Hitler Good Or Bad? Whats your opinion?

[assassin_696]

There's a surprising amount of prejudice in this discussion against anyone who voices any opinion other than "Hitler was evil, end of story".

 

 

 

Apart from the fact that you're trying to suppress freedom of speech, it's never as simple as that, there have been evil and tyrannical dictators or totalitarian leaders down the centuries many of whom have their names revered nowadays. Hitler is so hated because he still burns fresh in the memories of many people still alive. The propoganda campaigns against him in other countries were incredible, necessary during the war, but now that the war is over the victor countries still have this image of Hitler = evil burning in their minds.

 

 

 

Yes, Hitler was a genocidal lunatic, but was he acting in this way to be evil, or did he genuinely believe that he was doing what was best for his country? I believe the latter, yes he was power crazed, but he wasn't doing it for purely self motivated interests because of a personal grudge (although he did have one). He employed a form of social darwinism which was founded on the naive belief that the Aryan race was superior, this wasn't total lunacy, it was just his belief went against nearly all modern ethics.

 

 

 

You've got to remember that people voted Hitler into power. After the depression many people who were used to the Kaiser during WWI wanted another strong leader like Hitler. He was genuinely loved by many Germans at the time, they didn't mind losing some of their liberties as long as they had jobs, and they weren't aware of the concentration camps. At the time it was felt he was a genuinely good leader. The fact that so many German soldiers fought and died for him is testimony to this.

 

 

 

It's only when the dust settled and the advancing allied troops uncovered the horrors of the concentration camps did they find out to what extent he had carried out his racial policies.

 

 

 

Before the war many people thought he was what Germany needed, many British people were sympathetic to his foreign policy of reversing the unjust terms of the Treaty of Versailles. I think it was in 1939 (before th war) that time voted Hitler 'Man of the Year'. The Vatican praised Hitler, sending him birthday greetings and praising his 'strength and honour'.

 

 

 

His mistake was to take Germany into a war on more fronts than he could handle, no one tries to handle the USSR and the west at the same time, particularly when Hitler and Stalin had signed a non-aggression pact.

 

 

 

Yes, Hitler's ethics and morals were questionable to say the least (okay, disgusting), but that doesn't mean we should suddenly try and end the debate as to his leadership.

[Zonorhc]

To be honest I think Hitler was horrible.

 

 

 

People say he was a good leader, I have no idea how you can see that.

 

One of the first things he did as Chancellor of Germany was ban all other political parties besides the Nazi party. He also killed political enemies who were trying to overthrow him.

 

 

 

I personally think that was a brilliant exercise in Machiavellian politics. Killing off political enemies doesn't make you a bad leader. In most cases, it makes you a smart one. Look at Stalin. Brilliant guy.

 

 

 

I found this on Wikipedia:

 

 

 

"President Paul von Hindenburg died on August 2, 1934. Rather than holding new presidential elections, Hitler's cabinet passed a law proclaiming the presidency dormant and transferred the role and powers of the head of state to Hitler as FÃÆÃâÃâührer und Reichskanzler (leader and chancellor).[30] Thereby Hitler also became supreme commander of the military, whose officers then swore an oath not to the state or the constitution but to Hitler personally.[30] In a mid-August plebiscite, these acts found the approval of 84.6%[31] of the electorate. Combining the highest offices in state, military and party in his hand, Hitler had attained supreme rule that could no longer be legally challenged."

 

 

 

Now I don't think someone banning all Legal ways of trying to become President of Germany is a good leader.

 

 

 

All brilliant political moves. Although I don't condone using Wikipedia as a source.

 

 

 

And burning the Reichstag building, where the German Parliament meets doesn't sound like to good of a leader does he?

 

 

 

Even though it wasn't really proven that he did it, who else would want to burn the building?

 

 

 

Hitler was a horrible leader if you really look at it

 

 

 

Evidence? Oh, wait...

 

 

 

All these pro nazi things your saying, it sounds like you actually support him... :x

 

 

 

So pointing out something that somebody did right is instantly supporting them? Well, in that case, by all means, call me a Nazi. Go on.

 

 

 

My opinion is Bad, Because im sure any other political leader would be able to sort out the unemployed too...

 

 

 

You're kidding, right? Would you mind looking at how horribly the Great Depression affected the US, UK and Australia?

 

 

 

Also, the "factories" he built were concentration camps.

 

 

 

Evidence?

 

 

 

You know, tanks needed to be built somewhere, and you're not going to use half-starved Jews to do it before they're even in their camps.

[Guest]

I think I am going for bad on this one. Close call though...

 

 

 

If that isn't sarcasm than I really can't see how people could see it as being a close call? Are we forgetting the 8 million Jews and Gypsys he killed? And how he caused Germany (indirectly or directly it doesn't matter) to be split up into two states and pretty much screw up their country for practically 50 years.

[Defender2516]

Well, you guys say he fixed germany. I say he didn't, he just "used" the people there to build up his own image of what germany should be like.

 

 

 

Force Control basically..

 

 

 

~Defender~

[Sumpta]

This question is about whether Hitler was a good leader, not a good person. There's a difference. Also, when people talk about the Holocaust with Hitler, they're mistaken. It was other Nazi leaders such as Himmler (leader of the SS) and Goering (head of the Office of the Four-Year Plan) which radicalised the party and came up with the 'Final Solution'. This wasn't Hitler's doing - in fact Hitler was quite uneasy with this policy at first, but saw no other option after their invasion of the USSR.

 

 

 

Finally someone who knows what he's talking about instead of using the threadbare and canonised knowledge of Hitler. If you want a look into evil, learn about the SS. Himmler was quite a nasty piece of work. In the 1930's, Hitler had more than one thug gang at his hand. Himmler brutally slaughtered the SS' main competitor, the SA, to become the one and only 'safety' service. If Hitler gave the orders for a genocide, it was Himmler who drew the plans and executed them cheerfully.

 

 

 

Hitler was an idealist, with buckets of charisma, apparently. This charisma, his verbal skills and his ability to inspire a whole nation were his strong leadership traits. But he was also rather weak and not much of a "maker". He wouldn't have amounted to that much without his henchmen, who drew meticulate plans (Goebbels: propaganda, Himmler: SS, etc etc) to execute Hitler's idealist visions.

[doomy]

Neither, he did what he thought right, whether when he did was good or bad is a diferent question :P

[Guest]

It's laughable that anyone is trying to rationalize this. How about you think of it this way...you bring home a girl/boy to meet your parents, he/she helps old people, they volunteer their time to numerous causes, they are really intelligent...oh by the way they just happen to hate "certain" people and try and slaughter their entire race....... :XD:

[Bauke]

Hitler was a great speaker. But that's actually a negative point, since that made him populair.

[assassin_696]

It's laughable that anyone is trying to rationalize this. How about you think of it this way...you bring home a girl/boy to meet your parents, he/she helps old people, they volunteer their time to numerous causes, they are really intelligent...oh by the way they just happen to hate "certain" people and try and slaughter their entire race....... :XD:

 

 

 

That's irrelevant regarding the quality of their leadership or other such things. Ethically, yeah he was bad, but as I said, it's not that simple.

[Striker6]

When the Nazi's came to power didn't they only have like 40% of the electorate behind them? Germany was hardly united with Hitler. All that about the Autobahns were not started by Hitler as they were already planned by the previous government. By the time Hitler was in power the depression was lifting so he just got the credit. It was Bruning that got reparations abolished in 1932 before Hitler was in power.

 

 

 

Hitler had alot of charisma but his tactics to not make him any different from any other thug such as Mussolini who he idealised. He just quashed and killed anyone in the way. His plans of 'Autarky' completely failed, going to war as shown by Italy and Japan is a great way to unite the country behind you, the 'blitzkreig' or lightning war was designed to avert the eyes of the public from the internal problems in Germany like the fact it had very little resources of its own. In other words Hitler was just an opportunist, the traditionalist view that he was a hell bent maniac bent of destruction is exaggerated, just like the fact the allies went to war with Germany because of the evils of Nazism.

 

 

 

If anybody want to know where I got my information from I've read the book Origins of The Second World War by AJP Taylor.

 

 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AJP_Taylor ... ontroversy

[hohto]

When the Nazi's came to power didn't they only have like 40% of the electorate behind them? Germany was hardly united with Hitler. All that about the Autobahns were not started by Hitler as they were already planned by the previous government. By the time Hitler was in power the depression was lifting so he just got the credit. It was Bruning that got reparations abolished in 1932 before Hitler was in power.

 

 

 

43,9 % In the last elections. In my eyes that's a good achievment in multiparty elections, no matter what. It gets even better if you look how divided world and Germany were.

 

 

 

Hitler had alot of charisma but his tactics to not make him any different from any other thug such as Mussolini who he idealised. He just quashed and killed anyone in the way. His plans of 'Autarky' completely failed, going to war as shown by Italy and Japan is a great way to unite the country behind you, the 'blitzkreig' or lightning war was designed to avert the eyes of the public from the internal problems in Germany like the fact it had very little resources of its own. In other words Hitler was just an opportunist, the traditionalist view that he was a hell bent maniac bent of destruction is exaggerated, just like the fact the allies went to war with Germany because of the evils of Nazism.

 

 

 

Blitzkrieg was a super tactic for certain countries and using it wa a great idea. No matter how you see it, look how quickly their first enemies fell. For political murders, they were far more common in the Soviet Union.

 

 

 

I don't get your last line "llies went to war with Germany because of the evils of Nazism." Please explain that.

[Guest]

It's laughable that anyone is trying to rationalize this. How about you think of it this way...you bring home a girl/boy to meet your parents, he/she helps old people, they volunteer their time to numerous causes, they are really intelligent...oh by the way they just happen to hate "certain" people and try and slaughter their entire race....... :XD:

 

 

 

That's irrelevant regarding the quality of their leadership or other such things. Ethically, yeah he was bad, but as I said, it's not that simple.

To me it is that simple, I don't care if the guy split the atom he was a piece of trash.

[hohto]

That's irrelevant regarding the quality of their leadership or other such things. Ethically, yeah he was bad, but as I said, it's not that simple.

To me it is that simple, I don't care if the guy split the atom he was a piece of trash.

 

 

 

What's your opinion on American president(s) and generals who planned the camps for Japan-related people during ww2 and who ordered nukes to be dropped to civil places? What about those who turned Dresden in a flaming hell? What do you think about Stalin and his policies?

[Striker6]

When the Nazi's came to power didn't they only have like 40% of the electorate behind them? Germany was hardly united with Hitler. All that about the Autobahns were not started by Hitler as they were already planned by the previous government. By the time Hitler was in power the depression was lifting so he just got the credit. It was Bruning that got reparations abolished in 1932 before Hitler was in power.

 

 

 

43,9 % In the last elections. In my eyes that's a good achievment in multiparty elections, no matter what. It gets even better if you look how divided world and Germany were.

 

 

 

Hitler had alot of charisma but his tactics to not make him any different from any other thug such as Mussolini who he idealised. He just quashed and killed anyone in the way. His plans of 'Autarky' completely failed, going to war as shown by Italy and Japan is a great way to unite the country behind you, the 'blitzkreig' or lightning war was designed to avert the eyes of the public from the internal problems in Germany like the fact it had very little resources of its own. In other words Hitler was just an opportunist, the traditionalist view that he was a hell bent maniac bent of destruction is exaggerated, just like the fact the allies went to war with Germany because of the evils of Nazism.

 

 

 

Blitzkrieg was a super tactic for certain countries and using it wa a great idea. No matter how you see it, look how quickly their first enemies fell. For political murders, they were far more common in the Soviet Union.

 

 

 

I don't get your last line "llies went to war with Germany because of the evils of Nazism." Please explain that.

 

 

 

A good achievement, correct but many people here seem to be saying that Hitler was the greatest leader ever, 43% isn't much plus he had the S.A going around beating up everybody.

 

You said Blitzkrieg was a super tactic but it simply proved how weak and vulnerable Germany was internally.

 

Many people like to think that the reason Britain and France went to war with Germany because of the Nazi's but Britain especially was quite happy when the Nazi's came to power as Britain was more afraid of communism and it was believed Hitler would help the economy which would benefit Britain's. Its just one of the myths that surrounds this period.

[hohto]

A good achievement, correct but many people here seem to be saying that Hitler was the greatest leader ever, 43% isn't much plus he had the S.A going around beating up everybody.

 

 

 

All major political parties had their own "private armies" and at worst times it was almost like a civil war at the streets of Germany. Second, do you judge leaders by the amount of votes they got or what they did? With that logic Saddam would have been one helluva good leader.

 

 

 

You said Blitzkrieg was a super tactic but it simply proved how weak and vulnerable Germany was internally.

 

 

 

Weak in which way? Their army wasn't that superior in 1939 and they used a strategy which was perfect for their equipment and suprised the enemy. In my eyes it was one of the best strategies in whole world history.

 

 

 

Many people like to think that the reason Britain and France went to war with Germany because of the Nazi's but Britain especially was quite happy when the Nazi's came to power as Britain was more afraid of communism and it was believed Hitler would help the economy which would benefit Britain's. Its just one of the myths that surrounds this period.

 

 

 

Britain and France had promised to defend Poland's intependency and got into war that way. "Evilness" had nothing to do with it.

[Blue_Eggz]

Hitler was bad but he was also a jew

[Ginger_Warrior]

What's your opinion on American president(s) and generals who planned the camps for Japan-related people during ww2 and who ordered nukes to be dropped to civil places? What about those who turned Dresden in a flaming hell? What do you think about Stalin and his policies?

 

 

 

Eventually, someone mentions Dresden! All these people who think Hitler killed milliond of people in the Blitz... well that's laughable really. It is estimated the UK only lost about 40,000 (I say only 40,000, but on the scheme of things it's pretty small) citizens during the German bombing campaigns over the whole of the six-year war. Towards the end of the war, the Allies were killing around 40,000 people a night in their bombing missions!

 

 

 

If this thread proves one thing, it's that children go to school these days to be 'taught', not to learn.

[lymnli]

superb leader up to 1943, he masterfully hypnotized his aryans with propaganda.

 

 

 

later on, he promoted himself as the commander of the Germany army...which proved to be self destructive.

 

 

 

and his ideologies are poopy....thinking youself is superior is just lame

 

we need equality

 

not a brunch of blondes shooting at jews

[dutchdreams]

When megalomaniacs rise to power, the people suffer and pay for it....with their lives. He abused and singled out one part of the population as a scapegoat pre-war to favor the rest of the population. He tried to exterminate them like vermin during the war, authorized horrific experiments on these people, authorized breeding programs for the true race in Germany and Norway, indoctrinated the German youth and filled them with hate (Hitlerjugend).

 

All this to quench his thirst for glory and power, to further the grandeur of the true race. Disgusting.

 

 

 

A great military genius ? A disappointed corporal from WWI who decided to open up a front in Russia against the advice of his generals. One who carelessly sacrificed the lives of thousands of his own soldiers to further the glory of the 'race' and the 'Reich' in the aftermath of Stalingrad. Ordering his soldiers to fight to the death instead of surrender, even though it was obvious it was a lost cause.

 

 

 

A man who had no problem carpet bombing cities to rubble to aide his Blitzkrieg (Rotterdam, Warsaw, Stalingrad). The thousands of civilian casualties it caused were insignificant to him. Something his Luftwaffe had demonstrated already in 1937, in the Spanish civil war (Guernica).

 

A complete and total disrespect for human life or human suffering, *nobody* can qualify as good leader after that.

 

 

 

A sad, lying and manipulative master of puppets, who left his hateful legacy in a book he wrote in prison after his failed putsch in Munich. There's nothing good about the man. He even sucked at painting. Not even did he or any of his close henchmen fit the physique of the ÃÆââââ¬Å¡Ã¬Ãâ¹Ãâtrue raceÃÆââââ¬Å¡Ã¬Ã¢ââ¬Å¾Ã¢.

[hohto]

When megalomaniacs rise to power, the people suffer and pay for it....with their lives. He abused and singled out one part of the population as a scapegoat pre-war to favor the rest of the population. He tried to exterminate them like vermin during the war, authorized horrific experiments on these people, authorized breeding programs for the true race in Germany and Norway, indoctrinated the German youth and filled them with hate (Hitlerjugend).

 

All this to quench his thirst for glory and power, to further the grandeur of the true race. Disgusting.

 

 

 

Eugenics isn't anything that rare in western world actually. Just use google to find out that even our democractic goddess USA has been doing some of that stuff. Second, even after WW2 they kept doing some researches with living human beings, mainly blacks.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_Syphilis_Study

 

 

 

For the Scapegoat thing, it's not that black and white situation. Of course he did take "few" steps too much, but almost everyone everytime seem to forget the fact that the jews declared a war on Germany and drove them even deeper chaos after the ridicilous ww1 peace threaty.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judea_Decl ... on_Germany

 

 

 

A man who had no problem carpet bombing cities to rubble to aide his Blitzkrieg (Rotterdam, Warsaw, Stalingrad). The thousands of civilian casualties it caused were insignificant to him. Something his Luftwaffe had demonstrated already in 1937, in the Spanish civil war (Guernica).

 

A complete and total disrespect for human life or human suffering, *nobody* can qualify as good leader after that.

 

 

 

He was nothing compared to the war criminals who bombed Nagasaki and Hiroshima with Nukes or the ones who made Dresden into a fire hell. In my eyes those were a lot worse than what Hitler did to UK civilians for example.

[Burnt_arven]

Simply, I'd say bad.

 

 

 

He may have had good intentions: uniting the nation, restoring Germany, whatever.

 

 

 

However, the facts definately speak for themselves - he was predjudiced, and he slaughtered thousands(understatement of the century)

 

 

 

The question is were the Germans to blame for all this? :-k

 

 

 

Edit: Hmm, I failed to notice there were a lot of replies. I'm a little late. :oops:

[BlueTear]

For the Scapegoat thing, it's not that black and white situation. Of course he did take "few" steps too much, but almost everyone everytime seem to forget the fact that the jews declared a war on Germany and drove them even deeper chaos after the ridicilous ww1 peace threaty.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judea_Decl ... on_Germany

 

 

A boycot on german goods called a war by a british tabloid in response to a law that allowed Hitler to pass laws without consulting the elected Reischstag? After he had stuff like freedom of speech suspended? Lol, yes, clearly, the jews were creating chaos and turmoil. Killing 6 million people based on who their parents are has no shades of grey.

 

He was nothing compared to the war criminals who bombed Nagasaki and Hiroshima with Nukes or the ones who made Dresden into a fire hell. In my eyes those were a lot worse than what Hitler did to UK civilians for example.

 

The UK civilians had that whole island thing going. How about the civilians in countries he actually overran?

 

 

 

 

 

And to everyone who talks about the economic reforms and whatnot... Hitler started the second world war. He was not brutally assaulted after creating a brilliant future for his country, he send armed forces onto the soveriegn soil of another country. He then procceds with a series of military decisions that eventually leads to the complete ruin of the country and division into pieces handed out to the victors. Germany, as a country, practically ceased to exist!

 

 

 

Call me silly, but getting your country divided by losing a war you start - morals aside - is never a Good Thing for your country.

[hohto]

Think these facts could go to this thread. Hope they make even someone to think again their views on WW2 war criminals...

 

 

 

* After the failure at Stalingrad and During the Soviet Union's operation Bagratio (spelling might be a little different in other languages because of translittering) they captured in total around 650,000 soldiers, 300k in Stalingrad and 350k during Bagratio. Not too many survived. You can google for more info what happened.

 

 

 

* We hear every week about death camps and zyklon-b. Many seem to forget diseases and starvation which we partly can "blame" the other side of the war. Even jewish people admit this http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jso ... story.html

 

 

 

* Germany did not create concentration camps. They had been used by USA and Britain before AND after the WW2.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... ed_Kingdom

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... ted_States

 

 

 

* According to some sources, USA lost no civilians and UK lost under 100k civilians during WW2. Germany lost 780k and Japan 953k. The Soviet Union lost the most, but mainly because of their own acts.

 

http://www.scaruffi.com/politics/wwii.html

 

 

 

* In certain western worlds this holocaust-hocus-pocus has gotten ridicilous. You can deny whole ww2 but you aren't allowed to deny holocaust. Here's some list copypasted from Wikipedia. That law is also watched at least some how, you can ask Irving for example about it.

 

 

 

Country Minimum Maximum

 

Austria 6 months 20 years

 

Belgium Fine 1 year

 

Czech Republic 6 months 3 years

 

France Fine or 1 month 2 years

 

Germany Fine or 1 month 5 years

 

Israel 1 year 5 years

 

Italy (law against racial discrimination) 3 years 4 years

 

Lithuania Fine or 2 years 10 years

 

Poland Fine or 3 months 3 years

 

Romania 6 months 3-5 years

 

Slovakia Fine or 1 month 3 years

 

Switzerland Fine or 1 year 15 months

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4733820.stm

 

 

 

Ridicilous if you ask me. That many western worlds don't even allow historians like Irving to get "false" answers. Note: I didn't deny it, I'm just pointing how western world works in some cases.

 

 

 

Also reading http://www.scripturesforamerica.org/html2/jm0053.htm could open your mind. Remember that every coin has 2 sides and winners write the history.

[darkmage099]

Good point, but that can be argued because of the war which he brought them into.

 

 

 

Hit

 

fix'd

 

 

 

Anyone who tries to defend hitler should really log off the computer, call your local shrink and sigh up for a few years worth of treatment.

 

Why? We can all agree he was a terrible human being, and his actions were in no way justified, but he saved Germany and raised it out of the rubble only to bring it back down to rubble later destroying many families and lives.

 

 

 

This question is about whether Hitler was a good leader, not a good person. Yes, but do motives and morals influence how good of a leader you are? It is not only what you do but why and how. There's a difference. Also, when people talk about the Holocaust with Hitler, they're mistaken. It was other Nazi leaders such as Himmler (leader of the SS) and Goering (head of the Office of the Four-Year Plan) which radicalised the party and came up with the 'Final Solution'. This wasn't Hitler's doing - in fact Hitler was quite uneasy with this policy at first, but saw no other option after their invasion of the USSR. small source?

 

 

 

Now, on to the question. In my opinion, Hitler was at times a brilliant leader, but at other times the most hopeless one that will ever walk this Earth. You're right - he did recover Germany after they were hit badly because of the Wall Street crash (they'd borrowed a loan from the US, which the US recalled during the Depression), using the Autobahns and extending public works. However, does Hitler deserve all the credit for this? Well, it wouldn't have been possible without Schacht's bartering with the Balkan states or his Mefo Bills, so while Hitler had a very effective agenda, it wasn't him which made it work. As for restoring Germany to fighting fitness... well I'd have to say he only half did this. The introduction of the Hitler Youth, the conscription polices and the Four Year Plan all helped to get Germany ready. Indeed, had war not been declared in 1939, Germany's economy would have continued to grow, and the war would have been even tougher than it was for the Allies. But the fact remains that by 1939, Germany wasn't ready for war. Hitler also made the call to attack Poland with the USSR, so he could be called stupid for this. He was also winning the war when he decided rather stupidly to attack the Soviet Union. Therefore, Hitler at the beginning made some absolutely genius decisions which turned Germany from a ruined, broken country into a world power, but by the end of the war, as he becaome more radicalised it's clear his decision actually led to the downfall of Germany. But if it were never more radicalized would it have even worked at all?

 

 

 

I'd also like to point out Hitler never really 'led' his party. His ideas, people listening to him, him giving the speeches...I think he led The Nazi party was strangely organised, as pointed out in many books. It was almost like Hitler created the impression of what he wanted, and other went out to acheive that vision. Therefore, I think a more pertinant

 

 

 

It's laughable that anyone is trying to rationalize this. How about you think of it this way...you bring home a girl/boy to meet your parents, he/she helps old people, they volunteer their time to numerous causes, they are really intelligent...oh by the way they just happen to hate "certain" people and try and slaughter their entire race....... :XD:

 

 

 

That's irrelevant regarding the quality of their leadership or other such things. Ethically, yeah he was bad, but as I said, it's not that simple.

 

 

 

I don't quite understand how you can rule ethics out of the equation when asking, "what makes a good leader?"

 

 

 

Hitler was bad but he was also a half jew

 

Point being?

[BlueTear]

Also reading http://www.scripturesforamerica.org/html2/jm0053.htm could open your mind. Remember that every coin has 2 sides and winners write the history.

 

 

 

Yes, because a site contained quotes like "It might be well to state here, that as early as 1902, International Jewry had a plan for the destruction of Christianity in Europe. " and "But he [Eisenhower] did not hate it [war] as much as he hated Germans, and he took a terrible Jewish revenge on over a million surrendered German soldiers and civilians when the war ended" is clearly trusthworthy.