[Andreas Brekken]

Hi, Nick

I wasn't referring to you with regards to the justifying part in the last message, but to the entry by Tom Semenza, sorry for the misunderstanding.

I see your point with regards to the NSDAP government and I agree that we can see this now. My point was to what extent this was well known in the public outside Germany at the time. That the german nation under this government was aggressive and active with regards to extending their influence must have been well known, but I am unsure if this would be at this point in the war enough to make, for example, unit leaders at low level inform their soldiers that during fighting against the german Wehrmacht the Geneva convention was not to be considered.

That we can look back now and state that the german nation of 1933-1945 was one of the worst regimes ever, is our privilege, but a french infantry commander in the field in May 1940 would in my opinion not have this insight (I might be wrong, someone with better information about the state of the french army at the time should probably inform us of what was the situation).

If these soldiers we are talking about did what the story says, namely swiftly beheaded the crew of a german bomber, I would think that this was not common and a definitely not a result of a declared policy in the french army on how to treat german airmen that were downed on french territory?

That we in retrospective may believe that since this bomber crew fought for what we think was an evil regime and only got what they deserved is another case.

I myself find it hard to state that since the german Wehrmacht were under NSDAP government at the time, it was justifiable to neglect the Geneva convention (when considering german troops) and for example execute germans if you had this possibility.

Ok, enough from me, I have some real document digging to do.

Regards,
Andreas