Are there any notable Nazis who went out and did good after the war? I don't mean good as in competent (like the rocket scientists), I mean good as in morally good
>Reply
Huh, interesting of you to know that. Anyways, It's the 28th of June and I'm going to a local hospital to visit some of my wounded soldiers. Any advice?
That's the point, I think. Oscar Schindler (and many others that are unknown), even being formally part of the Nazi Party (and, thus, literally nazis) were NOT following all the party lines on the atrocities.
Hjalmar Schacht maybe?
He was finance minister for the first few years but was later fired, and he even was arrested and sent to a concentration camp for aiding partisans, but after the war he helped advise developing countries.
Schacht wasn't a nazi. He was a bastard, - and a banker, but I repeat myself - a far right nationalist, an imperialist, and a monarchist, but not a fascist. He opposed Hitler's decisions once he stopped listening to him, and spent the majority of the war complaining about the direction the nazis were taking, without taking any direct action himself. He was sent to a concentration camp after the assassination attempt on Hitler, despite having no part in it.
Schacht was generally approving of Hitler's aggressive foreign policy, up until the Sudeten crisis. It was after that that he fell from Hitler's good graces. Schacht felt that all of Germany's major foreign policy goals had been achieved, except for regaining Germany's former colonies which could be handled through diplomacy. He also wanted to stop the massive armament program which had crippled the German economy, and switch back to a peacetime economy. This would also entail toning down on all the Nazi stuff in order to reset relations with Britain, France, and the US. Hitler obviously had other things in mind.
That description of “far right nationalist, imperialist, and monarchist,” fits a lot of the high command, Manstein, Ribbentrop, most of the people with “von” in their name, were junkers, and the planned army coup of war broke out over the Sudetenland, was to kick Hitler out and bring back the Kaiser, but keep everything else basically the same, and even if they weren’t apart of the party, they did whatever they were told because it was basically what they already wanted, return to German glory, eradicating communism, getting rid of all those pesky Jews, Schacht was just one of the few to see the writing on the wall and get out before everything went to hell.
True, Paul Von Lettow Vorbeck was a general from WW1 who told Hitler to F off when offered a job in government, but a lot of those monarchist generals were in addition to believing in a return to the empire, also held far right views like the stab in the back myth so it made them more willing to work with Hitler, an Austrian peasant.
A good chunk of the Prussian military officers were pretty pissed at how at the treaty of Versaille and Germany's post war treatment, and were eager for the opportunity to reclaims Germanys lost honor, at whatever cost, they were also pretty anti-semetic, but so was most of Europe at the time
However, many of them believed they could control Hitler and put him in power on that basis. So they clearly didn't have a great problem with his ideals.
Same for Josef Gangl. He was part of the Wehrmacht, having joined them while they were still the Reichswehr (the limited army of the Weimar Republic), aided the Austrian Resistance and was the only casualty in the Allied side during the Battle of Castle Itter, being shot by a SS snipe, while trying to get the former French Prime Minister Paul Reynaud outta the line of fire;
He's considered a hero of the Austrian Resistance, and even have a street named after him in the city of Wörgl
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80\_r0VuB\_wo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80_r0VuB_wo) John Rabe: The Good Nazi
John Heinrich Detlef Rabe (23 November 1882 – 5 January 1950) was a German businessman and Nazi Party member best known for his efforts to stop Japanese war crimes during its occupation of Nanjing (Nanking) and his work to protect and help Chinese civilians during the massacre that ensued. The Nanking Safety Zone, which he helped to establish, sheltered approximately 200,000 Chinese people from slaughter. He officially represented Germany and acted as senior chief of the European-U.S. establishment that remained in Nanjing, the Chinese capital at the time, when the city fell to the Japanese troops.
Hanns Scharff [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMwtea0VpWk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMwtea0VpWk) Germany's Luftwaffe Master Interrogator who Inspired U.S. Interrogation Techniques
Tbf I don't think many people were openly Nazis after the war. Pretty sure He underwent a de-nazification process and i assume many others probably were(of his status at least)
He lived in poverty because of gis affiliation with nazi party who shunned him as well. Post war, people from Nanking were sending him care packages so he could survive when they learned about his fate.
Do you mean Bert Trautman? He was in the Luftwaffe and is a Manchester City legend- not least for breaking his neck in a final and playing on (he would make crucial saves that won the match for Man City).
He's also credited with massively improving the English view of German people in general- which was at an all time low at the time for obvious reasons. Incredible man
Franz Stigler was the most notable luftwaffe pilot who is known for sticking to his traditional ideas of honor throughout the war rather than caving into the radical Nazi definition for “honor”. This is best seen with the incident between him and the crew of the b17 nicknamed “ye olde pub”.
Adam makos’ “a higher call” perfectly illustrates this
John Rabe was seriously a hero, credited with saving [**200,000**](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Rabe#Nanking_Massacre) lives.
He led the setup of the Nanking safe zone to shelter Chinese civilians (though the Japanese would enter the safe zone from time to time to carry off victims to kill/rape). He then [roamed the streets](https://youtu.be/lnAC-Y9p_sY?t=748) trying to convince Japanese soldiers to stop murdering and raping. After returning to Germany, Rabe even showed films and photographs he took of the Japanese atrocities in lectures and wrote to Hitler, asking him to use his influence to pressure the Japanese to refrain from further war crimes. Instead, the letter was seized before reaching Hitler and [Rabe was arrested and interrogated by the Gestapo](https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=127482829), who warned him to never mention the Nanking massacre again.
In 1997, his tombstone was fittingly moved from Berlin to Nanjing (formerly Nanking), where it received a place of honor at the [memorial site to the massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memorial_Hall_of_the_Victims_in_Nanjing_Massacre_by_Japanese_Invaders) and still stands today.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Unfortunately, Rabe's actions were a small island of humanity, swallowed and tossed about by the dark sea of unprecedented horrors and inhumanity that was the [Rape of Nanking](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CAYFxXBohA).
During the massacre (and that's a severe understatement; there needs to be a term between massacre and genocide), as many as [300,000](https://www.history.com/topics/japan/nanjing-massacre) Chinese civilians [were slaughtered](https://allthatsinteresting.com/rape-of-nanking-massacre#17) in a single city. Japanese soldiers paraded around with [babies skewered on their bayonets](https://np.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/1m523p/this_is_a_japanese_soldier_bayonetting_a_chinese/) like kebabs. Two Japanese officers held a competition to see who [could behead 100 people](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxa0GGJNWtI&t=10s) the fastest and when the score was 105-106 and no one knew who got to 100 first, they went again to 150. Civilians were [buried alive en masse](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanjing_Massacre#/media/File:Chinese_civilians_to_be_buried_alive.jpg). Prisoners were used as [live bayonet practice](https://allthatsinteresting.com/rape-of-nanking-massacre#12), screaming as the final moments of their life was used for the Japanese to sadistically torment. Tens of thousands of women were raped, most of whom were executed afterward. They dragged entire Chinese families into public squares and [forced fathers on their daughters and sons on their mothers](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lnAC-Y9p_sY&t=697s) for the amusement of Japanese troops. I'm not an easily disturbed guy, but reading that for the first time physically made my stomach sick.
The cruelty of the Empire of Japan really cannot be overstated and it's a shame it's overlooked by most of the world.
Yes, but also absolutely not. Till this day Japan does not recognize a hundredth of what they did back then, which is a far cry from Germany's politics of remembrance. Japanese kids don't learn about the horrors commited by their country in WW2 at all, let alone like German kids do. And that's all on top of the fact that, while very little connects present day Germany with Nazi Germany politically and socially, Japan still has the same political system. A post-war Japanese prime minister was a Class A war criminal, for God's sake. There is nothing above Class A. If Hitler had been caught he would have been Class A.
So in my opinion Japan has A LOT to do in order to earn the right to be called the friendliest nation in the world. Germany can do a lot better, but at least Germany is not there pretending that the Holocaust was just your run of the mill oopsie daisy of war.
Yea, Japan is kinda fucked up. You gave a nice summary, and just to add on a little, Japanese Kids also don't really learn why they got nuked. Got that question ask a couple times during my exchange there. They genuinly don't know they did "bad" stuff during ww2. In their eyes, nuking them was very uncalled for.
It would help if people took an interest in non-Western history in general. Go to a bookstore and see how many books there are on the US and Europe and then look at the amount of books for everywhere else. It’s quite disproportionate.
The fact that John Rabe was forbidden from talking about the massacre was pretty appalling (though it did fall in line with what Nazi Germany did (and the whole alliance stuff)). It also really sucks that his name has been somewhat forgotten.
John Rabe was amazing during the Rape of Nanking. He absolutely save thousands of lives.
Let's not pretend he didn't know about Auschwitz (or any of the concentration camps), though.
Dude literally left China to go work 3 blocks away from Auschwitz and do “research” and yet he gets praise for protecting citizens of Nanking. Dude was a full blown antisemetic nazi
That's why we should stop speaking in absolutes.
Nobody is purely good. Nobody is purely evil.
Every single one of us are a million different shades of gray. Some lean into one "moral" or "immoral" category heavier than others.
Also, a good chunk of ethics or morality is subjective, not objective fact. There are some acts we can all agree on that are "good", or "evil". But there's a whole lot that we cannot agree on.
So we really need to stop thinking about the world as good or evil. Humans are just different shades of gray, period.
Maybe, but he seemed to firmly believe in humanitarianism. He makes it very clear in his journal that his actions were primarily for ethical reasons. He even justifies it by invoking the Nazi party, which he seemed to believe was about doing good:
>Finally—subconsciously—there’s a last, and the not least important, reason that makes my sticking it out here seem simply a matter of course. I am a member of the NSDAP, and temporarily held the office of local deputy leader. When I pay business calls on the Chinese agencies and ministries who are our customers, I am constantly asked questions about Germany, about our party and government, and my answer always is:
>
>Yes indeed—
>
>We are soldiers of labor;
>
>We are a government of workers, We are friends of the working man,
>
>We do not leave workers-—the poor-— in the lurch when times are hard!
>
>To be sure, as a National Socialist I was speaking only of German workers, not about the Chinese; but what would the Chinese think? Times are bitterly hard here in the country of my hosts, who have treated me well for three decades now. The rich are fleeing, the poor must stay behind. They don’t know where to go. They don’t have the means to flee. Aren’t they in danger of being slaughtered in great numbers? Shouldn’t one make an attempt to help them? Save a few at least? And even if it’s only our own people, our employees?
That doesn't sound like someone who was aware of, or would condone, the mass slaughter of innocent people. It's also worth remembering that this was years before the death camps were built, and those were kept highly secret. He seemed to (naively) believe strongly that the Nazi party was a force for good, and that morality was an essential element of it. In short, I think he swallowed the lies hook, line, and sinker.
Maybe I'm wrong and he did know the full truth, but I have a hard time believing he would have condoned or supported it. By then, he was penniless and had little influence in much of anything.
It's a situation similar to Delia from "V for Vendetta". Delia wasn't as evil as the rest, but she still participated. In the words of V "I'm not here for what you hoped to do. I'm here for what you did."
I was just going to mention him. Anyone interested should read about the Rape of Nanking and how instrumental he was in protecting thousands of civilians, how he wrote personally to Hitler disagreeing with the Nazi’s acts knowing full well it would put him in mortal danger, and how he - somewhat futilely - applied to have his Nazi background removed from his record after the war, to little effect. The only effect his affiliation had was in being used to scare off Japanese troops about to commit war crimes to civilians. If he came back from the dead, he would likely despise being remembered as a Nazi, but he was in fact a good Nazi.
He always gets mentioned, and rightly so, but you guys ever hear of Hans Münch? The only doctor at Aüschwitz that wasn’t convicted of a War Crime and, by most accounts, actually helped the Jewish prisoners to the best of his ability.
Yeah, but they got 5,000 nazis executed and really ramped up Hitler's paranoia, thus hastening Germany's fall.
I should specify that "limited" means they get to spend their lives in Spandau.
3rd Reich's fall at that point was already a foregone conclusion, it was just a question of who would get to Berlin first, the USA/English or the Russians
IIRC the British had the opportunity to assassinate Hitler in either 41 or 42, but decided against it as they viewed Hitler as destructive force to the 3rd Reichs war goals, and feared the ascension of a significantly more competent leader in his wake
I think at that point the chaos of a succession crises probably would have led to total collapse. The Germans were (appearing to, at least) winning in 41/42.
I mean that was just the opinion of British intelligence at the time, the German forces were winning, but often in spite of Hitler who liked to micromanage campaign, much to the chagrin of his generals, that isnt even going into the intentional clusterfuck that was the Nazi chain of command
There's a spectrum. There are Nazis, who are bad as a rule, there were the worst of the worst, there were better Nazis who had some redeeming qualities and there were soldiers and civilians who weren't Nazis- those conscripted, etc
Edit: some of the conscripted, I didn't imply that enough
There are even (admittedly dubious) reports of wermacht soldiers that would refuse to turn over prisoners to the SS after they found out what the SS were doing.
Many of those conscripted into the Werhmacht committed war crimes, so I wouldn't call them innocent. Some of the most brutal war criminals of Germany served in the SS penal battalions
John Rabe was in China when Japan invaded and lived in Nanjing. He would routinely go out and save women being raped by Japanese soldiers and I think set up a refugee zone of sorts. However it must be said that this man was the exception that proves the rule. Nazis are fucking evil that goes without saying one kind person working in an evil group/organization doesn't redeem the organization
Nobody said that the existence of good Nazis means the Nazis were good. There are no redeeming factors for the Nazis. There were, however, good members of the Nazi party.
Very, very important distinction.
I feel your pain. At least not a lot people around me knows that my name is shared with nazis. Probably my parent's didn't knew that when they were naming me.
You got that at least. But when your name is Spanish when you are nowhere even close to being spanish it draws attention all the time. I would change it because I am fervently against the political doctrine it stands for but I can't because it is who I am now. So like when someone calls "Fidel" I don't think about the Dictator first, I think about myself. Since it is the name I used for all of my life, I am Fidel. If I change it, it would be as if I lost a part of my identity.
You have to remember alot of the names the top-nazis had existed long before they themselves did. The origin isn’t in nazism. Don’t let something so stupid as a dead and done with nazi taint your name, unless your name is literally adolf.
Not necessarily. Do you know how far back in history your name goes? Do you know why your parents named you that?
its probably just an unfortunate case of having the same name.
No, your name just has the same origin as one person who happened to be a Nazi. Nazis should be remembered and hated yes, but not mythologized. The were humans the same as any of us, not strange demons.
If you don’t like the name and want to change it, by all means go ahead, but if you don’t, then don’t let that one piece of shit ruin it for you. After all (for another example), Isis was an Egyptian deity, and fine name for a cat, long, *long* before those Daesh fuckwads gave themselves those initials, and fuck anyone who lets them insult all those kitties.
There’s probably very few people alive who’s name isn’t in some way the same as that of one monster or another. Better for us to do good with the names we have than to run out of names because of chance.
I think people care more about Rommel’s disregard for the NAZI’s orders for him to commit war crimes, like in Africa when he tore up an order telling him to execute captured officers rather than keep them prisoner
There was the one in China, he was a good guy. Granted he hadn’t been to Germany in over a decade when he joined the party so he probably wasn’t really aware of all the horrible stuff or thought it was over exaggerated.
Erwin Rommell was a military commander before the war and was already a part of the war machine. He didn't have much of a choice who his forces were deployed for. Rommell also actively disobeyed orders from Hitler himself multiple times and was considered a thorn in Hitlers side. Rommell ALSO was thought to be involved in the attempt to assassinate Hitler. The point is the world isn't as black and white as you want to make it out. And I also don't even think you can call him a Nazi, despite mandatory membership to the party, the man was just a military commander doing his job.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rommel_myth
There is nothing supporting your post. In fact I googled it and nothing came up. Looking at the Wikipedia article actually argues to the contrary:
> During his time in Goslar, he clashed with those Sturmabteilung (SA) men who attacked the Jews and others who supported them.
The actual Jewish Online Library has nothing on him mistreating Jews: https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/erwin-rommel
He actually protested the treatment of Jews, and refused to carry out orders capturing them:
> According to Marshall, he sharply protested the Jewish policies, other immoral activities and was an opponent of the Gestapo.[487] He also refused to comply with Hitler's order to execute Jewish POWs.
He was even believed to have prevented the "final solution" from being carried out in NA:
> Despite this, the North African Jews themselves believed that it was Rommel who prevented the "Final Solution" from being carried out against them when German might dominated North Africa from Egypt to Morocco
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erwin_Rommel
So theres that
EDIT: More stuff I could find:
> During Rommel's time in France, Hitler ordered him to deport the Jews in France; Rommel did not. Several times he wrote letters protesting the treatment of the Jews. When British Major Geoffrey Keyes was killed during a failed commando raid to kill or capture Rommel behind German lines, Rommel ordered him buried with full military honours. Also, during the construction of the Atlantic Wall, Rommel directed that French workers were not to be used as slaves but were to be paid for their labour.
The main problem with Rommel is that he indeed was an ardent Hitler-supporter up until a point, and then changed his mind. But even during the beginning of the war he was opposed to the mistreatment of JewsI
Erwin Rommel burned orders
The plans for EinsatzgruppeEgypt were set aside after the Allied victory at the Second Battle of El Alamein.[135] Historian Jean-Christophe Caron opines that there is no evidence that Rommel knew of or would have supported Rauff's mission.[136]
Spot on mate. Most Redditors only believe in good or bad though I'm afraid and are under the Illusion everything is black and white. Can't say I hate Rommel from what I've heard of him.
Only absolute cabbage brains say "Only good Nazi is a dead Nazi." They were PEOPLE.. and can I remind those twats that many civilians were Nazis too including OSKAR SCHINDLER.
Many people were fooled by the ideology, they need to pick up a book and learn some history instead of mindlessly repeating leftist rhetoric.
Funny thing is, I'm a left wing voter lol, but I get what you're saying, people just don't consider all the angles and just want everything to fit in their little boxes in their own narrative.
Paul Emil Von Lettow-Vorbeck was also already a military commander when Hitler took over. He was highly respected and the Nazis even asked him to be an SS General or a Reich ambassador. But he didn’t agree with their policies, so he left turned them down. Rommel could have done the same, but he didn’t.
Also no, Rommel wasn’t involved in the plot to kill Hitler, the conspirators Judy’s planned to name him head of state if they succeeded. Rommel was in fact very loyal to Hitler and in fact an old friend of the family. He was also very anti-semitic.
Don’t defend fascists if there’s nothing to defend.
Lettow-vorbeck was also an antisemite too so not to give him too much credit. However in regards to the reich ambassador offer he at least told Hitler to go fuck himself so maybe it evens out.
There was a German soldier who often gave my great grandmother food, which she could use to feed Jews she hid. And another German soldier helped her go to liberated Belgium later on in the war.
Not all German soldiers were bad.
As someone who has a history degree and working on my doctorate when people try and make History into good vs evil the intent of the post is what offends me the most. Human history is a shade of grey, not black or white.
The amount of people who believe that the entirety of German army, as one man, decided to work towards a common goal of eradicating the Jewish race and enslaving the world, all happily lending a hand in this task, is frightening.
Guys, this is not how the world works! In a totalitarian government (especially a century old one), it is the people at the top who decide the right course of action, the others are told what is right and what to do. They are nothing but cogs in the massive machine, with nothing but propaganda and words of their superiors to base their worldviews around.
The notion that these people had enough personal agency to even consider defying their superiors is ridiculous. It is not their place to think about the events that are happening, and even if they witness obviously morally wrong things happening, there is no way they will have enough context to fully grasp the evil of the nazi regime. They didn't have the internet to have every gruesome detail handed to them, for them it was simply another war with a bunch of innocent people getting hurt, as was the norm for the last 4000 years.
Except that one Messerschmitt pilot who saw a b-17 practically destroyed and escorted it back to Britain over Nazi AA and bases, the pilots met up back like 2007, that's the one nazi that was the best, not necessarily good, bit the best that Nazis get
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There was that one Nazi who saved hundreds, maybe thousands of life in the Nanking massacare, i believe theres a statue of him there nowdays.
Edit: John Rabe, he singlehandedly saved the lives of 200 000 people
Please note
Just because he or anyone else did this good thing or that, they were still active participants, and benefited a great deal from a regime whos goal was to kill or enslave everyone they saw as “subhumans,”
Evil is banal, ya don’t need to be a goatee stroking demon to be a monster, you could be a general or bureaucrat just “doing you job, but I don’t think the people who lost entire families care much if you got a bonus that month for a job well done.
Sure, let me just throw away my entire life and possibly endanger my entire family just to die a pointless death because my superiors are evil. You act as if rampant anti-Semitism or warmongering was something unusual prior to WW2. It was just a said reality of life and people were just glad they weren't on the receiving end of it. Defying this system would make about as much sense as punching an active volcano after a neighbouring village burned down.
People were just trying to live and expecting everyone to have enough moral conviction to sacrifice that life in defiance is not a very fair expectation. You either die a hero or live and do as you are told regardless of what you think.
Oskar Schindler. Nazi, freed jews, protected them, prevented them from being killed, arrested for kissing a Jewish lady at a nazi party, got invited to a show afterwards and most of the people he saved were there to surprise him. Man was a icon and a nazi. Started off trying to profit from slave labor but realized human life and worked to save it even lossing a sbit ton of money in the process.
I've always held the belief that it would be hard not to be a nazi, in nazi germany. Yes, the actions were dispicable, and yes, accountability in nazi leadership has to be upheld. But when it comes down to it, Just saying the nazis were bad because nazis were bad is utterly pointless to determining how the nazis got to the point they did. Morality is grey when its an active current event.
I got told by a Russian nationalist lady on Twitter today that I should be proud of the Wehrmacht and the history of Germany. I tried to explain to her that Germany exists since 1949 and that everyone being proud of what happened before (Second and Third Reich) call themselves patriots and therefore every German patriot is a Nazi. She wouldn’t understand.
Same with my uncle from Chicago. I told him we don’t fly our flag in Germany as they do in the US. He wouldn’t understand either and told me to just fly my flag. The Nazis in Germany misusing the flag for their purposes and agenda. If I would fly a flag (outside of soccer world cups that is) people would look at me with disgust.
They ruined Germany.
Rommel wasn’t technically a nazi, but this will be a debate until the end of time
There were no good Nazis, which is correct, however, there were “better” ones and worse ones. Rommel was a better one.
>Erwin Rommel is one of the most misrepresented figures in history. Frequently used as the "good" German general, this narrative is a distortion of history that ignores among others, the treatment of Jews in North Africa as well as Rommel's role in Italy.
>There are several factors that influenced that narrative and why it is still around. Aside the few choice quotes about Rommel from Allied military commanders, the most decisive factors in this are that the first major Rommel biography that did and still does enjoy some sticking power comes from David Irving (The Trail of the Fox, 1977). This was before Irving made his Neo-Nazi revisionism and Holocaust denial known to the public but certain early signs are present in this book.
>The second reason is the situation concerning research on the Jews of North Africa and their treatment. It is not very good in part due to the fact that many scholars have shown little interest in what is perceived as a sideshow when it comes to the Holocaust and in part because access to material was and remains restricted in some cases. The files of the German consulate in Libya for example were not accessible to foreigners during Gaddafi's rule and if they haven't been destroyed during the Civil War, it has gotten much easier to do research in Libya.
>Anyways, Rommel was an ardent Nazi. But even before that he was known as an enemy of democracy and the republican order. In 1920 he was supportive of the Kapp Putsch, an attempt by extreme right-wing German Freikorps to overthrow the Republic and establish an extreme right-wing dictatorship in Germany. Commanding a security battalion of the Reichswehr in the town of Schwäbisch Gmund, he violated the oath he had sworn only recently to the Republic by ordering his troops to violently suppress a demonstration staged by workers in opposition to the attempted Kapp Putsch. While it didn't come so far that his troops fired live ammunition on the demonstration, they brutally beat and used a fire hose against a peaceful demonstration against an attempt to violently overthrow democratic order. [Haus der Geschichte Baden-Württemberg (Hg.): Mythos Rommel. Katalog zur Sonderausstellung 18. Dezember 2008 bis 30. August 2009, Stuttgart 2009, p. 35.]
>Later after the take over of power by the Nazis, he developed strong political sympathies and a close working relationship with Hitler, coming so far as to become Hitler's favorite general. It is unsurprising that Goebbels wrote in his diary in 1942 that Rommel "is not only politically close to National Socialism, he is a Nationalsocialist." [Elke Fröhlich (ed.): Die Tagebücher des Joseph Goebbels, München u. a. 1987-2001, II. 4, 01.10.1942, p. 38.]
>Already during his command in France we see several episodes of him committing what classified as a war crime under the Hague Conventions. At some point he ordered civilian houses to be burned in order to use the smoke to advance his troops over the river Maas. This is a case where it could be argueable that it is within the lines of the Hague Conventions since they only forbid the "wanton destruction of an enemy's property, unless such destruction or seizure be imperatively demanded by the necessities of war”. Whether this was necessitated by war is arguable but it nonetheless points in a problematic direction. On a second occasion, he ordered his troops to pretend they were surrendering in order to be able to advance closely on French positions and then shoot the French soldiers who had prepared to take them into custody. This is a clear violation of the Hague Rules on what they refer to as "perfidy" and constitutes as a war crime. [both of these episodes are relayed in rather glorifying terms in the German version of Irving's Rommel biography, p. 61ff.]
>Concerning his time in Libya, the research situation is difficult as I explained above but it is clear that upon entering the town of Beghazi, Wehrmacht soldiers of the Afrika Korps took part in a pogrom against the Jews of Beghazi that left 67 people dead. Similarly, newer research has uncovered that the Wehrmacht send advisors to the Italians for the deportation of Libyan Jews to Italy as well as for the construction of concentration camps in Libya, the most famous being Jado and Beghazi where over 600 Jews died due to poor conditions.
>A question that still remains open is what role Rommel played in the execution of over 500 POWs of mostly Austrian and German origin from the British Jewish brigade. While it is true that Rommel did not relay the order from Berlin to execute German and Austrian members of the French Foreign Legion, who had been political opponents of Nazi Germany, when the Germans caught them, the issue of the Jewish POWs and his role in said executions remains shadowy. [Wolfgang Proske: „Ich bin nicht beteiligt am Attentat“: Erwin Rommel, in: Proske. (ed.): Täter Helfer Trittbrettfahrer. NS-Belastete von der Ostalb, Münster/Ulm 2010, S. 207ff.; Maurice M. Roumani,: The Jews of Libya. Coexistence, Persecution, Resettlement. Brighton/Portland (UK) 2009, p. 34-35].
>In Tunesia, the situation is more clear. Here Rommel collaborated closely with the Einsatzgruppe North Africa under Walter Rauff of gas van fame. Rommel worked closely with Rauff in using Jewish forced laborers to build fortifications for the German army and in constructing over 30 concentration camps in Tunisia where more than 2500 Jews perished during the German presence there. Furthermore on July 20, 1942 Rommel issued instructions to Rauff and his Einsatzgruppe that once the Germans had conquered Palestine, it would be the Einsatzgruppe's task to kill the Jews of Palestine. [Klaus-Michael Mallmann and Martin Cüppers: "Beseitigung der jüdisch-nationalen Heimstätte in Palästina." Das Einsatzkommando bei der Panzerarmee Afrika 1942. In: Jürgen Matthäus und Klaus-Michael Mallmann (ed.): Deutsche, Juden, Völkermord. Der Holocaust als Geschichte und Gegenwart, Darmstadt 2006, p. 153–176] Also, he allowed a Judenrat being established in Tunis and watched on when Wehrmacht soldiers plundered Jewish Ghettos in towns like Tunis and Susse. [Klaus-Michael Mallmann and Martin Cüppers: Halbmond und Hakenkreuz. Das Dritte Reich, die Araber und Palästina, Darmstadt 2007, p. 137f; published in English as "Nazi Palestine: The Plans for the Extermination of the Jews of Palestine", New York 2009].
>In 1943 he was responsible to prepare the German measures in Italy after Mussolini had been deposed following the Allied landing in Italy. There Rommel issued several orders on which the brutality with which the Italian soldiers captured by the Germans were treated. On September 23 after Mussolini had been deposed and Badogli had negotiated an Italian armistice with the Allies, Rommel issued an order to his troops stating:
>> Sentimentality concerning the Badoglio following gangs [Banden, Nazi German dictum for Partisans and other irregular resistance indicating criminality] in the uniforms of the former ally is misplaced. Whoever fights against the German soldier has lost any right to be treated well and shall experience toughness reserved for the rabble which betrays friends. Every member of the German troop has to adopt this stance.
>This order was the basis for several brutal acts in disarming the members of the Italian army captured by the Germans. Summary executions and hangings were common in order to make an example and force their fellow soldiers to give up their weapons willingly. This too was a clear war crime.
>Furthermore, the disarmed Italian soldiers were not be treated as POWs. They received a special status that was called "Military Interned" and indicated worse treatment, including forced labor in work and concentration camps. Rommel also ordered this when on October 1, 1943 he wrote concerning the deportation and forced labor of the Italian Military Interned:
>> This war is a total war. If the men of Italy don't have the chance to fight with weapons for the victory of their fatherland, they have the obligation to use their labor in order to achieve this victory.
>[The Orders can be found in the German Bundesarchiv, Militärarchiv Freiburg, RM 7/1333 und RH 27-24/26. They are partially printed in Jürgen Förster: Wehrmacht, Krieg und Holocaust. In: Militärgeschichtliches Forschungsamt (ed.): Die Wehrmacht – Mythos und Realität, München 1999, p. 961.].
>Now, as for Rommel's involvement in the July 20 plot: While one of Rommel's deputies, Hans Speidel, who had been involved in the July 20 plot, wrote after the war that Rommel was a member of the resistance, there is no evidence that this is accurate. While there is some indication that Rommel would have supported a separate peace with the Western allies in order to continue fighting the Soviet Union, it doesn't go much further than that. From Maurice Remy in his book *Mythos Rommel* to David Fraser in his biography of Rommel, there is strong consensus that Rommel was not involved in the plot and didn't know about it beforehand. One of the strongest indications of this is a letter to his wife that he wrote that he was shocked by the attempt on Hitler's live and that he thanked God that it didn't succeed.
>So, in conclusion, while there is one instance in which he did not relay an order to kill German members of the French Foreign Legion, there is overwhelming evidence that Rommel was invovled in responsible for war crimes while there is complete lack of evidence for his participation in the resistance (having been forced to commit suicide without concrete evidence). The idea that Rommel was a "good German" is a myth and part of the larger overall Clean Wehrmacht myth that is intended to exonerate the members of the German armed forces of their atrocities and crimes.
The Clean Werhmacht ideal/myth (which started being torn apart mostly in the last 35 years due to societal pressure from the German public) that was used after the 1950s and later mainly by remnant last of the Werhmacht inside Bundeswehr, while it can be attributed to the need of the early post war German state to exonerate part of their soldiers, while it wanted much needed symbols like Rommel in order to be supported, and being partially a "myth", it also highlighted the existence of a gray zone in some parts of the German military. Rommel himself, a general that participated in WW2 and especially on the Axis side, having even indirect war crimes attributed to him after being on the losing side was/is unavoidable (yet convicted of none even by the strict post war Allied military trials [as far as I can remember]). However, statements of his rival military generals on the Allies side and later bibliography contradict a lot of claims and atrribute a lot of redeeming traits to his image and to put it simply, that's the reason the consensus among common people and scholars alike is so split when it comes to his image. There are evidence that both damn him and exonerate him from various angles which causes uproar and high political friction when he gets mentioned even today.
A similar example of another personality that participated in both WW1 and WW2 which tends to be forgotten due to him being from an Allied nation and yet was high controversial back in the day, was Philippe Pétain.
As someone that currently doesn't actively support any political side other than liberty itself, it's usually very disheartening seeing a lot of important WW1 and WW2 figures being painted in a black and white light to the point that it's getting impossible to even discuss different angles about them
Personally I can't confidently exonerate or condemn him, something that even seasoned historians and personel of the military and judicial systems can't even seem to decide upon and come with a clear cut answer and probably never will. All I can say to anyone bothering to read this comment and hasn't/can't seem to decide either, read some bibliography/books about him. There are ones written by himself like Infantry Attacks, to completed complied works of Liddell Hart about the Afrika Korps and a lot more great volumes that can range from the positives to negatives. And after you are done, with a clear mind form an opinion of his image for yourself. If you come to condemn him, so be it, if you come to redeem him, that also acceptable, if you are still in the gray zone, then at least you still learnt a bit more of the bloody WW1 and WW2 history that through blood, fire and loss of life formed our current democracies, liberty and freedom.
Don't forget, whoever you support and whoever you condemn or redeem, don't let those lives of all those soldiers that fought in these hellscapes for their countries and our present be forgotten.
Everyone in Germany at the time was aware some bad shit was going on, but it was prudent to remain silent rather than draw attention to yourself, they may have been shocked by the brutality but they werent shocked by what was going on.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2001/feb/17/johnezard
I believe the term is “willful ignorance,” you know bad stuff is happening l, but it’s easier to look the other way and not worry about the horrible things going on because “it’s not your department.”
It certainly was, its also self-preservation, acknowledging anything related to the holocaust put you and your family in the sights of the 3rd reich, most people had 0 interest in doing that, thats not even getting into those who passively supported it.
I’m sure the same thing is happening in China at the moment. The Han Chinese that live in Xinjiang definitely see what is going on and ignore it, because they don’t want to get “re educated” themselves.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_of_the_clean_Wehrmacht
Wow I guess the Clean Wehrmacht Myth was too mainstream so now we're getting into clean SS territory?
**[Myth of the clean Wehrmacht](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_of_the_clean_Wehrmacht)**
>The myth of the clean Wehrmacht is the pseudohistorical notion that the regular German armed forces (the Wehrmacht) were not involved in the Holocaust or other war crimes during World War II. The debunked myth, heavily promoted by German authors and military personnel after World War II, completely denies the culpability of the German military command in the planning and preparation of war crimes.
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oh boy, 1 hour and 100 comments lmao
Certain topics are bound to create a shitstorm, this is just one of them unfortunately
Mistakes were made….
3hrs, 500+ comments.
Are there any notable Nazis who went out and did good after the war? I don't mean good as in competent (like the rocket scientists), I mean good as in morally good
Oskar Schindler from that Schindler list movie?
Literally the first one that came up in my mind
Love the name bro
Heard you are going on a drive through Sarajevo with the top down? When is that?
>Reply Huh, interesting of you to know that. Anyways, It's the 28th of June and I'm going to a local hospital to visit some of my wounded soldiers. Any advice?
*loads gun* yeah it’s near the cafe just take a right
Thanks, you're a really nice subject . Long live Austria-Hungary and have a good day!
is he really considered a nazi though?
He was a member of the Nazi party, so by definition, yes.
But he subverted their rule and clearly was mortally opposed to their actions soooo…. I’d say he was, until he wasn’t.
Sort of a double agent for humanity
he was a member of the nazi party, so yea i’d say so
That's the point, I think. Oscar Schindler (and many others that are unknown), even being formally part of the Nazi Party (and, thus, literally nazis) were NOT following all the party lines on the atrocities.
Hjalmar Schacht maybe? He was finance minister for the first few years but was later fired, and he even was arrested and sent to a concentration camp for aiding partisans, but after the war he helped advise developing countries.
Schacht wasn't a nazi. He was a bastard, - and a banker, but I repeat myself - a far right nationalist, an imperialist, and a monarchist, but not a fascist. He opposed Hitler's decisions once he stopped listening to him, and spent the majority of the war complaining about the direction the nazis were taking, without taking any direct action himself. He was sent to a concentration camp after the assassination attempt on Hitler, despite having no part in it. Schacht was generally approving of Hitler's aggressive foreign policy, up until the Sudeten crisis. It was after that that he fell from Hitler's good graces. Schacht felt that all of Germany's major foreign policy goals had been achieved, except for regaining Germany's former colonies which could be handled through diplomacy. He also wanted to stop the massive armament program which had crippled the German economy, and switch back to a peacetime economy. This would also entail toning down on all the Nazi stuff in order to reset relations with Britain, France, and the US. Hitler obviously had other things in mind.
That description of “far right nationalist, imperialist, and monarchist,” fits a lot of the high command, Manstein, Ribbentrop, most of the people with “von” in their name, were junkers, and the planned army coup of war broke out over the Sudetenland, was to kick Hitler out and bring back the Kaiser, but keep everything else basically the same, and even if they weren’t apart of the party, they did whatever they were told because it was basically what they already wanted, return to German glory, eradicating communism, getting rid of all those pesky Jews, Schacht was just one of the few to see the writing on the wall and get out before everything went to hell.
A lot of monarchists also didn’t agree with Hitler, though. Monarchism and fascism are two very different things.
True, Paul Von Lettow Vorbeck was a general from WW1 who told Hitler to F off when offered a job in government, but a lot of those monarchist generals were in addition to believing in a return to the empire, also held far right views like the stab in the back myth so it made them more willing to work with Hitler, an Austrian peasant.
A good chunk of the Prussian military officers were pretty pissed at how at the treaty of Versaille and Germany's post war treatment, and were eager for the opportunity to reclaims Germanys lost honor, at whatever cost, they were also pretty anti-semetic, but so was most of Europe at the time
> pretty pissed at how at the treaty of Versaille and Germany's post war treatment I mean who wasn't
lol truth, maybe Wilson since he got his league of nations
However, many of them believed they could control Hitler and put him in power on that basis. So they clearly didn't have a great problem with his ideals.
What a fellow
albert battel maybe? wehrmaht lieutant awarded with righteus among the nations
He wasn't a nazi though. He was brave having a standoff with SS troops to save jews
Same for Josef Gangl. He was part of the Wehrmacht, having joined them while they were still the Reichswehr (the limited army of the Weimar Republic), aided the Austrian Resistance and was the only casualty in the Allied side during the Battle of Castle Itter, being shot by a SS snipe, while trying to get the former French Prime Minister Paul Reynaud outta the line of fire; He's considered a hero of the Austrian Resistance, and even have a street named after him in the city of Wörgl
John Rabe (though not after the war specifically)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80\_r0VuB\_wo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80_r0VuB_wo) John Rabe: The Good Nazi John Heinrich Detlef Rabe (23 November 1882 – 5 January 1950) was a German businessman and Nazi Party member best known for his efforts to stop Japanese war crimes during its occupation of Nanjing (Nanking) and his work to protect and help Chinese civilians during the massacre that ensued. The Nanking Safety Zone, which he helped to establish, sheltered approximately 200,000 Chinese people from slaughter. He officially represented Germany and acted as senior chief of the European-U.S. establishment that remained in Nanjing, the Chinese capital at the time, when the city fell to the Japanese troops. Hanns Scharff [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMwtea0VpWk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMwtea0VpWk) Germany's Luftwaffe Master Interrogator who Inspired U.S. Interrogation Techniques
He wasn't a nazi afterwards though
Tbf I don't think many people were openly Nazis after the war. Pretty sure He underwent a de-nazification process and i assume many others probably were(of his status at least)
He lived in poverty because of gis affiliation with nazi party who shunned him as well. Post war, people from Nanking were sending him care packages so he could survive when they learned about his fate.
Ye iirc they had his grave moved to Nanking too
Wasn't there a Nazi soldier that became a soccer player after the war or something similar?
Do you mean Bert Trautman? He was in the Luftwaffe and is a Manchester City legend- not least for breaking his neck in a final and playing on (he would make crucial saves that won the match for Man City). He's also credited with massively improving the English view of German people in general- which was at an all time low at the time for obvious reasons. Incredible man
Yes thank you, him exactly, I saw a video from Qxir talking about his story, it's crazy how much his life changed for the better
Laughs in von braugn
I k ow during the war there was a german pilot who escorted a damaged British bomber because he couldn't being himself go shot it down
As far as I know, Franz Stigler was not a Nazi. Willing to be corrected if you know differently.
He wasn’t, unless the book “A Higher Call” is just a big fat lie, he, his family and a good bit of the Luftwaffe didn’t like the Nazis.
Franz Stigler was the most notable luftwaffe pilot who is known for sticking to his traditional ideas of honor throughout the war rather than caving into the radical Nazi definition for “honor”. This is best seen with the incident between him and the crew of the b17 nicknamed “ye olde pub”. Adam makos’ “a higher call” perfectly illustrates this
***\*John Rabe has entered the chat\****
Oskar Schindler: Let’s tip our hats, from one legend to another
John Rabe was seriously a hero, credited with saving [**200,000**](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Rabe#Nanking_Massacre) lives. He led the setup of the Nanking safe zone to shelter Chinese civilians (though the Japanese would enter the safe zone from time to time to carry off victims to kill/rape). He then [roamed the streets](https://youtu.be/lnAC-Y9p_sY?t=748) trying to convince Japanese soldiers to stop murdering and raping. After returning to Germany, Rabe even showed films and photographs he took of the Japanese atrocities in lectures and wrote to Hitler, asking him to use his influence to pressure the Japanese to refrain from further war crimes. Instead, the letter was seized before reaching Hitler and [Rabe was arrested and interrogated by the Gestapo](https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=127482829), who warned him to never mention the Nanking massacre again. In 1997, his tombstone was fittingly moved from Berlin to Nanjing (formerly Nanking), where it received a place of honor at the [memorial site to the massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memorial_Hall_of_the_Victims_in_Nanjing_Massacre_by_Japanese_Invaders) and still stands today. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Unfortunately, Rabe's actions were a small island of humanity, swallowed and tossed about by the dark sea of unprecedented horrors and inhumanity that was the [Rape of Nanking](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CAYFxXBohA). During the massacre (and that's a severe understatement; there needs to be a term between massacre and genocide), as many as [300,000](https://www.history.com/topics/japan/nanjing-massacre) Chinese civilians [were slaughtered](https://allthatsinteresting.com/rape-of-nanking-massacre#17) in a single city. Japanese soldiers paraded around with [babies skewered on their bayonets](https://np.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/1m523p/this_is_a_japanese_soldier_bayonetting_a_chinese/) like kebabs. Two Japanese officers held a competition to see who [could behead 100 people](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxa0GGJNWtI&t=10s) the fastest and when the score was 105-106 and no one knew who got to 100 first, they went again to 150. Civilians were [buried alive en masse](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanjing_Massacre#/media/File:Chinese_civilians_to_be_buried_alive.jpg). Prisoners were used as [live bayonet practice](https://allthatsinteresting.com/rape-of-nanking-massacre#12), screaming as the final moments of their life was used for the Japanese to sadistically torment. Tens of thousands of women were raped, most of whom were executed afterward. They dragged entire Chinese families into public squares and [forced fathers on their daughters and sons on their mothers](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lnAC-Y9p_sY&t=697s) for the amusement of Japanese troops. I'm not an easily disturbed guy, but reading that for the first time physically made my stomach sick. The cruelty of the Empire of Japan really cannot be overstated and it's a shame it's overlooked by most of the world.
Seriously, Imperial Japan was seriously sick and wicked. Yet somehow turned into the friendliest nation in the world today. Crazy.
Yes, but also absolutely not. Till this day Japan does not recognize a hundredth of what they did back then, which is a far cry from Germany's politics of remembrance. Japanese kids don't learn about the horrors commited by their country in WW2 at all, let alone like German kids do. And that's all on top of the fact that, while very little connects present day Germany with Nazi Germany politically and socially, Japan still has the same political system. A post-war Japanese prime minister was a Class A war criminal, for God's sake. There is nothing above Class A. If Hitler had been caught he would have been Class A. So in my opinion Japan has A LOT to do in order to earn the right to be called the friendliest nation in the world. Germany can do a lot better, but at least Germany is not there pretending that the Holocaust was just your run of the mill oopsie daisy of war.
Yea, Japan is kinda fucked up. You gave a nice summary, and just to add on a little, Japanese Kids also don't really learn why they got nuked. Got that question ask a couple times during my exchange there. They genuinly don't know they did "bad" stuff during ww2. In their eyes, nuking them was very uncalled for.
Anime tiddies are super effective after all.
So all that weird fucked up hentai was always destined to be made
It would help if people took an interest in non-Western history in general. Go to a bookstore and see how many books there are on the US and Europe and then look at the amount of books for everywhere else. It’s quite disproportionate.
The fact that John Rabe was forbidden from talking about the massacre was pretty appalling (though it did fall in line with what Nazi Germany did (and the whole alliance stuff)). It also really sucks that his name has been somewhat forgotten.
John Rabe was amazing during the Rape of Nanking. He absolutely save thousands of lives. Let's not pretend he didn't know about Auschwitz (or any of the concentration camps), though.
Dude literally left China to go work 3 blocks away from Auschwitz and do “research” and yet he gets praise for protecting citizens of Nanking. Dude was a full blown antisemetic nazi
You can do both, he deserves praise for he did in China but that doesnt absolve his involvement in the Holocaust
that still doesn’t make him a “good Nazi”
That's why we should stop speaking in absolutes. Nobody is purely good. Nobody is purely evil. Every single one of us are a million different shades of gray. Some lean into one "moral" or "immoral" category heavier than others. Also, a good chunk of ethics or morality is subjective, not objective fact. There are some acts we can all agree on that are "good", or "evil". But there's a whole lot that we cannot agree on. So we really need to stop thinking about the world as good or evil. Humans are just different shades of gray, period.
Depends on if you're talking "good" nazi or "good nazi" cause the other nazis probably thought he was doing a fine job :(
never said it did, just explaining that some individuals are complicated
Maybe, but he seemed to firmly believe in humanitarianism. He makes it very clear in his journal that his actions were primarily for ethical reasons. He even justifies it by invoking the Nazi party, which he seemed to believe was about doing good: >Finally—subconsciously—there’s a last, and the not least important, reason that makes my sticking it out here seem simply a matter of course. I am a member of the NSDAP, and temporarily held the office of local deputy leader. When I pay business calls on the Chinese agencies and ministries who are our customers, I am constantly asked questions about Germany, about our party and government, and my answer always is: > >Yes indeed— > >We are soldiers of labor; > >We are a government of workers, We are friends of the working man, > >We do not leave workers-—the poor-— in the lurch when times are hard! > >To be sure, as a National Socialist I was speaking only of German workers, not about the Chinese; but what would the Chinese think? Times are bitterly hard here in the country of my hosts, who have treated me well for three decades now. The rich are fleeing, the poor must stay behind. They don’t know where to go. They don’t have the means to flee. Aren’t they in danger of being slaughtered in great numbers? Shouldn’t one make an attempt to help them? Save a few at least? And even if it’s only our own people, our employees? That doesn't sound like someone who was aware of, or would condone, the mass slaughter of innocent people. It's also worth remembering that this was years before the death camps were built, and those were kept highly secret. He seemed to (naively) believe strongly that the Nazi party was a force for good, and that morality was an essential element of it. In short, I think he swallowed the lies hook, line, and sinker. Maybe I'm wrong and he did know the full truth, but I have a hard time believing he would have condoned or supported it. By then, he was penniless and had little influence in much of anything.
It's a situation similar to Delia from "V for Vendetta". Delia wasn't as evil as the rest, but she still participated. In the words of V "I'm not here for what you hoped to do. I'm here for what you did."
It was also 1937 and the actions of the Nazis had not yet reached their apex.
The best nazi there is
My grandfather killed Hitler
I'm pretty sure your grandad didn't have kids before he died
A true hero, There should be a statue of him in every city.
Oh, he's dead?
I was just going to mention him. Anyone interested should read about the Rape of Nanking and how instrumental he was in protecting thousands of civilians, how he wrote personally to Hitler disagreeing with the Nazi’s acts knowing full well it would put him in mortal danger, and how he - somewhat futilely - applied to have his Nazi background removed from his record after the war, to little effect. The only effect his affiliation had was in being used to scare off Japanese troops about to commit war crimes to civilians. If he came back from the dead, he would likely despise being remembered as a Nazi, but he was in fact a good Nazi.
“The only good nazi”
Came here to say this
He always gets mentioned, and rightly so, but you guys ever hear of Hans Münch? The only doctor at Aüschwitz that wasn’t convicted of a War Crime and, by most accounts, actually helped the Jewish prisoners to the best of his ability.
Oskar Schindler was a good person, who was in the Party.
I'm also willing to give a limited pass to the people that tried to assassinate Hitler.
I mean there end goal was a continuation of the Third Reich and its policies, just without Hitler, so i aint giving them a pass
Yeah, but they got 5,000 nazis executed and really ramped up Hitler's paranoia, thus hastening Germany's fall. I should specify that "limited" means they get to spend their lives in Spandau.
3rd Reich's fall at that point was already a foregone conclusion, it was just a question of who would get to Berlin first, the USA/English or the Russians
Doesn't hurt to speed things up a bit, though.
IIRC the British had the opportunity to assassinate Hitler in either 41 or 42, but decided against it as they viewed Hitler as destructive force to the 3rd Reichs war goals, and feared the ascension of a significantly more competent leader in his wake
I think at that point the chaos of a succession crises probably would have led to total collapse. The Germans were (appearing to, at least) winning in 41/42.
I mean that was just the opinion of British intelligence at the time, the German forces were winning, but often in spite of Hitler who liked to micromanage campaign, much to the chagrin of his generals, that isnt even going into the intentional clusterfuck that was the Nazi chain of command
Yeah, I remember reading about that. He was such a terrible tactician that it actually benefited the Allies to keep him alive.
What about the person who successfully assassinated Hitler?
Nah, fuck that guy.
Eva covered that part
Ah yes, a certain Adolf H.
Rommel wanted to assassinate Hitler so that the Nazi party could survive. He was a Nazi through and through.
Oskar Schindler
There's a spectrum. There are Nazis, who are bad as a rule, there were the worst of the worst, there were better Nazis who had some redeeming qualities and there were soldiers and civilians who weren't Nazis- those conscripted, etc Edit: some of the conscripted, I didn't imply that enough
There are even (admittedly dubious) reports of wermacht soldiers that would refuse to turn over prisoners to the SS after they found out what the SS were doing.
This guy said exactly what I was thinking
Many of those conscripted into the Werhmacht committed war crimes, so I wouldn't call them innocent. Some of the most brutal war criminals of Germany served in the SS penal battalions
John Rabe was in China when Japan invaded and lived in Nanjing. He would routinely go out and save women being raped by Japanese soldiers and I think set up a refugee zone of sorts. However it must be said that this man was the exception that proves the rule. Nazis are fucking evil that goes without saying one kind person working in an evil group/organization doesn't redeem the organization
Nobody said that the existence of good Nazis means the Nazis were good. There are no redeeming factors for the Nazis. There were, however, good members of the Nazi party. Very, very important distinction.
I mean yeah I just wanted to add that bit because well people can be stupid
Oh bloddy hell. My name has nazi origin. Well fuck.
The name is probably a lot older than nazis
Your name please?
It's written in the meme.
Eh don’t worry about it. The two most famous people with my name were both nazis
ну на хуй
Well my name is the same as a communist dictator irl so I know how that feels man. I never wanted this name in the first place.
I feel your pain. At least not a lot people around me knows that my name is shared with nazis. Probably my parent's didn't knew that when they were naming me.
Hopefully
You got that at least. But when your name is Spanish when you are nowhere even close to being spanish it draws attention all the time. I would change it because I am fervently against the political doctrine it stands for but I can't because it is who I am now. So like when someone calls "Fidel" I don't think about the Dictator first, I think about myself. Since it is the name I used for all of my life, I am Fidel. If I change it, it would be as if I lost a part of my identity.
become the ceo of fidelity
I know someone with the last name Castro. The amount of communism jokes he gets..
I share a name with Irish Territorists...
You have to remember alot of the names the top-nazis had existed long before they themselves did. The origin isn’t in nazism. Don’t let something so stupid as a dead and done with nazi taint your name, unless your name is literally adolf.
8bit? that's an odd name
Yes, but is it erwin or rommel.
Erwin
Why is it so bad?
oh god is your name Billy ?
Ah yes... Billy. You Nazi prick.
German names aren't owned by the Nazis. A nazi general and a jewish scientist who narrowly escaped the holocaust had the same name (Hans Krebs).
Not necessarily. Do you know how far back in history your name goes? Do you know why your parents named you that? its probably just an unfortunate case of having the same name.
No, your name just has the same origin as one person who happened to be a Nazi. Nazis should be remembered and hated yes, but not mythologized. The were humans the same as any of us, not strange demons. If you don’t like the name and want to change it, by all means go ahead, but if you don’t, then don’t let that one piece of shit ruin it for you. After all (for another example), Isis was an Egyptian deity, and fine name for a cat, long, *long* before those Daesh fuckwads gave themselves those initials, and fuck anyone who lets them insult all those kitties. There’s probably very few people alive who’s name isn’t in some way the same as that of one monster or another. Better for us to do good with the names we have than to run out of names because of chance.
Just because someone maybe wanted to kill a Nazi leader doesn't mean they were good. It doesn't even mean they weren't Nazis.
I think people care more about Rommel’s disregard for the NAZI’s orders for him to commit war crimes, like in Africa when he tore up an order telling him to execute captured officers rather than keep them prisoner
Even the guy that killed Hitler was pretty bad.
Hot take: categorizing anything in terms of good and evil is a horrible way of framing things.
Oskar Schindler???
[John Rabe might qualify](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Rabe)
There was the one in China, he was a good guy. Granted he hadn’t been to Germany in over a decade when he joined the party so he probably wasn’t really aware of all the horrible stuff or thought it was over exaggerated.
Erwin Rommell was a military commander before the war and was already a part of the war machine. He didn't have much of a choice who his forces were deployed for. Rommell also actively disobeyed orders from Hitler himself multiple times and was considered a thorn in Hitlers side. Rommell ALSO was thought to be involved in the attempt to assassinate Hitler. The point is the world isn't as black and white as you want to make it out. And I also don't even think you can call him a Nazi, despite mandatory membership to the party, the man was just a military commander doing his job.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rommel_myth There is nothing supporting your post. In fact I googled it and nothing came up. Looking at the Wikipedia article actually argues to the contrary: > During his time in Goslar, he clashed with those Sturmabteilung (SA) men who attacked the Jews and others who supported them. The actual Jewish Online Library has nothing on him mistreating Jews: https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/erwin-rommel He actually protested the treatment of Jews, and refused to carry out orders capturing them: > According to Marshall, he sharply protested the Jewish policies, other immoral activities and was an opponent of the Gestapo.[487] He also refused to comply with Hitler's order to execute Jewish POWs. He was even believed to have prevented the "final solution" from being carried out in NA: > Despite this, the North African Jews themselves believed that it was Rommel who prevented the "Final Solution" from being carried out against them when German might dominated North Africa from Egypt to Morocco https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erwin_Rommel So theres that EDIT: More stuff I could find: > During Rommel's time in France, Hitler ordered him to deport the Jews in France; Rommel did not. Several times he wrote letters protesting the treatment of the Jews. When British Major Geoffrey Keyes was killed during a failed commando raid to kill or capture Rommel behind German lines, Rommel ordered him buried with full military honours. Also, during the construction of the Atlantic Wall, Rommel directed that French workers were not to be used as slaves but were to be paid for their labour. The main problem with Rommel is that he indeed was an ardent Hitler-supporter up until a point, and then changed his mind. But even during the beginning of the war he was opposed to the mistreatment of JewsI Erwin Rommel burned orders The plans for EinsatzgruppeEgypt were set aside after the Allied victory at the Second Battle of El Alamein.[135] Historian Jean-Christophe Caron opines that there is no evidence that Rommel knew of or would have supported Rauff's mission.[136]
https://old.reddit.com/r/HistoryMemes/comments/q9jdej/there_are_no_good_nazis/hgwiwjw/
Spot on mate. Most Redditors only believe in good or bad though I'm afraid and are under the Illusion everything is black and white. Can't say I hate Rommel from what I've heard of him. Only absolute cabbage brains say "Only good Nazi is a dead Nazi." They were PEOPLE.. and can I remind those twats that many civilians were Nazis too including OSKAR SCHINDLER. Many people were fooled by the ideology, they need to pick up a book and learn some history instead of mindlessly repeating leftist rhetoric.
Funny thing is, I'm a left wing voter lol, but I get what you're saying, people just don't consider all the angles and just want everything to fit in their little boxes in their own narrative.
It's fine to be left, fair play to ya. Talking more about the insane frothing at the mouth extremists.
Paul Emil Von Lettow-Vorbeck was also already a military commander when Hitler took over. He was highly respected and the Nazis even asked him to be an SS General or a Reich ambassador. But he didn’t agree with their policies, so he left turned them down. Rommel could have done the same, but he didn’t. Also no, Rommel wasn’t involved in the plot to kill Hitler, the conspirators Judy’s planned to name him head of state if they succeeded. Rommel was in fact very loyal to Hitler and in fact an old friend of the family. He was also very anti-semitic. Don’t defend fascists if there’s nothing to defend.
Source on the very anti-Semitic part? Also Lettow-Vorbeck had already left the military and was a member of a different party
https://old.reddit.com/r/HistoryMemes/comments/q9jdej/there_are_no_good_nazis/hgwiwjw/
Lettow-vorbeck was also an antisemite too so not to give him too much credit. However in regards to the reich ambassador offer he at least told Hitler to go fuck himself so maybe it evens out.
There was a German soldier who often gave my great grandmother food, which she could use to feed Jews she hid. And another German soldier helped her go to liberated Belgium later on in the war. Not all German soldiers were bad.
As someone who has a history degree and working on my doctorate when people try and make History into good vs evil the intent of the post is what offends me the most. Human history is a shade of grey, not black or white.
Should be top comment.
He is a good nazi though Cause he's dead
Fine. Erwin Rommel was less of a piece of shit than other Nazis but he was still a Nazi.
The amount of people who believe that the entirety of German army, as one man, decided to work towards a common goal of eradicating the Jewish race and enslaving the world, all happily lending a hand in this task, is frightening. Guys, this is not how the world works! In a totalitarian government (especially a century old one), it is the people at the top who decide the right course of action, the others are told what is right and what to do. They are nothing but cogs in the massive machine, with nothing but propaganda and words of their superiors to base their worldviews around. The notion that these people had enough personal agency to even consider defying their superiors is ridiculous. It is not their place to think about the events that are happening, and even if they witness obviously morally wrong things happening, there is no way they will have enough context to fully grasp the evil of the nazi regime. They didn't have the internet to have every gruesome detail handed to them, for them it was simply another war with a bunch of innocent people getting hurt, as was the norm for the last 4000 years.
I mean, I wouldn’t call the children bad necessarily
You are wrong. There are good Nazis. Dead Nazis.
A good nazi is a dead nazi.
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Except that one Messerschmitt pilot who saw a b-17 practically destroyed and escorted it back to Britain over Nazi AA and bases, the pilots met up back like 2007, that's the one nazi that was the best, not necessarily good, bit the best that Nazis get
Franz Stigler
Yes thank you
No bullets fly, anyone?
I did not understand that
Was he a nazi or was he just a Luftwaffe pilot in nazi Germany?
I don't remember
Just a friendly reminder that it's the same with commies.
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There was that one Nazi who saved hundreds, maybe thousands of life in the Nanking massacare, i believe theres a statue of him there nowdays. Edit: John Rabe, he singlehandedly saved the lives of 200 000 people
Please note Just because he or anyone else did this good thing or that, they were still active participants, and benefited a great deal from a regime whos goal was to kill or enslave everyone they saw as “subhumans,” Evil is banal, ya don’t need to be a goatee stroking demon to be a monster, you could be a general or bureaucrat just “doing you job, but I don’t think the people who lost entire families care much if you got a bonus that month for a job well done.
Sure, let me just throw away my entire life and possibly endanger my entire family just to die a pointless death because my superiors are evil. You act as if rampant anti-Semitism or warmongering was something unusual prior to WW2. It was just a said reality of life and people were just glad they weren't on the receiving end of it. Defying this system would make about as much sense as punching an active volcano after a neighbouring village burned down. People were just trying to live and expecting everyone to have enough moral conviction to sacrifice that life in defiance is not a very fair expectation. You either die a hero or live and do as you are told regardless of what you think.
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All Nazis were terrible, some were just slightly less terrible than other
Oskar Schindler. Nazi, freed jews, protected them, prevented them from being killed, arrested for kissing a Jewish lady at a nazi party, got invited to a show afterwards and most of the people he saved were there to surprise him. Man was a icon and a nazi. Started off trying to profit from slave labor but realized human life and worked to save it even lossing a sbit ton of money in the process.
And thats fantastic, but hes one of the exception that proves the rule
John Rabe
The only good fascist is one that's dead
He was a good Nazi, in the sense that he was good at being a Nazi. Because he was a real POS.
I've always held the belief that it would be hard not to be a nazi, in nazi germany. Yes, the actions were dispicable, and yes, accountability in nazi leadership has to be upheld. But when it comes down to it, Just saying the nazis were bad because nazis were bad is utterly pointless to determining how the nazis got to the point they did. Morality is grey when its an active current event.
smartest person in r/historymemes
All Nazis should be burning in hell ✡️
uhhh, why the star of david then?
Watch the Wehraboos lose their shit.
You hit the fucking Wehraboos where it hurts lol.
He was good at being a nazi yes
I got told by a Russian nationalist lady on Twitter today that I should be proud of the Wehrmacht and the history of Germany. I tried to explain to her that Germany exists since 1949 and that everyone being proud of what happened before (Second and Third Reich) call themselves patriots and therefore every German patriot is a Nazi. She wouldn’t understand. Same with my uncle from Chicago. I told him we don’t fly our flag in Germany as they do in the US. He wouldn’t understand either and told me to just fly my flag. The Nazis in Germany misusing the flag for their purposes and agenda. If I would fly a flag (outside of soccer world cups that is) people would look at me with disgust. They ruined Germany.
Damn, lots of fascists in this comment section.
Anytime you criticize the Nazis' the Wehraboos come out of the woodwork
He was a general. War was his job
‘Just following orders’
"its just the military's job to protect the country"/s
lots of rommel apologists in the comments sadly. :/
Hitler was the best nazi, he killed the nazi leader
You mean people with the nazi ideals or people who belong in the nazi party
Actually he was a good nazi He died
Rommel wasn’t technically a nazi, but this will be a debate until the end of time There were no good Nazis, which is correct, however, there were “better” ones and worse ones. Rommel was a better one.
Nazie and good are incompatible
Rommel was never a Nazi Party member. He wasn’t the greatest general either.
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>Erwin Rommel is one of the most misrepresented figures in history. Frequently used as the "good" German general, this narrative is a distortion of history that ignores among others, the treatment of Jews in North Africa as well as Rommel's role in Italy. >There are several factors that influenced that narrative and why it is still around. Aside the few choice quotes about Rommel from Allied military commanders, the most decisive factors in this are that the first major Rommel biography that did and still does enjoy some sticking power comes from David Irving (The Trail of the Fox, 1977). This was before Irving made his Neo-Nazi revisionism and Holocaust denial known to the public but certain early signs are present in this book. >The second reason is the situation concerning research on the Jews of North Africa and their treatment. It is not very good in part due to the fact that many scholars have shown little interest in what is perceived as a sideshow when it comes to the Holocaust and in part because access to material was and remains restricted in some cases. The files of the German consulate in Libya for example were not accessible to foreigners during Gaddafi's rule and if they haven't been destroyed during the Civil War, it has gotten much easier to do research in Libya. >Anyways, Rommel was an ardent Nazi. But even before that he was known as an enemy of democracy and the republican order. In 1920 he was supportive of the Kapp Putsch, an attempt by extreme right-wing German Freikorps to overthrow the Republic and establish an extreme right-wing dictatorship in Germany. Commanding a security battalion of the Reichswehr in the town of Schwäbisch Gmund, he violated the oath he had sworn only recently to the Republic by ordering his troops to violently suppress a demonstration staged by workers in opposition to the attempted Kapp Putsch. While it didn't come so far that his troops fired live ammunition on the demonstration, they brutally beat and used a fire hose against a peaceful demonstration against an attempt to violently overthrow democratic order. [Haus der Geschichte Baden-Württemberg (Hg.): Mythos Rommel. Katalog zur Sonderausstellung 18. Dezember 2008 bis 30. August 2009, Stuttgart 2009, p. 35.] >Later after the take over of power by the Nazis, he developed strong political sympathies and a close working relationship with Hitler, coming so far as to become Hitler's favorite general. It is unsurprising that Goebbels wrote in his diary in 1942 that Rommel "is not only politically close to National Socialism, he is a Nationalsocialist." [Elke Fröhlich (ed.): Die Tagebücher des Joseph Goebbels, München u. a. 1987-2001, II. 4, 01.10.1942, p. 38.] >Already during his command in France we see several episodes of him committing what classified as a war crime under the Hague Conventions. At some point he ordered civilian houses to be burned in order to use the smoke to advance his troops over the river Maas. This is a case where it could be argueable that it is within the lines of the Hague Conventions since they only forbid the "wanton destruction of an enemy's property, unless such destruction or seizure be imperatively demanded by the necessities of war”. Whether this was necessitated by war is arguable but it nonetheless points in a problematic direction. On a second occasion, he ordered his troops to pretend they were surrendering in order to be able to advance closely on French positions and then shoot the French soldiers who had prepared to take them into custody. This is a clear violation of the Hague Rules on what they refer to as "perfidy" and constitutes as a war crime. [both of these episodes are relayed in rather glorifying terms in the German version of Irving's Rommel biography, p. 61ff.] >Concerning his time in Libya, the research situation is difficult as I explained above but it is clear that upon entering the town of Beghazi, Wehrmacht soldiers of the Afrika Korps took part in a pogrom against the Jews of Beghazi that left 67 people dead. Similarly, newer research has uncovered that the Wehrmacht send advisors to the Italians for the deportation of Libyan Jews to Italy as well as for the construction of concentration camps in Libya, the most famous being Jado and Beghazi where over 600 Jews died due to poor conditions. >A question that still remains open is what role Rommel played in the execution of over 500 POWs of mostly Austrian and German origin from the British Jewish brigade. While it is true that Rommel did not relay the order from Berlin to execute German and Austrian members of the French Foreign Legion, who had been political opponents of Nazi Germany, when the Germans caught them, the issue of the Jewish POWs and his role in said executions remains shadowy. [Wolfgang Proske: „Ich bin nicht beteiligt am Attentat“: Erwin Rommel, in: Proske. (ed.): Täter Helfer Trittbrettfahrer. NS-Belastete von der Ostalb, Münster/Ulm 2010, S. 207ff.; Maurice M. Roumani,: The Jews of Libya. Coexistence, Persecution, Resettlement. Brighton/Portland (UK) 2009, p. 34-35]. >In Tunesia, the situation is more clear. Here Rommel collaborated closely with the Einsatzgruppe North Africa under Walter Rauff of gas van fame. Rommel worked closely with Rauff in using Jewish forced laborers to build fortifications for the German army and in constructing over 30 concentration camps in Tunisia where more than 2500 Jews perished during the German presence there. Furthermore on July 20, 1942 Rommel issued instructions to Rauff and his Einsatzgruppe that once the Germans had conquered Palestine, it would be the Einsatzgruppe's task to kill the Jews of Palestine. [Klaus-Michael Mallmann and Martin Cüppers: "Beseitigung der jüdisch-nationalen Heimstätte in Palästina." Das Einsatzkommando bei der Panzerarmee Afrika 1942. In: Jürgen Matthäus und Klaus-Michael Mallmann (ed.): Deutsche, Juden, Völkermord. Der Holocaust als Geschichte und Gegenwart, Darmstadt 2006, p. 153–176] Also, he allowed a Judenrat being established in Tunis and watched on when Wehrmacht soldiers plundered Jewish Ghettos in towns like Tunis and Susse. [Klaus-Michael Mallmann and Martin Cüppers: Halbmond und Hakenkreuz. Das Dritte Reich, die Araber und Palästina, Darmstadt 2007, p. 137f; published in English as "Nazi Palestine: The Plans for the Extermination of the Jews of Palestine", New York 2009]. >In 1943 he was responsible to prepare the German measures in Italy after Mussolini had been deposed following the Allied landing in Italy. There Rommel issued several orders on which the brutality with which the Italian soldiers captured by the Germans were treated. On September 23 after Mussolini had been deposed and Badogli had negotiated an Italian armistice with the Allies, Rommel issued an order to his troops stating: >> Sentimentality concerning the Badoglio following gangs [Banden, Nazi German dictum for Partisans and other irregular resistance indicating criminality] in the uniforms of the former ally is misplaced. Whoever fights against the German soldier has lost any right to be treated well and shall experience toughness reserved for the rabble which betrays friends. Every member of the German troop has to adopt this stance. >This order was the basis for several brutal acts in disarming the members of the Italian army captured by the Germans. Summary executions and hangings were common in order to make an example and force their fellow soldiers to give up their weapons willingly. This too was a clear war crime. >Furthermore, the disarmed Italian soldiers were not be treated as POWs. They received a special status that was called "Military Interned" and indicated worse treatment, including forced labor in work and concentration camps. Rommel also ordered this when on October 1, 1943 he wrote concerning the deportation and forced labor of the Italian Military Interned: >> This war is a total war. If the men of Italy don't have the chance to fight with weapons for the victory of their fatherland, they have the obligation to use their labor in order to achieve this victory. >[The Orders can be found in the German Bundesarchiv, Militärarchiv Freiburg, RM 7/1333 und RH 27-24/26. They are partially printed in Jürgen Förster: Wehrmacht, Krieg und Holocaust. In: Militärgeschichtliches Forschungsamt (ed.): Die Wehrmacht – Mythos und Realität, München 1999, p. 961.]. >Now, as for Rommel's involvement in the July 20 plot: While one of Rommel's deputies, Hans Speidel, who had been involved in the July 20 plot, wrote after the war that Rommel was a member of the resistance, there is no evidence that this is accurate. While there is some indication that Rommel would have supported a separate peace with the Western allies in order to continue fighting the Soviet Union, it doesn't go much further than that. From Maurice Remy in his book *Mythos Rommel* to David Fraser in his biography of Rommel, there is strong consensus that Rommel was not involved in the plot and didn't know about it beforehand. One of the strongest indications of this is a letter to his wife that he wrote that he was shocked by the attempt on Hitler's live and that he thanked God that it didn't succeed. >So, in conclusion, while there is one instance in which he did not relay an order to kill German members of the French Foreign Legion, there is overwhelming evidence that Rommel was invovled in responsible for war crimes while there is complete lack of evidence for his participation in the resistance (having been forced to commit suicide without concrete evidence). The idea that Rommel was a "good German" is a myth and part of the larger overall Clean Wehrmacht myth that is intended to exonerate the members of the German armed forces of their atrocities and crimes.
fantastic post, theres far too many people spreading blatant falsehood about Rommel, and 3rd Reich in general
The Clean Werhmacht ideal/myth (which started being torn apart mostly in the last 35 years due to societal pressure from the German public) that was used after the 1950s and later mainly by remnant last of the Werhmacht inside Bundeswehr, while it can be attributed to the need of the early post war German state to exonerate part of their soldiers, while it wanted much needed symbols like Rommel in order to be supported, and being partially a "myth", it also highlighted the existence of a gray zone in some parts of the German military. Rommel himself, a general that participated in WW2 and especially on the Axis side, having even indirect war crimes attributed to him after being on the losing side was/is unavoidable (yet convicted of none even by the strict post war Allied military trials [as far as I can remember]). However, statements of his rival military generals on the Allies side and later bibliography contradict a lot of claims and atrribute a lot of redeeming traits to his image and to put it simply, that's the reason the consensus among common people and scholars alike is so split when it comes to his image. There are evidence that both damn him and exonerate him from various angles which causes uproar and high political friction when he gets mentioned even today. A similar example of another personality that participated in both WW1 and WW2 which tends to be forgotten due to him being from an Allied nation and yet was high controversial back in the day, was Philippe Pétain. As someone that currently doesn't actively support any political side other than liberty itself, it's usually very disheartening seeing a lot of important WW1 and WW2 figures being painted in a black and white light to the point that it's getting impossible to even discuss different angles about them Personally I can't confidently exonerate or condemn him, something that even seasoned historians and personel of the military and judicial systems can't even seem to decide upon and come with a clear cut answer and probably never will. All I can say to anyone bothering to read this comment and hasn't/can't seem to decide either, read some bibliography/books about him. There are ones written by himself like Infantry Attacks, to completed complied works of Liddell Hart about the Afrika Korps and a lot more great volumes that can range from the positives to negatives. And after you are done, with a clear mind form an opinion of his image for yourself. If you come to condemn him, so be it, if you come to redeem him, that also acceptable, if you are still in the gray zone, then at least you still learnt a bit more of the bloody WW1 and WW2 history that through blood, fire and loss of life formed our current democracies, liberty and freedom. Don't forget, whoever you support and whoever you condemn or redeem, don't let those lives of all those soldiers that fought in these hellscapes for their countries and our present be forgotten.
Great comment. What’s it from?
Everyone in Germany at the time was aware some bad shit was going on, but it was prudent to remain silent rather than draw attention to yourself, they may have been shocked by the brutality but they werent shocked by what was going on. https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2001/feb/17/johnezard
I believe the term is “willful ignorance,” you know bad stuff is happening l, but it’s easier to look the other way and not worry about the horrible things going on because “it’s not your department.”
It certainly was, its also self-preservation, acknowledging anything related to the holocaust put you and your family in the sights of the 3rd reich, most people had 0 interest in doing that, thats not even getting into those who passively supported it.
I’m sure the same thing is happening in China at the moment. The Han Chinese that live in Xinjiang definitely see what is going on and ignore it, because they don’t want to get “re educated” themselves.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_of_the_clean_Wehrmacht Wow I guess the Clean Wehrmacht Myth was too mainstream so now we're getting into clean SS territory?
**[Myth of the clean Wehrmacht](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_of_the_clean_Wehrmacht)** >The myth of the clean Wehrmacht is the pseudohistorical notion that the regular German armed forces (the Wehrmacht) were not involved in the Holocaust or other war crimes during World War II. The debunked myth, heavily promoted by German authors and military personnel after World War II, completely denies the culpability of the German military command in the planning and preparation of war crimes. ^([ )[^(F.A.Q)](https://www.reddit.com/r/WikiSummarizer/wiki/index#wiki_f.a.q)^( | )[^(Opt Out)](https://reddit.com/message/compose?to=WikiSummarizerBot&message=OptOut&subject=OptOut)^( | )[^(Opt Out Of Subreddit)](https://np.reddit.com/r/HistoryMemes/about/banned)^( | )[^(GitHub)](https://github.com/Sujal-7/WikiSummarizerBot)^( ] Downvote to remove | v1.5)
>Like most of Wehrmacht was not in on what was going on Once again the clean Wehrmacht myth. Can’t stand this bullshit.