Holocaust Documentary

[sako751sg]

Having lived in Germany in the early 70s and with the old fella in the forces i saw it all from a very early age and was very fascinated by it.Left a huge impression and im all for the younger folks knowing about as the episode should never be allowed to be forgotten.

[Blunderbuss]

If I can take anything positive from this harrowing subject, it is the moving and articulate way the majority of contributors to this thread have spoken about how this affects them. In a small way, it shows a glimmer of humanity and hope. That people who weren't directly involved can be so affected and determined to remember is good I think.

 

Although as a kid my parents had taught me about the Holocaust, my first real inkling of the scale and horror of it was watching the 1970s 'World at War' series, narrated by Laurence Olivier. The footage was probably heavily edited for a 70s audience and tame by today's standards, but as a 10 or so year old, the images of bodies being bulldozed into mass graves have seared themselves onto my memory. In the late eighties I visited Bergen Belsen whilst stationed in Germany. I vividly remember in particular, the piles of children's shoes, that really got to me.

 

I have been equally moved by testimony and images from Cambodia, Bosnia, Rwanda and others. There is no denying that the capacity for humans to do the same to each other again is only just kept in check in 'civilised' society. That is why we absolutely must remember and remind ourselves of the depths we could stoop to, if we were to listen to the idiots who say 'forget'.

[Pastiebap]

With Hitler to the west and Stalin to the east it wasn't a great time to be an Eastern European, 1928-1954 I.G. Dyadkin estimated that the USSR suffered 34 - 49 Million deaths directly linked to Stalin.

For those who like to read, look out for the book Under Two Dictators, it's about a German Communist (Jew) who fled to Russia, ended up in the Gulags, then was sent back to Germany as part of Stalins "Gift" to Hitler, she then ended up in Concentration camps. Well worth a few pounds and made me think a bit.

The Allies were happy enough to align with Stalin, and part of me wonders if he had threatened us first, would we have Allied ourselves to Nazi Germany? Churchill for one was a fan of neither yet took up with Stalin due to necessity.

Anyway, that book can be found in Amazon for anyone interested.

[grrclark]

I think I was around 10 when I first saw graphic pictures of some of the atrocities carried out in the death camps, the memory of those images lives with me. I cannot recall being disturbed, scared or frightened by the images, but i do recall being staggered by the magnitude of what just a few photographs represented.

 

Childish innocence prevented me from really understanding the motives of why or how people could do that to other people, but what just a few pictures represented I did understand and much like IG I think that had a very formative effect on my beliefs now, hopefully in a positive way.

[Psyxologos]

 

Hitler had a breeding programme - the name escapes me.

 

Lebensborn

[Mungler]

With Hitler to the west and Stalin to the east it wasn't a great time to be an Eastern European, 1928-1954 I.G. Dyadkin estimated that the USSR suffered 34 - 49 Million deaths directly linked to Stalin.

 

For those who like to read, look out for the book Under Two Dictators, it's about a German Communist (Jew) who fled to Russia, ended up in the Gulags, then was sent back to Germany as part of Stalins "Gift" to Hitler, she then ended up in Concentration camps. Well worth a few pounds and made me think a bit.

 

The Allies were happy enough to align with Stalin, and part of me wonders if he had threatened us first, would we have Allied ourselves to Nazi Germany? Churchill for one was a fan of neither yet took up with Stalin due to necessity.

 

Anyway, that book can be found in Amazon for anyone interested.

Good post.

 

Indeed, Stalin was the biggest butcher of his own of all but history has been kinder to him presumably because he held power and fear over people for longer.

[Psyxologos]

Good post.

 

Indeed, Stalin was the biggest butcher of his own of all but history has been kinder to him presumably because he held power and fear over people for longer.

 

I think winning the war also played a big role. After all History is written by the victors...

[Flashman]

How could a country that was as civilised and educated as Germany commit such enormous crimes?

 

The industrial murder and processing of the bodies was beyond understanding, but I recommend a superb HBO film titled "Conspiracy," that uses the Wannsee meeting's transcripts to demonstrate the business-like planning of the Final Solution. The lack of emotion makes it all the more chilling.

 

The planning and execution of the Allied war effort is an unnecessary hijacking of the main issue under discussion. The RAF did bomb the civilian population in order to slow down armament manufacture, not just terror bombing like the Germans. We built the four-engine heavy bombers, whereas the Germans did not, hence "sowing the wind and reaping the whirlwind" when Bomber Command could launch thousand bomber raids. In 1940 - 44 - before the camps were found - we were fighting for our lives against an aggressive invader who tortured and murdered across Europe, hence the motivation to fight in all ways possible, even area bombing, Post liberation, the Germans should consider themselves lucky the Allies didn't salt the earth and consign the whole nation to history once and for all.

 

I cannot comprehend why anybody should suggest forgetting the past: this isn't Stonehenge of the Pyramids, some victims and veterans are still alive. Ignoring the insult to the dead, it's the start of Holocaust denial all over again. Or perhaps it's simply a lack of education.

Edited January 27, 2015 by Flashman

[Flashman]

The Times, as always, hits the nail on the head:

 

"Seventy years ago today, shocked Russian soldiers reached the gates of the Nazi death camps at Auschwitz. They found only a few thousand people; those who had been too sick to be marched elsewhere. In nearby buildings, records show, they also found hundreds of corpses, clothing for well over a million people, and slightly under eight tonnes of human hair. All this, not in some distant age, but within touching distance of today. Queen Elizabeth II, then Princess Elizabeth, was 18 years old. It was only 70 years ago.

It would be hard, one hopes, for any British child today to pass through school without at least being aware of the numbers: six million murdered Jews, and millions more gypsies, homosexuals and dissidents of other sorts. Yet familiarity, while it might not always breed contempt, can more easily breed a numbed triviality. As The Times reported yesterday, loose language about the Holocaust swiftly becomes fuel for antisemitism. Awed solemnity here is no mere taboo for satirists to challenge. It the proper human response to the most inhuman event humanity has known. Not only must we remember. We must also remember to be shocked.

It is regrettable that Poland, most likely as part of a diplomatic freeze with Russia, opted not to invite Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, to today’s ceremony marking the liberation of Auschwitz. While Polish ire is warranted and Russia’s own wartime history remains a matter of revisionist Kremlin equivocation, this should have been an event worthy of the highest diplomatic representation. As it is, the United States will be sending Jack Lew, the treasury secretary, and Britain will be represented by Eric Pickles, the communities secretary.

It is an ugly slur, and widespread not only in the Islamic world, that the commemoration of the Holocaust is an implicitly Zionist obsession. Certainly one can derive a clear rationale for the State of Israel from the crimes of the Nazis, and the current upward trend of European antisemitism carries an extra horror with this backdrop. Yet the memory of the Holocaust should spur us not only to fight rising antisemitism in Europe, but also rising Islamophobia. It carries lessons about the persecution of Christians in much of the Middle East, and the populist oppression of homosexuals in Russia and much of Africa. Wherever in the world you can find a majority indulging in the hatred of a minority in its midst, the Holocaust should be remembered. This is how it can end.

The term “genocide” is used carelessly, and should not be; distinct from mass murder, it is an attempt to extinguish a people. If the Holocaust is remembered more forcefully than other genocides, we should comprehend that this is because of its mechanism, not its personnel. It was not, as so many mass crimes are, one of passion. Rather, it was systematic, considered and industrialised. In moral terms, it was the nadir of the modern age.

“Monsters exist,” wrote Primo Levi, himself a survivor of Auschwitz, “but they are too few in number to be truly dangerous. More dangerous are the common men, the functionaries ready to believe and to act without asking questions.” Today, alongside politicians, there will be up to 300 survivors of the Holocaust at Auschwitz. Sooner or later, and almost certainly for the 90th anniversary of the liberation, there will be none. Those who remain must remember to be shocked on their behalf. Heaven help us all if we do not."

[Hamster]

[Fuji Shooter]

Will this be repeated at all or is it available on sky catchup?

 

Was going to record it but it ended up clashing with something else.

[Psyxologos]

Will this be repeated at all or is it available on sky catchup?

 

Was going to record it but it ended up clashing with something else.

 

It is still available on 4OD

[martyn2233]

Will this be repeated at all or is it available on sky catchup?

 

Was going to record it but it ended up clashing with something else.

link to watch online http://m.movietube.co/watch.php?v=lbB9NCYzQVU

[Pastiebap]

It will happen again,somewhere on the world, with maybe a different people. And as always we will stand by and do nothing.

 

We did nothing during the cultural revolution

We did nothing to stop Pol Pot

We did nothing in Rwanda

We did nothing in the Balkans

We're doing nothing about North Korea

[leeds chimp]

How could a country that was as civilised and educated as Germany commit such enormous crimes?

 

The industrial murder and processing of the bodies was beyond understanding, but I recommend a superb HBO film titled "Conspiracy," that uses the Wannsee meeting's transcripts to demonstrate the business-like planning of the Final Solution. The lack of emotion makes it all the more chilling.

 

The planning and execution of the Allied war effort is an unnecessary hijacking of the main issue under discussion. The RAF did bomb the civilian population in order to slow down armament manufacture, not just terror bombing like the Germans. We built the four-engine heavy bombers, whereas the Germans did not, hence "sowing the wind and reaping the whirlwind" when Bomber Command could launch thousand bomber raids. In 1940 - 44 - before the camps were found - we were fighting for our lives against an aggressive invader who tortured and murdered across Europe, hence the motivation to fight in all ways possible, even area bombing, Post liberation, the Germans should consider themselves lucky the Allies didn't salt the earth and consign the whole nation to history once and for all.

 

I cannot comprehend why anybody should suggest forgetting the past: this isn't Stonehenge of the Pyramids, some victims and veterans are still alive. Ignoring the insult to the dead, it's the start of Holocaust denial all over again. Or perhaps it's simply a lack of education.

 

very easy if you look back at the rise of it all..

Alot of people blame Hitler but if you study it and look closer ....it was the people around him that

 

Hans Frank

Hermann Goering

Heinrich Himmler.

Karl Brandt

Phillip Bouhler.

to name a few

[Zetter]

Following on from this I am watching Auschwtiz inside the Nazi state which is available on Netflix at the moment made by the BBC. Its really harrowing to watch and a real reminder it wasn't just the Jews who were slaughtered though they were by far the largest group.

Also exterminated were the mentally ill, the disabled and several million Russian POWs who after surrender were either worked to death or killed out of hand. I can see why the Russians hated the Nazi's so much.

Worth a watch and illustrates how beyond inhuman it was.

[PhilR]

This is worth a watch too.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10153051883204805&fref=nf