Dachau SS guards shot

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3088025/How-American-doctor-witnessed-Dachau-s-SS-guards-tortured-shot-dead-GIs-cold-blood-coming.html

this is part of the story of the 45th ID at Dachau....the book Rock of Anzio describes this more in detail..also said some of the ex POWS tore guards apart...with their bare hands..and some with tools

http://remember.org/witness/sparks2

Felix Sparks gives his account

humans and emotions...humans and unfathomable rage...... .some of the US soldiers were horrified, shocked, sick, etc by seeing the ''scenes'' at Dachau..and then, the shooting of the unarmed SS guards
when you treat humans like this, something that you as a human could never do, comes to the surface, correct?? something unimaginable and horrific...inhuman,but really, human, no???

 

They should have done that at every camp, as policy.

 

Alex Kershaws's book on the 45th goes into detail about this as well. It's amazing to me that there weren't more mass executions by the Allies when liberating camps after witnessing the atrocities. The psychological toll was excruciating.

 

There were a LOT of summary executions of captured SS men. The only reason this incident is known is because some war correspondents showed up immediately after.

 

both interesting points...yes KJ, especially thinking of not only the scenes they saw, but of all they went through before that.....the hell they went through, physically, mentally and spiritually....do you mean the book ''The Liberator"...? read that....
wow, Kody...you get to the point in all your posts....very admirable....I think I posted long ago, and believe like you, there were a lot more ''executions'', etc than what is known or talked about....i cannot blame the US men for this shooting at all.....
my other point was the POWs revenge killings....to my knowledge, they were not charged with any crimes..Dachau unleashed their human rage...the war unleashed the evil in humans and caused a human tidal wave- explosion, chain reaction, etc, of this human evil

 

Good point.

 

The photo below is Franz Zieres, commandant of Mathausen. He was "shot while escaping" by some GI's and some inmates decided to decorate a fence with him. This is part of the reality of what happened as Germany fell.

View attachment 22528

 

The picture of Sparks in the middle of the article with his hand up and pistol in opposite hand always stuck with me. Quite the microcosm of the mind. One can only imagine the emotions battling within him at that moment.

http://scrapbookpages.com/DachauScrapbook/DachauLiberation/SoldiersKilled.html

 

That is a great link, KJ!

 

One of the things that I have always given thought to was how Mr. Geiser and his unit reacted if they captured any of the guards of the camp that they liberated. Things like this thread have given me some insight into how some Americans who liberated the camps reacted to the guards, but I've always wondered how Mr. Geiser and his unit reacted if they did capture any guards.

 

AFAIK the GIs did not murder any guards simply because there were no guards any more. They had run away before the GIs arrived. NCOs from a nearby training facility and even wounded SS men from a hospital fell victim to the GIs.

By the way, the Daily Hail is not a reliable source of either news or history.

 

Killing in anger is not always good. I trust these guys were not innocent but I cannot be sure.

 

They were wearing SS uniforms. They were not innocent.

 

I do not blame any GIs or POWs for killing anyone, innocent or not......once the explosion of killing/rape/etc has started, the chain reaction starts....that's just what humans will do...I'm sure a lot of innocents were '''murdered''....but that's the way it is....if anyone was to blame for innocent German SS being killed, it would be hitler, heydrich, etc....that's just tough luck they were there at that time...

 

Its tough to fathom the morality of the situation. Its also tough to fathom the feelings of discovering one of those camps would be like. I can imagine I would have little qualms with those GIs shooting the SS, if I wasn't holding a rifle myself. You could say the people involved in running the camps may have deserved a trial, which so very few received. Knowing the fact that most SS got away with it, I personally wish that shootings like this had happened on the regular.
I guess it would be considered 'in bad taste' to receive an award for killing POWs, but this would be the case I would argue.

 

I think most of them were Waffen-SS, not regular.


Legal or not, the guards would have deserved it but the GIs seem to have gotten the wrong guys. Though I get why they reacted the way they did.

 

The Waffen SS were terrible people as well. They got what they deserved. In page two of KJ's link you can see that at least some of the SS lined up against that wall were guards. Several prisoners asked for a particular guard so they could deal with him personally. The GIs gave them the guard and he was beaten to death with a shovel.

 

I have to agree. In this case, and I can't imagine the feeling this is just conjecture, but if a prisoner in the camp asked to deal with a camp guard, regardless of unit, how could you not allow them to take matters into their own hands after witnessing their physical and emotional state. Those are the countless witnesses and victims to the crimes.

 

That photo - taken out of context is terrible. A defenseless man about to be beaten to death with a shovel.
Put into context, it makes me want to frame it and hang it on my wall. A little piece of redemption.
I play video games, and there is nothing I find more gratifying that shooting nazis. At least I can make those bastards pay 'virtually'.
If they had a game called line up the SS guards and shoot them, I bet it would be a best seller.

 

Today's ethical thinking doesn't allow us to judge was it right or not. At that point it was total war and hate against the enemy was mainly the driving force to most of the men. It's hard to imagine what those US troopers felt when they faced things like concentration camps. Those men were already stretched to the limits and they've already seen real horror and suddenly they have to encounter something they've never could imagine seeing - concentration camp.

Everyone has his breaking point. I can understand what happened, let it be right or wrong.