Gunther Grass-Waffen SS service (2 Viewers)

[jazzeum]

As is usual with many an issue, what seems clear on the surface is often on analysis as clear as mud. Ian Buruma's excellent article shows the shadations where there is sometimes no right and no wrong and when a country tries to shake its past but must move on, as Adenauer did, with the necessity of re-creating a country striding among two collosuses. We sometimes seek clear yes and no answers where there are none. I don't see hyprocrisy but a person struggling with moral ambiguities as what's best for his country and what part he can play in it. Should he have come cleaner sooner? Probably so but there is quite a difference between a person called to service and some of the former Nazis he sought to expose who voluntarily participated in that state.

 

[Capitolron]

I stand corrected as to the issue of being drafted. I was not aware of this law. Thank you Geoff for pointing this out.

However, I still don't believe somebody who was indoctrinated into the Hitler Youth should be pope, and that doesn't make Gunther Grass any less a hypocrite for knocking everybody involved in the German war machine without revealing he was a member of the Waffen SS for more than 50 years.

Louis

BINGO - My point excately - lying scum HYOPCRITE and Soviet Communist apologist.

 

[ROAN]

I’d like to give Pope Benedict the benefit of the doubt, because he was supposed to be a deeply religious youth, that he may have not internalized much of the HJ indoctrination. But that’s just speculation on my part.

On the other hand, the HJ was a haven for fanatics and juvenile delinquents of every stripe(this according to Michael Burleigh in his excellent “The Third Reich”). The HJ only brought out the worse in these types.

Many of these went on to join the Waffen SS long before the war turned against Germany and there was forced conscription into the Waffen SS. How were these types as soldiers? The 12th SS Panzer Division HJ, the rank and file being composed of mostly ex-HJ born in 1926 , massacred a number Canadians around Caen during the Normandy campaign, their commander tried and convicted for war crimes.

 

[damian]

Louis
Pope Benedict is a vey learned Theologian and an extremely pious man. I think your analysis is a little bit narrow to be honest. I think he is the choice of the College of Cardinals and I have no problem with this. Trying to say he is a Nazi just holds no water. I don't think this forum is not designed for us to get into religious anymosity. I feel we are beginning to get a little off the topc of toy soldiers here. Most Catholics are open to criticsm of the Catholic Church provided that the person criticisng is open to a repsonse but I just feel this is nnot the forum for it.
You don't like him fine. I see him as the Pope and head of the Church perhaps this topic is best left alone.
Regards
Damian Clarke

 

[OzDigger]

Being in the Waffen SS didn't make you a Nazi as such, there were even a number of German generals that weren't Nazi's.

 

[Gideon]

I’d like to give Pope Benedict the benefit of the doubt, because he was supposed to be a deeply religious youth, that he may have not internalized much of the HJ indoctrination. But that’s just speculation on my part.

Well, he does want to do away with secularism and bring it all back under the Vatican and Papal control - a bit of a reformation.

400 years ago, this would have lead to major wars throughout Europe with horrible bloodshed.

Maybe he should be figuring how to adapt the last vestige of Rome once again.