German court convicts 93-year old man for Nazi crimes

[n00dle]

1 minute ago, Logosone said:

It's not about justice.

 

It's about maintaining the jobs of the snappily named "Central Office of the State Justice Administrations for the Investigation of National Socialist Crimes" for as long as possible, with their high salaries and pensions. Because they know they can't drag it out forever. So they come up with ever more inventive ways to generate more and more cases. To drag out the taxpayer funded gravytrain for as long as possible. After all they have fantastic salaries and who wants to give that up?

essentially what i inferred, albeit in the form of a question.

Edited July 24, 2020 by n00dle

[VocalNeal]

Probably in STALAG Limp Wrist? It was just a little camp.

[Saint Nick]

1 hour ago, sanuk711 said:

Every Nazi in it played their part.----But every German wasn't a Nazi

 

Once again I don't want to be (and I am not) writing in defense of the Third Reich--- but with that change in law,

What would you feel would be an appropriate sentence for someone who delivered eggs/the newspapers 5 times a week to the camp.

a) yeah...and that is why not every German was on the Nuernberg Trial!

b) you don't see a difference between a MILKMAN and a SS- guard at a labour/ concentration- camp?

 

Interesting!

Edited July 24, 2020 by Saint Nick

[Logosone]

33 minutes ago, Saint Nick said:

a) yeah...and that is why not every German was on the Nuernberg Trial!

b) you don't see a difference between a MILKMAN and a SS- guard at a labour/ concentration- camp?

 

Interesting!

Indeed not every German was put on trial for holocaust crimes. Because of course most Germans did not participate in the holocaust, and most did not know about it.

 

While in West Germany and united Germany between 1946 and 2005, cases were brought against 140,000 individuals, only 6,656 were convicted of Nazi crimes. In the Communist Kangaroo courts of East Germany a whopping 12,890 were committed of war crimes.

 

So in total 20,000 or so Germans were found guilty of crimes related to the holocaust.

 

By way of reference 18 million men served in the Wehrmacht. Which means a grand total of 0.11 percent of the Wehrmacht committed crimes related to the holocaust. Or in other words, 99.89% of men in the Wehrmacht did not commit crimes related to the holocaust.

 

 

 

Edited July 24, 2020 by Logosone

[tlandtday]

4 minutes ago, Logosone said:

Indeed not every German was put on trial for holocaust crimes. Because of course most Germans did not participate in the holocaust, and most did not know about it.

 

While in West Germany and united Germany between 1946 and 2005, cases were brought against 140,000 individuals, only 6,656 were convicted of Nazi crimes. In the Communist Kangaroo courts of East Germany a whopping 12,890 were committed of war crimes.

 

So in total 20,000 or so Germans were found guilty of crimes related to the holocaust.

 

By way of reference 18 million men served in the Wehrmacht. Which means a grand total of 0.11 percent of the Wehrmacht committed crimes related to the holocaust. Or in other words, 99.89% of men in the Wehrmacht did not commit crimes related to the holocaust.

 

 

 

Yeah but the German people were all wrongly accused of conspiring and suffered.  The civilians in Dresden and other cities were firebombed resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocents including women and children being incinerated.  Millions of Germans who lived in neighboring countries lost their homes and were left to wander as migrants many dying on the way. Migrants crossing the frozen ice were shot down by Allied and Russian fighters. The Red Cross refused to assist sick children in Denmark and other places.    Millions of German soldiers many only boys as well as women and children spent years in Russian Gulags being endlessly tortured and many killed.  Only a fraction made it out alive. And don't forget that hundreds of thousands of women both young and old were raped during the occupation of Germany.  This is justice?  This is the two sides of war.  No one wins and no one is innocent.  People need to ask why these facts are so rarely presented. 

[JensenZ]

56 minutes ago, n00dle said:

yes, we know this. 

 

Everybody knows this

but when most say swatika, they mean Nazi Hakenkreuz and there is no ambiguity there.

No they don't. Hardly anyone does, and certainly not the younger generations, and especially Asians.

[tgw]

Quote

Although the number of suspects is dwindling due to old age, prosecutors are still trying to bring individuals to justice. A landmark conviction in 2011 opened the way to more prosecutions as it was the first time that working in a camp was sufficient grounds for culpability, with no proof of a specific crime.

this is very disturbing.

 

[Baerboxer]

1 hour ago, n00dle said:

this is compounded by the fact that at 93, any punishment is essentially death sentence.

i also question what is achieved by trying a 93 year old man for the action of his 17 year old self.

 

is justice served in this instance, or is it just an attempt at as many convictions as possible given that in a few years time everyone who could possibly be held accountable will be dead?

 

thats kinda what fascism is all about, outright opposition was not an option.

my grandfather was a soldier (thankfully in hindsight not luftwaffe), was conscripted, and not a nazi per se . he spent his time on the Russian front and suffered the consequences of that environment for the rest of his life, missing fingers due to frostbite among them. I truly cannot imagine who he might have become has he been assigned elsewhere. He always said neither could he and that his fingers were a small price to pay.

This is not to say that any particular part of the german army was "clean" but given the environment im sure many individuals crossed lines they would rather not have in the interests of survival.

 

My father went into the British Army mid 1940 and was demobbed late 1949. Once the tied of war changed, and large numbers of POW's were being taken he was involved in POW camps. This meant literally building and establishing a camp and then managing and running it. He had several camps under his command. 

First prisoners were Italians captured in North Africa, followed by Wehrmact and then separate camps established specifically for the SS.

Like many veterans he never spoke much about all his experiences. But he did think that the German army soldiers were, in the main, very similar to British ones. Doing their duty for their country and family. Not fanatics or brainwashed politically. Most simply wanted to return home safely and the war to stop. He had German orderlies and clerks who he regarded highly. However, not a good word for the SS prisoners. They wouldn't work or do anything other than chant and sing political songs. Spat at guards, fought like tigers to keep their insignia and were all totally committed to Nazism. 

 

It's important to recognize not everyone was a committed Nazi fanatic. But they still loved their country and many laid down their lives for it. 

 

Younger people, teenagers and early 20's were often the most likely to be radicalized by the Nazis with their Hitler Youth, propaganda, films etc etc. 

[Mac98]

4 hours ago, bert bloggs said:

I remember back in the early 70s going to stay at a friends home in Germany ,we were both young ,born after the war and were joking around about things in front of his father ,who had a go at us ,saying that so many Germans hated Hitler but were to afraid to speak out in case the SS came knocking at your door ,

More likely the Gestapo, but that's nitpicking.

Edited July 24, 2020 by Mac98
Spelling error

[JustAnotherHun]

2 hours ago, Chomper Higgot said:

His guard tower must have been upwind of the well documented stench of the death camps.

 

And who knows, he might never have talked to any of the other Nazi guards while there.

 

Unluckily for him the court didn’t believe him.

 

 

I'm deeply impressed to see how brave some TV-heroes would have reacted at the age of 17 in a situation they never were in and cannot even imagine.

Ever heared what happened to those who refused orders in Nazi-Germany? No? OK, in short: They were executed faster than they could say "I love the Fuehrer". 

 

There's a word of the German-Jewish author Henrik M. Broder. Roughly:

"The longer the Nazi-Regime is in the past, the braver the antifacists become". Seems true.

 

 

[Mac98]

5 hours ago, Jingthing said:

Yes and there isn't any doubt that he believed the Nazi ideology to an extreme level. 

Just out of high school with all teachers required to follow party lines. He probably thought the SS had the 'neatest' uniforms. 

[n00dle]

1 hour ago, JensenZ said:

No they don't. Hardly anyone does, and certainly not the younger generations, and especially Asians.

Oh, alright then.

 

Do you thnk many of "the younger generations, and especially Asians" are on thaivisa now, reading this?

Edited July 24, 2020 by n00dle

[n00dle]

6 minutes ago, Mac98 said:

Just out of high school with all teachers required to follow party lines. He probably thought the SS had the 'neatest' uniforms. 

seems there was a movie to effect recently.

[Saint Nick]

1 hour ago, tlandtday said:

Yeah but the German people were all wrongly accused of conspiring and suffered.  The civilians in Dresden and other cities were firebombed resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocents including women and children being incinerated.  Millions of Germans who lived in neighboring countries lost their homes and were left to wander as migrants many dying on the way. Migrants crossing the frozen ice were shot down by Allied and Russian fighters. The Red Cross refused to assist sick children in Denmark and other places.    Millions of German soldiers many only boys as well as women and children spent years in Russian Gulags being endlessly tortured and many killed.  Only a fraction made it out alive. And don't forget that hundreds of thousands of women both young and old were raped during the occupation of Germany.  This is justice?  This is the two sides of war.  No one wins and no one is innocent.  People need to ask why these facts are so rarely presented. 

You are aware, who started the war, who brought the suffering, who lost the war and who won the war?

These facts are presented- just not in the way you like it!

To whitewash Germany's history!

[n00dle]

44 minutes ago, tgw said:

this is very disturbing.

 

Indeed time to revise the old cv.

[n00dle]

1 hour ago, nobodysfriend said:

That does not necessarily mean that they have a clue about the Nazi ideology or what the Nazis did ...

Nonsense.

 

The knowlege may be hazy or innacurate, but it is there.

 

It is the single most well publicised geneocide in history.

 

You can not have grown up in the western world without awareness, certainly not if you are "middle-aged"

Edited July 24, 2020 by n00dle

[dimitriv]

5 hours ago, Logosone said:

Dey was a mere tower guard. He had no involvement in killings whatsoever.

 

No. He made sure that nobody could escape from the gas chambers. But he didn't kill so not guilty?

 

If I hold you and someone else puts a knife in your body I will not be guilty ?

 

 

[stevenl]

1 hour ago, Logosone said:

Indeed not every German was put on trial for holocaust crimes. Because of course most Germans did not participate in the holocaust, and most did not know about it.

 

While in West Germany and united Germany between 1946 and 2005, cases were brought against 140,000 individuals, only 6,656 were convicted of Nazi crimes. In the Communist Kangaroo courts of East Germany a whopping 12,890 were committed of war crimes.

 

So in total 20,000 or so Germans were found guilty of crimes related to the holocaust.

 

By way of reference 18 million men served in the Wehrmacht. Which means a grand total of 0.11 percent of the Wehrmacht committed crimes related to the holocaust. Or in other words, 99.89% of men in the Wehrmacht did not commit crimes related to the holocaust.

 

 

 

'Most did not know about it' is not correct, many sources for that, e.g. https://www.timesofisrael.com/what-did-germans-know-secret-anti-nazi-diary-gives-voice-to-man-in-the-street/ .

 

Your reasoning behind the stats is way off, you can't just relate the 20k convicted to the total number of wehrmacht soldiers for quite a few reasons.

[Opl]

4 hours ago, Logosone said:

Of course it matters, he didn't even know at the time what was going on at the camp behind closed doors. He was just a tower guard. 

the OP states: "between August 1944 and April 1945"... do you really believe what you are saying?

[JustAnotherHun]

2 minutes ago, stevenl said:

'Most did not know about it' is not correct, many sources for that, e.g.

Agree. Most Germans knew at least roughly what was going on, even those living in rural aeras.

 

But what does that mean? Were all of them guilty because they knew and did not uprise? Who of us members of lucky generations can seriously claim he would have resisted the Nazi regime and it's deadly minions?

[metisdead]

Off topic deflection posts and replies have been removed. 

[JustAnotherHun]

Young Thai dudes wearing Nazi symbols and uniforms have nothing to do with the ideology behind the <deleted>. And the worldwide famous Thai education system garantees they don't know much about it.

It's just some sort of strange fashion and provocation as in my generation long hair and wearing US-parkas and Che-Guevara-caps were.

Edited July 24, 2020 by JustAnotherHun

[Purdey]

I think Germany's government is trying to ensure that they are not open to accusations of complicity or being soft on Nazis. Young kids who joined the SS we're often enthusiastic about serving their country and I doubt volunteering for the SS is the same as volunteering to shoot civilians in the back of the head. 

[n00dle]

36 minutes ago, dimitriv said:

 

No. He made sure that nobody could escape from the gas chambers. But he didn't kill so not guilty?

 

If I hold you and someone else puts a knife in your body I will not be guilty ?

 

 

Spurious, simplistic and unrealistic comparison taking into account none of the circumstances of situation.

 

 

[Logosone]

50 minutes ago, dimitriv said:

 

No. He made sure that nobody could escape from the gas chambers. But he didn't kill so not guilty?

 

If I hold you and someone else puts a knife in your body I will not be guilty ?

 

 

He was not involved with killing people in the gas chambers. He was a simple guard.

 

If you physically hold me and someone kills me obviously that is a completely different situation to you being conscripted into an army unit where you are assigned guard duty where you do not even know people are being killed.

 

Very different situation.

[Logosone]

49 minutes ago, stevenl said:

Your reasoning behind the stats is way off, you can't just relate the 20k convicted to the total number of wehrmacht soldiers for quite a few reasons.

And perhaps you can elucidate these "quite a few reasons"?

 

And no, most did not know about the holocaust. It stands to reason, if only 20,000 were convicted of crimes related to the holocaust and 80 million people lived in Germany and those convicted did their utmost to keep the crimes secret, then very clearly the majority did not know about it.

[StayinThailand2much]

4 hours ago, Logosone said:

The Nazis went to great lengths to hide the killings of civilians and of course the camps were gigantic complexes that had many other purposes and activities.

 

The court clearly sided with Dey, obviously it had no option but to find him guilty of over 5000 murders simply because the German prosecutors framed the law in such a way that just working in a camp was a crime. However they merely imposed a suspended 2 year sentence for those supposed 5000 plus murders, so you can see what they really thought of it.

I haven't closely followed news about the verdict. While I always applauded the hunting down of the war criminals and Nazis in the past, I still wonder about this guy's responsibility, as he barely was 18 when the war was over. 

Edited July 24, 2020 by StayinThailand2much

[JustAnotherHun]

4 minutes ago, Logosone said:

And perhaps you can elucidate these "quite a few reasons"?

 

And no, most did not know about the holocaust. It stands to reason, if only 20,000 were convicted of crimes related to the holocaust and 80 million people lived in Germany and those convicted did their utmost to keep the crimes secret, then very clearly the majority did not know about it.

The majority may not have known exactly what was going on but no one could not have realized the sudden vanishing of his jewish neighbor. The jewish life in Germany was rich at that time. No city, no town without jewish communities.

The HC was a huge industrial complex with trains full of prisoners crossing the whole country and a complete infrastructure. There were also hundreds of thousands German troops in the east covering SS-units with "special orders". They saw what happened to the polish and russian jews.

Only who did not want to know did not know.

 

Sure, after the defeat, no one knew nothing about anything. It was much easier than to confess "yes, I knew about the crimes but i was not strong enough to stand up against it. I just tried to keep my own hands as clean as possible."

 

[metisdead]

An off topic post about Black Lives Matter has been removed. 

[Jingthing]

Yes it's well documented that the vast majority of Germans certainly knew that all detected Jews were disappeared and not expected to ever return. Knowledge of the exact details of industrialized mass murder were indeed a secret so far fewer knew those details. Another thing many modern people don't realize is how common mass shootings into pits was of Jews that never made it to the camps.