The boygeneral opened up a corridor and saved 300.000 lifes instead of following a mad mans order . To me wenck is a true hero

Well not all the german are the bad guys, have bad guys as leaders. Look at Stiegler escorting an american b17, Wenk saving civilians from the soviet advance, Gangl saving French prisioners of war. In my country the sunk of the german battlecruiser Graf Spee, with the captain saving enemy prisioners and his crew keeping them at the harbor and destroying the ship to avoid a battle he cant win. They are several examples of good choices from germans in the oposite side of the leaders orders. I know we all put the germans as the bad guy for a lot of atrocities they made and the leaders they have, but not all are in the same bag (they are even germans in the resistance).

@andrewludwig9251

9 ай бұрын

Sie sind überhaupt richtig! Auf allen Seiten, gab es schlechte Menschen. Ich habe Ihrem ganzen Land bereits vergeben, ich hoffe nur, dass alle anderen das Gleiche tun.

@thomasjones6216

2 ай бұрын

Look at Oskar Schindler, he used his position as an industrial within the Nazi party to protect the lives of 1,100 Jewish prisoners by taking them into his "armaments" factory Funnily enough, not one functional bullet or bomb ever left that factory He later planted a tree at the Avenue of the righteous Or the soldiers of the last battle who fought alongside the US to rescue POWs from the SS

My great-grandfather actually served under Wenck during this. For most of the German soldiers, it wasn't about ideology (like we're taught in an overly-simplified telling of such) but of the country as a whole.

A lot of my relatives served in World War 2 on the German side. Great uncles, grandfather and other relatives. The main thing that is forgotten about is the toll it took on the civilian population, words that rhyme with grape, firebombings, etc. People who lost everything they owned while never supporting the political goals of the Nazis. They just wanted to live in peace. My grandmother had her house bombed with an incediary bomb, she lost everything, her dogs, her cats and one of her kids and then the Russians came and I don't even want to go into that.

@LV-nb9cs

12 күн бұрын

"then the Russians came and I don't even want to go into that" As a Hungarian, who lost half the male family to the soviets it's important not to forget, that yes, the civilian population suffered too. And not little.

@gopnik9967

7 күн бұрын

@@LV-nb9cs as a russian who's family was mass murdered during the civil war, I agree.

i always like this song also Walther Wenck one of only few THAT DID NOT DO ANY WARCRIMES. after Wenck was taken prisoner by the U.S. Army. He was released in 1947, and then began a second career as an industrialist. During the 1950s, he worked as the managing director of Dr. C. Otto & Comp., a producer of industrial ovens, and in the 1960s as the director of the Diehl Group, an arms manufacturer.[16] In 1957, he was invited to become Inspector General of the Bundeswehr, but refused after being informed that his requirements, such as turning the office into that of Commander-in-chief, could not be met.[17][18] In Cornelius Ryan's 1966 epic The Last Battle he was listed as a contributor. On 1 May 1982, Wenck died while on a trip to Austria, when his car collided with a tree. He was buried in his hometown of Bad Rothenfelde in Lower Saxony a few days later.[19]. ALSO, NEAT I NEVER HERAD THAT SAABATON HAD A HAND IN MUSIC FOR HEARTS OF IRON 4 .

The commander of the 12th army with his 9th counterpart, managed to save approximately 1/2 million civilians before his soldiers with Walter wrenk the 12th commander crossing last… this guy may have been a German, but he was human. And a good man. Not all Germans were evil in ww2. Yet they were portrayed as evil by the allies. Especially the soviets… The Soviet wanted to punish the German people rather than the scum that hurt them. Pillage, burn, killing randomly and torture and defiling the women, wherever they could…

I'm very sure there are a lot of people who wouldn't like this song bcs it goes against their preferred narrative and shows that there were *German* soldiers, people who fought for their country and not an ideology. But people prefer the simplified version saying Germans and Nazis were the same thing bcs it's a lot more comfortable. Simplified black and white narratives makes it a lot easier to feel good about yourself

@allisoncampbell1631

9 ай бұрын

The same with No Bullets Fly too, hell the guy that wrote A Higher Call Originally didn't want anything to do with the story because of this attitude

The Soviet troops were very big fans of "eye for an eye", all too eager to hurt German civilians the way theirs had been & worse. So, good on the 12th & 9th rescuing as many as they could. Sad to learn about the extraditions though.

@binyominsilverman1592

9 ай бұрын

& worse is a major stretch.

@1320crusier

9 ай бұрын

Russians being russians.

@ThePuma1707

9 ай бұрын

Do you even know what the germans did in the USSR that the soldiers developed an eye for an eye attitude? Go watch Sabaton History on the Battle of Berlin, Attero Dominatus

@joshuaturcotte6724

8 ай бұрын

@@ThePuma1707 a reminder was the expectations that the government was supposed to protect the civilians, but Stalin used civilians as a moral booster to cause Russians to fight harder and garner hate. Germany didn't do that, instead the civilians that were opposed to war in the first place often refused to leave there home saying its a deserved loss, only for those soldiers to rape, pillage, murder, burn people alive, and more. Germany wasn't the best, but Russia used any means of execution including running over civilians with tanks. Keep in mind Russia was also executing jews on the political agenda as well, soldiers who disobeyed did save whome they could however. So Germany gassed them and Russia burned them alive. I see no distinction realistically. brutality and brutality means nothing if all they did was primarily target civilians! Berlin was a problem because Stalin decided civilians couldnt leave, same for Leningrad (Where they claimed civilians were killed by Germans, but in reality most of them starved to death). Germany told there civilians to flea and even sent conscripts to hold the tide, however when all was bare about to break, the upper echelon was so damned stupid and tried to claim they still had a winning chance or a chance to save themselves they made stupid demands which lead to the destruction of the civilians faster. Realistically the 9th and 12th stopped an absolute massacre. There are heroes in war, but keep in mind most of the reinforced 9th and 12th were between the ages of 13 and 15 and there commanders refused to send them into the grinder without a reason worth risking them. With that in concept, your looking at Russia which basically threw anyone at the enemy and often with poor conditions sending people to there deaths, which in Russia the only good soldiers are the one that was the most ruthless and the ones that died for the motherland, anything else is a traitor and then forced into prison battalions and sent to the front and considered part of the "Statistical" field. Russia's reason to be hostile is fine, but sheer execution of civilians claiming "An eye for an eye" is like saying Japan should nuke America. Terrible acts that shouldnt be repeated just because you think its a great thing now. Soldiers were angry and took there frustrations out on what was available, its a common hate and reality of trapped in a situation with a damned if you do, damned if you dont. Again though, there were good guys in all armies as well, so thats something to note, there were people that tried to fix things, help people, and even save lives of any side when they could apply such effects! I just think people need to broaden the persoective outside the mindless murder machine a bit as often people just paint one side as good and bad. Again, America wasnt much better, causing several war crimes and problems of there own, a means that often can be seen as horrific and even war ending.

@fallout44454

7 ай бұрын

Oh please an eye for an eye? The atrocities that the soviets carried out were standard practice in accordance with the Russian doctrine. Need examples? Just look at the current war in Ukraine or the Finnish Winter War.@@ThePuma1707

Walter Wenk could just say at the end of April to the Americans "Ok, its over now, I surrender" before his retreat to Berlin. Instead he pulled this rescue misson from scratch.

@Lazarultos

11 күн бұрын

He was a true soldier through and through. Not someone who follows orders blindly, but someone who took on this job because he believed that he was responsible for the safety of his fellow citizens. He knew that there were still hurt, sick, and lost people in the chaos of the invasion that needed to be saved and he recognized that he and his men were one of the few remaining individuals who were in a position to do something about it. If more people with those sorts of morals were in charge of world militaries we'd probably see much less terrible things committed during wars.

This might be a bit of topic but I HATE when I hear people speak of the Hitler youth with the same animosity as nazis or just treat them as the same coin. They were kids brainwashed since childhood, people who during their most influential years were crammed with propaganda and the world was still so small back then. If you were born after the mid-90s you probably don't or can't understand what I mean or know that feeling but everyone basically lived in a large echo chamber but one in which you had little to no control over

Was a pleasure watching you having an eye on Sabaton again! Fun fact: The part of the Song, that sounds like classical Music is actually classic music! Its "Air on the G string" by J. S. Bach. The german part means "Not a battle, but a rescue mission"

This reminded me about another story, that I learned about recently an that is Dr. Hans Münch: The Good Man of Auschwitz by Biographics. I think it would make for a good reaction.

@AmericansLearn

9 ай бұрын

Oh, that sounds interesting. Thanks for letting me know

FYI: Movies are not historical documents. Basing ones world view on them is such a quintessential American thing.

About the question what TimeGhost is (at 21:40). It's the company behind Indy Neidell's other channels; TimeGhost History and World War Two.

Sabaton did two songs for the battle of Berlin, one is of course Hearts of Iron which covers the Germans, the other is, and im gonna miss spell this cause its latin, attero dominatus, which covers the Soviets attacking berlin.

There is a video on KZread that shows an old American WWII vet who was on the west side of the Elbe River when this event occurred. He said the German artillery on the east side of the river was "blazing away" at the Russians and the Americans were told to stand fast and let the Germans pound the soviets.

The order to shift trops from the western front to the eastern front is sain. The thing is that they would much rather have usa take Berlin than ussr due to all the rape and murder. In the end of the war there was even german troops copersring with us trops prior to the very end. I think sabaton maybe made a song about that tö.

The courage and bravery of those men is astounding.

Not sure if someone already pointed it out, but the German 12th Army had some men amongst them that are still held in high regard in Germany to this day. There's Dieter Hildebrandt, a German Kabarett artist - which is basically political satire and comedy, aswell as basic philosophy for laymen. Even more important in regards to history was Hans-Dietrich Genscher. He was a German politician and was Vice Chancellor and Minister of Foreign Affairs during the 80s and early 90s who saw to the the German Reunification and the end of the Cold War.

If you want some good stories about Germans in WW2, I'd recommend looking up John Rabe (the good man of Nanking) and Dr Hans Münch. I think Biographics has videos on them both if you're interested.

@melkor3496

9 ай бұрын

I second this suggestion and the video of him from Biographics.

@AmericansLearn

9 ай бұрын

Cool, thanks!

Hello everyone

When you are soldier and taken military oath, its very hard for soldier go against chain of command...

Don't forget he was a drug attic

The Allies won the war, but lost the peace

not a good idea for the germans to surrender to the Russians after what happened in Stalingrad

The germans were not the good guys, but werent the bad guys, alot of countries, including mine that wouldve been better under german occupation.

I love butchering german words. No they aren't pronounced as englisch. Der Untergang is great movie but hardly accurate....it's not a documentary. Parts true parts false it's like 9/11 in Chile. Oh wait---there's not movies about that but there are documentaries. They are still trying to find their family members there...all bc. Ah socialism might fuck big corporations. I know it's whattaboutism. this isn't: by calculations german army was most effective army in the war. Western front they lost bit less than uk, usa, france together but most of losses were when nazi germany was already collapsing. Soviets lost 2-3 times more soldiers in eastern front that wehrmacht. Ofc we have to understand that Stalin was ruthless....History isn't very exact. It's always from some point of view...