Band Of Brothers - Episode 9 - Why We Fight - REACTION

[@Heritage367]

Ron Livingston who plays Nixon does not get enough credit for his performance on this show. He's primarily known for his comedic roles (like Office Space), but his portrayal of the physical and emotional exhaustion and survivor's guilt in this episode is amazing.

[@bbb462cid]

LIvingston 😀

[@Heritage367]

@@bbb462cid thanks! I'll fix it!

[@bbb462cid]

@@Heritage367 He made a great video diary about the series

[@RamblersInc]

I think Office Space is all I've seen him in as well. He absolutely nailed this role as did the others. Hope Nixon got another swig of Vat 69 before they all went home.

[@michaelflower6172]

To be fair, Band of Brothers the series is much like the book itself which follows the exploits of Dick Winters and not the myriad of lives of those that followed him! The character who played Sgt. Christiansen thought being on Band of Brothers the HBO Mini Series was going to be a life changer to his acting career, which never materialized…

[@evilsponge6911]

General Eisenhower foresaw the possibility of people calming the camps weren't real or that the Allies were exaggerating their claims, so ordered his commanders to take the local populous and the media to tour the camps and aid in their clean up.

[@iammanofnature235]

When the camp shown in Band of Brothers, Kaufering IV (Hurlach), was liberated by the 12th Armored Division on April 27, 1945, Colonel Edward Seiller of the 12th Armored Division took control of the camp and he was the one who ordered civilians from the Landsberg area to bury the dead.

[@GrumpyOldGuyPlaysGames]

Some behind the scenes notes: This was Tom Hardy's first role ever in which he actually had dialogue. None of the actors playing American soldiers had seen the concentration camp set, or the extras playing the victims, before they were to film there, and the reactions of most of the cast are genuine. Ross McCall, playing Joe Liebgott, said there were talks of bringing the actors to a camp to prepare them for the scene - but they ultimately decided not to, for the sake of getting honest reactions. The specific camp that was liberated in this episode was the Ohrdruf Concentration Camp. The liberation occurred on April 4, 1945. The US Army brought in tents and emergency shelters immediately, as well as a volunteer force of medical personnel. The Army began relocating the prisoners as quickly as they could, beginning the day after the camp's liberation. In total it took about a week to get all the prisoners to better accommodations in order to give them medical care and food. Many of the concentration camp victims were played by patients with advanced stage cancer undergoing treatment. They agreed to make an appearance in the episode because they saw it as a "good cause." The tall, thin actor playing the "helpful German prisoner" who explained about the camp is played by multi-award winning Swiss actor Anatole Taubman, who is himself Jewish. Taubman has appeared in dozens of productions, both European and American, and can speak five languages so fluently that he doesn't carry an accent in any of them. The man who approaches Shifty Powers carrying what looks like a corpse is Serbian actor Goran Kostic. As he approaches,, he is saying (in Serbian), "Please help him! Please help him. He is still alive! Please help him!" The music being played at the beginning is "String Quartet in C# Minor, Op. 131, 6th Movement" by Ludwig van Beethoven.

[@CrowR75]

That was really informative, thank you.

[@bbb462cid]

Excellent content

[@neutchain7838]

I was about to set out to put most of this down. Thank you for doing this 1. it saved me a lot of time and 2. this show is amazing and some of the BTS stuff is really interesting and I am glad they got the recognition they deserved for the length they went to make it

[@RamblersInc]

Thanks for the info 👍 Was there any relevance to that specific movement being played?

[@GrumpyOldGuyPlaysGames]

@@RamblersInc Not really, I just find the translation from Serbian to be notable.

[@Macilmoyle]

The camp prisoners were played by cancer patients. Many did not survive long enough to see this broadcast.

[@LavitosExodius]

The truly scary part about that as well is many of the cancer patients were in better shape than actual camp survivors.

[@RamblersInc]

That's horrific. Powerful imagery though.

[@b1blancer1]

The actors were prevented from seeing the camp set beforehand so their reaction would be as genuine as possible. The looks of shock on their faces were largely real.

[@Macilmoyle]

12:40 Those were French soldiers executing the prisoners. (The guy actually firing the pistol was played by Tom Hanks)

[@GK-yi4xv]

Imo, the people they were executing were probably also French. Some of the thousands of French volunteers fighting in the SS. When they were captured late in the war by the Free French forces, fighting with the Western allies, they were denied standard POW protections and executed on the spot, on the grounds of being the worst kind of traitors (worse even than German SS). There was an entire division of Waffen SS (combat SS) made up of French volunteers, the 'Charlemagne Division'. I've read somewhere it was fighting in this area around this time (not sure). It was also one of the last die-hard units fighting in Berlin at the very end, after even most German units had given up. Possibly because they knew surrender wasn't an option anyway.

[@greggross8856]

@@GK-yi4xv The French soldiers performing the execution might've been attached to the French 2nd Armored Div. Not sure.

[@georgeprchal3924]

The French didn't take too kindly to Frenchmen serving the S.S.

[@GrumpyOldGuyPlaysGames]

My Uncle Jimmy -- my grandmother's older brother, but we didn't bother with the entire "Great Uncle" thing, he was always just "Uncle Jimmy" -- was one of the nicest, kindest people you'd ever love to meet. Hale fellow well met, never an unkind word, never a prejudiced bone, give the shirt off his back sort of fellow. He was the fun uncle. He played card games and board games with the kids of my generation, bought ice cream and pizza and such. Handed out peppermints. I'm sure you have such relatives in your own life. Jimmy hated Germans and anything connected with Germany with a boiling passion that burned like the sun. He refused to have anything to do with such people. I never knew the source of this hatred until after Jimmy passed on in 2004. My Aunt Doris -- Jimmy's wife -- explained it to me. I never knew that she was Jewish. Not once did the subject ever come up. And while I knew that Jimmy had served with the 10th Armored during World War II, I did not know that he had a hand in the liberation of the Dachau concentration camp. He came home carrying nightmares in which he saw my Aunt Doris's face on the many victims of the Holocaust he encountered. And he was never able to shake these nightmares for the rest of his life.

[@RamblersInc]

That's rough. There are no words that can alleviate that kind of trauma.

[@Charles-i4y]

I once had a friend who lived in Greece during the Nazi occupation. She did not talk about it, but she always had a knee jerk reaction to the sound of German music.

[@LavitosExodius]

My grandfather served with 3rd Armored during WW2 he helped liberate the Mittelbau-Dora camp also known as the Nordhausen Camp. It took him a very long time to ever talk about what he saw that day. I remember watching this with him. He said the horror shown in this one episode only scratched the surface, and yes many of the troops were utterly upset about having to leave the prisoners in the camp. But refeeding syndrome is a very real thing they would have literally ate themselves to death. As for the locals helping bury the dead they were not given a choice he told me. It was made very clear you will come do this were not asking.

[@RamblersInc]

Respect to your Grandfather. It must have been tough reliving it even a tiny bit by watching this episode. I had no idea refeeding syndrome was a thing. I have no words.

[@Charles-i4y]

When Patton saw what happened at one camp, he ordered his MP's to go to the local city and round up 1 thousand adults for a tour of the camp. His MP's brought back twice that many.

[@Macilmoyle]

As well as the look on the faces of Nixon and Winters, what really got me was the look on Spiers' face c 16:54 - 17:19. None of the actors playing the guys from Easy Company were allowed to see the camp set before filming in order to get the best reactions from them.

[@Iymarra]

Bull, too. Guy hasn't been fazed by anything. This? Had him on his ass.

[@RamblersInc]

I just went back to the timestamp to look at Spiers. He looks broken 😔. And Bull on the floor just staring at the ground. Oof

[@tracymiller1149]

I think the episode made a great argument for why we had to defeat the Axis powers.

[@kissmy_butt1302]

And the irony is we made a deal with the same devil in Stalin. Stalin killed more people than Hitler as well as Mao did later. This gets lost to history.

[@FrenchieQc]

At 18:12 it's the first time Perconte calls O'Keefe by his proper name. He realizes O'Keefe has seen the "action" he was so eager to see, and the time to mess with him has passed.

[@rep4063]

He calls him by his real name when it matters.

[@RamblersInc]

And you can see in Perconte's face that it's not what he wanted the kid to see. And O'Keefe's face when he's slumped on the ground? As if his soul has been ripped out.

[@Charles-i4y]

O'Keefe had seen the White Elephant and he wanted nothing more to do with it.

[@marinesinspace6253]

It reminds me of a line from Fury "Wait 'til you see it, what a man can do to another man."

[@Alex-zo5bh]

Great reaction as always gents... This episode always resonated with me as a Jew. My family didn't lose anyone in the Holocaust because we left Germany for the US a nearly a century before the war started, but I've always wanted to find my family's roots. I researched where we were from in Germany and saw this photo of the town in WW2 that has stayed with me since... The entrance to the town had a sign that said "get out Jews!" on it. What was fascinating was that no Jews had lived in the town for a few decades at that point, all having been driven away by discrimination. Yet despite that, the Jewish cemetery in that town (the last vestige of the Jewish population) was destroyed and the gravestones used as road materials as an insult. Sadly enough, that act destroyed most of the information that I could have used to trace my ancestors. It's so frustrating because my Jewish family in the US is fairly well-known, and a bunch of us have Wikipedia pages and whatnot. But I don't even have the names of more than 4 of my ancestors that were born in Germany. Their history was just obliterated, and my family didn't even lose anybody directly from the Holocaust. I feel like sometimes people don't understand the totality of the Holocaust in just raw numbers. LAST YEAR the number of Jews worldwide returned to same level as pre-1939. By comparison, the world population went from 2 to 8 billion in that same time. It's hard to imagine a situation in which there's such hatred that you have to destroy the memory of a people long after you drove them away. My mother is Turkish and I worked in Turkey and saw how the Turkish state treated Armenian churches after the Armenian Genocide, so I know that such total hatred is a human quality, not a German one. I'll never understand it, but I do hope to go to the town in Germany some day.

[@RamblersInc]

The search for your roots ending up with massive gaps in information because of the horrific acts they caused just made me angry. You have my sympathies. I hope you're able to connect in some way if you do go to the town. Yep it's a human one. There are many events throughout human history that are stains on us as a species. This was one of them. And a big one at that.

[@Alex-zo5bh]

@@RamblersInc I appreciate your sympathies! They've made a small museum in the town to the Jewish population in what used to be a synagogue, and I plan on going there sometime soon. True there are so many stains, but also bright spots within those stains as well. People giving love and support at the risk of their own lives. I think that's the most you can ever hope to do as an individual, learn from the past and act to make the world better. But I appreciate your reactions, they're so heartfelt. I like your anger in this one too, because a lot of people just respond with sadness when they see this episode, and I feel like you need to feel angry as well to understand atrocities, you know?

[@RamblersInc]

That's a beautiful gesture from them. Agreed. We're capable of both. If only we learnt.....if only. Yeh, erm I didn't mean to shout or swear so much (baldie on the left). Apologies if it was too much.

[@Alex-zo5bh]

@@RamblersInc Don't apologize! Seriously I appreciate seeing the emotion, it's part of the reason that I keep watching all of your reactions.

[@johannesvalterdivizzini1523]

My Grandmother was born in Lemburg (now known as Lviv) in 1898. Her family were prominent members of the Jewish community in a city which was 1/3 Jewish. She left as a teen, coming to NY. Her entire family back there were killed, along with that enormous Jewish community through the Holocaust. 1/4 of my extended family was murdered

[@markjohnson2079]

A movie which isn’t reacted to much on KZbin but is absolutely horrifying was the 2001 HBO movie Conspiracy. It documents the Wannsee Conference - where high ranking party officials outlined the final solution. The movie has Colin Firt, Kenneth Branagh, Stanley Tucci… incredible film… in my view, scariest horror movie ever to exist. Men, siting around a conference table.

[@RamblersInc]

That definitely sounds a horror movie. What a feeling whilst watching it. To be scared of something...that has already happened 😔

[@budoboy1977]

A fantastic movie about a horrific decision.

[@DirtnapJack]

@@budoboy1977 well put

[@Proteus2905]

I'm German. And as a part of my country's history, this hits close to home. I will never understand what madness went down during this time. Maybe it's for the better. Maybe madness like this isn't meant to be understood.

[@RamblersInc]

Very true.

[@bencollord2957]

As an American, I feel the same way any time I see anything about slavery. Maybe this level of ignorance and monstrosity isn't meant to be understood, but feeling the full weight of your cultural legacy in order to make sure it's never repeated is something that everyone should do.

[@BTinSF]

Have you seen the German series "Unsere Mütter, unsere Väter" which is just about as affecting in its own way and perhaps answers some questions you might have?

[@johannesvalterdivizzini1523]

It was indeed madness, and impossible to really understand. I'm 1/4 Austrian Jewish through my grandmother, who was born in Lemburg (Lviv), which at that time (1898) had a very large thriving Jewish community. Her family were very patriotic and loyal to the KUK Emperor (FJ). I lost 1/4 of my extended family who were murdered during WWII.

[@Charles-i4y]

I believe that the more one understands the madness, it can serve to try and prevent it from happening or at least expose it for what it is.

[@neilpaine9063]

Having made it this far, you're both now fully fledged members of the " BoB appreciation society. Well done guys 👍🏻

[@RamblersInc]

Thanks for joining us on the journey 🙂

[@PHDiaz-vv7yo]

Currahee indeed 💪

[@MaskHysteria]

The final shot at the camp with Nixon and his accusatory stare at the German officer's wife which can be juxtaposed against the final shot of Nixon in her house looking for loot and her accusatory stare at him is one of my favorite pieces of filmmaking, ever. His offense of rummaging through her house pales in comparison with "her" offense at being a participant in the regime that brought about the camps and the deaths of millions. This series is, hands down, one of the most brilliant works ever produced.

[@aidenharvey3784]

Define "participant". Most people outside Hitler's inner circle never knew of the camps existence. Those who did thought they were simply prison camps for POW's, murderers, and such. Hitler literally brainwashed and manipulated the entire country into thinking they were the ones being invaded so no one could see what he was doing behind the curtain. Furthermore, her husband was regular Germany military, not SS. She and her husband might have known what the camps were, but what could they do about it? Those who questioned Hitler and his plans were executed. When he broke into her house, Nixon felt no shame, he just left. Later on when he saw her helping bury the dead, which was the last thing he was expecting to see, he looked upon her the same way she looked at him... yet she showed actual shame, and it was for horrors she herself never committed. Its meant as a humanizing moment since at the beginning of the series, it shows everyone thinking that all Germans were enemies, yet in reality, German citizens were but more victims of Hitler's manipulation.

[@sheila-dt5np]

my father helped liberate one of these camps he would wake up still 30 years later screaming from the memory of the bodies and smell he said you could never forget that

[@RamblersInc]

Respect to your father. I can't imagine the things he saw.

[@dansmart3182]

The locals knew, maybe not everything, but enough.

[@Chloe11124]

I was 10 when this show first came out and I watched it with my dad who is a veteran. This episode was my first introduction to the Holocaust and even now (and even after having visited Auschwitz) I still struggle to comprehend such evil and I don’t know how anyone could ever begin to process seeing something like that when they had no knowledge of it’s existence. It’s heartbreaking and my 9 year old is already very aware of the Holocaust and I hope his children and grandchildren never forget as well. I don’t want to say that I enjoyed reaction because that sounds wrong given this episode’s theme but I really could feel how difficult it was for you guys to watch.

[@RamblersInc]

That visit must have been tough. I hope no one forgets what we are capable of doing to each other, so hopefully we try not to do it again (even though we still do). My utmost respect to your father.

[@razmot5547]

The intelligence services and the very top brass knew fairly early on in the war. However there was very little they could do until they closed on the camps and liberated them. Undercover agents actually allowed themselves to be interned in certain camps to report back.

[@joshuaortiz2031]

They were worried allied troops, if they knew what was going on, would be more likely to execute German POWs which would cause the Germans to be more reluctant to surrender, dragging the war on.

[@lidlett9883]

This episode makes me weep every single time. And I've watched Band Of Brothers every year since it's originally aired. What makes me weep is the depth of inhumanity people are willing to do to other humans

[@RamblersInc]

Well said.

[@MetalDetroit]

Donald Burgett’s book: Beyond the Rhine describes being in the 101st and liberating this camp. (He includes a photo of nuns wearing the same habit as seen on Band of Bros). Having read his book, there is no possible way to put what he describes that he saw on tv - it would never be allowed.

[@PHDiaz-vv7yo]

I’ve visited Dachau near Munich. You can visit the lab/ chambers where SS Doctors experimented on those that didn’t meet the Aryan ideal. Those with learning disabilities. Much like my children

[@RamblersInc]

That visit must have been difficult to stomach. Or haunting in the very least. That's sickening. Who even thinks of doing stuff like that? Mate, all any kid needs is love and guidance throughout their lives. ✌️

[@pliny8308]

Now you can see why it's called "Why We Fight". Also, it's impossible that neighboring towns would not have known about the camp. The smell alone, as Webster said, would have told them, and inmates would have gone out on work details. Plus, someone from the town obviously told the guards to leave. Those guards had, btw, been previously told by their commanders to kill all the Jews in their camps before the Allies or Russians arrived,, because the great, overriding "MISSION" of the Third Reich, to eradicate the Jewish people from the face of the earth, had to be seen to its conclusion. How freaking sick is that. In one of the shows I've watched, Bebe's family said that when the revisionists in the 70s and 80s started saying it didn't happen or wasn't as bad as portrayed, he would jump, incensed, and take on anybody who dared to say such a thing. "I SAW it", he'd say, bless him.

[@OgrimMetal]

The stench was most likely referenced for dramatic effect by a justifiably upset soldier. Either way, these people where living under a tyrannical murderous police state. The sort of people who would speak up, had already joined the prisoners. The N*zi government took active steps, until the very end, to suppress information about the holocaust towards it's own people. This is well documented. Most people (likely including you and I) living under these circumstances keep their heads down and their mouth shut to try and get their families through this.

[@RamblersInc]

I didn't ask the question in my head of how the soldiers would have known to leave. Obviously someone in town would have fed them that info. Whether voluntarily or out of fear.

[@MetalDetroit]

In fairness, there wasn’t news like there is today. Something could be going on 5 miles from your house and you would have no clue. And even if you did, there is nothing remotely possible you could do to stop it.

[@ruthsaunders9507]

@@MetalDetroit The guards were probably billeted in the village, just like the camp commander. People knew they were there and knew they were "undesirables". Most may not have understood how bad it was, since they probably weren't allowed too close.

[@ReadmanJ]

12:45 Just wanted to let you guys know one of those French soldiers is actually Tom Hanks doing a blink-and-you'll miss it Cameo.

[@tonyhaynes9080]

Please remember, when the allies liberated these camps, it was a thousand times worse than depicted here.

[@RamblersInc]

I can't imagine. You read about it, you're taught about it school, you watch movies based on it. But not to the level shown in this episode. And if it's a thousand times worse....I have no words.

[@sherryb6351]

This episode crushes me every time. Thanks for sharing your reaction.

[@timd4780]

You can find actual video on youtube of German townspeople walking up to the camp with huge smiles on their faces and mugging for the camera. And all of the smiles go away VERY quickly once they get inside the camp.

[@Smoshy16]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/Y4S4iYenaZygo8U

[@RamblersInc]

Not surprised. What the hell did they expect?

[@MetalDetroit]

Donald Burgett’s book Beyond the Rhine describes his part in liberating this camp. At one point, he sees teen girl’s laughing and talking as they were coming BACK from the camp. A US officer sees them laughing and orders them stopped, and sends them back where they were forced to spend the night locked in the camp.

[@Brandon-im9wj]

just noticed for the first time, when Spiers is talking to the clerk Vest in the UPO he gave him 2 packets of cigarettes for him to ship all that stolen large, expensive, delicate cargo. Always cigarettes with him

[@RamblersInc]

😂

[@b1blancer1]

WW2 veterans who survived D-Day and fought their way through Europe. Those who found these camps have said that nothing compared to the horror of what they saw when they found the camps. Nothing else was even close. Nothing could've prepared them for it. Indeed, the Greatest Generation.

[@iammanofnature235]

Too bad Easy Company never actually liberated a camp, though they did arrive two days later.

[@MetalDetroit]

Donald Burgett’s book: Beyond the Rhine describes being in the 101st and liberating this camp. (He includes a photo of nuns wearing the same habit as seen on Band of Bros). Having read his book, there is no possible way to put what he describes that he saw on tv - it would never be allowed.

[@or10nsharkfin]

What hits hardest is how Speirs's expression changes. You have one of the most battle-hardened, efficient soldiers who has shown little mercy or any care for his own well-being for the sake of making sure the mission was complete. The moment the realization hits about what they discovered and the fates of the people in those camps, you can see that his entire demeanor shifts. The man could not believe his eyes. Superbly acted.

[@RamblersInc]

He looked crushed 😔

[@goodboy1233b]

There's one more episode to watch after 10 . Its called we stand alone together.Amust watch

[@mulrich]

13:05 Carwood Lipton was indeed discharged. As an enlisted man. He was then immediately given a battlefield commission to 2nd Lieutenant. It's a bit of a quirk of how officer commissions work.

[@RamblersInc]

He earned it. Legend.

[@tonyhaynes9080]

In today's British army, a Warrant Officer one, can be a Warrant Officer one day, and a Major the next. It's a quirk of the army. Unlike the RAF, who if an enlisted man, or a senior non commissioned officer, is accepted for a commission, then he has to do the full course at Cranwell, along side baby officers that have just enlisted.

[@mulrich]

@@tonyhaynes9080 interesting. But do the same things apply to the American armed forces?

[@Mr.Ekshin]

Ramblers at 5:32 - "Look at how young he is!" 98% of all dudes on the planet: "What? Who are they talking about? Wait, there was a guy in that scene?"

[@RamblersInc]

Trust me. 10 seconds before this bit, we weren’t looking at him. I just can’t show it on KZbin 😂

[@Scott-J]

I am impressed you all were able to carry on with the video. I always need a few minutes after watching this episode. Why We Fight.

[@RamblersInc]

Yeh it was brutal. We took those minutes as soon as I stopped recording.

[@jeffwellman8347]

At the beginning, one can see the stress and PTSD starting to take the toll on the men. The average soldier would not have known about the extent of the abuse Jews and other minorities were suffering. Good reaction.

[@JJSmith1981]

There is another reaction channel with two Serbian's. At 16:20 , in your reaction, there is a man carrying his friend or relative saying something, I think asking for help. When this was shown in their reaction they said 'That is our language'. The man asking for help is speaking Serbian. I can say, I have never shit myself harder than at the moment I heard that. I never commented on their channel because I could not think of anything to say in the face of this horror, and I must admit I still do not have anything to say about this. It is just too big an atrocity. A weak comment perhaps, but this is what I have to say, eventually.

[@FrenchieQc]

Yeah I remember watching their reactions too, Lola and Milena, I believe. This series took a heavy toll on them, and distinctly remember that passage you mention. I'm watching them react to The Wire now.

[@saberx08]

I saw that as well, not too long ago. I had to pause the video for a few minutes and go take a break. I've seen the episode before, and have known of the holocaust for decades. It's horrific, and this is well known... but to see two modern people feel such a direct connection because the "foreign language" being spoken is their language took it to a whole new dimension.

[@MetalDetroit]

Same

[@tumunu]

Same

[@nurseshrek]

This never fails to remind me of the quote from the Lord of the Rings,” So much death, what can men do against such reckless hate?”

[@RamblersInc]

Powerful quote. Theoden?

[@BryonLape]

When hardened soldiers, who have been through hell, find out there is something worse.

[@RamblersInc]

Cuts deeper. When "men of men" that have iron will and balls of steel look.....broken.

[@iammanofnature235]

The camp depicted in Band of Brothers is Kaufering IV which was actually liberated by the 12th Armored Division on April 27, 1945 with some units of the 101st Airborne Division arriving on April 28 and Easy Company arriving on April 29. And there were only about 7 prisoners found alive (those who had managed to hide), along with about 500 bodies. For dramatic purposes, Easy Company is shown liberating the camp. From the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: _As US armed forces approached the Kaufering complex in late April 1945, the SS began evacuating the camps, sending the prisoners on death marches in the direction of Dachau. Those inmates who could not keep up were often shot or beaten to death by the guards. At Kaufering IV, the SS set fire to the barracks killing hundreds of prisoners who were too ill or weak to move._ _When the 12th Armored Division and 101st Airborne Division arrived at Kaufering IV on April 27 and 28, respectively, the soldiers discovered some 500 dead inmates. In the days that followed, the US Army units ordered the local townspeople to bury the dead._

[@RamblersInc]

Horrifying

[@ranger-1214]

1-The initial treatment of Webster for not going AWOL from the hospital to re-join them for Bastogne was misplaced by the men. The guys that came back to the unit were in "local" aid stations or hospitals. Webster had been evacuated to England so he would have had great difficulty getting from there to Belgium and finding Easy. 2-The song they were singing is "Blood On The Risers" and it has endured since the airborne was formed in WWII. We learned/sang it when I was in Jump School in 1971. It can be heard in total on KZbin. 3-Winters said after all he had seen of the Germans up to that point, he had no problem kicking them out of their houses to quarter his men. 4-This was a work camp; much smaller than the major concentration camps. Eisenhower had everything filmed and documented so that later deniers would be countered with the evidence. 5- in the episode end, Nixon realizes how his problems were pretty insignificant by comparison. Still horrible for him, but he's alive.

[@RamblersInc]

Makes sense why Webster was away for so long. Beautiful song. You must feel a sense of pride whenever you hear it. Yeh, looks like it completely sobered him up.

[@MetalDetroit]

Burgett’s book Beyond the Rhine also describes his seeing teen girl’s laughing and talking as they were coming BACK from the camp. A US officer sees them laughing and orders them stopped, and sends them back where they were forced to spend the night locked in the camp.

[@RamblersInc]

Wow.

[@catherinelw9365]

WWII certainly was a reflection of the depths of depravity and heights of courage that mankind is capable of. I remember watching documentaries about the Holocaust with my Dad when I was a teen, so this wasn’t surprising but still brings sorrow every time. Many people are unaware of the horrific atrocities committed by the Japanese Army. The Rape of Nanking shocked the Nazi observers in China; they made the Germans look like choirboys. The Sack of Manila, Unit 731, the brutal treatment of POWs… I know you’re going to watch The Pacific- which I look forward to - although it barely touches on Japan’s war crimes. You will see the fanatical brutality the Marines faced and a descent into dehumanization on both sides, which is probably why many viewers don’t like The Pacific as well as Band of Brothers. BoB’s theme of the brotherhood of war is much more palatable than the theme of the dehumanization of war, but the latter seems more powerful to me. One more episode! I hope you consider the “11th” episode: We Stand Alone Together - The Men of Easy. There you will see an in-depth documentary on Easy and many more interviews and post war stories. Very satisfying and moving. Again, your reactions are among the best for this series, and I’ve watched dozens of reactions. Well done!

[@RamblersInc]

I just read up on Nanking after someone else mentioned it. Gut wrenching stuff. We'll check out the documentary. I'm assuming that the beginning clips of each episode were taken from there. Thanks for sticking around 🙂

[@mikecarew8329]

Strongly second the suggestion to finish BoB with We Stand Alone Together. Adds great context and speaks to many (not all, but many) of the Qs you have asked along the way. Hearing from the men (with names revealed) directly about their experiences, memories, adjustments to postwar life, etc plus some archival footage and pictures. Regarding WW2 impact / deaths - the YT video "The Fallen of WW2" is very well done and worth a watch.

[@damonmcknight]

I really like the scene where Winters meets Nixon at the start of the episode. It really shows the effects of the war and PTSD even on a man like Nixon who has never been in combat and has never fired his rifle in battle, but still grapples with the knowledge that he keeps surviving instances like that plane being shot down while people he knows die in battle.

[@RamblersInc]

Yeh, it was really well acted. Plus the emotion of having to write those letters to the parents of those kids. Hence the inhalation of Vat 69.

[@MetalDetroit]

Nixon had been in combat.

[@damonmcknight]

@@MetalDetroit Correct. I worded that funny, I'll admit. I meant he's never been up at the front where he is in a position to directly engage soldiers. Jumping from a plane being fired upon would be in combat. He got that ricochet into his helmet during Market Garden because he was up with Winters near the evacuation area as the company fled the city as well. What I meant is he's not been up at the front where he see the enemy and has to fire at them.

[@rednecksniper4715]

Lipton was discharged as an enlisted man and was given a battlefield commission as a 2nd Lieutenant you have to be discharged as an enlisted man before you can be made an officer

[@lesaahrenstein6360]

Survivors went into DP camps (displaced person camps.from there survivors were monitored for health. It gave them a place to live and operate. At this point they were people without a place to call home bc they had no citizenship in any state/country. They had to be "taken in" by a country. This took years. I think Elie Wiesal was there for years. His autobiography post Night covers this time. Today

[@RamblersInc]

Thanks. I'll read further into Elie Wiesal.

[@simonbar-el4094]

As an Israeli Jewish born in the UK i can confirm that the US government were inforned in late 1942 about the concentration camps in general and Aushwits Birkenau specifically. The allies even bombed bridges and some railways systems around the area in 1943 But only in January 1945 the liberation of the camps started

[@Gromit801]

A very few prisoners escaped and got messages to the Western Allies, but the allies just didn’t believe such a thing existed. Most of the camp were in Poland, or parts of Germany well away from the UK and photo reconnaissance. The one or two camps they did know about, like Dachau, were thought to be something else.

[@patrioticjustice9040]

In the beginning when the German band were playing Beethoven, which was mistaken for Mozart, this was symbolic of Germany being freed from Hitler. Hitler was, in fact, from Austria, just as Mozart was, but he is largely mistaken as a German. The 300,000 Germans that you see marching was known as the Ruhr Pocket; the last line of defense to keep the Allies out of Berlin. Originally, a lot of major cities like Hamburg were slated for air raids and bombings. German resistance in Hamburg were able to overcome the Waffen-SS stationed there and made a deal with the Allies; they'd get the Ruhr to stand down if the cities would be spared. The Allies agreed, and the Ruhr surrendered; most likely they were happy to, as they were mostly old men and boys who were too weak or sick to fight, yet were drafted in anyway. The camp that they found was Kauffering IV; a sub camp satellite around Dachau. Originally when US troops were going to storm the place, they thought it was a chemical factory because the stench was so bad. When they got inside and saw what it really was, they were so overwhelmed with shock, grief, anger and disgust that they rounded up all the guards to the barbed wire fences and shot them all. People still debate as to whether this was a war crime, as the guards had surrendered and it was a violation of the Geneva Articles to mistreat or execute soldiers who surrendered, but given what they were apart of, there's not a lot of objection to the act. Germans are given the benefit of the doubt as to whether or not they truly did or did not know about the camps. After brownshirt activists and Hitler Youth Program students targeted homes and stores owned by Jews and non party members (Kristallnacht), this actually created sympathy for them in the German population. This pissed Hitler off because it meant he didn't have the support for the Final Solution that he thought he had. Jews were rounded up and sent to the ghettos, with the Propaganda Ministry telling the populace it was for the Jews own safety. Once the camps were built, they were sent there. The camps were a secret because they didn't want knowledge of them leaking out to the Allies, who would use it against them to spur on the war effort. The Germans that did know about the camps either supported them or kept their heads down out of fear of being sent there. Remember, they lived under a dictator who placed sadists and madmen in positions of authority over the people; each day was like living with a gun at the back of your head. There were also a significant amount of Germans, dubbed the Righteous Among The Nations, who sacrificed and risked much to save Jews from the camps, such as Oskar Schindler and Karl Plagge.

[@RamblersInc]

Thanks for the info 👍 I was horrified at each sentence I read in that last paragraph.

[@patrioticjustice9040]

@@RamblersInc Some last bit of information I forgot to write earlier. When Nazi Germany started getting pushed out of occupied territories like Poland and France, the order was sent out to destroy evidence of the Final Solution because the Nazis knew the Allies would use the camps to further spur on the war effort against them. Mass graves were dug up again and the bodies were burned, documents, files and records containing prisoner information were destroyed, and camps were desolated. One camp called Buchenwald was slated for destruction with all the prisoners in it; and this was a massive camp, we're talking up there with Auschwitz when it comes to size and prisoner numbers. The prisoners were able to hold off the Gestapo and Waffen SS from dynamiting the facility long enough for them to send a message out to Patton's forces to come and rescue them. So the sad fact is we may never truly know how many died in the Holocaust. We estimate 11,000,000 victims, but chances are the number is probably much higher.

[@RamblersInc]

That is disgusting. Glad those prisoners were able to hold off the Nazis.

[@catherinelw9365]

Also Captain Wilhelm Hosenfeld. Despite being a German officer in the war, (Wehrmacht), he secretly helped Jews escape from being sent to concentration camps. Poor man was killed by the Soviets but many Jews came forward and told their stories about being helped by him.

[@patrioticjustice9040]

@@catherinelw9365 Kinda reminds me of Major Josef Gangl, a German officer who set POWs free and gave them arms to defend themselves at Castle Itter against Waffen-SS with orders to exterminate prisoners. With what few troops he had, the armed POWs and US reinforcements, they fought the Waffen-SS off. Unfortunately, Gangl died sacrificing himself to knock former French Prime Minister Paul Reynaud out of the way of a sniper bullet.

[@billholder1330]

Anyone who watches the opening scene of Saving Private Ryan and wonders "why?" needs to watch this episode. This is why we had to send our young men into the guns at Omaha. It had to be done.

[@lithium23]

If polled US at the time, the answer would still have been no.

[@billholder1330]

@@lithium23 Correct, because most of the US population did not know.

[@lithium23]

@billholder1330 no, you misunderstood lol. They wouldn't have really cared, like patton

[@billholder1330]

@@lithium23 I didn't misunderstand; I disagree. Big difference. You underestimate the people.

[@billholder1330]

@@lithium23 And yeah, Patton was a great General, great strategy and tactics, but as a person, as a human being, he was a complete (bleep)ing asshole. No, the rest of America was not like Patton.

[@somthingbrutal]

this is the end result of blaming the Other for your problems

[@ridl8006]

what struck me most.. was the look on every BOB soldier...upon first seeing the horror of these camps... how they instantly showed their moral character... especially Nixon peering at the general's wife...

[@RamblersInc]

And that shame in her eyes to the point where she couldn't maintain eye contact.

[@ridl8006]

@@RamblersInc indeed...

[@Jon_FM]

Dunno if it was addressed yet, but the Allied command knew at least the location of some of the camps and that they were bad. How best to deal with them was debated before the troops reached them. I believe on the ground the troops themselves were likely in the dark.

[@Jon_FM]

historians debate whether the majority of the public really knew what was going on in the Axis countries but most say that people near the camps likely did know or knew enough to suspect.

[@iammanofnature235]

_but the Allied command knew at least the location of some of the camps_ Many of the larger concentration camps were operational before the war began, such as Dachau (1933), Sachsenhausen (1936), Buchenwald (1937), Mauthausen (1938), and others, and so widely known to exist. _I believe on the ground the troops themselves were likely in the dark._ The camps I listed above were reported on by U.S. newspapers before and during the war (The U.S. was technically neutral until December 11, 1941 when Hitler declared war on the U.S.). What individual soldiers knew depended on what they had read. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has on online section called _"What Americans Knew."_ The camp shown in Band of Brothers is Kaufering IV which was one of 11 labor subcamps of Dachau located in the Landsberg (Bavaria) region of Germany known as the Kaufering complex. These camps became operational in June of 1944 and were established primarily to construct underground factories to build the ME262 Jet Fighter and they a had secondary role of providing infrastructure repairs to roads, rail lines, etc. The Germans tried to make the camps and the construction activities as invisible from the air as possible (They didn't want it bombed). It is unlikely that any of the soldiers would have known about these camps. On a side note: Easy Company did not liberate Kaufering IV or any other camp.

[@greggd2027]

The soldier at 12:42 executing the German soldiers is Tom Hanks

[@BadgerBJJ]

My uncle liberated the German camps. I interviewed him for my university thesis paper, and he still couldn’t find the words. But he said he can still taste and smell it, 50 years later.

[@RamblersInc]

I feel for your uncle and applaud him for helping doing something so important. It must have been just as tough for you to see him like that.

[@BadgerBJJ]

@@RamblersInc it was something we knew, but that generation didn’t talk about it.

[@clee3133]

Why we fight - and why we watch. The most frightening thing to me is how much of the present generation can't even fathom how twisted and abominable humanity can become. If you can't imagine and understand it, you can't be on guard against it. That's why seeing things like this is so important, at least as a starting point. Germany was one of the most advanced, sophisticated societies in the world, not some backward third-world country and culture. They were in a hard situation after WW1, and that ultimately led them to this place. We in the western world these days are fat, lazy, and have it easier than any generation ever in the history of the world. But it can't be that way forever. And when things start to decline as they inevitably must, we will once again see that Humanity has not fundamentally changed, and without people of great moral courage and sacrifice, the same or similar could very well happen again.

[@MetalDetroit]

Donald Burgett’s book: Beyond the Rhine describes being in the 101st and liberating this camp. (He includes a photo of nuns wearing the same habit as seen on Band of Bros). Having read his book, there is no possible way to put what he describes that he saw on tv - it would never be allowed.

[@ronmaximilian6953]

Allied leadership knew about the death camps in 1942. Polish resistance had frankly done the unimaginable. They made sure that one of their members Witold Pilecki,, would get captured by the Germans and sent to Auschwitz, where he set up a resistant cell, gathered intelligence about the complex and the death camp at Auschwitz II Birkenau, and escaped. The information was reported to the Polish home army and forwarded to the Polish government and exiled in London, allied leadership and key Jews in London. The allied leaders chose to do nothing not believing it. A few months later, the allies liberated North Africa including German occupied French colonies and Italian colonies where the Nazis worked with locals to round up and Jewish communities and in some cases take the men from these communities and work them to death. This information was suppressed and the collaborationist officials largely kept their offices to facilitate a handover. The Allies also jumped want to play into Nazi claims that they were fighting for Jews. The war wasn't fought over this. Allied leadership didn't care until they were forced to. Various resistant groups like the Polish home army made some effort to help but got no support from Washington, London, or Moscow until 1944.

[@kenle2]

No, the war "wasn't fought over this", but the Allies beating the German Army into the ground and occupying Germany was the only way it was going to end. There was plenty of hatred over what the average American or Briton did know about Nazi tyranny and oppression directed at everyone they deemed "inferior", even before the specifics of the "Final Solution" were widely known. I think you are too eager to shift as much blame for the Holocaust away from the people who actually committed the "legal" kidnappings and the extra-judicial murders and onto people you want to suffer politically today.

[@RamblersInc]

What a legend. Shame the higher ups sat on the info. I just googled him in the hopes that I could read that he lived to the end of his days after doing all of that..... damn....and his burial place has never been found.

[@scotth5038]

Okeffe's shocked look compared to the veterans at the prisoner killing was classic. The executers were wearing French helmets, while someone pointed out the German uniformed prisoners may have been French collaborators in uniform. Also the one doing the shooting was a short role by Tom Hanks.

[@RamblersInc]

Kid looked broken 😔

[@iammanofnature235]

_The executers were wearing French helmets_ The French soldiers were wearing older early war uniforms (c. 1940) and were using nonstandard equipment which would suggest that they weren't actually part of any Free French Army unit. I don't know if this was done by accident or on purpose. French soldiers of 1944-45 were largely equipped with U.S. armaments (M1 Garands, etc.) and wore U.S. style uniforms, which made them pretty much indistinguishable from their American counterparts. A relatively smaller number of French forces, such as French commandos who had been trained by the British, used British equipment and uniforms. _French collaborators in uniform_ It has been suggested that the German soldiers were members of the SS Charlemagne Division (33rd Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS Charlemagne) but as I pointed out to others, the division had been essentially destroyed by the Soviets and that by April 1945 there were only about 700 members still alive. Roughly half the remaining soldiers were in Northern Germany and the other half were in Berlin...nowhere near the Landsberg region (Bavaria). I suggested that there is a small possibility that they were non-SS Milice but it is unlikely they would be wearing German uniforms.

[@scotth5038]

@@iammanofnature235 Good research.

[@ellygoffin4200]

Great reaction. Just a couple of points. Orders were for the guards to liquidate all proof of the camps existance. This was accross all camps. Polish camps like Auschwitz were moved west to Germany. You see bodies with numbers on it they would have been people who made it here on a death march from Auschwitz. Imagine every step of the way being told by the Nazi's that it is for your own good. Now Liepgot who was Jewish had to make the announcement it is no shock that there was resistance from the survivors. Regarding feeding and housing the survivors there is a great BBC movie called Relief of Belsen.

[@RamblersInc]

I wasn't surprised that they resisted when he told them they needed to stay. And the heartbreak of him not wanting to tell them but had to. I'll check out Relief of Belsen. Thanks.

[@philb2085]

The Allies had to get the locals to help clean the camps because they thought the Allies were exaggerating how bad they were. A lot of ordinary Germans didn't know (or want to know) and those that did speak out (and their families) ended up IN the same camps. We all like to think we'd be brave enough to stand up but who really knows what you'd do when you're family's at stake?

[@RamblersInc]

Wow I didn't know they'd end up in camps if they spoke out. Rough situation.

[@iammanofnature235]

_The Allies had to get the locals to help clean the camps because they thought the Allies were exaggerating how bad they were._ The camp shown in Band of Brothers is Kaufering IV (Hurlach) which was one of 11 labor subcamps of Dachau located in the Landsberg region (Bavaria) of Germany. Kaufering IV had been designated a "sick camp" where those too sick or weak to work were sent to either get better or most often die. Those who could work, worked either in the nearby underground armaments factories or performed infrastructure repairs (roads, rail lines, etc.). Prisoners were routinely marched through the local towns and villages to their daily work sites, and so the locals knew. Some the locals did indeed try to help the prisoners by leaving food along the routes. When the 12th Armored Division liberated Kaufering IV on April 27, 1945, Colonel Edward Seiller took control of the camp and he is the one who ordered civilians to bury the dead.

[@philb2085]

@@RamblersInc Yep, millions of non-Jewish people ended up in concentration camps. Political opponents, trade unionists, physically disabled people, Roma/Gypsies, Homosexual men, Freemasons, Jehovah's Witnesses, Poles, Soviet civilians and POW's, European black people and people with Down's Syndrome etc.

[@XSRKRXSRKRXSZKZXSZKZ]

This is the most heartbreaking episode.

[@keithcharboneau3331]

I know what would be going through my mind seeing something like this suddenly, RAGE, Repulsion, the desire for vengeance and justice.

[@RamblersInc]

True

[@PiterDeVries668]

Even though this is the most horrible episode of this entire show, it is by FAR my personal favorite. This should NEVER be forgotten... (And I can NOT imagine being Liebgott {hope that's spelled right} having to tell them they have to stay there after thinking they were free) One of the most heart breaking scenes ever...

[@iammanofnature235]

_(And I can NOT imagine being Liebgott {hope that's spelled right} having to tell them they have to stay there after thinking they were free) One of the most heart breaking scenes ever..._ Well, you'll be happy to know that it never happened...it is fictional.

[@PiterDeVries668]

@@iammanofnature235 Good, no one should've ever had to do that... Even to try and save people, just shouldn't have that situation at all...

[@iammanofnature235]

@@PiterDeVries668 Easy Company never liberated a concentration\labor camp. The camp depicted in Band of Brothers is Kaufering IV which was actually liberated by the 12th Armored Division on April 27, 1945 with some units of the 101st Airborne Division arriving on April 28 and Easy Company arriving on April 29 (the 522nd Field Artillery Battalion and 36th Infantry Division arrived on April 30). And there were only about 7 prisoners found alive (those who had managed to hide), along with about 500 bodies. For dramatic purposes, Easy Company is shown liberating the camp. From the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: _As US armed forces approached the Kaufering complex in late April 1945, the SS began evacuating the camps, sending the prisoners on death marches in the direction of Dachau. Those inmates who could not keep up were often shot or beaten to death by the guards. At Kaufering IV, the SS set fire to the barracks killing hundreds of prisoners who were too ill or weak to move._ _When the 12th Armored Division and 101st Airborne Division arrived at Kaufering IV on April 27 and 28, respectively, the soldiers discovered some 500 dead inmates. In the days that followed, the US Army units ordered the local townspeople to bury the dead._

[@texaspatriot4215]

My wife's family lost people in the camps in WW2 they were Hungarian Jews. My father fought in WW2 from North Africa to the occupation of Germany, latter he fought in the Korean War. Thank you guys for your great reaction.

[@RamblersInc]

My condolences. My utmost respect to your father.

[@simonbar-el4094]

In addition to my previous add even Churchill knew but the BBC Uk would not allow the broadcast of the news during the war in the UK but allowed BBC europe to broadcast the news. In 1944 a Royal British airforce unit flew out of Israel (Under british mandate) with Jewish volunteers who were trained under the British army and parashuted in Yugoslavia in attempt to pass the boarder to Hungary and rescue Jews because the Nazi regime only took over Hungary in 1944. However, they were cought, tortured and executed. You can read the story of Hanna Senesh Or Watch the 1988 movie called Hanna's war Recommended

[@RamblersInc]

That was very brave of them. Messed up that they were captured. Thanks for the recommendation 👍

[@rollomaughfling380]

01:36 That was an M17 rifle fragmentation grenade with an impact-fuze, *_NOT_* a smoke grenade, before Jackson fucked up and threw his MK 2 through the window and rushed in too soon after. Why did he do that? Adrenaline, exhaustion . . . But why on Earth would anyone get an order to refit their rifle, and initially fire a fucken smoke grenade into a flat they're invading within seconds, close-quarters? Think about what you're saying! 👀

[@yankee__tango]

The allied forces didn’t know this was happening. When they found this and Winters saw it, he realized why he was there.

[@RamblersInc]

He looked speechless. 😞

[@pangkaji]

25:12 "what happened here is an absolute stain on who we are as a species". We all watch this and vow "Never Again!". Yet in almost a century after, we saw it repeated again and again. Bosnia, Kosovo Albanian, Rhawhanda, Rohingya, The Uyghur in China. We never learn and become numb to it. True, none of what happened later never came close to what the industrialized killing the Nazi did. However, it keeps happening.

[@RamblersInc]

Very true. So many events throughout time were we've done shameful things to each other. Is it preventable? Or is it just ingrained in human nature?

[@MetalDetroit]

Cambodia too

[@pangkaji]

@@MetalDetroit yes Cambodia 😭.

[@Michael-yl2iq]

Not monsters, humans. Humans, every single one of us, have always been and still are capable of good and evil deeds.

[@RamblersInc]

Well said.

[@sivonni]

The Refeeding Syndrome (what the malnourished prisoners suffered) was even more complicated for the Jewish population, especially since they wanted to eat kosher as soon as they could, with limited options post war. Many Holocaust survivors had food disorders until even today (per studies published as recently as 2016), from food hoarding, to overeating, to eating spoiled food because they couldn't bear any waste. It affected their bodies differently too, causing more issues with bone and nutrition based disorders, even in their grandchildren's bodies due to genetics being altered somewhat. It's devastating to see what evil could be done to an entire population is such a short amount of time.

[@RamblersInc]

Wow. I didn’t think the effects of what happened would be felt today with the current generation. That’s heartbreaking.

[@isaiahpavia-cruz678]

To think that these events occurred on this very planet less than 100 years ago is mind boggling and puts in to context the “recency” of World War 2.

[@RamblersInc]

It’s mental when you put it like that. Only been 78 years.

[@kentbarnes1955]

Why We Fight. Episode 7 is more devastating relative to Easy Company. THIS episode is the "BIG PICTURE"....the clear depiction of EVIL....and why perhaps in the history of warfare...WWII is a war that HAD to be fought. Thanks for the good review gentlemen.

[@MySerpentine]

Probably some of the top brass had some idea that the camps existed, but not how bad they were. And the rank-and-file would have been clueless aside from maybe a few guys who had flown over Auschwitz or something.

[@kenyattaclay7666]

EZ company didn’t actually find this concentration (or any of the) camp but they did an excellent job of depicting what soldiers were coming across at the end of the war. Honestly I don’t care how many times I see this it’s still extremely emotional. Also, while the soldiers on the ground didn’t really know about the camps there was intelligence that found out & at the very highest levels they knew but there was still some debate among them if the intelligence was correct.

[@RamblersInc]

Hmm, I get it. It would sound like unbelievable information that people are doing this to other people. Yeh this was tough to edit as well as you have to keep on going back and forth. If anything, this episode will stay with me for a very long time.

[@coltaine503]

Sad to say that it doesn't take a 'monster' to commit these kind of actions. It just takes complacency, a leader who exploits fear and insecurity and old prejudices and hatreds in his followers. It can happen here as well as 'over there' someplace. No one is truly immune from this.

[@RamblersInc]

Very true

[@nurseshrek]

All that is required for humans to commit horrors beyond comprehension is for one group of people to start to think another group is less than they are.

[@RamblersInc]

Facts.

[@TekWolfie]

Sadly it turns out it's not super hard to get most people to do(or at least ignore) what was done in camps.

[@notthestatusquo7683]

Lipton was discharged. He was discharged as an enlisted man and then commissioned as an officer. That's how it works if you want to go from sergeant to lieutenant. It's a rare thing that usually only happens during wartime, they call it a battlefield commission. Typically to be an officer you have to go to a military academy or have a university degree before joining the military. It's basically a remnant of old world class systems, the enlisted men are the plebs and the officers are the aristocracy and you can't have the two mixing, right?

[@RamblersInc]

Interesting point. I never knew there was an undertone of a class system involved in ranks.

[@Kamenari37]

Enlisted men and Officers occupy different tiers of the command structure. It's a very big deal for an enlisted individual to earn a commission and be promoted to officer. It simply doesn't happen often, and usually happens when someone has displayed exemplary service and qualities needed in an officer, or when in combat a situation demands. Lipton's discharge is a bit symbolic as you cannot be an enlisted man and an officer. Within Haguenau the mission was to get prisoners for interrogation as the rumor mill had begun spinning the yarn that the Germans were on the verge of defeat and they wanted confirmation of that from German soldiers who might be better in the know of their own situation. By this point the Germans were essentially broken. The major offensive which had Easy Company surrounded in Bastogne was a desperate move that taxed Hitler's resources and ultimately failed. The United States, Britain, and Canadian forces were all pushing from the West, but Germany was also being pinched by the Red Army in the East where fighting was much more brutal. The Russians had been massacred by the German army for years, enduring long sieges and occupations of cities such as Stalingrad. When the tide finally began to shift with the Allied invasion in 1945 the Red Army was ruthless in its counter-offensive. It became quite apparent ery quickly that if as a soldier you were given the option to surrender you'd be much better off in the hands of U.S. and British soldiers as opposed to Russians. When it came to taking Berlin, the Red Army was the first to arrive and lay siege to the city cutting Hitler off from his armies and resupplies. If it had been the U.S. forces that had entered the city first perhaps Hitler would have lived to stand trial, perhaps not, but it is fairly certain that knowing it would be the Russians he'd have to answer to he opted for suicide via cyanide and a bullet instead of capture.

[@RamblersInc]

Wow. I didn't know the Russians were more ruthless. Interesting. Then again, seeing as Goring took cyanide before he was going to get hanged at the Nuremberg trials (if I remember correctly), Hitler would've probably done the same anyway. I'm just speculating though.

[@t.j.mcfadden7993]

Keeping the prisoners in the camps to be treated was the least bad of a lot of very bad options. There were bands of escaped prisoners roaming the countryside, killing and robbing civilians and anyone they found, and/or being killed when they attacked people, and/or just dropping dead and spreading typhus and other diseases. Problem was that the Wehrmacht and SS had already consumed or destroyed most of the available supplies, so the US and Brits had to bring in everything, while still supplying their own forces. Millions of camp inmates were saved but tragically the allied troops could not save tens, or even hundreds of thousands of inmates whose health had been broken by the camps.

[@bbb462cid]

This series should have changed how we demand quality from our TV content. It was too damned good.

[@RamblersInc]

Facts !

[@BadgerBJJ]

Answered “why we fight”

[@justinhall3243]

the shooters at 12:45 were French

[@JDMyers-lj8nz]

The doctor (an Officer) shouldn't have put an enlisted man to explain that to the Jews in the 'prison'. The doctor should of been up there speaking and Liebgott translated. That wouldn't have taken such a toll on him.

[@RamblersInc]

This is a brilliant point. If only.

[@krisfrederick5001]

Imagine seeing all of the horrors of War then seeing this, and being speechless. "Why We Fight" is a throw back to the legendary Frank Capra film series that was released while the War was still on going, when there was no certainty of victory. I also believe the Nazi wife in the stark red coat was a direct connection to the little Jewish girl that dies in the Holocaust during Schindler's List. I don't think there are any coincidences in Spielberg's work...TOM HANKS ALERT He's the soldier that executed the German 🚨

[@krisfrederick5001]

The Allied leadership knew what was going on, and the Russians had done the same thing. An "Ally." The troops were mostly unaware on the ground. The enemy of your enemy is your friend, then the Cold War when that ends. F the Russians

[@Mauther]

The scenes with the Nazi wife are meant to show them in contrast. When Nixon breaks into her house, she looks down at him as a looter and is almost sneering at him. Later when she is stumbling over the bodies, her haughtiness is gone and she is shamed.

[@susanstein6604]

The ordinary soldiers didn’t know but Roosevelt and Churchill knew and the generals knew too.

[@sharonstonts]

It's Steven Spielberg so this episode makes sense. I do think the allies forces knew, or guessed, but not the soldiers on the ground, even the more high ranked ones. The Germans left, ran away, they were ordered to dispose of the population in all camps. Of course it wasn't an order they could fully obey

[@iammanofnature235]

_I do think the allies forces knew, or guessed_ Many of the larger concentration camps, such as Dachau (1933), Buchenwald (1937), and Mauthausen (1938), were operational before the war and so the Allies knew of their existence. The smaller subcamps, such as Kaufering IV, were largely unknown. _The Germans left, ran away, they were ordered to dispose of the population in all camps._ What happen at the camp shown in Band of Brothers, Kaufering IV, is detailed by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: _As US armed forces approached the Kaufering complex in late April 1945, the SS began evacuating the camps, sending the prisoners on death marches in the direction of Dachau. Those inmates who could not keep up were often shot or beaten to death by the guards. At Kaufering IV, the SS set fire to the barracks killing hundreds of prisoners who were too ill or weak to move._ _When the 12th Armored Division and 101st Airborne Division arrived at Kaufering IV on April 27 and 28, respectively, the soldiers discovered some 500 dead inmates. In the days that followed, the US Army units ordered the local townspeople to bury the dead._

[@sharonstonts]

@@iammanofnature235 thank you for the information. I do know a lot about the Holocaust, my grandfather died in Dachau. I will visit someday when I get the mental strength.

[@whtz9000]

Hey, btw, try "Generation kill". You two should understand it.

[@RamblersInc]

Almost can't fail with a HBO production either. Seems they do justice to these stories. Thanks for the recommendation. We'll add it to the list.

[@MoMoMyPup10]

Yeah we were never really taught the timeline for when the Camps were discovered - it's kind of just assumed that we knew all along. But knowing this it makes sense because it's not like anyone would have access to the information outside of those who were involved directly. Germany isn't going to put it on the news and no one is going to leak it on their cellphone. It's a remarkable twist for us watching now.

[@RamblersInc]

Good point.

[@clockwork204]

If people knew about this, various countries probably wouldn't have pushed the Jewish refugee ships away. Can't really blame them though, with the great depression still raging on. And it was early on in the war (or was it even before?). It's kind of sad to think that thousands of Jews could've been saved.

[@lucasmorgan4379]

This kind of stuff still happens today in chinas re education camps😢 never forget unless we want to repeat history

[@RamblersInc]

That’s messed up. We’re just doomed to keep on doing it aren’t we?

[@headsup2433]

Typhus was the main problem.

[@ronmaximilian6953]

Yes, disease was among people who had been purposely starved and put in unsanitary overcrowded conditions and worked to death. Unfortunately, former prisoners kept dying from disease even after this, despite attempts to care for them. Many more survived.

[@rodlepine233]

they where ordered to bury not help they had no choice

[@RamblersInc]

Good.

[@Lee_Forre]

In addition to your sentiments regarding the holocaust representing the worst of humanity, take into account slavery. For over 300 years slavery was used to build the economy of my country. Slavery is one of the worst degradations done upon other humans.

[@RamblersInc]

Agreed. One of the worst things we can do to each other.

[@rodlepine233]

Those where free French forces soldiers

[@d.s.9692]

The Allied command was well aware that Jews were being oppressed and deported - the US in fact rejected asylum requests from many boatloads of Jewish refugees. They did not think it would be something soldiers might have to deal with in the field, and were totally caught off guard by the presence of massive concentration camps. When the Allied command was made aware of them, they insisted on documenting them with photographs and motion pictures, and used those in the postwar deprogramming of the German public.

[@catherinelw9365]

Many? One boat that was denied by Cuba then tried to go to the US. Roosevelt denied them because we had 24% unemployment and under a Great Depression. Get your facts straight.

[@Tanatosanimus]

"People have punished people with this fate" (Zofia Nałkowska quote from the novel "Medallions"). But can those who built them be called people?... The world used the name "Polish concentration camps". Big mistake. These were German camps built in occupied Poland. German camps-not Polish.And there were about 1634 such camps (bigger or smaller) all over Europe... So many gates of hell. May there never be such atrocities again. Never.

[@RamblersInc]

Sickening. Thought provoking quote.

[@pinsandneedles3]

Great reaction!! I have really enjoyed these videos. Since it's Pride month, I wanted to share a fact that made me physically nauseous when I learned it. In Nazi Germany, around 100,000 men were imprisoned because they were gay. A portion of them (5,000 to 15,000 according to estimates) were sent to concentration camps. After the Allied victory, a lot of them were forced to serve our their sentences despite having spent time in concentration camps because homosexuality remained illegal in Germany for a long time after WW2. Every time I think about that, I get so incredibly mad. I just... I can't imagine the relief of being liberated, and the following crushing disappointment when they realized they were being locked up again by their liberators. It makes me sick. I visited Auschwitz-Birkenau in 2016 during my travels after I finished high school. I was 18. I will never forget the tour and highly recommend it.

[@RamblersInc]

WHAT ?! They still had to stay in the camps ? That's disgusting. It must have been an evocative experience.

[@pinsandneedles3]

​@@RamblersInc Sorry, I should have been more clear. They had to serve out their sentences. I assume most were sent to regular prisons which were obviously better than the camps - though I can't imagine them having been very good to people convicted of homosexuality. You would *think* that the people making the call would have seen they had suffered enough as it was, but no....

[@barrettolsen1622]

I loved the dichotomy between the scene where the older German woman stared the young GI down and shamed him with a look for breaking into her home and stealing and the final scene where the old woman can’t meet his gaze when faced with the reality of what her husband was doing.

[@catherinelw9365]

Her husband was dead. Black ribbon on the photo frame means deceased.

[@robertwhite2935]

The locals weren't asked but forced to bury the dead.the locals DID know

[@leslieshand4509]

I’ve been to a concentration camp. It’s haunting. If you believe in a soul, those places are full of them. I have never heard the kind of silence I did there. Why we fight and why we must never let it happen again. Yugoslavia certainly tried in that atrocious war. Cambodia’s killing fields. Gettysburg. Treblinka. Places in Vietnam. We are horrifying to each other

[@RamblersInc]

Very true

[@sirdavidoftor3413]

Also included in the 11 million, is any person with a disability, mental or physical. At the beginning of the regime, any of these persons who were seen as a drain on the state’s resources and couldn’t contribute, would be put to death, regardless of nationality, even if they were German. Homosexuals were hung on the streets up high on a crane, with their flies open and showing their thing. Some survived, but only if they co operated with the Gustopo. Stay safe, stay sane, stay strong Ukraine 🇺🇦

[@GK-yi4xv]

Along with something like 3 million Soviet POWs. At one point, they were fenced into open fields, by the hundreds of thousands, with barely enough room to lie down, no shelter or toilets, barely any food, and held there 'to wait until they died off'. It was considered more economical than using precious bullets on them. German sentries were forbidden from patrolling the perimeter alone, as sentries had 'gone missing' and were presumed to have been dragged into the desperate, starving mass, killed, and eaten. In fact, some of the notorious methods of the Holocaust, like gassing and mass shootings, were originally pioneered on Soviet POWs. (and we wonder why Russians are so paranoid about 'Nazis' these days)

[@RamblersInc]

Sickening. Absolutely sickening.