Should Old Veterans Forgive Their Former Enemies?

[sapper]

Did Bulgaria fight alongside the Germans? Dont give an opinion about something you lnow nothing about. The men that murdered our men in Normandy were German Soldiers. And they murdered in cold blood.
German Soldiers ran the extermination camps. It was fine while they were winning. a different story when they started to lose. 60 million people died in WW2 and the German soldier did the best part of that killing. There is nothing anyone can say that will bring the murdered British and Canadians back.

All you politically correct can call for what you like. it is us old Veterans that went and fought these savages that have the right to forgive. NO THANKS
Sapper

[BulgarianSoldier]

Originally Posted by sapper

Did Bulgaria fight alongside the Germans? Dont give an opinion about something you lnow nothing about. The men that murdered our men in Normandy were German Soldiers. And they murdered in cold blood.
German Soldiers ran the extermination camps. It was fine while they were winning. a different story when they started to lose. 60 million people died in WW2 and the German soldier did the best part of that killing. There is nothing anyone can say that will bring the murdered British and Canadians back.

All you politically correct can call for what you like. it is us old Veterans that went and fought these savages that have the right to forgive. NO THANKS
Sapper

Your know best what they did your a veteran and you fight those soldiers.Bulgaria was German friend in the begining of the war since the Russians have come.We start to cut the withdrawing SS devisions from Serbia.Bulgarian army did there best they even enter in Hungaria.many Bulgarian villiges were fully destroyed by the German Soldiers they cut some heads they burn some villiges bomb outher.We did the same.In ww1 Bulgara and Sebia fight each outher those were maybe the most rabid fightings that some one can think about.When two nations that hate each outhers meet in the battlefield the comanders dont even think for surrendering.Many soldiers died.However Bulgarian armys did win the battles and enter in Serbian villiges our soldiers killed almost anything that moved in those villiges and get anything that they could carry.Then The Serbians attacked they done the verysame thing in our citys and villiges.But we forget those things and we live like brothers now.German soldiers killed many people indeed but didnt many germans die from starvation after ww1 when germany didnt had permision even to have own army? Bulgaria too half of our territory was given to Rumania and Greece.And the people who live on this territory couldn't get back.

[A Potts]

Sapper,

As a veteran yourself, I would never second guess your instinct.

I asked my grandfather as a child (about 10 years old) if he would ever speak to a Japanese person.

I remember him saying, 'No'.

He then contemplated for a little while and said, 'certainly not someone my age, I guess I could talk to someone your age (their grandchildren)'.

His feelings and memories ran very deep.

I think it is entirely a personal decision. There really is no 'correct' answer. No rational or encompassing slogan will give an answer.

It is your memories, feelings and reasoning.

[Sgt Pilot Bernard Henson RAFVR]

This is something that is between the Veteran,his conscience & his enemy,some do choose to forgive,but rarely forget,others carry their scars & emnity to the grave,who are we to judge.

The sins of the Fathers should however not be visited upon the Sons

[vailron]

my father was a ww11 medic in the ramc. he said that the americzans he met were much much worse than any german he ever came across, and he was a pow from 1942 onwards

[Kyt]

Was that because they were "oversexed, overpaid and over here"

[vailron]

after being liberated by the americans he was then seconded to them being a medic, and to his dying day he maintained that the attrocities they carried out towards the germans, were worse than anything done by the germans, and he was one of the first medics to arive at the nazi death camps.

[Aust Viet Vet]

As a veteran of another war, I have to say the thought of forgiveness is a difficult one for me to entertain, but I know others who have done it and I have no problem with that. In my view it is definitely a personal decision that has to be made by the individual concerned.

[sapper]

I can forgive the Wehrmacht Soldier, but not the SS. But I cannot forgive what they did to innocent women and children. To burn down a Church they had packed with women and children, so that they were burned alive...I cannot forgive, I have hopes that those responsible will, when the time comes, have to answer for their deeds.

I hope that they will be sentenced to listen to the hideous screams of women and little children. The screams of little children as their own skin and flesh melted, as they slowly burned alive..I hope that they will have to listen....For all eternity.
Sound never goes away completely it just fades in volume. Somewhere out there in the universe, those screams are still echoing.
Orador sur glan, Lidice, and a thousand other atrocities that were committed when they were "Winning"
Sapper

[WotNoChad?]

I don't believe it's anyones place to suggest what Veterans should or shouldn't do. It's up to them and as such effectively nobody else's business. I remain deeply grateful for what British veterans did for us as a nation, and what allied veterans did for us as allies. I also bear no ill feeling towards veterans from the other side nor their descendants - since, thankfully, hostilities have ceased. This isn't apologism nor revisionism, as those who committed atrocities meet their maker they shall be judged and it's not my place to question the wisdom of the Lord, just as it isn't to question whether veterans should or should not be willing to forgive.