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Irma Grese
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2024-07-10 at 4:53 PM UTC
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2024-07-10 at 4:54 PM UTC
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2024-07-10 at 4:54 PM UTC
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2024-07-10 at 4:54 PM UTC
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2024-07-10 at 4:56 PM UTC
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2024-07-10 at 4:56 PM UTC
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2024-07-10 at 4:56 PM UTC
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2024-07-10 at 4:56 PM UTC
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2024-07-11 at 6:47 AM UTC
Originally posted by the man who put it in my hood Of November 6, 1944, we reached America’s east coast and entered the harbor of New York. On that same day, western Allied troops in the Netherlands stood east of the town of Nijmegen, and with Aachen the first major German city had been captured. Further east in the huge woodlands west of the Ruhr River, however, November 6 saw most intense fighting. The battle for Hurtgen forest there would grow into the largest ground battle for American forces on German soil. On the eastern front, the Red Army was preparing for the assault on Warsaw and Budapest in early November. Of all this struggle along Europe’s front lines we did not learn anything, however. We all stood at the railing of our ship, gazing at the Statue of Liberty and the Manhattan skyline. The former, which just seemed gigantic to us, left an especially deep impression. When some American seamen noticed our amazement, they laughed and remarked that there would not be much liberty for us Prisoners of war in the foreseeable future. We had to contritely acknowledge that they were quite right. Now we had to hand over everything we had treasured up from supply and food crates during our journey. All we were left with was our uniforms, a duffle bag with a blanket and additional clothing, as well as any personal items we were carrying on ourselves. The ship docked at a harbor mole, and we went ashore over the gangway. As we walked out, we were greeted by a crowd of curious American civilians. With much interest they watched us falling in lines and being counted. Suddenly a man from the crowd shouted at us in German. “How are the Panthers doing? How are the Tigers doing?” We had to smirk but remained silent and waved at him in a friendly manner. We were marched into a great hall, where we had to take off our clothes and take a shower. Then we were examined by a doctor and received new clothes. Black trousers, light-colored shirt, with the old uniform getting shoved into the duffle bag. After that, we were again registered and divided into new groups right after. Us officers were also reorganized, but this time we were separated immediately; our group of around fifteen men and the clique of five “renegade” officers. From now on, each of the different groups of Prisoners of war was to be relocated separately. Our group of officers, along with some guards, marched right through the middle of busy New York City to a public subway station. Everything was new to us, and with much astonishment we looked at our surroundings, which to us were unusual and, most of all, colorful. The inhabitants of New York registered our presence more or less casually, mostly occupied with their daily business and hurrying past us. At the station we boarded a subway train that took us across the Hudson River. I would have never imagined to one day be riding the New York subway. We kept going under Manhattan until we arrived at a railway station from where trains were departing westwards. Here, we were loaded into large Pullman carriages and sent off into the west. What now followed was a multiple day long train ride over a distance of almost 1,550 miles. Inside the train, we learned from our guards that our destination was Alva, Oklahoma. If the United States were to have a central point, it would be around there. The town of Alva was around 90 miles northwest of Oklahoma City, the state’s capital. And we were told something else: we were to stay in a “Nazi camp.” I was puzzled. “We are to be sent to a Nazi camp?” I thought exasperatedly. Back at home, and especially at the frontlines, I had never bothered with politics. Today, this could be the grounds for accusations against me. Back then, however, I viewed myself to be a soldier first and officer second, and as such I had a duty to serve our people. With that, any questions regarding politics were answered from my point of view. I bore the responsibility for the lives of all soldiers under my command and was thus obligated to facilitate their survival. After each casualty that we had suffered, I puzzled my head over how it could have been avoided. The result was that I oftentimes came to the depressing realization that pure luck alone decided between life and death. When First Lieutenant Braatz and I had been writing letters to a fallen soldier’s loved ones, we always tried to depict their death without any pathos. But we also avoided asking questions about the meaning of death. Our understanding of duty would not even let such questions come to pass. This was the world of thought that we were living in. But calling us “Nazi” based on that would never have occurred to me. Quite the opposite; already back in the Hitler Youth, I felt deeply repulsed by those party barons strutting around like cocks in their brown uniforms. Apparently, our restive behavior during the days of interrogation at Saint Loup, but also the animosities with our own “renegade” officers, had brought us this assignment to Alva. Once again, I felt bitterness. How could it be that only because someone invokes the rules of the Geneva Convention, they are immediately branded as fanatics? Did being in captivity warrant that I give up all sense of honor? This was absolutely repugnant to me. I would rather stay true to my principles, just as I had been taught. To immediately throw in the towel now that I was in the victor’s hands seemed vile to me, as if I would betray my loved ones back at home. To the listener, these words may appear stubborn, but many others had sentiments just like mine. And in the long conversations we had on the ship or now on the train, we only found our convictions strengthened. The war was not over yet, and of the inhumane atrocities that had been committed in Hitler’s name, at least most of us still had not the slightest knowledge. As such, we proudly viewed ourselves as German officers that, albeit having been captured, had not been stripped of their pride and dignity. “What would people think of us back at home?” we kept asking ourselves. On the long train ride to Oklahoma, we had much time to think. The unusually flat American landscape was passing by, and each time we would stop at a station, there were new things to discover; among those were huge spherical water towers that created the pressure necessary to run water lines in these pancake-flat regions. Our train was not marked in any way, and thus we were often waved at by American girls during our short stops, who certainly thought us to be US soldiers. We would then happily wave back. At the railroad station of a town called Emporia, we even had the chance to chat with an American girl that spoke perfect German. Our military police guards were deliberately lax and did not intervene. At night, we often passed through towns that were lit as bright as day. This was a most unusual sight for us, as back at home we had to keep everything dark to avoid air attacks. Here, however, work in the factories could continue through day and night. To us, America seemed truly humongous. Hitler had not gotten about much. That much became clear to me as we went through the vast stretches of the American lands. On November 9, at 02:00 in the night, we arrived at Alva. In the earliest morning hours, we were brought to the camp. To us it appeared like a small city that was lit by electrical lamps as bright as day. We were assigned quarters. Haeffele, who had been by my side since the day of my capture, moved into a room together with me. It had two beds, two lockers, a table and two chairs. After a short night of sleep, we went to breakfast at 07:00 AM, which was handed out in a huge mess hall. To my great surprise, there was a lectern at one end of the hall, decorated with a swastika flag. Behind it hung an imperial eagle with a wingspan of almost seven feet. On the long tables, the meal was already waiting. We sat down and were immediately engaged in conversation. Then we were asked for attention and, I could not believe my own ears, an actual speech of the Führer was read aloud. I started to understand why this camp was called “the Nazi camp” by the Americans. Later I would learn that American soldiers also called it Devil’s Island. On the way back to our barrack, I talked with Haeffele about what had happened. Like me, he was no NSDAP party member and also had not too much sympathy for our supreme party barons. In his opinion, his duty as German officer bound him to his people, not the party. We resolved to maintaining a low profile and keep waiting. This way we found out that many of the prisoners here, just like us, had insisted on being treated correctly and according to the Geneva Convention during their capture and interrogation. Nevertheless, there was also a core of irreversibly convinced national socialists, who were quite anxious to let us know which supreme commander we were still serving. To most of us, however, all this was by now completely irrelevant. They had come to terms with life in this American camp, hoping to be able to return to their loved ones at home as soon as possible. We decided for ourselves that we did not want to deal with politics or group formations, and we stayed true to that decision. On the day of my arrival, there were around 1,500 German officers of varying ranks in the camp. A large number of those had been captured in 1943 through the capitulation in Africa or later during the fighting in Italy. Prisoners were organized into companies of around 200 men each. Roughly fifty men were housed in each individual barrack. The higher the rank, the more space was given to any individual prisoner.
You expect me to read all of this shit? -
2024-07-11 at 7:23 AM UTCIll rape u irma grease
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2024-07-11 at 7:43 AM UTCnarc all of those videos say they're unavailable in muh country beetch
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2024-07-11 at 7:58 AM UTCMust suck to live in a shit country
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2024-07-11 at 8:01 AM UTCthe usa ? nah its pretty nice where I live, and I am too lazy to change my vpn for this lol
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2024-07-15 at 11:34 PM UTCMuch of the USA is actually nice. California is beautiful when you get away from the street shitters. go out into the parks or into nature.
thank God the majority of people are city dwellers. imagine if shitheads were distributed equally throughout the land. no where to go to get away from fuckheadsThe following users say it would be alright if the author of this post didn't die in a fire! -
2024-07-16 at 12:57 PM UTCGot some awesome lakes and rivers there too
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2024-07-17 at 8:58 PM UTC
Originally posted by NARCassist Got some awesome lakes and rivers there too
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white water on the sacramento is something we used to do as kids. you rent a giant inflatable boat and you take it for miles and then when it hits these calmer waters (where it moves out farther) you then drag it to the top of the slope and they pick you up from a bus and take you back to the starting point.
you always see people cliff diving off to the side. lots of fun in the day when people were beautiful. those currents are super strong though so you have to be a good swimmer. most heavy set kids today can't swim that
