1,800 Germans dug up from 1945 mass grave in Poland

Chicago Sun Times ^ | AFP

[GSP.FAN]

WARSAW - The remains of 1,800 German civilians who perished in 1945, towards the end of the World War II, have been exhumed from a mass grave in Malbork, northern Poland, officials said Wednesday.

[GSP.FAN]

As the Red Army was approaching, Malbork residents, mostly ethnic Germans, were ordered to evacuate deeper into the Third Reich. The fate of 1,800 of the 3,800 people known to have stayed behind has long remained a mystery.

I presume ethnic Germans means they are Polish

[laweeks]

Reminds me of the Katyn Massacre that the lackies from the West blamed on Hitler for decades . . . Old Uncle Joe was a bigger monster than Hitler (multiply Hitler’s slaughters by 10), but Joe gets better press because he was a stinking communist . . . and we all know that communism is the best system . . . if only we let it have another chance . . .

[Tijeras_Slim]

Eastern Europe from 1930 to 1945 was the valley of the shadow of death.

Satan’s playground. No one was safe.

[driftdiver]

Stalin was just misunderstood don’t you know.

[ak267]

Germans masacred??? Boo hoo...ya breaking my heart (sarc)

[laweeks]

I wonder, Freepers, have they ever done a movie about the Katyn Massacre? I understand the Tom Cruise movie “Valkyrie” give a false slant to the hero in that he “was against the slaughter of the Jews” whereas, in reality, that was NOT why he tried to kill Hitler . . . he was right along with the rest of the Nazis, but wanted Hitler out of the way so they could sue for a “friendly” term peace.

Amazing how ONLY HITLER is portrayed as a monster and Uncle Joe as just a nutty old codger.

[randomhero97]

Should of listened to General George S Patton and pushed the bolshevik sons-of-bitches out of Eastern Europe.

[driftdiver]

I’ve read that they wanted to get Hitler out of the way because they knew they would lose with him in charge.

I agree though that saving jews was not his agenda.

[laweeks]

“Should of listened to General George S Patton and pushed the bolshevik sons-of-bitches out of Eastern Europe.”

Yep! And MacArthur wanted to push the commie bums off the planet from Eastern China until Truman stopped him. If we would’ve crushed the communists from both sides, as both generals wanted to, probably 150 million or more lives would have been saved.

[hecht]

without the a-bomb, they would have knocked us off the continent.

[GSP.FAN]

We promised the Europeans freedom. It would be worse than dishonorable not to see they have it. This might mean war with the Russians, but what of it? They have no Air Force anymore, their gasoline and ammunition supplies are low. I’ve seen their miserable supply trains; mostly wagons draw by beaten up old horses or oxen. I’ll say this; the Third Army alone with very little help and with damned few casualties, could lick what is left of the Russians in six weeks. You mark my words. Don’t ever forget them. Someday we will have to fight them and it will take six years and cost us six million lives. http://deathby1000papercuts.com/2008/08/gen-george-patton-georgia-fighting-and-pattons-russian-predictions/

[GSP.FAN]

http://deathby1000papercuts.com/2008/08/gen-george-patton-georgia-fighting-and-pattons-russian-predictions/

[PAR35]

Interesting post. We don’t see many Stalinists on FR.

[Revolting cat!]

Yes,Polish director Andrzej Wajda (Ashes and Diamonds, Kanal, The Man of Iron, many others), made a film about Katyn, quite recently, as a matter of fact. It might have been submitted as a foreign film Oscar candidate this year. (Will the Stalin apologists in Hollywood vote for it?) It should make it to the U.S. screens this year. A friend in Europe sent me an e-mail last week saying it was good, if lacking some historical truths he thought should have been included (and he's not Polish.)

[randomhero97]

I don’t know about that. A rejuvinated and resupplied German army under American command would of crushed them IMO.

[Mogwai]

And of course Rosie Velt had a great personal fondness for Stalin and suppressed media criticism of the Soviets. Not that there wasn’t plenty of native Sovietophilia among media, e.g. Walter Duranty.

[Travis McGee]

George didn’t mince words!

[yarddog]

I once read a book by Erich Hartmann the all time ace of aces. He mentioned one air battle near the end of the war in which Russian fighters attacked American P-51s.

During the ensuing furball, he noted a large number of Russian planes going down. As good as the Russians were, the Americans were better. I have no doubt we could have whipped them. Also we were providing nearly all their mechanized support, trucks jeeps etc.

[Pharmboy]

I presume ethnic Germans means they are Polish

No, they were ethnic German. One of the "reasons" Hitler gave for invading the Sudetenland was the high concentration of ethnic Germans living there, the "Sudetendeutsche" (Sudeten Germans).

In border areas there was a lot of mixed ethnicity in the towns (e.g., Roumanian/German, Polish/German, etc.)..

For more on this, click here.

[GSP.FAN]

Straight to the point no bu**s**t

[icwhatudo]

Just like Gorby was not for freedom, he wanted a more open economy only so he could make more money to keep the Soviet Union in the arms race.

[BenLurkin]

?

[HereInTheHeartland]

“And of course Rosie Velt had a great personal fondness for Stalin and suppressed media criticism of the Soviets. “

There were many filthy Communists in our government at that time, and much sympathy for their system.

[joe.fralick]

About 3 million ethnic German civilians died in the aftermath of the war, driven from their homes in Poland, Czechoslovakia, etc. For the most part, they were like most people in all places and times. Not monsters, just people caught up in events they did not control.

[GSP.FAN]

Stalin has his fingerprints all over this ,nothing to do with Hitler.
Stalin was doing his etnic cleansing

[Pharmboy]

Oh, I know that. After WWII, the ethnic NON-Germans took it out on the ethnic German populations living amongst them. Stalin had little to do with much of it among the civilians.

The Red Army was another matter.

[pierrem15]

Churchill had the British Army draw up plans to re-arm 250,000 German POW's in summer '45 in case Uncle Joe got any ideas.

Lord Mountbatten did precisely that later in 1945: when the Indonesians tried to declare independence, the small Allied garrison placed interred Japanese commanders and their troops under their command and used them to crush the Indonesians.

[BrianE]

“And of course Rosie Velt had a great personal fondness for Stalin and suppressed media criticism of the Soviets. “

There were many filthy Communists in our government at that time, and much sympathy for their system.

There is more today alot more!!

[pierrem15]

I used to think that also about von Stauffenberg, but I've begun to change my mind after reading more lately. The murder of Jews, Poles and Soviet POW's weighed on his conscience (and even more so on von Tresckow's).

It's true of course that they were all German nationalists who supported the war initially: but that doesn't imply that the conduct of the Nazis (and especially the way in which the German Army was pushed into becoming a primary instrument of Nazi atrocities) didn't repulse them also.

Each individual conspirator was also different, and drawn to the conspiracy for slightly different reasons and with different degrees of resolve (nicely shown in the film, I think).

Would they have been better men if they had opposed the Nazis seriously from the beginning? Undoubtedly. But there's still something noble and even tragic in seeing figures like von Stauffenberg and von Tresckow decide-- even after their earlier involvement-- to say, 'enough'.

[conservative cat]

About 3 million ethnic German civilians died in the aftermath of the war, driven from their homes in Poland, Czechoslovakia, etc. For the most part, they were like most people in all places and times. Not monsters, just people caught up in events they did not control.

My grandfather was a German in Poland. He was in Germany already at the end of the war. However, his mother and sister fled on foot to what became E. Germany, where they lived for the rest of their lives. Another great-aunt fled on foot to the future West Germany. My cousin-in-law's mother fled the area on foot as a child, too. Another friend's father's family lost their estate and escaped on foot, too. His aunt was fathered by a Soviet soldier who raped her mother. Lots of stories out there and not many know of them. And you are absolutely right, they were not monsters.

[randomhero97]

Cool piece of history that I did not know. Thanks!

[Gumdrop]

You are wrong about von Stauffenberg. His motives were complex. I have not seen the movie. But it is well known that: von Stauffenberg was a military man who was interested in trying to rebuild a sense of respect for his country following WWI and the horrible economy that followed; that his military career was primarily to restore a sense of pride in the German people; that von Stauffenberg was a Bavarian who also was a fairly religious Catholic man. That in about 1942 he began to speak to his wife and a maternal uncle about Hitler’s murderous schemes and that he was against them - that he abhored Hitler’s concentration camps, and the Nazi propaganda machine; that he almost was convinced to join his maternal uncle in a group that was opposed to Hitler already in 1942, but he delayed; that he and his wife Nina had 4 children and a fifth on the way when Operation Valkyrie was begun, and that he deliberately withheld info from his wife in case the scheme failed. He did not want her or his children to be implicated directly in the operation; that he told his wife that what he was about to do was high treason, and if he failed, he would pay with his life.

Following the failure of the effort, his children were removed forcefully from their home and put into homes of Nazi sympathizers, and Nina was put into a concentration camp where she gave birth to their fifth child, a daughter. Nina died in either 2006 or 2007. She lived to be an old woman. She never remarried. All five of their children are still living.

It is wrong to over simplify the Nazi era in Germany. It was a terrible, evil time. Not very many people have the courage to confront a totalitarian government which has the military might to crush all opponents. Even the fact that these men tried to kill Hitler, for whatever reason, took guts.

[dfwgator]

I wonder, Freepers, have they ever done a movie about the Katyn Massacre?

Andrzej Wajda directed a movie about Katyn last year, but it only was released in Poland AFAIK.

[dfwgator]

Forgive me if I don’t shed a tear. And a lot of those ethnic Germans willingly moved into Polish homes that were seized by the Nazis in 1939.

[SolidWood]

The Poles made an excellent high budget movie on Katyn last years. Look at IMDB.com for Katyn. Must watch (there should be a subtitled version).

[neb52]

“Forgive me if I don’t shed a tear. And a lot of those ethnic Germans willingly moved into Polish homes that were seized by the Nazis in 1939.”

Malbork is a Prussian town and was under Polish control for 300 hundred years (1475-1772). The Prussians took back the area to bring all of Prussia back together during the First Partition of Poland in 1772. So while some Polish may have lived there during that time. It was always a Prussian/German populated town.

[RedMonqey]

That is the attitude that got the world into two world wars and countless other wars across history.

Thankfully, the following was the attitude of the Allies(except the Ruskies) after the war.

“...for when lenity and cruelty play for a kingdom, the gentler gamester is the soonest winner.”
From Henry V Act lll Scene 6

[dfwgator]

“I have given the order, and will have everyone shot who utters one word of criticism that the aim of the war is not to attain certain lines, but consist in the physical destruction of the opponent. Thus for the time being I have sent to the East only my “Death’s Head units” with the order to kill without pity or mercy all men, women, and children of the Polish race or language. Only in such a way will we win the vital space that we need. Who still talks nowadays of the extermination of the Armenians?” - Adolf Hitler’s order to his Generals during the planning of the invasion of Poland.

All things considered, the Germans got off easy.

[wtc911]

Yep, zero sympathy for any German eighteen or older during the War years.

[wtc911]

Should of listened to General George S Patton and pushed the bolshevik sons-of-bitches out of Eastern Europe

_____________________________________

We couldn't have done it without dropping the bomb and at that time we only had two, and they were slotted for use elsewhere.

[BnBlFlag]

At that time, the area was part of Germany.

[wtc911]

I don’t know about that. A rejuvinated and resupplied German army under American command would of crushed them IMO.

_____________________________________________

Absolute fantasy that exhibits a severe lack of actual knowledge of the time.

[timm22]

Forgive me if I don’t shed a tear. And a lot of those ethnic Germans willingly moved into Polish homes that were seized by the Nazis in 1939.

A lot of them were children who had no choice in the matter. Anyone who murders a child is a monster.

[dfwgator]

Next time when Josef Goebbels asks “Do you want total war?” Just say ‘nein.’

[timm22]

Next time when Josef Goebbels asks “Do you want total war?” Just say ‘nein.’

You realize that some of the victims were toddlers (or not even born yet) when Josef was pitching the war, right? Were they also supposed to speak up and stop the Nazis?

[randomhero97]

Absolute fantasy that exhibits a severe lack of actual knowledge of the time.

Really? Then back it up with some of your pro-soviet research. You don't think the Allied presence in Europe could of pushed the soviets back across their border? As I recall it Roosevelt "let" uncle joe take Berlin.

[wtc911]

Really? Then back it up with some of your pro-soviet research....

____________________________________________

Pro-soviet? You just lost sonny.

[Citizen Blade]

Forgive me if I don’t shed a tear.

The people who stayed behind were probably the elderly, the ill and the infirm. In the history of WWII, a massacre of 1,800 such people is fairly small. But, it doesn't mean we should ignore the horror of such people being massacred for no reason other than the fact that they were of the wrong ethnicity.

[Citizen Blade]

You don't think the Allied presence in Europe could of pushed the soviets back across their border?

Maybe, if we were willing to soak up another million or so dead. the Red Army would not have just rolled up and played dead.

[dfwgator]

Yes, we should always remember that there are consequences of starting wars, and it’s the innocent who suffer those consequences.