# Challenging WWII myths



## Brian G Turner (Nov 3, 2017)

Brandon H makes some interesting arguments on how some myths about the German army during WWII have been readily accepted - perhaps, for political purposes:


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## reiver33 (Nov 3, 2017)

The early success of the German army was done to its superior operational organisation and definitely not its equipment. Put it this way; the standard infantry rifle throughput the war was the K98 - 5 shot magazine clip, bolt action - from 1898.

The major German failing was a form of technological arrogance; if we can’t design it then nobody else can. Hence the Soviet T-34 came as a hideous surprise and they wouldn’t accept that Enigma could be broken (encrypted communications).


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## Venusian Broon (Nov 3, 2017)

Bizarre listening to the old Wehrmacht soldiers at the end, stating that Stalin's Bolshevists 'didn't need to respect international conventions of war, and he showed it...he massacred our people...' Then when asked, well, why did you invade the Netherlands or even why did you not even declare war they stated: "War has it's own laws"!

Also got to point out that the Wehrmacht were part of the occupying forces and therefore culpable in the deliberate starvation of millions of Slavs in the occupied Russian territories, as well as a host of other atrocities. Even if a particular soldier was constantly on the front line facing the Russian army and never did see any atrocities (possible but statistically unlikely, troops usually get pulled back and rested in regular intervals) they were part of that organisation and by their actions enabled everything else.


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## Foxbat (Nov 3, 2017)

reiver33 said:


> The major German failing was a form of technological arrogance; if we can’t design it then nobody else can. Hence the Soviet T-34 came as a hideous surprise and they wouldn’t accept that Enigma could be broken (encrypted communications).


And when the Germans built the Panther as their medium tank reply to the T34, they made the suspension and other components so complicatedthat it was impossible to build them in the vast numbers required.


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## Venusian Broon (Nov 3, 2017)

Foxbat said:


> And when the Germans built the Panther as their medium tank reply to the T34, they made the suspension and other components so complicatedthat it was impossible to build them in the vast numbers required.



They did make quite a number of Panthers, but by the time they were churning them out they had effectively lost air supremacy on all fronts and armour was particularly vulnerable to ground assault aircraft.


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## Foxbat (Nov 3, 2017)

Yes, the Germans built around 6000 Panthers but the Soviets built well over 35000 T34s.


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## Venusian Broon (Nov 3, 2017)

Foxbat said:


> Yes, the Germans built around 6000 Panthers but the Soviets built well over 35000 T34s.



True, and I believe the Americans made more shermans than T-34's. But it was one of the most numerous AFV's the Germans produced - which says more I think, about their inept industrial planning. (Or perhaps their belief that it would be a short war.)

It be interesting to know how many were lost (T-34's). And actually how many were used by the Germans.  

One of the interesting biases you have in WW2 photography is that they would only show that side using 'their' equipment. I believe at least 25% of all tanks used by the Nazi's were not German. (It's weird seeing Sherman's and T-34's with German insignia!)

Also a great deal of Soviet equipment was not Russian. They had entire armoured divisions entirely kitted out with Grants and even British made Matilda's. Even, my memory tells me, a division with captured Pnz 3 and 4's


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## Foxbat (Nov 3, 2017)

As an aside, I have a DVD documentary on German Panzers and among the extras is an interesting little training film for  infantry on how to disable a tank. They used a Panther Mk1 for the demonstration and disabled it using only a machine gun and one hand grenade.

Here's how it was done: continuous fire from the machine gun on or close to the the lead-glass viewing port in the hull (machine gun fire itself is enough to force the crew to close the hatches). The lead-glas was brittle and would crack because of the bullet vibrations. At this point the tank is blind until the crew replace the viewer (they always carried spare). The trick then was to sneak up to the tank and stick a grenade into the engine grille. Et Viola! One disabled tank.

Just thought I'd share

As for the number of T34s destroyed, I have no idea but I can tell you that when I went to Russia, just about every second WW2 memorial was a T34 on a plinth so they must have had plenty left at the end.


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## Edward M. Grant (Nov 4, 2017)

reiver33 said:


> Put it this way; the standard infantry rifle throughput the war was the K98 - 5 shot magazine clip, bolt action - from 1898.



And the standard British infantry rifle was the Lee-Enfield bolt-action from 1895, though it did at least have a ten-round magazine. The Soviet's standard rifle was the Moisin-Nagant five-shot bolt-action from 1882, though they handed out a lot of submachineguns later in the war. They started with war with the SVT-40, which was arguably the best semi-automatic rifle of WWII (the Germans loved captured SVT-40s, even the Swiss copied it, and it inspired the design of several post-WWII rifles), but the Finns stole a lot of them, it was too difficult to make, and too delicate in the field, so they went back to the Moisin-Nagant.

So pretty much everyone was using bolt-actions for most of the war.

That said, there's an interesting video on Youtube which shows why the Lee-Enfield was better than the K98 for numerous reasons (e.g. the K98 bolt comes back so far that you have to move your head aside between shots, whereas the Enfield bolt is short enough that you can keep your eyes on the target). I think it's one of the 'Bloke on the range' vids.



> The major German failing was a form of technological arrogance; if we can’t design it then nobody else can.



AFAIR, one of the reasons they stuck with the K98 was that they didn't believe you could drill a hole in the barrel to extract gas for a gas-operated semi-automatic, and their gas trap semi-automatic rifle was rather a flop. It was only after guns like the SVT-40 and Garand proved you could do that that the German engineers considered it a viable option.


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## BAYLOR (Nov 4, 2017)

Foxbat said:


> And when the Germans built the Panther as their medium tank reply to the T34, they made the suspension and other components so complicatedthat it was impossible to build them in the vast numbers required.





What the German should have done but wouldn't do was copy the T34 and the simplicity of design, the The T34 simple design made them easily to produces and easier  to service on the battle field.  The Germans kept clapping more and more armor on their tanks .  The Tiger 1 weighed 54 tons and successor the Tiger 2(King Tiger )  increased the weight to 68 tons. The result is these tanks were slower then the T34 and more prone to breakdown .


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## Edward M. Grant (Nov 4, 2017)

Don't forget, though, that the Germans were building defensive tanks later in the war, while the Allies were building offensive tanks. A Sherman or T34 had to be able to drive from Paris or Moscow to Berlin, whereas a Tiger could handle requiring maintenance every 100 miles, because it would take quite a while to travel that far (AFAIR a lot of them ended up effectively dug-in as pillboxes). What it needed was to be able to knock out the lighter offensive tanks while surviving hits from their guns. The T34 likely wouldn't have met that goal.

I agree, though, they made them overcomplicated, and the lack of air superiority meant they were easy targets for fighter-bombers, despite their armour.


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## BAYLOR (Nov 4, 2017)

Edward M. Grant said:


> Don't forget, though, that the Germans were building defensive tanks later in the war, while the Allies were building offensive tanks. A Sherman or T34 had to be able to drive from Paris or Moscow to Berlin, whereas a Tiger could handle requiring maintenance every 100 miles, because it would take quite a while to travel that far (AFAIR a lot of them ended up effectively dug-in as pillboxes). What it needed was to be able to knock out the lighter offensive tanks while surviving hits from their guns. The T34 likely wouldn't have met that goal.
> 
> I agree, though, they made them overcomplicated, and the lack of air superiority meant they were easy targets for fighter-bombers, despite their armour.



One of The biggest ironies  was the Germany had the first  first operation  jet aircraft just prior to the start of WWII.  It's  fortunate for the world., that they failed to see the potential in Jets  early on . Had they  gotten the jet fighters like the ME 262 fighter in to production  earlier then they did. and had Hitler  not meddled in the  program by insisting that they be used as dive bombers , it could tipped the air war in their favor.


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## Cathbad (Nov 4, 2017)

If Gemany had had a sane leader...


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## BAYLOR (Nov 4, 2017)

Cathbad said:


> If Gemany had had a sane leader...



Hitler did have mental illness in his family.

 He not in a genius ,he was a bungler who was more lucky then he was good. When Germany was invading France , they were outnumbered by the allies in both manpower and milady equipment. In fact,  France had on paper the most powerful army in all of Europe . Yes Germany had a pretty good air force , but  the British had the best fighter in the the sky, the Spitfire which was a better plane  then the German Messerschmitt .    If the allies had had better military leadership then they did ,  they could have stopped Hitler and Germany before he ever got started.


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## Edward M. Grant (Nov 4, 2017)

I watched an interesting documentary on Netflix a few months back which claimed that many of the Nazis (leaders and soldiers) were on crystal meth for much of the war. Apparently Hitler's doctor was injecting him with crystal meth and a cocktail of other drugs.

That may explain a lot.


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## Mad Alice (Nov 4, 2017)

I thought that was amphetamines or dextrose amphetamines. Speed pills I believe they were called.


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## Foxbat (Nov 4, 2017)

BAYLOR said:


> One of The biggest ironies  was the Germany had the first  first operation  jet aircraft just prior to the start of WWII.


Don't forget rocket-propelled aircraft as well
We have an Me163 at our local air museum and it's tiny.
Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet - Wikipedia

I only recently found out that the small propellor on the nose was used to power a dynamo and provide electrics for the cockpit.


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## Venusian Broon (Nov 4, 2017)

Mad Alice said:


> I thought that was amphetamines or dextrose amphetamines. Speed pills I believe they were called.



Manoeuvre warfare, of which the Germans were very partial too, required their soldiers to be active for very long periods of time - no stopping at barracks or towns whilst you are surrounding an enemy or going deep into their land. Hence the need for amphetamines, 'cause falling asleep deep in enemy territory is generally a bad idea


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## Venusian Broon (Nov 4, 2017)

BAYLOR said:


> One of The biggest ironies  was the Germany had the first  first operation  jet aircraft just prior to the start of WWII.  It's  fortunate for the world., that they failed to see the potential in Jets  early on.


In some sense everyone did. The Jet engine is, of course, a British invention - having been patented by Frank Whittle in 1930 . But the air ministry in Britain was a bit sceptical about it so didn't push it and give it resources the same way the German Hans von Ohain got, to make the first operational jet in, I believe 1939.

In many senses I can see why - there was still a great deal of performance that could be wrung out of propeller-driven aircraft. Remember that the RAF in the 1930's were still flying biplanes. It was the Spanish civil war and the appearance of the new Bf 109's that really got them to move on getting Hurricanes and especially Spitfires into service (and they did it just in time.)  Hence it probably looked like the safer path for R&D and development.

A jet engine was a whole new ball game and there was going to be a large amount of teething issues with such aircraft - didn't the Me262 need it's engines replaced after every flight?

As for tipping the air war in their favour...meh! The Gloster Meteor actually entered British service at approximately the same time as the Me262 in 1944 (and the British Jet too had it's share of delays and problems, same as the 262, so conceivably it could have been put into operational service much sooner too). If the German plane's introduction had been game changing for the course of the overall air war, I am sure RAF's priorities would have been to get Meteor's against the German plane as soon and in as many units as possible.


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## Dave (Nov 4, 2017)

It was possibly also the state of airfield runways. In most places they were still landing on grass and uneven, untested surfaces, swamps and sand. That was the reason they brought in the flying boats for long haul commercial flights (the short Sunderland was the military version.) The much faster speeds of jet aircraft would require much longer runways in much better conditions of repair and built to higher specifications.


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## Caledfwlch (Nov 4, 2017)

Mad Alice said:


> I thought that was amphetamines or dextrose amphetamines. Speed pills I believe they were called.



A huge part of the Civilian Population, those working in factories etc were also on them.

One potential Myth I would love to know the truth of, is one I have heard from a couple of sources - that towards the end, especially to the East/Russia, it got to the point that SS Units were refusing to go into combat in front of Wehrmacht Infantry Companies, because "friendly fire" would gun most of them down before they even got into range of Soviet weapons.

As I understand it, this was more your standard "thugs in black" SS Units, that were being gunned down by the grunts in the Wehrmacht, not the Waffen SS Regiments - one of my sources for it, is one of my best mates Grandfather who died a couple of years ago. Bill (Wilhelm) was in the Waffen SS, though not by choice - Either his Section/Squad, or his Company, i'm not sure which, as soon as they saw Allied Troops from a Western Nation, in this case, it was US Army forces, they turned their guns on the Officers, and men who were known to be Nazi's, shot them, then dropped their firearms and walked towards the US Troops, arms in the air with white flags. Bill says he heard a lot of stories of the same happening, and about the standard SS Units being gunned down by Wehrmacht troops.

Another one that is interesting, is the British Free Corps
British Free Corps - Wikipedia
A Waffen SS Unit composed of British/Dominion POW's who were on message with Nazi beliefs.
Officially, according to the UK, there were never more than 27 men in the BFC, so it was never a combat unit.
But there have been a few German survivors from the Eastern Front who claim to have fought in line with the BFC - they only even remember them, because they were wondering WTF the moment the troops turned up (and there were at least 1-3 Companies worth of them by the sounds) Who are these guys? Because they had standard Waffen SS Battle Dress, but with shields on their arms bearing the Union Jack, something that would certainly stand out to a German.

So, either several Wehrmacht Veterans are lying for some random reason, or Westminster and the MOD out of embarressment have hushed up some inconvenient truths, such as the real numbers of men who joined the Free Corps.


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## Venusian Broon (Nov 4, 2017)

Caledfwlch said:


> about the standard SS Units being gunned down by Wehrmacht troops.



Well this is not quite your story, but there is of course the battle for Castle Itter which saw the US army, Wehrmacht and French political prisoners fighting against Waffen SS:

Battle for Castle Itter - Wikipedia


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## Caledfwlch (Nov 4, 2017)

Venusian Broon said:


> Well this is not quite your story, but there is of course the battle for Castle Itter which saw the US army, Wehrmacht and French political prisoners fighting against Waffen SS:
> 
> Battle for Castle Itter - Wikipedia



Awesome story - I was going to say, it would make a fab movie, then saw at the bottom, that it has been filmed, for release next year!

I have always thought that Sven Hassel's books would make brilliant if gory films - as long as on film, they could convey the strong anti war message that drips through every page, and the sarcasm and humour.
They "filmed" Wheels of Terror in the 80's, they stripped away everything that made the novels what they were, the gallows humour, the comradeship, the anti war message, seeing through Sven's words & eyes his personal horror at what he was seeing, and perhaps in some ways worse, what he and his friends were being turned into, and turned it into a generic War Movie, who's characters and plot were entirely interchangeable with those of any war movie ever made. 

Sven is one of the people who claims to have fought alongside British Free Corps Units on the Eastern Front - I can't recall which novel it was, but around the time I read it, I had read what very little was available, on the Web in those days, many years ago about the BFC, so, having seen the official position that there were only 27 members, and they were never really a Combat Unit etc, it stood out a mile, when he mentions moving into positions supported by British troops on one side, so first thing I did at the time was check publishing date, that particular novel had come out in around 1951, when even basic information would have been so much harder to get hold of, especially for a Danish Veteran of the Wehrmacht, living in Spain, it felt more legit, perhaps, that he genuinely recalled seeing the BFC on the front lines, in numbers. It even ties up with the official story in a way - the BFC was formed primarily, and only to fight the Soviets and Communism, on the Eastern Front, they were never going to be asked to fight British Forces.

There is a Danish Journalist, who right till he died, hounded Sven for years, real bee in his bonnet, trying to "unmask him" as a Fraud, and prove his books wrong - but the books are not Autobiographical, they are fictional stories, based on real things he saw, battles he was in, and real Comrades, Tiny, Porta, the Old Man were all real people - he has on his website if its still up, a photo of him and the Old Man on a Panzer, a shot of Tiny standing in the snow etc. The Journalist has been determined to prove that Sven never fought in the Wehrmacht.
Ironically, it was the Journalist who ended up exposed. It turned out that he is a Neo Nazi, member of a Danish Far Right Group. Clearly, he was trying to discredit Sven, because the books are very anti Nazi, anti Hitler an organisation and person the journalist worships.
One of the madder claims the Journo made was that Sven's wife actually wrote the novels - he also claims she owned and ran a Brothel, so, she was writing the novels whilst working as a "Madame"....


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## Brian G Turner (Nov 4, 2017)

One of the more interesting WWII autobiographies I read was _Twilight of the Gods_ - about a Swedish volunteer to the SS - specifically because there was no attempt to hide their Nazi ideology. In short, there had been a general fear in pre-war Germany that the communists would take over the country and that these remained Germany's real enemy - with the war with Western Allies being seen as a civil war orchestrated by corrupt Jewish bankers. Interestingly, I've seen both these points repeated in the history of pre-war Germany - the first as a fact, the second as propaganda.



Caledfwlch said:


> One potential Myth I would love to know the truth of, is one I have heard from a couple of sources - that towards the end, especially to the East/Russia, it got to the point that SS Units were refusing to go into combat in front of Wehrmacht Infantry Companies, because "friendly fire" would gun most of them down before they even got into range of Soviet weapons.



I've read quite a number of WWII autobiographies from German ground troops, both Wermacht and SS , and I've never seen this suggested anywhere. Instead, the SS are often admired as like Teutonic Knights, the bravest and best. Though some of the Wermacht grumbled at the SS units being better supplied, they never question their bravery - especially when the SS divisions suffered such horrendous casualties at the front lines in the East.

However, I've not yet read Guy Sajer's account, and that may provide a different perspective - plus I've not yet read anything from anyone on the ground at Stalingrad.

On the issue of planes - an interesting criticism I've seen is that Hitler played WWII according to WWI experiences, where planes were of limited impact. Goering comes across as little more than a bloated opium addict living on past glories.


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## Danny McG (Nov 4, 2017)

Cathbad said:


> If Gemany had had a sane leader...


 Hitler used to froth at the mouth and chew the corners of the carpet.
This is true, my grandad (the one who survived) told me he heard that on the BBC sometime in 1941


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## Edward M. Grant (Nov 4, 2017)

Mad Alice said:


> I thought that was amphetamines or dextrose amphetamines. Speed pills I believe they were called.



Here is it: Pervitin.

WWII Drug: The German Granddaddy of Crystal Meth - SPIEGEL ONLINE - International


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## BAYLOR (Nov 4, 2017)

Venusian Broon said:


> In some sense everyone did. The Jet engine is, of course, a British invention - having been patented by Frank Whittle in 1930 . But the air ministry in Britain was a bit sceptical about it so didn't push it and give it resources the same way the German Hans von Ohain got, to make the first operational jet in, I believe 1939.
> 
> In many senses I can see why - there was still a great deal of performance that could be wrung out of propeller-driven aircraft. Remember that the RAF in the 1930's were still flying biplanes. It was the Spanish civil war and the appearance of the new Bf 109's that really got them to move on getting Hurricanes and especially Spitfires into service (and they did it just in time.)  Hence it probably looked like the safer path for R&D and development.
> 
> ...



The Germans didn't have materials like Titanium to build durable Jet engines components,  the heat from the engine would melt  parts of the engine so they were constantly rebuilding them every few hours.  Their jet engines consumed a lot fuel so they had a somewhat limited range . I think they could only go 500 or 600 miles before they needed refueling.


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## Venusian Broon (Nov 4, 2017)

BAYLOR said:


> The Germans didn't have  material like Titanium to build durable Jet engines components,  the heat from the engine would melt  parts of the engine so they were constantly rebuilding them every few hours.  Their jet engines consumed a lot fuel so they had a somewhat limited range . I think they could only go 500 or 600 miles before they needed refueling.



I came across a quite amazing statistic regarding the Gloster Meteor - that suggests that it took a long time for all the kinks to be ironed out of operating jets (although it's on Wikipedia, so apply a some degree of scepticism):

"A total of 890 Meteors were lost in RAF service (145 of these crashes occurring in 1953 alone), resulting in the deaths of 450 pilots"  

I assume that a great deal of these losses were outwith WW2!


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## Edward M. Grant (Nov 4, 2017)

Yeah, the post-WWII RAF had a heck of a lot of crashes. But they didn't really care when they'd lost more aircrew in a single night in WWII than a year of the post-war Air Force. Deaths were just assumed to happen now and again.

I believe the big problem with Meteors was unbalanced thrust if one engine failed, because they were so far out on the wings.


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## BAYLOR (Nov 4, 2017)

Venusian Broon said:


> I came across a quite amazing statistic regarding the Gloster Meteor - that suggests that it took a long time for all the kinks to be ironed out of operating jets (although it's on Wikipedia, so apply a some degree of scepticism):
> 
> "A total of 890 Meteors were lost in RAF service (145 of these crashes occurring in 1953 alone), resulting in the deaths of 450 pilots"
> 
> I assume that a great deal of these losses were outwith WW2!



Thats a very depressing statistic. 

I often wonder that the second world war had gone into 1946 whether  the ME 262 and Meteor would have  face off against each other.  That would have been an interesting contest.


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## Venusian Broon (Nov 4, 2017)

A bit like the first generation of single winged propeller craft, I think the first 1944 class of jets had loads of problems and quite a restricted range.

But it took till the Korean War - so only 6 years - for Mig-15's Versus Sabres


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## BAYLOR (Nov 4, 2017)

Venusian Broon said:


> A bit like the first generation of single winged propeller craft, I think the first 1944 class of jets had loads of problems and quite a restricted range.
> 
> But it took till the Korean War - so only 6 years - for Mig-15's Versus Sabres



Mig 15 and  and F 86 Saber were both great planes and  in terms of capabilities . pretty much evenly matched.


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## Foxbat (Nov 5, 2017)

Just to add to VB's assertion of British ingenuity in the invention of the jet engine, the de Havilland Vampire (or Sea Vampire variant to be precise) was the first jet to take off and land on an aircraft carrier. It was piloted by Eric 'Winkle' Brown, a Scotsman with a number of 'firsts' and records to his name. These include the most carrier take offs and landings (2407 and 2271 respectively).

He also was instrumental in ensuring that the museum mentioned in one of my previous posts got delivery of the Me 163 Komet. Sadly he died last year at the grand old age of 97. A real pioneer of the skys.


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## Brian G Turner (Nov 7, 2017)

Caledfwlch said:


> Bill (Wilhelm) was in the Waffen SS, though not by choice - Either his Section/Squad, or his Company, i'm not sure which, as soon as they saw Allied Troops from a Western Nation, in this case, it was US Army forces, they turned their guns on the Officers, and men who were known to be Nazi's, shot them, then dropped their firearms and walked towards the US Troops, arms in the air with white flags. Bill says he heard a lot of stories of the same happening, and about the standard SS Units being gunned down by Wehrmacht troops.



Actually, coming back to this, this wouldn't surprise me for the very end of the war - I think it was around 1943 that Wehrmacht soldiers were conscripted into the SS, which was not a popular move. Additionally, once Hitler was dead, there seems to have been a rush by some to disassociate themselves from the SS as much as possible else face execution if captured by the Allies.

The battle at Itter Castle has been mentioned elsewhere, when a SS Officer led a group of Wehrmacht soldiers to fight alongside American soldiers to protect the French VIP POWs there against an attack by other SS soldiers:
Battle for Castle Itter - Wikipedia


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## Caledfwlch (Nov 8, 2017)

Brian G Turner said:


> Actually, coming back to this, this would surprise me for the very end of the war - I think it was around 1943 that Wehrmacht soldiers were conscripted into the SS, which was not a popular move. Additionally, once Hitler was dead, there seems to have been a rush by some to disassociate themselves from the SS as much as possible else face execution if captured by the Allies.
> 
> The battle at Itter Castle has been mentioned elsewhere, when a SS Officer led a group of Wehrmacht soldiers to fight alongside American soldiers to protect the French VIP POWs there against an attack by other SS soldiers:
> Battle for Castle Itter - Wikipedia



There was likely rumours of all sorts of things, there always is, and he said he hasn't a clue if it happened anywhere else, but he wasn't lying about his own personal experience - that the guys in his Squad or Company wanted to find Allied Troops ASAP and surrender to them, before they fell into the Soviets, so as soon as they saw some allied troops they opened fire on anyone who wouldn't surrender, or wanted them to fight the allies - I don't know the figures, but it was literally a very small group, everything had gone to hell, the Regiment was scattered all over the place, people were desserting.
He only told us that once, it wasn't something he liked to talk about, but my mate kept asking him why he was allowed to come to Britain/Wales in early 1945 - I can't recall the date, but it was not much time after Victory in Europe Day, maybe a very few short months. And it's kind of bizarre, because he surrendered to American Troops and was in a US Army run POW Camp, he couldn't go to his home town, back to his family, it was in the Russian held area that became the GDR, and as a Waffen SS Vet, he expected that he would have swiftly vanished off into a Gulag, or an unmarked grave.

There has always been conspiracy rumours that for a couple of years from VE Day, the UK quietly brought in a load of ex Waffen SS, and other men, to train up as a secret anti soviet force hidden amongst the population, should the Russians come, like Operation Gladio in Italy, and to this day, my mate wonders if thats how/why his Dadcu was allowed in.

When he arrived, he moved to the village he spent the rest of his life living in, Blaenplwyf, about 5 miles south of Aberystwyth, and within days/couple of weeks, he met and began dating his future wife, my mates Mamgu, a Farmer's Daughter who hadn't been in either the Armed Forces, or something like the Land Girls, and had never even been to England, so at the start, he actually spoke better English than her! (My Mamgu was only as fluent in English as she was, which wasn't perfect because she had been in the Royal Artillery, which gave English lessons to rural farmers daughters like my Mamgu - my Dadcu who was a farmers son with around 8 or 9 brothers and daughters was only 12 when the war broke out, so was too young, plus being a Farmer he was in a "restricted profession", and not allowed to join up, so his English was never fluent.
My paternal Grandmother was again a rural farmers daughter type, but having joined the Auxiliary Fire Brigade, being deployed to the South Wales Valleys and London, she picked up fluent English. My Paternal Grandfather grew up in Gwynedd, near Harlech, and was extremely clever, so despite the fact he wanted to be a Blacksmith/Farrier, he was sent to a Grammar School, where he learnt fluent English.
When the War began, he was working as a Blacksmith in a beautiful tiny town in Gwynedd called Dolgellau, immediately tried to sign up, and was rejected as Blacksmith was a vital restricted profession. He and some friends came up with a cunning plan though - they went around the town, and got pretty much every single person living there to sign a petition asking that he be allowed to sign up, and that did it, the Army finally relented, he joined up, and became a Commando for most of the War, he was a very big guy, really, really tall, and until he was allowed to Serve, he would get nasty comments in the street from passers-by who didn't know him - why was such a big young man not in uniform type stuff, drove him mad.

This is something that never seems to get mentioned in history books or documentaries focusing on social stuff - there wasn't just problems with especially rural Welsh servicemen and women not having much, or any English, and Highlanders for example in Scotland only having Gaelic - because Radio was in it's infancy, television did not exist, and travel to other parts of the UK was not easy and affordable for pleasure, Scousers could struggle to communicate with and understand Geordies, or Cockneys, or Brums and so on, people were being lumped into Units, barracks with people who's accents and dialects they had never heard before.
A proper Gog North Walian accent, esp from Gwynedd is extremely strong - it's not just a regional accent, it's also caused/made heavier by how the throat is used when speaking North Walian Welsh, but because of going to Grammar School, my Grandfather spoke a more Received Pronounciation type English, rather than "Wenglish" or a localised variant of English with lots of colloquialisms, which softened his accent in English, and the Army quickly noticed that whilst a Yorkshireman and a Scouse were struggling to understand each other, both of them could understand my Grandfather, so he also did a lot of "English Courses", teaching members of units that were struggling to understand each other.


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