Near the end of World War II the Russians were closing in on the Germans from the East. They were tired of the brutality of the Hitler invasion and were fighting back in deadly fashion. The Western Allies had already given Berlin up to the Russians and really did not care about the Russians taking it over, but the women and children did. The Russian Army were known to be very brutal, doing what they wanted to the women (old and young) after conquering, in fact, they had built up such a reputation of doing this wherever they went that the women in Germany began to be deeply horrified.
The question here is this... Do invading armies that have suffered much have the right to r-pe, and plunge an already devastated country into ruin? Consider that this has been done by ancient armies year after year.
International Level: International Guru / Political Participation: 3231 100%
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do invading armies that have suffered much have the right to rape, and plunge an already devastated country into ruin? Consider that this has been done by ancient armies year after year. |
International Level: International Guru / Political Participation: 1089 100%
In my opinion:
On the philosophical level no country has the right to go to war, not even a defensive war, let alone commit revenge atrocities. In reality though Hitler was elected by the German people, do not those same people deserve to feel the price of their politics. After WWI, Germany did not think of itself as a defeated nation. They got to try there own people on war crimes. The result was 20 years later they attacked their neighbors again. After WWII the Germans knew they were defeated and they have been peaceful ever since.
A war is a harsh thing and everything happens. I didn't hear much about excessive violence of the Soviet army although I do admit cases of violence could happen - it was a war. I read about cases when soldiers (and officers) when caught on cruelty to locals were killed, on the spot, according to the laws of the war times as they said it then.
Leaving Soviet army aside and speaking generally, a war is a war. If it has any rules, the main one should be that the civil population should not suffer, but really when this rule worked last time?
No way I advocate rape and violence to defenseless people, especially coming from those who, supposedly, came to free them.
I do not think there should be the right to violence, but as long as there are wars, violence would happen.
In my opinion, winners should be generous. I'd rather understand the anger and despair of those who lost, and anger and despair might turn you into an uncontrollable beast.
International Level: Politics 101 / Political Participation: 2 0.2%
I wander if germans have been more human because they had Whore Houses with different "qualities" for soldiers, officer and SS.
...or because they treat humanly the prisoners of war and put innocent people in gas chamber.
Often the girls had been from Lager.
To rape and to obligate a woman to prostitute in my opinion is very close, if not worse.
The atrocities happened when 'the spiral of hate" transform the war in a game without rule.
But there is no war without atrocities.
When you want to paint the enemy in a black colour you say about him: they rape woman and kill children, and everybody will hate them, even if there is no facts.
I think the germans never imagined russians as to free them.They have to accept the liberation and to survive. (Hitler wanted all to die with him).
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When they passed romanian territory, the russian soldiers had the habit to ask for girls and womans, so the natives had to hide them till the military column departed, letting in the house only the oldest and ugly ones.
Never heard of major incident, instead I know about a russian who left his family and two young children in Ukraine and started a new one here, where he had a boy which was a friend of mine.
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Edited: Steve on 6th Mar, 2006 - 6:43pm
Where did you take it Germans were more human? At the first sight of Nazis approaching the village, people hid their females either in the cellars or they had to run in the forest and stay there. How about people keeping their children underground for many months, until finally the enemy was out of the village? I read about kids who got blind because they spent all time in the darkness and only came outdoors at night and not for long.
Raping women, putting all young population of the place - be it men or women - in a wagon, locking and barring it and keeping that way until the train comes to Germany, to the plant they were supposed to work at. Part of the people in the wagon by that time were dead, they were mixed with those still alive.
Throwing babies in water wells, on their mothers' eyes.
Putting all the village in one house, barring it and burning them all alive, shooting those who managed to jump out of the burning place.
It all happened, and it is proved by what is left, by ruins, pictures that soldiers took before killing the victims, stories of those who were lucky to survive.
And Nazis, they even didn't have that understandable excuse of revenge. They just came and did.
Violence came from both parties, and I really strongly doubt Soviet soldiers ever burnt a whole place out. All, as it was, with not a single survivor left. The practice of "burnt land" Nazis were so good at.
I really have to check for proves of the cruelty of the Soviet army, because I have never heard of it.
But generally speaking, as I already said,. I do NOT say that it is okay to get your enemy back for what they did doing the same to their people. I do believe in revenge, but it should be targeted at offenders, not neutral part.
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When you want to paint the enemy in a black colour you say about him: they rape woman and kill children, and everybody will hate them, even if there is no facts. |
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I think the germans never imagined russians as to free them. |
International Level: Politics 101 / Political Participation: 2 0.2%
QUOTE (Klausse @ 7-Mar 06, 8:05 AM) |
Where did you take it Germans were more human? |
QUOTE (Klausse @ 7-Mar 06, 8:05 AM) |
And Nazis, they even didn't have that understandable excuse of revenge. They just came and did. |
QUOTE (Klausse @ 7-Mar 06, 8:05 AM) |
And I don't comment the bit about allies "letting" the SA to take Berlin.... |
These are not my words but you can read this site"
"New History Tome Exposes Massive Soviet AtrocitiesNew History Tome Exposes Massive Soviet Atrocities ... of rape in the dying days of WWII was conducted on a "much greater scale than previously suspected. ...
www.americanfreepress.net/Books/New_History_ Tome_Exposes_Massi/new_history_tome_exposes_massi.html - 16k - Cached - Similar pages "
from the site:
"Beevor's high reputation as a historian ensures that his claims will be taken seriously, according to The Tele graph. Stalingrad was widely praised and awarded the prestigious Samuel Johnson Prize, the Wolfson Prize for History and the Hawthornden Prize.
According to the author, Stalin and vicious propagandists, such as Ilya Ehrenburg, urged rape, murder and torture, not only of Ger mans but also their allies in Hungary, Romania and Croatia. When the Yugoslav Communist Milovan Djilas protested to Stalin, the dictator exploded: "Can't he understand it if a soldier who has crossed thousands of kilometers through blood and fire and death has fun with a woman or takes some trifle?"
And when German communists warned him that the rapes were turning the population against them, says Beevor, Stalin fumed: "I will not allow anyone to drag the reputation of the Red Army in the mud."
In many towns and villages every female, aged from 10 to 80, was raped, according to irrefutable evidence."