Re: Glorification of Estonian Waffen SS Re: Vodka, vobla i chastushka

In article <1193294087.431850.304020@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
vello <vellokala@xxxxxx> wrote:

<deletions>

Well it was not this way with military men. Surely there was little
enthusiasm about German occupation in Estonia but in given conditions
it was considered as "lesser evil". I never find sources about
military men killed by germans for being Estonian soldiers-officers -
and seemingly you, too.

Well you cut (or your source cuts) a part of Rosenberg's claim. It
ends this way: "blabla more then 50% (no mention was it due german or
nordic presence) blabla "therefore they must be considered as kindred
nation".

Source: http://www.historycommission.ee/temp/pdf/conclusions_en.pdf

<quote>
<deletions>
THE KILLING OF AT LEAST A FURTHER 7000
PEOPLE, INCLUDING APPROXIMATELY 6000
ETHNIC ESTONIANS

The Commission's researchers have undertaken a
statistical analysis of post-war (1944 onward) files
from Soviet era archives, and a close analysis of
existing databases. The researchers have estimated
that some 6000 ethnic Estonians, apart from Jews
and Roma, were killed during this period. In addi-
tion, some 1000 people of uncertain citizenship,
mostly ethnic Russians, were killed. In some cases
there was some form of trial; in others, no attempt at
any judicial process. The majority of those killed
appear to have been ethnic Estonians, and to have
been accused of membership in destruction battal-
ions, or of having Communist sympathies. There is
evidence that the dead included family members of
the accused. The majority of killings took place prior
to the spring of 1942.
<deletions>
</quote>


Source:
http://www.estonica.org/eng/lugu.html?menyy_id=99&kateg=43&alam=61&leht=3

<quote>
<deletions>
The Estonians' opinion of the German authorities in the rear sank even
further because of the witch-hunt in the early months of the occupation
where all people who had collaborated with the communists, or were
suspected of doing so, were arrested: about 7000 Estonian citizens were
executed, of them about 5000 ethnic Estonians. The Nazis also
exterminated the Jewish and Romany populations who had not managed to
flee Estonia. In addition, thousands of prisoners of war and Jews from
other European countries perished in the concentration camps built by
the Germans in Estonia.
 
In 1942, when the difficulties that Germany faced in its war with the
Allied Forces were becoming more pronounced, young people who were
previously considered of an inferior race, including Estonians, were
recruited into the Waffen-SS with a choice between the front-line
divisions or service in a labour battalion in Germany. There was a
promise to form an Estonian Legion to defend the Estonian borders. As
there were not enough volunteers, general conscription was ordered.
  
To escape the German army, thousands of young men fled to Finland. The
number of Estonians in Finland increased to the extent that a separate
entity, the 200th Infantry Regiment, was formed.
<deletions>
</quote>

As I have understood things from readings in various sources:

1. The Germans knew that the Soviets had liquidated most of the Estonian
military in 1940. Those members of the former Estonian military who
survived had been incorporated into the Soviet army and were naturally
regarded by the Germans as Soviet collaborators or sympathizers. They
and their families were the primary objects of the witch-hunt mentioned
above during the first months of the occupation. The higher an
Estonian's military rank in the Soviet army, the greater the suspicion
on the part of the Germans that he had been a Soviet collaborator or
sympathizer and the higher the probability that he and his family would
be the objects of German retribution.

2. The Estonians who avoided conscription into the German army and
escaped to Finland were regarded by the Germans as draft-dodgers. They
were arrested, put into concentration camps, or made to work as forced
labor under extremely harsh conditions if they were caught by the
German authorities. Some of them wound up and died at the notorious
Salaspils concentration camp outside Riga, a facility where draft
dodgers from Ostland were often interned.

Regards,
Eugene Holman
.

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