Posted on 10/31/2024 3:09:09 PM PDT by nickcarraway
The Germany President pictured here with his Greek counterpart flew to Crete on Thursday to apologize for the German atrocities in Crete. Credit: German Presidency President of Germany, Frank-Walter Steinmeier has asked the people of Kandanos in Crete for forgiveness on behalf of Germany for the massacres committed by the German Wehrmacht during the Second World War.
“We cannot undo the suffering. We will never be able to properly make up for it. But we must keep its memory alive to ensure that what happened once does not happen again”, he said at a commemoration ceremony.
Visiting Kandanos on Crete which was almost destroyed by German forces in June 1941, the German President added: “The photos give us an idea of what happened in this place, but pictures and photos can only ever convey in part the full dimension of the horror.”
The village was burned to the ground and Nazi troops massacred all its 180 residents. It was one of the worst atrocities committed by the occupiers and has haunted Crete and Greece for decades.
Steinmeier spoke to survivors of the massacre as some demonstrators shouted slogans demanding “justice” and war reparations from Germany.
The massacre site of Crete is a “German shame”
As Steinmeier noted during a ceremony at the village Kandanos was one of the first Cretan villages to be razed to the ground by German soldiers, members of the Wehrmacht, during the Second World War.
“The 3rd company of the 55th Motorcycle Battalion, a paratrooper platoon and two groups of the mountain pioneers committed horrific, brutal crimes,” he said.
“They burned down the houses. They killed the livestock. They shot all the villagers they encountered, primarily women and old people. The only people who managed to escape were those who happened to be away from the village or were just able to get away in time.
“It is with a heavy heart that I, as President of the Federal Republic of Germany, have come to this place. But I cannot come here, to Crete, without visiting this site of German shame,” Steinmeier stressed.
Speaking in Greek, the German president added: “Και γι΄ αυτό θα ήθελα σήμερα να ζητήσω συγχώρεση στο όνομα της Γερμανίας.” (I would like to ask for your forgiveness today on behalf of Germany.)
“I ask you, the survivors and descendants, for your forgiveness for the heinous crimes perpetrated here by Germans. I ask for forgiveness for the fact that over many decades my country failed to punish these crimes. That after the war it initially turned a blind eye and remained silent.”
Greece on Wednesday raised again the issue of German reparations for WWII with Steinmeier.
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said, “These issues remain alive and we hope that at some point we will resolve them.” The German guest replied that legally for Germany, the issue is considered closed.
Bfl
“”Greece on Wednesday raised again the issue of German reparations for WWII with Steinmeier.””
I just learned this week at my ripe old age that survivors of the concentration camps received reparations from the country of Germany. My neighbor’s father was a survivor of Auschwitz and we’ve spent some time visiting lately and she said that some of his care when he was ill several years back - he passed away in 2017 - were paid by ????? It was a German name and I had to ask her what it meant. I can’t believe I never knew that - or did I and just don’t remember? I think she said the money came from two funds set up in Germany for that!!
You’ve hit upon something that would make a good discussion in a philosophy class.
WW2 is filled with examples of civilians striking back at their Axis occupiers. Civilians are not supposed to do that. And neither are the Axis occupiers supposed to execute civilians who had nothing to do with those strikes.
So who has the dirty hands here? I suppose that would be determined by the victors. It is they who convene the courts after the war is over.
“Do you remember Berlin Freeper? I have seen a post from him in a long time.”
Went dark in March. Perhaps he crossed paths with an immigrant.
I formally apoligize for Germany and Russian, the Chinese, the Arabs, even Adam and Eve!!!!!
I win.
Yep!
I apologize for The Backstreet Boys reunion.
If Mussolini had played his cards right, he would have ended up like Spain’s Francisco Franco - a respected leader (when he was alive, anyway) who lived a long and comfortable life.
Instead Mussolini fell under the spell of Hitler, and he ended up being executed like a dog by partisans in northern Italy as the war came to a close.
Are you suggesting giving the Greeks Malta? Or suggesting that the Germans should have occupied Malta and massacred them? Not sure where you are heading with that comment.
In any event, the Greeks got sufficient Italian territory to satisfy reparations from the Axis.
Just thank god the Turks stayed out of the war.
Hitler demanded the unification of Austria with Germany and the German-speaking border regions of Czechoslovakia, but he never made Mussolini return the South Tyrol (German-speaking areas given to Italy after WWI which had been part of Austria until then).
I had read elsewhere that the delay in attacking the USSR in 1941 was not caused by Hitler’s decision to attack Yugoslavia (he was mad about the coup that ousted Prince Paul, but the new government promised to observe the agreement that Paul had made with Germany), despite the myth. But I was not aware of the rainy weather in Poland being the real reason.
Yes, I know! At the time the Italian army was viewed as superior to the German Army. (Yes hard to believe but it was believed back then!). There was no way Hitler could intimidate Mussolini into giving up south Tyrol. Italy spent a lot of lives in WWI in Alpine fighting. South Tyrol was its reward for doing so.
The Germans killed a large number of men and boys in Kragujevac, Serbia, in reprisal for attacks by the resistance.
Italy also got Trieste and other areas along what is now the border with Slovenia from Austria, as well as Zara (now Zadar in Croatia). Zara had been a base for the Austrian navy. Georg von Trapp (the father in “The Sound of Music”) was born in Zara when his father was in the Austrian navy. The Italians wanted more as their reward for siding with the Allies in the war, places where few of the inhabitants were Italian—Woodrow Wilson opposed them.
If the perps are still around to “apologize”, lock the bastards up!
Could that be the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich?
“In fact, Barbarossa was delayed because of the rainy Spring season in Poland, which delayed the Germans moving their troops and equipment to the Russian border, and that it had little to do with going into Greece and Yugoslavia.”
Yes, the flooding was unusual that spring. The Germans had their Balkan operations wrapped up well before the end of May. Plenty of time to redeploy.
“Migration is not solely “Germany’s crime.””
Never said it was.
I think that’s correct.
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