Talk:2nd SS Division Das Reich
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Dear readers and other editors,
I visited this site on 1st of April, 2006 and found several errors concerning order of Battle during the Normandy invasion. I also realise that this page is a stub. I will continue editing this untill it has become a real page. I will edit its organizational history and also extent the war criminal section,
with regards,
Lex Rommel
[edit] Further Additions
Once I finish the semester on May 19th and return home, I will add to this page extensively with full references.
-Jclingerman Mwahahah DAS DRITTE REICH!--82.92.175.32 10:50, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Shocking by the War Crimes section
I'm a contributor of the french Wikipedia. My english is not very correct, so I think I'm not able to correct myself the War Crimes section of this article Das Reich.However, I am shocking by the last content of this section.
I disagree with changed made by IP 205.211.54.10 on 12:47, 24 January 2007 :
First about Oradour-sur-Glane, he changed the world "massacre" in "execution". I'm not very good in English but the soldier of the "Regiment Der Fürher" killed the women and chidren in the Church with fire and machines guns. They also killed men with machine guns and burn their bodies in barnes. (See the article Oradour-sur-Glane).
Secondly : he removed the sentence "Only the Regiment "Der Führer" was held responsible for the massacre.". Why ? Who killed this people ?
Third, he added ", in retaliation due to partisan activity". The origin of the massacre is not so clear. It was Adolf Diekmann who justified this massacre in this way. Even if Partisan had attacked them in the past to prepare DDay, German chiefs would not believe Diekmann's version and assigned him in front of a German military tribunal.
I also disagree with the sentence "Apart from this, Das Reich was one of the front-line SS divisions that had an illustrious, mostly crime free career." : I wrote a section with a map (that can be understand by everybody who click on it) about the other massacre of Das Reich in south of France. See this link [1]. More than six hundreed persons where killed or sent in Internment and never came back.
Best Regards : Thierry46 (on french Wikipedia [2]) --81.250.92.113 21:30, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
- I'll be glad to rework this section. Regarding the other massacre, was it one or several? Do the crosses on the maps denote massacres, and if so were they all carried out by 2. SS? Abel29a 23:36, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Thank you for your work on this articles.
Soldier of the 4th Waffen-SS ("Der Führer") panzergrenadier regiment killed many people in may and june 1944 in a large area at the north of the Lot department as you ca see it on the map [3].
Crosses on the map show places where soldier perpetrated violence against population. Numbers (n, m) mean n people were arrested and m people were killed. Stars mean places where SS soldiers fought against partisans.
Best Regards : Thierry46 (on french Wikipedia [4]) --81.49.78.4 20:25, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Advance north in 1944
I'm not an expert in any way on the subject, but a couple of years ago, I remember reading a text by Max Hastings that focussed specifically on the advance north through France following D-Day.
I think it may be relevant for two reasons:
Firstly, it discussed the war crimes extensively, and secondly in the early chapters of the book, the operational condition of Das Reich at the time (06/1944) was assessed - I believe the author concludes that although the fresh recruits brought the division back to full strength following the eastern campaigns, they were so large in number and of only moderate quality. He supposed that this means that the division was not necessarily at the peak of its powers by the time it arrived in Normandy, and further proposed (again, as far as I remember) that the very rawness of the new troops may have predisposed them to overreact to partisan attacks as they advanced north, eventually leading to the war crimes perpetrated at Oradour-sur-Glane and other places (though of course other factors contributed as well, and none excuse the actions.)
I believe this is the book in question: Hastings, M (1982). Das Reich: The March of the 2nd Panzer Division Through France, 1944. Republished: Pan, London (2000). - available from: [http://www.amazon.co.uk/Das-Reich-Panzer-Division-Through/dp/0330483897 ]
As I say, I'm not an expert and this is only my dim recollection, so anyone interested may want to find that book and others in a library or something to check. This just caught my eye... bye...
--Comrade jo 19:45, 5 October 2007 (UTC)