"Gunter Grass, Jagdpanther gunner" Topic

Gunter Grass, one of *the* German postwar literary figures, died today.

Along with novels like "The Tin Drum" (quite the movie!), he left this memoir of his service at the end of the war. He started out as a Flakhelfer, then volunteered for active duty and ended up as a Jagdpanther gunner in the SS Frundsberg Division on the Eastern front.

I find his account of the last months of the war very interesting and authentic:

link

I find it interesting that almost every piece of equipment he ended up using, from Jagdpanther to Italian submachine gun, was something he had not been trained in. He also gets across very well the mood of chaos and desperation that marked the collapse of the Reich.

It speaks volumes for the power of redemption and the ascent of the human spirit from the abyss of the human condition. I hope he finds peace.
Rod Robertson

I think in his case, it speaks volumes about his lack of redemption.

When his past in the SS came up a few years ago, he claimed that he was drafted by force. Only when reporters kept on digging deeper and found more and more evidence that he actually volunteered did he admit to it and tell his story. IMHO denying your past does not help redemption.

But I agree… I hope he finds his piece now.

Quite the story – after reading it I can see where The Tin Drum came from.

Interesting that he first tried to volunteer for U-Boats, but instead was sent to a labor battalion until he was drafted at 17. According to his essay he was sent a draft notice and assigned to the Frundsberg division. Compelling story about the chaos of the fall of the Reich.

Wow, thanks for the link. That was quite a read.

great link, just goes to show how a person can achieve great things in one aspect of their life while being less than great in others.
A great novelist but a fundamentally rather foolish 16 year old (like most 16 year olds).
Interesting as an insight into the mind of an individual growing up in Nazi Germany, I suspect that he was not that unusual, didn't really give the SS that much deep thought, most of us here probably are more aware of the SS and what it really stood for than half of the kids who volunteered were.

I personally don't judge him harshly for having joined the SS. It would be hard to expect him to have shown better understanding than the hundreds of thousands of young men in his same environment.

But, he should have come clean sooner about his history in the SS once he achieved fame, and had started making public judgements about German society.

The movie "The Tin Drum" is highly to be recommended, by the way. I liked it better than the book.

Amazing how many SS veterans 'didn't actually participate' in combat or their darker activities……….plausible deniability at its limits.

Based on pop history statistics, there were no actual soldiers in the SS, only truck drivers and 3 conscripted Bosnian repairmen.

Really? Iḿ sure Battlefront makes a Waffen SS Field Bakery and a Caesar do a set of Waffen SS Chiropodists in summer dress…..

The elite "Adolph Hitler Cupcakes and Candy Apples" battalion.

The issue of "redemption" hinges on forgiveness. The grant of or withholding of forgiveness" is only within he jurisdiction of the directly wronged. Your sense of moral outrage has nothing to do with it.

"Each man shall be punished for his own sin."

Remember that Grass is a novelist.