German SS outfit clothing

[SS_Ouche-Vittes]

Hi I’m interested in buying a SS outfit:cool:. What are the contents that make up the outfit or at least the exposed stuff. I want the combat outfit not the one for formal meetings. what do i first buy? Any good web sites? this is the best i think: http://www.zeugmeisterei.com

[Moreheaddriller]

So are you getting ss stuff to be in reenactments?

[pdf27]

Why the hell do reenactors always want to be in either “Elite” units or those particularly associated with war crimes. What’s wrong with the 2973rd Independent Saniation Company?

[SS_Ouche-Vittes]

I’m not a reenactor pdf27. I want to have an ss uniform because thier outfit is very modern. The peadot camo I think is a pretext to the modern digital camo. I don’t like the regular german grey coats. The next outfit i would want is the german medic outfit.

[pdf27]

So you aren’t even a reenactor but want to dress up like a war criminal anyway? It’s hardly the only modern cammo in WW2 in any case - USMC helmet covers and British Denison smocks spring to mind…

[flamethrowerguy]

@pdf27

So you aren’t even a reenactor but want to dress up like a war criminal anyway? It’s hardly the only modern cammo in WW2 in any case - USMC helmet covers and British Denison smocks spring to mind…

Running around in a Waffen-SS uniform these days is one thing…a moderator on a WW2 forum calling a group of about a million soldiers collective “war criminals” is another…

[pdf27]

Prosecution summing up at Nuremberg:

@Nuremberg Trials

It is the prosecution’s contention that the SS, as defined in Appendix B of the Indictment, was unlawful. Its participation in every phase of the conspiracy alleged in Count One is clear. As an organization founded on the principle that persons of “German blood” were a “master race,” it exemplified a, basic Nazi doctrine. It served as one of the means through which the conspirators acquired control of the German government. The operations of the SD, and of the SS Totenkopf Verbaende in concentration camps, were means used by the conspirators to secure their regime and terrorize their opponents as alleged in Count One. All components of the SS were involved from the very beginning in the Nazi program of Jewish extermination. Through the Allgemeine SS as a para-military organization, the SS Verfuegungstruppe and SS Totenkopf Verbaende as profes- sional combat forces, and the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle as a fifth column agency, it participated in preparations for aggressive war, and, through its militarized units,. in the seizure of Austria, the invasion of Czechoslovakia, the attack on Poland, and the waging of aggressive war in the West and in the East, as set forth in Counts One and Two of the Indictment. In the course of such war, all components of the SS had a part in the war crimes and crimes against humanity, set forth in Counts Three and Four,-the murder and ill treatment of civilian populations in occupied terri-tory, the murder and ill treatment of prisoners of war, and the Germanization of occupied territories.

The evidence has shown that the SS was a single enterprise- a unified organization. Some of its functions were, of course, per-formed by one branch or department or office, some by another. No single branch or department participated in every phase of its activity. But every branch and department and office was necessary to the functioning of the whole. The situation is much the same as in the case of the individual defendants at the bar. Not all participated in every act of the conspiracy ; but all per-formed a contributing part in the whole criminal scheme.

The evidence has shown, not only that the SS was an organization of volunteers but that applicants had to meet the strictest standards of selection. It was not easy to become an SS member. That was true of all branches of the SS. During the course of the war, as the demands for manpower increased and the losses of the Waffen SS grew heavier and heavier, there were occasions when men drafted for compulsory military service were assigned to units of the Waffen SS rather than to the Wehrmacht. Those instances were relatively few. Evidence of recruiting standards of the Waffen SS in 1943 has shown that membership in that branch was as essentially voluntary and highly selective as in other branches. The fact that some individuals may have been arbi-trarily assigned to some Waffen SS unit has no bearing on the issue before the tribunal, which is this, whether the SS was or was not an unlawful organization. Doubtless some of the members of the SS, or of other of the organizations alleged to be unlawful, might desire to show that their participation in the organization was small or innocuous, that compelling reasons drove them to apply for membership, that they were not fully conscious of its aims, or that they were mentally irresponsible when they became members. Such facts might or might not be relevant if they were on trial. But in any event this is not the forum to try out such matters.

The question before this Tribunal is simply this, whether the SS was or was not an unlawful organization. The evidence has fully shown what the aims and activities of the SS were. Some of these aims were stated in publications. The activities were so widespread and so notorious, covering so many fields of unlawful endeavor, that the illegality of the organization could not have been concealed. It was a notorious fact, and Himmler himself admitted that in 1936, when he said:

“I know that there are people in Germany now who become sick when they see these black coats. We know the reason and we don’t expect to be loved by too many.”

It was at all times the exclusive function and purpose of the SS to carry out the common objectives of the conspirators, Its activities in carrying out those functions involved the commission of the crimes defined in Article 6 of the Charter. By reason of its aims and the means used for the accomplishment thereof, the SS should be declared a criminal organization in accordance with Article 9 of the Charter.

[pdf27]

And the judgement:

@Nuremberg Trials

"The SS was utilized for purposes which were criminal under the Charter involving the persecution and extermination of the Jews, brutalities and killings in concentration camps, excesses in the administration of the occupied territories, the administration of the slave labor program and the mistreatment and murder of prisoners of war…In dealing with the SS the Tribunal includes all persons who had been officially accepted as members of the SS including the members of the Allgemeine SS, members of the Waffen SS, members of the SS Totenkoph Verbaende, and the members of any of the different police forces who were members of the SS.

The Tribunal declares to be criminal within the meaning of the Charter the group composed of those persons who had been officially accepted as members of the SS as enumerated in the preceding paragraph who became or remained members of the organization with knowledge that it was being used for the commission of acts declared criminal by Article 6 of the Charter, or who were personally implicated as members of the organization in the commission of such crimes, excluding, however, those who were drafted into membership by the State in such a way as to give them no choice in the matter, and who had committed no such crimes. The basis of this finding is the participation of the organization in War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity connected with the war; this group declared criminal cannot include, therefore, persons who had ceased to belong to the organizations enumerated in the proceeding paragraph prior to 1 September 1939."

Therefore, anybody who was voluntarily a member of any part of the SS after the first of September 1939 was a war criminial.

[ptimms]

He might be a conscripted man.

Seriously I had never spotted that before. If you proved you were conscripted in you were in the clear ? How would this apply to transfers. i.e. Luftwaffe ground crew transferred into Leibstandarte ? Or a lot of the ethnic divisions ? There were regular army units pushed into 36th SS Dirlewanger when it acheived divisional status?

[pdf27]

@ptimms

Seriously I had never spotted that before. If you proved you were conscripted in you were in the clear ? How would this apply to transfers. i.e. Luftwaffe ground crew transferred into Leibstandarte ? Or a lot of the ethnic divisions ? There were regular army units pushed into 36th SS Dirlewanger when it acheived divisional status?

Correct - you had to have voluntarily been a member of the SS after the 1st of September 1939 to commit the crime of membership of an illegal organisation. A good example of an IMT judgement on this can be found here, in the case of Matthias Graf.
It should be noted however that conscription is not a general excuse for war crimes, rather it means you cannot be convicted of membership of an illegal organisation. As pointed out in the prosecution closing arguments, however, the majority of SS members were volunteers of one sort or another.

[flamethrowerguy]

@pdf27

And the judgement:

Therefore, anybody who was voluntarily a member of any part of the SS after the first of September 1939 was a war criminial.

Uhm, in Germany there’s this naughty term especially used by the right fraction, that’s why I normally don’t use it. It’s called “victor’s justice”.

[Nickdfresh]

@flamethrowerguy

Uhm, in Germany there’s this naughty term especially used by the right fraction, that’s why I normally don’t use it. It’s called “victor’s justice”.

I don’t totally agree with either side in this debate. And I can see valid arguments for both. But having said that, there wasn’t a hell of a lot of “justice” afforded by the defeated in their occupied spheres of control…

[flamethrowerguy]

@Nickdfresh

I don’t totally agree with either side in this debate. And I can see valid arguments for both. But having said that, there wasn’t a hell of a lot of “justice” afforded by the defeated in their occupied spheres of control…

Yup, but I learned we have been liberated from the evil, and the liberators were the good ones. Furthermore, since when is a common grunt part of the judiciary?

[pdf27]

@flamethrowerguy

Uhm, in Germany there’s this naughty term especially used by the right fraction, that’s why I normally don’t use it. It’s called “victor’s justice”.

A justice which the victors have applied equally to themselves (if imperfectly) in the years since. If you think the SS was declared an illegal organisation purely because it was politically associated with a the ruling faction of a defeated state you’re off your rocker. As the prosecution closing arguments I posted clearly posit, they were declared an illegal organisation for their participation at all levels in a huge number of what are universally recognised as crimes - most notably mass murder.

[flamethrowerguy]

@pdf27

A justice which the victors have applied equally to themselves (if imperfectly) in the years since.

Imperfectly? Well, that’s a hell of an understatement. They even built a statue for Bomber Harris in 1992 as far as I recall!

@pdf27

As the prosecution closing arguments I posted clearly posit, they were declared an illegal organisation for their participation at all levels in a huge number of what are universally recognised as crimes - most notably mass murder.

No objection concerning the reasons (war crimes and crimes against humanity). “Where’s much light, there’s much shade”, former members of the Waffen-SS said about themselves retrospectively. Take the 2nd SS “Das Reich” as an example regarded as the probably most capable Waffen-SS division. War crimes? Yes, Oradour of course. A terrible war crime committed by one company. One out of 70 in that particular division, still it makes an outfit of about 15000 bloodthirsty psychopaths. Just one example. Oh, why again wasn’t the Red Army declared an illegal organisation? Katyn occured before the Waffen-SS really got started.

In one of my books there’s printed a document of modern Germany’s first Federal Chancellor Dr. Konrad Adenauer sent to Generaloberst a. D. Paul Hausser. Therein he declares that his formal apology of the Wehrmacht soldiers (in front of the Bundestag on December 3 1952) included dependants of the Waffen-SS as well since they exclusively fought honourably for Germany. In my opinion (surely not in yours) the words of this honourable man count more than those of the whole Nuremberg prosecutor posse.

BTW, why do you think why reenactors all over the world (but Germany) pick a Waffen-SS uniform of all things? Are all of these guys potential mass murderers? Or is it admiration for a military elite unit (talking early and mid war here)?

[pdf27]

@flamethrowerguy

Imperfectly? Well, that’s a hell of an understatement. They even built a statue for Bomber Harris in 1992 as far as I recall!

Actually, I was thinking of Lt Calley’s risibly small sentence after committing a crime rather similar to that of the SS and Wehrmacht at My Lai. If you want to claim bombing as a war crime, then you’ve got to both overturn quite a lot of established case law (Hague convention, etc. - the proportionality tests that are currently part of the Geneva conventions/protocols were so far as I’m aware first applied in the 1948 convention) as well as add quite a lot of crimes to your own side (starting with Guernica, and moving on through Rotterdam, Belgrade, etc. Belgrade was of course attacked without a declaration of war, which IIRC is perfidy, a war crime in itself).

@flamethrowerguy

War crimes? Yes, Oradour of course. A terrible war crime committed by one company. One out of 70 in that particular division, still it makes an outfit of about 15000 bloodthirsty psychopaths. Just one example.

Oradour is the best known because it was in France. Das Reich spent most of it’s time in the East, where war crimes were practically standard operating procedure for the Wehrmacht/SS.

@flamethrowerguy

Oh, why again wasn’t the Red Army declared an illegal organisation? Katyn occured before the Waffen-SS really got started.

Katyn was the NKVD, not the Red Army. And the Western Allies had no evidence which would stand up in court to prove their culpability - something emphatically not true for the SS.

@flamethrowerguy

Therein he declares that his formal apology of the Wehrmacht soldiers (in front of the Bundestag on December 3 1952) included dependants of the Waffen-SS as well since they exclusively fought honourably for Germany. In my opinion (surely not in yours) the words of this honourable man count more than those of the whole Nuremberg prosecutor posse.

Correct. The number of German soldiers (mainly in the East) who fought honourably is very limited indeed. Those who fought in the west largely but not exclusively followed the laws and customs of war (as C Coy 2 Bn Royal Norfolks found out in 1940).
I can find it credible that Adenauer believed that German soldiers had by and large fought honorably - their behaviour in the East was not widely known or talked about, and is hardly the sort of thing one would want to believe your own people would do. However, I do NOT find it credible that he knew what was going on better than the IMT at Nuremberg.

@flamethrowerguy

BTW, why do you think why reenactors all over the world (but Germany) pick a Waffen-SS uniform of all things? Are all of these guys potential mass murderers? Or is it admiration for a military elite unit (talking early and mid war here)?

The baptismal promises of the Catholic church include a statement rejecting “the glamour of evil”. I think that’s deeply perceptive, and very relevant in this case.

[mrongosajeg]

well any design shirt from SS?

I want to has one …and made ny my own…please help!

[flamethrowerguy]

@pdf27

If you want to claim bombing as a war crime, then you’ve got to both overturn quite a lot of established case law (Hague convention, etc. - the proportionality tests that are currently part of the Geneva conventions/protocols were so far as I’m aware first applied in the 1948 convention) as well as add quite a lot of crimes to your own side (starting with Guernica, and moving on through Rotterdam, Belgrade, etc. Belgrade was of course attacked without a declaration of war, which IIRC is perfidy, a war crime in itself)…

OK, you convinced me. “Carpet bombings” may not be that bad after all, even the already named Bomber Harris said: “In spite of all what happened in Hamburg, bombing remains a relatively humane measure”…
-Guernica was a misdrop due to bad sight, disadvantageous winds and crappy aiming devices of the JU52 (!) bombers of the still unexperienced german Luftwaffe. The actual target of the attack were bridges and street crossings eastwards of Guernica. Any civilian victim is one too much, but the Guernica air raid caused the death of 226 people, so it was not by far the mass terror bombing enemy- especially communist voices tried to make it.
-Rotterdam was a defended town, the city centrum was packed with strongholds. The only german units fighting in the town were some paratroopers, since own artillery was not available they called in the airstrike as “vertical artillery” (not my term). Article 25 of the Hague Convention says it’s forbidden to attack or shell UNDEFENDED towns, villages and homeplaces. Rotterdam lost this status since defended by the dutch army.
-Belgrade was attacked without declaration of war, right. As I said I can’t and don’t want to justify everything committed by Germany. But IIRC there was an attack of the RAF the very next day after the Belgrade bombings hitting the town of Sofia/Bulgaria. This attack was described as an act of reprisal by the UK itself.

@pdf27

Oradour is the best known because it was in France. Das Reich spent most of it’s time in the East, where war crimes were practically standard operating procedure for the Wehrmacht/SS.

Oh, now it’s the Wehrmacht as well. Man, that’s a tough one. I now have to handle that I actually descending from a bunch of war criminals since every male member of my family with the fitting age served in the Wehrmacht. Seriously: “war crimes were practically standard operating procedure”, that’s as cheap as it is wishy-washy.

@pdf27

Katyn was the NKVD, not the Red Army. And the Western Allies had no evidence which would stand up in court to prove their culpability - something emphatically not true for the SS.

The NKVD wasn’t called an illegal organisation at Nuremberg either, right? In place of Katyn I give you Nemmersdorf or hundreds of other east-prussian, silesian, pommeranian, hungarian villages for the Red Army…
No evidence for Katyn which would stand up in court to prove their culpability? Well, what evidence DID they need. What about the statements of the commission of 12 foreign official medicolegal expert from all over Europe plus an unknown number of british and american POWs as well as several members of the polish Red Cross? All these people have been “in situ” on invitation/request of the german government to prove that the killings actually took place in 1940 meaning under soviet domain. Honestly, the IMT hadn’t the balls to accuse Uncle Joe and his clique for anything!

@pdf27

The number of German soldiers (mainly in the East) who fought honourably is very limited indeed. Those who fought in the west largely but not exclusively followed the laws and customs of war (as C Coy 2 Bn Royal Norfolks found out in 1940).

Ah, this is generalizing crap again. You’re discrediting millions of decent front soldiers here. But WTF, they were only “krauts”, right?!? Do you think there was some kind of selection by the Wehrmacht leadership like “good guys westwards, bad guys eastwards”???
“Le Paradis” was a flawless war crime and the CO, SS-Obersturmführer Fritz Knöchlein, got what he deserved in 1948.

@pdf27

I can find it credible that Adenauer believed that German soldiers had by and large fought honorably - their behaviour in the East was not widely known or talked about, and is hardly the sort of thing one would want to believe your own people would do. However, I do NOT find it credible that he knew what was going on better than the IMT at Nuremberg.

I am sure as a former concentration camp inmate (cologne fair grounds) Adenauer thought nothing but the best of the Wehrmacht and the Third Reich without forming his own picture of things. Surely, the IMT at Nuremberg was impeccable…but how bout this little differences in the Jodl judgement? Didn’t one of their own call it a miscarriage (french judge Henri Donnedieu de Vabres)?

@pdf27

The baptismal promises of the Catholic church include a statement rejecting “the glamour of evil”. I think that’s deeply perceptive, and very relevant in this case.

Why did I just know you’d come up with that? I will immediately start searching the net for any NKVD-, Khmer Rouge- or Manson Family-reenactor groups.

[ptimms]

Interestingly the lad who is an AK re-enactor says an SS cammo is standard part of their kit. Not everyone born in a stable is a horse.

[pdf27]

@flamethrowerguy

OK, you convinced me. “Carpet bombings” may not be that bad after all, even the already named Bomber Harris said: “In spite of all what happened in Hamburg, bombing remains a relatively humane measure”…

Remember, Harris had to lead a bunch of young men facing fearful odds and get them to keep going despite this. He can’t exactly say during wartime that area bombing is aimed at killing women and kids, and postwar he’s backed himself into a corner.

@flamethrowerguy

-Rotterdam was a defended town, the city centrum was packed with strongholds. The only german units fighting in the town were some paratroopers, since own artillery was not available they called in the airstrike as “vertical artillery” (not my term). Article 25 of the Hague Convention says it’s forbidden to attack or shell UNDEFENDED towns, villages and homeplaces. Rotterdam lost this status since defended by the dutch army.

As Hamburg and Dresden were defenced by the German army. Here we meet the difference between illegality and immorality. Area bombing is almost certainly immoral (that is my point of view and the 4th Geneva Convention/Geneval Protocols introduced concepts of proportionality and military necessity which support this) but under the laws of the time it was legal.

@flamethrowerguy

Oh, now it’s the Wehrmacht as well. Man, that’s a tough one. I now have to handle that I actually descending from a bunch of war criminals since every male member of my family with the fitting age served in the Wehrmacht. Seriously: “war crimes were practically standard operating procedure”, that’s as cheap as it is wishy-washy.

It’s also reality on the Eastern Front. Soviet PoWs suffered horrendous mortality rates (camps like Novo-Alexandrovsk for the army and Karpovka for civilians), and there was acquiesence at all levels to the likes of the Commisar order in most branches of the Wehrmacht.

@flamethrowerguy

No evidence for Katyn which would stand up in court to prove their culpability? Well, what evidence DID they need.

Evidence that proves named individuals carried out the crimes in question. For example, this chap was an NCO in Einsatzkommando 6 and was found not guilty by the IMT due to lack of proof he did anything illegal beyond membership of the SD

@flamethrowerguy

Do you think there was some kind of selection by the Wehrmacht leadership like “good guys westwards, bad guys eastwards”???

I would refer you to the Stanford Prison Experiment. National Socialist ideology at senior levels took away the restraints on human behaviour, with very similar results to the Stanford experiment. These restraints remained in place in the West.

@flamethrowerguy

I am sure as a former concentration camp inmate (cologne fair grounds) Adenauer thought nothing but the best of the Wehrmacht and the Third Reich without forming his own picture of things.

He discriminated between the Wehrmacht/Waffen SS and Nazi Party/Gestapo/rest of the SS. His experience (and I note he was released before things in the concentration camps started to get really bad) would have been at the hands of the latter.

@flamethrowerguy

Why did I just know you’d come up with that? I will immediately start searching the net for any NKVD-, Khmer Rouge- or Manson Family-reenactor groups.

http://www.vikmo.ru/1m.html
I suspect the Khmer Rouge suffer from being jungle based - that kind of tends to ruin the glamour. Try seeing which side has more reenactors in something like Star Wars though - I bet most people want to be stormtroopers!