Germans invited to D-day 60th.

This is an enormously difficult subject as we in Europe saw only too clearly during the 50th Anniversaries ten years ago.

Many of the wounds - physical and mental - inflicted 60 years ago run very deep indeed among those who were there.

It's easy for us who didn't know those times not to understand - I'm certainly not saying that I do - but some veterans can 'forgive and forget', others can never do so. We should respect this.

It may sound unduly harsh, but tragically, only when such events pass from living memory ( as is almost the case with WW1 ) can real objectivity be approached.

In my opinion it would be better in any case if modern-day politicians would stay at home .

 

Well it looks very much as if Sapper has answered my points in my post above.

As Martin also says, people have very strong views on this subject.

These views apart I still believe that the German head of state should attend in order to show his respect for the efforts of OUR
troops that defeated a vile enemy called Hitler.

Regards Graham.

 

Brian's view is completely respectable. HE has the right to choose whom he wants to remember on that very special day. He was there and he has reasons enough to think the way he does.

I, however don't agree with his view. That day many other men from many nations lost their lives. One should also remember that there were two stationary divisions in Normandy, along Juno and Sword beaches. 3rd rate divisions made of Soviet asiatic POWs who of course, did not want to be there and even less, fight for the Führer. They killed and they died as well.

French maquis —terrorists for many people— also died and gave their lifes for their country too. Shouldn't they be remembered as well? Shouldn't German boys fighting for their comrades and their family back home more than for Goebbels and Hitler's insanities? Of course they should.

I was really touched when I watched a documentary about Pearl Harbour in which veterans, survivours of USS Arizona shook hands with Japanese Zero and dive-bombers pilots who participated in the attack. I saw tears, hugs and remembrances. I think a lot of blood had to be spilled to wash rencor away...

Many veterans, however, refused to shake hands with the men who killed their mates and sunk their ships. But the ones who did, gained many friends and made reconciliations with their own past.

My grandfather is one exemplary case. He —as Sapper— suffered very severe war injuries. He lost an eye and a bullet went so deep into his throat that he hasn't been able to speak since May 1945! And he still has attended many reunions of veterans in North Africa, Italy —where he met with British, American, Italian, Canadian, Australian, Indian, French, Polish and New Zealander veterans—, he even madea long trip to Russia a few years ago to beg for pardon and to pardon himself. He didn't contact any veteran, but the old battlefields —the bloodiest in History— made him change his mind and try to beat the deamons inside his head.

I admire him for that.

 

this is just becoming like the Dresden thread and should be closed. It has spent itself as forum users are continually repeating themselves. I find it regrettable in some ways that several members feel the way they do....... but this is just part of life plain and simple. War has left scares on some, those that fought there some 60 plus years ago as well as those that have been grandfathered in, such as myself; "Rote kind" coming from WW 2 aged parents and familie that fought on both sides as well as dying to defend their country. Not for politcal reasons but because their country called them up for service. I know some of you just will not be able to understand this but that is the way it was for us.......

v/r

~Erich

 

Erich
I don't know about closure of this thread

Members may still want to contribute to it.

What I do know is that I will be there as I have just booked my campsite about 400 metres from Pegasus bridge

I am looking forward to this very much as it is the first vetrans event I have ever attended.

We will visit Sword beach too in order to carry out a promise made to sapper on a different thread

Regards Graham

 

Graham:

I really see no point beating a dead horse over the head. Either you are or you are not. Pretty simple.....

The 60 year anniversary should be quite an event so hoping you come away with some great photos and a special time to meet the veterans that were there. Your honoring Brian is a noble cause. Good for you !

but again it is time for the veterans to attend and their families, let the governments stay out as they were the cause of this whole bloody mess in the first place

 

There are many Veterans who would turn in their graves at the thought of the Germans attending the 60th anniversary of D Day.

I asked one or two Veterans how they felt about this issue, here I must apologise, for I cannot print the answers.

What is being missed here, is that the invasion of Normandy was to drive out an evil regime. A regime that had murdered, maimed, tortured and killed all across Europe, Russia, and a hundred other places. How are the Veterans that fought and lost good comrades removing this evil regime, supposed to come to terms with having to share an anniversary with them.

AS much as I would like, I cannot welcome people that invaded innocent Nations, fought and killed everywhere.

IT seems to me that every German soldier attending would have a ghostly throng behind him. the grey shadowy ghostly figures that lost their lives sometimes in unbearable agony. The shadowy ghosts of yesterday, a huge throng fading away into the distance.

The gathering of the millions that lost their lives in the Germans naked ambition of creating the evil of the greater Germany of the Third Reich.
When we are gone, then perhaps we shall carry the memory away with us.

Then I just wonder how the French feel about welcoming back those that invaded and ruled their country? for they paid a terrible price under the occupation.
Sapper

 

Brian:

I can understand your pain only through the many veteran contacts I have had. War is hell and it sucks and you have seen too much of it. I'll not comment anymore.......but I will say once these celebrations if we want to call them that do occur and the video tape is rolling will the outside world really get a TRUE taste of what went on ? Will the reports be one-sided ? This is one aspect of my feelings in having the German veterans there. Maybe not in unison with the victorious Allies but maybe a seperate meeting to gather and remember the fallen. Leave the big-whig officials at home.

ok I have said enough.

 

But hang on a min Brian. You were a part of the British Army at a time when Britain had an Empire. That word EMPIRE is the same wether its apllied to Rome, Germany or Great Britain. It means one country occupies and takes over other countries for its own benifit. It was only a few years before WW2 that the RAF were bombing Afghan villages and gassing kurds. It was only a couple of decades before WW2 that British soldiers killed peaceful demonstrators in India. Ok, argue numbers if you want, but murder is murder.

You were and i am members of an army that going back through history has built and defended deffinatly the biggest and possable one of the most brutal Empires ever.

If the families of our victims can put the past behind them, surley you can.

 

Are we back to PC lectures again? This has got more like a Social Worker's tea-break than a WW2 forum recently.

[ 13. January 2004, 07:07 PM: Message edited by: The_Historian ]

 

are you talking about this particular thread at the moment or the whole ww2 forums. Because if you are stating the latter you are correct.....

 

Erich,
I was referring to certain sections of the forum as a whole, not this thread in particular. Should have made that more clear.

Regards,
gordon

 

Easy: It's 2004 and "those that invaded and ruled their country" are no more. Not their regime, and, with few exceptions, not the soldiers.

If war – any war – has a basic lesson, than it’s to do everything to avoid the next one. I find it very hard to succeed in this by cultivating a culture of distrust, reservation, unjust condemnation or outright hatred towards another country or their people. I don’t need people of my generation (or younger) saying „I don’t like country x or people for x because for what they done to my country / family etc. 60 years ago.“. Cultivating this kind of war heritage over the next generations has no other purpose other than serving cheap own prejudices and to make another war more possible. This attitude makes peace just a time period between the last and the next war.

While I agree that for our parents‘ generation, who experienced the war, it might be hard, maybe very hard or even impossible to reach out a hand and ask for or accept forgiveness, I see no reason why my generation should continue to fight this war in our hearts and minds.

After the war, it was one of the biggest historical achievements that already the majority of the generation who experienced the war, realized the lesson and started to build a culture of mutual friendship and trust between the former enemies to establish an enduring peace, unfortunately handicapped by the Iron curtain and contrary ideologies until 1990. The French-German friendship shouldn’t be an exception but an example for a likewise German-Polish, Czech-German friendship. The Russian-German relationship since the 1990s is very encouraging. THIS is the heritage my generation should proceed, not being held hostage by the ghosts of what our fathers and grandfathers did or suffered from. But I admit it’s more hard to fight for mutual friendship between former enemies compared instead of comfortably staying in the trenches and keeping old resentments alive.

So maybe it’s not the question to ask why there is such a strong Franco-German friendship, but to ask: Why isn’t there a likewise strong British-German, Polish-German, Czech-German friendship? Maybe I’ll get some flak here, but while I can observe that Poles, Czechs and especially Russians are very interested in a mutual friendship with Germany, even young Britons are still seem to be stuck into the mindset of the 1940s with Germany being the big evil. If that observation is right, it’s more a British problem than a German one (hope that doesn’t sound too accusing). It’s common for Germans in the UK to be referred to be a “Nazi”. British newspaper are selling with anti-German articles and headlines. Students in the UK learn a lot about Nazi Germany, but almost nothing about contemporary Germany. That’s like if Germans would stop to study British history with the Nineteenth Century, having a picture of an imperialistic and violent empire where Manchester-Capitalism substituted slavery.


WRT to the invitation of Schroeder to the 60th anniversary:

Schroeder didn’t asked for it. He was invited by Chiraq and he, who lost his father during the war, will be pleased to attend. Can’t remember any other country participating raising objections. The key question is what you see in the D-Day celebration:

- a opportunity for all involved to mourn their losses: Certainly Germany has a place there

- remembering those that fought to liberate Europe from Nazism: Why shouldn‘t the Chancellor of a new, free and democratic Germany being invited to it? D-Day didn’t just symbolize the W-Allies‘ part in the liberation of Nazism in Europe, but also the liberation of Nazism in Germany.

- a meeting of the few remaining allied veterans: No need to attend.


- celebrating a battle fought against Germans: No need to attend.

‘nuff said.

[ 14. January 2004, 03:26 AM: Message edited by: AndyW ]

 

In some ways I would like to come to terms that the war is long gone. That I really ought to welcome my former enemies, But then, I have to come to terms with the fact that by the actions of the Nazi's I lost many friends,

Should I now say "Forget them" The massed graves of fallen service men? Welcome former enemies?

Then again I recall that all over Germany, Poland, There were concentration camps, death camps, hundreds of white skelital bodies waiting to be buried, I recall the villages wiped off the map, Not just in France, but in many places elsewhere. The hangings, the beatings, the role of the Gestapo. I recall the savage repression of Warsaw. This is where I find it so difficult to come to terms with those that knew all about what was going on. The buzz bombs, the rockets raining down on innocent women and children.

I recall the people screaming Sieg Heil, when Hitler paraded up and down in his staff car. Do not tell me! that the Germans knew nothing about what was happening to the Jews!

Those were not isolated instances, it was everywhere, each time Hitler conquered another country he was hailed as a hero. The unspeakable cruelty, the savagery, was so wide spread there is not the faintest chance that it was not known.

WE are not talking about a few thousand dead we are talking of 50 million dead... Who was responsible for those deaths?

Should I forget my mates that died freeing Europe from the yoke of the evil Nazi regime?

When we, the old Veterans go, then perhaps it will be easier to forge some sort of bond with our former enemies. The German people were happy enough while they were winning, make no mistake they adored Hitler......I should now forget?
I am sorry I cannot do that.
Sapper.

 

OK, gentlemen. Before we go any further I would like to make VERY clear what I think is the general thought of the members here:

WWII and all its atrocities —by all sides— must NEVER be forgotten because it would mean making all those deaths worthless. However, forgive is a should for the wellfare of the new generations.

How veterans from the USS Arizona can shek hands with Zero pilots of December 7th 1941? How the sons of Eichmann and other SS monsters can meet with the sons of Auschwitz's survivours? Because of that great virtue we all Christians proclaim: forgiveness.

Sapper's view —as I said already— is completely valid. He lost friends and was injured himself by those men. But those men lost friends too and were injured as well.

And I'm sure there will be no ex Gestapo agents or SS veterans attending the meetings...

But enough. That's all I'll say in this thread. It's time for me to shut up. Let it be.

 

I was posting the same but had second thoughts. Well said Friedrich. We must not forget history and those who made it and those who suffered. May we learn from it and yes move on. If we cannot forgive and forget, then lets not let that intervene in the healing process. Honorable Sapper has every right to feel how he does. Others may disagree. Everyone deals with it in their own way. I also say lets move on.

 

Sorry, but you sound like a total hypocrite to me. Everyone knew about the slave trade Britain conducted. There are peoples in the world, the North American Indians, Australian Aborigonies and New Zealand Maories to name just 3 who still suffer because of our Empire building. You condemn soldiers who defended an Empire while you did exactly the same thing.

 

Sapper. [/QB][/QUOTE]Sorry, but you sound like a total hypocrite to me. [/QB][/QUOTE]

I find that comment a bit harsh Bish

Brian is simply stating his personal views at to why he wouldn't wish to stand shoulder to shoulder with German vets.
His views are understandable. He is entitled to these views and to air them on these boards.

I don't think that calling him a hypocrite is advancing this matter any. Sad comment I think

Regards Graham

 

You vailidated a point Sir Bish. Each country did at one time commited some kind of crime against humanity during its imperialistic expansion. but those countries have changed and most no longer conduct such acts. I believe the point here is to allow Germany that same opportunity to change without being reminded of its dark history.

 

Just a thought Bish.........

Do you really hold the OBE ?

If so what does that medal stand for ?

Mmmmmm "Glass houses.... throwing stones". Pot and kettle ?

Regards Graham