SS is not the same as Waffen-SS. The Waffen-SS again had foreign legions. These Waffen-SS foreign legions were volunteers at first, later a mixture of volunteers, voluntolds, conscripts and in the end pressured and/or forced conscripts.

I don’t know about the individual motives of the person in question. But the Waffen-SS foreign legions are too much of a mixed bag to generalize.

In Eastern Europe many joined the Waffen-SS foreign legions to fight against the occupation of their countries by the Soviets. Their values and goals didn’t necessarily align with those of the Nazis, except that they had a common enemy.

Edit: The Waffen-SS was part of the German war machine and they did commit plenty of war crimes. I was commenting to differentiate between two different criminal organizations here (SS/Waffen-SS) and to explain how the recruitment changed as the war went on. It was a mistake on my part to omit this, given the sensibility of the topic. Please do not take my comment as an attempt at whitewashing the numerous crimes of various Waffen-SS units.

[–] gnuhaut@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Ah you're right, there were also conscripts in some Waffen-SS units. Looks like this guy volunteered though, as it says in the article:

A blog by an association of its veterans, called “Combatant News” in Ukrainian, includes an autobiographical entry by a Yaroslav Hunka that says he volunteered to join the division in 1943 and several photographs of him during the war. The captions say the pictures show Hunka during SS artillery training in Munich in December 1943 and in Neuhammer (now Świętoszów), Poland, the site of Himmler’s visit.

In posts to the blog dated 2011 and 2010, Hunka describes 1941 to 1943 as the happiest years of his life and compares the veterans of his unit, who were scattered across the world, to Jews.

I guess they couldn't confirm that this is definitely that same Yaroslav Hunka, though that would be some coincidence. Not only did he volunteer, he loved it. And what even is that comparison? That doesn't sound like a person who has learned anything.

Their values and goals didn’t necessarily align with those of the Nazis, other than they had a common enemy.

You call it "not necessarily aligned, other than". I call it very much aligned. The difference in opinion can't be that big or important if they're willing to kill and die under Nazi orders.

[–] Tarte@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

The difference in opinion can’t be that big or important if they’re willing to kill and die under Nazi orders.

That’s a valid point. They also did commit war crimes, including dozens of massacres. I am certainly not trying to whitewash the Waffen-SS foreign units. They are to blame for what they did, including those of them that were coerced or conscripted.

I was talking from a historical perspective and trying to provide some needed context about those organizations and why it’s incorrect to equate membership in a Waffen-SS foreign legion with membership in the SS. Both organizations are guilty of war crimes and atrocities. With the Waffen-SS it’s less certain if each and every member is guilty and to which degree. I cannot say much about Yaroslav Hunka, whose name I have heard for the first time here. From what is in the article, he sounds guilty as fuck.

I have also updated my above comment to clarify this.