On the other hand, the majority of the German military was in fact engaged on their Eastern front for the majority of the war. For instance, the German army in northeast Africa--the famous Afrika Corps--never numbered more than five divisions, probably not even. As opposed to the two hundred or so divisions sent into the Soviet Union in June 1941.
By June 1944 the Germans had 156 divisions in the Soviet Union, 27 in Italy, 54 in the west. I'm not sure, but I think "the west" also included an army of close to half a million stationed in Norway, which never saw action against the allies at all after 1940, aside from small commando raids. There was also a substantial number of divisions in the Balkans, fighting the resistance in Greece and Yugoslavia. And many of the divisions in the west were under-strength--sent to France to recuperate and regroup after their mauling in the east.
So the odds of any particular German soldier fighting against the Allies--especially Americans--was probably something like three or four to one, maybe more.
I mention all this just because it's my experience that Americans tend to downplay the Soviet contribution to winning that war, if they know anything about it at all. The fact is by June 1944 the Soviets had torn the guts out of the German army. This isn't to slight the Americans who fought, my FIL among them. But the casualties on D-Day and beyond would have been far far more horrific if not for the three years the German military spent being ground down in the east.
And while I'm at it, I find the same true of American perceptions of the war in the Pacific. In that case it was the Chinese who fought for years before the American entry into the war against Japan, and suffered the vast majority of causalities. Then too, in both Europe and Asia, the number of civilian casualties were exponentially higher among Russians, Ukrainians, Poles, Germans, Chinese, Japanese, Italians, Yugoslavs... than anything Americans suffered. And not just casualties of bullets, bombs, and mines. The mass rapes of women and girls, especially Chinese, Soviet and German, are without parallel in American history, excepting those of native Americans and slave women and girls.
All of my family alive in that era suffered during the war in Europe--I'm the first member of my family to be born here. The pain remains in those left alive, even after all these years, and that emotional miasma was a big part of my growing up. It's only as an adult that I began to understand what trauma like that can do to a person's life.
It may be that the Germans you spoke to were lying. Then too, it might also be that the topic in general was something they preferred not to revisit.
Again, this is not to slight those Americans who fought and died or otherwise suffered. Nor does it excuse in any way the atrocities and genocide. But as I get older I realize that human history is in large part a dismal saga of pain inflicted by the powerful against the powerless. Like Joyce said: a nightmare from which I--we--are trying to awake.
edited to add: I apologize for this ridiculously long lecture. I guess you hit a nerve--my problem, certainly not yours.
= new reply since forum marked as read
