Erich Rudorffer

[Spikes]

No. However, I will point out that Great Britain has had a continuous government since 1703 and that government, currently led by Cameron, is both legally and morally responsible for everything Great Britain has done in the last four centuries. Just like the German government is held legally and morally responsible, even for what the Nazis did, and has had to make reparations to just about everyone involved. And the American government is held responsible for what they did back in the day.

Should we then point out all this whenever we discuss one soldier and his achievements? Germany and Russia is high on the list, but it is hard to think of a country that has caused more suffering and injustice in the world than Great Britain.

/thread

[Masherbrum]

/thread

Agreed.   

[Saxman]

Well, then, just in case you think there has to be some sort of personal grudge to feel that way, let's take someone who isn't Jewish, like me.

I recently told a German friend in the EU government that he shouldn't feel responsible for atrocities committed before he was born.  Euros seem to me to be obsessed with inherited feuds, as illustrated by the Turks and Armenians, or the Serbs and Croats...the list goes on.  Hating people, much less killing people, for things that happened before you were alive is stupid.

That's not the point of our objections here, though.  Rudorffer was a participant, fighting to advance (or preserve) a monstrous society.  I have no respect for that.

- oldman

Hell, inherited feuds was a HUGE part of what caused WWI AND II in the first place.

[zack1234]

It was the Germans who caused both wars and lost both

Their cars are overrated as well.

Japan was one of the few countries that was not to blame 

[pipz]

I drive a Volkswagen! 

[zack1234]

Swine!

[FESS67]

I actually find it disgusting that you disrespect the memory of this man with nothing but school boy knowledge of the facts.

Try going back and looking up some real history and then bring your xenophobic views here

[FLOOB]

The British empire was the most benevolent empire yet. A lot of places are civilization now thanks the the British Empire.

Although in some uncivilized places the worship prince Philip as a deity.

[nrshida]

Anyone unable to see the fundamental logical flaw in Benjamin NetanYahu’s analogy is tragically in need of returning to school for basic reasoning lessons. Astounding, to my mind that Godwin's law is so well known. I think nrshida's law is far more handy: "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a revisionist Brit-bashing fest approaches 1"

Never thought I'd live to see the assertion that the British Empire was a more deliberately malevolent entity than the Third Reich on this forum. Or even something as obviously easy to think of as the Roman Empire. A watershed moment for me in understanding the nature of internet-based integration and the purpose it serves for some people. Please report to reception for a reality check.

Not one of the people here posting lives in a country without selected odious acts as a fundamental building brick of its formation. You cannot extract the British Empire from the time period it existed in any more than you can Nazi Germany. Similarly not one person posting lives in a nation which has not to a greater or lesser extent benefited from the formation, expansion and decline of the British Empire. You snivelling, ungrateful barstards. 

[GScholz]

Had the Roman Empire still existed your point would have had some merit, but it doesn't and you don't. We could ask the Irish about what they think of the British killing off half their population, for their religious beliefs (sounds awfully familiar). Not even the Nazis managed to do that in any of their occupied areas. Heh, even Stephen Fry, himself being Jewish, and British, likened Oliver Cromwell to Adolf Eichmann. Difference is Germany is not naming things after Eichmann or proudly displaying statues of him...

[puller]

INteresting thread here

  to those who actually flew in battle and made it home alive

[Spikes]

Anyone unable to see the fundamental logical flaw in Benjamin NetanYahu’s analogy is tragically in need of returning to school for basic reasoning lessons. Astounding, to my mind that Godwin's law is so well known. I think nrshida's law is far more handy: "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a revisionist Brit-bashing fest approaches 1"

Never thought I'd live to see the assertion that the British Empire was a more deliberately malevolent entity than the Third Reich on this forum. Or even something as obviously easy to think of as the Roman Empire. A watershed moment for me in understanding the nature of internet-based integration and the purpose it serves for some people. Please report to reception for a reality check.

Not one of the people here posting lives in a country without selected odious acts as a fundamental building brick of its formation. You cannot extract the British Empire from the time period it existed in any more than you can Nazi Germany. Similarly not one person posting lives in a nation which has not to a greater or lesser extent benefited from the formation, expansion and decline of the British Empire. You snivelling, ungrateful barstards. 

I don't think the argument is whether or not the British Empire was better or worse than the Third Reich in their respective time periods. The bottom line is many civilizations committed atrocities on various levels. Governments do crazy things during times of war.

What makes the analogy right is the fact that one person cannot be held accountable for something that the government (whom that person more than likely never knew personally) did. Whether or not the particular person was alive during the time period or centuries later, it just doesn't make sense.

[JunkyII]

Didn't Germany recently downgrade Walter Nowotny's grave site from a National monument to nothing??

That amount of victories is to be respected by friend and foe a like. Being dangerous is a badge of honor.

[Lusche]

Didn't Germany recently downgrade Walter Nowotny's grave site from a National monument to nothing??

Austria, in 2003

[GScholz]

And after a British citizen sued the Austrian government. Apparently he had lost a relative in Bomber Command. That's where we are today ladies and gentlemen; people suing to have war graves defiled.