Wartime treatment of Germans questioned

[maddezmom]

Source: AP

~snip~

The stories of the Germans have gotten little attention so far, but the Senate took a step toward changing that this week, voting to look into the treatment of Germans and other Europeans in the U.S. during World War II.

The legislation's status is uncertain because it was passed as an amendment to the immigration bill, which stalled in the Senate this week.

Still, just getting a vote on the issue was an accomplishment for Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., who represents a large German population. For the last six years, a hold placed by an anonymous Republican senator had kept it from coming up for a vote.

"Congress and the U.S. government did the right thing by recognizing and apologizing for the mistreatment of Japanese Americans during World War II," Feingold said. "That same respect has not been shown to the many German Americans, Italian Americans, and European Latin Americans."

Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., opposed the bill, saying it was based on findings "that slander America incorrectly." Those findings say, in part, that U.S. wartime policies were "devastating" to Germans and Italians living in the United States.



Read more: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/politics/4875836.html

[murielm99]

1. I did not know any of this.

My father grew up in a German-speaking community in Minnesota. His parents had immigrated from Germany when they were children. His community was a mix of immigrants, and first and second generation German Americans.

He and his family said that their treatment during WWI was terrible. They have never said anything about WWII mistreatment.

He did mention a big scandal in a community near them. There was a pastor who was actually a German spy. He was investigated after he got a girl pregnant. I don't remember all the details.

No one from his community was deported or mistreated. In fact, there was a German POW camp not far from them. A couple of the imprisoned soldiers helped my grandparents on their farm. My father maintains that we treated the prisoners there humanely.

Thank you for this story. I will continue to follow it with interest.

[one more state]

2. My grandfather came to Wisconsin

with his whole family. They had to change their names to get work. They came over in the 30's. My great grandmother couldn't become a citizen till the late 50's. People need to get over these things. Sure it was hard but they did what they had to. Now my family is all American with an American name.

[no_hypocrisy]

3. Welcome to DU.

German-Americans to some extent are still seen with a jaundiced eye in this country. My friend was born here in 1947 and still hears himself referred to as a Nazi in certain social circles. His parents were afraid of beng deported for just being born in Germany. I heard about a German WWII POW who literally lost his mind from the the camps.

[psychopomp]

26. About one in four Americans have some German roots

I can't see how one could claim that a person with a German-sounding last name would be seen as less American today. In fact, most Americans probably would not even recognize a name like Klein as being German at all, German names being so common in the US.

[izzie]

4. I have read a lot about WW1 and the treatment but not WW2

Frankly one wonders how bad it could be with Ike the head of the Eur. part of the war. Having started as a English country any one not English was sort of picked on and specially if the name sounder different. This is sort of human nature. Three people and one is always an out sider so to speak. Lets hope we now do not have to pay back It/Am. Ger/Am. that is not before we start doing some thing about the Am. Indians. Now that is a group we have really treated bad. As a filler I will add this. I can recall during WW2 that people wanted to get rid of German made items. My mother almost went nuts. Her German music and Xmas things would not go and she felt every one was crazy to even say it when it was not Germans but Hitler that was the real evil one. We had a It/POW prison in the next town. My father did business with the camp and I really liked going inside as it made me feel big. You figure that out as I was between 7 and 10.Could not have been to bad if they would let a man take in his little daughter. Course living on the coast of NH in winter may be mean to It/POW. From what you read of the Germany's in the NH. Mt. they liked it but for it being a prison. Many came back or have written about it.Cutting trees down in NH had to beat going to Russia or so many of the stories leads you to believe.

[ikojo]

11. There were camps in the US where German POWs

werer detained. I don't recall reading that German Americans were rounded up in the same way as Japanese Americans.

The German American Bund had camps where kids were indoctrinated into the Nazi philosophy. There was even a pro Nazi rally held at Madison Square Garden in 1939. It drew 20,000. Fritz Kuhn, head of the German American Bund made a trip to Germany with the hopes of being declared the American Fuhrer. He was not successful.

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005684

snip

Aside from its admiration for Adolf Hitler and the achievements of Nazi Germany, the German American Bund program included antisemitism, strong anti-Communist sentiments, and the demand that the United States remain neutral in the approaching European conflict.


Public opinion surveys of 1939 show that Fritz Kuhn, the leader of the German American Bund, was seen by the U.S. public as the leading antisemite in the country.

snip

The German American Bund carried out active propaganda for its causes, published magazines and brochures, organized demonstrations, and maintained a number of youth camps run like Hitler Youth camps.

snip

The German American Bund closely cooperated with the "Christian Front" organized by the antisemitic priest Father Charles Coughlin. The activities of the German American Bund led both Jewish and non-Jewish congressional representatives to demand that it be investigated by the House Un-American Activities Committee chaired by Martin Dies. The Committee hearings, held in 1939, showed clear evidence of German American Bund ties to the Nazi government.

[Chemical Bill]

27. Those people were confused.

>Public opinion surveys of 1939 show that Fritz Kuhn, the leader of the German American Bund, was seen by the U.S. public as the leading antisemite in the country.

The news didn't get out about how Henry Ford funded Hitler in the 1920s, specifically for Hitler's antisemitic propaganda. IBM under Watson was making lots of money selling punchcards technology to the Nazis so they could run their census. That way they made sure that all the Jews were stripped of their citizenships (in 1935). The Jews were being herded into ghettos in 1939, their businesses and even possessions were confiscated, all thanks to the census that IBM was facilitating. Watson and Ford got medals from Hitler before WWII, didn't they? And of course Prescott Bush was funding the rise of the Nazis, as managing partner of Union Bank in NYC. Kuhn just got more publicity, but Ford, Watson, and Bush got things done.

Bill

[izzie]

30. I recall my mother-in-law talking about the Bund.

She lived in a Ger. part of NYC in the 3o's. I would think that it would have been really hard to make a case about Ger/Am. and It/Am. in camps or such a thing in WW2 as we had so many in this country and they sure were good Am. I frankly always felt the Japanese thing was just plain greed to grab their businesses and land. I did know of a girls mother that was born in Japan and was not put in a camp if she came to the East Coast which she did. Kids did say bad things about people with German names etc. and they must have learned it at home. It was really a time most today would not understand. Just look at the govt. if you think this one is all white men with white hair.

[kskiska]

33. My mother remembered kids from her high school in Conn.

going to NY for the bund meetings.

[Captain Hilts]

7. FDR wanted to round up Germans a la the Japanese, but Francis Biddle told him...

it wasn't practical.

[izzie]

31. This may be true but hard to think about it as real.

After all Am. has more Ger. Am. than any group but English and I am not sure about people from Mexico now.

[kskiska]

32. My father was a POW in Germany

On the whole, as an officer, he was treated relatively well by the Germans. The prisoners received Red Cross food boxes, but there were times when provisions didn't get through to them and things were pretty tough. They even cooked up "Pomeranian Rabbit" if an unfortunate stray cat wandered into the compound. He was dismayed upon release to find that German POWs in the States had been eating steak and ice cream, and had been treated very well, indeed. No wonder many chose to remain in the U.S.

[Solly Mack]

5. and years from now the US will argue over apologizing to the Iraqis

and others who were detained and/or tortured....as well as to American Muslims.


but enough years will have to go by first...enough so that an apology is all there is left to offer

"War" is not an excuse for overriding the laws (and principles) of this country. It wasn't then and it isn't now.

[southtpa]

6. deeper

You might want to look at treatment of German POW's post war in germany. Our hands are not clean.

[toopers]

8. The treatment the Germans received from the Americans . . .

postwar was kind in comparison to the treatment Germans received from the Russians.

[DavidDvorkin]

9. True but irrelevant

[toopers]

10. It is relevant to this comment to which I replied . . .

eom

[DavidDvorkin]

13. No, it is irrelevant to that, as well

The terrible treatment German POWs received at the hands of the Soviets is a separate matter. It does not excuse in any way the Allies' mistreatment of German POWs.

Evil done by A to B does not excuse lesser evil done by C to B. C is responsible and guilty for its own acts.

[ikojo]

12. Or the treatment received by Jews and other so

called undesireables at the hands of willing Germans.

[anotherdrew]

19. look, remember what they wanted to do... and did...

the fact they weren't all lined up and gunned down is a testament to the decency of humanity... the German war machine was the greatest threat to civilization we've seen before global climate change, you don't play around with a threat like that. It's a cancer, you CUT IT OUT and make sure it doesn't live on. Unfortunately, half or more of the problems we face today are caused because we didn't cut that cancer out completely. It's too bad if a few people, innocent and loyal, got beat up, or called names, or some property damaged, but consider again what was going on... we were a hairs-breadth away from the loss of _everything_, facing a foe with no shame against the use of total war; but... we made it, we won; and thank god, they lost.

Those willing and happy believers in hitler were, for all intents and purposes, no longer human as far as I'm concerned and gave up their claim on humane treatment, due to their depravity. Later, many of them were brought back into the human community, thankfully, and many others were ended; but many more got away, and spread their poison... we have that poison to thank for bush amongst many other modern evils.

[davsand]

14. I live in a predominately German ethnic area.

This entire area was settled by German immigrants because it was swamp land in its natural state and nobody wanted it. They were able to buy it for pennies per acre. The particular group that settled here was from a region of Germany that was below sea level and they knew how to deal with a surplus of ground water. What we have now is an area of especially rich farmland that currently sells for somewhere around $6000 per acre.

When I was a kid back in the 60's there were several of the older ones around here that still spoke a particular dialect of German both at home and in public. We learned our Christmas carols in German and English both, and they did teach German as part of the curriculum at our grade school (which was unheard of in rural schools at that time.) We get called the "Dutch Flats" to this day which is a corruption of Deutch (German.) We danced polkas at weddings and we drank schnapps and beer (yes, even as kids.)

I have heard tales from the older folks about the fact that there was a time when people would come here just to beat up a "Kraut." We have a monument in our little town for our vets and more than a few of them were in WW2. One man (I grew up with his 5 boys) was in Europe and was decorated multiple times for his service. WHILE he was serving people were coming here and beating on his extended family members for fun and games. I never heard him express any kind of anger about that--EVER.

He just passed away last year and his boys found all his medals still in the boxes they came in. They were tucked in a drawer along with letters from Katie--the lady he married when he came home and the mother of his boys.

To this day we have a reputation that we are "clannish." Literally, I never SAW a real estate sign in this town until about 15 years ago because property was always kept in the family. I am dead serious when I say that one of the first things you will encounter when you come here is a discussion of who you are here to see or who your "family" is (to establish your pedigree, I guess...)

I dunno how much of all this is rooted in the experience of the folks who came here and how much is tied to ethnic bashing in the times of war. I suspect that they are so inter-connected that it would be impossible to determine, but it IS there, still, for some of them anyway.

Frankly, I don't think anybody owes much of anything to anybody when it comes down to actions from years ago. I don't think anybody here expects or even WANTS an apology or some kind of meaningless resolution from the federal government. It isn't like the Germans here were hauled off and incarcerated. They didn't have assets seized by the government and they weren't brought here by force.

Experiences may have been different in other places, but I don't think this is even on the radar for most of the descendants of Germans in my area.

Just my two cents.


Laura

[SayWhatYo]

15. We also executed German and Japanese soldiers after they surrendered.

I wouldn't go as far to say this, but some might say we were just as bad as the Germans were... In many respects they may be right too.

[Louie the XIV]

17. The difference is these were heat of the moment incidents

involving SS concentration camp guards. Frankly I can't blame the first Allied soldiers to enter Auschwitz,etc. for not acting with restraint considering the overwhelming examples of inhumanity they faced.

Comparing these few incidents to the Japanese and German official policies of torture and murder of captured soldiers and civilians is inane.

[CBHagman]

25. Oh, for heavens's sake.

I wouldn't go as far to say this, but some might say we were just as bad as the Germans were... In many respects they may be right too.

Anyone who can't distinguish the Marshall Plan and the Berlin Airlift from the Final Solution and Kristallnacht slept through history class.

[SayWhatYo]

28. Well, this can explain things better than I can...

http://www.patriceayme.com/ltr_010_carrol.html

[anotherdrew]

16. we should have rounded up the entire american Bund movement and shipped them back to germany

The German American Bund, an organization of ethnic Germans living in the United States, was marked by a pro-Nazi stance.

Aside from its admiration for Adolf Hitler and the achievements of Nazi Germany, the German American Bund program included antisemitism, strong anti-Communist sentiments, and the demand that the United States remain neutral in the approaching European conflict.




Public opinion surveys of 1939 show that Fritz Kuhn, the leader of the German American Bund, was seen by the U.S. public as the leading antisemite in the country.

Actual membership figures for the German American Bund are not known with certainty, but reliable estimates place membership at 25,000 dues-paying members, including some 8,000 uniformed Sturmabteilungen (SA), more commonly known as Storm Troopers.




The German American Bund carried out active propaganda for its causes, published magazines and brochures, organized demonstrations, and maintained a number of youth camps run like Hitler Youth camps.




German American Bund activities often led to clashes--even street battles--with other groups, most notably with Jewish veterans of World War I. A February 1939 rally was held on George Washington's birthday to proclaim the rights of white gentiles, the "true patriots." This Madison Square Garden rally drew a crowd of 20,000 who consistently booed President Franklin D. Roosevelt and chanted the Nazi salutation "Heil Hitler."

The German American Bund closely cooperated with the "Christian Front" organized by the antisemitic priest Father Charles Coughlin. The activities of the German American Bund led both Jewish and non-Jewish congressional representatives to demand that it be investigated by the House Un-American Activities Committee chaired by Martin Dies. The Committee hearings, held in 1939, showed clear evidence of German American Bund ties to the Nazi government.

Shortly thereafter, Kuhn was convicted of embezzling funds from the organization and was sentenced to prison. In the following years, a number of other German American Bund leaders were interned as dangerous aliens, and others were jailed for various offenses. By 1941 the membership of the organization had waned. After the United States entered World War II in December 1941, the U.S. government outlawed the German American Bund.
Copyright © United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, D.C.




http://www.amazon.com/American-Axis-Henry-Charles-Lindbergh/dp/B0009YAXEA/ref=pd_sxp_grid_pt_0_1/104-0748086-6828704
http://www.amazon.com/Who-Financed-Hitler-Funding-1919-1933/dp/0671760831/ref=pd_sxp_grid_pt_0_0/104-0748086-6828704
http://www.amazon.com/American-Swastika-Shocking-Collaborators-Present/dp/0385178743/ref=pd_sxp_f_pt/104-0748086-6828704

[David__77]

21. During wartime?

So they could join the wehrmacht? I don't think so. It was right to intern the bundists.

[Joe Chi Minh]

18. The windows of shops owned by Italians in London were smashed, during WWII, apparently.

Very ugly treatment of our own civilian citizens, but the craziest thing was the Government's rounding up of a number of Jewish families and shipping them off to Australia for internment there, as dangerous aliens or some such. Our own version of solemn, negative Freak Power by our Establishment.

[fedsron2us]

23. With the Luftwaffe dropping bombs on London and an Axis army

in Northern France just 20 miles from the British mainland it is hardly surprising that the UK government and its population got a bit jumpy in 1940. Originally, only those deemed to be high risk were held (Category A) but as the war situation deteriorated all aliens of axis origin were interned. After 1942 when the war situation improved most were released. The issue was not without controversy even during the war. Amongst the critics were H.G.Wells and the M.P Peter Cazelet who questioned the logic of rounding up and interning individuals many of whom had fled to Britain in order to escape fascism in the first place.

[Joe Chi Minh]

24. Oh, I'm not apologetic about mega-retaliation in a total war against

a vicious inhuman aggressor, but uniformed freelance vandalism against local civilian residents of foreign origin does disgust and anger me.

[EFerrari]

20. What is a European Latin American? n/t

[David__77]

22. My German-speaking relatives sufferred nothing like the Japanese.

I don't think the two can be compared.

Now, during the first world war, my great-great grandparents had to flee Minnesota for Canada so I'm told.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

29. I have a bunch of German-American relatives

Judging from their stories, World War I was very bad for German immigrants, kind of like being an Arab-American after 9/11. Gangs of proto-freepers came into German neighborhoods to beat people up, several states banned the teaching of German, and (shades of "freedom fries!") sauerkraut was supposed to be called "liberty cabbage." My grandmother recalled that one of her schoolteachers, a British immigrant teaching in a German immigrant neighborhood, carried on about how unfortunate she was to be teaching "Huns."

Among most people my mother and grandmother knew, Hitler was considered low-class and a speaker of a crude variety of German, so they didn't really take him seriously. I'm told that my great-great-grandparents, who had emigrated from Germany to join their children in the 1910s or so, were shocked when Hitler became Chancellor. "Hausmaler wird Reichskanzler?" "A house painter is Chancellor of the Reich?"

My relatives had a distant cousin who was active in the German-American Bund and who was interned during the war. The relatives considered him a loser and thought of his pro-Nazi activities as still another attempt by a mediocrity to become a bigshot.

Most--possibly not all--of the Germans who were interned had actually done something illegal or inidicative of Nazi sympathies, unlike the Japanese-Americans, who were locked up solely because of their ethnicity. The Japanese were more identifiable, and unlike the Germans and Italians, were not much intermarried with the rest of the population.