Germans urged to remember Nazi resistors

[J-10]

Germans urged to remember Nazi resistors

By DAVID RISING
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

BERLIN -- Germany's culture minister Monday praised those Germans who actively opposed Nazi tyranny, saying all acts of resistance deserve recognition, 60 years after the most famous plot to kill Adolf Hitler with a briefcase bomb.

Speaking at the opening of a new exhibit on the Nazi resistance, Christina Weiss said Germans had come a long way in developing admiration for the army officers around Col. Claus Graf Schenk von Stauffenberg who tried to kill Hitler with a briefcase bomb on July 20, 1944.

"The slogan promoted by the Nazis that they were 'traitors' had a long-lasting effect," Weiss said. But a recent poll by Der Spiegel magazine found that 33 percent of Germans now admire the Stauffenberg plotters and another 40 percent hold them in high esteem, she noted.

http://www.joric.com/Conspiracy/CStauffenberg.jpgColonel Claus von Stauffenberg (1907-1944)
"Fate has offered us this opportunity, and I would not refuse it for anything in the world. I have examined myself before God and my conscience. It must be done because this man [Hitler] is evil personified."

Stauffenberg placed the bomb in a conference room with Hitler. But when the Nazi leader escaped the blast, the aristocrat and his cohorts were arrested and executed.

The attempt on Hitler has been memorialized in a new feature film as well as documentaries and books. The street outside the World War II army headquarters in Berlin, now a national memorial to the Nazi resistance, carries Stauffenberg's name.

Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder will lead the official anniversary commemorations there Tuesday.

But the July 20 plot is just one example of anti-Nazi resistance by Germans, Weiss said.

Stauffenberg co-conspirators Maj. Gen. Henning von Tresckow and Maj. Gen. Hans Oster were already plotting as early as 1934 to bring Hitler down. In Munich, students formed The White Rose movement, distributing pamphlets urging "passive resistance" starting in 1942. Helmuth James von Moltke's so-called Kreisau Circle started working in secret to end the dictatorship in 1940.

"July 20 was definitely the high point of the fight against tyranny," Weiss said. But it began in 1933, the year Hitler came to power, she said, long before the German defeat by the Soviet army in the 1942-43 battle of Stalingrad or the 1944 Allied landing in Normandy on D-Day.

Like Stauffenberg, von Tresckow, Oster, von Moltke and the principals of The White Rose were either executed by the Nazis or committed suicide.

"The victory of freedom and justice, this goal, bound the German resistance with the resistance fighters in the occupied European countries," Weiss said.

"Today's ... peaceful and just Europe was also a vision of the German resistance."

In a separate ceremony, German President Horst Koehler hailed the July 20 plotters as "patriots."

"They did what they did for Germany, for the self-respect of our country and for a better future," he said.

Seattlepi (http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apeurope_story.asp?category=1103&slug=Germany%20Nazi%20Resistance)

[Romulus]

Been posted already.

[BadKarma26]

I hate NAZI's.

[Kilgor]

I hate NAZI's.

"I hate Illnois Nazis" ;)

[menel]

Ther was no resistors when Hitler was winging the war.

[Zenchan]

:fork:

How do YOU know?

Did you live in Germany during 1933-1945?
Did you study history? If not, shut the f*** up or at least learn how to spell.

There was resistance prior to the outbreak of WW II, in a lot of different ways. People actively aided Jews to hide and escape the persecution. For less than that, you earned yourself a free ticket to a concentration camp and or a short walk to the gallows.

So what, if people here confess, they hate Nazis? Big deal. Who doesn't?
Ever asked yourself what you would have done in those days, if you would have grown up in Nazi Germany in the 1930ties? It took more than guts to stand up against that regime...

And yes, as a reply to that clever posting: At least one bombing attempt (in the Munich Hofbräukeller) took place but failed as AH left the place early. There were a number of plans and attempts on Hitlers life coming from the officer corps prior to 20th July 1944, they failed, misfired etc.

So what do we talk about here?

[Freibier]

/salutes Stauffenberg and the men of July 20th, 1944
P.S
When facing the firing squad, his last words were:
"Lang lebe das heilige Deutschland!"

[AVZ]

:fork:

How do YOU know?

Did you live in Germany during 1933-1945?
Did you study history? If not, shut the f*** up or at least learn how to spell.

There was resistance prior to the outbreak of WW II, in a lot of different ways. People actively aided Jews to hide and escape the persecution. For less than that, you earned yourself a free ticket to a concentration camp and or a short walk to the gallows.

So what, if people here confess, they hate Nazis? Big deal. Who doesn't?
Ever asked yourself what you would have done in those days, if you would have grown up in Nazi Germany in the 1930ties? It took more than guts to stand up against that regime...

And yes, as a reply to that clever posting: At least one bombing attempt (in the Munich Hofbräukeller) took place but failed as AH left the place early. There were a number of plans and attempts on Hitlers life coming from the officer corps prior to 20th July 1944, they failed, misfired etc.

So what do we talk about here?

Great Post!! woot woot woot woot

[Shadow]

I ask myself often why nobody attacked him with a knife?
If you quickly cut his throat their is a good chance that he dies.
Plus a knife is small.

[aixina]

maybe because he alwais had like 20 SS men of the leibstandarte Adolf Hitler around him. And those were totally deboted to the fuhrer.

[Shadow]

Sure when you run screaming towards somebody with a knife this will be a little bit stupid. But don't you think that Staufenberg had could stand (?) next to Hitler and the quickly pull his knife?

[Kitsune]

If you can smuggle a knife in....you could also smuggle a pistol in. So why not use a pistol? Stauffenberg, who was the only one of THAT conspiracy circle, who had the chance to get this close to Hitler, had only one arm. And on the other one he had not many fingers left. He had problems using a pistol and even more using a knife.
But the conspirators had aquired British plastic explosives (and had tested them before...the explosive power was quite something) so the assassination seemed to be a sure thing. In fact it is a kind of miracle that Hitler had survived, and even with only minor injuries. One reason was that the meeting took (surprisingly) place in a wooden house and not within a bunker...lots of the destructive energy of the blast could escape to the outside. (Stauffenberg, seeing the blast, seemed nonetheless to have been convinced that Hitler must be dead, the way the wooden walls gave in). Another facotr was an especially heavy wooden table who shielded Hitler (although the table slammed into him, he had problems moving his arm for weeks after that incident). The rest must have been because of his "fortunate" :roll: position as the bomb exploded.
With Stauffenbergs belief that Hitler is dead the coup was started (codename "Walküre" meaning Valkyrie). But as it turned out that Hitler had survived it collapsed.
Nonetheless it was a close thing. History would have gone a different path (wether for good or ill in the long run is debatable). But a different one it would have been.

[oldsoak]

Brave men. Its good to see they are honoured in Germany. Were any military establishments named after them in the Bundeswehr ? I seem to remember the Bundesmarine had a ship called Rommel.

[He219]

^ I believe there is a Stauffenberg Kaserne in Sigmaringen (http://www.deutschesheer.de/C1256B6C002D670C/vwContentByKey/150644F7CB50A97DC1256ED3002E467E).

(Don't quote me)
;)

[Phoenix]

Brave men. Its good to see they are honoured in Germany. Were any military establishments named after them in the Bundeswehr ? I seem to remember the Bundesmarine had a ship called Rommel.

The Name of the german navy is not Bundesmarine but "Deutsche Marine" since 1990 .

And yes a Destroyer was called Rommel ^^ woot

[caleb]

:fork:

How do YOU know?

Did you live in Germany during 1933-1945?
Did you study history? If not, shut the f*** up or at least learn how to spell.

There was resistance prior to the outbreak of WW II, in a lot of different ways. People actively aided Jews to hide and escape the persecution. For less than that, you earned yourself a free ticket to a concentration camp and or a short walk to the gallows.

So what, if people here confess, they hate Nazis? Big deal. Who doesn't?
Ever asked yourself what you would have done in those days, if you would have grown up in Nazi Germany in the 1930ties? It took more than guts to stand up against that regime...

And yes, as a reply to that clever posting: At least one bombing attempt (in the Munich Hofbräukeller) took place but failed as AH left the place early. There were a number of plans and attempts on Hitlers life coming from the officer corps prior to 20th July 1944, they failed, misfired etc.

So what do we talk about here?


Don't waste your time on him, he just registered to flame and see the reactions. Just look at his post counter.

[oldsoak]

Brave men. Its good to see they are honoured in Germany. Were any military establishments named after them in the Bundeswehr ? I seem to remember the Bundesmarine had a ship called Rommel.

The Name of the german navy is not Bundesmarine but "Deutsche Marine" since 1990 .

And yes a Destroyer was called Rommel ^^ woot

- oops apologies :oops:

[Kitsune]

The Name of the german navy is not Bundesmarine but "Deutsche Marine" since 1990 .
:roll:

No sweat oldsoak. :D


That makes as much sense as with the British...its the "Royal" Airforce and the "Royal" Navy...but the "British" army.

[OB Kenobi]

http://www.pensfans.com/dissentbutton.jpg

[Zapp Brannigan]

Brave men. Its good to see they are honoured in Germany. Were any military establishments named after them in the Bundeswehr ? I seem to remember the Bundesmarine had a ship called Rommel.

There are or were (some have closed):

Generaloberst-Beck-Kaserne - Sonthofen im Oberallgäu
Generalfeldmarschall-Erwin-Rommel-Kaserne - Augustdorf bei Detmold
Generalfeldmarschall-Erwin-Rommel-Kaserne - Osterode/Harz
Graf-Stauffenberg-Kaserne - Sigmaringen
General-Dr.-Speidel-Kaserne - Bruchsal
Henning-von-Tresckow-Kaserne - Potsdam/Geltow
Julius-Leber-Kaserne - Berlin/Wedding
General-Heusinger-Kaserne - Hammelburg
General-Friedrich-Olbricht-Kaserne - Leipzig


The destroyer Rommel (D.187) was decommissioned on June 30, 1999, after 29 years' service (20 of which was when it was still called the Bundesmarine, so someone owes someone an apology ;) ).

[Kitsune]

It was always a bit funny to name a destroyer after the desert fox...but that happened in a country that nearly had named a powerful future IFV the "Hedgehog" (it now will be called "Puma", thank God). Probably the the next MBT will be called the "Cockroach" or something... :roll:

Just some thoughts...

Ah, well.

:|

[Zapp Brannigan]

It was always a bit funny to name a destroyer after the desert fox...but that happened in a country that nearly had named a powerful future IFV the "Hedgehog" (it now will be called "Puma", thank God). Probably the the next MBT will be called the "Cockroach" or something... :roll:

Just some thoughts...

Ah, well.

:|

There were 3 destroyers, all former Charles F. Adams class DDGs. Each service was to get one name. So they were called Zerstörer Rommel (Army), Zerstörer Mölders (Air Force) and Zerstörer Lütjens (Navy). The naming of the Lütjens was controversial because in one of the last messages from the battleship Bismarck, at 0032 hours on the day she sank, Admiral Lütjens radioed: "An den Führer des Deutschen Reiches Adolf Hitler: Wir kämpfen bis zum Letzen im Glauben an Sie, mein Führer, und im felsenfesten Vertrauen auf Deutschlands Sieg!" ("To the Führer of the German Reich, Adolf Hitler: We shall fight to the last man with confidence in you, my Führer, and with rocksolid trust in Germany's victory!").

[SeanAshi]

I'm urged to remember the Nuremberg War Crime Trials.

[aeternum]

The Name of the german navy is not Bundesmarine but "Deutsche Marine" since 1990 .
:roll:

No sweat oldsoak. :D


That makes as much sense as with the British...its the "Royal" Airforce and the "Royal" Navy...but the "British" army.

Sorry kitsune, but oldsoak is right.


Nach der friedlichen Herstellung der Einheit Deutschlands am 3. Oktober 1990 ging die Bundesmarine in die heutige Deutsche Marine über.
Source: http://www.deutschemarine.de/redaktionen/marine/internet/dmbas.nsf/Frame/N25MWCTQ301MJOEDE

[Zapp Brannigan]

Brave men. Its good to see they are honoured in Germany. Were any military establishments named after them in the Bundeswehr ? I seem to remember the Bundesmarine had a ship called Rommel.

There are or were (some have closed):

Generaloberst-Beck-Kaserne - Sonthofen im Oberallgäu
Generalfeldmarschall-Erwin-Rommel-Kaserne - Augustdorf bei Detmold
Generalfeldmarschall-Erwin-Rommel-Kaserne - Osterode/Harz
Graf-Stauffenberg-Kaserne - Sigmaringen
General-Dr.-Speidel-Kaserne - Bruchsal
Henning-von-Tresckow-Kaserne - Potsdam/Geltow
Julius-Leber-Kaserne - Berlin/Wedding
General-Heusinger-Kaserne - Hammelburg
General-Friedrich-Olbricht-Kaserne - Leipzig


The destroyer Rommel (D.187) was decommissioned on June 30, 1999, after 29 years' service (20 of which was when it was still called the Bundesmarine, so someone owes someone an apology ;) ).

Add:

General-Erich-Fellgiebel-Kaserne - Maising (Pöcking) bei Starnberg
Oberst-Eberhard-Finckh-Kaserne - Engstingen (now the Gewerbepark Haid)
Generaloberst-Erich-Hoepner-Kaserne - Wuppertal
Wilhelm-Leuschner-Kaserne - Hennickendorf

There appear to have been several Graf-Yorck-Kasernen, named for both the hero of the Wars of Liberation against Napoleon and his great-nephew, executed on 8 August 1944.

[Kitsune]

@aeternum: I knew its called "Deutsche Marine" since reunification and I would never dare to doubt oldsoak anyway ;) . I just thought that this renaming was a bit superflous, thats all.