Hirohito was really a figurehead. He was really useful in transitioning to a post war Japan. Sometimes reality takes over from ideals. I e Warner von Braun the brilliant physicist.
I often wonder why, compared to the tens of thousands of Germans who were prosecuted for war crimes, relatively few japanese were tried Also, when the allies became tired of the trials,the west german government took over In Japan the whole issue of japanese war crimes was swept under the carpet For some reason the allies treated Germany much harsher then Japan Of course,in Germany there were four zones of occupation,the allied control commission and all the rest In Japan there was only MacArthur, acting as some modern day Shogun He was soft on the japanese,and one has to wonder what he got out of it
@@daveanderson3805 one should wonder what they get out on getting so harsh on Germany.. they maybe lost the War but won the moneyrace.. haha no. 2 only second to those who stole their Gold after ww2 in goldreserves… they maybe won the peace to haha…
@2:24 Hitler did not seize power in 1933! He was appointed Chancellor by an aging President Paul Von Hindenburg who thought he could control Hitler! Hitler did not seize power until Hindenburg died in August 1934! Keitel's death was a joke! Why didn't any Russian generals face any war crimes trials for invading 5 countries before June 22, 1941? Or for the brutal murders of 25,000 Polish officers and politicians in the 1940 Katyn Massarce? Also the Soviets did not comply with Geneva Convention rules on German POW's!
Well said! The media never talked about 7 million Ukrainian people starved to death at gunpoint by Stalin in the early 1930's! Or the plan to invade Germany! H____ beat them to the punch! If you win the war you get to write the history books! WWII was a battle in an ongoing war to destroy Western Civilization.
@@paulcrooks6008 For sure, there were millions of people that had already been through the Prussian Empire desecration. Praying to "Satin" is a dip into the future guardians of your LIFE. And their panic about persons perpetrating the exact same wrong ideals as those AGAIN in error for the people that didn't pray for and endless assault upon even Desault!
Because it was ultimately U.S.S.R. that reached Berlin first and effectively ended the war. Remember, they made a treaty with the Nazis that was supposed to stop the Nazis from invading the U.S.S.R.! The Nazis didn't keep that treaty.
Still nazi scum no matter what the Russians did or didn't do and it sure as all hell ain't gonna somehow exonerate no nazi scum. nazi scum communist scum F...them both! LOMFL
The Germans missed a great opportunity in handling occupied areas with a fist. As the Germans entered Russia, the mostly ethnic populations actually hailed their arrival. Instead of expanding on that liberation image, the evil from the top down and a feeling of superiority doomed Barbarossa from the very beginning in spite of their speedy advances in the first few months.
The Germans were guilty of widespread atrocities in the newly liberated areas within the USSR that initially welcomed their arrival in 1941. The anti Communist/Soviet local population there simply exchanged one suppressive regime for another.
@@angloaust1575 No, we didn't conquer anyone in Vietnam. We simply helped an existing nation not get run over by another nation before we deserted them. Ironically Vietnam's former benefactor China would soon afterward invade them and cause a fair amount of death and destruction. At least China was genuinely provoked by Vietnam's behavior.
@Tavo Tamm Oh, the indigenous population was on America's side in these conflicts, certainly to the point where they knew the alternative was worse. In fact, when South Korea's ruler Syngman Rhee was deposed in 1960, American property was protected. And though the Iraqis were unhappy with American troops, they definitely did not want a return of Saddam! BTW the other ethnics did not necessarily love the Germans but they definitely did not welcome the Russians, and even fought an organized resistance against them for several years.
@@wr1120 von rundsted was shorter and an aristocrat Wilhelm on the other hand was blue collar all the way .von rundsted was highly decorated knights cross and all keitel had decorations but his were from commendable feats of organisation and logistics beans bullets and bad guys not combat but he was, next to borman Hitler's main YES man.
I don't think Keitel hit his head on the trap door, but rather the trap door swung back and hit him in the face. John C. Woods was incompetent. He didn't know how to tie the proper knot and placed it at the back of the head, which forces the head to bend forward. That doesn't break the neck, but forces the tongue out. The knot should be placed under the left jaw to throw the head back, which snaps the 2nd and 3rd vertebrae.
Actually from what I've read (two books by US Army doctors - one MD and one psychologist, both of whom had daily interaction with the Nuremberg defendants) Woods was to be the executioner of convicted war criminals for US Army in Europe. It's believed that the inconsistencies were intentional, and he was relieved of duty. I've seen a morbid photo of him posing with a noose (half of it shown here 7:47). Geneva Convention... Only the Allied powers adhered to the provisos of the GenCon
@@philipmorgan6048 No he was known as Lakeitel (Lackey is Lakai in german) and Hitler was known in the german military as "Austrias revenge for Königgrätz"
The worst day in the life of Keitel was not when he died by hanging but when he was forced to sign Germany's surrender in front of french general,Delattre de Tassigny.He would have said : "That's all we needed ! "
He was an armchair general. Unfortunately for us all, most of today´s armies are filled with Keitels. Sending drones thousands of miles to their targets to kill people like it were a video game. Cowardice as a military tradition. No war can be won with these armchair, video-gaming officers like we have now.
Comparatively speaking, from what little I know about Pierrepoint he had a more professional outlook to his job, whereas the executioner here was allegedly kicked out of the pre-war Navy for having sociopathic tendencies. I think he got the job because no one else wanted to be an executioner. I also don't think anyone cared if he did a good job or not, just so long as they got executed.
Many executioners in the states had "much trouble" too when they executed "criminals" in the States, with the electric chair they often barbeceued the condemend, thats american tradition from the old west lnych mob times, "let em suffer"
@@Sturminfantrist the U.S. nearly always had been better at the firing squad as opposed to hanging inherited by the British. Not all of the original 13 colonies hanged. It was pretty much an even split between hanging and the firing squad. Whilst traditionally being shot was for the military, more than a few colonies and later territories as expanded westward applied it equally to civilian, soldier, sailor militiamen alike. One territory in particular, the Utah territory and the present-day State of Utah, the firing squad was used almost exclusively for all condemned to death, civilian or otherwise. They still do it today as a secondary option per the condemned's choice between that and Lethal Injection. I would have had it so if Pierrepoint wasn't available, a firing squad was on standby at all times ready to carry out death sentences.
@@muskokamike127 history is written by the victor. people seem to think you cannot commit crimes against germans or even nazis. we are not allowed even to think that.(ANY anti.......)
@david toler When you compare the terrible suffering and destruction involved in both wars, you have to wonder if the advances in technology are worth the cost? The technology would have happened eventually. The horror of two world wars seems like a terrible price to pay, just to get the technology sooner.
@david toler The major items that came out of WW1 were tanks, sub-machine guns and poison gas. WW2 gave us atomic bombs, nerve gas and ballistic missiles. The Nazi party gave us industrialised mass murder. The Japanese gave us biological warfare as a routine exercise. Everything else existed before the related wars.
@Dan Beech I think may be. The german King Wilhelm2 was partly disabled with his arm. He did compensate it with military attitude. At the other hand he was grandson of Queen Viktoria. What would happen if grandma would have had better contact to her grandson? Usualy you do not Visite your relatives with batleships.
@@torstenkiessling2933 Victoria had been dead for 13 years when WW1 started. Germany had been attacking France about twice a century and it had become a tradition…
@@allangibson2408 Hi Allan, i did not know, that Queen Victoria pased away allready long before WW1. As I learned at Google even the mother of Wilhelm2 was british. Yes the conflict between prusia and france is a point. As I learned at school. Since france was a centralized state. Germany was Split in various small parts. There was also the austria hungarian empire as Part of the game. As Napoleon attacked Russia in 1812 part of german countries joyned Napoleon side, while others did fight together with russia. This history is still allive between East and West Germany. Prussia with Bismark unified Germany by several wars. Germany was founded in Versailes in 1871. This conflicts are allways at the expence of somebody else.
8:09 Wilhelm Keitel got it worse than anyone else in the Gallows at Nuremberg, 28/24 (some sources say it was 24 minutes and others say 28 minutes I’m not sure which is right) minutes is a VERY long time to strangle to death. Jodl’s face looked quite bruised up but Keitel’s face literally looked like someone tried to cut it off and gave up half way through. I find it ironic that Keitel suffered the most of all the defendants when he was perhaps the most remorseful of all the Nazis condemned (according to his interpreter Lion Le Tanson he cried when shown pictures from Dachau Concentration Camp of Holocaust victims needing to be scrapped up into piles with bulldozers as though they were just garbage) to death admitting his (as well as making his peace with God through the help of Protestant Chaplain Henry Gerecke) guilt, accepting execution as his consequence and acknowledging his failure to see that there is a limit even for a soldier’s performance of duty which involves obeying orders.
If they didn't follow Hitler's orders they would have been killed along with their family. This happened to my grandmothers first husband, he was against the Nazi's and refused to kill unarmed civilians so he was killed and Gestapo was sent after his family but my grandmother fled into hiding with her two children.
@Dan Beech Just because you want something to be true doesn't make it true, I also have no sympathy for those Nazi's, or anyone for that matter because I'm a sociopath, so you're wrong again.
The question is rather whether you aspire to get a high position in the army of an obviously criminal regime or whether you have the ethics to refrain from it. No one gets his position without wanting it.
What baffles my mind is, he went to the signing a condemned man. He knew it and he still went. The Soviets and allies shook his hands knowing they were going to execute him shortly thereafter. Its just mind boggling
Please comment.. Any comment raises a video up in RUclips's algorithm, and more people will see it. And more people DO need to see this great series. Thank you.
Hitler did not "seize control" in 1933. He was legally elected and legally replaced Paul von Hindenburg, when von Hindenburg could no longer carry out his duties, as the civil head of the German Government. Please be more accurate in your future narrations.
ALSO HE MENTIONS THE GENEVA CONVENTION AND SOVIET POWS. BUT FAILED TO TELL THAT THE SOVIETS DID NOT SIGN THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS SO UNDER THE RULES OF WAR THE SOVIETS WERE NOT PROTECTED UNDER THE GENEVA CONVENTION.
True. But that's where his legitimacy ended. During the next eighteen months, Hitler eliminated nearly all sources of opposition, both within the Nazi Party and in Germany. By August 1934, he had declared himself Führer - the sole leader of Germany.
@@mathewm7136 His legitimacy ended? In what way? What state did not recognize him as the legitimate leader of Germany? And under what rules? Rules under the so called "Weimar Republic"? The circus that was.
@@goolag6536 Good, bad or somewhere in the middle, the Weimar was the Democratic government in place. He used his position to destroy it. In August, 1934, he used his position as chancellor to declare himself the sole leader - termed "Fuhrer" - of Nazi Germany for life. That's one of the classic signals of a dictatorship. He was able to enforce his declaration by completely eliminating the democratic system that he used to get into the Chancellors position in the first place. All other countries were forced to recognize him because they had no choice what so ever.
He went like a man, he deserved Albert Pierrepoint, not the alcoholic and idiot Sgt. John C. Woods, who had previously been kicked out of the Navy for being a “head case”.
Zoydian: He had no other choice but to resign himself to what was waiting.. You probably never been at the edge of death. But believe me after you try everything and fail you know is the end.. That is when you start accepting what is coming.. I been in that position believe me.. And the last thought I had were of resignation to the inevitable. Always trying to look my best! I was lucky and do not know how... But here I am!
Hearing the hanging didn't go smoothly put a smile on my face .Nazis killed both my grandfather and his dog and my dad witnessed it all at the age of 7 .
A grandmother I never knew and some neighbours of hers were killed by a flying bomb in July 1944 so I don't feel much sympathy for the top Nazis. I don't even build models of their WW II equipment.
@@gurjeetsingh-gd1wr Just outside London in Britain. My grandfather was at work on the London docks, my aunt was away in the service, my mother had gone out to work. When she came home for lunch I believe, police barriers and no house.
As Clausewitz said, "War is the continuation of policy by other means." It is not the function of military officers to determine a nation's foreign policy. It is the function of military officers to prepare the military operations required by that foreign policy. WW2 was not the first time that the victors forgot this reality. After WW1, the Allies wanted to try at least 850 Germans for war crimes. It never happened because the German and Dutch governments refused to cooperate.
First, the armed forces of the USA did not begin requiring servicemembers to disobey illegal orders until AFTER Nuremberg. Second, the Final Solution was an SS operation, not an OKW one. Keitel was executed for losing.
@ That was after WW2. The idea of refusing illegal orders didn't come about until the war crimes trials, with many defendants stating some variation of "I was following orders".
@ yeah and we all know what happend when Capt. Medina and Lt. Calley gave orders to kill more then 200 Women and Children in My Lai VN or what the MPs in Abu Ghraib did .
Keitel was Hitler’s ‘lackey’ who had no backbone to resist Hitler’s appalling criminal directives during the conquest and occupation of central and Eastern Europe. As Hitler’s puppet, he signed’ a number of criminal military orders from April 1941.The orders went way beyond established codes of conduct for the military - and broadly allowed the execution of Jews, civilians and non-combatants for any reason. Keitel went along with all of Hitler’s directives by ignoring the Geneva Convention. He ordered officers to use the utmost severity in stamping out resistance (coded language for mass murder) in Russia and in other occupied countries. He also sanctioned the practice of taking - and executing up to 100 communists for every German soldier killed. He endorsed Hitler’s ‘Night and Fog’ order, where foreign nationals could be deported to Germany and tried by special courts, or in some cases be picked up by the Gestapo, who would then send them to a concentration camp, without any reason. The fate of these foreign nationals would be kept a secret. Keitel, also in October 1942, signed the Commando Order, that authorized the killing of enemy special operations troops, even when captured in uniform. Keitel signed scores of orders where captured solders based on his signature, called for soldiers and political prisoners to be killed or to ‘disappear.’ Keitel’s behaviour was cowardly and despicable. He was fully aware of the consequences of the orders he was signing. His execution was inevitable and justified.
A pretty extensive list of his crimes, the only other things I can think of to add is that he also was was involved with reprisals to a certain extent after the 1944 July plot on Hitler’s life and he was in charge of harsh discipline near the end of the war, offering bounties to hunt down deserters, everyone that was left in Germany was to fight to the bitter end or else. Keitel never ever told Hitler NO while he was in power, blinded by the notion of obedience and loyalty as a soldier which was instilled in him at an early age. Keitel (along with Jodl) needed to be made an example of at Nuremburg and the fact that somebody who was as lost as him could self reflect and change his mind before it was (death) too late I think can only be a good thing.
Keitel signed operational orders-including directives authorizing the shooting of allied commandos or soviet political commissars taken prisoner in uniform and other directives making it possible to detain civilians without due process.
Keitel was one who served in the army of whom had the mission of getting rid of communism. The United States of America has the same stated goal and so does the western world so why was one like Keitel executed seeing that the aims of the so called victorious alliance were the same as the defeated axis powers? What is it that is not being declared here?
@@gyasikrasineb4808 Gosh, you're clearly in total denail there then. Some in my family were commandos at that time. Even American ones were simply executed on the spot or put in concentration. The guy was a war criminal. End of story.
Summary executions are not the American way of dealing with its ideological enemies. The USA did that to neither Commies in neither Korea nor Vietnam nor to Ba'athists in Iraq. The Soviet Union at least went through a legal process (flawed as one would expect in view of the system) with war criminals caught in the field and with Nazi collaborators. Membership in the Nazi Party was never grounds in itself for execution. The legal status of Soviet commissars was shaky unless they actually were combatants. The Commissar Order was deemed criminal in nature. To be sure, neither the USA nor the UK had them but both concurred that summary executions of people for their political beliefs and affiliations was wrong. The Commissar Order was well known, and it may have kept beleaguered Soviet units fighting longer than otherwise because the Commissar knew that he would be murdered.If you really want to be more successful in waging war, then you must make surrender easier and less objectionable. The Commissar Order may have allowed the Red Army to fight harder than otherwise and take a heavier toll of German troops than otherwise. It was both a blunder and a crime. That is Keitel for you.
I often thought the hangman, Woods, was given the title of executioner since he was known for being incompetent and did not have a clean record. Ironic to say, if it was intentional, it would be fitting for a criminal executioner to kill another and do a piss poor job of it
Ironically he met an early demise as well. While serving with the 7th Engineer Brigade in Eniwetok, Marshall Islands, on July 21, 1950, Woods died from electrocution while attempting to repair an engineer lighting set.
It's a stain on the "justice" of the trials that their sentences could not be carried out humanly. It should also be noted that several allied generals also ordered the execution of uniformed POW's at various points without sanction either at the time or after the war.... Remember people, history is never black and white but rather a kaleidoscope of grey....
Truman was also a criminal. The mass killing of Civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki was the biggest war crime. Also the mass killing of civilians in Korea.
Yeah I can't fathom this "Vengeful" crap... he was executed because he condoned/was complicit in the comission of war crimes. Misleading title, he's not a victim of some sort of "revenge".
The orders he signed were mainly against the Sovietunion. But the Sovietunion never signed the geneva convention so germany was not bound to fulfill it. Sorry for my bad english
@@JamesAlexander14 General Milley made it abundantly clear: that Joe Biden had been lawfully elected President and Kamala Harris was lawfully elected Vice-President, and their terms in office would begin on January 20 no matter what President Trump did. Joe Biden didn't exercise any power because he had no Presidential powers at the time.
so who prosecuted the USSR generals who invaded Poland in 1939? I guess the concept of kangaroo courts was still popular in both the east and west. show trail???
Yes you are right, the victorious Allies in many cases were a bunch of hypocrites when it came to punishing war criminals. If they were any use post-war against the Communist Bloc or weapon development they got away with murder, German or Japanese.
@@dp-sr1fd eh, the cases weren't that many. And, as the saying goes "No matter how many innocent people lost their lives, killing one guilty person more ain't going to bring a single sole back."
@@dp-sr1fd it was simply vengeance. the moral element was empty. not saying that the guilty didn't deserve killing, but they missed all of Uncle Joe's murdering, raping clan.
I'm guessing that he was a competent if soulless administrator. He transformed the German Army into the Nazi Army, making it subordinate to those who chose mass murder over a humane course of actions that would have better served the Wehrmacht. I can easily contrast him to General George C. Marshall, who had the most analogous position in the US Armed Forces. By demanding humane treatment of Italian and German civilians who had just been conquered, Marshall (in concurrence with FDR and Churchill) could win the peace. Hitler and Keitel could never win the peace, the ultimate objective of a well-thought-out military campaign. General George C. Marshall would eventually win a Nobel Peace prize for humane deeds to keep the peace that he won, and Field Marshal Keitel would dangle and strangle for his complicity in genocide. I'm not saying that American and British forces, especially by their air forces, weren't brutal and lethal. Then again, the Axis Powers brought such upon themselves through their earlier and more persistent brutality. As Erwin Rommel showed, it was possible for a German commander to countermand the worst tendencies of Nazism if those tendencies impeded victory. . The Nazis lost the war because of their atrocities, and Keitel was complicit in the extreme. He was a genocidal figure, and he was nearly as culpable as the more repugnant mobile killing units and the secret police in the field. The only military chiefs more horrible than he were the chieftains like Attila the Hun, Timur Lenk, and Genghis Khan. Keitel brought nothing but mass suffering to the world, whether of conquered people or the German armed forces. He was the least heroic general possible, a sniveling coward when having to choose between absolute evil and its mitigation. .
@@Powersnufkin looks like he has! Perhaps you had better start reading yourself, the army were willing to comply to the Nazi genocidal plans, don't forget he was regular army no ss,, and don't forget the army swore alliegence to that certain Nazi called Adolf, so yes the bastards were Nazis.
@@rogernicholls2079 Yes it’s true, Keitel was one of those quoted as saying “Furor command we will follow” which went for the army as well and he even had a few soldiers/officers that didn’t comply handed over to the gestapo. Perhaps his most infamous quote was “such misgivings belong to a frivolous war we are dealing with the annihilation of a way of life which is why I approve of these measures”. Perhaps Keitel’s biggest issue was that he was always sheltered from the grim reality of the decree’s he was signing, he never actually saw any shootings or concentration camps in action for that matter. However once he was in Nuremberg and forced to see and think about the real human suffering he had helped cause it seems to me he in fact did have a conscience that he suppressed. After being shown Holocaust footage and pictures (which absolutely tore him up inside) there was no way he could use “I was just following orders nothing more” as an excuse nor did he want to, he knew he had to die for what he had done. In the end the only thing he was hoping for himself was that he could somehow make peace with (which Henry Gerecke may have actually succeeded in helping him do) god before he died.
@@paulbrower3297 Completely true! German Armies turned into Nazi Armies. They became bloodthirsty robots,led by anti-semitic monsters whose top satanic leader was the scoundrel Hitler!!
@@remember_Pat_Tillman Devastating reply. No doubt indicative of the the wit and perspicacity passed on by your ancestors. I'm sure your people will master fire and sharpened stones any day now. Considering the stilted and atonal narration, the gloss of pre-packaged material written in an idiom obviously unnatural to the speaker, his difficulty pronouncing common terms, and the general lack of theme or direction in the presentation of both opinions and facts, you seem to fit right in here. Special Ed class in the basement for Special Jim.
6:07 THE SOVIETS DID NOT SIGN THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS THAT WOULD HOLD THEM ACCOUNTABLE TO THE RULES OF WAR, THEREFORE THE SOVIETS WERE NOT PROTECTED UNDER THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS.
Um. Yes it does. Germany did sign it. And the Geneva convention doesn't say you only have to treat pow's of nations that signed the treaty . It states pow's. Not to mention what the Nazis did during WW2 was horrific Geneva or not.
@@jasonk5979 DID YOU LISTEN TO THE TIME STAMP? GERMANY WAS A SIGNATORY OF THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS. THE SOVIETS WERE NOT. THEREFORE AS POWS THEY WERE NOT PROTECTED UNDER THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS.
@@goolag6536 1st of all. Typing in all caps is shouting. Second of all . Does it matter.? Or just because the soviets didn't sign a document. It ok to starve beat torture to death prisoners of war? Your implying that's ok . FYI it's not. I don't care if the Soviets or the Nazis did it. Geneva convention or not.
@@jasonk5979 Now the Geneva Convention signatories do not matter? Your hypocrisy is utter ignorance to imply that the Soviet Union did not treat POWs just as bad or worse than the Germans treated Soviet POWs. The really funny part is after the war, Soviet POWs were liquidated in mass by the USSR as they were deemed traitors.
Remember that all these slavishly obeyed one of the cruelest regimes in history, they were all guilty of war crimes, they caused the suffering and deaths of millions, in fact the allies were very benevolent with them as so many got away with their crimes, why do you think there were so many nazi hunters working after the war and as far as I know very few gestapo people were put on trial and just went back to service in the police
@@SaintlyAussie And he's used it before. It also brings out the fascists who attempt to equate Allied behaviour with the systematic atrocities of the Germans, Italians & Japanese.
@@Pablo-kw5jb Where, when... Biscari was not general behavior. And as far as I recall, action was taken to those responsible. Further, the USA didn't start the war.
@@robertshields2066 the guy that served as executioner lied about his experience as executioner. He was mostly a fraud that apparently got a kick from getting to hang some nazi's. The nuckle head got himself electrocuted to death, by accident, some time after the war. He was clearly perfect man for hanging Keitel.
Its hard to believe they were "botched" as executioners did nothing to mitigate the issue after the first case. You have opening in the hole, that is way too small for an adult AND rope, that is too short. You can botch one, not both at the same time. I hardly can believe it myself, since it cheapens whole affair.
@@OkurkaBinLadin Pierrepont was always extremely scathing about the American method of hanging using the traditional wild west noose and a fixed length of drop.
He was supposedly just a yes man and went along with Hitler no matter how dumb or unreasonable the orders were. I think he was just happy being so close to Hitler and wasn't totally willing to accept the crimes against humanity that his beloved Furher was involved in.
@@MasterHaloOne so has pretty much every other country and for alot longer also. The U.S. is probably closer to 300-350 years. It took a really long time to even create anything close to a stable environment to live in after it was discovered.
@@jeffreyval9665 That is not true , all countries have a bad past but not everyone had slaves. Plus the US had official racist laws until 1960's , many countries didn't have that.
@@laza6141 yeah the world was a tough place for alot of people for many years. Trying to overcompensate for things that happened in the past that we had nothing to do with isn't right either.
He tried to resign 3 times but Hitler wouldn’t let him. The fact is that if he had refused to follow orders he would’ve been executed anyway. He had no chance of avoiding execution either way
@paul For any that were truly remorseful and accepted Christ as their savior yes they would be forgiven. I know it’s not something people want to acknowledge but if you believe in religion it’s the truth. According to the Bible Jesus sacrificed himself to save sinners, Nazis were sinners it really is as simple as that.
@paul Gerecke and O’Connor walked out of the gym, back across the wet yard, and into the prison corridor where they waited for the signal to bring in the next man. Speer again heard Andrus from the second tier. “Keitel!” Again, the cell door opened, and Gerecke walked in to pray with the man he would later call “my friend.” The general chose the Bible readings, hymns, and prayers for the ritual and read them aloud. He kneeled by the cot in his cell and confessed his sins. “On his knees and under deep emotional stress, [Keitel] received the Body and Blood of our Savior,” Gerecke wrote later. “With tears in his voice he said, ‘You have helped me more than you know. May Christ, my Savior, stand by me all the way. I shall need him so much’.” “Our period of prayer in his cell was drenched with his tears,” Gerecke later wrote. As they walked through the courtyard, Keitel recited Bible verses in German that Gerecke couldn’t decipher. He also all but hummed the melody to Johann Friedrich Raeder’s nineteenth-century hymn, “Harre, Meine Seele” (“Await, My Soul”). At the top of the gallows, Keitel said his final words, and then he recited a prayer that his mother taught him when he was a child. Gerecke’s mother had said the same prayer with him when he was young, and now the two men prayed it together: “Christi Blut und Gerechtigkeit, das ist mein Schmuck und Ehrenkleid; darin will ich vor Gott bestehen, wenn ich zum Himmel werd eingehen. Amen.” “Christ’s blood and judgment are my adornment and robe of honor; therein I will stand before God when I go to Heaven. Amen.” Keitel turned to Gerecke. “I thank you, and those who sent you, with all my heart,” he said. An excerpt from Mission at Nuremberg by Tim Townsend www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00ENGZLN8/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?ie=UTF8&qid=&sr=.
@paul I’m assuming your responding to me I don’t know why the @ name is so screwed up though. I mean as far as I can tell Keitel and a number of others grew up as Christians and Catholics but lost their way later on believing in Hitler’s/The Nazi lies and accepting his/it’s offers.
But loyal as a dog. Hitler was called "The Bohemian Corporal" by some Generals including Friedrich Von Paulus. Gestapo Müller had called Hitler "the unemployed house painter and Austrian draft dodger".
yeah, the entire Nuremberg was a kangaroo court, barbaric vendetta justice with people charged with what Allies had been doing even more, England and France declared war on Germany, not the other way around, ostensibly over Poland, which was then thrown to the wolves, with Britain starting to bomb civilian targets and even cities and ultimately firebombing Dresden and Hamburg, Churchill was a warmonger, a traitor and a war criminal, it was only due to some honorable British generals Britain didn't drop massive quantities of poisonous gas on German cities, Churchill was a bankrupt drunk who sold his soul to an ethnic lobby, a mad man, he effectively destroyed the European civilization.
So what make no diff I ain't talking bout no careers man it's all about making the Nazi scum feel a lil of the pain and humiliation they inflicted upon innocent folks .god dam good work sargent woods .
Well, how do you become an expert, and proffessional, without practice ? he just needed a little longer at it, thats all, like a few thousand Nazi necks.
Yo no estoy de acuerdo en que fuera un incompetente. En los otros países que combatieron en el conflicto, Sus jefes de estado mayor, desempeñaron funciones parecidas y sin embargo no se les critica, Tengo que añadir, que el mariscal del aire Harthur Arris, fue un criminal de guerra que nunca fue juzgado y ahorcado, ya que ordenó bombardeos indiscriminados contra población y murió con honores. Una vergüenza.
Well yes, and he also said, "History is written by the victors", which is true 99 per cent of the time, with the possible exception of the Roman Empire. The Nazis could say things that were true though this lay on a bed of other lies and some of the cruellest most immoral behaviour thew world has ever seen.
@@bigverybadtom Indeed and there was one trial in particular that was highly questionable. It was that of an Italian general, whose name escapes me and who had fought with distinction on the allied side when Italy changed sides. He was hanged for shooting prisoners of war, attempting to escape when Italy was with the axis. My understanding was that this was not a breach of the Geneva Convention. It is believed he was chosen as a scapegoat when there were far more deserving members of the postwar Italian establishment. British and American reporters did all they could to save him, openly criticising his trial, all to no avail. There were numerous cases where prisoners were killed, a couple of camps where they were starved to death before the Red Cross managed to halt this in return for no further action against the perpetrators. In the pacific the Americans had quite excusable reasons for not taking prisoners as the Japanese had shown that their surrender was just a ruse, so some of this was not just hate, but mere practicality. Add to that the Geneva Convention permits the killing of prisoners if the prevailing side is not in a position to take them.
W. Keitel's hanging was said to have been botched. The trap door area wasn't wide enough, and his head struck the wood as he fell. Being wedged it took approximately 20 minutes for him to subbcomb. The Brits used this incident to embarrass American hangings, & bragged their hangman was an expert.
... I mean, if he didn't do his duty to his Gov't someone else would've. There was no room for negotiations or objections with Holter. Come on let's be realistic not idealistic
This is like a shoplifter saying that if he doesn't steal an object on display, then some other thief will. That is one of the weakest excuses possible.
@@rackcity5981 You need to educate yourself to exactly WHAT Keitel was charged with, his "defense" of his actions in context to the crimes he was charged with, and the prosecutor's summation of the crimes Keitel was found guilty of. No one has a "duty to his Gov't" to commit crimes when a govt orders them to commit crimes. You would do well to educate yourself before commenting next time.
I don't understand why John C. Woods is so controversial. What he did to these war criminals was far less harsh than what they did to the innocent men, women, children, and little babies that were sent to gas chambers and went through an excruciatingly horrific 20-30 minute long death on a daily basis. Woods actually deserves respect in my opinion. As does Albert Pierrpoint. On behalf of the U.S. and U.K. they carried out their duties to avenge the atrocities.
Woods is controversial because he failed to do his job correctly. He was appointed to execute NOT torture. There is a moral difference. The judgement given was death by hanging. The judges expected a quick, clean execution. To deliberately botch the killings and lengthen the death process is sadistic not righteous.
May I suggest you change the word “ Vengeful “ in your introduction to each story . It sounds like you think these people did not deserve what they did . It was a punishment for what they did . C.
Hirohito is not a war criminal .The greatest war criminal is Winston churchill , a cruel murderer who was responsible for millions of death in india due to famine and war ,whereas the japanese tries there best to liberate india from the cruel monsters.
Once and for all, Hitler did not "seize control" in 1933. While it was true that he had his SA storm troopers available, he was appointed by Hindenburg after a series of complex political negotiations involving himself, the President, von Papen and von Schlecher. Sad to say, it was grown men of "reason" that put him in.
These “Loyal Dogs” truly believed that “I was only following orders” was a legitimate explanation for their inhuman actions. This is how they were raised from feudal times to the modern age; one did not question established authority.
Let's have Germans talk about that period. I am not a mothertongue, however I can recognize a British accent in narrator's voice. Great Britain was amongst the winners of the war. Too simple, too easy to deliver homilies from the pulpit!
No: Rommel had been only the commander of divisions and the corps in Lybia. His superior commanders were Generalfeldmarschall Keitel and Generalcoronel Jodl, who did not command fighter units. And he never ordered to kill captured enemies and innocent Jews. After the defeat of his "Afrika Korps" in May 1943, he was reduced to inspect the Wehrmacht in France under the command of the Generalfeldmarschalls von Rundstedt and Kluge and to make propaganda for Hitler. Generalfeldmarschall von Rundstedt was never charged for warcrimes. After the invasion in France in 1944 Rommel critized Hitler openly on behalf the mistakes in the war and demanded for surrender of the Wehrmacht. Therefore he was forced to comit suicide.
Oh, poor General Keitel. His execution didn’t go smoothly. He suffered during his death sentence. Hmmmm... I wonder if the family members (if there were any left) of those he slaughtered felt any sorrow in his suffering??? I’m thinking NOT!!!
@@micanopykracker902 well if we ask victims of ideologies .. than capitalisem has the most that makes the usa and brittain vilain staates ( well they are anyway responsible for nearly every war since world war 2 ) and those are facts not things that propaganda put in your head
Wasn't Keitel the officer who complained of being brought to a prison, whereupon the Colonel in command of the prison personally pulled off his rank insignia then remarked "Now you're a war criminal?"
I can see Keitel getting the noose, but less so for Jodl. Bormann definitely deserved execution if he had been caught. Speer should have been given the firing squad. Goering was such a Chad troll lmao. Would have been awesome if he had been found in his cell after he took the poison, and rigormortis made him have his middle finger sticking up, or if he had a drawing on his chest of a hand flipping the bird with "LOL" in that severe, serious German font.
I disagree with your fundamental conceit that his death was a form of revenge by the Allies. The whole trial was to illustrate by example that the Allies would not succumb to vengeance. As some defendants were given prison, were ultimately released, as well as executions taking place; I’d say the Allies made their point nicely. It’s a fact his execution was botched (as many still are in the US today, despite modern technology). It’s dangerous fantasy that his life was taken with malice. There’s no reason, even with hindsight, to believe that. Not only were the Nazi’s fairly trialled but they were also dispatched as well as could be done. That’s many times better treatment than they would ever give their “enemies.”
Nah weak argument. Hitler gave the order. Kietal and the Wehrmacht for that matter had an oath to Hitler - not to Germany - Hitler. He wasn’t at any Liberty legally to speak against orders handed down to him. The Allies should have tried the Soviet leaders too - then that would be a fair trail - obviously impossible. At least having Soviets not sit as a judge would help.
Interesting that Americans Allies executed 8-9 times as many Japanese military leaders, as Germans. (Through courts) Hundreds of German war criminals were hunted down and shot. Twice shown in Band of Brother's series.
A word or two about the method of execution. It was exactly the same as that used for Sadaam Hussein. What went wrong was two fold. First, the American method was followed. This uses a standard six foot drop as opposed to the British Home Office regulated minimum six foot drop, weight determining drop thereafter. second, and chiefly, the executioner deliberately bungled it. He placed the noose at the back of the head so that the condemned would choke rather than die from a broken neck, moreover their head would hit the scaffold as they tumbled through the trap door. Ribbentrop, Keitel and Streicher all died this way. Many will comment that they had it coming, but the view of the allies was that this was unacceptable and unprofessional, adopting the British Home Office philosophy that the punishment for murder was forfieture of life, not torture and forfieture of life. In the belief that the victorious allies should set an example by eliminating, as far as possible, suffering from the procedure, Albert Pierrepoint, hangman from the UK, was appointed, who swiftly dispatched in excess of 300 war criminals without incident in a single day.
We will never know... but this is consistent with the executioner having exceptional hatred for those three. Most of the Nazis lost weight (especially Goering) while on trial, so they were more likely to strangle than have their necks break. Goering of course took poison. We can all have our ideas of what the fitting end would have been for them. I thought Kaltenbrunner the most objectionable, and burning at the stake would have been too nice for him. Then again -- maybe the Allies didn't want Albert Pierrepoint making death so easy for them.
@@paulbrower3297 Officially at the execution of Tojo and others, the Americans said the day before to news crews that every effort would be made to effect a humane death. I think the Americans were genuinely embarrassed by what was a bad rough and tumble job on Hitler's henchmen, so much so that they handed the baton over to the British. Churchill initially wanted them shot once their identities were established, without the the process of a trial, such was the enormity of their crimes. There remains to this day fierce debate as to whether that would have been the more appropriate action. The prevailing wind went with the desire to do things properly as they should be done - a proper trial and, where guilt was established, a clean execution. As for the condemned losing weight, the British method adapts the length of drop to accommodate such factors, the American is fixed at six feet, so you may be right.
@@pigslefats My humble apologies. I checked this out further. You are correct. It was not 300 in a day, I felt certain it was. Pierrepoint hanged a total of 600 people during his career. There were 238 war criminals hanged by him. The most he ever hanged in a single day was 10, and 17 over two days. Between 1948-9 he hanged 226 war criminals at a prison in Hamelin ( Wikipedia, Albert Pierrepoint).
I keep seeing different account of the execution of the Nuremburg war criminals, this says it was a guy named Woods who did a bad job, but other accounts I hear say the British executioner named Pierpont who evidently was a more competent professional. Which was it?
Pierpoint was the executioner for the British of the host of lesser war criminals such as camp guards. He was a thorough professional. If he had been used for the top rank there would have been no botched executions.
Pierrepoint didn't execute any of those sentenced to death at Nuremburg or anywhere else in the American occupied sector. He executed those condemned in the British sector such as those in the Bergen-Belsen trial, who were hanged in Hamelin prison.
Historical events are rarely neat and tidy. Nuremberg was no exception. The Allies should have convened a separate war crimes trial in answer to atrocities committed by their own forces, and I mean, not merely individual acts in violation of codes of military justice, but large scale actions like the unnecessary bombing of Dresden for instance. If Nuremberg established that following orders is no excuse for committing a crime, this should apply to all countries, not just Germany, Japan, and Italy, or the whole point is lost.
@@abc64pan Ahhh that old chestnut, Dresden. The unnecessary bombing of Dresden? Is there some new evidence which confirms that Dresden was not a "legitimate" target in February 1945? Or should I interpret the posting above as yet another plea from the Joerg Friedrich corner of the Historical Debate?? What is true is that the generations committed to war have almost died out; however, on the other hand the Second World War had still not finished in the city of Essen even August 2021. In the city of Dortmund the Blindgänger (UXB) is a matter of daily occurrence in 2021. Should the governments of the United Kingdom and United States of America have to contribute financially to removal of these unexploded bombs???
Residents of Dresden as well as Hamburg were given warning to evacuate their cities before they were firebombed. Anyone who decided to stick around just lacked common sense.
How about this for a history exam question? "After The Treaty of Versailles, The Allied powers did absolutely nothing to prevent Germany from re-arming again. Discuss".
One thing that has gone unmentioned is that after World War One, Britain was actually afraid of both Russia and France. It didn't help that both nations committed acts of war on their own.
![Felix "Unfair" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Oswujxm2Ag0/mqdefault.jpg)
And Hirohito, possibly the greatest war criminal of WW2 went scot-free!
Unfortunately not the only monster who never paid...
Hirohito was really a figurehead. He was really useful in transitioning to a post war Japan. Sometimes reality takes over from ideals. I e Warner von Braun the brilliant physicist.
I often wonder why, compared to the tens of thousands of Germans who were prosecuted for war crimes, relatively few japanese were tried Also, when the allies became tired of the trials,the west german government took over In Japan the whole issue of japanese war crimes was swept under the carpet For some reason the allies treated Germany much harsher then Japan Of course,in Germany there were four zones of occupation,the allied control commission and all the rest In Japan there was only MacArthur, acting as some modern day Shogun He was soft on the japanese,and one has to wonder what he got out of it
@@daveanderson3805 one should wonder what they get out on getting so harsh on Germany.. they maybe lost the War but won the moneyrace.. haha no. 2 only second to those who stole their Gold after ww2 in goldreserves… they maybe won the peace to haha…
@@daveanderson3805 remember that many took their own lives for "honor" or disgrace hopefully for what they did they and knew was wrong.
@2:24 Hitler did not seize power in 1933! He was appointed Chancellor by an aging President Paul Von Hindenburg who thought he could control Hitler! Hitler did not seize power until Hindenburg died in August 1934! Keitel's death was a joke! Why didn't any Russian generals face any war crimes trials for invading 5 countries before June 22, 1941? Or for the brutal murders of 25,000 Polish officers and politicians in the 1940 Katyn Massarce? Also the Soviets did not comply with Geneva Convention rules on German POW's!
Well said! The media never talked about 7 million Ukrainian people starved to death at gunpoint by Stalin in the early 1930's! Or the plan to invade Germany! H____ beat them to the punch! If you win the war you get to write the history books! WWII was a battle in an ongoing war to destroy Western Civilization.
@@paulcrooks6008 For sure, there were millions of people that had already been through the Prussian Empire desecration. Praying to "Satin" is a dip into the future guardians of your LIFE. And their panic about persons perpetrating the exact same wrong ideals as those AGAIN in error for the people that didn't pray for and endless assault upon even Desault!
Because it was ultimately U.S.S.R. that reached Berlin first and effectively ended the war. Remember, they made a treaty with the Nazis that was supposed to stop the Nazis from invading the U.S.S.R.! The Nazis didn't keep that treaty.
Russia won. That's it.
Still nazi scum no matter what the Russians did or didn't do and it sure as all hell ain't gonna somehow exonerate no nazi scum. nazi scum communist scum F...them both! LOMFL
The Germans missed a great opportunity in handling occupied areas with a fist. As the Germans entered Russia, the mostly ethnic populations actually hailed their arrival. Instead of expanding on that liberation image, the evil from the top down and a feeling of superiority doomed Barbarossa from the very beginning in spite of their speedy advances in the first few months.
Yes their ideology prevented them from getting the indigenous population on their side.
The Germans were guilty of widespread atrocities in the newly liberated areas within the USSR that initially welcomed their arrival in 1941.
The anti Communist/Soviet local population there simply exchanged one suppressive regime for another.
One could say same in vietnam
The hearts and minds failed there!
@@angloaust1575 No, we didn't conquer anyone in Vietnam. We simply helped an existing nation not get run over by another nation before we deserted them.
Ironically Vietnam's former benefactor China would soon afterward invade them and cause a fair amount of death and destruction. At least China was genuinely provoked by Vietnam's behavior.
@Tavo Tamm Oh, the indigenous population was on America's side in these conflicts, certainly to the point where they knew the alternative was worse. In fact, when South Korea's ruler Syngman Rhee was deposed in 1960, American property was protected. And though the Iraqis were unhappy with American troops, they definitely did not want a return of Saddam!
BTW the other ethnics did not necessarily love the Germans but they definitely did not welcome the Russians, and even fought an organized resistance against them for several years.
keitel was just a ruthless careerist yes man, was not a general in the field like rommel or guderian
Rommel put victory over slaughter of defenseless people. Guderian simply moved the troops around.
Rommel is so overrated
Anyone who says Rommel is overrated has not read his book about his exploits in WW1
Tony Blair got more blood on his hands
@@Rick-zw9kp “Rommel, You Magnificent Bastard. I Read Your Book!
I like how Wilhelm Keitel and Gerd von Rundstedt are visually indistinguishable from one another.
You noticed that too
That's real I got them confused on few occasions
Really? They look different to me...
Von Rundstedt never smiled. That's how you can keep them apart.
@@wr1120 von rundsted was shorter and an aristocrat Wilhelm on the other hand was blue collar all the way .von rundsted was highly decorated knights cross and all keitel had decorations but his were from commendable feats of organisation and logistics beans bullets and bad guys not combat but he was, next to borman Hitler's main YES man.
Nothing new I've learnt from the video but good content overall. Keeping history intact is what I will and always will respect.
I don't think Keitel hit his head on the trap door, but rather the trap door swung back and hit him in the face. John C. Woods was incompetent. He didn't know how to tie the proper knot and placed it at the back of the head, which forces the head to bend forward. That doesn't break the neck, but forces the tongue out. The knot should be placed under the left jaw to throw the head back, which snaps the 2nd and 3rd vertebrae.
Spot on, Sounds like Pierrepoint;)
A man of culture I see...
Actually from what I've read (two books by US Army doctors - one MD and one psychologist, both of whom had daily interaction with the Nuremberg defendants) Woods was to be the executioner of convicted war criminals for US Army in Europe. It's believed that the inconsistencies were intentional, and he was relieved of duty. I've seen a morbid photo of him posing with a noose (half of it shown here 7:47). Geneva Convention... Only the Allied powers adhered to the provisos of the GenCon
Agreed Albert Pierpont was the master of this particular trade
Bit of a hanging expert are we LOL
Keitel wasn't called the 'Nodding Donkey' by other generals for nothing.
He was known as "The Lackey".
@@philipmorgan6048 No he was known as Lakeitel (Lackey is Lakai in german) and Hitler was known in the german military as "Austrias revenge for Königgrätz"
Hess and Goring sitting beside each other!!
I could only imagine the conversation!!
Goosebumps!!
Ach, Rudolf, did you stop at the duty free store for my schnapps on the way here?
@paul A bit off the wall at times. Just filling in an imaginary conversation. Bet the real one was good though.
Goering was deeply embarrassed by Hess' rantings and told him to "Shut up" while he was in mid flow.
The worst day in the life of Keitel was not when he died by hanging but when he was forced to sign Germany's surrender in front of french general,Delattre de Tassigny.He would have said : "That's all we needed ! "
One of four of the Downfall Dudes, alongside Jodl, Krebs & Burgdorf 🤣
"DAS WAR EIN GEFEHL!!!" ("That was an order!!!")
@@billh230 BEFEHL
@@niranjansrinivasan4042 Thanks. I should know better.
@@billh230 It's either sarcasm/ somebody who is extremely rare in YT comment section
Interesting, informative and worthwhile video.
He was an armchair general. Unfortunately for us all, most of today´s armies are filled with Keitels. Sending drones thousands of miles to their targets to kill people like it were a video game. Cowardice as a military tradition. No war can be won with these armchair, video-gaming officers like we have now.
I didn't know they had armchairs in the WW1 trenches
Reminds me of the current Chairman of The Joint Chiefs of Staff Milley and Lloyd Austin Defense Sec'y.
And what about politicians that start wars, sending in other people's kids instead of their own?
Or draft dodging presidents. Which general are you talking about, and what years did you serve?
@@rtauzin64 you are referring to William Jefferson Clinton aren't you right?
Pierrepoint didn’t have much trouble with the drop method.
Comparatively speaking, from what little I know about Pierrepoint he had a more professional outlook to his job, whereas the executioner here was allegedly kicked out of the pre-war Navy for having sociopathic tendencies. I think he got the job because no one else wanted to be an executioner. I also don't think anyone cared if he did a good job or not, just so long as they got executed.
Many executioners in the states had "much trouble" too when they executed "criminals" in the States, with the electric chair they often barbeceued the condemend, thats american tradition from the old west lnych mob times, "let em suffer"
@@Sturminfantrist the U.S. nearly always had been better at the firing squad as opposed to hanging inherited by the British. Not all of the original 13 colonies hanged. It was pretty much an even split between hanging and the firing squad. Whilst traditionally being shot was for the military, more than a few colonies and later territories as expanded westward applied it equally to civilian, soldier, sailor militiamen alike. One territory in particular, the Utah territory and the present-day State of Utah, the firing squad was used almost exclusively for all condemned to death, civilian or otherwise. They still do it today as a secondary option per the condemned's choice between that and Lethal Injection.
I would have had it so if Pierrepoint wasn't available, a firing squad was on standby at all times ready to carry out death sentences.
i just read that three direct relatives on the pierpoint family were all hang men. WOW! father son and uncle!
Proof positive that being a lackey has it's perils....."I just signed whatever was put in front of me" doesn't cut it.....
Consider how many lackeys, war criminals and political criminals there are on the anti nazi side to this very day. They are legion.
@@stevenrowlandson4258 Not following you.....not sure there are ANY anti nazis who are war criminals....what do you mean?
@@muskokamike127 You never heard of the Soviet Union? And yes, the Allies did bad things in their colonies too.
the allies were experts in the war ''gegen frauen und kinder''
@@muskokamike127 history is written by the victor. people seem to think you cannot commit crimes against germans or even nazis. we are not allowed even to think that.(ANY anti.......)
Thanks for the video !
It was not 'vengeful', it was totally justified.
Could it not be both vengeful and justified?
I believe you use the word justice rather than vengeance when it's a sentence passed down by a court.
@@pauldh62 was he an ss officer though .
Think alot got off Scott free who were in the SS compared to this guy
Of course you BOLSHEVIK !
@@kristijanfranjoivancic6769 you seem to be replying to the wrong comment, friend
Thank you for sharing. Very informative and well presented. I look forward to your next video..👏👏👏👏....P
All this started with the Sarajevo assassination. What would had been happen if WW1 would not had been started?
@david toler When you compare the terrible suffering and destruction involved in both wars, you have to wonder if the advances in technology are worth the cost? The technology would have happened eventually. The horror of two world wars seems like a terrible price to pay, just to get the technology sooner.
@david toler The major items that came out of WW1 were tanks, sub-machine guns and poison gas. WW2 gave us atomic bombs, nerve gas and ballistic missiles. The Nazi party gave us industrialised mass murder. The Japanese gave us biological warfare as a routine exercise.
Everything else existed before the related wars.
@Dan Beech I think may be. The german King Wilhelm2 was partly disabled with his arm. He did compensate it with military attitude. At the other hand he was grandson of Queen Viktoria. What would happen if grandma would have had better contact to her grandson? Usualy you do not Visite your relatives with batleships.
@@torstenkiessling2933 Victoria had been dead for 13 years when WW1 started. Germany had been attacking France about twice a century and it had become a tradition…
@@allangibson2408 Hi Allan, i did not know, that Queen Victoria pased away allready long before WW1. As I learned at Google even the mother of Wilhelm2 was british. Yes the conflict between prusia and france is a point. As I learned at school. Since france was a centralized state. Germany was Split in various small parts. There was also the austria hungarian empire as Part of the game. As Napoleon attacked Russia in 1812 part of german countries joyned Napoleon side, while others did fight together with russia. This history is still allive between East and West Germany. Prussia with Bismark unified Germany by several wars. Germany was founded in Versailes in 1871. This conflicts are allways at the expence of somebody else.
8:09 Wilhelm Keitel got it worse than anyone else in the Gallows at Nuremberg, 28/24 (some sources say it was 24 minutes and others say 28 minutes I’m not sure which is right) minutes is a VERY long time to strangle to death. Jodl’s face looked quite bruised up but Keitel’s face literally looked like someone tried to cut it off and gave up half way through.
I find it ironic that Keitel suffered the most of all the defendants when he was perhaps the most remorseful of all the Nazis condemned (according to his interpreter Lion Le Tanson he cried when shown pictures from Dachau Concentration Camp of Holocaust victims needing to be scrapped up into piles with bulldozers as though they were just garbage) to death admitting his (as well as making his peace with God through the help of Protestant Chaplain Henry Gerecke) guilt, accepting execution as his consequence and acknowledging his failure to see that there is a limit even for a soldier’s performance of duty which involves obeying orders.
I do really pity Keitel.
He was a fascist and deserves no pity.
@@kevinramsey417 True fascist doesn't need pity. Hitler was a real Nietzschean fanatic, he would spit at pity.
Is remorse and acknowledgement of guilt enough to atone for crimes? Or is punishment still an essential?
@@kimmarsh5987 I think punishment is still essential as well yes and Keitel certainly received his earthly punishment!!
Genuinely look forward to your videos!!! Interesting content as always and great research
Glad you call them Germans and not Nazis. It would be like calling the US or Australian armed forces by whichever government party was in power.
LISTERN AGAIN .... KEITEL killed 5000 Germans .... I call American Nazis trump supporters
Kietel was a nazi party member
@@scharfoskar3254 No, it is the Trump haters who are the real nazis.
@@scharfoskar3254 Nazis were Socialist.
@@unappreciatedtreehouse821 Nazis turned industrial workers into serfs. That is no more socialism than is the plantation system of a slave society.
If they didn't follow Hitler's orders they would have been killed along with their family. This happened to my grandmothers first husband, he was against the Nazi's and refused to kill unarmed civilians so he was killed and Gestapo was sent after his family but my grandmother fled into hiding with her two children.
@Dan Beech Just because you want something to be true doesn't make it true, I also have no sympathy for those Nazi's, or anyone for that matter because I'm a sociopath, so you're wrong again.
Sounds like bullshit to me!
The question is rather whether you aspire to get a high position in the army of an obviously criminal regime or whether you have the ethics to refrain from it. No one gets his position without wanting it.
@@louismart He was in the German Army before the war and comes from a military family.
@@guineanord no excuse. Lucid people knew the criminal character of nazism long before WW2
What baffles my mind is, he went to the signing a condemned man. He knew it and he still went. The Soviets and allies shook his hands knowing they were going to execute him shortly thereafter. Its just mind boggling
Shaking hands with such scums is mind boggling indeed.
@@Artoootube I don’t think they did shake Keitel’s hand, I mean I know they didn’t return his salute which is basically the same kind of gesture.
@@Artoootube you probably shake hands with scum everyday and not know it
Wht other option he had....None!!!
2+ years later
Please comment.. Any comment raises a video up in RUclips's algorithm, and more people will see it. And more people DO need to see this great series. Thank you.
Hitler did not "seize control" in 1933. He was legally elected and legally replaced Paul von Hindenburg, when von Hindenburg could no longer carry out his duties, as the civil head of the German Government. Please be more accurate in your future narrations.
ALSO HE MENTIONS THE GENEVA CONVENTION AND SOVIET POWS. BUT FAILED TO TELL THAT THE SOVIETS DID NOT SIGN THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS SO UNDER THE RULES OF WAR THE SOVIETS WERE NOT PROTECTED UNDER THE GENEVA CONVENTION.
Of course, the Reichstag fire had nothing to do with anything.
True. But that's where his legitimacy ended. During the next eighteen months, Hitler eliminated nearly all sources of opposition, both within the Nazi Party and in Germany.
By August 1934, he had declared himself Führer - the sole leader of Germany.
@@mathewm7136 His legitimacy ended? In what way? What state did not recognize him as the legitimate leader of Germany? And under what rules? Rules under the so called "Weimar Republic"? The circus that was.
@@goolag6536 Good, bad or somewhere in the middle, the Weimar was the Democratic government in place. He used his position to destroy it. In August, 1934, he used his position as chancellor to declare himself the sole leader - termed "Fuhrer" - of Nazi Germany for life. That's one of the classic signals of a dictatorship. He was able to enforce his declaration by completely eliminating the democratic system that he used to get into the Chancellors position in the first place.
All other countries were forced to recognize him because they had no choice what so ever.
'Nodding Donkey' or not, he showed true character at the time of his execution. I wonder how many would equal him in similar circumstances.
Well, Keitel always did do what he was told....
He went like a man, he deserved Albert Pierrepoint, not the alcoholic and idiot Sgt. John C. Woods, who had previously been kicked out of the Navy for being a “head case”.
@@Johnnycdrums Yes he was an incompetent buffoon who got himself electrocuted in the Far East. Poetic justice!
@@Johnnycdrums I, too, feel sad for Keitel's slow death, and thought of Albert Pierrepoint. Why was Pierrepoint not available?
Zoydian: He had no other choice but to resign himself to what was waiting.. You probably never been at the edge of death. But believe me after you try everything and fail you know is the end.. That is when you start accepting what is coming.. I been in that position believe me.. And the last thought I had were of resignation to the inevitable. Always trying to look my best! I was lucky and do not know how... But here I am!
Hearing the hanging didn't go smoothly put a smile on my face .Nazis killed both my grandfather and his dog and my dad witnessed it all at the age of 7 .
I think about families like yours when I watch these videos.
When it comes to that lot there's no such thing as unnecessary suffering.
A grandmother I never knew and some neighbours of hers were killed by a flying bomb in July 1944 so I don't feel much sympathy for the top Nazis. I don't even build models of their WW II equipment.
Which place?
@@gurjeetsingh-gd1wr Just outside London in Britain. My grandfather was at work on the London docks, my aunt was away in the service, my mother had gone out to work. When she came home for lunch I believe, police barriers and no house.
As Clausewitz said, "War is the continuation of policy by other means." It is not the function of military officers to determine a nation's foreign policy. It is the function of military officers to prepare the military operations required by that foreign policy. WW2 was not the first time that the victors forgot this reality. After WW1, the Allies wanted to try at least 850 Germans for war crimes. It never happened because the German and Dutch governments refused to cooperate.
@ I guess he figures planning genocide is part of a soldiers job!
First, the armed forces of the USA did not begin requiring servicemembers to disobey illegal orders until AFTER Nuremberg. Second, the Final Solution was an SS operation, not an OKW one. Keitel was executed for losing.
@ That was after WW2. The idea of refusing illegal orders didn't come about until the war crimes trials, with many defendants stating some variation of "I was following orders".
That's definitely not how Clausewitz handled things, he was quite political.
@ yeah and we all know what happend when Capt. Medina and Lt. Calley gave orders to kill more then 200 Women and Children in My Lai VN or what the MPs in Abu Ghraib did .
Great read as always, thank you for your hard work👏👏👏👏
Keitel hit his head on the trapdoor as he fell ?
This makes me feel so sad .... not.
Keitel was Hitler’s ‘lackey’ who had no backbone to resist Hitler’s appalling criminal directives during the conquest and occupation of central and Eastern Europe. As Hitler’s puppet, he signed’ a number of criminal military orders from April 1941.The orders went way beyond established codes of conduct for the military - and broadly allowed the execution of Jews, civilians and non-combatants for any reason. Keitel went along with all of Hitler’s directives by ignoring the Geneva Convention. He ordered officers to use the utmost severity in stamping out resistance (coded language for mass murder) in Russia and in other occupied countries. He also sanctioned the practice of taking - and executing up to 100 communists for every German soldier killed. He endorsed Hitler’s ‘Night and Fog’ order, where foreign nationals could be deported to Germany and tried by special courts, or in some cases be picked up by the Gestapo, who would then send them to a concentration camp, without any reason. The fate of these foreign nationals would be kept a secret. Keitel, also in October 1942, signed the Commando Order, that authorized the killing of enemy special operations troops, even when captured in uniform. Keitel signed scores of orders where captured solders based on his signature, called for soldiers and political prisoners to be killed or to ‘disappear.’ Keitel’s behaviour was cowardly and despicable. He was fully aware of the consequences of the orders he was signing. His execution was inevitable and justified.
A pretty extensive list of his crimes, the only other things I can think of to add is that he also was was involved with reprisals to a certain extent after the 1944 July plot on Hitler’s life and he was in charge of harsh discipline near the end of the war, offering bounties to hunt down deserters, everyone that was left in Germany was to fight to the bitter end or else.
Keitel never ever told Hitler NO while he was in power, blinded by the notion of obedience and loyalty as a soldier which was instilled in him at an early age. Keitel (along with Jodl) needed to be made an example of at Nuremburg and the fact that somebody who was as lost as him could self reflect and change his mind before it was (death) too late I think can only be a good thing.
There was nothing vengeful about Keitel's execution.
@@TheUltimateTroll9 He was a criminal who got his proper reward: death!
Killing the Killer to Prevent Killing.
Humans enjoy their own misery and suffering very, very much.
Those who were responsible needed to be held to account and many were Keitel was one of them along with Jodel.
Tuskagee shot program.
Keitel was known even in the Wehrmacht as 'Lakeitel', a play on words as 'lackey' to Hitler. He was utterly complicit and not some scapegoat.
He was the worst Hitler yes man indeed.
Keitel signed operational orders-including directives authorizing the shooting of allied commandos or soviet political commissars taken prisoner in uniform and other directives making it possible to detain civilians without due process.
Keitel was one who served in the army of whom had the mission of getting rid of communism. The United States of America has the same stated goal and so does the western world so why was one like Keitel executed seeing that the aims of the so called victorious alliance were the same as the defeated axis powers? What is it that is not being declared here?
@@gyasikrasineb4808 Gosh, you're clearly in total denail there then. Some in my family were commandos at that time. Even American ones were simply executed on the spot or put in concentration. The guy was a war criminal. End of story.
@Tavo Tamm Rules of warfare? The Geneva convention? War crimes? One convicted Nazi found guilty?
Summary executions are not the American way of dealing with its ideological enemies. The USA did that to neither Commies in neither Korea nor Vietnam nor to Ba'athists in Iraq. The Soviet Union at least went through a legal process (flawed as one would expect in view of the system) with war criminals caught in the field and with Nazi collaborators. Membership in the Nazi Party was never grounds in itself for execution.
The legal status of Soviet commissars was shaky unless they actually were combatants. The Commissar Order was deemed criminal in nature. To be sure, neither the USA nor the UK had them but both concurred that summary executions of people for their political beliefs and affiliations was wrong.
The Commissar Order was well known, and it may have kept beleaguered Soviet units fighting longer than otherwise because the Commissar knew that he would be murdered.If you really want to be more successful in waging war, then you must make surrender easier and less objectionable. The Commissar Order may have allowed the Red Army to fight harder than otherwise and take a heavier toll of German troops than otherwise.
It was both a blunder and a crime. That is Keitel for you.
Luckely those things we're never done by the allies....
I often thought the hangman, Woods, was given the title of executioner since he was known for being incompetent and did not have a clean record. Ironic to say, if it was intentional, it would be fitting for a criminal executioner to kill another and do a piss poor job of it
Ironically he met an early demise as well. While serving with the 7th Engineer Brigade in Eniwetok, Marshall Islands, on July 21, 1950, Woods died from electrocution while attempting to repair an engineer lighting set.
They should have let Albert Pierrepoint do the executions, he always did a professional job lol
It's a stain on the "justice" of the trials that their sentences could not be carried out humanly. It should also be noted that several allied generals also ordered the execution of uniformed POW's at various points without sanction either at the time or after the war....
Remember people, history is never black and white but rather a kaleidoscope of grey....
@@CS-zn6pp they got what they deserve.
@@iangarner8857 na, Wood did a good job, they hot what they deserved.
Truman was also a criminal. The mass killing of Civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki was the biggest war crime. Also the mass killing of civilians in Korea.
I've just become a subscriber based on this very informative presentation. The photographs shown helped colour the story. Thank you.
Pretty much the same recycled phots you see in any WWII doc.
Basically he was clearly guilty - he signed several ilegal orders against the Geneva convention and knew what he was doing.
Yeah I can't fathom this "Vengeful" crap... he was executed because he condoned/was complicit in the comission of war crimes. Misleading title, he's not a victim of some sort of "revenge".
The orders he signed were mainly against the Sovietunion. But the Sovietunion never signed the geneva convention so germany was not bound to fulfill it. Sorry for my bad english
@@bossderbosse9939 oh well then everything is ok, and of the thousands of innocent dead who cares, right?
@@boozolini4465 No i just sayed that most of the orders were legal but that doesn't mean they were not bad
@@bossderbosse9939 come on
Dictators are only dictators with the support of the army.
The US Army turned against Trump on January 6. It knew what he was up to.
@@paulbrower3297 They didn’t know what that TWAT Biden was up to, did they?
@@JamesAlexander14 General Milley made it abundantly clear: that Joe Biden had been lawfully elected President and Kamala Harris was lawfully elected Vice-President, and their terms in office would begin on January 20 no matter what President Trump did.
Joe Biden didn't exercise any power because he had no Presidential powers at the time.
so who prosecuted the USSR generals who invaded Poland in 1939? I guess the concept of kangaroo courts was still popular in both the east and west. show trail???
To the victor goes the spoils. But, hey, good luck with that. Let me know how it turns out.
Yes you are right, the victorious Allies in many cases were a bunch of hypocrites when it came to punishing war criminals. If they were any use post-war against the Communist Bloc or weapon development they got away with murder, German or Japanese.
@@dp-sr1fd eh, the cases weren't that many. And, as the saying goes "No matter how many innocent people lost their lives, killing one guilty person more ain't going to bring a single sole back."
And not only Poland - Baltic States, part of Finland. And the the whole of Eastern Europe
@@dp-sr1fd it was simply vengeance. the moral element was empty. not saying that the guilty didn't deserve killing, but they missed all of Uncle Joe's murdering, raping clan.
very interesting video. can you make a video with the ranking of the number of deaths at the end of the Second World War divided by nationality?
IF GERMANY AND HER ALLIES WOULD OF BEEN VICTORIOUS, THE US, USSR, UK AND CO BELLIGERENTS WOULD OF BEEN ON TRIAL.
Damn good show mate 😃👍
I'm guessing that he was a competent if soulless administrator. He transformed the German Army into the Nazi Army, making it subordinate to those who chose mass murder over a humane course of actions that would have better served the Wehrmacht. I can easily contrast him to General George C. Marshall, who had the most analogous position in the US Armed Forces. By demanding humane treatment of Italian and German civilians who had just been conquered, Marshall (in concurrence with FDR and Churchill) could win the peace. Hitler and Keitel could never win the peace, the ultimate objective of a well-thought-out military campaign. General George C. Marshall would eventually win a Nobel Peace prize for humane deeds to keep the peace that he won, and Field Marshal Keitel would dangle and strangle for his complicity in genocide.
I'm not saying that American and British forces, especially by their air forces, weren't brutal and lethal. Then again, the Axis Powers brought such upon themselves through their earlier and more persistent brutality. As Erwin Rommel showed, it was possible for a German commander to countermand the worst tendencies of Nazism if those tendencies impeded victory. .
The Nazis lost the war because of their atrocities, and Keitel was complicit in the extreme. He was a genocidal figure, and he was nearly as culpable as the more repugnant mobile killing units and the secret police in the field. The only military chiefs more horrible than he were the chieftains like Attila the Hun, Timur Lenk, and Genghis Khan. Keitel brought nothing but mass suffering to the world, whether of conquered people or the German armed forces. He was the least heroic general possible, a sniveling coward when having to choose between absolute evil and its mitigation.
.
Nazi army? lol have you ever opened a history book? lol
@@Powersnufkin looks like he has! Perhaps you had better start reading yourself, the army were willing to comply to the Nazi genocidal plans, don't forget he was regular army no ss,, and don't forget the army swore alliegence to that certain Nazi called Adolf, so yes the bastards were Nazis.
@@rogernicholls2079 Yes it’s true, Keitel was one of those quoted as saying “Furor command we will follow” which went for the army as well and he even had a few soldiers/officers that didn’t comply handed over to the gestapo. Perhaps his most infamous quote was “such misgivings belong to a frivolous war we are dealing with the annihilation of a way of life which is why I approve of these measures”. Perhaps Keitel’s biggest issue was that he was always sheltered from the grim reality of the decree’s he was signing, he never actually saw any shootings or concentration camps in action for that matter.
However once he was in Nuremberg and forced to see and think about the real human suffering he had helped cause it seems to me he in fact did have a conscience that he suppressed. After being shown Holocaust footage and pictures (which absolutely tore him up inside) there was no way he could use “I was just following orders nothing more” as an excuse nor did he want to, he knew he had to die for what he had done. In the end the only thing he was hoping for himself was that he could somehow make peace with (which Henry Gerecke may have actually succeeded in helping him do) god before he died.
@@Powersnufkin An Army that acts like Nazis is a Nazi army! Transforming the Wehrmacht into a Nazi army is the first of his crimes against Humanity.
@@paulbrower3297 Completely true! German Armies turned into Nazi Armies. They became bloodthirsty robots,led by anti-semitic monsters whose top satanic leader was the scoundrel Hitler!!
The "hoist" hanging method is far more satisfying than the "drop" method.
Spoken like a true psychopath.
@@remember_Pat_Tillman Replied to like a domesticated house pet.
@@archenema6792 derp derp.
@@remember_Pat_Tillman Devastating reply. No doubt indicative of the the wit and perspicacity passed on by your ancestors. I'm sure your people will master fire and sharpened stones any day now.
Considering the stilted and atonal narration, the gloss of pre-packaged material written in an idiom obviously unnatural to the speaker, his difficulty pronouncing common terms, and the general lack of theme or direction in the presentation of both opinions and facts, you seem to fit right in here. Special Ed class in the basement for Special Jim.
@@archenema6792 all those words and you said less than nothing.
6:07 THE SOVIETS DID NOT SIGN THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS THAT WOULD HOLD THEM ACCOUNTABLE TO THE RULES OF WAR, THEREFORE THE SOVIETS WERE NOT PROTECTED UNDER THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS.
Um. Yes it does. Germany did sign it. And the Geneva convention doesn't say you only have to treat pow's of nations that signed the treaty . It states pow's. Not to mention what the Nazis did during WW2 was horrific Geneva or not.
@@jasonk5979 DID YOU LISTEN TO THE TIME STAMP? GERMANY WAS A SIGNATORY OF THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS. THE SOVIETS WERE NOT. THEREFORE AS POWS THEY WERE NOT PROTECTED UNDER THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS.
@@goolag6536
1st of all. Typing in all caps is shouting. Second of all . Does it matter.? Or just because the soviets didn't sign a document. It ok to starve beat torture to death prisoners of war? Your implying that's ok . FYI it's not. I don't care if the Soviets or the Nazis did it. Geneva convention or not.
@@jasonk5979 Now the Geneva Convention signatories do not matter? Your hypocrisy is utter ignorance to imply that the Soviet Union did not treat POWs just as bad or worse than the Germans treated Soviet POWs. The really funny part is after the war, Soviet POWs were liquidated in mass by the USSR as they were deemed traitors.
Remember that all these slavishly obeyed one of the cruelest regimes in history, they were all guilty of war crimes, they caused the suffering and deaths of millions, in fact the allies were very benevolent with them as so many got away with their crimes, why do you think there were so many nazi hunters working after the war and as far as I know very few gestapo people were put on trial and just went back to service in the police
You are right sir.
Exactly and I personally feel like the allies didn't execute nearly enough of them either. Guys like Albert Speer got away with everything.
Befehl ist befehl.
If it was true justice, most ALL-LIES generals would have been killed too.
Wrong side won the war, do your own research.
Vengeful? Maybe you should study what the nazis actually did.
And the allies too. ! War crimes like Biscari
Agree. Rather stupid title on this video.
@@SaintlyAussie And he's used it before. It also brings out the fascists who attempt to equate Allied behaviour with the systematic atrocities of the Germans, Italians & Japanese.
@@Pablo-kw5jb Where, when... Biscari was not general behavior. And as far as I recall, action was taken to those responsible. Further, the USA didn't start the war.
@Max Power Only because you don't understand the concept correctly.
Vengeful? More like deserved.
Very Satisfying as well, I dear say that his victims will be overjoyed with his slow death.
@@robertshields2066 the guy that served as executioner lied about his experience as executioner. He was mostly a fraud that apparently got a kick from getting to hang some nazi's. The nuckle head got himself electrocuted to death, by accident, some time after the war.
He was clearly perfect man for hanging Keitel.
Amazes me how a common non aristocrat rose to such a high level. Good video
Same as Hitler
Keitel was as guilty as any. Botched executions are a separate issue and not something which should have been allowed to occur.
Its hard to believe they were "botched" as executioners did nothing to mitigate the issue after the first case.
You have opening in the hole, that is way too small for an adult AND rope, that is too short. You can botch one, not both at the same time. I hardly can believe it myself, since it cheapens whole affair.
@@OkurkaBinLadin Pierrepont was always extremely scathing about the American method of hanging using the traditional wild west noose and a fixed length of drop.
He was supposedly just a yes man and went along with Hitler no matter how dumb or unreasonable the orders were. I think he was just happy being so close to Hitler and wasn't totally willing to accept the crimes against humanity that his beloved Furher was involved in.
America has done mass murder to black people for 500 years yet no one talks about that
@@MasterHaloOne so has pretty much every other country and for alot longer also. The U.S. is probably closer to 300-350 years. It took a really long time to even create anything close to a stable environment to live in after it was discovered.
@@jeffreyval9665 That is not true , all countries have a bad past but not everyone had slaves.
Plus the US had official racist laws until 1960's , many countries didn't have that.
@@laza6141 yeah the world was a tough place for alot of people for many years. Trying to overcompensate for things that happened in the past that we had nothing to do with isn't right either.
He tried to resign 3 times but Hitler wouldn’t let him. The fact is that if he had refused to follow orders he would’ve been executed anyway. He had no chance of avoiding execution either way
Rudolph Hess
...he was the only man , who inspite of being innocent for all war crimes, suffered most and lastly killed by Allied ...
Please excuse me if I don't shed a tear for how keitel died.
Tuskagee shot program
John C Woods - The last war criminal of WW II.
It's ironic that many Nazis invoked God's name before being lynched from the gallows.
@paul For any that were truly remorseful and accepted Christ as their savior yes they would be forgiven. I know it’s not something people want to acknowledge but if you believe in religion it’s the truth. According to the Bible Jesus sacrificed himself to save sinners, Nazis were sinners it really is as simple as that.
@paul Gerecke and O’Connor walked out of the gym, back across the wet yard, and into the prison corridor where they waited for the signal to bring in the next man. Speer again heard Andrus from the second tier. “Keitel!” Again, the cell door opened, and Gerecke walked in to pray with the man he would later call “my friend.” The general chose the Bible readings, hymns, and prayers for the ritual and read them aloud. He kneeled by the cot in his cell and confessed his sins. “On his knees and under deep emotional stress, [Keitel] received the Body and Blood of our Savior,” Gerecke wrote later. “With tears in his voice he said, ‘You have helped me more than you know. May Christ, my Savior, stand by me all the way. I shall need him so much’.”
“Our period of prayer in his cell was drenched with his tears,” Gerecke later wrote. As they walked through the courtyard, Keitel recited Bible verses in German that Gerecke couldn’t decipher. He also all but hummed the melody to Johann Friedrich Raeder’s nineteenth-century hymn, “Harre, Meine Seele” (“Await, My Soul”). At the top of the gallows, Keitel said his final words, and then he recited a prayer that his mother taught him when he was a child.
Gerecke’s mother had said the same prayer with him when he was young, and now the two men prayed it together: “Christi Blut und Gerechtigkeit, das ist mein Schmuck und Ehrenkleid; darin will ich vor Gott bestehen, wenn ich zum Himmel werd eingehen. Amen.” “Christ’s blood and judgment are my adornment and robe of honor; therein I will stand before God when I go to Heaven. Amen.”
Keitel turned to Gerecke. “I thank you, and those who sent you, with all my heart,” he said.
An excerpt from Mission at Nuremberg by Tim Townsend www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00ENGZLN8/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?ie=UTF8&qid=&sr=.
@paul I’m assuming your responding to me I don’t know why the @ name is so screwed up though. I mean as far as I can tell Keitel and a number of others grew up as Christians and Catholics but lost their way later on believing in Hitler’s/The Nazi lies and accepting his/it’s offers.
Yeah, well, historically, more people have been killed in the name of "God" than all other reasons combined.
@paul I really get sick of hearing the Chosen People!, Chosen by Whom?
Great! This made my day. Good job John Woods!
All the brains of a cinema usher. Poor old Keitel.
But loyal as a dog. Hitler was called "The Bohemian Corporal" by some Generals including Friedrich Von Paulus. Gestapo Müller had called Hitler "the unemployed house painter and Austrian draft dodger".
@@renemoya6831 Churchill would have also attracted some unpleasant comments in his time.
To be in Hitler's inner circle one needed to suppress intellectual and moral judgment. One needed do little thinking in that coven of demons.
@@renemoya6831 Hitler certainly didn't dodge the draft if you look at his World War One service.
@@bigverybadtom He dodged the Austrian Draft and instead served in the German army, remember Hitler was born in Austria.
yeah, the entire Nuremberg was a kangaroo court, barbaric vendetta justice with people charged with what Allies had been doing even more, England and France declared war on Germany, not the other way around, ostensibly over Poland, which was then thrown to the wolves, with Britain starting to bomb civilian targets and even cities and ultimately firebombing Dresden and Hamburg, Churchill was a warmonger, a traitor and a war criminal, it was only due to some honorable British generals Britain didn't drop massive quantities of poisonous gas on German cities, Churchill was a bankrupt drunk who sold his soul to an ethnic lobby, a mad man, he effectively destroyed the European civilization.
Pierrepoint was a professional executioner, Woods was an amateur.
So what make no diff I ain't talking bout no careers man it's all about making the Nazi scum feel a lil of the pain and humiliation they inflicted upon innocent folks .god dam good work sargent woods .
God bless Woods then, eh?
@@randymillhouse791 f......eh! My man
@@wfranceschi3606 ABSOLUTELY, IN MY OPINION, THEY SHOULD HAVE ALL, BEEN BURNT TO DEATH, SLOWLY.
Well, how do you become an expert, and proffessional, without practice ? he just needed a little longer at it, thats all, like a few thousand Nazi necks.
Yo no estoy de acuerdo en que fuera un incompetente. En los otros países que combatieron en el conflicto, Sus jefes de estado mayor, desempeñaron funciones parecidas y sin embargo no se les critica, Tengo que añadir, que el mariscal del aire Harthur Arris, fue un criminal de guerra que nunca fue juzgado y ahorcado, ya que ordenó bombardeos indiscriminados contra población y murió con honores. Una vergüenza.
Goering was the truly brave one at Nuremberg, calling the trial "victor's justice". Which it was in real life.
Well yes, and he also said, "History is written by the victors", which is true 99 per cent of the time, with the possible exception of the Roman Empire. The Nazis could say things that were true though this lay on a bed of other lies and some of the cruellest most immoral behaviour thew world has ever seen.
@@pauldh62 It still was victor's justice. Just because the Nazis were evil doesn't mean the Allies were all saintly either.
@@bigverybadtom Indeed and there was one trial in particular that was highly questionable. It was that of an Italian general, whose name escapes me and who had fought with distinction on the allied side when Italy changed sides. He was hanged for shooting prisoners of war, attempting to escape when Italy was with the axis. My understanding was that this was not a breach of the Geneva Convention. It is believed he was chosen as a scapegoat when there were far more deserving members of the postwar Italian establishment. British and American reporters did all they could to save him, openly criticising his trial, all to no avail. There were numerous cases where prisoners were killed, a couple of camps where they were starved to death before the Red Cross managed to halt this in return for no further action against the perpetrators. In the pacific the Americans had quite excusable reasons for not taking prisoners as the Japanese had shown that their surrender was just a ruse, so some of this was not just hate, but mere practicality. Add to that the Geneva Convention permits the killing of prisoners if the prevailing side is not in a position to take them.
@@bigverybadtom Equating the Allies with the Nazis is not just wrong, it's repulsive. Either learn some history or learn some morality.
@@pauldh62 Almost everything in your comment is a lie. How do you sleep at night?
W. Keitel's hanging was said to have been botched. The trap door area wasn't wide enough, and his head struck the wood as he fell. Being wedged it took approximately 20 minutes for him to subbcomb. The Brits used this incident to embarrass American hangings, & bragged their hangman was an expert.
... I mean, if he didn't do his duty to his Gov't someone else would've. There was no room for negotiations or objections with Holter. Come on let's be realistic not idealistic
This is like a shoplifter saying that if he doesn't steal an object on display, then some other thief will. That is one of the weakest excuses possible.
@@paulbrower3297 yikes...that is a horrible example.
@paul Sorry, I meant to respond to @rack city. My bad.
@@rackcity5981 You need to educate yourself to exactly WHAT Keitel was charged with, his "defense" of his actions in context to the crimes he was charged with, and the prosecutor's summation of the crimes Keitel was found guilty of. No one has a "duty to his Gov't" to commit crimes when a govt orders them to commit crimes. You would do well to educate yourself before commenting next time.
@paul all war is murder. State sanctioned murder
Proverbs 11:21 Be sure of this: The wicked will not go unpunished, but those who are righteous will go free.
How profound that is. "All darkness is the moonless night, and all whiteness is the spotless snow." Me, proverbs 1, verse 1.
I don't understand why John C. Woods is so controversial. What he did to these war criminals was far less harsh than what they did to the innocent men, women, children, and little babies that were sent to gas chambers and went through an excruciatingly horrific 20-30 minute long death on a daily basis. Woods actually deserves respect in my opinion. As does Albert Pierrpoint. On behalf of the U.S. and U.K. they carried out their duties to avenge the atrocities.
Woods and sparky became buddies.
Pierrepoint was a professional who did not bungle executions.
Keitel was Wehrmacht, not SS. As an army senior field marshal, he had nothing to do with the concentration camps.
Woods is controversial because he failed to do his job correctly.
He was appointed to execute NOT torture.
There is a moral difference.
The judgement given was death by hanging.
The judges expected a quick, clean execution.
To deliberately botch the killings and lengthen the death process is sadistic not righteous.
@@rosemarymurlis-hellings8138 maybe they should have given them the chair then?
Historic videos keep knowledge alive
Those trap door can be dangerous. Be careful…
Post sentencing they's take them right
out from the door we see, and boom, over.
May I suggest you change the word “ Vengeful “ in your introduction to each story . It sounds like you think these people did not deserve what they did . It was a punishment for what they did . C.
The enemy of something evil is not necessarily something that is good.
Good to hear he suffered...bit tricky to use "following orders" as a cop out when you're very near the top!!
Excellent video, thank you 👍🏻👍🏻
Jewish fingers typed this
Hirohito and Speer were more deserving of the title " war criminal "..
Hirohito is not a war criminal .The greatest war criminal is Winston churchill , a cruel murderer who was responsible for millions of death in india due to famine and war ,whereas the japanese tries there best to liberate india from the cruel monsters.
Not vengeful at all.
It was well earned.
Once and for all, Hitler did not "seize control" in 1933. While it was true that he had his SA storm troopers available, he was appointed by Hindenburg after a series of complex political negotiations involving himself, the President, von Papen and von Schlecher. Sad to say, it was grown men of "reason" that put him in.
These “Loyal Dogs” truly believed that “I was only following orders” was a legitimate explanation for their inhuman actions.
This is how they were raised from feudal times to the modern age; one did not question established authority.
It didn't help that the Allied nations practiced their own brutalities on the nations they themselves colonized.
@@jonathanjrod And it will always exist.
Let's have Germans talk about that period. I am not a mothertongue, however I can recognize a British accent in narrator's voice. Great Britain was amongst the winners of the war. Too simple, too easy to deliver homilies from the pulpit!
If not forced to comit suicide, would Rommel have faced trial for warcrimes?
Nein!
No
Nope! He did not commit any war crimes
No: Rommel had been only the commander of divisions and the corps in Lybia. His superior commanders were Generalfeldmarschall Keitel and Generalcoronel Jodl, who did not command fighter units. And he never ordered to kill captured enemies and innocent Jews. After the defeat of his "Afrika Korps" in May 1943, he was reduced to inspect the Wehrmacht in France under the command of the Generalfeldmarschalls von Rundstedt and Kluge and to make propaganda for Hitler. Generalfeldmarschall von Rundstedt was never charged for warcrimes. After the invasion in France in 1944 Rommel critized Hitler openly on behalf the mistakes in the war and demanded for surrender of the Wehrmacht. Therefore he was forced to comit suicide.
@@WilloSNoack Thanks.
Any chance on a video on Albert Pierrepoint
Coming soon!
@@TheUntoldPast outstanding!
Oh, poor General Keitel. His execution didn’t go smoothly. He suffered during his death sentence. Hmmmm... I wonder if the family members (if there were any left) of those he slaughtered felt any sorrow in his suffering??? I’m thinking NOT!!!
wow nice opinon you would have looked good in those black uniforms with the skull
Good Point Mr McPhail!
Savagery from those who would be seen as civilized, is never laudible
Ask all the victims of the Bolsheviks
@@micanopykracker902 well if we ask victims of ideologies .. than capitalisem has the most that makes the usa and brittain vilain staates ( well they are anyway responsible for nearly every war since world war 2 )
and those are facts not things that propaganda put in your head
This guy John C Woods has somehow stepped into my sympathy
This guy was know as "The Lackey" by other generals.
Love the nickname 'Lackeitel' Proper banter.
@@TheUntoldPast Apparently it was also a reference to a Latin word meaning slave/servant , in other words Keitel was a slave/servant to Hitlers will.
Meanwhile, real-life cinema ushers are like c'mon bruh, don't put me in the same league as this Chav...
Wasn't Keitel the officer who complained of being brought to a prison, whereupon the Colonel in command of the prison personally pulled off his rank insignia then remarked "Now you're a war criminal?"
Was this after or before the Nurenberger conviction?
@@rwood87 That was when Keitel and the others were first brought to Nuremberg after the war.
@@rwood87 I believe it was just before.
9:40 who is on the other side of Keitel?
I can see Keitel getting the noose, but less so for Jodl. Bormann definitely deserved execution if he had been caught. Speer should have been given the firing squad. Goering was such a Chad troll lmao. Would have been awesome if he had been found in his cell after he took the poison, and rigormortis made him have his middle finger sticking up, or if he had a drawing on his chest of a hand flipping the bird with "LOL" in that severe, serious German font.
I think how Goring managed to poison himself deserves a video in itself!
Keitel should have been left alive, and Speer and Dönitz deserved their sentence
i don't know to much about bormann other than knowing he was hitler's private secretary, what crimes would he likely have ordered ?
@paul not necessarily, oskar schindler was a member of the nazi party
@@shutup2751 He was the head of the Party as Reichsleiter. Hitler's consigliere of the Nazi crime family, as it were.
Patton, Eisenhover could never become the standard with Keitel around.
Patton, Eisenhover could never become the standard with Keitel around.
I disagree with your fundamental conceit that his death was a form of revenge by the Allies. The whole trial was to illustrate by example that the Allies would not succumb to vengeance. As some defendants were given prison, were ultimately released, as well as executions taking place; I’d say the Allies made their point nicely.
It’s a fact his execution was botched (as many still are in the US today, despite modern technology). It’s dangerous fantasy that his life was taken with malice. There’s no reason, even with hindsight, to believe that. Not only were the Nazi’s fairly trialled but they were also dispatched as well as could be done. That’s many times better treatment than they would ever give their “enemies.”
@Pieter Balk Poland, of course, not being a part of Europe?
Whatever horrors Keitel may have faced in death, he richly DESERVED THEM.
Nah weak argument. Hitler gave the order. Kietal and the Wehrmacht for that matter had an oath to Hitler - not to Germany - Hitler. He wasn’t at any Liberty legally to speak against orders handed down to him. The Allies should have tried the Soviet leaders too - then that would be a fair trail - obviously impossible. At least having Soviets not sit as a judge would help.
He was executed for wars of aggression but no allied generals were tried for invading Poland, Finland, and Iran.
Interesting that Americans Allies executed 8-9 times as many Japanese military leaders, as Germans. (Through courts) Hundreds of German war criminals were hunted down and shot. Twice shown in Band of Brother's series.
A word or two about the method of execution. It was exactly the same as that used for Sadaam Hussein. What went wrong was two fold. First, the American method was followed. This uses a standard six foot drop as opposed to the British Home Office regulated minimum six foot drop, weight determining drop thereafter. second, and chiefly, the executioner deliberately bungled it. He placed the noose at the back of the head so that the condemned would choke rather than die from a broken neck, moreover their head would hit the scaffold as they tumbled through the trap door. Ribbentrop, Keitel and Streicher all died this way. Many will comment that they had it coming, but the view of the allies was that this was unacceptable and unprofessional, adopting the British Home Office philosophy that the punishment for murder was forfieture of life, not torture and forfieture of life. In the belief that the victorious allies should set an example by eliminating, as far as possible, suffering from the procedure, Albert Pierrepoint, hangman from the UK, was appointed, who swiftly dispatched in excess of 300 war criminals without incident in a single day.
We will never know... but this is consistent with the executioner having exceptional hatred for those three. Most of the Nazis lost weight (especially Goering) while on trial, so they were more likely to strangle than have their necks break. Goering of course took poison.
We can all have our ideas of what the fitting end would have been for them. I thought Kaltenbrunner the most objectionable, and burning at the stake would have been too nice for him.
Then again -- maybe the Allies didn't want Albert Pierrepoint making death so easy for them.
American std drop was 5 ft. Pierrepoint never dispatched 300 in a day
@@pigslefats Perhaps it was more, I'll check again, thanks.
@@paulbrower3297 Officially at the execution of Tojo and others, the Americans said the day before to news crews that every effort would be made to effect a humane death. I think the Americans were genuinely embarrassed by what was a bad rough and tumble job on Hitler's henchmen, so much so that they handed the baton over to the British. Churchill initially wanted them shot once their identities were established, without the the process of a trial, such was the enormity of their crimes. There remains to this day fierce debate as to whether that would have been the more appropriate action. The prevailing wind went with the desire to do things properly as they should be done - a proper trial and, where guilt was established, a clean execution. As for the condemned losing weight, the British method adapts the length of drop to accommodate such factors, the American is fixed at six feet, so you may be right.
@@pigslefats My humble apologies. I checked this out further. You are correct. It was not 300 in a day, I felt certain it was. Pierrepoint hanged a total of 600 people during his career. There were 238 war criminals hanged by him. The most he ever hanged in a single day was 10, and 17 over two days. Between 1948-9 he hanged 226 war criminals at a prison in Hamelin ( Wikipedia, Albert Pierrepoint).
Wilhelm Keitel was born and raised in Bad Gandersheim in the village of Helmscherode.
I keep seeing different account of the execution of the Nuremburg war criminals, this says it was a guy named Woods who did a bad job, but other accounts I hear say the British executioner named Pierpont who evidently was a more competent professional. Which was it?
Pierpoint was the executioner for the British of the host of lesser war criminals such as camp guards. He was a thorough professional. If he had been used for the top rank there would have been no botched executions.
Woods kept a piece of the rope he used to hang each of the condemned as a souvenir.
Pierrepoint didn't execute any of those sentenced to death at Nuremburg or anywhere else in the American occupied sector. He executed those condemned in the British sector such as those in the Bergen-Belsen trial, who were hanged in Hamelin prison.
There is nothing 'vengeful' about this at all.
All the judges were drawn from the victorious powers including USSR, an ex-ally of Germany in Poland, thus possibly not independent.
Historical events are rarely neat and tidy. Nuremberg was no exception. The Allies should have convened a separate war crimes trial in answer to atrocities committed by their own forces, and I mean, not merely individual acts in violation of codes of military justice, but large scale actions like the unnecessary bombing of Dresden for instance. If Nuremberg established that following orders is no excuse for committing a crime, this should apply to all countries, not just Germany, Japan, and Italy, or the whole point is lost.
@@abc64pan Ahhh that old chestnut, Dresden. The unnecessary bombing of Dresden? Is there some new evidence which confirms that Dresden was not a "legitimate" target in February 1945? Or should I interpret the posting above as yet another plea from the Joerg Friedrich corner of the Historical Debate?? What is true is that the generations committed to war have almost died out; however, on the other hand the Second World War had still not finished in the city of Essen even August 2021. In the city of Dortmund the Blindgänger (UXB) is a matter of daily occurrence in 2021. Should the governments of the United Kingdom and United States of America have to contribute financially to removal of these unexploded bombs???
Residents of Dresden as well as Hamburg were given warning to evacuate their cities before they were firebombed. Anyone who decided to stick around just lacked common sense.
@@Poshypaws si, las hay , infórmate un poco que la verdad no hace daño
@@landrober1161 ¿Necesito averiguar la "verdad"? ¿A qué aspecto te refieres en este caso?
Why would they seat Hess and Goring next to each other? Since Hess defected from Germany in 1941.
I wouldn’t call these executions ‘vengeful’ rather ‘justice’, as that’s what they were.
The title is click-bait. Where was the controversy or discussion of vengeance? Sounds like he read Keitel’s Wikipedia page.
He most likely did lol
How about this for a history exam question? "After The Treaty of Versailles, The Allied powers did absolutely nothing to prevent Germany from re-arming again. Discuss".
Had the allied powers intervened, wouldn’t history judge them as the aggressors?
Object was solely retribution!
@@catman8670 - Huh? The reason the allied powers didn’t intervene was retribution? For what? Germany was just in the preparation point at that stage.
Actually it did, but lamely. The Anglo German naval treaty of 1935 had precisely this in mind.
One thing that has gone unmentioned is that after World War One, Britain was actually afraid of both Russia and France. It didn't help that both nations committed acts of war on their own.