Posted on 09/20/2006 4:54:44 PM PDT by CommonSense1stOverParty
An 84-year-old San Francisco woman was deported to Germany this month after admitting she worked as a guard in a Nazi-operated concentration camp, federal officials announced Tuesday.
News about the dark chapter in Elfriede Lina Rinkel's past left her relatives in the Bay Area stunned. They said Rinkel had kept the secret for more than 60 years, from them and, apparently, from her late husband -- a German Jew who had fled the Holocaust himself.
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The government's charges, filed in April, say Elfriede Rinkel was born July 14, 1922, in Leipzig, Germany; served at the camp from 1944 to 1945; and applied for a U.S. immigrant visa Aug. 29, 1959, at the U.S. consulate in Frankfurt. The visa application instructed her to list all her residences from 1938 forward, but she omitted Ravensbruck.
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``because all these years she was totally embarrassed.''
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Ravensbruck, saw an estimated 130,000 women and children imprisoned within its walls. About 90,000 died from starvation, execution, weakness or medical experimentation.
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``We did help her to close up her apartment and helped her to buy her airplane ticket and go to the airport and buy her luggage -- but never a word about why she was leaving,'' the sister-in-law said. ``We thought she was going because her situation in her apartment had deteriorated.''
``She said she just wanted to go back to Germany, and because she told us that, we believed her.''
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She admitted being assigned to the camp, explaining that she had had a less desirable job as a factory worker and then volunteered to be a dog handler at the camp for better wages.
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She is barred from re-entering the United States. Only in death could she be returned.
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
So they're shipping her back to Europe? Well, I know Elfriede's 84 years old, but if she'll just hang in there for a while longer, she can get her old job back.
There was no such thing as just a school boy in wartime Germany.
From 1936 onwards, every boy in the country was enrolled in the Hitler Youth. As the war situation worsened, the HJ were increasingly incorporated into the fighting apparatus of the country. In 1942, that meant 15 year old kids working the fire brigades after RAF bombing. In 1945, it meant 12 year olds being sent to Volkssturm units to fight Russians house to house in Berlin.
Too bad the women and children who died at Ravensbruck didn't get to live to her age, huh? Too bad they died of exhaustion, starvation, medical experimentation or were gassed or shot.Oh, except for the children who were stomped to death in front of their mothers. Revenge is sweet? Yup. It sure is. I love a happy ending.
She applied for the job as a dog handler.She admits she volunteered to be a dog handler for the better pay. Can you imagine, gee my factory work doesn't pay as much as a dog handler in a concentration camp, guess I'll apply and make more money. SHe has expressed no remorse for what she did. As a matter of fact officials have used the term cold, and commented that she shed no tears, offered no apology.
My favourite own comment follows:
They never saw, they never bled, they never suffered, they never served.
Meantime, if one listens to Coast to Coast, some blighters are really going to lay it to the United States.
Talk about a terrible catastrophy. I tell myself it is alarmist. Oh, I have to check my street- the Nazi's are coming.
Did you read the poster's snarky allegation? Your post validates my point in detail.
No, here is what you wrote:
At least some, like Ratzinger, can TRY the excuse that their service to the Nazi's was forced but in this case this itchba
You even capitalized TRY.
I would have left this alone but your post strikes a chord. I remember WW2. We (snot nosed English kids were told lies, about the Allied bombing and it kept up morale.
The book that brought the horror of war to me was "Slaughter House Five", by Kurt Vonnegut. An American soldier surving captivity in Dresden. He WAS there. 20,000 forced labour workers were killed in that raid. Possibly 50,000 German civilians were incinerated.
"Man's inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn" Scotlands immortal bard. Robert Burns.
Considering the millions here illegally, an 84 year old is one of the last I'd be concerned about.
Compared with the utter horror and almost inconceivable terror, many Europeans were faced with, they(adults) were right.
A present day North American child would need a raft of counselling and therapy, if they had to face that which some of us snots faced.
Please God, they (North American kids) never will. That war was hell on earth for parts of Europe. Hollywood not with standing.
trashcanbred,
I was just responding & giving my opinion on your line that appeared to be complaining that I had come to a conclusion as to her guilt/innocence.
IMHO, those that stood by (esp those that VOLUNTEERED to do so) & did nothing are at best as guilty as the actual "doers" & possibly worse than them.
I think the chances are more likely that they won't charge her b/c of her age & her gender - which I think is favoritism.
onyx,
Yes, I put TRY in all caps. I'm more willing to except it from him & those in the type of situation he faced BUT I will never accept it from the likes of her especially since he long ago admitted what he did as where she was still LYING to family, friends & acquaintances up to the day she left & they didn't find out about her WWII "job" & her decades of deception until after she was out of the USA & then they found out by means other than directly from her. Ratzinger was in the Hitler Youth & later was in the german army where he helped setup tank traps etc. Remember, I pointed out that Oriana Fallaci of Italy fought in the resistance (as a teenager) against the evil of WWII (as did other youth in the area where Ratzinger was from at one time during the war) as where Ratzinger instead chose to go into where he was directed & when he was not where he was directed he never participated in any "resistance"...at least I've never heard him say that he did. At least the last papal office holder did participate in anti-Nazi theater performances in his homeland of Poland, while not in the "resistance" at least it was anti-Nazi/Hitler activity.
TheDon,
Someone here illegitimately is here illegitimately REGARDLESS of age or how long they've been here illegitimately. I don't care if they are a newborn or 100+, if they are here illegitimately OUT THEY SHOULD GO. One of my bigger questions in this whole matter is...I wonder if the SSA will still send her checks to germany. As far as I'm concerned, she isn't entitled to it b/c she was here illegitimately regardless of if her deceived & deceased husband or herself payed into the "system"...I say she should get nothing...
Nice to see there are a few absolutists out there.
Do you think this kind of hand-wringing should go on if the authorities in 2066 finally catch some old geezer who ran the cameras for al-Qaeda decapitation videos in 2006?
Er, no. She lied by omission on the entry paperwork, making her entry illegal.
Charge her with what? Lying on her visa application in 1959 or for being a guard? Unless witnesses have come forward and complained about her treatment as a guard, she won't be charged with anything.
You say she is worse that a "doer"? You mean a "doer" like Josef Mengele?
I am not going to waste my time on a blow-hard that hasn't a clue what he is talking about.
Please excuse me using your post to clarify my own. Looking over what I had previously posted, I had not made myself too clear. It would be a bad policy to deliberately antagonise someone, in disagreeing. This you did not do. I will try to do likewise.
I thought of a novel example. One might imagine an entry into the after life. There are three sets of children. (1) Billy and sister Queenie. Killed in the fire bombing of East London.
(2) Horst and little Annaliese. Killed in the fire bombing of Dresden.
(3) Haru and Haya, Killed in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
The Luftwaffe, the Royal Air Force and the USAAF, delivered the payload.
I hope that the mercy of God will be on this woman. I hope the mercy of God will be on those who ordered these bombings.
I've read more about her these last few days, she doesn't think she did anything wrong - so while I still think it will be God to judge - I no longer feel sympathy for her.
steve-b,
Excellent point again this time to madison10.
It's was already specifically pointed out (in my initial post in this thread aka post 1 of this thread) that she lied on her VISA paperwork which makes her an illegal alien invading trespasser before montag813 even posted but it appears to me either he lacked reading comprehension skills in re to that being pointed out or IMHO, he just doesn't care.
trashcanbred,
Well, make up your mind are you going to "waste" your "time" or not...if not then stop asking me questions about this & my opinions related to it. And it is you, IMHO, that are what you accuse me of being.
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