Elkins Park in Montgomery County has several synagogues ... and one large monument to Nazi collaborators. Many people had no idea it existed until recently.
Similar memorials have also generated outcry in Canada. Jared McBride, a UCLA historian of Eastern Europe, said that within the Ukrainian diaspora, many believe that the soldiers allied with the Nazis with noble intentions.
But it is a view that he said scholars view widely as historical revisionism.
“The Nazi regime was a genocidal regime,” McBride said. “This idea of parsing these things out — that ‘We were the good SS division,’ or ‘The good police unit,’ or ‘The good mobile death battalion’ — is not the strongest of arguments.”
John-Paul Himka, a retired history professor at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, and an expert on Ukrainian history, said SS Galizien had “very little to do with the Holocaust” since it was not formed until 1943 and first saw combat the following year. But, Himka said, the unit was also tied to other war crimes during World War II.
“Galizien fought with the Germans against the Soviets; it helped suppress the Slovak uprising; it was involved in atrocities against Poles and Slovaks; it welcomed into its ranks many perpetrators of the ethnic cleansing against the Polish population and of the Holocaust; it propagated antisemitism and seems to have been involved in a roundup of Jews in Brody in 1944,” Himka said by email. “I cannot accept the notion that they were ‘freedom fighters.’”
These were not Nazis, but rather a separate organization that fought against everyone at some point, including fighting against Nazis. I don’t have a personal opinion on it
Even the so-called goods people mention were obtained at the cost of blood. A lot of blood of innocent people. How hard is it to denounce nazism really lol fuck.
Kind of like how the US government did the same thing when they protected former Nazis against War crime tribunals because we wanted their help against the Communists?
There’s a bit of a difference between literally volunteering to fight for the nazi state and protecting von Braun so he could work for NASA.
Protecting von Braun doesn’t enable the holocaust and other Nazi atrocities. It’s machiavellian and realpolitik, sure, but the nazi atrocities are over by that point.
Literally enlisting in the SS, though, you’re either actively carrying out atrocities or enabling other people to carry out atrocities.
Imagine assuming your comfortable 2020s life where you can apply black and white morality to everythin was the status quo thoughout world history, and no one has ever had to try and decide between two evils.
Have you been taking stupid pills…? Like yeah, obviously some things are grey and complicated… But some things are black and white. And (I can’t fucking believe I have to say this) Nazis = Bad.
I’d kind of love to hear how you would justify to Ukranians in 1939 that the Russians who have been murdering 10s of millions of Ukranians are the good guys.
The monument, in a Montgomery County community known for its synagogues, is dedicated to the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the Schutzstaffel — the Nazi military branch often referred to simply as “the SS.”
Not to be that guy but the SS was also the foreign legions of Germany because they weren’t allowed in the Wehrmacht (normal military) and SS had many people that just wanted to fight the communists.
Doesn’t mean we call them heros and erect monuments to them. if anything we place these objects in a museum dedicated to the group. We acknowledge their troubled past, difficult decisions, horrible actions, good actions, and learn from all of it. A sense of shame and humility doesnt make current Ukrainians bad in any way.
They collaborated with the Nazis because the Soviets invaded and occupied the country twenty years earlier.
They both fought against the Germans and the Soviets to try to go back to having independence
You’re whitewashing and apologizing for nazis:
These were not Nazis, but rather a separate organization that fought against everyone at some point, including fighting against Nazis. I don’t have a personal opinion on it
They were literally Waffen SS.
Lol, imagine trying to find a reason to excuse helping literal Nazis…
Even the so-called goods people mention were obtained at the cost of blood. A lot of blood of innocent people. How hard is it to denounce nazism really lol fuck.
It’s almost like people want to find a reason to support… what they really believe in.
There are loads… For example…
Being treated better by them than by the ones you fight…
And no, although SS where the guys that run the KZs most of SS didn’t even know about them especially not the foreign legions.
Kind of like how the US government did the same thing when they protected former Nazis against War crime tribunals because we wanted their help against the Communists?
There’s a bit of a difference between literally volunteering to fight for the nazi state and protecting von Braun so he could work for NASA.
Protecting von Braun doesn’t enable the holocaust and other Nazi atrocities. It’s machiavellian and realpolitik, sure, but the nazi atrocities are over by that point.
Literally enlisting in the SS, though, you’re either actively carrying out atrocities or enabling other people to carry out atrocities.
Then formed entire government agencies for them. Here’s the new headquarters for one of them
They also fought Nazis at some point, so it’s a bit more complicated
You are thinking of the Ukrainian insurgent army. This is the Ukrainian SS division.
Shades of grey are not understood anymore.
Imagine assuming your comfortable 2020s life where you can apply black and white morality to everythin was the status quo thoughout world history, and no one has ever had to try and decide between two evils.
Have you been taking stupid pills…? Like yeah, obviously some things are grey and complicated… But some things are black and white. And (I can’t fucking believe I have to say this) Nazis = Bad.
I’d kind of love to hear how you would justify to Ukranians in 1939 that the Russians who have been murdering 10s of millions of Ukranians are the good guys.
Fuck them and fuck whitewashing.
Not to be that guy but the SS was also the foreign legions of Germany because they weren’t allowed in the Wehrmacht (normal military) and SS had many people that just wanted to fight the communists.
Hey buddy drinks soda
You just blow in from stupid town?
Doesn’t mean we call them heros and erect monuments to them. if anything we place these objects in a museum dedicated to the group. We acknowledge their troubled past, difficult decisions, horrible actions, good actions, and learn from all of it. A sense of shame and humility doesnt make current Ukrainians bad in any way.
Who’s this we you’re talking about. It’s a private fucking cemetery.