Igor Delovski Board

[Tiger]

Gavyn Davies does the maths - How a statistical formula won the war

By using this formula, statisticians reportedly estimated that the
Germans produced 246 tanks per month between June 1940 and
September 1942. At that time, standard intelligence estimates had
believed the number was far, far higher, at around 1,400. After the war,
the allies captured German production records, showing that the true
number of tanks produced in those three years was 245 per month..."

[Guest]

A secret weapon: Me-262, the world's first operational jet-powered fighter.

[Ike]

The Hiroshima Myth, by John V. Denson

"Baldwin concludes that the unconditional surrender policy ". . . was
perhaps the biggest political mistake of the war . . . . Unconditional
surrender was an open invitation to unconditional resistance;" ... The stark
fact is that the Japanese leaders, both military and civilian, including the
Emperor, were willing to surrender in May of 1945 if the Emperor could
remain in place and not be subjected to a war crimes trial after the war"

[Borat]

Eric Margolis: The 20th Century's Worst Crime Goes Unpunished

"Stalin declared war on his own people. In 1932 he sent Commissars V.
Molotov and Lazar Kaganovitch, and NKVD secret police chief G. Yagoda to
crush the resistance of Ukrainian farmers to forced collectivization."

[delovski]

The story of how Germany became dictatorship!

"The overwhelming majority of Germans did not seem to mind that their
personal freedom had been taken away, that so much of culture had been
destroyed and replaced with a mindless barbarism, or that their life and
work had become regimented to a degree never before experienced even
by a people accustomed for generations to a great deal of regimentation...."

[Ike]

... and the jokes about it: The Pig is Dead!

A new book about humor under the Nazis gives some interesting insights
into life in the Third Reich...

[delovski]

If WWII was an MMORPG

*tru_m4n has joined the game.*
tru_m4n: hi all
T0J0: hey
Stalin: sup
Churchill: hi
tru_m4n: OMG OMG OMG i got all his stuff!
tru_m4n: NUKES! HOLY **** I GOT NUKES
Stalin: d00d gimmie some plz
tru_m4n: no way i only got like a couple
Stalin: omg dont be gay gimmie nuculer secrets
T0J0: wtf is nukes?
T0J0: holy sh*tholysh*thoylshti!!!111
*T0J0 has been eliminated.*
*The Allied team has won the game!*
Eisenhower: awesome!
Churchill: gg noobs no re
T0J0: thats bullsh*t u fockin suck
*T0J0 has left the game.*

[XNote]

Poland's Biological Defensive

"Two physicians, Drs. Lazowski and Watulewicz, were living in Poland in
1939 when the Nazis invaded and began deporting the population into
concentration camps. When a young man condemned to slave labor in
Germany appealed to them for help, the two doctors tried a unique
deception. They injected him with Proteus and then sent a blood sample
back to Germany for testing. The Weil-Felix test came back positive for
typhus, and the young man was spared."

[XNote]

Some Pictures

Pictures, mostly "Eastern front"

[delovski]

The Sunday Times: How we didn't win the war . . . but the Russians did

"Britain and America still insist they defeated the Nazis, in the face of
overwhelming evidence that they were minor partners, says Norman
Davies"

“History will be kind to me,” predicted Winston Churchill, “because
I intend to write it.”

“Don’t you realise that we were pinning down 56 German divisions in
France alone,” he said. “Without that the Red Army would have been
heavily defeated.” What is less acknowledged is that without the Red
Army pulverising 150 divisions, the allies would never have landed."

[Ike]

Amazing Alex, the Spitfire ace who never got to fly a mission

"He flew more Spitfires than any other man and was hailed as the greatest
test pilot of World War II. He risked his life repeatedly to iron out dangerous
problems with the RAF's aircraft, saving the lives of countless aircrew. And
he was the only pilot ever to 'roll' the massive Lancaster bomber upside-down
in mid air ... just for fun.

The death of Alex Henshaw at 94 concludes a remarkable story of courage,
danger, astonishing skill and devilment. He survived numerous crashes
and frequently clashed with officials who disapproved of his antics - which
included bringing the centre of Birmingham to a standstill by flying his Spitfire
upside-down only feet above the rooftops."

[Ike]

'Beast of Omaha' weeps as he recalls slaughter of thousands on beach

"Severloh was safe in an almost impregnable concrete bunker overlooking
the beach. He had an unimpeded view of the oncoming Allied forces. He was
the last German soldier firing, and may have accounted for about 3,000
American casualties, almost three-quarters of all the US losses at Omaha."

[Ike]

YouTube: richard hammond presents bloody omaha (the graphics)

How 3 graphic designers created D-Day on a shoe string budget for the
timewatch program "Bloody Omaha"

[Ike]

http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/126rq2/recently_declassified_secret_recordings_of_nazi/

Recently declassified secret recordings of Nazi PoWs answer long-asked questions about the perceptions and roles of soldiers within the Nazi regime.

[Ike]

Y - U.S. finds long-lost diary of top Nazi leader, Hitler aide

"A preliminary U.S. government assessment reviewed by Reuters asserts
the diary could offer new insight into meetings Rosenberg had with Hitler
and other top Nazi leaders, including Heinrich Himmler and Herman Goe-
ring. It also includes details about the German occupation of the Soviet
Union, including plans for mass killings of Jews and other Eastern Euro-
peans."

[delovski]

Slate.fr - Les paysages du Débarquement en photos, en 1944 et aujourd'hui

"Le 6 juin 1944, les soldats alliés ont débarqué sur les plages de Normandie
lors d'une opération qui a changé le cours de la Seconde Guerre mondiale et
marqué le début de la fin du conflit. Le photographe de Reuters Chris Helgren
a compilé une série de photos d'archive prises pendant l'invasion de 1944 et
est retourné aux mêmes endroits pour les photographier aujourd'hui, à la
veille du 70e anniversaire de l'évènement."

[Ike]

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-20698098

[Ike]

reddit - During the Holocaust, is there evidence of even a single
SS soldier who stopped and said "This is immoral, I can't do this"?

"As Christopher Browning (author of the popular "Ordinary Men") put it,
there were three types of SS men, those who had no issues carrying out
the mass killings, those who had issues but used alcohol or other coping
methods to carry them out anyways, and finally those who refused out-
right."

[Ike]

Auschwitz Survivor Gena Turgel Walked Out of Gas Chamber Alive

"After two months, as the Red Army advanced towards Auschwitz, she was
sent on a "death march," first to Buchenwald concentration camp and then
to Belsen, where she shared a barracks with the dying Dutch teenager Anne
Frank."

[Ike]

Postwar Rape: Were Americans As Bad as the Soviets?

[Ike]

sz - The Singular Tale Of A British Soldier Caught In The Firebombing
Of Dresden

"There where about 20 people on the other side of the street trying to escape
the fire, and to do so they had to get to our side. A few tried to run, but the
asphalt had melted with the heat of the fire and they got stuck in it halfway.
At some stage their bodies imploded from the heat. Your brain is not able to
process something like that."

[Ike]

r - IamA 95 year old german women from a village in the Black
Forest, and experienced Nazi Germany as a civilian. AMAA

"When we first heard that they were coming, we fled uphill into the forest.
We were scared there, because we didn't know what would happen. But
we were told to return and stay at home. So we went back and waited.
First we were insecure of what would come, but once the Moroccan
soldiers where here and came to each house, they didn't do anything. And
they were only looking for jewels and food. This is when we calmed down.
Shortly after french soldiers came and they also stayed at each house
there. The young french man staying at my place was very polite and
nice. he even placed newspaper on the place where he slept to not make
it dirty."

[delovski]

tportal - Britanski expert za NDH govori kako ne vjeruje u hrvatsku pomirbu

"Britanski povjesnicar Rory Yeomans, specijalist za razdoblje NDH, govori
o teroru i nefunkcionalnosti ustaske drzave, objasnjava zasto je Jasenovac
bio logor smrti te istice da bi Hrvati trebali biti ponosni na otpor Pavelicevoj
fasistickoj i marionetskoj tvorevini."

[delovski]

r - High Hitler: how Nazi drug abuse steered the course of history

"German writer Norman Ohler's astonishing account of methamphetamine
addiction in the Third Reich changes what we know about the second world
war"

"Unlikely as it sounds, it was Ohler's friend, the Berlin DJ Alexander
Kramer, who first put him on to the idea. He's like a medium for that
time, says Ohler. 'He has this huge library, and he knows all the music
from the 20s. One night he said to me: 'Do you know the massive role
drugs played in National Socialism?' I told him that I didn't, but that it
sounded true - and I knew immediately it would be the subject of my
next book."

[Ike]

historynet.com - Fury: A Tanker's Eye View

"I'm glad a young friend - when you're 90, somebody 64 is young - invited
me to see Fury, the movie about GIs in Sherman tanks fighting in Germany
in April 1945. In April 1945 I was a GI in Germany fighting in a Sherman
tank, and I wondered how close the film gets to what I remember.

It gets darned close."

[delovski]

r - How did the Red Army react when it discovered concentration camps?

"We were standing in a circle, everyone was silent. From the barracks
more and more hungry children were emerging, reduced to skeletons
and enveloped in rags. Like ants they assembled in large groups, mak-
ing noise as if they were in a large school yard. With arms extended,
they were waiting, begging and screaming for bread. They were whining
out of despair and wiping away their tears... Only death reigned here. It
smelled of it"

[delovski]

r - IamA 89 year old german WW2 veteran who got drafted into the
army in the last months of war and subsequently became a prisoner
of war in the UdSSR for 4and half years. AmaA

"Our Opa was born in 1927 in a tiny village in Lower Saxony near the border
to North-Rhine-Westphalia. He was a Luftwaffe auxiliary personnel in
Osnabruck with 14/15 years for 9 months and helped during the air raids
against Osnabruck at that time."

[Ike]

https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/5y11zs/my_name_is_norman_ohler_and_im_here_to_tell_you/

https://youtu.be/IB8FCye08g8

[Ike]

r - Don't be a sucker (1947)

"US's propaganda movie in which a man in simple terms explains how NSDAP
rose to power in Germany and how it ended in destruction of the country to a
fellow countryman who seems to be swayed by orators similair to Hitler."

[delovski]

r - Hans Oster actively sabotaged the nazi war effort

"TIL Part of the reason why the Allied secret services could fool the nazis
many times is that the deputy head of the German Abwehr, Hans Oster,
actively sabotaged the nazi war effort."

[delovski]

cbs - At 97, Ben Ferencz is the last Nuremberg prosecutor alive

"Lesley Stahl: Ben? I'm sitting here listening to you. And you're very wise. And
you're full of energy and passion. And I can't believe you're 97 years old.

Benjamin Ferencz: Well, I'm still a young man.

Lesley Stahl: Clearly, clearly.

Benjamin Ferencz: And I'm still in there fighting. And you know what keeps
me going? I know I'm right."

[delovski]

r - On June 6th, 1944, John Ford commanded a film crew on Omaha Beach. Most of the footage was accidentally dropped overboard.

"During World War II, Hollywood directors such as John Huston and John Ford
volunteered for service with the military (Army, and Navy, respectively), where
their talents were put to the best use, namely making movies. They, and
others, were tasked with creating films for domestic consumption to bring the
war home to American audiences, in other words, propaganda."

[delovski]

r - Hitler killed himself the same day the Soviets took the reichstag?

"There is an episode in the documentary World at War (made in early 70's)
about Hitler's last days in the bunker. It has interviews with the same people
whose eye wtness accounts inspired Der Untergang. The similarities between
the movie and the interviews are very haunting."

[Ike]

https://old.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/eqtjff/the_netherlands_1966/fey1nqy/

There was a book launch this week about the bitter-sweet ending of the war and how entires Dutch cities were plundered by allied soldiers. All safes and banks in Nijmegen were emptied.
https://nos.nl/artikel/2319048-plunderingen-door-geallieerden-zwarte-kant-van-de-bevrijding.html
Dutch article, sorry about that. The book is called "Bezet, bevrijd en geplunderd".

[Ike]

r - What happened in terms of rape in Berlin at the end of WWII?

"Sexual violence during and after World War 2 were a mass phenomenon,
including that perpetrated by members of the German and Axis armies, the
Western Allies and, most well known, the Red Army. It is impossible to
seriously quantify beyond a mass phenomenon that a startling amount of
women in occupied and controlled terrritories on all sides were familiar with
because of several reasons"

[Ike]

r - The Red Army in Yugoslavia, 1944-1945

"Although most troops were content with seizing goods, many also be-
lieved that they had a right to sex. The Red Army had a hyper-masculine
and misogynist subculture, and the gang rapes which some troops committed
were meant to cement their own friendships and relations. The soldiers'
identity included a focus on their sexual potential and their right to inter-
course. Therefore, even women who served in the Red Army faced a preda-
tory environment at times. These attitudes were ingrained in the troops'
ethos and they invariably shaped their interactions with local women, whom
they harassed and pursued brazenly, but often without resorting to outright
violence."

[Ike]

Y! - Black Infantry is going into battle again

"Dressed in civilian dark cloaks, they didn't even have uniforms, their
weapons consisted of one rifle for ten people. Others had sticks, or like
the famous Ukrainian writer Anatoly Dimarov, a piece of brick.

You throw your bricks, and let the Germans think they are grenades!
he recalled his orders. The Germans let us in and hit us with targeted
fire. It was impossible to turn back - the Smerch members were sitting
there with machine guns aimed at our backs..."

[Ike]

wiki - World War II casualties in Yugoslavia

"In 1954, the United States Census Bureau estimated the war related deaths
of Yugoslavia at 1,067,000. Estimates and calculations of the wartime pop-
ulation losses of Yugoslavia from Ivo Lah, a Slovene statistician, Croatian
demographers Ivan Klauzer and Vladimir Zerjavic, and Serb statistician
Bogoljub Kocovic, ranging between 900,000 and 1,150,000, showed that
the official Yugoslav government's figure was highly exaggerated.

The 1964 victims census was conducted for the purpose of negotiating war
reparations for human losses and damage to infrastructure with West
Germany.[3] The census was requested by Germany as its government did
not agree with negotiations on the basis of the official Yugoslav estimate at
the time. The 1964 census resulted in a death toll of 597,323 for Yugoslavia.
The results were declared a secret and were first revealed to the public in
1989"