The sinking of the Bismarck

[MikeWaters]

I watched the James Cameron documentary about this today, didn't catch the beginning.

A couple of the German survivors were along for the expedition.

It was a miracle they survived. They were picked up from the water by British ships, and they say, were treated with "respect", not as enemies.

That struck me. Yet again. How much we have changed.

(don't bother with they were "uniformed" or blah, blah, blah).

Point is we've forgotten what it is to be the good guys. and that's the trap that was laid for us.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

I watched the James Cameron documentary about this today, didn't catch the beginning.

A couple of the German survivors were along for the expedition.

It was a miracle they survived. They were picked up from the water by British ships, and they say, were treated with "respect", not as enemies.

That struck me. Yet again. How much we have changed.

(don't bother with they were "uniformed" or blah, blah, blah).

Point is we've forgotten what it is to be the good guys. and that's the trap that was laid for us.

That's one of the interesting things about WWII. We treated some enemies well and some quite poorly. German POW's captured by the US were taken to camps in the US, one of the bigger ones being in Alabama, IIRC. They worked on farms during the day and were well fed. Many of them even got weekend passes and could go into town to have a few beers and catch a movie. Towards the end of the war, German soldiers were typically happy to be captured because they knew they would finally get some decent meals. Only one German soldier in the US attempted to escape. US soldiers were treated well overall in Germany, and if they were poorly fed, it was typically because the Germans themselves were short on food.

On the other hand, things were not so civilized on the Eastern front. The Germans were absolutely brutal with the Russians and Poles. And vice versa. After D-Day there was a group of Polish soldiers fighting on the Western Front with the Allies and they were supposed to transport a group of German POWs to a new location. When they got to the destination, there were only a few POWs left. They told the US commanders that the other POW's "died along the way". When asked how the remaining POW's survived, they replied "We ran out of bullets".

In the Pacific theater, Japanese POW's did not fare well in US camps. This is not a well-known part of our history, but those camps were brutal. And that is not to mention the detention camps for US citizens of Japanese ancestry. There was most definitely racism in the US towards the Japanese relative to the Germans and Italians.

[Venkman]

oh brother.

"don't bother with they were uniformed, or blah blah, blah"?

I'm pretty sure we treated uniformed Iraqi soldier POW's just fine in 91 and 03. Yes, there's a big difference.

I do have concerns with with our policies regarding "enemy combatants", gitmo, waterboarding, etc, but please, using the sinking of the Bismark to prove your point just doesn't work.

Try getting less hysterical on this issue, there are shades of gray here.

[YOhio]

Originally Posted by Jeff Lebowski

That's one of the interesting things about WWII. We treated some enemies well and some quite poorly. German POW's captured by the US were taken to camps in the US, one of the bigger ones being in Alabama, IIRC. They worked on farms during the day and were well fed. Many of them even got weekend passes and could go into town to have a few beers and catch a movie. Towards the end of the war, German soldiers were typically happy to be captured because they knew they would finally get some decent meals. Only one German soldier in the US attempted to escape. US soldiers were treated well overall in Germany, and if they were poorly fed, it was typically because the Germans themselves were short on food.

On the other hand, things were not so civilized on the Eastern front. The Germans were absolutely brutal with the Russians and Poles. And vice versa. After D-Day there was a group of Polish soldiers fighting on the Western Front with the Allies and they were supposed to transport a group of German POWs to a new location. When they got to the destination, there were only a few POWs left. They told the US commanders that the other POW's "died along the way". When asked how the remaining POW's survived, they replied "We ran out of bullets".

In the Pacific theater, Japanese POW's did not fare well in US camps. This is not a well-known part of our history, but those camps were brutal. And that is not to mention the detention camps for US citizens of Japanese ancestry. There was most definitely racism in the US towards the Japanese relative to the Germans and Italians.

Interesting. I wonder how much of the US treatment of the Japanese had to do with their shear brutality toward US POW's and their actions in Nanking.

There was also the situation in 1942 when German spies were found in the U.S. They were tried before a military commission, approved by FDR and upheld by the SCOTUS, and six of them were executed by electrocution.

[MikeWaters]

Originally Posted by Venkman

oh brother.

"don't bother with they were uniformed, or blah blah, blah"?

I'm pretty sure we treated uniformed Iraqi soldier POW's just fine in 91 and 03. Yes, there's a big difference.

I do have concerns with with our policies regarding "enemy combatants", gitmo, waterboarding, etc, but please, using the sinking of the Bismark to prove your point just doesn't work.

Try getting less hysterical on this issue, there are shades of gray here.

I already know how callous you are, you've revealed that to the whole world already.

[Venkman]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

I already know how callous you are, you've revealed that to the whole world already.

Shades of gray buddy, shades of gray...

Doesn't that work into your definition of a mullah somewhere?

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by YOhio

Interesting. I wonder how much of the US treatment of the Japanese had to do with their shear brutality toward US POW's and their actions in Nanking.

Yeah, that was probably part of it. But many of the details of the rape of Nanking weren't widely known by the international community. Ironically, one of the things that shocked the world community was the bombing of Chinese civilians in large cities by Japanese planes. It was labelled an act of terrorism and a horrendous war crime. By the end of the war we were doing the same thing. On both fronts.

Another interesting thing is that when a German U-boat would sink a US merchant ship, the U-boat would generally surface and put out a distress signal so that other US boats would come and rescue survivors. Allies generally did the same thing and if a US ship was nearby they would sometimes come and rescue German survivors. Not so in the Pacific. There was a movie clip taken near New Guinea that was shown in the "news reels" that would circulate in US theaters to be shown prior to movies. It showed US planes strafing Japanese sailors who were in the water clinging to debris after their ship had been sunk. The narrator said "Our boys are making sure these Japs don't fight again!" Audiences cheered.

[YOhio]

Originally Posted by Jeff Lebowski

Another interesting thing is that when a German U-boat would sink a US merchant ship, the U-boat would generally surface and put out a distress signal so that other US boats would come and rescue survivors. Allies generally did the same thing and if a US ship was nearby they would sometimes come and rescue German survivors. Not so in the Pacific. There was a movie clip taken near New Guinea that was shown in the "news reels" that would circulate in US theaters to be shown prior to movies. It showed US planes strafing Japanese sailors who were in the water clinging to debris after their ship had been sunk. The narrator said "Our boys are making sure these Japs don't fight again!" Audiences cheered.

It's funny, but I can almost hear the stock voice of the 1940's narrator saying that.

[Colly Wolly]

Naive.

[8ballrollin]

Originally Posted by Jeff Lebowski

Yeah, that was probably part of it. But many of the details of the rape of Nanking weren't widely known by the international community. Ironically, one of the things that shocked the world community was the bombing of Chinese civilians in large cities by Japanese planes. It was labelled an act of terrorism and a horrendous war crime. By the end of the war we were doing the same thing. On both fronts.

It was pretty widely known on each side that it was gloves off in the pacific theater, POW or not, especially during battles in places like Guadalcanal.