'Everyone lied to me': Hitler's rant in bunker

[Metatron]

I don't agree that it was lack of materiel or mobilisation that lost the war for the Germans. Are we forgetting the odds they were facing? 14000 Bf 109s were produced in 1944, I'd call that pretty efficient, but still not enough when you are facing the RAF, USAAF and VVS combined.

 

[Shangas]

I would say it wasn't so much a LACK of materials and/or mobilisation.

It was a lack of commitment. Arrogance. And just misappropriation. The Germans didn't put in the effort where it was needed.

 

[Widebrim]

Attacking Russia was probably the single biggest mistake that the Germans made during the war. I'm sure they must've known that they couldn't win against the Reds. Russia is a GIGANTIC country. All its menfolk have to do is reverse back into their homeland and sit and wait while the Germans freeze their butts off.

And Mussolini was a vainglorious fool for insisting on sending Italian troops along for the adventure...although the Savoy Cavalry distinguished itself in the last full-fledged cavalry charge ever made.

 

[filfoster]

I don't agree that it was lack of materiel or mobilisation that lost the war for the Germans. Are we forgetting the odds they were facing? 14000 Bf 109s were produced in 1944, I'd call that pretty efficient, but still not enough when you are facing the RAF, USAAF and VVS combined.

Without petrol and trained pilots. Thank god. The Herr Reichsminister Speer managed an impressive production, no doubt.

 

[Big Bertie]

Hitler very much wanted to cut a deal with the British. ...

In fact that would have been his only chance of achieving anything at all, and it wasn't ever likely to happen. Hitler's monumental errors of strategy have been well catalogued by various historians. The more I read about the war, the more whimsical his big game of bluff seems. Hitler was a certifiable maniac and even given the circumstances in which he came to power, it's outrageous that so few Germans attempted to stop him, but of course the odds were not exactly in their favour by the time war had started.

 

[1961MJS]

I would say it wasn't so much a LACK of materials and/or mobilization.

It was a lack of commitment. Arrogance. And just misappropriation. The Germans didn't put in the effort where it was needed.

Hi

I think we can all be thankful that they didn't win. The world would have been ruled by a failed artist (ole Adolph), a failed chicken farmer (Heinrich Himmler), a champagne salesman (Ribbontrop), a druggie (Goering), and a porno mag salesman (Streicher).

Later

 

[Memnon]

A bit late in the discovery LOL but nevertheless interesting.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/9634647/Everyone-lied-to-me-Hitlers-rant-in-bunker.html

Is there anywhere to read these newly disclosed documents? That short article doesn't really reveal anything that wasn't either already known or shown in the movie Downfall.

 

[this one guy]

You know, I'm sure everybody did lie to him. If you are a dictator who makes it adamantly clear that you don't want the truth, you just want to hear that victory shall be yours, well, then that's what people tend to tell you.



Um, no. Parts of Scandinavia. Norway and Denmark, but not Sweden, which is the largest country in Scandinavia.

My favorite example concerns air supply to the sixth army in Stalingrad, in which Hitler listened to assurances that supported his own preconceptions and closed his mind to alternate strategies. With Hermann Goering's blessing of the operation (motivated by a desire to gain favor with Hitler), dissenting opinions of front line commanders such as Generals von Richthofen and Fiebig were dismissed as defeatist. Hitler's "iron will" prevailed and the consequences were disastrous.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

My favorite example concerns air supply to the sixth army in Stalingrad, in which Hitler listened to assurances that supported his own preconceptions and closed his mind to alternate strategies. With Hermann Goering's blessing of the operation (motivated by a desire to gain favor with Hitler), dissenting opinions of front line commanders such as Generals von Richthofen and Fiebig were dismissed as defeatist. Hitler's "iron will" prevailed and the consequences were disastrous.

I believe Göring was also the one who persuaded Hitler to halt the panzers outside of Dunkirk and allow the Luftwaffe to "finish off" the Allied forces who were trapped there which only bought time for the Royal Navy to organize the evacuation and rescue of over 25,000 British and 100,000 French troops.

 

[Stearmen]

I believe Göring was also the one who persuaded Hitler to halt the panzers outside of Dunkirk and allow the Luftwaffe to "finish off" the Allied forces who were trapped there which only bought time for the Royal Navy to organize the evacuation and rescue of over 25,000 British and 100,000 French troops.

Your numbers are a little off! 338,226 men were evacuated at Dunkirk, 198,229, under British control, and 139,997, French, Polish, Belgian and a small number of Dutch soldiers.

 

[p51]

I knew a guy years ago who hated Jehova's Witnesses only because one stole a girlfriend from him, and I supposed he has a deep-seated hatred of all of them to this day.
Knowing that, would it be that big a stretch for a young Adolf Hitler having someone named Steinberg cut in front of him in a line at a movie theater or something as stupid as that being the root cause of WW2? Stranger things have happened...

 

[Flicka]

Unfortunately anti-semitism as a phenomenon was fairly entrenched across most of Europe even before Adolf was born. Mercifully, it is now quite uncommon. I think Hitler was making use of a convenient scapegoat, blaming the Jews for Germany's defeat in the First World War and for many other things that were wrong in pre-war Germany.

Anti-semitism in Western Europe was strong already in the Middle Ages, but it was rampant around 1900. Look at the progroms in Russia -- absolutely horrible slaughter of innocents, including children -- but it existed in most Western countries at the time. Jews had been the target of suspicion in the Kaiser Reich as they constituted a foreign element, along with Catholics (see Bismarck's Kulturkampf), Polish and Danish speaking groups living in Germany. Anti-semitism then mingled with eugenists and fascism to form German National Socialism, but it was really part of a much more wide-spread theory of racial purity and strength that led to to the advocating (and in Germany, the practice of) the killing off of undesirables (mentally ill, handicapped, homosexuals and "deviants") in the interest of strengthening the race. For example, one of the sons of Charles Darwin) supported that idea (though not publicly) along with plenty of other supporters of eugenics around the world. Many governments around the world (including mine) practiced race studies and sterilized people they deemed unfit to breed. In fact, in the Western world (Europe and America) in the 20s and 30s, plenty of people supported the idea of government by a superior race purified from foreign and weakening elements. Germany wasn't at all as extreme when seen in context.

Of course, I know plenty of people did not support it either, but fact remains: anti-semitism, racism and institutionalised murder was not exclusively a German idea.

 

[Dixon Cannon]

Originally Posted by Big Bertie

Unfortunately anti-semitism as a phenomenon was fairly entrenched across most of Europe even before Adolf was born. Mercifully, it is now quite uncommon. I think Hitler was making use of a convenient scapegoat, blaming the Jews for Germany's defeat in the First World War and for many other things that were wrong in pre-war Germany.

Anti-semitism in Western Europe was strong already in the Middle Ages, but it was rampant around 1900. Look at the progroms in Russia -- absolutely horrible slaughter of innocents, including children -- but it existed in most Western countries at the time. Jews had been the target of suspicion in the Kaiser Reich as they constituted a foreign element, along with Catholics (see Bismarck's Kulturkampf), Polish and Danish speaking groups living in Germany. Anti-semitism then mingled with eugenists and fascism to form German National Socialism, but it was really part of a much more wide-spread theory of racial purity and strength that led to to the advocating (and in Germany, the practice of) the killing off of undesirables (mentally ill, handicapped, homosexuals and "deviants") in the interest of strengthening the race. For example, one of the sons of Charles Darwin) supported that idea (though not publicly) along with plenty of other supporters of eugenics around the world. Many governments around the world (including mine) practiced race studies and sterilized people they deemed unfit to breed. In fact, in the Western world (Europe and America) in the 20s and 30s, plenty of people supported the idea of government by a superior race purified from foreign and weakening elements. Germany wasn't at all as extreme when seen in context.

Of course, I know plenty of people did not support it either, but fact remains: anti-semitism, racism and institutionalised murder was not exclusively a German idea.[/QUOTE]

This is a very good documentary on the history of Anti-Semitism, for further study: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0229537/

-dixon cannon

 

[Shangas]

Your numbers are a little off! 338,226 men were evacuated at Dunkirk, 198,229, under British control, and 139,997, French, Polish, Belgian and a small number of Dutch soldiers.

As Churchill said: "A miracle of deliverance, achieved by valour. But we should not impart on this event, the attributes of a victory. Wars are not won by evacuations!"

Addressing the issue of Jews.

The Jews have been scapegoats for CENTURIES. And as much as we'd all probably like to wish that it won't be true...they'll continue to be scapegoats for centuries to come.

In the 1300s, the Jews were burned and executed for starting the Black Death in 1347. They didn't, of course. But they were a handy scapegoat.

In the 1880s-1910s, they were targeted in Pogroms (race riots) in Russia and Eastern Europe. A lot of them fled to Poland, Germany, the UK, and the U.S.A. during this time. Some fled to Shanghai in China.

And of course there's no need to discuss what happened post-1933.