>Severity Order >The army's commander, Walther von Reichenau, a committed, fanatical Nazi, had this to say about the expected conduct of soldiers under his command:
>"The soldier in the eastern territories is not merely a fighter according to the rules of the art of war but also a bearer of ruthless national ideology and the avenger of bestialities which have been inflicted upon German and racially related nations. Therefore the soldier must have full understanding for the necessity of a severe but just revenge on subhuman Jewry. The Army has to aim at another purpose, i.e., the annihilation of revolts in hinterland which, as experience proves, have always been caused by Jews...".[30]
>Immediately after this order was issued, Sixth Army records show a dramatic increase in shootings, rapes and massacres committed by Sixth Army constituent units. The BBC upon examining the now released records of the Sixth Army, stated that there were "so many executions, and so many victims that it was impossible to keep them a secret."[29]:08:13
>Soon after the beginning of Operation Barbarossa, the Sixth Army's surgeon, the staff doctor Gerhart Panning, learned about captured Russian dumdum bullets by using Jewish POWs. To determine the effects of this type of ammunition on German soldiers, he decided to test them on other human beings after asking SD member and SS-Standartenführer Paul Blobel for some "guinea pigs" (Jewish POWs).[28]
>In July 1941 while conducting operations in Right-bank Ukraine, the Sixth Army bloodlessly captured the Ukrainian village of Bila Tserkva. Immediately after the village's capitulation, Sixth Army police units separated the Jewish population of the city into a ghetto and required that they wear the Star of David as identification. Two weeks after the occupation, members of Einsatzgruppen marched the Jews out of the village, 800 men and women in all, to be shot. The Sixth Army provided logistical support for this massacre, providing drivers, guards, weapons and ammunition. Afterwards ninety children aged twelve and under were left, their parents having been killed the night before. A staff officer with the division that made the village their headquarters wrote of their conditions:
>"The rooms were filled with about 90 children. There was an indescribable amount of filth; Rags, diapers, refuse lay everywhere. Countless flies cover the children, some of whom were naked. Almost all of the children were crying or whimpering. The stench was unbearable. In the above mentioned case, measures were taken against women and children which were no different from atrocities committed by the enemy.".
>Sixth army headquarters was faced with a decision on what to do with the children left behind now that their parents had been murdered. The division commander passed the decision up to Walter von Reichenau, then commander of the Sixth Army, who personally authorized the massacre.[29]:06:54 All the children were murdered[29]:07:27 by Sixth Army regulars.
Jaxon Anderson
S
Henry Jackson
>The Sixth Army deserved its fate at Stalingrad
'Talk shit, get hit' is still a thing right?
Kevin Wilson
Any good memoirs on how participants in Nazi atrocities felt during the act? I've always wanted to know what's going on in the heads of who carry out casual acts of murder.
Lincoln Barnes
Read 'Ordinary Men'
Luke Edwards
I think there’s a disconnect between the men on the ground and the men up in the ranks. The officers and generals deserved this, but I still feel bad for the soldiers. Imagine those who were drafted under pain of death to a war they never wanted to fight and ended up dead in Stalingrad.
Anthony Russell
...
Blake Lee
You have a point, the cauldron was probably some of the shittiest fighting conditions ever experienced by a military outfit.
Still though, they have ample opportunities to surrender, even under terms far more generous than they deserved. As they so adamantly refused even in the face of total defeat, they deserved their fate in the Soviet prison camps.
For comparison, the North African campaign was called "the gentleman's war" because Nazis weren't going full autism and treating indigenous populations and POWs like shit, and the Brits reciprocated with captured Nazis
Chase Stewart
>The officers and generals deserved this
not all of the officers and general staff were assholes. seydlitz was on the level.
Austin Johnson
90,000 of them did surrender, and I imagine it only took longer than needed because Paulus refused surrender at first. And from the get go there were plenty of discontent with the Eastern Front amongst German soldiers even in 1941. Graffiti was being found of German soldiers demanding to be returned home. As with the North African campaign, the Germans were not operating on their lebensraum retardation and thus could conduct themselves in a nightly fashion. It was the Nazi generals up top who justified and demanded the atrocities committed in the East because that’s where they wanted lebensraum. Hitler’s partisans were the real bad guys, I pity the average soldier caught in the middle.
Jaxon Jones
>Hitler’s partisans were the real bad guys, I pity the average soldier caught in the middle. I can't find any fault in that. Still though, that's what they get for letting autistic partisans decide policy
Ryan Ward
>And from the get go there were plenty of discontent with the Eastern Front amongst German soldiers even in 1941. Graffiti was being found of German soldiers demanding to be returned home.
Source?
Jack Bell
>Immediately after this order was issued, Sixth Army records show a dramatic increase in shootings, rapes and massacres committed by Sixth Army constituent units.
Actually, the source doesn't say anything about rapes, it seems the wiki author just added this for dramatic effect.
But they sure as shit weren't proud of dying in the cauldron, nutzi
Matthew Parker
samefag
Brody Smith
>muh good bois dindu nuffin etc THE SYSTEM MADE THEM DO IT
Jaxon Bennett
kys, you're talking about millions of individuals
Brandon Martinez
>kys, you're talking about millions of individuals
>he says, as he defends the genocide of millions of individuals
Angel Gray
In Turtledove's books he mentions that Soviets and Germans had an execution style of shooting people in the back of the neck, instead of in the head. Also he says this was referred to as a "noodle". Was he just making that up or is that really true?
Parker Adams
>>he says, as he defends the genocide of millions of individuals imagine how autistic one must be to consider my post as an excuse for the Nazis
Robert Richardson
Seems more ethical, sever nerves instantly, zero chance of creating a vegetable, they'd bleed out instantly if they miraculously lived, very hard to fuck up as well, plus no grisly destroyed skull (probably good for morale and potential funerals)
Jose Taylor
The Soviets executed the Katyn victims in this way.
Caleb Walker
Very interesting. But, is there any truth to the "noodle" thing? It seems like an interesting tid-bit from history, but I don't want to parrot it if its not real.
Nathan Gomez
Fuck. Stupid Varus, for how many centuries will humanity continue to pay for his mistakes.
>SS man described them as follows:
>I went to the woods alone. The Wehrmacht had already dug a grave. The children were brought along in a tractor. I had nothing to do with this technical procedure. The Ukrainians were standing around trembling. The children were taken down from the tractor. They were lined up along the top of the grave and shot so that they fell into it. The Ukrainians did not aim at any particular part of the body. They fell into the grave. The wailing was indescribable. I shall never forget the scene throughout my life. I find it very hard to bear. I particulary [sic] remember a small fair-haired girl who took me by the hand. She too was shot later ... The grave was near some woods. It was not near the rifle-range. The execution must have taken place in the afternoon at about 3:30 or 4:00. It took place the day after the discussions at the Feldkommandanten ... Many children were hit four or five times before they died.
Lincoln Evans
Nah it would be easy to miss the nerves especially if the bullet glances off the vertebrae, not to say you wouldn't die quickly enough but it could be messy. I've seen people shot in the head personally and nobody is getting time to think about that shit.
Ryder Williams
Nice source.
Camden Myers
>This isn't propaganda but 100's of historical descriptions of Jewish Blood Libel are fake and anti semitic propaganda
Dominic Gomez
antony beevor, stalingrad
some german generals saw it and got really pissed, issued a general order about officers maintaining political discipline.
there were even communist cells operating in the rank and file.
Gabriel Fisher
Interesting, I never read Beevor since I assumed it was pop history. Does he provide any source citations for those claims in his book?
