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Not all Germans captured by the Soviets were summarily raped or executed, though. High profile Nazi scientists survived by working for the Soviets, and some were resettled in either East Germany or West Germany a few years after Stalin's death. Quite a few regular German soldiers survived the war too, after passing through the gulag system. I've met people whose grandparents or parents were captured by the Soviets and sent to Siberia, and they survived, so it did happen too. (I should specify that these survivors were not German... just Slavic people from captured territory, or ethnic Germans from annexed territory who were conscripted into the German army and sent to fight the Soviets).
It's not easy to find info on what the Soviets did with the families of high profile Nazis that they captured.
Would the Goebbels children have been murdered on the spot, given how well-known they were? I just have doubts.
Please stop making too much sense, because this will make some "connoisseurs" of Russia here totally unhappy.
What's even worse - this particular man and his witnessing will be christened as figment of imagination, or pure lunacy.
"Soon after being handed over to the Soviet armed forces, Hartmann experienced the following:
The first thing the Russians did was to separate the German women and girls from the men. What followed was a brutal orgy of rape and debauchery by Red Army soldiers. When the greatly outnumbered Americans tried to intervene, the Russians charged towards them firing into the air and threatening to kill them if they interfered. The raping continued throughout the night. The next day a Russian General arrived at the encampment and immediately ordered a cessation ... Later when a few Russians violated the order again and assaulted a German girl, she was asked to identify them from a lineup. There were no formalities, no court martial. The guilty parties were immediately hanged in front of all their comrades. The point was made.[41] "
So of course it was not about fear of what would happened to Magda's children had they been captured by Russians.
It was all about Magda and her convictions, as some already said here.
I am sure it wasn't an easy thing to do but do you think she ultimately made the right call under the circumstances? Had they lived wouldn't the Russian troops have raped her daughters and then killed them anyway?
Magda Goebbels? Here is Clive James on her:
"When the beautiful Magda Riestschel met her future second husband, she had just finished being passionate about Buddhism. Before that, it had been Zionism. In order to marry Josef Goebbels, she became equally passionate about National Socialism. Her latest and last enthusiasm made even less sense than the others, but there can be no doubt it convinced her; she not only killed herself for it, she made certain that her children died too. And so on, all the way back through history, in which the beautiful women, because they get written about, are forever cropping up in the grip of the latest explanatory fad, whose essential property is to console them for having been picked out from other mortals and thus made to feel so mortal. Friedell caught the essential truth about people prone to catch-all theories: they aren't in search of the truth, they're in search of themselves." Cultural Amnesia, on Egon Friedell.
(My emphasis - the book is a very interesting read.)
So, if Frau Goebbels had also been passionate about Zionism, it suggests that she was in the grip of something other than a fanatic attachment to Nazism. Clive James seems reliable, what I've read of him, & he has a lot to say. The book is a listing of worthies & essays on them, from the arts & history - excellent reading.
Back @ Mrs. Goebbels - James seems to be suggesting that if she had continued on long enough with the Nazis, that she would have very likely tired of their line too, & gone on to the next passion. I don't have a dog in the hunt, & I've never looked into the loyalties that the upper-echelon Nazis had; it didn't seem relevant to me, to anything I was interested in.
Please stop making too much sense, because this will make some "connoisseurs" of Russia here totally unhappy.
What's even worse - this particular man and his witnessing will be christened as figment of imagination, or pure lunacy.
"Soon after being handed over to the Soviet armed forces, Hartmann experienced the following:
The first thing the Russians did was to separate the German women and girls from the men. What followed was a brutal orgy of rape and debauchery by Red Army soldiers. When the greatly outnumbered Americans tried to intervene, the Russians charged towards them firing into the air and threatening to kill them if they interfered. The raping continued throughout the night. The next day a Russian General arrived at the encampment and immediately ordered a cessation ... Later when a few Russians violated the order again and assaulted a German girl, she was asked to identify them from a lineup. There were no formalities, no court martial. The guilty parties were immediately hanged in front of all their comrades. The point was made.[41] "
So of course it was not about fear of what would happened to Magda's children had they been captured by Russians.
It was all about Magda and her convictions, as some already said here.
Not to question the account, but I distinctly remember reading that the only method of execution in the Soviet Army of that period was by the firing squad, since the Communist propaganda associated the hanging with Tsarist Empire ?
Magda and her kids would have been brutalized or killed by the Soviets if they had been found running away or trying to surrender, just like anyone else in Berlin was who was caught in the chaos and turmoil; that was Berlin in the end. I don't believe the Soviets would have given gentle treatment to anyone they caught especially those who had ties to a very prominent Nazi like Goebbels, even if they were "only" the wife and kids.
The death of the kids and the parents was probably the only practical solution for the Goebbels, especially if you look at the time and place and how the Goebbels thought of the Hitlers as very good friends that they chose not to abandon at the end.
Magda's other son from her first marriage survived the war.
Magda and her kids would have been brutalized or killed by the Soviets if they had been found running away or trying to surrender, just like anyone else in Berlin was who was caught in the chaos and turmoil; that was Berlin in the end. I don't believe the Soviets would have given gentle treatment to anyone they caught especially those who had ties to a very prominent Nazi like Goebbels, even if they were "only" the wife and kids.
The death of the kids and the parents was probably the only practical solution for the Goebbels, especially if you look at the time and place and how the Goebbels thought of the Hitlers as very good friends that they chose not to abandon at the end.
Magda's other son from her first marriage survived the war.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Frostnip
Didn't read the thread, eh?
Country, your last line is telling.
Magda Goebbels first son (Harald Quandt) survived because he was old enough to be serving in the German Luftwaffe and was not in Berlin but instead was captured by Allied troops in Italy in 1945. If Magda had left Berlin and gone west to the Allies, both her and her children would probably had survived. Some of the children may be alive to this very day.
Not to question the account, but I distinctly remember reading that the only method of execution in the Soviet Army of that period was by the firing squad, since the Communist propaganda associated the hanging with Tsarist Empire ?
Officially so, it probably was.
But from what I see here, I would read the situation in a way that whoever was in charge that day, opted specifically for hanging to send a message to perpetrators that they were not even worth a bullet, since it was more dignified way to go. The reason for it I suspect was that after all the warnings, they chose to rape a child. That's why the superiors made sure that she'd identify the guilty party, and someone got very personal to bring a point across this way, even though the official, *prescribed* method of execution was the firing squad.
Magda had no idea what would happen to her children once they got into the hands of the allies. If we killed thousands of children through terror bombing what would stop them from slaughtering her children. Maybe we wouldn't have killed them but she didn't know that.
Magda had no idea what would happen to her children once they got into the hands of the allies. If we killed thousands of children through terror bombing what would stop them from slaughtering her children. Maybe we wouldn't have killed them but she didn't know that.
Uh huh...
Millions of German refugees fled for the lines of the Western Allies in the face of the Red Army's advance. They knew.
Hundreds of thousands of Wehrmacht soldiers, who did virtually anything to avoid surrendering to the Russians, happily laid down their arms in the West. They knew.
Albert Speer made sure his family made it to the West. He knew.
Martin Bormann sent his family to reach Allied lines in Italy. He knew.
Hermann Goering made sure his wife and daughter were in territory occupied by the Western Allies. He knew.
Heinrich Himmler, a doting father to daughter Gudrun who often brought her with him on official business, saw to it that his family reached American forces in Italy. He knew.
But somehow, this was all a big secret to Magda... who just had to off five children because she didn't know with millions of refugees, hundreds of thousands of soldiers, and every other high-ranking Nazi leader knew.
Of course she didn't - should have said to Joseph: "Go to Valhalla, if you will, but the kids and I are going to Westphalia."
The problem with propaganda is that you end up believing your own lies.
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Another voice
