German soldiers talk about ww2

[Unsettomati]

Originally Posted by Unsettomati

People rationalize.

The wartime experience of soldiers is usually the most intensely emotional thing they will ever experience, and it generally occurs when they are of an impressionable age. They are faced with accepting that they were agents in a mission of evil, or absolving themselves of that guilt. Most choose the latter. And this certainly is not limited to Germans of World War II.

I'm sure many Soviet veterans of the Afghan campaign in the 70s and 80s do the same thing. I've certainly heard some veterans of the recent Iraq do so, insisting that there really were 'vast stockpiles of WMD'. They're coping. They're trying to give the deaths of their buddies meaning. They're trying to justify going through what has left them with PTSD, or with a prosthetic limb, or with a ruined marriage because they came back as someone other than the person their spouse married.

As I wrote before, the denialism is very predictable. Right? No, certainly not. But it is typical human behavior.

Originally Posted by Dr. Evil

I had a long response typed to this but instead I'll just offer this. What you see as denialism is the truth to many. You obviously have your mind made up and choose to see it as such.

Well, duh.

Denialists always think their denial is the truth. That's how coping mechanisms work.

Soldiers today are much more informed and much more intelligent than the average citizen. Most of us, yes a vast majority of us, simply live our lives. We are not damaged and full of rage and PTSD, please don't try to characterize us all as such. Its simply not true. There is a perspective on life that anyone who has never been in actual combat will never know.

Please don't falsely suggest I did any such thing. I used the word 'some' - which you quoted, before going on to insinuate otherwise - instead of 'all' for a reason.

[Steve Bagu]

Not sure when that video was made but those men do not look to be over 90 yrs of age as woud be the case if they were soldiers during the 1941-45 time period.

I was 14 and under age in the Canadian Reserve Army (1945) before the war ended. A person was to be at least 16 and I lied my age/

I did see captured German 8MM film showing British and Canadian soldiers being marched on the beach by German soldiers with bayonets laughing towards the camera and in the background the dead bodies being brought to shore via the waves. I could read the units they were from via the shoulder insignia we wore.

These men are speaking of the 3rd Reich as if they had learned or experienced some info in a few years after 1945.

Personally I do not give their opinions much value......a library might show more correct info based upon a persons actual experience then the current hearsay.

[travric]

Re: 'Personally I do not give their opinions much value......a library might show more correct info based upon a persons actual experience then the current hearsay'

You know it would seem that the comments by the German war veterans were of a type that can be called 'oral history'. And in them contain the opinions and rationalization of combatants in the war. All in all anybody affected by the war would have recollections that because of their perhaps exceedingly personal view would sound maybe disjointed or 'wrong' to hearers.
But I'd think it's important to note that when it comes to the war civilians, generals, politicians , clergy, resistance fighters, traitors, soldiers, et etc all have a perspective where being a 'victim' perhaps brings about much different attitudes in rationalizing behavior in hindsight.