If World War II was a fiction story, no one would take it seriously.

I read up on SS-Oberfuhrer Oskar Dirlewanger, and it turns out he was such a deranged bastard that his exploits read like a Cliché Storm.

• "a mentally unstable, violent fanatic and alcoholic, who had the habit of erupting into violence under the influence of drugs" (quote from a police report from the twenties)
• "though intelligent, he was a liar, an alcoholic, and a pervert who molested children." Seriously, that sounds like a lazy characterization of a kitten-eating evil overlord! And I'll stop at that, because Dirlewanger's methods and pastimes (as described on Wikipedia, for example) demand a serious trigger warning. There's a big-ass cross in memory of his victims, with a plaque describing the atrocities he committed on one day, two streets away from my home.
• He had serious patrons, Gottlob Berger (one of Himmler's top men) and Himmler himself. When a SS judge started sniffing around Dirlewanger's doings in Poland, he got promptly Reassigned to Antarctica, and that was after a string of reduced sentences, being re-induced into the NSDAP after getting kicked out for kiddy fiddling and a drunken joyride in a "government vehicle" and rapid rise among the ranks of Waffen-SS.
• On top of that, he was an arrogant prick. For example, his superior's staff officer sent to summon Dirlewanger before him was driven off at gunpoint.
• His command style was apparently very heavy on We Have Reserves, Attack! Attack! Attack! and Red Shirt Army, as his unit also won a dubious distinction of having suffered extremely severe casualties in Warsaw, losing a total 315% [sic] of its personnel (including reinforcements and replacements) in just two months of fighting.
• And there are at least two accounts of him owning a monkey. Maybe it's not a Right-Hand Cat, but as far as depraved, insane villains go, a familiar like that is par for the course.

edited 17th Aug '14 11:23:50 AM by NotSoBadassLongcoat

-Googles-

Damn, he was a real piece of work.

The Dirlewanger Brigade show up a lot in my favourite WW 2 author, Sven Hassel's books, the most prominent of those being "Reign of Hell", which dealt with the Warsaw Rising. His characters weren't at all impressed with them. They made even the 27th Panzer (Penal) look like angels.

There were also Stalin's red-lapel crews that were recruited from prison wards with an emphasis on the violent and criminally insane, who were basically the Allied mirror to Dirlewanger's brigade. I can't remember what they were formally called, but they were the ones sent to harry Berlin after Hitler offed himself.

Really, WWII was a truly horrifying sequence of events.

Sounds a bit like these guys.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shtrafbat

Poor bastards.

And today, I have learned about another colorful individual, although one insignificant enough not to even warrant a footnote in history books.

Bahnschutzpolizeifeldwebel Karl Schmalz, AKA "The Dame". He was known by this nickname among the Home Army in Warsaw, as it was his favorite way of ambushing hapless folks wandering near the train tracks. Schmalz liked to dress in drag and either shoot people on the spot, or capture them at gunpoint, drag them to the Bahnschutzpolizei post at the railway station and torture them to death. Of course, the Home Army was understandably pissed by this, so they decided to bump him off.

The biggest surprise, though? They walked into The Dame's den using two stolen Wehrmacht uniforms as disguise, popped him and realized they just stumbled onto a fucking arsenal. Like, a heavy machinegun with six full belts of ammo and a crate of loose rounds, twenty four rifles, two submachine guns and a supply of ammo for all that.

OK I know it's been YEARS since this thread was posted in, but I stumbled across it today, and it reminded me of this one post I saw.

I mean Hitler was kinda a one dimensional villain type character so I see where you're coming from

Edited by ThatAsianInTheCorner on Mar 13th 2022 at 3:35:12 AM

Real life is kinda badly written sometimes, I’ve realized.

Edited by Novis on Mar 12th 2022 at 1:55:33 PM

There is so much media out there solely to ridicule the Axis Powers in order to boost the morale and confidence of soldiers and citizens. This demonisation is ridiculous and entertaining.

Maus is one of my favourite World War II stories. The story of someone who was tortured is much more powerful and impactful than fighting and mockery. We need more perspectives but those involved are gone, what’s left is streamlined for a general audience.