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I know those were other times and that war was viewed differently. But there were limits nonetheless, and what happened in Dresden was very wrong, just as what happened in Coventry, London, Poland and elsewhere was very wrong.
There is a good argument regarding whether there is any point in apologising 60 years later. But to suggest that there was nothing wrong with the act itself is well out of order IMO.
And I suspect that with some people such attitude is simply prompted by the ''my country right or wrong'' philosophy.
No, we shouldn’t apologise.
Nazi Germany had to be defeated. If Germany would like an apology for the suffering of Germans in the war they should seek it from their parents and grandparents who elected Hitler.
Present leaders of Britain have no responsibility to apologise for decisions taken by their predecessors.
I believe it is perfectly appropriate for the Queen to help raise money for the Cathedral there and it would be fitting for British leaders to take part in memorials for the innocent people who lost their lives there. An apology however is unnecessary and inapt.
i agree with disillusioned, we should both have our governments express their deepest sympathies for the actions previous generations have done, which im sure all of us and all of them have, but an apology is impossible, much like it is for them - we should just forget the blame game, and just focus on improving modern europe
I think that's a first...:)
thats what i thought
people are too wrpped up in the past, see ill make sure any kids i have in future know about the atrocities that happened then and in my lifetime, but i dont want them to be wrapped up in the politics of it
and why arent they requesting thisoff the americans even the chances of an apology off them are lower than us apoligising
What do you call three years of studying the subject at University and writing a paper on it?
I see no reason why the Queen of all people (considering she was only about 17 at the time) needs to apologise, when both nations were engaged in full scale war.
Can you imagine the Americans apologising to the Japanese for incinerating 150,000 people? No, didn't think so.
how about apologizing for the kiddly fiddling of recent times ...the part the church played in the hutu massacres ...taking both sides in the second world war ...aiding hitler to slaughter millions of jews ...killing an estimated 100 million christians in europe in the dark ages for daring to challenge the popes word ...etc etc.
he knew it meant nothing to no one ...
Dresden was a war-crime, Churchil a butcher as was Bomber Harris
You sound like you know what you're talking about. So give us your definiton of a 'War Crime' then.
The Greek Turks of Turkey (and most Orthoxod Christians) have been very pissed off for a long time over this incident.
I think teaching English schoolchildren a little about German culture, focusing on their sound artistic and musical traditions, would go a long way to fusing better international relations and end stereotyping by the youth. Lets face it, the Germans and us are friends, we unite under the banner of hating the French.
They don't. Most Germans would rather forget the war. It's not exactly something they want to bring up lots. Some German newspaper has just got the arse about something and is stirring the nation up.
No-one currently living is remotely at fault with regards to WWII. I thought we had reached some sort of national acceptance and tolerance when Schroder was invited to the D-Day celebrations. Apparently that all seems to have been forgotten. Maybe we should honour German successes. When all's said and done, atrocities and illegalities aside, most people involved with the war were just soldiers who fought gallantly and bravely, precisely what they were told to do. Let's honour the gallant fight of the German soldiers.
yeh im sure most people there would rather forget the war these days, its all good and well teachings about the causes of the war etc as to serve a warning from history of how a civilised country can become when fooled that cleverly, however the war itself id rather forget, but not what happened to the minorities and how that nazi scum got in 'legitmally'
i may agree with you in not apoligising, forgetting the war itself isnt forgetting an evil past, their evil past is that someone got elected in, and managed to convince people what he was doing was right, through a system of relative stability for non-questioners and downright oppresison to those who questioned
not forgetting how they treated minorities too
theyll never forget that, how could you, its the lowest of the low
and their regular sodliers were conscripted, even if they didnt believe in the cause it was fight or die, and most people would rather live than die
i expect theyre aware of their own history
Fair or unfair, there's a reason for that. Really abominable things happened because of their country, I'd rather gloss it over as well.
I don't think so. This isn't a game, where you shake hands with the other team at the end.
not quite many of the officers etc did support nazism as to work their way up the ranks
their soldiers aiblity and their military plannin was far superior to ours though, except we didnt have a control freak crackpot as commander in chief who continuly screwed good military tactics
SS Soldiers however are a different matter. And I'm sure most agree with these fairly recent cases of former SS Soldiers being charged?
http://archives.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/europe/07/05/engel.convicted/index.html
http://archives.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/europe/04/03/germanwar.criminal/index.html
It is a game. It's a game of life and death played by silly men in uniforms, sitting in offices pushing bits of plastic around on a big map. At the end of the day, the grass roots of the German Army fought just as well and just as hard as we did, and they deserve a little credit for that. Every underdog deserves credit. I'm for congratulating the German Army, with the exception of the commanders. In the same way, we should congratulate the American Army for fighting in Vietnam, but not the politicians for starting the war or the generals for using such disgusting tactics.
to correct you their troops on the ground were better equipped and better led than ours ever were, thats why at first they took most of europe, then their commander in chief started making specific commmands instead of objectives and thus killed any advantage they gave themselves
at one point they was on verge of killing our air force, then hitler decided to bomb london instead of military targets and so we could regroup
erm the germans werent the underdogs, at so many points they had our backs to walls,especially at the begining, then they gave us leeway cause hitler called it off, their troops on the ground were bettere trained and quipped than ours ever were
They lost though. They came off worse in the end.
consult your accounts of the battle of britain. some idiot german bombed london by mistake, hitler didn't want to. then we bombed berlin, so they bombed london.... etc....
He speaks the truth.
But anyway...back to the topic at hand.