Interview with German veterans about Putten raid

[fountainhead]

Just wanted to share this video I stumbled upon with you and see what your thoughts are. A group of German WWII veterans seems to be taking a tour of a tank museum and they get to talking amongst themselves about their reasons for fighting the war and it gets pretty interesting. I'd actually never seen a taped interview that allowed German veterans to speak so freely about politics especially since they still speak very proudly of their Wehrmacht and their fight against Bolshevism.

However, when a Dutch lady brings up the Putten raid, while not directly related to the Holocaust, I think the soldiers faltered a little in the face of a chance to dispel propaganda about Germany and its soldiers. When she says that men from Putten were rounded up and sent to labor camps and most of them never came back, she seemed to be implying that they were executed. Here, the Germans could have explained the terrible conditions in the labor camps that were not the result of a desire to kill but an unfortunate consequence of the collapse of their infrastructure.

Upon complaining about Germany's invasion of her country, they also appear to just brush it off as collateral damage, making them, to the casual viewer, fit the stereotype of evil Nazis who wanted to take over the world. They would have been more sympathetic had they apologized for their part in any harm to innocents in Holland while explaining Germany's reasons for invading which are debatable, but still, more understandable than just shrugging and acting like the woman shouldn't be upset.

I did have to laugh a little when she told them that the Putten raid (which they didn't seem to be familiar with) was in response to a partisan attack and all of them suddenly nodded as if to say, "Aha! No wonder!" Since we often have the same reaction here in our Holocaust discussions upon discovering that a shooting victim was a partisan and not an innocent civilian, that made me laugh. Anyway, let me know if you've seen this documentary and what you think.

[Mulegino1]

Just wanted to share this video I stumbled upon with you and see what your thoughts are. A group of German WWII veterans seems to be taking a tour of a tank museum and they get to talking amongst themselves about their reasons for fighting the war and it gets pretty interesting. I'd actually never seen a taped interview that allowed German veterans to speak so freely about politics especially since they still speak very proudly of their Wehrmacht and their fight against Bolshevism.

However, when a Dutch lady brings up the Putten raid, while not directly related to the Holocaust, I think the soldiers faltered a little in the face of a chance to dispel propaganda about Germany and its soldiers. When she says that men from Putten were rounded up and sent to labor camps and most of them never came back, she seemed to be implying that they were executed. Here, the Germans could have explained the terrible conditions in the labor camps that were not the result of a desire to kill but an unfortunate consequence of the collapse of their infrastructure.

Upon complaining about Germany's invasion of her country, they also appear to just brush it off as collateral damage, making them, to the casual viewer, fit the stereotype of evil Nazis who wanted to take over the world. They would have been more sympathetic had they apologized for their part in any harm to innocents in Holland while explaining Germany's reasons for invading which are debatable, but still, more understandable than just shrugging and acting like the woman shouldn't be upset.

I did have to laugh a little when she told them that the Putten raid (which they didn't seem to be familiar with) was in response to a partisan attack and all of them suddenly nodded as if to say, "Aha! No wonder!" Since we often have the same reaction here in our Holocaust discussions upon discovering that a shooting victim was a partisan and not an innocent civilian, that made me laugh. Anyway, let me know if you've seen this documentary and what you think.

I think the woman's questions automatically presume German guilt and reflect the post-war re-education of the European mind to reflexively acknowledge that everything the Germans did during the war was with evil intent and that "Nazi Germany" was the most despotic, tyrannical, murderous and evil regime in world history.

In her mind, I would guess that the partisans were all brave, guileless and high minded freedom fighters.

In Europe and the United States, it requires persistent study and intense emotional effort to achieve and maintain an objective perspective and reject the received official narrative of the "Good War."

On the other hand, these men are simply old soldiers who know exactly what war is like.