Last year I spoke with a German LAH veteran (Nachrichtenkompanie) who was attached to KG Peiper in the Ardennes. He has his own theory about what happened and I tend to believe he's right. First of all he stated that he can't deny what happened (as many other veterans do). He believes the men in the field were killed by the crew of the present 251's, not by the Panzers. Must say this makes sense to me since he showed me on location why the tanks are out of the question. He also gave me a psychological profile on the men who did it. He said: "imagine these 17-year old grenadiers, green as grass the only thing that makes them feel strong is their gun. A small group of these teenagers is ordered to guard this large group of Americans". He said that he's convinced that the SS-men were probabely more scared of the American prisoners then vise versa. And then all over sudden the Americans start moving. As a reflex the grenadiers opened fire. Like all men without sufficient training would do (whoever trained young recrutes knows this is a fact).

I don't say its right to open fire, no way, but I guess I understand the reflex that made them do it.

After they stopped firing the soldiers realized the consequenses of what they did (they knew the war would be over soon) and they decided to kill all survivors. Had they been battle harden veterans nobody whould have lived to tell, but even this (fortunately) these rookies couldn't do "right".

That, executing survivors, was their real crime. And a crime that was. No doubt about it.

[ 05 July 2002, 12:03 PM: Message edited by: Timo ]

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Also spricht der Narr: 'der Umgang mit Menschen verdirbt den Charakter, sonderlich wenn man keinen hat.'