Talk:5th SS Panzergrenadier Division Wiking

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[edit] The Last Days

according to a report of Leonore Lappin the Wiking serrenered near Graz. From the Balaton to Graz is a straight line, so Chechoslovakia seems to be wrong. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.114.182.217 (talk) 17:07, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] War Crimes

July 9: Divisional troops massacre Jews at L'viv:

"...A similar gauntlet, but more lethal, was organized four days later by officers of the Waffen-SS Viking division following the shooting death of the commander of one of the division's regiments. [note: may have been SS-Staf. Hilmar Wackerle of the Westland regt.?] Günther Otto, a twenty-one year-old butcher assigned to the train that carried fresh meat for the troops, described the experience in a Nurenburg trial deposition after the war:

'...The members of the meat train and the bakery company systematically rounded up all Jews who could be found based on their facial characteristic and their speech, as most of them spoke Yiddish. Obersturmführer Braunnagel of the bakery company and Untersturmführer Kochalty were in charge of rounding them up. Then a path was formed by two rows of soldiers. Most of the soldiers were from the meat train and the bakery company, but some of them were from the 1st Mountain Hunter Division. The Jews were then forced to run down the path and while doing so the people on both sides beat them with their rifle butts and bayonets. At the end of the path stood a number of SS and Wehrmacht officers with machine pistols, with which they shot the Jews dead as soon as they had entered into the bomb crater [being used as a mass grave]. [Superior officers of the regiment] were part of this group that conducted the shootings. About fifty to sixty Jews were killed in this manner."*

The Viking Division 'had been indoctrinated with anti-Semitic thoughts in Dachau and Weuberg' by a major and a corporal, Otto explained, 'but we were never told that the anti-Semitic program went as far as extermination.'"**

Peter Neumann, a young SS officer in the division, write in a letter "Liquidations, executions, purges. All these words, synonyms with destruction, seem completely banal and devoid of meaning once one has gotten used to them."**

  • Masters of Death: The SS Einsatzgruppen and the Invention of the Holocaust pg. 63
    • Ibid. pg 146


From diary of Keijo Kääriäinen.

"22.8.41...Usually we don't anymore shoot all prisoners but in the begening,apart of Ukrainians who we had orders to release immediadly,others were deaths own.Once our company did drive 300 Russians to river and all were machinegunned there.... To the Finns is this kind of butchery made repulsive impression.I have avoided from killing of prisoners and have succeed in that..."

Panttipataljoona by Mauno Jokipii --Molobo 22:36, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

none of this is proven, and cannot be said to actually refer to the Wiking division. these alleged atrocities cannot be proven, nor are they accepted by the scholarly public, because they are uncorroborated and cannot be backed up by any scholarly research.

--Jadger 17:22, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

"Proven" ?? They are statements from witnesses/participants. What more do you want? What "scholarly public" does not accept that Waffen-SS units committed numerous atrocities? You claim to be fighting POV but you are pushing an alternative POV.

DMorpheus 20:36, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

well, first it needs cited, and second, it needs to be peer reviewed to be credible. And thirdly, have these finnish soldiers testified? this comes from a diary, and diaries are easily forged or edited to exaggerate or fake an occurence, case in point: the hitler diaries.

for instance, from my diary from yesterday: "29.03.06... This morning, I won 100 million dollars in the lottery, and was named king of the world, now this puts a heavy burden on me, as I feel I must properly represent everyone on God's green earth."

of course I am just as infallible as this Finnish soldier, so surely what I just stated in my diary is true.

--Jadger 22:01, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Hello, I edited "infamous" since with a good combat record and without war crimes convictions there is no need for bias. Kenaz9 13:48, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Edited War Crimes sections since "some sources" are not sufficient proof. Kenaz9 17:05, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] additions

Someone has gone through and started adding this to almost every divisional page - "Still it was a part of the Waffen-SS, which was found to be a criminal organization at the Nuremberg Trials." Personally I find it a bit redundant and most divisional pages it was reverted quickly. I suspect someone with an agenda was adding it, as to some SS divisions are not notable outside of being 'criminals' user:Pzg Ratzinger

[edit] details

"the SS divisions defeated two Soviet tank armies (totalling over 1,000 tanks) and destroyed over 800 tanks. At no time did the SS divisions have any more than 50 panzers in working order."

Was there any particular reason for the astounding performance of this division in battle? More details should be added as to how the Germans managed to inflict so many casualties with so little equipment

[edit] New redirect from redundant article SS-Division Wiking

SS-Division Wiking now redirects to this article. As all content in the source article was deemed redundant or not properly sourced by the merging editor, thus no new text was added to this, the target article, 5th SS Panzergrenadier Division Wiking. Zalktis 09:53, 14 June 2007 (UTC)