UID:
almahu_9947413626502882
Format:
1 online resource (vii, 304 pages) :
,
digital, PDF file(s).
ISBN:
9781107110106 (ebook)
Content:
This is an innovative account of how the concept of comradeship shaped the actions, emotions and ideas of ordinary German soldiers across the two world wars and during the Holocaust. Using individual soldiers' diaries, personal letters and memoirs, Kühne reveals the ways in which soldiers' longing for community, and the practice of male bonding and togetherness, sustained the Third Reich's pursuit of war and genocide. Comradeship fuelled the soldiers' fighting morale. It also propelled these soldiers forward into war crimes and acts of mass murders. Yet, by practising comradeship, the soldiers could maintain the myth that they were morally sacrosanct. Post-1945, the notion of kameradschaft as the epitome of humane and egalitarian solidarity allowed Hitler's soldiers to join the euphoria for peace and democracy in the Federal Republic, finally shaping popular memories of the war through the end of the twentieth century.
Note:
Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 28 Feb 2017).
,
Introduction: a concept from a different world -- Part I. The myth of comradeship, 1914-1939 -- Healing -- Coalescence -- Steeling -- Part II. The practice of comradeship, 1939-1945 -- Assimilation -- Megalomania -- Nemesis -- Part III. The decline of comradeship, 1945-1995 -- Privatisation -- Integration -- Demonisation -- Conclusion: protean masculinity and Germany's 20th century.
Additional Edition:
Print version: ISBN 9781107046368
Language:
English
URL:
https://doi.org/10.1017/9781107110106
