The Wehrmacht are to blame in some part. When Hitler gained full control of the government, he forced the army (The Wehrmacht) to take an oath to him. Now, this gives Hitler a lot of free reign over what the army did and a lot of times, he passed orders through his generals, who were definitely high-ranking Nazis and were all up in Hitler's war machine and anti-Semitic attitude, and sometimes those orders got lost or changed, depending on the whim of the general. It should be noted that Hitler hated giving written orders.

So, were the Wehrmacht demonized? Yes. It's only to be expected from the time period and who they worked under. Were they completely innocent? No. Some soldiers gleefully killed Jews and others, and that attitude often earned them a promotion from their like-minded superiors.

This info has been presented to you by the awesome me, who got it from my Holocaust teacher. J'ai vous enprie

zakski:

Skullkid4187:
I love America and I love my homeland Germany, i breaks my heart to hear people always say "All Germans are evil" Which was an act of propaganda used by the brits and French to hide the fact they were loosing until America stepped in. I think we need to learn to forgive.

Your facts are skewed, the British fought the Germans to a stalemate over the Channel and in Africa only the arrival of Rommel and his Afrika Korps prolonged the Axis's inevitable defeat. The German's attacking the Soviets, affected the war more than the US becoming involved ever did. The only things the US getting involved did was taking the pressure off in the pacific and allowing the Allies to go on the offensive in mainland europe, both of which didn't really effect the outcome of the war, just the aftermath.

The propaganda was used to tighten the Allies resolve and to get more bodies to enlist, not to hide that they were "losing".

read Cross of Iron then come back with a real statement.

The Wehrmacht were just soldiers, just like our boys who were over there. Some were good, some bad, some didn't stand out either way.

The SS deserved to be castrated and choked with their own genitals, though.

Skullkid4187:
read Cross of Iron then come back with a real statement.

Im sorry but I would rather use the knowledge I gained from reading the whole of the "The Rise and Fall of The Third Reich" by William L. Shirer

"As for a landing, it could "only be contemplated after Germany had gained control of the air.""[pg760]

"Goering ... boasted that the enemy fighters "Ought to be finished off within four to five days," Hitler and the Army and Navy commanders knew better and ... on Septemeber 17th, as has been noted , the Fuehrer called off Sea Lion indefinitely"[pg781]

As you can see the Germans had no hope of succeeding in the invasion of Britain in the face of a superior air and naval force.

As for north Africa, In 1940 "Two days after Christmas ... "The Threat to Britain in the entire eastern Mediterranean, the Near East and in North Africa ... has been eliminated"[pg812]

Which at this point Hitler decides to commit troops to support his floundering Italian ally

As for the Wehrmacht when invading russia they were given the order

"With regard to offenses committed against enemy civilians by members of the Wehrmacht, prosecution is not obligatory even when the deed is at the same time a military crime or offense"[pg831]

"Thus the army must assume the onus of the murders and burnings which up until now have been confined to the SS"[pg846, footnotes]

There is an especially good reason to demonize the Wehrmacht if you are Russian right there

Anachronism:

Greyfox105:
Some people don't realise the difference between the Wehrmacht and the SS.

This is the problem. The SS deserve all the flak they get; they did some genuinely horrifying things in the War which I would have preferred to think people weren't capable of doing. The Death's Head units who supervised the concentration camps are a particular example of this.

The Wehrmacht, by contrast, were, for the most part, little different from the Allied soldiers. They were mostly people who had joined the army out of patriotism, or people who had been conscripted and given no choice in the matter. Granted, not everything they did was honourable, but there was nothing comparable to what the SS did. Besides, there are just as many criticisms that could be made of the Allies' conduct during the War. There's no point criticising the Wehrmacht when our armies were no better.

I agree with this.

Although I have to say that the Japanese were, in my opinion, crueler than anybody else.

zakski:

Skullkid4187:
read Cross of Iron then come back with a real statement.

Im sorry but I would rather use the knowledge I gained from reading the whole of the "The Rise and Fall of The Third Reich" by William L. Shirer

"As for a landing, it could "only be contemplated after Germany had gained control of the air.""[pg760]

"Goering ... boasted that the enemy fighters "Ought to be finished off within four to five days," Hitler and the Army and Navy commanders knew better and ... on Septemeber 17th, as has been noted , the Fuehrer called off Sea Lion indefinitely"[pg781]

As you can see the Germans had no hope of succeeding in the invasion of Britain in the face of a superior air and naval force.

As for north Africa, In 1940 "Two days after Christmas ... "The Threat to Britain in the entire eastern Mediterranean, the Near East and in North Africa ... has been eliminated"[pg812]

Which at this point Hitler decides to commit troops to support his floundering Italian ally

As for the Wehrmacht when invading russia they were given the order

"With regard to offenses committed against enemy civilians by members of the Wehrmacht, prosecution is not obligatory even when the deed is at the same time a military crime or offense"[pg831]

"Thus the army must assume the onus of the murders and burnings which up until now have been confined to the SS"[pg846, footnotes]

There is an especially good reason to demonize the Wehrmacht if you are Russian right there

But i can stop you right there with the invasion of Normandy and battle of stalingrad. The invasion was barely won even with The Americans, and stalingrad could have gone ether way, and lets not forget Market Garden.

Skullkid4187:
But i can stop you right there with the invasion of Normandy and battle of stalingrad. The invasion was barely won even with The Americans, and stalingrad could have gone ether way, and lets not forget Market Garden.

The events that I mentioned happened before that, the invasion of Normandy, is irrelevant in this discussion and indeed the overall outcome of the war as I have already shown, hence by extension, market garden is too. As I have shown, the allies without American involvement quite clearly were not losing before the "American stepped in".

As for stalingrad, im not sure what that has to do with the questionable statement of "the french and the british put out anti-german propaganda because they wanted to "cover-up" that they were "losing" before the americans stepped in". For I see no mention of the soviets within it.

zakski:

Skullkid4187:
But i can stop you right there with the invasion of Normandy and battle of stalingrad. The invasion was barely won even with The Americans, and stalingrad could have gone ether way, and lets not forget Market Garden.

The events that I mentioned happened before that, the invasion of Normandy, is irrelevant in this discussion and indeed the overall outcome of the war as I have already shown, hence by extension, market garden is too. As I have shown, the allies without American involvement quite clearly were not losing before the "American stepped in".

As for stalingrad, im not sure what that has to do with the questionable statement of "the french and the british put out anti-german propaganda because they wanted to "cover-up" that they were "losing" before the americans stepped in". For I see no mention of the soviets within it.

You should study the end of world war 1 for why the French and brits hated the Germans so much that we demonize them today.

Greyfox105:
I think they probably do.
Some people don't realise the difference between the Wehrmacht and the SS.
And the Einsatzgruppen. I may have spelled that wrong.
But yes, it seems they have been demonised, along with everything else to do with Nazi Germany...

Very well said, Einsatzgruppen is also correct.

The problem is, most people nowadays think that the Germans were by that time just a bunch of bloodthirsty monsters, whose favourite occupation it was to wage war and kill innocent people. The Wehrmacht was a regular army, the army of the Third Reich nevertheless, but it was still a army, soldiers who served in the Wehrmacht where still humans. Humans with emotions, with families and with dreams.

Either they wanted to serve their country or they were conscripted. They where people who were ripped out of their lifes by the Nazi Government only to die and suffer far away from home, and that all for a senseless and insane cause. A dead soldier of the Wehrmacht is for me a victim of the Nazi regime, like a victim of the holocaust is.

And believe it or not, there were even some few "good" men in the SS (men who where no genocidal maniacs and not infused with the regular SS-insanity). Rochus Misch for example, member of the Waffen SS and body guard of Hitler, who just slipped into the whole thing through the Verfügunstruppe (don't confuse this with the Holocaust-Einsatzgruppen, the VT was some kind of police in Germany) and due to his height (He was about 6 feet tall, so the SS took him). Even Ralph Giordano, a jew and survivor of the Holocaust, said that this man was not some kind of evil or bad, but that he was a decent person and he would not have any problems to shake hands with him.

And if the Russians hadn't been feeling like sending a certain imprisoned soldier towards homeland, you wouldn't be able to read this paragraphs.

The vast majority of the Wehrmacht were just ordinary people doing their jobs and fighting for their country, just like the majority of soldiers in the Allied forces. No doubt there were a few that fully supported the Nazi party and all of their terrible actions, but I'm sure they were a small minority of the whole. So on the whole, yes, I think we do demonise the Wehrmacht too much. It's an understandable thing to want to make the enemy out to be monsters when fighting a war (however much I personally disagree with it), but still doing it long after the war is over is just ignorant.

Besides, it's not as if the Allies were squeaky clean themselves...

The SS on the other hand were utter bastards.

I'm neutral.

Every conflict has some demonization thrown in by "your side" towards "the bad guys" in order to justify the conflict.

Everyone does it, it's basically a fact of life. So, eh, might as well continue doing the same thing.

In my opinion, yes, Germans are being overly demonized compared to certain other historical events or even Allies themselves. But history is rarely objective. The winners will always try to paint their enemy black.

When it comes to Nazi Germany and Holocaust, people generally don't bother to look at various historical differences very much present in the time. Jews weren't poor, innocent people history often paints them as. Well, they kind of were. But the general perception of Jews in Europe was just about always very negative.

And yes, Hitler blaming the Jews for everything was a huge dick move. But it worked for a reason. People were desperate, the jews and gypsies and other groups subjected to various amounts of suffering over the whole affair were pretty much an acceptable target to the people at the time.

Does it make a difference? Yeah, somewhat. You don't have to be a dark and evil caricature on real life to commit all those things. Put you in enough of a shithole, give you a scape goat, and you'll be blaming shit on the said scapegoat pretty soon. Add a charismatic leader to direct you, and bam. And Germany, when it comes to shitholes, was WAY over their heads after Germany got completely fucked over in WW1. So in a way, you should also blame other European nations for cornering Germans so close to the wall. Desperate people do desperate things, and if you read up on pre-late 30s Germany, they sure were.

Both sides of my family fought for Germany in WWII. It wasn't just for ideology. Remember Hitler used the treaty of Versailles and Germany's humiliation in the Great War to get to power, so those must have been huge issues for the common German man. Nobody wanted another loss like the Great War, and the glory Hitler brought Germany through conquest plus all of the good things he did domestically brought him very much support. He also received little blame for anything wrong due to scapegoating.

I know little of my father's side, but my maternal great uncle died with the German artillery in Russia and my maternal grandfather survived as what I would describe as a clerk with the Luftwaffe, driving supply trucks and later a motorcycle.

The Wermacht committed atrocities as well as the SS. It is stupid to try and divide them, even though I don't doubt that not all Wermacht members were evil, civilian slaughtering bastards, many of them were also war criminals.

Also, Inglorious Basterds is a deliberately over the top film. It is demonising the Wermacht, but that is just the type of film it is. Anyone who refers it in the slightest way to history is missing the point epically.

Hardcore_gamer:

Doug:

Against the Russians, I could understand that - the Russian's where in a revenging mood, after all - but the Americans and Brits? Sure, we weren't keen on the Germans at the time, but we weren't going to murder them or nowt.

Actually, allied terror bombing on German cities caused huge amount of human suffering so the typical German had a fair reason to hate the Allies.

S'war. And reading 'Band of Brothers' the Germans (the one who lived in the countryside) were friendly towards American soldiers. In fact the soldiers thought that the Germans were the people most like the Americans, except for maybe the Dutch.

effilctar:

I remember Hitler not as a tyrannical dictator but as one sick banjo playing motherfucker!

It takes a true man to play Through the Fire and the Flames on the banjo. I suppose that balances out with Hitler's anti-manness to make him a neutral being.

Well, as with anything to do with World War Two, to the uninformed or the prejudiced, everything is interpreted differently. I don't see it as right to demonise the Wehrmacht, nor do I think anything should be demonised. I think they should be held responsible for their actions beyond their orders, and nothing more.

As far as I'm concerned, the troops were just doing their jobs, and were quickly desentized to the atrocities they commited.It was a war of ideology and race. remember, hiter was inspired by the AMERICAM trail of tears...

You know that was the whole point of that movie? Except the only difference was that they had a pretty good reason to be pissed.

Cmwissy:
I've just got done watching Tarantinos' Inglorious and how he has portrayed the Ally forces as just as brutal and unlikeable as the Axis forces are portrayed in most World War 2 movies. (which are usually comparable to Star Wars black vs white morality of straight up America vs Germany forsaking everything else.)

With Pitts' character calling every single Wehrmacht soldier 'Natzies' and making him unlikeable (As Nazi was just a political party, no different from Conservative, Liberal or Labour in our government, I believe)

And I've come to expect that the winners write the history and I'm thinking if maybe we as a society demonize the Axis (Although primarily Wehrmacht) forces.

I personally think that every soldier is *ofcourse* his own man and may not have even supported Hitler, but still had to carry out his job.

What do you think?

Have you seen the pianist?

Look, I also believe that not all were so... hate filled, that applies doubly for hitler, but on the other hand if you're socially conditioned to hate specific groups of people and would otherwise be yourself hated... well its pretty easy to assume you'll grow up hating them too.

I'm sure some Germans had an issue with the ordeal, but most of them were happy with getting to the top.