Inside The SS (Nat Geo)

[WillBrink]

Seen a lot of documentaries in my day on all things WWII, but this one is really worth the watch. Most of the time, they're rehash of the basic facts we all known about, stock vid you have probably seen before and done, usually taken from accounts/books we have all seen/read. Much of the vid never seen before, given to the makers of the documentary from family members of the SS soldiers. This documentary interviews surviving members of the SS, and gets them to openly talk about what they did, how they felt doing it, etc. The level of mass psychopathy is hard to grasp, so it's ignored by so many, and listening to them talk is a level of malevolence, that exists to this day, is something difficult to watch and absorb, even among those who are no strangers to the details. This should be required viewing in any school, etc. Facts and figured don't penetrate when they're that big, but hearing it right from the people who did it, is a very different experience. "Never again" does mean a damn thing if most people really don't understand it at the visceral levels required:

http://www.natgeotv.com/int/inside-the-ss

And:

http://www.natgeotv.com/int/inside-t...lleries/the-ss

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/t.../inside-the-ss

[meausoc]

Thanks for posting, looks very interesting !

[Firefly]

The SS had pretty uniforms and looked futuristic but at the end of the day they were a political group. That lends itself to it being, for lack of a better term, “a good ol boy not what ya know but who ya know”

They had geniuses designing some of their kit and we stole as many krauts as we could get post War. But in a lot of ways their way of fighting didn’t make much sense.

They bulldogged and rolled high but didn’t have the logistics train and Hitler himself didn’t listen to key people, militarily speaking, past a certain point. Plus he was Boomer AF concerning their armaments. The Germans were the first with feasible and working assault rifles and he reportedly got teetotaling pissed when he found they weren’t toting Mausers like “they should”.

No sympathy for them. They had cool toys and come on, Hugo Boss made some pretty and sharp looking uniforms, but when rubber met the road; they didn’t have it. They just didn’t have it.

They had the most modern tank tactics and armor of the day but the long game was stymied.

But hey, he got to parade around a buncha uncircumcised blonde kids and their songs were kinda catchy.

But that doesn’t win wars. That said, some of the legit fighters Germany had ended up with jobs in the US Army or French Legion.

Interesting

[just a scout]

An eye watering amount of good German soldiers wound up in SF. Fighting some brothers that wound up in the KGB and GRU.


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[WillBrink]

The SS had pretty uniforms and looked futuristic but at the end of the day they were a political group. That lends itself to it being, for lack of a better term, “a good ol boy not what ya know but who ya know”

They had geniuses designing some of their kit and we stole as many krauts as we could get post War. But in a lot of ways their way of fighting didn’t make much sense.

Why do you say that? I'm no expert on German military tactics, but they were doing pretty damn well until they were dumb enough to open up a second major front and over extend supply lines, deal with Russian winters, etc.

They bulldogged and rolled high but didn’t have the logistics train and Hitler himself didn’t listen to key people, militarily speaking, past a certain point. Plus he was Boomer AF concerning their armaments. The Germans were the first with feasible and working assault rifles and he reportedly got teetotaling pissed when he found they weren’t toting Mausers like “they should”.

No sympathy for them. They had cool toys and come on, Hugo Boss made some pretty and sharp looking uniforms, but when rubber met the road; they didn’t have it. They just didn’t have it.

They had the most modern tank tactics and armor of the day but the long game was stymied.

Mostly a function of a lunatic who ignored his best generals, which was of course to our benefit, vs over deficiencies in their ability to wage war per se.

But hey, he got to parade around a buncha uncircumcised blonde kids and their songs were kinda catchy.

But that doesn’t win wars. That said, some of the legit fighters Germany had ended up with jobs in the US Army or French Legion.

Interesting

I know about the scientists of course, but fighters? Sounds interesting.

[Diamondback]

Why do you say that? I'm no expert on German military tactics, but they were doing pretty damn well until they were dumb enough to open up a second major front and over extend supply lines, deal with Russian winters, etc.

Just for one, their Logistics Train was still very dependent on HORSES. The weapons may have changed, but behind the front the Wehrmacht was very little that Napoleon couldn't see and recognize how it worked, in rather stark contrast to the Red Ball Express that went roaring across France the other way.

[just a scout]

The German Army redefined the value of the NCO Corps and made them professionals. They also implemented the use of Mission Command all the way down to the squad level, combined with good NCOs it gave them incredible tactical flexibility. Der Führer lost his focus and came out of his role, thus ****ing things up to a galactic degree. If he would’ve just given direction to the generals and let them deal with the strategy and logistics, we’d all be speaking German now as we live under the Man in the High Castle.


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[just a scout]

Just for one, their Logistics Train was still very dependent on HORSES. The weapons may have changed, but behind the front the Wehrmacht was very little that Napoleon couldn't see and recognize how it worked, in rather stark contrast to the Red Ball Express that went roaring across France the other way.

That’s all about priorities. And manufacturing capability. We had the factories. By then they didn’t.


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[Diamondback]

Frankly, these kind of shows need to be required viewing in every high-school history class, along with whatever can be done similar with alumni of the other great evils, so that our children can be safely brought to face it and made to see that no matter how much the Kumbayah Singers say otherwise, True EVIL really DOES exist, and regularly needs to be confronted and crushed.

[Firefly]

Why do you say that? I'm no expert on German military tactics, but they were doing pretty damn well until they were dumb enough to open up a second major front and over extend supply lines, deal with Russian winters, etc.



Mostly a function of a lunatic who ignored his best generals, which was of course to our benefit, vs over deficiencies in their ability to wage war per se.



I know about the scientists of course, but fighters? Sounds interesting.

Most famously Larry Thorne. Soldier of three armies. He fought the winter war for Finland, joined German SS, and later died a Green Beret in Vietnam.

Also, and this is just guy on Internet talk, but I did know a black fellow in the day who told me once his grandfather had retired from US Army and had been a paratrooper in WW2. I said “I’m not trying to be funny here but I didn’t know they had black paratroopers in Normandy (this is 19 yo Firefly. Don’t judge).”

He said “I wouldn’t know. He didn’t jump into Normandy and he didn’t jump for the US. He was German”.

At some point his daughter married a black guy. My acquaintance didn’t look mixed or too light but wasn’t a BSer either.

And unless someone was directly implicated in war crimes or atrocities; the door was open. Lots of people either anglicized their names or whatever and started a new life.

Some German victories are kinda overhyped I think because France didn’t want to fight because WWI wiped out so many. The central European and African campaigns didn’t have the resistance most would think. They even had Vichy France supporting them. As well as Arabs. Their only real resistance were partisans and British. US wasn’t in the war yet and Russia was honoring their non aggression pact.

They seriously thought that simply deeboing their way would keep working. No. Operation Barbarossa was their Waterloo. By that point US was in it and they were in a box.

At that point, there was no chance of a German victory nor even a truce.

They almost caught an A Bomb too.

So some of that is hype IMO