@@TheDKServices Indeed, in fairness one can substitute “dog” for any favorite animal. I happen to be a cat person, and though I love dogs and animals to be exact, they never disappoint. I’m not a people’s person at all. Best regards to you.
My grandfather landed at Omaha beach and ended up in the 3rd army under George Patton. He fought across France and took part in the battle of the bulge. He would never discuss the war even with my grandmother. He had a locked footlocker we all knew we were forbidden to touch. When I was preparing to leave for Vietnam he asked me to walk with him and told me the war would change me in ways I couldn’t imagine, but he said son don’t lose your humanity because if you become callous to killing it will destroy you. Then he said something I’ll never forget. He said I hope to god you never have to kill a man hand to hand. He seemed to be saying goodbye like he knew we’d never see each other again. Unfortunately I did kill a Vietcong soldier hand to hand, and we never saw each other again. He died close to the end of my first tour. I didn’t take leave to attend his funeral because I knew he would want me to remain with my team, but my grandmother said he left me the footlocker. I volunteered for a 2nd tour and though given 45 days leave I didn’t go home because I felt I didn’t belong there anymore so I spent it in the Philippines and Australia. I was wounded three months into my tour twice in the same firefight. I ended up in a coma waking six weeks later in Bethesda Naval Hospital. When I finally went home I took the footlocker and to my utter shock discovered he was a master Sargent and during the fighting around Bastogne he had killed eight Germans by taking a machine gun position and killed two more in hand to hand fighting with bayonets in which he was wounded in the thigh. He had two Purple Hearts and a silver star for remaining behind while allowing his platoon to retreat from a position across a bridge. He was shot in the upper leg and refused to leave his position. He was given credit for saving not only the bridge but allowing his men to fall back about a hundred yards and dig in to repel the Germans advancing on the bridge. I read those citations with tears in my eyes because none of us knew any of it. I think killing those Germans in hand to hand fighting did to him what it did to me. It’s one thing to shoot someone from a distance but when you close with them and you feel the fear but realize you are the better trained fighter and he knows he’s going to lose. Seeing that fear in his eyes has a different effect. You feel his fear, his desperation and almost pleading look of wanting to live, and when you can look at his face, his eyes, his breathing and trembling and it’s over. It’s not just a dead body. You connected with him in a way i can’t explain. I remember seeing how peaceful he looked in death and I searched his body. I wish i hadn’t because there was a photo of his wife and children that made me feel sick. I can only imagine what my grandfather felt. He was and is the best man I ever knew in my life.
As French by birth ,1950 , I know the story of Oradour-sur-Glane , but I seem to be the first to be impressed around what goes through your experience , survival hand to hand ( we say "face à face" at Oradour or elsewhere ) means only you weigh more , you give a better value of your own life and that could have been same for the VC ; remember after Fr. Indochine , after Jap. occupation and your war ,Vietnamese people are 100 million people today , threatened by PRC and for economics they accept all US citizens to come and visit their homeland , expatriates here in N.Caledonia are numerous , a few are friends but we do not talk much of who killed who in History , for instance about past or Ukraine or Palestinians .
My father served in the South Pacific. The only story I ever heard from him was when contracted malaria. Trying to get out of a trench after an air raid. He said it was the shits - literally. Really
Your personal history is ennobling. Thank you for sharing this harsh lesson. There are times when the very depth of one's character only comes to light from out of horrific darkness.
@@normanleach5427 that’s honestly the reason I shared it. I get so frustrated at the glorification of war. I hear people say they would do this, or they would do that. Until you survive the baptism of fire you don’t know what you’ll do. I saw a combat veteran friend of mine break from watching our LT execute a Vietcong soldier. He’d been in two fights I knew of and fought hard, but seeing that man bound on his knees get shot up close and he snapped. I know what happened to him. I wouldn’t make eye contact with the prisoner because I knew what had to be done, but he looked into his eyes and he had to be Medivaced out. I never saw him again. Do I think he was a coward? Hell no! I saw him fight. Something just snapped, and for people who don’t care about the mental and emotional trauma of war on soldiers. I spit on them unless they know what literally waiting to die feels like. I don’t like to say it, but I will because maybe some emotionally scarred combat veterans might accidentally read it and not feel so alone. I know of four men I for sure killed and two I may have. That young Vietcong soldier I physically engaged with was the worst experience of my military life! Having him under control and knowing I had to finish him didn’t make it easy or fun. I saw men lose their humanity but I refused to become a monster. Why? Because if I survived the nightmare of war how would I ever regain the humanity and compassion I would have surrendered. That was what my grandfather was telling me and I never fully understood till I saw the horror up close of suffering people caught in the middle. Sadly we live in a time where even the slaughter of innocent children and women of another race and religion has become as common as the common cold, and we just look away.
Several years ago I visited Oradour sur glane with my wife. We almost remained silent for the rest of the day, just because we were deeply shocked. I'm now an old french man but the horror I felt that day is still written in my soul. Thank you for this video.
@@lucsurmon2623 I went with my Ukrainian girlfriend to their military museum in Kyiv in 2016. I'm looking at items from WW2 when she taps me on the arm and points up. It was a big red & black Nazi swastika flag draped across the ceiling and it made the hairs stand up on my arms, but what really made me doubt the human race was a small noose on display that the Germans used for hanging younger teenagers
what about the Paris massacre on October 17.10.1961 and the countless atrocities committed by the French army against civilians in the Algerian War ? Is that horror written in your soul too ?
Oradore-sur-Glane - symbol of Nazi terror! May victims of this massacre be never forgotten. Thank you for keeping memory of those who suffered during the Nazi regime alive.
what about the Paris massacre on October 17, 1961 and the countless atrocities committed by the French army against civilians in the Algerian War ; should those victims be never forgotten , too ?
Only country in ALL of occupied EUROPE that got of their KNEES & rose up . I couldn’t BELIVE my eyes seeing polish fighters on WW11 fighting against panzer on horse back . Warsaw raised to the ground. NOT a bit of Paris touched the Nazis danced into Paris & NOT a bullet fired . It always gets me why the British I’m SCOTTISH declared war on Germany 🇩🇪 bc Poland 🇵🇱 was to Far East to defend as HISTORY proved then the Russians owned the polish so basically the war was for NOTHING. If only occupied Europe would have fought as bravely as the polish . Even in the Battle of Britain those polish pilots that got here up in the sky shooting down luffwaffe planes . The ENGIMA machine brought here by the poles & it shorted the war by 2 yrs according to the experts .
So what happened to the people who dropped two atomic bombs not on military targets but on two of the largest civilian cities in Japan, incinerating alive, within seconds, innocent men women and children, vaporizing hundreds of thousands withing the wink of an eye and many more dying of a slow agonizing death of radiation poisoning. How about the intentional fire bombing of many civilians cities both in Germany and Japan with napalm and incendiaries? Killing civilians is a war crime no matter who commits it and the US and UK have many to account for. As a young boy, I asked my father, a survivor of the NAZI concentration camps (he was not Jewish) who was right in that war. He said it made no difference. I asked him why. He said the winners get to write the history and they can write whatever they want. He was right, the west's official history and movies of the second world war are nothing more than very simplistic comic book style fairy tales of good triumphs over evil,..the enemy killed civilians so they are evil. We killed civilians because we had to, because we are good. If this were true, why are the UK and US still keeping secrets of that war from the public long after the principle barbarians who orchestrated that war, with the largest recorded deaths of any war in history...abut 80 million, are long dead. What else could they be hiding but the truth?
For any of you who have wives small children and grandchildren the pure evil that the Nazis commited is too painfull to even imagine, but we must NEVER forget what happened 80 yrs ago, we owe it to the memory of these poor souls.
SS German soldiers were seldom allowed prisoner of war status during the post D-Day invasion. But nothing could erase the horrors they committed during WWII.
Precise they were tried by a German court. Lots of German criminals were let go after a few years and then lived long happy lives in Germany, talking about the good old days with their fellow Germans.
@@jomon723 You have to remember, the world changed forever after 1945. The cold war meant western Europe was under the threat of Soviet attack and the territory of Germany was where that attack was going to come in and be met. So it was politically necessary to get western Germany sorted and 'on side' as quickly as possible. Thats why hunting and bringing to justice individuals in the German forces of WW2, who had committed war crimes or were suspected of being involved, gradually slipped off the agenda. Its not right or fair but life isnt. There was a new enemy to face and the world moved on.
Yes, and Ukraine, Belarus and too many, many other places. The horror of that ideology. It shocks and must shock us even now how such a civilised country can become so barbaric, so uncivilised. We must be on watch always, because the lesson must be, “there but for the grace of God, go I” because there are SS and camp guards in every nation under the sun.
Stop being a Nazi apologist. The German "investigation" was a worthless shame, as exemplified by the postwar behaviour of the German Government to extradite the German General commanding the 2nd SS Panzer division.
The SS didn't investigate anything. We now know that the SS unit that was responsible for this atrocity included SS from Alsace. De Gaulle didn't want to create any problems with the newly liberated Alsatians, and so nothing was done about it. Likewise, it was known who the SS general was, who responsible for the atrocities in Tulle but he was never brought to justice and he went to live out his life as if nothing had happened. The b****** who was head of gestapo during the War in Bordeau and later in Paris was caught, arrested and tried. He was condemned to death, but somehow his sentence was changed to life-imprisonment. Again sometime later De Gaulle pardoned him 'in the interests of Franco-German friendship' - of course De Gaulle wasn't in Paris during the War and his behaviour towards the Résistance members when he did get to Paris was despicable.
The post-war trials were a sham and disgraceful, especially Nuremberg. Virtually every criminal there, with the exception of the few who committed suicide, served just 5 to 10 years and were released. The reality was, the court simply didn't know what to do with them and were so afraid of being too harsh. That ineptitude is what forced the creation of Israel's own criminal court and the rounding up of Nazis themselves. When you see Nazi soldiers actually "smiling" and "waving" when in custody of Allied troops, you know something's wrong.
Warsaw Uprising 1944 - 150,000-200,000 Poles killed. Wola Massacre - 40,000-50,000 Polish civilians executed during just few days. Women, men, children, elders - shoot on spot. No responsibility, no justice at all. Google: Heinz Reinefarth - dude died of natural causes in the 70's living peaceful life, even became a mayor of his hometown in Germany.
Because the Western allies did exactly the same thing to African and Asisan people in the past hundreds years. They are simply afraid of backfire. And I could not help to doubt that you are a supporter of them.
In some cases people weren't prosecuted because doing so would have complicated the occupation after the war. The best example was Emperor Hirohito of Japan. Many people wanted him prosecuted for war crimes but MacArthur decided that keeping Hirohito on the throne would make the occupation and reconstruction of Japan easier. Another example was Wernher von Braun. The Americans needed him to assist in the space race with the Russians.
@@柱惠扈Please don't make up history because America has never done anything like Nazi Germany? Native Americans and minorities had it bad, but not like death camps.
Excellent video on a disturbing case. It's sad that there really wasn't any Revenge... Thanks for bringing this story to us. Many Tears Shed for the victims...😢😢😢
unfortunately history is being rewritten by many, removing many of these events. Im from texas and even texas history is being rewritten, to remove the 'fights for freedeom' that many went through. Fighting will always continue no matter who is in power because some people like freedom and are not sheep
I’ve visited Oradore-sur-Glane a truly moving experience that I’ll never forget. It’s unbelievable how so many Germans could commit such terrible brutality.
There is a scene towards the end of 'Band of Brothers', the war is finished, the Wehrmacht marching into captivity where angry French soldiers pull three germans from a shed, kneel them down and you know what happens next and I immediately thought 'Oradour...' The opening scene of the 'World at War' series (1973) that have stayed with me for 50 years - as a 10 year old I was so shocked at what I was hearing...
SS Colonel Joachim Peiper was dumb enough to live in France after somehow getting out of prison early despite war crimes. They smoked him out and killed him. Have to get justice somehow
How many of the hundreds of men in that battalion would have started out as psychopathic killers? Almost certainly, not that many. But as an elite SS division they would have had a higher than average ideological motivation and I imagine that bit by bit their inhibitions about carrying out atrocities just withered away, assisted by orders from above, peer pressure and hatred of civilians for fighting back. But imagine growing old with the memory of having participated in that and knowing that you have forever surrendered your humanity.
@@hannotnFrom what I have seen of any interview with German veterans, including those known to have been involved in civilian deaths and later tracked down in “ambush” interviews by journalists… the Germans had ZERO regret or shame for their crimes. They just dismissed their crimes as “following orders” or “that was a long time ago” or “it was a very different time…you can’t judge me.”
@@mlisaj1111 But denial is an obvious tactic for shutting out the criticism from the outside. Not for dealing with the reality of what you've inflicted. I remember reading something that said that in the later stages of the war it was hard to refill the ranks of the einsatzgruppe, the mobile death squads, due to them having a high suicide rate. I just did a quick search to find the piece where I read that and couldn't find it, so may be an outlier or incorrect, but it sounded credible to me. That sort of atrocity is traumatic to any sane mind.
@@mlisaj1111 an Auschwitz tour guide once said he could tell who were and who were not N@zis by their reaction to seeing evidence of N@zi crimes. He said the N@zi --- no tears. Normal human beings --- tears.
The French had a problem with the SS soldiers of das Reich at Oradour: many were conscripted from Alsace, which French province had been annexed by Nazi Germany in 1940. After 1945 they were held in French military jails to face trial for war crimes but not for their forced conscription. Many ended up being sent to French Indochina in the war against Vietnamese communists. The survivors were repatriated to France in 1954 and freed.
@@Hartley_Hare not so. A soldier from my father's platoon in the Polish 1st Armored Division joined the French Foreign Legion in 1946 and served to 1954. In discussions with my father in London and Brussels in rhe 1960s he stated that there was a large contingent of Germans in rhe FFL , many of whom were ex SS. There was no love lost between those Germans and the Polish and Spanish Republican contingents.
The last defenders of Hitler's bunker in Berlin in May of 1945 were French from SS Charlemagne Division. Interestingly, French were allies with both side, during WW II. 🤔
Never say that the rank-and-file German soldier was only defending his homeland from the Allied invasion. Any perceived enemies of the Reich were dealt with brutally for years.
This is third hand information that I can’t otherwise confirm. My brother was in the US Army in 1960. He was told by a sergeant who had been an 18 year old in The Normandy invasion that after they learned about Oradour his unit would check each German they captured to see if he was a member of the SS. SS members had often ditched their identifying insignia or changed into regular uniforms but were revealed by their blood type tattoos on their upper left arms. If that was present they were shot on the spot.😮 Red
Yep definetly third hand information. Americian troops captured over 2,500 Waffen SS prisoners in the Roncey Pocket from 2nd SS Das Reich and 17th SS GvB . They weren,t shot on the spot, they were processed and sent to POW camps. Same at Mortain, hundreds of Waffen SS troops were captured from 1st, 2nd and 17th SS divisions, all treated fairly. SS Oberscharfuhrer Sepp Lainer was captured twice. In the first instance he escaped after 2 days in captivity, was on the run for 4 days before being recaptured. He wasn,t shot on either occaision.
It is sad how Evil and Hate filled seemingly ordinary men can become. What kind of animals can lock hundreds of women and children into a church and burn them alive?
I met one of the only survivors. He gave a lecture in Perpignan. A truly lovely man who explained that he greeted German tourists with respect as he would with all tourists. Robert Hebras who died in 2023.
We started the war to stop a dictator from taking over Poland. When the war was over Poland had a different dictator so all those lives and all that carnage and destruction was for nothing
Beg to differ. Two murderous regimes were totally stamped out in Germany/Japan, plus the 3rd troublemaker lost 15-20 million men which crippled them for decades. Poland and everything up to Berlin fell under the Iron Curtain, but it could've been worse
This is an almost identical event to the one that transpired in Lipa, Slovania, which at the time was heavily infiltrated by Italian/Yugoslav resistance fighters. After 2 German soldiers were killed in an ambush, the Commandant - an Italian himself - ordered the men, women and children of the villiage to be locked in the church, which was then set alight, killing around 286. My great grandfather was the village elder and most of the ruins remain, with a museum built to house much memorabilia of this event. It is there as a reminder of this catastrophic event. Please never forget what comes with the atrocities of war.
When I watch things like this I’m ashamed I’m part of the human race. But I remember I have a good heart and it spurs me on to be the best person I can but evil is so strong
The name of the village near Berlin, where Russian soldiers murdered 1,000 German civilians in late April 1945 is Treuenbrietzen. My mistake. In 2009, prosecutors in Potsdam wished to investigate this massacre. They were informed that Control Council Law No. 4 enacted in late 1945 exempted Allied personnel from being prosecuted for crimes against Germans. All Allied Control Council Laws were incorporated into Article 139 of the Basic Law of The Federal Republic of Germany, effective May 23, 1949. That Article remains in force today.
Patton said it right: the object of war is not to die for your country, but to make your enemy die for his. War happens by attrition. When all are killed, or there is no one who will fight, the war is over. If not, the war can last forever. In modern times it is absurd that countries are fighting for decades, even centuries under multiple leaderships.
@@Norm100ful The Americans were at war in Aghanistan for up to 20 years. How many crimes did American soldiers commit there. I do not know, but he Pentagon is keeping this under wraps.
It - German atrocities and Vichy complicity therein - didn't disgust the French to the point of not electing Francois Mitterrand to President. (he'd been a member of the Vichy gov't)
You forgot, that Denmark also was invated by Germany in may 1940. We didnt fight in WW2 because of that. But many danes where arrested and killed, because the helped the Jews to escape to Sweden.
@@highcountrydelatite The exact number of Danes who died during World War II varies depending on the sources and how different categories of deaths are counted. However, estimates generally fall into the following ranges: 1. **Civilian casualties**: Around **3,000 to 3,500 Danish civilians** died during the war. This includes those who died as a result of bombings, accidents, and Nazi reprisals, as well as the approximately 500 Danish Jews who were deported to concentration camps, with most of them perishing in the Holocaust. 2. **Danish resistance fighters**: Approximately **850 members of the Danish Resistance** died, either in combat, as a result of Nazi reprisals, or in German concentration camps. 3. **Danish military casualties**: While Denmark’s official military was not heavily involved due to the occupation, **around 49 Danish soldiers** were killed during the brief German invasion in 1940. 4. **Danish volunteers for the German military**: Around **6,000 to 12,000 Danes** volunteered to fight for Nazi Germany, mainly in the Waffen-SS. Of these, it is estimated that **about 2,000 to 2,500** died, primarily on the Eastern Front fighting against the Soviet Union. In total, it's estimated that around **4,000 to 6,000 Danes** lost their lives during World War II, depending on how deaths are categorized.
The power and superior feeling they must have felt. That feeling and themselves were very short lived. Take this as a lesson those being influenced by hate. The innocent will be rewarded and the guilty, not so much.
I visited Oradour-sur-Glane while working in the Charente region of France about 15 years ago and still have haunting memories of the atrocities which took place in that beautiful region in Haute Vienne. May those innocent souls rest in peace. It sickens me to think of how low and barbaric humankind can sink to in times of war and conflict, as is happening right now and on many fronts in the world.
@@lakenneth374 Trump told her. She told the lawyer. They lawyer told somebody else and now you heard it. What could go possibly wrong, huh? It must be true!
@@nocturnaljoe9543 President Donald Trump once complained to his White House chief of staff, General Kelly, that his generals weren't "totally loyal" like Adolf Hitler’s during World War II
Not much "Revenge" but okay. Really don't need to use 'click-bait' scamming with the rest of the title the way it is. Horrific story regardless. No sub No like
Yes indeed, especially books on the rise of fascism in Italy and how mussolini led a mob to the king of Italy to be anointed as the new leader of Italy. Given trumps plan to lead the Jan 6 mob to the Capitol, obviously he has read at least One BOOK AND HIS ADVISER , STEVEN MILLER , SEEMS VERY WELL READ ON "Mein kampf"!!!
I have read a book. Many many more books than you. If you think there are no modern day Hitler's, then you wouldn't know a Hitler if one came up and bit you in the ass.
In the South of France they were running around trying to find Allied Units to surrender to, because they feared what the FFI and other armed Résistance groups would do to them. They had good reason, knowing what they had done.
If the Allied did anything wrong "the other side had it coming", "it's all a lie" or "everybody would have done the same to get home alive", "it happened in the heat of the fight", etc... excuses enough to defend their own warcrimes...
My great grand uncle was Waffen ss He served in a anti tank platoon in Russia and in the Bulge He was wounded and captured 2 days before the Malmady massacre Roughly 3 days after he and 3 other men was beaten almost to death by American MPs while in custody He said he didn’t kill civilians and PoWs , he was a anti tank gunner too much time fighting armor than anything else he said check infantry and panzer units or military police He survived the war but lost use of his left arm ( 65 percent from the beating) and had 4 combat wounds from exploding shells from tank fire He later in 1950 moved to South Dakota and worked at the post office in Rapid City , he worked that job until his retirement in 1981 Both American born sons later served in the Navy , one rose to be a commander Other served on the carrier America He died in 2000
He was lying, all SS killed civilians and Allied POWs were also killed and sometimes tortured by the SS. What they did to French Résistance and others is too horrible to explain. Another thing, we now from the Trent Park transcriptions that the Wehrmacht was just as guilty of atrocities as were the SS and gestapo. In fact they freely admitted that quite often they lent hand to the SS when it came to atrocities. It's all there in the archives.
@@derin111But it is true that regular Wehrmacht troops aided in the commission of atrocities, particularly on the Eastern Front, as a response to partisan activities.
@@derin111Read the SS and Wermacht's own accounts. Thousands of diaries recalling fun times of burning women and children alive. Stop trying to rewrite history, the facts are too many.
@@franc9111 500 000 plus including conscripts , didn't murder everyone. Get your head out of your ass , not ever German is a nazi or criminal , the same can be said about Imperal Japan , which murdered 37 percent of all allied PoW camps , and generally got away with murder at the trials. What about Stalin ? 20 million of his own people before the war started , how about operation polish before the war 110,000 murdered ? know your history
What a horrible story. The atrocity of war never ceases to amaze me. I’m glad I live in the relative safety of the UK and not in Europe circa 1940. What collective madness allowed these acts of genocide and other crimes against humanity based on what? Race purity? Ideology? Geography? Technical supremacy? The global shock still reverberates. No community was left unaffected. Reconstruction has been long and painful. Even now we are still reaping the whirlwind. My Jewish friends are fighting a war of religion against an enemy who would wipe them out of existence. The Palestinians are suffering because of Hamas while the Lebanese are under the yoke of Hezbollah. Who is being held accountable? Not the perpetrators that’s for sure. Just like post war Germany the criminals will sink back into obscurity and a new generation will take their place brought up on a diet of hatred and lies. I’m too old now to fight in a war, all I can do is look on with despair. The Ukrainians are fighting against occupation, while Russia is fighting for a tyrant. Western Democracies are looking on waiting to intercede before a nuclear weapon is deployed. Western Europe is backing Ukraine. The Russians will be forced to step down. Their campaign is not sustainable. Putin will either die in office or there will be a coup to oust him. His days are numbered. His alliance with China and Iran is not worth the paper it is written on. North Korea is slipping further and further into the abyss. Soon there won’t be anyone else left to kill. We will have reached extinction. In less than in a blink of an eye our entire existence will cease, causing less reaction than a butterfly flapping its wings after emerging from a chrysalis. No one will remember us. We will be the wind in the trees and the flutter of a falling leaf will have more effect as it hits the ground than our entire civilization, if you can call it that.
You know this is all woke lies, right? They were good Christian men, that he left tries to ruin just like they are doing to Trump. That is what is sad.
Well, you Brits have your own history of violations of basic human right and commiting warcrimes all over the world. Your troops have had their time with Belgium civilians and Germans troops in 1940, not to mention what you did overseas...
While I abhor the brutality of WW2, or any brutality at all (and all wars for that matter, being a Vietnam vet), what amazes me are responders here seemingly unaware this kind of inhumanity, in its own morbid way perhaps, is happening right now in the Middle East. What do you think happens to anyone caught near or inside these buildings when taken out by drones, missiles, artillery strikes, etal, like what's been happening of late, even over the weekend? The unintended victims, and I'm sure they're many (collateral damage to be sure) are either killed in the blast, burn to death in the fire, or slowly die over days if buried alive. What occurred in France in '44 should never have happened, nor ever be repeated, while the current wars we have should never have started to begin with. Strong headed leaders wage wars, weak nations allow them to happen. Wars are good for business after all, if not for the public who pays the price -- in more ways than one.
These weren't men, they were sub-beasts. More vicious than any animal that could only happened Germany. My WW2 uncle was a sniper who followed the front. He said he had no pity on German soldiers, Nazis or not. He said he it took hard not kill German civilians. He also mentioned that murdered French children and women changed many men into rage.. he died at 92 years in 2010. He was a 46% white mountain Apache 54% Hispanic.
That's why the United States Secret Service is called the USSS for short. Unlike the IRS, FAA, FCC and NASA, no one calls the United States Secret Service the SS.
Recommend reading "French Children of the Holocaust". Large book, maybe 1800 pages. Has many pictures of French Jewish children who were apprehended, almost always by the French, and later deported to Nazi concentration camps. Very, very few came back. The extent of the French collaboration with the Germans to send their own people to concentration/death camps is an eternal stain on France's honor.
What happened in that village was beyond sick and cruel and the massacre was committed by animals, but prior to the massacre French communist resistance fights captured SS soldiers and burnt them to death in the back of a truck and that is the reason the SS gave as the excuse for the atrocity. Very sad
No, most of them were KIA after it happened or were shot on spot by Allied troops because they were SS. But maybe you can enlighten us with your wisdom and tell us who of them became executives (unless the US brought them to the States in Operation Paperclip)
Just for some perspective: the Germans did this to over 600 villages on the Eastern Front. And those are the ones the Soviets documented, there may have been more. Murdered everyone they could, burned everything to the ground, poisoned wells, took livestock & moved on to do it again. That's why when the Red Army entered German-settled territories & Germany itself they were rapacious, bloodthirsty + relentless. The brutality of the war in the East was so bad that divisions being rebuilt or rested were moved to the Western Front. That's why Das Reich + Leibstandarte were in the West. Taking a break & rebuilding. In fact the commanding officer at Oradour explicitly told the new men (boys, really) "We'll show you what we learned in the East". The Allies like to pat themselves on the back but there was nothing, not even D-Day itself, that compares to the horror of Stalingrad, Kursk, Voronezh, Smolensk, Minsk, Kyiv, Babi Yar.. nothing even close.
Could you change the narration on this video, please. It is just absurdly over the top. Otherwise, not a bad post, but I had to watch without sound and rely upon subtitles.
WWII did not start on Sept. 1, but 3 with England (and France) declaring war on Germany. Strangely enough England and France did NOT declare war on Russia which had invaded the Eastern part of Poland... 🤔
@@brianferris8668 Yes they did. The did a formal declaration of war on 3 Dec 1939. Learn a little about history before you write a comment. Especially now days when you can use google to look it up.
It is also tragic to realize the unimaginable horrors that normal well educated people can do to others if told the appropriate lies through total control of media/information. After 75 years we must admit we have not learned the lesson, therefore are bound to apparently repeat the “course”. We were expected to wright 80 million times “we shall not kill”, etc. Tragic indeed !
“The more I learn about people, the more I love 💕 my dog.” -Mark Twain
Same....
As the years go by it becomes more true than the day before.
Never knew that was from Mark Twain. I've used it myself :
"The more people I meet, the more I like my dog"
Sharp guy
@@TheDKServices Indeed, in fairness one can substitute “dog” for any favorite animal.
I happen to be a cat person, and though I love dogs and animals to be exact, they never disappoint.
I’m not a people’s person at all.
Best regards to you.
My father often said that this is a beautiful world - except for man!
My grandfather landed at Omaha beach and ended up in the 3rd army under George Patton. He fought across France and took part in the battle of the bulge. He would never discuss the war even with my grandmother. He had a locked footlocker we all knew we were forbidden to touch. When I was preparing to leave for Vietnam he asked me to walk with him and told me the war would change me in ways I couldn’t imagine, but he said son don’t lose your humanity because if you become callous to killing it will destroy you. Then he said something I’ll never forget. He said I hope to god you never have to kill a man hand to hand. He seemed to be saying goodbye like he knew we’d never see each other again. Unfortunately I did kill a Vietcong soldier hand to hand, and we never saw each other again. He died close to the end of my first tour. I didn’t take leave to attend his funeral because I knew he would want me to remain with my team, but my grandmother said he left me the footlocker. I volunteered for a 2nd tour and though given 45 days leave I didn’t go home because I felt I didn’t belong there anymore so I spent it in the Philippines and Australia. I was wounded three months into my tour twice in the same firefight. I ended up in a coma waking six weeks later in Bethesda Naval Hospital. When I finally went home I took the footlocker and to my utter shock discovered he was a master Sargent and during the fighting around Bastogne he had killed eight Germans by taking a machine gun position and killed two more in hand to hand fighting with bayonets in which he was wounded in the thigh. He had two Purple Hearts and a silver star for remaining behind while allowing his platoon to retreat from a position across a bridge. He was shot in the upper leg and refused to leave his position. He was given credit for saving not only the bridge but allowing his men to fall back about a hundred yards and dig in to repel the Germans advancing on the bridge. I read those citations with tears in my eyes because none of us knew any of it. I think killing those Germans in hand to hand fighting did to him what it did to me. It’s one thing to shoot someone from a distance but when you close with them and you feel the fear but realize you are the better trained fighter and he knows he’s going to lose. Seeing that fear in his eyes has a different effect. You feel his fear, his desperation and almost pleading look of wanting to live, and when you can look at his face, his eyes, his breathing and trembling and it’s over. It’s not just a dead body. You connected with him in a way i can’t explain. I remember seeing how peaceful he looked in death and I searched his body. I wish i hadn’t because there was a photo of his wife and children that made me feel sick. I can only imagine what my grandfather felt. He was and is the best man I ever knew in my life.
As French by birth ,1950 , I know the story of Oradour-sur-Glane , but I seem to be the first to be impressed around what goes through your experience , survival hand to hand ( we say "face à face" at Oradour or elsewhere ) means only you weigh more , you give a better value of your own life and that could have been same for the VC ; remember after Fr. Indochine , after Jap. occupation and your war ,Vietnamese people are 100 million people today , threatened by PRC and for economics they accept all US citizens to come and visit their homeland , expatriates here in N.Caledonia are numerous , a few are friends but we do not talk much of who killed who in History , for instance about past or Ukraine or Palestinians .
My father served in the South Pacific. The only story I ever heard from him was when contracted malaria. Trying to get out of a trench after an air raid. He said it was the shits - literally.
Really
@@wilber9735 my respect to your father
Your personal history is ennobling. Thank you for sharing this harsh lesson. There are times when the very depth of one's character only comes to light from out of horrific darkness.
@@normanleach5427 that’s honestly the reason I shared it. I get so frustrated at the glorification of war. I hear people say they would do this, or they would do that. Until you survive the baptism of fire you don’t know what you’ll do. I saw a combat veteran friend of mine break from watching our LT execute a Vietcong soldier. He’d been in two fights I knew of and fought hard, but seeing that man bound on his knees get shot up close and he snapped. I know what happened to him. I wouldn’t make eye contact with the prisoner because I knew what had to be done, but he looked into his eyes and he had to be Medivaced out. I never saw him again. Do I think he was a coward? Hell no! I saw him fight. Something just snapped, and for people who don’t care about the mental and emotional trauma of war on soldiers. I spit on them unless they know what literally waiting to die feels like. I don’t like to say it, but I will because maybe some emotionally scarred combat veterans might accidentally read it and not feel so alone. I know of four men I for sure killed and two I may have. That young Vietcong soldier I physically engaged with was the worst experience of my military life! Having him under control and knowing I had to finish him didn’t make it easy or fun. I saw men lose their humanity but I refused to become a monster. Why? Because if I survived the nightmare of war how would I ever regain the humanity and compassion I would have surrendered. That was what my grandfather was telling me and I never fully understood till I saw the horror up close of suffering people caught in the middle. Sadly we live in a time where even the slaughter of innocent children and women of another race and religion has become as common as the common cold, and we just look away.
Several years ago I visited Oradour sur glane with my wife. We almost remained silent for the rest of the day, just because we were deeply shocked. I'm now an old french man but the horror I felt that day is still written in my soul. Thank you for this video.
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@@lucsurmon2623 I went with my Ukrainian girlfriend to their military museum in Kyiv in 2016. I'm looking at items from WW2 when she taps me on the arm and points up. It was a big red & black Nazi swastika flag draped across the ceiling and it made the hairs stand up on my arms, but what really made me doubt the human race was a small noose on display that the Germans used for hanging younger teenagers
what about the Paris massacre on October 17.10.1961 and the countless atrocities committed by the French army against civilians in the Algerian War ?
Is that horror written in your soul too ?
Oradore-sur-Glane - symbol of Nazi terror! May victims of this massacre be never forgotten. Thank you for keeping memory of those who suffered during the Nazi regime alive.
what about the Paris massacre on October 17, 1961 and the countless atrocities committed by the French army against civilians in the Algerian War ;
should those victims be never forgotten , too ?
@@klauswende4636why would the French care? Only their sufferings count.
Maybe if the french fought, this would not have happened?
Nazis are Christians
A terrible crime for sure. But this type of crime occurred every week in Poland for 5 years.
Yes, but that was Poland, and no one cared about Poland. Sad isn't it. Please understand I am being sarcastic and I agree with you 100%
Only country in ALL of occupied EUROPE that got of their KNEES & rose up . I couldn’t BELIVE my eyes seeing polish fighters on WW11 fighting against panzer on horse back . Warsaw raised to the ground. NOT a bit of Paris touched the Nazis danced into Paris & NOT a bullet fired . It always gets me why the British I’m SCOTTISH declared war on Germany 🇩🇪 bc Poland 🇵🇱 was to Far East to defend as HISTORY proved then the Russians owned the polish so basically the war was for NOTHING. If only occupied Europe would have fought as bravely as the polish . Even in the Battle of Britain those polish pilots that got here up in the sky shooting down luffwaffe planes . The ENGIMA machine brought here by the poles & it shorted the war by 2 yrs according to the experts .
So what happened to the people who dropped two atomic bombs not on military targets but on two of the largest civilian cities in Japan, incinerating alive, within seconds, innocent men women and children, vaporizing hundreds of thousands withing the wink of an eye and many more dying of a slow agonizing death of radiation poisoning. How about the intentional fire bombing of many civilians cities both in Germany and Japan with napalm and incendiaries? Killing civilians is a war crime no matter who commits it and the US and UK have many to account for. As a young boy, I asked my father, a survivor of the NAZI concentration camps (he was not Jewish) who was right in that war. He said it made no difference. I asked him why. He said the winners get to write the history and they can write whatever they want. He was right, the west's official history and movies of the second world war are nothing more than very simplistic comic book style fairy tales of good triumphs over evil,..the enemy killed civilians so they are evil. We killed civilians because we had to, because we are good. If this were true, why are the UK and US still keeping secrets of that war from the public long after the principle barbarians who orchestrated that war, with the largest recorded deaths of any war in history...abut 80 million, are long dead. What else could they be hiding but the truth?
and in Ukraine
And all over Asia by the japs.
For any of you who have wives small children and grandchildren the pure evil that the Nazis commited is too painfull to even imagine, but we must NEVER forget what happened 80 yrs ago, we owe it to the memory of these poor souls.
Yes the french should have defended their country!!
Well ,,its still happening in Palestine, I.E. providing you choose not to see
SS German soldiers were seldom allowed prisoner of war status during the post D-Day invasion. But nothing could erase the horrors they committed during WWII.
And rightly so. The SS soldiers were despicable humans.
What a disgrace to let them go...How could that be ?
The U.N. Let them go.
Precise they were tried by a German court. Lots of German criminals were let go after a few years and then lived long happy lives in Germany, talking about the good old days with their fellow Germans.
Absolutely disgusting behavior from the allies
I cant belive the lack of accountability byt the alies for allowing these murderous bastards to get away with it 😢
@@jomon723 You have to remember, the world changed forever after 1945. The cold war meant western Europe was under the threat of Soviet attack and the territory of Germany was where that attack was going to come in and be met. So it was politically necessary to get western Germany sorted and 'on side' as quickly as possible. Thats why hunting and bringing to justice individuals in the German forces of WW2, who had committed war crimes or were suspected of being involved, gradually slipped off the agenda. Its not right or fair but life isnt. There was a new enemy to face and the world moved on.
For one Oradour sur Glane there were over 400 such massacre places in occupied Poland.
Wola Massacre - 40,000-50,000 civilians executed during just one week 5-12 August 1944.
Yes, and Ukraine, Belarus and too many, many other places. The horror of that ideology. It shocks and must shock us even now how such a civilised country can become so barbaric, so uncivilised. We must be on watch always, because the lesson must be, “there but for the grace of God, go I” because there are SS and camp guards in every nation under the sun.
@@Daniel-deMerrivaleApart from the US & UK of course 😉
@@richardingamells7213 No mate, 🙂I wish. But sadly not. Every nation under the sun.
And...!
Oradore-sur-Glane is the only war crimes investigated by the SS, which means even they were shocked on what happened.
Stop being a Nazi apologist.
The German "investigation" was a worthless shame, as exemplified by the postwar behaviour of the German Government to extradite the German General commanding the 2nd SS Panzer division.
The SS didn't investigate anything. We now know that the SS unit that was responsible for this atrocity included SS from Alsace. De Gaulle didn't want to create any problems with the newly liberated Alsatians, and so nothing was done about it. Likewise, it was known who the SS general was, who responsible for the atrocities in Tulle but he was never brought to justice and he went to live out his life as if nothing had happened. The b****** who was head of gestapo during the War in Bordeau and later in Paris was caught, arrested and tried. He was condemned to death, but somehow his sentence was changed to life-imprisonment. Again sometime later De Gaulle pardoned him 'in the interests of Franco-German friendship' - of course De Gaulle wasn't in Paris during the War and his behaviour towards the Résistance members when he did get to Paris was despicable.
?? 🤔🤔🙄🙄😅😂
rubbish
@@lulufutenegresa7635Your intelligence is not enough to read this thread. Go away!
The post-war trials were a sham and disgraceful, especially Nuremberg. Virtually every criminal there, with the exception of the few who committed suicide, served just 5 to 10 years and were released. The reality was, the court simply didn't know what to do with them and were so afraid of being too harsh. That ineptitude is what forced the creation of Israel's own criminal court and the rounding up of Nazis themselves. When you see Nazi soldiers actually "smiling" and "waving" when in custody of Allied troops, you know something's wrong.
Warsaw Uprising 1944 - 150,000-200,000 Poles killed. Wola Massacre - 40,000-50,000 Polish civilians executed during just few days. Women, men, children, elders - shoot on spot. No responsibility, no justice at all. Google: Heinz Reinefarth - dude died of natural causes in the 70's living peaceful life, even became a mayor of his hometown in Germany.
Because the Western allies did exactly the same thing to African and Asisan people in the past hundreds years. They are simply afraid of backfire. And I could not help to doubt that you are a supporter of them.
In some cases people weren't prosecuted because doing so would have complicated the occupation after the war. The best example was Emperor Hirohito of Japan. Many people wanted him prosecuted for war crimes but MacArthur decided that keeping Hirohito on the throne would make the occupation and reconstruction of Japan easier. Another example was Wernher von Braun. The Americans needed him to assist in the space race with the Russians.
@@joevignolor4u949 Was von Braun forced to join the Nazi party "or else?" Did he agree with Nazi doctrine?
@@柱惠扈Please don't make up history because America has never done anything like Nazi Germany? Native Americans and minorities had it bad, but not like death camps.
Excellent video on a disturbing case. It's sad that there really wasn't any Revenge... Thanks for bringing this story to us. Many Tears Shed for the victims...😢😢😢
Max Hasting's Das Reich goes into this tragic tale. Very powerful stuff. Thanks for the great video.
I have that book.....powerful indeed.
I remember watching this and being devastated by the bruatlness of the massacre.
History repeats itself, just different people and countries.
When will people say no to fighting for dictators.
Sounds like Israel
Looks like many-in the us are wanting a dictator - I guess they feel privileged,like they will not be effected.
Thank you for your perseverance in keeping these memories out in the open, may they never be forgotten
Thanks for teaching the truth,you and your team great history telling 10/10
Many tears. Never forget
unfortunately history is being rewritten by many, removing many of these events. Im from texas and even texas history is being rewritten, to remove the 'fights for freedeom' that many went through.
Fighting will always continue no matter who is in power because some people like freedom and are not sheep
I’ve visited Oradore-sur-Glane a truly moving experience that I’ll never forget. It’s unbelievable how so many Germans could commit such terrible brutality.
They were obviously desensitized by the brutality of the Eastern Front. Just another massacre in a LONG LIST of massacres
Isn't that the town that was never rebuilt?
CRIMES NOT BRUTALITY
Following orders, just like french bullies brutalising women?
@@JohnSmith-ei2pz german simpathizer
This happened on a greater scale in Italy at Marzabotto by the Hermann Goering para division who killed more than 900 people.
Hard to watch, even harder to comprehend!!!
horrible, beyond belief what else can you say
This is click bait! There was no revenge against the SS soldiers who did this.
Of course not, they were good men like Trump. Persecuted for their Christians and lies made up against them!
6:53
There is a scene towards the end of 'Band of Brothers', the war is finished, the Wehrmacht marching into captivity where angry French soldiers pull three germans from a shed, kneel them down and you know what happens next and I immediately thought 'Oradour...'
The opening scene of the 'World at War' series (1973) that have stayed with me for 50 years - as a 10 year old I was so shocked at what I was hearing...
SS Colonel Joachim Peiper was dumb enough to live in France after somehow getting out of prison early despite war crimes. They smoked him out and killed him. Have to get justice somehow
It opened "The World At War", and at it's closing episode, as well! I do recommend this series, narrated by Oliver!!!
I wouldn't even harm a child even at gunpoint! Have they gone stark flying out of their minds?!
You're not a monster. But as a species, we have little to recommend us.
How many of the hundreds of men in that battalion would have started out as psychopathic killers? Almost certainly, not that many. But as an elite SS division they would have had a higher than average ideological motivation and I imagine that bit by bit their inhibitions about carrying out atrocities just withered away, assisted by orders from above, peer pressure and hatred of civilians for fighting back. But imagine growing old with the memory of having participated in that and knowing that you have forever surrendered your humanity.
@@hannotnFrom what I have seen of any interview with German veterans, including those known to have been involved in civilian deaths and later tracked down in “ambush” interviews by journalists… the Germans had ZERO regret or shame for their crimes.
They just dismissed their crimes as “following orders” or “that was a long time ago” or “it was a very different time…you can’t judge me.”
@@mlisaj1111 But denial is an obvious tactic for shutting out the criticism from the outside. Not for dealing with the reality of what you've inflicted. I remember reading something that said that in the later stages of the war it was hard to refill the ranks of the einsatzgruppe, the mobile death squads, due to them having a high suicide rate. I just did a quick search to find the piece where I read that and couldn't find it, so may be an outlier or incorrect, but it sounded credible to me. That sort of atrocity is traumatic to any sane mind.
@@mlisaj1111 an Auschwitz tour guide once said he could tell who were and who were not N@zis by their reaction to seeing evidence of N@zi crimes. He said the N@zi --- no tears. Normal human beings --- tears.
When Germany Attacked Poland at the start of WW2 , The Soviet Union also attacked Poland per agreement with the Nazi regime.
I understand that the French government has left this village exactly as it was after the massacre - a monument to man's inhumanity to man.
SO JUST LIKE PRESENT DAY.....WEAK MEN NO JUSTICE... THEY GOT AWAY UN-PUNISHED....
WHATELSE IS NEW?????????????
Terrible loss of life.
The French had a problem with the SS soldiers of das Reich at Oradour: many were conscripted from Alsace, which French province had been annexed by Nazi Germany in 1940. After 1945 they were held in French military jails to face trial for war crimes but not for their forced conscription. Many ended up being sent to French Indochina in the war against Vietnamese communists. The survivors were repatriated to France in 1954 and freed.
The idea that ex-SS served in Indochina is a myth.
@@Hartley_Hare not so. A soldier from my father's platoon in the Polish 1st Armored Division joined the French Foreign Legion in 1946 and served to 1954. In discussions with my father in London and Brussels in rhe 1960s he stated that there was a large contingent of Germans in rhe FFL , many of whom were ex SS. There was no love lost between those Germans and the Polish and Spanish Republican contingents.
@@Hartley_Hare... ss was in the french legion after war.. 1945 , 70 %ex german soldier
The last defenders of Hitler's bunker in Berlin in May of 1945 were French from SS Charlemagne Division. Interestingly, French were allies with both side, during WW II. 🤔
@@irenagreg7373 plus Scandinavians from SS Viking and Norland. Very few survived.
It was often a mystery as to why this village was targeted but now I know.
The worst of humanity.
Never say that the rank-and-file German soldier was only defending his homeland from the Allied invasion. Any perceived enemies of the Reich were dealt with brutally for years.
This is third hand information that I can’t otherwise confirm. My brother was in the US Army in 1960. He was told by a sergeant who had been an 18 year old in The Normandy invasion that after they learned about Oradour his unit would check each German they captured to see if he was a member of the SS. SS members had often ditched their identifying insignia or changed into regular uniforms but were revealed by their blood type tattoos on their upper left arms. If that was present they were shot on the spot.😮
Red
They wanted Germany to pay reparations for losing world war 1...?
I don't believe this. Americans do not commit warcrimes... according to Americans.
Yep definetly third hand information.
Americian troops captured over 2,500 Waffen SS prisoners in the Roncey Pocket from 2nd SS Das Reich and 17th SS GvB . They weren,t shot on the spot, they were processed and sent to POW camps.
Same at Mortain, hundreds of Waffen SS troops were captured from 1st, 2nd and 17th SS divisions, all treated fairly.
SS Oberscharfuhrer Sepp Lainer was captured twice. In the first instance he escaped after 2 days in captivity, was on the run for 4 days before being recaptured. He wasn,t shot on either occaision.
What frightens me ? Those that deny this
It is sad how Evil and Hate filled seemingly ordinary men can become. What kind of animals can lock hundreds of women and children into a church and burn them alive?
I have been to Oradour-sur-Glane with visitors several times. Familiarity does not make it easier.
so no revenge?????
Just click bait
No Nazi SS soldiers as there were mani nazis no Germans. The right is to say German SS soldiers, or even, German soldiers.
What??
I met one of the only survivors. He gave a lecture in Perpignan. A truly lovely man who explained that he greeted German tourists with respect as he would with all tourists. Robert Hebras who died in 2023.
We started the war to stop a dictator from taking over Poland. When the war was over Poland had a different dictator so all those lives and all that carnage and destruction was for nothing
That changed also
Beg to differ. Two murderous regimes were totally stamped out in Germany/Japan, plus the 3rd troublemaker lost 15-20 million men which crippled them for decades. Poland and everything up to Berlin fell under the Iron Curtain, but it could've been worse
"We fought the wrong enemy" - Patton
Correct Germany didn't start WW2 . England's Chamberlain did.
This is an almost identical event to the one that transpired in Lipa, Slovania, which at the time was heavily infiltrated by Italian/Yugoslav resistance fighters. After 2 German soldiers were killed in an ambush, the Commandant - an Italian himself - ordered the men, women and children of the villiage to be locked in the church, which was then set alight, killing around 286. My great grandfather was the village elder and most of the ruins remain, with a museum built to house much memorabilia of this event. It is there as a reminder of this catastrophic event. Please never forget what comes with the atrocities of war.
When I watch things like this I’m ashamed I’m part of the human race. But I remember I have a good heart and it spurs me on to be the best person I can but evil is so strong
Rest in peace for the victims 😢😭
The name of the village near Berlin, where Russian soldiers murdered 1,000 German civilians in late April 1945 is Treuenbrietzen. My mistake. In 2009, prosecutors in Potsdam wished to investigate this massacre. They were informed that Control Council Law No. 4 enacted in late 1945 exempted Allied personnel from being prosecuted for crimes against Germans. All Allied Control Council Laws were incorporated into Article 139 of the Basic Law of The Federal Republic of Germany, effective May 23, 1949. That Article remains in force today.
Control Council Law #4 - He who wins the war gets to make the rules. Just Sayin'.
@@beuski6531 Unfortunately, you are right, but it is unjust.
@@beuski6531 Nazis and Stalin's thugs were cut from the same cloth.
Patton said it right: the object of war is not to die for your country, but to make your enemy die for his. War happens by attrition. When all are killed, or there is no one who will fight, the war is over. If not, the war can last forever. In modern times it is absurd that countries are fighting for decades, even centuries under multiple leaderships.
@@Norm100ful The Americans were at war in Aghanistan for up to 20 years. How many crimes did American soldiers commit there. I do not know, but he Pentagon is keeping this under wraps.
It - German atrocities and Vichy complicity therein - didn't disgust the French to the point of not electing Francois Mitterrand to President. (he'd been a member of the Vichy gov't)
RIIIGHT! And you want me to believe this one too?
Most people today have no idea how brutal and barbaric that war became. May we never forget.... and never do it again.
You forgot Denmark
Denmark was occipied by Germany. Many danes fought in the resistance, some went to england to help the allied.
Danish bacon?
You forgot, that Denmark also was invated by Germany in may 1940. We didnt fight in WW2 because of that. But many danes where arrested and killed, because the helped the Jews to escape to Sweden.
@@highcountrydelatite What country is this?? Uganda?
@@highcountrydelatite The exact number of Danes who died during World War II varies depending on the sources and how different categories of deaths are counted. However, estimates generally fall into the following ranges:
1. **Civilian casualties**: Around **3,000 to 3,500 Danish civilians** died during the war. This includes those who died as a result of bombings, accidents, and Nazi reprisals, as well as the approximately 500 Danish Jews who were deported to concentration camps, with most of them perishing in the Holocaust.
2. **Danish resistance fighters**: Approximately **850 members of the Danish Resistance** died, either in combat, as a result of Nazi reprisals, or in German concentration camps.
3. **Danish military casualties**: While Denmark’s official military was not heavily involved due to the occupation, **around 49 Danish soldiers** were killed during the brief German invasion in 1940.
4. **Danish volunteers for the German military**: Around **6,000 to 12,000 Danes** volunteered to fight for Nazi Germany, mainly in the Waffen-SS. Of these, it is estimated that **about 2,000 to 2,500** died, primarily on the Eastern Front fighting against the Soviet Union.
In total, it's estimated that around **4,000 to 6,000 Danes** lost their lives during World War II, depending on how deaths are categorized.
The power and superior feeling they must have felt. That feeling and themselves were very short lived. Take this as a lesson those being influenced by hate. The innocent will be rewarded and the guilty, not so much.
Now Germany is going full circle to far right
A horrendous crime. The same could be said for the AI voice over.
I've quit watching any AI crap. Ain't gonna finish this one, either.
Not many SS troops were taken prisoner in WWII. They were targeted for their cruelty.
I visited Oradour-sur-Glane while working in the Charente region of France about 15 years ago and still have haunting memories of the atrocities which took place in that beautiful region in Haute Vienne. May those innocent souls rest in peace.
It sickens me to think of how low and barbaric humankind can sink to in times of war and conflict, as is happening right now and on many fronts in the world.
The massacre at Oradour-sur-Glane was covered in a segment of the TV series "The World at War."
Absolutely deplorable!
Reporter = Professor Einstein, what are your thoughts on humanity”
Albert = Humanity? Oh dear, we are a very sorry lot indeed.”
Been there twice it’s a must go but also very humbling place
Paul uk
Remember this when people tell you it didn't happen.
Ivana Trump once told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that her husband, Donald Trump, kept a book of Hitler's speeches near his bed.
@@lakenneth374 What does this clip have to do with Trump, LOL?!
@@nocturnaljoe9543 Ivana Trump once told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that her husband, Donald Trump, kept a book of Hitler's speeches near his bed.
@@lakenneth374 Trump told her. She told the lawyer. They lawyer told somebody else and now you heard it. What could go possibly wrong, huh? It must be true!
@@nocturnaljoe9543 President Donald Trump once complained to his White House chief of staff, General Kelly, that his generals weren't "totally loyal" like Adolf Hitler’s during World War II
Not much "Revenge" but okay. Really don't need to use 'click-bait' scamming with the rest of the title the way it is. Horrific story regardless. No sub No like
Agree with you totally. A bestial atrocity! 'Click-bait' title not good!
What was the revenge on the Nazi SS Soldiers? That is your title.
I get furious, when I hear people compare anyone alive today to Hitler or Nazis. Read a history book!!!
Yes indeed, especially books on the rise of fascism in Italy and how mussolini led a mob to the king of Italy to be anointed as the new leader of Italy. Given trumps plan to lead the Jan 6 mob to the Capitol, obviously he has read at least One BOOK AND HIS ADVISER , STEVEN MILLER , SEEMS VERY WELL READ ON "Mein kampf"!!!
I have read a book. Many many more books than you. If you think there are no modern day Hitler's, then you wouldn't know a Hitler if one came up and bit you in the ass.
instead of reading a book, how about rubbing the sleep out of your eyes and look what's happening in front of your face this very day
Now we know where IDF learned how to retaliate on the innocent, after their own are attacked...
"Down this road on a summer day in 1944, the soldiers came. Nobody lives here now."
The first line of dialog: "The World at War"
Earlier form of Vietnam My Lai massacre in France 🇫🇷.
War brings out the worst in people.
Not just war.
And dear old Albert speer got a book deal
A German surrendering in 1945 fears two people, the Soviets and the French.
He feared everyone. Except the Swiss.
And the Poles and Serbs
In the South of France they were running around trying to find Allied Units to surrender to, because they feared what the FFI and other armed Résistance groups would do to them. They had good reason, knowing what they had done.
@@franc9111 specially after the massacre of Resistance units in Vercors, July 1944.
And not the Dutch?
When the US burned thousands of women and children to death in Dresden, who was punished?
British and American air bombs burned the city of Dresden to the ground - that happen throughout WW2.
If the Allied did anything wrong "the other side had it coming", "it's all a lie" or "everybody would have done the same to get home alive", "it happened in the heat of the fight", etc... excuses enough to defend their own warcrimes...
My great grand uncle was Waffen ss
He served in a anti tank platoon in Russia and in the Bulge
He was wounded and captured 2 days before the Malmady massacre
Roughly 3 days after he and 3 other men was beaten almost to death by American MPs while in custody
He said he didn’t kill civilians and PoWs , he was a anti tank gunner
too much time fighting armor than anything else
he said check infantry and panzer units or military police
He survived the war but lost use of his left arm ( 65 percent from the beating) and had 4 combat wounds from exploding shells from tank fire
He later in 1950 moved to South Dakota and worked at the post office in Rapid City , he worked that job until his retirement in 1981
Both American born sons later served in the Navy , one rose to be a commander
Other served on the carrier America
He died in 2000
He was lying, all SS killed civilians and Allied POWs were also killed and sometimes tortured by the SS. What they did to French Résistance and others is too horrible to explain. Another thing, we now from the Trent Park transcriptions that the Wehrmacht was just as guilty of atrocities as were the SS and gestapo. In fact they freely admitted that quite often they lent hand to the SS when it came to atrocities. It's all there in the archives.
@@franc9111That really is a mindless, oafish and unhelpful blanket response.
@@derin111But it is true that regular Wehrmacht troops aided in the commission of atrocities, particularly on the Eastern Front, as a response to partisan activities.
@@derin111Read the SS and Wermacht's own accounts. Thousands of diaries recalling fun times of burning women and children alive. Stop trying to rewrite history, the facts are too many.
@@franc9111 500 000 plus including conscripts , didn't murder everyone. Get your head out of your ass , not ever German is a nazi or criminal , the same can be said about Imperal Japan , which murdered 37 percent of all allied PoW camps , and generally got away with murder at the trials. What about Stalin ? 20 million of his own people before the war started , how about operation polish before the war 110,000 murdered ? know your history
Unbelievable! Mans inhumanity to man. Will we ever learn?!
What a horrible story. The atrocity of war never ceases to amaze me. I’m glad I live in the relative safety of the UK and not in Europe circa 1940. What collective madness allowed these acts of genocide and other crimes against humanity based on what? Race purity? Ideology? Geography? Technical supremacy? The global shock still reverberates. No community was left unaffected. Reconstruction has been long and painful. Even now we are still reaping the whirlwind. My Jewish friends are fighting a war of religion against an enemy who would wipe them out of existence. The Palestinians are suffering because of Hamas while the Lebanese are under the yoke of Hezbollah. Who is being held accountable? Not the perpetrators that’s for sure. Just like post war Germany the criminals will sink back into obscurity and a new generation will take their place brought up on a diet of hatred and lies. I’m too old now to fight in a war, all I can do is look on with despair. The Ukrainians are fighting against occupation, while Russia is fighting for a tyrant. Western Democracies are looking on waiting to intercede before a nuclear weapon is deployed. Western Europe is backing Ukraine. The Russians will be forced to step down. Their campaign is not sustainable. Putin will either die in office or there will be a coup to oust him. His days are numbered. His alliance with China and Iran is not worth the paper it is written on. North Korea is slipping further and further into the abyss. Soon there won’t be anyone else left to kill. We will have reached extinction. In less than in a blink of an eye our entire existence will cease, causing less reaction than a butterfly flapping its wings after emerging from a chrysalis. No one will remember us. We will be the wind in the trees and the flutter of a falling leaf will have more effect as it hits the ground than our entire civilization, if you can call it that.
You know this is all woke lies, right? They were good Christian men, that he left tries to ruin just like they are doing to Trump. That is what is sad.
Well, you Brits have your own history of violations of basic human right and commiting warcrimes all over the world. Your troops have had their time with Belgium civilians and Germans troops in 1940, not to mention what you did overseas...
And now we see the same being played out in Ukraine and the conflict between Muslims and Jews. The sins of humanity are truly sick.
While I abhor the brutality of WW2, or any brutality at all (and all wars for that matter, being a Vietnam vet), what amazes me are responders here seemingly unaware this kind of inhumanity, in its own morbid way perhaps, is happening right now in the Middle East. What do you think happens to anyone caught near or inside these buildings when taken out by drones, missiles, artillery strikes, etal, like what's been happening of late, even over the weekend? The unintended victims, and I'm sure they're many (collateral damage to be sure) are either killed in the blast, burn to death in the fire, or slowly die over days if buried alive. What occurred in France in '44 should never have happened, nor ever be repeated, while the current wars we have should never have started to begin with. Strong headed leaders wage wars, weak nations allow them to happen. Wars are good for business after all, if not for the public who pays the price -- in more ways than one.
I myself a Vietnam vet agrees with you. There is a saying, "Only the dead will see the end of war". Stay safe.
So essentially, revenge was denied. Click bait should not be used with video like this.
These weren't men, they were sub-beasts. More vicious than any animal that could only happened Germany. My WW2 uncle was a sniper who followed the front. He said he had no pity on German soldiers, Nazis or not. He said he it took hard not kill German civilians. He also mentioned that murdered French children and women changed many men into rage..
he died at 92 years in 2010. He was a 46% white mountain Apache 54% Hispanic.
Many of the SS soldiers were from ALSACE and the French themselves.
The term Nazi SS Soldiers is redundant. SS Soldiers would have been enough. Otherwise, were there also Communist SS Soldiers.
That's why the United States Secret Service is called the USSS for short. Unlike the IRS, FAA, FCC and NASA, no one calls the United States Secret Service the SS.
Recommend reading "French Children of the Holocaust". Large book, maybe 1800 pages. Has many pictures of French Jewish children who were apprehended, almost always by the French, and later deported to Nazi concentration camps. Very, very few came back. The extent of the French collaboration with the Germans to send their own people to concentration/death camps is an eternal stain on France's honor.
1:01 is the soldier on the right carrying a Stengun?
What happened in that village was beyond sick and cruel and the massacre was committed by animals, but prior to the massacre French communist resistance fights captured SS soldiers and burnt them to death in the back of a truck and that is the reason the SS gave as the excuse for the atrocity. Very sad
God made the Heavens and the Earth. Satan created Germany.
These germans were never held accountable for their war crimes. They went on to become executives at BMW, Mercedes, Siemens, VW, Audi etc., etc.
No, most of them were KIA after it happened or were shot on spot by Allied troops because they were SS. But maybe you can enlighten us with your wisdom and tell us who of them became executives (unless the US brought them to the States in Operation Paperclip)
The more I hear about this guy named Hitler, the more I don't like him
Maquis not marquis.
WAR IS HELL!
Just for some perspective: the Germans did this to over 600 villages on the Eastern Front. And those are the ones the Soviets documented, there may have been more. Murdered everyone they could, burned everything to the ground, poisoned wells, took livestock & moved on to do it again.
That's why when the Red Army entered German-settled territories & Germany itself they were rapacious, bloodthirsty + relentless. The brutality of the war in the East was so bad that divisions being rebuilt or rested were moved to the Western Front. That's why Das Reich + Leibstandarte were in the West. Taking a break & rebuilding. In fact the commanding officer at Oradour explicitly told the new men (boys, really) "We'll show you what we learned in the East".
The Allies like to pat themselves on the back but there was nothing, not even D-Day itself, that compares to the horror of Stalingrad, Kursk, Voronezh, Smolensk, Minsk, Kyiv, Babi Yar.. nothing even close.
its makes absolute no sense the way this project is cut. how bad are you as an editor. there is no story line, no message and not really a clear goal.
My father lost to brothers in the battle of the shelt. Until this very day no german is welcome in our communiity.
Could you change the narration on this video, please. It is just absurdly over the top. Otherwise, not a bad post, but I had to watch without sound and rely upon subtitles.
Was there in 2004 , left just as it was after the Germans left , eerie place , there is a big underground museum next to the village .
In fact it was Germany and Russia that invaded Poland on Sept 1, forcing a two front war on Poland.
This could happen again in America
WWII did not start on Sept. 1, but 3 with England (and France) declaring war on Germany.
Strangely enough England and France did NOT declare war on Russia which had invaded the Eastern part of Poland...
🤔
England never declared war on Germany at any time.
@@brianferris8668 Yes they did. The did a formal declaration of war on 3 Dec 1939. Learn a little about history before you write a comment. Especially now days when you can use google to look it up.
I never understood that either.
It is also tragic to realize the unimaginable horrors that normal well educated people can do to others if told the appropriate lies through total control of media/information.
After 75 years we must admit we have not learned the lesson, therefore are bound to apparently repeat the “course”.
We were expected to wright 80 million times “we shall not kill”, etc.
Tragic indeed !
What a sad mess
How dis it take 18 days that’s crazy
Still we go to war
When will they ever learn........
These are the people who taught Hamas in1941
How could they do that?
How could they kill so many Jews? How could people transport slaves to America? Humans are a nasty lot.
What "revenge"?