A Romanian SS officer at the Battle of Bulge?, Please make us clear

Hi everybody!

There are plenty of WW2 books coming out in Hungary these days. Among them is a very popular series written by Kurt Rieder (Zoltan Geczi) and Pal Foldi. Well, what could I say, they're both something-like-Nazis, however, they cover it well. Although their books contain a lot of interesting - and certainly true - details about great battles and historic persons, some of their "theories" are beyond imagination. Being great patriots, especially Pal Foldi (yeah, god bless our country, but not this way, please), the Romanian soldiers are always depicted as traitors and cowards. A good example is when Foldi cites a memoir of Rudel, the famous Stuka pilot, who allegedly saw some fleeing Romanian infantry from the air at Stalingrad, and was quite upset of not having any more bombs, so he couldn't "teach them a good lesson." Foldi meanwhile does not mention that Hungarians were fleeing just alike, and the Germans indeed treated them just as Rudel wanted the Romanians... Whatever. One has to be careful when reading a Pal Foldi book. He is a good military expert, but has strange views of politics.

But there is something that I don't know how he found out. Perhaps you remember the American movie 'Battle of the Bulge'? In that movie there is a scene when German SS soldiers shoot plenty of American POWs dead with a machine gun. This actually happened, although the reason is still unknown: some say the Nazis just massacred the poor unarmed prisoners, others said that the Americans wanted to escape, and hence they were shot. Well, Pal Foldi has added an interesting detail: he wrote that the commander of that SS detachment was a Romanian officer, and as the Americans stood up and attacked the guards, he ordered the gunners to kill them all. Quite interesting and sounds like bull. A Romanian officer in command of German soldiers, on the Western front? However, I'd like to hear your opinion. Can it be at least partly true?

What I don't understand is why do you blame the author Földi for quoting directly Obstlt. Rudel? Blame Rudel if you wish, as the quote is accurate, I've read it in his memoirs.

Gen. Dénes

That would be strange indeed. Maybe a Romanian citizen of German ethnicity that served in the Waffen SS. For details on Romanians in the Waffen SS please read this older thread: http://www.worldwar2.ro/forum/index.php?showtopic=44. Romanian ethnics in the Waffen SS only saw action in 1945 near Stettin, in Germany, and against the Red Army.

Denes, just because Rudel wrote it in his memoirs does not make it accurate. I hope you agree with me that an author should try to at least verify his sources more thoroughly, not just select what suits his agenda.

Rudel's memoirs should not be taken as a proven fact, given his political orientation. The clouds were very low, at about 50-100 m from the ground, navigation was difficult and effective air support was very difficult (think that a Ju-87 had no altitude to perform the dive). From what I read only recon missions were flown. Of course I may be wrong and missions were flown by the Luftwaffe (I am waiting for Black Cross/Red Star vol. 3 to come out). Furthermore, near Kletskaya were situated the Col. Voicu Detachment and the 1st Cavalry Division. The first was encircled by mechanized forces that had broken through the lines of the 13th Infantry Division further to the west, but managed, with losses, to brake out and join the Gen. Lascar Group by the evening. The 1st Cavalry Division held its positions near Kletskaya and only gave up small portions of land. It was eventually caught in the bulge at Stalingrad. Btw, Rudel's idea of "easily defendable positions" is needs no actual comment to his objectivity.

Maybe I wasn't clear enough. What I meant is that the quote is accurate, not the fact covered by the quote.
All memoirs should be treated with a pinch of salt and used accordingly.

As for the second part of your quoted posting, of course I agree with it. However, one should not suspect that evey author has an agenda. Many have, but not everyone.
BTW, I didn't read the works of this Földi guy, so I have no opinion about him.

Gen. Dénes

This post has been edited by Dénes on February 27, 2005 05:23 pm

I just checked this author, Pál Földi. It appears that he is one of the most prolific Hungarian authors writing about W.W. 2 (and not only).
He apparently authored over 50 books in this topic, ranging from the Gestapo to the occult side of Naziism, but also great military leaders of all times, etc.

Judging by the huge number of his books and wide variety of topics, I wouldn't put too much emphasis on the reliability of his works as scholarly researched historical studies.

Gen. Dénes

Hi everybody !

Malmedy massacre : the americans tried to escape (if not ,why only those americans prisonners were gunned down and not the hundreds other ones captured by the Leibstandarte during that battle who were treated with all respect due to POWs according to the Geneva Conventions ?)
Evern a comittee of the US Congress innocented the Waffen-SS in this affair in 1948 .

About this rumanian officer : In the book of Hans Schmidt (former Uscha of the LSSAH ) "SS Panzergrenadier" ,he refers to a rumanian Obersturmführer serving as "volksdeutsche" in the LSSAH in Austria in 1945 .This man was the commander of a submarine of the rumanian navy in 1941-42 in the Black Sea .
He committed suicide in a small austrian town in the last month of the war ,telling Hans Schmidt : "I will end it soon . Try to save yourself .For me it's useless ,I know Iwill never see my family again ."
Some bottles of Schnapps were on the table .SDchmidt thought the officer was drunk and didn't care .When he get out of the building ,in the middle of the street fights , he listened to a gunshot .The rumanian officer had shot himself .

Maybe are we talking of that same officer ?????

Hmm, interesting. As there were probably not too many Romanian SS officers, especially not on the Western front, that might well be the same person. So it might be true after all, or at least something of it.

The problem with Foldi is not about factual knowledge, but his theories and biased interpretations. He always depicts Romanian soldiers as cowards, but I don't think that can be true - an entire army of cowards? Every army has its heroes, and well, yes, its cowards too.

Foldi's greatest theory is about the reason of WW2. He claimed that it was actually started by Churchill, and poor Hitler was just fooled into it. This was the way of the Americans and the British to world domination. That's something I'd call stupid.

Leibstandarte declared innocent by a US Congressional committee in 1948? Really? Can you provide some more information on this?

I mean this question seriously, not as a challenge. Certainly it is possible, but that is not the way that the Malmedy Massacre has been portrayed in American histories of the Bulge. It's usually portrayed just as the name suggests -- as a massacre of surrendering green troops by the SS.

As for how these POWs could be shot while others were not, there are many reasons why that could happen. So much depends on the details -- how much resistance the surrendering soldiers put up, how much capacity the Germans had to evacuate prisoners to the rear without slowing their advance, the character of the senior German leader on the scene, etc. These can change from place to place, and from minute to minute, so in one place you find a "by the book" surrender, following the Geneva Convetion perfectly, and in another a massacre. I know that it is a classic ethical question put to American officer trainees -- a small group is on a mission behind enemy lines, you capture a prisoner and have no way to evacuate him. Do you let him go and endanger the mission? Shoot him and become a war criminal? Tie him to a tree, leave him some food and water and move on? Try to take him with you? Usually the trainees try to come up with some creative solution... not always a legal one.

My father was actually a trainee at the US Army's artillery school when the massacre occured, and the victims were from a class just ahead of his, so many of his instructors knew them and remembered them. He remembers that it got lots of attention in the US Army, as you would expect. The war in Europe ended before he went overseas, so it did not matter. The Japanese already had a bad reputation in the US Army for their treatment of prisoners.

There is a movie about the Marmedy massacre: Saints and Soldiers

I don't know how accurate it is, but in the movie a POW tries to escape and he is shot.



The rest of the POWs became agitated and one of the takes a rifle from a german guard and shoots him.



The germans start shooting, killing almost everybody.



Peace!

I forgot to tell :

The name of this officer was Obersturmführer Nicolaì .(family name)

I remember talking about this family name (not about this particular person) in an old thread:
http://www.worldwar2.ro/forum/index.php?sh...hl=nicolai&st=0

Gen. Dénes

The commander of the Delfinul submarine was cpt. Constantin Costachescu. No "Nicolai".

you mean ,you ,rumanians,had only ONE submarine during WW2 ???

Anyway ,I just told you what I read in the book of Schmidt ...he does not have to be lying ,so maybe the memories of Schmidt are blurred ,or maybe Nicolai had just been an offiver aboard of this submarine and he had told later some LSSAH men that he was THE commander ???

Can you check the names of the officers of that submarine ? (If you had only one ,it shouldn't be difficult ...) so maybe it was a Nicolai officer there ....

3 submarines and several CB-class submarines.

check http://www.worldwar2.ro/arme/?category=ships&language=en

Ha, ha! That with Rudel was good. And who was going to teach the Germans a lesson when they retreat?

My grandfather told me a story with a whole German infantry regiment running on their feet, trying to escape from a Soviet armored regiment who was chasing them. Even though their human running was no match for the armored vehicles following them, they still tried to carry the wounded soldiers unable to walk, and to do not abandon them. This picture was overall something very sad, and my grandfather did not feel the urge to administer to the Germans a lesson.

BTW: Rudel should ask himself why Germany did not supply the Romanian Army with 75 mm PAK's, the only thing which could stop a T-34, and why the Romanian Army, having 4 full armies engaged alongside Germany, received only 11 (eleven) modern tanks as supply (the Pz-IV's).
Anyway, it's a story useful to know. I had more esteem for Rudel until now.

This post has been edited by Florin on March 03, 2005 04:24 am