one.armistice/index.html"]"The War To End All Wars"[/url] the other day. Funny how that one never comes up when the superpowers wants to bask in their own glory...
I am not young enough to know everything. - Oscar Wilde
Support bacteria, they're the only culture some people have!
Support bacteria, they're the only culture some people have!
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dragon wench
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@Moonbiter,
yes indeed, I'm very well aware that the victors write the history books, or in this case the victors conducted the interview long after the events occurred.
There are undoubtedly many examples of equally horrendous acts by the Allies. Similarly, we are all aware of the death camps in South and Central America that were supported by US administrations. Britain, France and Canada don't exactly have clean hands either. Or, we can bring the USSR into the mix.
The list goes on...
This is but one example of the atrocities humans are capable of inflicting upon one another, and that was essentially the context in which I posted it.
And yes, I agree, that phrase "The War to End All Wars" always makes me choke back bile as well.
On reflection, I've also realised that another reason this particular piece grabbed my attention is because I have an academic background in history, and I focused quite heavily on class/gender issues during WW2 on the home front. Part of my research involved conducting interviews with people who had lived through the era, and for anybody in the history field this kind of stuff is gold because it is a primary source. (and yes, subject to similar biases we find in written material or anywhere else) I recall all too well my difficulty even finding people who were still alive while I was trying to track down first-hand accounts.
yes indeed, I'm very well aware that the victors write the history books, or in this case the victors conducted the interview long after the events occurred.
There are undoubtedly many examples of equally horrendous acts by the Allies. Similarly, we are all aware of the death camps in South and Central America that were supported by US administrations. Britain, France and Canada don't exactly have clean hands either. Or, we can bring the USSR into the mix.
The list goes on...
This is but one example of the atrocities humans are capable of inflicting upon one another, and that was essentially the context in which I posted it.
And yes, I agree, that phrase "The War to End All Wars" always makes me choke back bile as well.
On reflection, I've also realised that another reason this particular piece grabbed my attention is because I have an academic background in history, and I focused quite heavily on class/gender issues during WW2 on the home front. Part of my research involved conducting interviews with people who had lived through the era, and for anybody in the history field this kind of stuff is gold because it is a primary source. (and yes, subject to similar biases we find in written material or anywhere else) I recall all too well my difficulty even finding people who were still alive while I was trying to track down first-hand accounts.
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The interesting thing about WW2 veterans is that the people who really experienced it, never wants to talk about it. That's what makes Wenchie's posted item so unique. What we know about the horrors of "total war" comes from the backline. People who were NOT on the front, but came back wearing medals.
When I first started my military training as a "gunsmith" (for lack of a more technical title on this board) I served with an armsmaster who refused to retire and had been a personal bodyguard for Montgomery, first in Africa, then on his personal staff after the landing. I was young and dumb, so I kept on pestering him about details. His only reply was.."It was bad." So on New Years Eve in 1987 all of us cocky young morons who were shipping out to do "foreign service" threw a grand party with fireworks galore.... and he was hiding under his desk! I kid you not. A 76 year old man taking cover each time we lit up a "whistler" because that was the natural thing to do. It took me ages to understand that a particular firework we used sounded exactly like a German 81mm mortar shell coming down. He knew, but he never told us.
That's why what Wenchie's posted is so unique. There's a survivor of Total War finally speaking. Must be funny for all you "Medal of Honor" players....
When I first started my military training as a "gunsmith" (for lack of a more technical title on this board) I served with an armsmaster who refused to retire and had been a personal bodyguard for Montgomery, first in Africa, then on his personal staff after the landing. I was young and dumb, so I kept on pestering him about details. His only reply was.."It was bad." So on New Years Eve in 1987 all of us cocky young morons who were shipping out to do "foreign service" threw a grand party with fireworks galore.... and he was hiding under his desk! I kid you not. A 76 year old man taking cover each time we lit up a "whistler" because that was the natural thing to do. It took me ages to understand that a particular firework we used sounded exactly like a German 81mm mortar shell coming down. He knew, but he never told us.
That's why what Wenchie's posted is so unique. There's a survivor of Total War finally speaking. Must be funny for all you "Medal of Honor" players....
I am not young enough to know everything. - Oscar Wilde
Support bacteria, they're the only culture some people have!
Support bacteria, they're the only culture some people have!
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prof. Moriarty
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While the story of Acevedo was like a slow, painful twisting of my guts Moonbiters retelling hit me more like a punch to the stomach. There is so much pain and suffering that still lingers 60 years later. We in Sweden are blessedly spared from all that. And I'm both thankful and partially shamed because of it.
The swedish neutrality might partially have been moraly dubious (especially with all the political maneuvering that ensured it) since "we" essentialy let other do the fighting for us. The benefit was, in my opinion, not the economical gains from having an intact infrastructure and industries spared from bombings, but the fact that the neutrality spared the lives of men, women and children who would surely have perished if we hade been drawn into the war on either side (and the ties between Sweden and Germany hade been strong for almost a century before WW2).
Because of that I actually believe that we owe an extra debt of gratitude to the young men who DID go to a war they hardly could have understood.
Oh, and Moonbiter reminded me of a PVP strip I read yesterday.
PvPonline Archive Veterans Day
Peace! (God wills it!)
Moriarty
The swedish neutrality might partially have been moraly dubious (especially with all the political maneuvering that ensured it) since "we" essentialy let other do the fighting for us. The benefit was, in my opinion, not the economical gains from having an intact infrastructure and industries spared from bombings, but the fact that the neutrality spared the lives of men, women and children who would surely have perished if we hade been drawn into the war on either side (and the ties between Sweden and Germany hade been strong for almost a century before WW2).
Because of that I actually believe that we owe an extra debt of gratitude to the young men who DID go to a war they hardly could have understood.
Oh, and Moonbiter reminded me of a PVP strip I read yesterday.
PvPonline Archive Veterans Day
Peace! (God wills it!)
Moriarty
"Sometimes it is better to light a flamethrower than to curse the darkness" - Terry Pratchett
No need for the shame bit Prof, nothing would have been gainedby Sweden joining in. No matter how valorous the Sedish armed forces might have been they would have lost, which not only would have meant pointless Swedish deaths, but a loss of a safe haven for many that did escape from occupied Europe throughout the war.
[QUOTE=Darth Gavinius;1096098]Distrbution of games, is becoming a little like Democracy (all about money and control) - in the end choice is an illusion and you have to choose your lesser evil.
And everything is hidden in the fine print.[/QUOTE]
And everything is hidden in the fine print.[/QUOTE]
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prof. Moriarty
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True enough. And Sweden also became a place for danish (and to some extent norwegian and north german) jews to hide. My own grandfather and his father helped both danish and german jews to escape over the Baltic Sea, which is a point of family pride, actually.
But the fact still remains that Sweden let other countries defeat the Third Reich and simply reaped the benefits. Not something to be very proud of. Especially considering some of the deals Sweden had to make with Hitler and the Wehrmacht. Oh, well... Certain individuals (like my grandfather and Folke Bernadotte) did some part to lessen the guilt.
Deus Vult!
Moriarty
But the fact still remains that Sweden let other countries defeat the Third Reich and simply reaped the benefits. Not something to be very proud of. Especially considering some of the deals Sweden had to make with Hitler and the Wehrmacht. Oh, well... Certain individuals (like my grandfather and Folke Bernadotte) did some part to lessen the guilt.
Deus Vult!
Moriarty
"Sometimes it is better to light a flamethrower than to curse the darkness" - Terry Pratchett
Sweden, like Switzerland, did a lot of nasty stuff during the war, most of which is still kept under wraps. Thankfully the people of Sweden didn't follow the government's edicts, and did a lot of good. There's always a price to pay for neutrality, and I can't help thinking that is would have been a completely different ballgame if Sweden had joined the allies. Germany would have had a much harder time of it invading both Norway and Sweden, which might have changed the whole course of the war in Europe. As it was, the allies actually managed to kick the Germans out of northern Norway, and they only managed to establish a new foothold because Sweden let German reserves travel by train up to reinforce them. I've always tried to imagine what it would have been like if The Reich had to use resources to fight a real war in Scandinavia. If the allies had managed to keep the Germans out of north Norway, everything would have been different. It would have meant a serious depletion of iron ore to the German war machine, there would have been no U-boat terror for the convoys in the North Atlantic, and there would have been no staging points for the monstrous German battleships. The phenomenal panzer-tactician Heinz Guderian famously wrote:prof. Moriarty wrote:True enough. And Sweden also became a place for danish (and to some extent norwegian and north german) jews to hide. My own grandfather and his father helped both danish and german jews to escape over the Baltic Sea, which is a point of family pride, actually.
But the fact still remains that Sweden let other countries defeat the Third Reich and simply reaped the benefits. Not something to be very proud of. Especially considering some of the deals Sweden had to make with Hitler and the Wehrmacht. Oh, well... Certain individuals (like my grandfather and Folke Bernadotte) did some part to lessen the guilt.
Deus Vult!
Moriarty
"God provided Norway with 75% of their defences. The last 25% the Norwegians managed to screw up themselves."
That's a statement that Norway has learned nothing from to this day.
Anyways, I just saw that we're down to only four official veterans of WW1 worldwide. Like I previously said, that's the war nobody wants to talk about. Quite possibly because they were all badguys! There was no good guys, only imperialistic madmen playing a game of chess with their inflated armies as pieces on the board. Funnily enough, as far as I know there has been almost no games made about WW1, except for some dogfight-games and a ropey turn-based strategy game back in the 90s. The "War To End All Wars" has become the "Forgotten War" in the minds of people. It reached the point in the mid-80s when they didn't even teach about it in school. I was sitting in class in high school and the teacher went; "and the industrial revolution culminated in the First World War, which brings us to the economic situation in the 1930s..." I was like "HEY! You're gonna skip 30 years of history here? It was the reason why central Europe embraced National Socialism, and you're gonna bypass it??????" It turned out the teacher had no friggin clue herself, so I ended up teaching my own class about WW1 and the aftermath for 3 weeks. Got me an A in history.
Anyways, I'm rambling. To get back on track, I have still living veterans galore from WW2 in my family, who fought on both sides. Like I said, they don't want to talk about it, and I've grown old enough to respect that. I don't like it, because these days it's IMHO important for them to speak up, so we can try to postpone another global Total War.
(and I can't believe I got through all that without a single spelling error)
I am not young enough to know everything. - Oscar Wilde
Support bacteria, they're the only culture some people have!
Support bacteria, they're the only culture some people have!
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dragon wench
- Posts: 19609
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I think Moonbiter makes a very good point about WWI, and I truly doubt there is any coincidence that few, if any, games are based upon it.
WWI was the repugnant end result of imperialistic greed, and moreover, one that directly spawned the demagoguery of Nazi Germany.
While, undoubtedly, there would have been individual feats of bravery, there was nothing heroic about WWI, no ideals worth fighting for, no sense that the victory of one side over the other would have made any significant difference to the outcome.
WWII was different though... While those same imperial powers were at play, the rise of fascism changed everything. Of course, it must also be stated that many of the British elite privately supported Hitler, just as it must be noted that while everyone in France claims to have been in the Resistance, many actually supported the Vichy Regime... But, the Allies don't like to talk about that... Nor do they like to discuss the fact that the USSR entering the fray impacted the eventual outcome as much as did the entry of the Americans.
The hypocrisies and omissions are vast and nauseating on all fronts..
But, WWII could still be justified. This is part of why I stated that I am not a pacifist, sometimes conflict is inevitable, and the choice between the lesser of evils...
OK... I'm not sure what I was trying to say with any of that... probably just procrastinating on an assignment due at midnight tonight...
@prof. Moriarty,
I don't think there is any need for you to feel guilt... Just like there is no need for so many Germans today to bear such a huge burden of shame. Nobody is responsible for the actions of those who precede them; rather, we are responsible for the choices that confront us in the present, and we can hope that the lessons of the past will guide our decisions...
Of course, given the way in which the world has unfolded since 1945, I'm not sure if we've even learned anything at all... but that is probably an entirely different topic altogether.
WWI was the repugnant end result of imperialistic greed, and moreover, one that directly spawned the demagoguery of Nazi Germany.
While, undoubtedly, there would have been individual feats of bravery, there was nothing heroic about WWI, no ideals worth fighting for, no sense that the victory of one side over the other would have made any significant difference to the outcome.
WWII was different though... While those same imperial powers were at play, the rise of fascism changed everything. Of course, it must also be stated that many of the British elite privately supported Hitler, just as it must be noted that while everyone in France claims to have been in the Resistance, many actually supported the Vichy Regime... But, the Allies don't like to talk about that... Nor do they like to discuss the fact that the USSR entering the fray impacted the eventual outcome as much as did the entry of the Americans.
The hypocrisies and omissions are vast and nauseating on all fronts..
But, WWII could still be justified. This is part of why I stated that I am not a pacifist, sometimes conflict is inevitable, and the choice between the lesser of evils...
OK... I'm not sure what I was trying to say with any of that... probably just procrastinating on an assignment due at midnight tonight...
@prof. Moriarty,
I don't think there is any need for you to feel guilt... Just like there is no need for so many Germans today to bear such a huge burden of shame. Nobody is responsible for the actions of those who precede them; rather, we are responsible for the choices that confront us in the present, and we can hope that the lessons of the past will guide our decisions...
Of course, given the way in which the world has unfolded since 1945, I'm not sure if we've even learned anything at all... but that is probably an entirely different topic altogether.
Spoiler
testingtest12
Spoiler
testingtest12
To get back on form: I have a Grand Uncle (He's the uncle of my mom, but I have never figured out the correct english word for that) who served as a conscript in the German "Mountaineers" on the eastern front. He was a machine-gunner at the Kuban-bridgehead, before being transfered to Stalingrad. There, he caught a mortar-shell right down in his position, and was sent sent home with over 2000 small pieces of metal in his body. 29 operations later, he's still alive today. If you look at the X-rays of his hands, you can form the perfect pattern of the grip of an MG-42, because it is embeded in his bones. He's got 3 "survival medals" from the Reich. You got one for each week you stayed alive.
Last year, after a lifetime of pestering him about The War, he gave those medals to my brother. And then he made a grand statement:
"Hah! Everyone is saying that we got forced into it, and that might have been the case later. I started marching for the Germans long before they forced it, because we had absolutely nothing! My family were wearing old newspapers as shoes, and the pay and the promise of better times was all I needed. I sent all my money back to my family."
That was not popular in our Slovenian family, but I loved it! Hell, feed your family, after the victors of WW1 have made you a pariah and you're close to starving to death. I repeat: and the industrial revolution culminated in the First World War, which brings us to the economic situation in the 1930s..."
My bro, who's one of the biggest collectors worldwide of WW2-stuff, finally got his clock cleaned. And so did my mom, who lived through that.:laugh:
Oh, and there's the walnut......
Last year, after a lifetime of pestering him about The War, he gave those medals to my brother. And then he made a grand statement:
"Hah! Everyone is saying that we got forced into it, and that might have been the case later. I started marching for the Germans long before they forced it, because we had absolutely nothing! My family were wearing old newspapers as shoes, and the pay and the promise of better times was all I needed. I sent all my money back to my family."
That was not popular in our Slovenian family, but I loved it! Hell, feed your family, after the victors of WW1 have made you a pariah and you're close to starving to death. I repeat: and the industrial revolution culminated in the First World War, which brings us to the economic situation in the 1930s..."
My bro, who's one of the biggest collectors worldwide of WW2-stuff, finally got his clock cleaned. And so did my mom, who lived through that.:laugh:
Oh, and there's the walnut......
I am not young enough to know everything. - Oscar Wilde
Support bacteria, they're the only culture some people have!
Support bacteria, they're the only culture some people have!
I don't think there's anything sinister about there being few games based on WW1, the nature of the combat in that war didn't really lend itself to any sort of interesting game material. Apart from aerial combat, which has spawned quite a few games over the decades.
As to the notion that Sweden entering into WW2 would have had any adverse impact on the Third Reich, sorry but that's a complete pipe dream. There was never a hope in hell of Churchill's Narvik escapade achieving anything, apart from another disaster. Whilst the campaign was a waste of men and material, at least it wasn't in the same awful league as Churchill's earliest mad idea, the Dardanelle’s in WW1. Sweden would have held the Germans up for maybe two weeks, and mainly due to the terrain, joining in would have been suicide for the Swedes.
As for not teaching WW! in schools, sadly that seems to be universal, heck in this country history is an optional course for most of secondary school. An option which sadly many, if not most, pupils pass up. The result is we are producing a whole generation with as little knowledge of history as Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. At least I assume they are completely ignorant of history, how else can one explain them getting us involved in Afghanistan after our previous record there?
Back on track, my father is a WW2 vet, he's quite happy to talk about a lot of his experiences, but when it concerns events of a personally traumatic nature. He'll quite cheerfully recount the pursuit of the Bismarck, Scharnhorst etc., but will never talk about his experiences in the Mediterranean where things got nasty. My uncles were the same, especially the one who spent the best part of three years in a German POW camp after being captured on Crete.
I don't find it particularly surprising, people of my own generation that had bad experiences in the South Atlantic in the early eighties are the same. Who can blame them, who really want to relive painful memories if they can avoid them.
As to the guys who had to sign an undertaking never to talk about their experiences, that's effectively what all of us servicemen and ex servicemen do, at least in the UK forces, when we sign up. Having to sign something hat covers a particular event or series of events as related though is far more sinister, and as has been said by others, the actions of the winners, even post war, were despicable in the extreme. Both the West and East didn't give a fig about what their former German enemies did during the war if they could b useful to them in the cold war.
As to the notion that Sweden entering into WW2 would have had any adverse impact on the Third Reich, sorry but that's a complete pipe dream. There was never a hope in hell of Churchill's Narvik escapade achieving anything, apart from another disaster. Whilst the campaign was a waste of men and material, at least it wasn't in the same awful league as Churchill's earliest mad idea, the Dardanelle’s in WW1. Sweden would have held the Germans up for maybe two weeks, and mainly due to the terrain, joining in would have been suicide for the Swedes.
As for not teaching WW! in schools, sadly that seems to be universal, heck in this country history is an optional course for most of secondary school. An option which sadly many, if not most, pupils pass up. The result is we are producing a whole generation with as little knowledge of history as Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. At least I assume they are completely ignorant of history, how else can one explain them getting us involved in Afghanistan after our previous record there?
Back on track, my father is a WW2 vet, he's quite happy to talk about a lot of his experiences, but when it concerns events of a personally traumatic nature. He'll quite cheerfully recount the pursuit of the Bismarck, Scharnhorst etc., but will never talk about his experiences in the Mediterranean where things got nasty. My uncles were the same, especially the one who spent the best part of three years in a German POW camp after being captured on Crete.
I don't find it particularly surprising, people of my own generation that had bad experiences in the South Atlantic in the early eighties are the same. Who can blame them, who really want to relive painful memories if they can avoid them.
As to the guys who had to sign an undertaking never to talk about their experiences, that's effectively what all of us servicemen and ex servicemen do, at least in the UK forces, when we sign up. Having to sign something hat covers a particular event or series of events as related though is far more sinister, and as has been said by others, the actions of the winners, even post war, were despicable in the extreme. Both the West and East didn't give a fig about what their former German enemies did during the war if they could b useful to them in the cold war.
[QUOTE=Darth Gavinius;1096098]Distrbution of games, is becoming a little like Democracy (all about money and control) - in the end choice is an illusion and you have to choose your lesser evil.
And everything is hidden in the fine print.[/QUOTE]
And everything is hidden in the fine print.[/QUOTE]
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prof. Moriarty
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Thankfully Sweden has History as an obligatory class, and it is also by law obligatory to teach about the Holocaust. I THINK my grammar school teacher in History taught us about WW1 as well when I was in about 8th grade (14 years old) or possibly in 7th grade. But I do remember that I taught myself more by reading (I started with Biggles, actually, but continued with the historybooks in the School Library). It IS sad that so little is said about "the Great War" and how it started, since there IS a direct connection between the Peace Treaty in 1919 and the rise of the Nazis and all of WW2. *Shudders* Every piece of history is connected but there is here a great gap in the chain and that can easily be exploited by those so inclined.
On the point of guilt, both among swedes and germans. Well, I know that rationally the swedish people should feel little guilt and that _I_, being born 38 years after the END of WW2 should feel even less. But there is seldom anything RATIONAL about emotions. I'm just glad that I'm swedish and not german. I'm just feeling the occasional twinge of guilt when this topic is brought up but I have several good german friends who've told me about a social stigma that is ever present. Imagine never to be able to feel really and completely proud of your nation. That is why I was so happy last World Cup in Football when I saw on the tele how german supporters, all of them younger than "the War" (as it's simply called in Sweden) proudly waving their own Tricolor, faces painted with the same colours and so on. I actually felt a sort of euphoria that lasted the rest of the day. I sincerely hope that the germans can finally allow themselves to throw of the guilt and stand proud of themselves again. Because neither I, nor those of you from the Allied nations nor even the jews that survived the Death Camps can do that for them. They can only do that themselves.
Obviously that also goes for swedish guilt, we'll see.
About a hypothetical swedish participation of WW2: the problem is that while several of the bigger swedish newspapers were openly critical of the Third Reich and the popular opinion was somewhat suspicious of Hitler and his goons the fact is that Sweden had been having cordial relations with Germany for a long time than, at least since Bismarck and possibly as long as since Luther. Especially after Soviet allied with Britain and USA chanses are that Sweden would have instead allied with Germany. The swedish goverment was seeing the nazis as legit until the end of the war when the proofs of their atrocities became so abundant that they could no longer be ignored and Sweden didn't formally help Finland (allied with the Reich) in their wars against Soviet but that was because of our neutrality and not because of any moral or political reservations but the goverment allowed swedish volounteers to organize themselves into militia-like fighting units and go to Finland under the slogan "Finlands sake is ours".
Thankfully the King had nothing to say in the matter. He was a great friend of Germany and was directly pushing for a swedish alliance with Hitler.
In that light there is little surprise that Sweden allowed the trooptransports mentioned above. The goverment had a slight leaning towards Germany and the other choice was to incur the wrath of Hitler, possibly if not certainly leading to war. Morally completely wrong, politicaly sane. That is the nature of it, is it not? But it was bitter. Less than half a century after the peaceful end of our alliance Sweden let Germany attack Norway in the rear. The suspicions (spelling?) I mentioned earlier were confirmed and many cried out that it was nothing short of treason.
But the elite still prefered Germany over Soviet.
Like DragonWench I had a point when I began but it is lost. So I'll leave it as a short lesson in swedish history.
Deus Vult!
Moriarty
On the point of guilt, both among swedes and germans. Well, I know that rationally the swedish people should feel little guilt and that _I_, being born 38 years after the END of WW2 should feel even less. But there is seldom anything RATIONAL about emotions. I'm just glad that I'm swedish and not german. I'm just feeling the occasional twinge of guilt when this topic is brought up but I have several good german friends who've told me about a social stigma that is ever present. Imagine never to be able to feel really and completely proud of your nation. That is why I was so happy last World Cup in Football when I saw on the tele how german supporters, all of them younger than "the War" (as it's simply called in Sweden) proudly waving their own Tricolor, faces painted with the same colours and so on. I actually felt a sort of euphoria that lasted the rest of the day. I sincerely hope that the germans can finally allow themselves to throw of the guilt and stand proud of themselves again. Because neither I, nor those of you from the Allied nations nor even the jews that survived the Death Camps can do that for them. They can only do that themselves.
Obviously that also goes for swedish guilt, we'll see.
About a hypothetical swedish participation of WW2: the problem is that while several of the bigger swedish newspapers were openly critical of the Third Reich and the popular opinion was somewhat suspicious of Hitler and his goons the fact is that Sweden had been having cordial relations with Germany for a long time than, at least since Bismarck and possibly as long as since Luther. Especially after Soviet allied with Britain and USA chanses are that Sweden would have instead allied with Germany. The swedish goverment was seeing the nazis as legit until the end of the war when the proofs of their atrocities became so abundant that they could no longer be ignored and Sweden didn't formally help Finland (allied with the Reich) in their wars against Soviet but that was because of our neutrality and not because of any moral or political reservations but the goverment allowed swedish volounteers to organize themselves into militia-like fighting units and go to Finland under the slogan "Finlands sake is ours".
Thankfully the King had nothing to say in the matter. He was a great friend of Germany and was directly pushing for a swedish alliance with Hitler.
In that light there is little surprise that Sweden allowed the trooptransports mentioned above. The goverment had a slight leaning towards Germany and the other choice was to incur the wrath of Hitler, possibly if not certainly leading to war. Morally completely wrong, politicaly sane. That is the nature of it, is it not? But it was bitter. Less than half a century after the peaceful end of our alliance Sweden let Germany attack Norway in the rear. The suspicions (spelling?) I mentioned earlier were confirmed and many cried out that it was nothing short of treason.
But the elite still prefered Germany over Soviet.
Like DragonWench I had a point when I began but it is lost. So I'll leave it as a short lesson in swedish history.
Deus Vult!
Moriarty
"Sometimes it is better to light a flamethrower than to curse the darkness" - Terry Pratchett