What image or event of 2nd World War has moved you the most?

[Davey Boy]

Hetman, I've seen that photo captioned as everything from "dead Jews in Auschwitz" to "German bomb victims in Berlin". How do you know its from Poland?

Tony

..see Ogorek's post below...

[Caldric]

I thought the helm looked more French, I was thinking they used those funny almost firemen looking helms. At any rate he looks injured.


Thinking of equipment, what German soldier would have a prized pair of Binoculars? Scout? Officer?

[Ogorek]

The photo was taken by Julien Bryan, an American journalist who was in Warsaw in 1939, and first published in a book “SIEGE” in 1940. His account was ripped off by Herman Wouk and used in the book “WINDS OF WAR” (which I refer to as ‘WINDS OF WHOOPEE!’)

SIEGE is not an easy book to find, but of interest, the book was re-printed in Warsaw in 1959 as “WARSAW 1939 Siege - 1959 Warsaw revisited, where in addition the original text, and many of the photos, Bryan sought out, and found many of the people he had photographed, including the then 12-year-old girl (Kazimera Mika) who was weeping over her older sister, killed among others when strafed by Stukas while digging potatoes near Pawazki cemetary.

[harry palmer]

Re: that photograph of the German and French soldiers. The photograph comes from Purnell's "History of the Second World War" and is captioned "A dying French soldier, assisted by the man who shot him"

[harry palmer]

BTW, as regards the German's equiment (some of which was clipped off when I had to reduce the image); interestingly he seems to be carrying both a K98 and a Luger, although I cannot discern any rank markings. Unfortunately my scanner is off-line at the moment so I'll have to send on the rest of the image at a later stage.

[Christoph Awender]

Hello!

A long time I wondered which image/event I should add to this thread and I didn´t come to a decision till today. This nightshift I saw the 120 minutes edited film of the Eichmann trial.

Seeing Eichmann talk and act brought the horror of war very close to me. How he reacted on the accusations, attacks... how he talks about his four journeys to report about the killing methods to Heydrich and Gruber.
See him listening to all the witnesses etc...

So many feelings and questions came to my mind watching these scenes and I am still thinking about the things I saw tonight.

In his last words at the end of the trial he talks about a book he wants to write to show people that such things should never happen again.
Did they allow him to write it before his execution?

All in all a very, very impressing film-document and I recommend it to everyone.

[Caldric]

Re: that photograph of the German and French soldiers. The photograph comes from Purnell's "History of the Second World War" and is captioned "A dying French soldier, assisted by the man who shot him"

Man that is deep. All the more proof of the irony of war, they may have been friends in another place and time.

[harry palmer]

It really reminded me of a similar incident in "All Quiet on the Western Front". Audie Murphy's "To Hell and Back" recounts another story of soldiers trying to save a German who had been an enemy to them only minutes before.

[tonyh]

Cheers Hetman and Ogorek, that clears that up. I guess there have been many, many photos abused and misused over the years to promote an agenda. This one is just one of the many.

Tony

[subskipper]

Re: that photograph of the German and French soldiers. The photograph comes from Purnell's "History of the Second World War" and is captioned "A dying French soldier, assisted by the man who shot him"

Thanks Harry. I suppose that I can now add this photograph to those that have moved me the most. It is very powerful indeed. Many thanks for showing it to us Harry.


~Henric Edwards

[Psycho Mike]

There is a famous shot of Leni Reifenstahl in Poland screaming in agony as she is restrained by German soldiers as she watches them fighting in Poland. Haunting and scary, more so because we can't tell what is causing her breakdown. Only that she feels they are not acting like good soldiers.
If someone out there can find it and post,I'd be much obliged.

[Samantha]

What picture moved me the most... it was one I saw years ago. It's a posed picture of a bunch of Russian soldiers standing in a square in Germany with captured German banners held in their hands but upside down, dragging on the ground. The Russian soldier nearest the camera has a flat Mongolian face, and an expression of contempt. I feel anger at that, but fear also-- I'm a white gal and I hope to heck I have a pistol with me, and don't waste the last bullet!

Yeesh, I'm glad I'm in America sometimes... where we might not be right (ha) but at least us little people only have to worry about our own problems.

[Zygmunt]

I think it is that guerilla's, in the metaphor of Chairman Mao, are like fish swimming in the sea of a host populace, drawing comfort and sustenance from that enemy population. (I would argue that guerillas also draw aid and arms from enemy superpowers directly supporting them, clandestinely or by proxy as well, but that is besides the point.)

Anyway, using Mao's image, what you want to do is "drain the swamp" by controlling the enemy populace somehow, whether contained in ghettoes, concentration camps, or "fortified hamlets," as the U.S. did in South Vietnam.

The U.S. during WWII also considered Japanese-American citizens living on the West Coast to be enemy aliens and "Fifth Columnists" and sent them to concentration camps. There was absolutely nothing to support this position.

And the British put Boer civilians into concentration camps--that is the origin of the word--as well, in order to put pressure on Boer "guerillas" during that South African colonial campaign.

So, the principles of security during irregular/regular war and occupation are nothing new or unique. Plus, clearing the ghettoes was not safe for the Germans by any means and did involve armed resistance and casualties.

Absolutely. Britain did the same thing in Malaya 1948-60, with "fortified villages" which were the model for the (somewhat less successful) US "Strategic Hamlets" in Vietnam.

Doesn't "Draining the swamp" seem rather like what Milosevic's forces were trying to do in Kosovo? Albeit by somewhat brutal means?

As for an image, or account of WWII which moved me, I would have to name "Catch 22", specifically the passages in which Yossarian tries to tend to his wounded fellow crewmember in the aircraft. It is fiction I know, but was based on Hellers experiences with wounded aircrew while serving with the USAAF.

"Freezing to death, in a puddle of yellow sunshine"

[Roberto]

I feel anger at that, but fear also-- I'm a white gal and I hope to heck I have a pistol with me, and don't waste the last bullet!

[Roberto]

So, the principles of security during irregular/regular war and occupation are nothing new or unique.

Slaughtering innocent civilians at a ratio of 50-100:1 in reprisal actions or wiping out the non-combatant population of entire villages, towns and regions in so-called "anti-partisan operations" can hardly be justified by "principles of security during irregular/regular war and occupation".

[…]The overview especially shows very clearly who were the victims of German major operations between 1942 and 1944. The relation between the number of so-called enemy dead or those “liquidated” or “shot” – self-explanatory terms – on the one hand and the number of captured rifles, machine pistols and machine guns on the other was usually between 6:1 and 10:1. As since the end of 1942 at the latest every partisan possessed such a weapon – new members had to bring one along – this means that about 10 to 15 percent of the victims of the German actions were partisans. The remaining 85 to 90 percent were mainly peasants from the surroundings as well as refugees. This is confirmed by the extremely low German losses, the relation of German dead to those on the other side usually being 1:30 to 1:300, on average 1:100.
What these relations meant was generally known among the German occupation officials in Belorussia. For instance, General Commissar Kube wrote about a preliminary report received from SS and police commander v. Gottberg about the operation “Cottbus”, according to which there had been “4,500 enemy dead” and “5,000 dead bandit suspects.” Kube commented as follows:
“If only 492 rifles are taken from 4,500 enemy dead, this discrepancy shows that among these enemy dead were numerous peasants from the country. The Battalion Dirlewanger especially has a reputation for destroying many human lives. Among the 5,000 people suspected of belonging to bands, there were numerous women and children.”
Reich Commissar Hinrich Lohse forwarded Kube’s report with the following note:
“What is Katyn compared to this? […] To lock men, women and children into barns and to set fire to these, does not appear to be a suitable method of combating bands, even if it is desired to exterminate the population.” [italics in original, translator's note][…]

My translation from Christian Gerlach’s book Kalkulierte Morde, see my post of Fri Aug 30, 2002 8:38 pm on the thread

Major Anti-partisan Operation in Belorussia
http://www.thirdreichforum.com/phpBB2/v ... 9414b8da0c

Not to mention taking advantage of war and occupation to get rid of a segment of the civilian population that certain paranoid morons consider parasitical and/or menacing, according to Goebbels’ diary entry of 27 March 1942:

Beginning with Lublin, the Jews in the General Government are now being evacuated eastward. The procedure is a pretty barbaric one and not to be described here more definitely. Not much will remain of the Jews. On the whole it can be said that about 60 per cent of them will have to be liquidated whereas only about 40 per cent can be used for forced labor.
The former Gauleiter of Vienna, who is to carry this measure through, is doing it with considerable circumspection and according to a method that does not attract too much attention. A judgment is being visited upon the Jews that, while barbaric, is fully deserved by them. The prophesy which the Fuehrer made about them for having brought on a new world war is beginning to come true in a most terrible manner. One must not be sentimental in these matters. If we did not fight the Jews, they would destroy us. It's a life-and-death struggle between the Aryan race and the Jewish bacillus. No other government and no other regime would have the strength for such a global solution of this question. Here, too, the Fuehrer is the undismayed champion of a radical solution necessitated by conditions and therefore inexorable. Fortunately a whole series of possibilities presents itself for us in wartime that would be denied us in peacetime. We shall have to profit by this.
The ghettoes that will be emptied in the cities of the General Government now will be refilled with Jews thrown out of the Reich. This process is to be repeated from time to time. There is nothing funny in it for the Jews, and the fact that Jewry's representatives in England and America are today organizing and sponsoring the war against Germany must be paid for dearly by its representatives in Europe - and that's only right.

Source of quote:

http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/people/g/goe ... ts-02.html

Emphasis is mine.