1945 Dresden terrorist attack?

[TWS]

Maybe he wasn't carrying large amounts of money. I remember an accommodation block being blown up in Northern Ireland, and every squaddie who had personal effects in that building lost expensive Pentax SLR camera's. This is what soldiers do... they lose more personal possessions and equipment than they actually had!

Not surprising in the least. Along the lines of airline lost baggage claims. Every claimant suddenly has an (imaginary) bunch of valuable items that were in said lost suitcase. I believe that's why airlines imposed strict liability limits years ago.

Yes, I found it "interesting" that Leutnant Bludau claimed to have had so many Reichsmarks in that briefcase.

[stuka f]

I hope to find my doc of loss, to see if he lost money as well...
First that came up to me, when seeing the paper, was he might have dumpt the military stuff in the hope not having to full fill his military duty...

[Watchdog]

Mark,
Please don't get your knickers in a twist. There's no reason to. I explained the gist of the document and explained why that term is on the document. Because that is what the Germans called it. Note that I even put it inside quotation marks.
I made no judgement of my own. Your post seems a little pre-emptively thin skinned and worried that such a debate may break out - but it did not, at least until you brought it up.
Please have a pint and sit back and understand my post was a dispassionate explanation of the contents of the document.

Hi Todd,
Sorry if you thought I was criticising you post, I definately was not!
I was agreeing with your interpretation of the document.
My comment re the terror thing was in response to the title of the thread which refers to the Dresden raids as a "Terror attack". I know that phrase is included in the document but as a thread title I was concerned that the long running controversy ( started by TR propaganda) be not encouraged here.

The Dresden episode was awful and so was the "Blitz" etc in UK but the British and US bomber crews were doing their duty. I don't know about the US Bomber force but the RAF Bomber Command vets have been very badly treated over the intervening decades by 2nd guessers who have no idea about that on which they pass judgement whilst the vets of Fighter Command have been lauded constantly (nothing against them).
Bomber Command vets had to pay for their own memorial only recently and it was defaced by ignorant louts painting words like "Murderers" on it. This in reference to men who died ensuring the freedom of these people to be arseholes.

I suppose I do react to any reference to terrorism in this context but I am not "thin skinned" (quite the opposite actually) just passionate and patriotic.

Once again, sorry if you thought I was misrepresenting your post, I wasn't.

Best wishes

Mark
PS I was a teenager when the US vets came home from Vietnam to appaling abuse from people they felt they were representing and I actually cried with rage on their behalf.

[HARRY THE MOLE]

numizz actually gave his thread the title of '1945 Dresden terrorist attack,' and for a fleeting moment I actually thought of something entirely different.

Cheers,
Steve

[Anderson]

Having that amount of cash in his briefcase might raise some suspicions as to why.

[drmessimer]

Leutnant Bludau was probably the paymaster for his company and the 5,000 RM (cash) was to have been paid out that month, probably on 14 or 15 February 1945. For the full details on pay in the German Amy in WWII the best source is; War Department Technical Manual TM-E30-452, Handbook on German Military Forces 1945. in which it says, "Every member of the German Armed Forces in active wartime service (except when a prisoner of war) receives tax-free war service pay (Wehrsold), paid to him in advance, monthly or at shorter intervals of not less than 10 days, by his unit paymaster." The Leutnant would have to have accounted for the loss of the money. Dwight

[TWS]

Hi Todd,
Sorry if you thought I was criticising you post, I definately was not!
I was agreeing with your interpretation of the document.

Hi Mark,
Just quoting a small bit of your post so you'll get notification. Thanks for clarifying. Since you quoted my post, I thought your entire post was directed at mine.

Yes, the Allies did a few things that are being second-guessed these days, with Dresden and Hamburg being just a couple. The destruction of Monte Cassino is another as is much of the behavior of Gen. Mark Clark during the Italian campaign. As you pointed out, Dresden was a bit of "reaping what you sow" after the London Blitz and Coventry, etc.
Luckily, the U.S. Bomber vets do not seem to be under attack as in the U.K. Here it's more the groups upset about the use of the atomic bombs but they don't seem to single out the memory of our veterans in their condemnation. Their angst seems to be facilitated by an ignorance of history: Not knowing how ghastly the fighting on Tarawa, Iwo Jima, etc. was and what that foreshadowed for the alternative of landing on the Japanese mainland - which would have been much worse for both sides.
But I digress and those are topics probably better discussed elsewhere and not here.

[drmessimer]

Todd, I disagree that " those are topics probably better discussed elsewhere and not here." This thread, in its coarse, has logically led to that discussion. If this Forum has a collateral role to discuss the issues associated with the primary topic, then why not go there? Though we are primarily focused on collecting, it is equally important to know all aspects of that which one is collecting. To collect without learning is at least a shallow approach if not pointless. I totally support your contributions to the thread. Dwight

[TWS]

Todd, I disagree that " those are topics probably better discussed elsewhere and not here." This thread, in its coarse, has logically led to that discussion. If this Forum has a collateral role to discuss the issues associated with the primary topic, then why not go there? Though we are primarily focused on collecting, it is equally important to know all aspects of that which one is collecting. To collect without learning is at least a shallow approach if not pointless. I totally support your contributions to the thread. Dwight

Hi Dwight,

I wrote that because I have seen way too many threads get heated when issues of... for lack of a better term off the top of my head..."moral right and wrong" come up for discussion. For example, I'm in a couple Facebook groups, one focused on Stalingrad and another that is a research forum about the Eastern Front battles. Every time topics like "Who was worse, Stalin or Hitler?" or matters like the Holocaust come up, it devolves into a shouting match. Luckily the moderators usually step in and remind all participants that the group is to discuss military operations.

If you follow my threads, you'll see I am really big, "Yuge!" (Trump voice) about learning about the history of the items we collect. I routinely post items from my collection with biographical data about the soldier who wore them, or a bit on the history of the unit the item came from. I am sometimes disappointed that some collectors can tell you every manufacturer variation about an item but would be hard pressed to discuss some of the major battles of WWII in any depth. They only study the minutiae of the item and not the historical context. Thankfully, though, I think most collectors tend to study the history too.

So, in short, we are very much of the same mindset about learning while collecting. I just find some topics are hot buttons likely to lead to unpleasant exchanges.