A very long shot - No1MkIII S#16229

[Surpmil]

I have no wish to hijack this posting but I want to be very clear to everyone.

The Waffen SS were elite German troops and they fought out of patriotism and love of country, just as the elite troops of the Allies did. All sides in war are involved in atrocities and the difference is the winner gets to rewrite history.

In the fire bombing of the German city of Dresden it is estimated that the "Allies" killed over 250,000 German civilians in four days of bombing.

"It sickens me when people call the SS "elite troops"..."

The British and American Airmen who flew the bombers over Dresden were elite troops, the "real" difference in the word "elite" was we won the war and the Germans didn't.

In the war I served in we killed over 1 million South Vietnamese civilians defending them against "Communist aggression" and 60,000 Americans lost their lives in a war we lost....................

We also rewrote history and banned the import of Australian designed A1A Enfield Rifles because they "may" have been made in Viet Nam by "capitalist" trying to make money.

Also the "elite" American Air Force C-141 aircraft I worked on could carry 176 coffins at one time stacked 4 across and 4 high on 11 cargo pallets.

In war there are no real winners................and you use a fire hose to clean up the blood on the aircraft floor.

It certainly makes things easier if we just pretend that everyone is the same, all wars are the same, everyone is a "patriot fighting for his country", etc. etc.. "I won't blame you, if you don't blame me" is what it boils down to. Good for people with guilty consciences I suppose.

Yes, it's much easier than actually studying the historical record. History written by the victors? Depends which victors you mean. When you fight the Anglo-Saxon powers you get to write your own history later. When you lose to some others you don't even know you have a history.

The SS were tough fighters, but then so were the VC, and yet I don't hear of many Americans dressing up in black pajamas and sporting AKs at re-enacting events. Black is such a "cool" colour for the Walter Mitty's so I'm really not sure why...it must something other than miltary couture though, as re-enacting is a serious business I'm sure.

The SS were recruited in large part from the material - I was going to say social trash - that the Army did not want: ex-German communists from the Sturm Abteilung, ex-criminals etc. There was a strong undercurrent of contempt for the SS in the German Army proper; well justified, but as events were to prove, somewhat hyprocritical in view of the widespread atrocities committed by regular German army units in WWII.

The SS graduated from Kristallnacht and Dachau to machine gunning more than 80 British prisoners in 1940 at Wormhoudt and they went on from there, as even the most casual student of history should know. After Kurt Meyer and his little thugs killed a quantity of Canadian POWs in 1944, our troops got something of a reputation for shooting SS as a matter of policy. Perhaps that's why the Germans called the Canadians "Tommy SS"

I'm afraid attacking neighboring countries and killing millions of civilians in cold blood is not the action of those who fight "out of patriotism and love of country". It is action of callous thugs who despise all who are not like themselves.

As for Dresden, or any other such case, the Germans sowed the wind and reaped the whirlwind, as AM Harris so eloquently put it. As you would know of course Ed, it was the Germans who began the practice of dropping bombs on cities in 1915 with their Zeppelin attacks on London - and on a Canadian field hospital in France as it happens.

So I've got your opinion as clearly as you stated it, but don't confuse it with the historical facts to which it bears no resemblence in this case.

As for Walter Mittys in SS uniforms, may they all meet the fate of the two at the LA gunshow some decades ago who happened to meet a couple of Israeli "specials" in the men's washrooms...I do believe their fancy unforms may have got a little crumpled.