If Willy Brandt kneeling before the Warsaw Ghetto Memorial divided people, it could only have meant there were many Nazi sympathisers around. And that is a frightening thought. Brandt's spontaneous gesture acknowledged Germany's guilt in the Shoah though Brandt himself bore no guilt.
No it had more to do with pride and the fact that most people at that time were not educated about the crimes we committed during WW2. Today it is different but there are still things that are not taught in schools. We focus a lot on the things that happened to the jews and to little on the crimes that were committed against the slavic population. I as a 20 year old know a lot more about certain war crimes than people that lived during that age
Howz about the 1918 allied conglomerate whose underhand policies made the revenge crazed Nazi powergrab succeed ? on towards a war Germany was guaranteed to lose again ; and was literally brought to its knees. The French and British who still had unfinished business with Germany succeeded brilliantly. Germany to this day is forced to support and finance Israel unconditionally ; for obvious reasons. While the Nazis shared all their criminal knowhow with their new master. Some came out of that slaughter not entirely unsatisfied and wouldn't change this horrible history , not even if they could.....
@@johnhaggerty4396 Willy Brandt said a great thing, that Germans should not accept collective guilt but collective responsibility. I really agree with that and it’s a powerful thing to say.
@@Delorean90 does that mean Japan should never apologize to the people of China just because what CCP is doing in Xinjiang? Japan should apologize to Chinese people, not CCP.
@@samad3251true. They beat up and tortured my Chinese grandad. My grandad was a doctor and went to help rural patients in China. Japanese came and terrorised the area. Somehow my grandad escaped running through the mountainous forest in the middle of the night and escaping by boat back home.
the whole thing with "apoligizing" is so hypocritical and stupid. That that means every human nation (including "the oppressed ones") should have apologies to each other
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Merci pour ce rappel. Cependant, je déplore que les Allemands ne soient pas plus francophiles. Pourtant nos deux langues sont issues de la grande famille de Charlemagne. Une solide amitié France-Allemagne serait beaucoup fécond pour l'Europe que de se coller aux Anglos-Saxons qui sont beaucoup plus isolationnistes.
what's also noteworthy here is that brandt was a communist and in exile during the nazi regime he had all reason to say "i had nothing to do with this i was against the nazis why should i kneel" but he did this anyway
Ich bin überrascht, wie viele Polen Deutsch sprechen! Auch heute noch wird deutsch an Schulen in Polen gelehrt, andersherum wissen die wenigsten (mich eingeschlossen) genauer über unsere Nachbarn Bescheid... Ich hoffe, dass in Zukunft die Freundschaft zwischen Deutschland und Polen noch stärker wächst. 🇵🇱🤝🇩🇪
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Both countries are powerhouse in the Vatican after an Italian Popes before 1st Latin American Pope ( Francis an Argentine of Italian descent) during John Paul and Benedict’s papacy and especially during Polish Pope John Paul II’s papacy German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (who will succeeded him as Benedict XVI) as his right hand man
Polen sind keine Freunde der Deutschen, und sie wollen keine sein; Polen sind mehrheitlich deutschfeindlich und haben sich politisch fast immer so verhalten.
Oder würden die Deutschen vielleicht lernen, Polnisch zu sprechen? Die Menschen in diesem Film sprachen Deutsch, weil sie es unter Zwang lernen mussten, um die Befehle der deutschen Besatzer zu verstehen.
The kneeling set a great precedent. It is a tragedy the Barack Obama did not follow it and kneel before a memorial in Hanoi to victims of the American war against Vietnam.
Excuse me, please! But how can Grass comment Willy's Act as if it means NOTHING?! Günther Grass has NO IDEA of what Greatness means! We have "a History" ... and reguarding to what happend here, is this the most respectful honour someone can get - WOW! I am feeling my tears drop out of my eyes.. This great Man had a hard way infront of him, at that time. Günther Guillaume. *I'll fall on my knees for Willy!
He was our Kennedy. A great chancellor, wanted by the Nazis, but never gave up to work for a democratic Germany. He is missed! He would smash right party’s like AFD with Wehner and Schmidt. Willy, always a peace of Germany. 🇩🇪
In Protestant Leaders John Kennedy could be Billy Graham to Willy Brandt’s Martin Luther in all 4 people only Martin Luther who did not live in the 20th century he lives in 1500s others 3 all lives in the 20th century all born in 1910s
Did he ever bow in honor of those ethnic Germans expelled from their homelands in the eastern Reich, Sudetenland, etc? A few million died or were killed by Poles and Soviet soldiers on the way to rump Germany.
These Germans were expelled as a result of a war started by Germany. Also, your numbers are largely exaggerated. Germany had a total civilian loss of life of around 2,2 million.
@@DWHistoryandCulture, Im not exaggerating anything. My maternal ancestors were expelled from their homeland in what were East and West Prussia. I doubt young Germans even know or are taught much about this history in state schools in Germany today. Poles, the Soviet Red Army, and Czechs in The Sudetenland perpetrated atrocities in the last months of the war and in the aftermath against German civilian populations in these areas stolen from Germany.
@@Interlocutor67 Why Benedict XVI never visited Sudetenland when he visit Czech Republic his student and Papabile when electing Francis in 2013 Christoph Schonborn was born in Czech Republic as Sudeten German he moved to Austria after expulsion and his mother grew up in Sudetenland during 1920s, 1930s, 1040s
@@Interlocutor67 Hope you can make peace with a change that is done and will not be reversed. The German people have moved away from the sad mistakes of the past and built an amazing future. If they had obsessed over historic lands and irredentism they would still be picking through rubble for salvage.
@@jt7638 , why can’t it ever be reversed? Borders aren’t always permanent. Overcoming the war is one thing but groveling in self-abasement is quite another.
@@AimeranCS As a foreign to this problem. All what I can say is that Poland didn't ask for it. It was destroyed the same ways its population was. A real and honest reconciliation will be accepting proper reparations never took place. 70 years plus after, you don't see a proper monument honoring polish victims. I have no grounds in this matter whatsoever, as an historian I can only tell you that Polish territory was also shifted to the est and never asked for more territory. It could barely keep up with his already destroyed land. Just reflect about it and be honest as German people is known around the world. Be honest and accept your responsibility that's all.
@@rotweiss958 Your answer screams I'm a fascist extremist who don't believe in Germany's responsibility from the damages cause by the war they created. Keep your thoughts as they are. I'm jot interested to judge or change someone's mind. However with the resent sick coup d'État that the German far right was planning, it makes me thing that there is a big extremist movement that Germany has pretended not to see but has been there since the end of the war. Your answer tells me I'm part of that movement.
what a great act, he could have chose not to do it but still he chose humility just like konrad in 1945.
If Willy Brandt kneeling before the Warsaw Ghetto Memorial divided people, it could only have meant there were many Nazi sympathisers around.
And that is a frightening thought.
Brandt's spontaneous gesture acknowledged Germany's guilt in the Shoah though Brandt himself bore no guilt.
No it had more to do with pride and the fact that most people at that time were not educated about the crimes we committed during WW2. Today it is different but there are still things that are not taught in schools. We focus a lot on the things that happened to the jews and to little on the crimes that were committed against the slavic population. I as a 20 year old know a lot more about certain war crimes than people that lived during that age
Howz about the 1918 allied conglomerate whose underhand policies made the revenge crazed Nazi powergrab succeed ? on towards a war Germany was guaranteed to lose again ; and was literally brought to its knees.
The French and British who still had unfinished business with Germany succeeded brilliantly.
Germany to this day is forced to support and finance Israel unconditionally ; for obvious reasons.
While the Nazis shared all their criminal knowhow with their new master. Some came out of that slaughter not entirely unsatisfied and wouldn't change this horrible history , not even if they could.....
@@johnhaggerty4396 Willy Brandt said a great thing, that Germans should not accept collective guilt but collective responsibility. I really agree with that and it’s a powerful thing to say.
@@1984isnotamanual , and keep paying and paying, and groveling unto the end of time.
Germany acknowledged it. The Japanese still haven't apologized to the Chinese for what they've done.
China has not apologized for the genocide of the Uighurs either. Even more, still waging this genocide.
@@Delorean90 does that mean Japan should never apologize to the people of China just because what CCP is doing in Xinjiang? Japan should apologize to Chinese people, not CCP.
@@samad3251true. They beat up and tortured my Chinese grandad. My grandad was a doctor and went to help rural patients in China. Japanese came and terrorised the area. Somehow my grandad escaped running through the mountainous forest in the middle of the night and escaping by boat back home.
@@Delorean90 в своей стране им нечего извиняться. Уйгуры это потенциальные сепаратисты Китая и их держат жестко.
the whole thing with "apoligizing" is so hypocritical and stupid. That that means every human nation (including "the oppressed ones") should have apologies to each other
Willy Brandt war für mich ein wahrer POLITIKER , ein aufrechter Demokrat , ein Wahrzeichen für Versöhnung und Frieden.
THank you for this great video. Never forget
"I did what people do when words fail."
In kurzer Amtszeit unglaublich viel Wichtiges umgesetzt, besonders Innenpolitisch.
Merci pour ce beau et émouvant portrait du chancelier Brandt. Danke
Thanks for the kind words and taking the time to comment. We kindly ask our viewers on this channel to engage with topics in English so that both DW and the community have the chance to respond. For further information, please refer to DW's netiquette policy: p.dw.com/p/MF1G Thanks for watching!
Merci pour ce rappel. Cependant, je déplore que les Allemands ne soient pas plus francophiles. Pourtant nos deux langues sont issues de la grande famille de Charlemagne. Une solide amitié France-Allemagne serait beaucoup fécond pour l'Europe que de se coller aux Anglos-Saxons qui sont beaucoup plus isolationnistes.
what's also noteworthy here is that brandt was a communist and in exile during the nazi regime he had all reason to say "i had nothing to do with this i was against the nazis why should i kneel" but he did this anyway
Williy Brand was't a communist. Just because sombody is for social justice he isn't a communist.
Brandt was not communist, he was in fact very anti communist in his policies, he even supported the vietnam war.
Brandt was a social democrat who despised communism.. You shoild buy a book and learn
BRAVO!
(with tears in my eyes)
Great men in history
the greatest MAN i am proud of this GERMAN''s son long life 4 German GOD Bless your country
They day when Poland and the whole world forgives Germany. Honorable leader from an honorable nation.
Ich bin überrascht, wie viele Polen Deutsch sprechen! Auch heute noch wird deutsch an Schulen in Polen gelehrt, andersherum wissen die wenigsten (mich eingeschlossen) genauer über unsere Nachbarn Bescheid...
Ich hoffe, dass in Zukunft die Freundschaft zwischen Deutschland und Polen noch stärker wächst. 🇵🇱🤝🇩🇪
Thanks for watching and for sharing your thoughts with us and the community! We kindly ask our viewers on this channel to engage with topics in English so that both DW and the community have the chance to respond. For further information, please refer to DW's netiquette policy: p.dw.com/p/MF1G Thanks for watching!
Both countries are powerhouse in the Vatican after an Italian Popes before 1st Latin American Pope ( Francis an Argentine of Italian descent) during John Paul and Benedict’s papacy and especially during Polish Pope John Paul II’s papacy German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (who will succeeded him as Benedict XVI) as his right hand man
Polen sind keine Freunde der Deutschen, und sie wollen keine sein; Polen sind mehrheitlich deutschfeindlich und haben sich politisch fast immer so verhalten.
Oder würden die Deutschen vielleicht lernen, Polnisch zu sprechen? Die Menschen in diesem Film sprachen Deutsch, weil sie es unter Zwang lernen mussten, um die Befehle der deutschen Besatzer zu verstehen.
@@CYRKLE1975 ja es gibt deutsche die polnisch lernen und freiwillig in Polen leben. Grüße aus Gdynia.
People like him only have a chance to be heard, when everything is out of order and destroyed.
The kneeling set a great precedent. It is a tragedy the Barack Obama did not follow it and kneel before a memorial in Hanoi to victims of the American war against Vietnam.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts with us and our community.
Excuse me, please!
But how can Grass comment Willy's Act as if it means NOTHING?!
Günther Grass has NO IDEA of what Greatness means!
We have "a History" ... and reguarding to what happend here, is this the most respectful honour someone can get - WOW! I am feeling my tears drop out of my eyes..
This great Man had a hard way infront of him, at that time.
Günther Guillaume.
*I'll fall on my knees for Willy!
one day I hope I can see a Japanese leader can kneel in front of the Nanjing massacre memorial hall in China！
They won't did it the don't admit that they are coward
Emperor or PM?
@@redbaron9029 if Han Chinese people memorial allow in the memory of all the han Chinese people during the Uyghur terrorist attack..why not..
We need people like him - in Germany and in Europe. To keep us together, and to stop new nazi's and to stop hate.
1:02-1:10 - this picture looks more like Lidice killing than Warszaw Uprising to me
If Chancellor Brandt's kneeling before the memorial to Jewish men and women murdered
Willy Brandt son, Matthias, is an actor, who played the Jewish head of the "Political Police" in the first(two?) series of Babylon Berlin.
He was our Kennedy. A great chancellor, wanted by the Nazis, but never gave up to work for a democratic Germany. He is missed! He would smash right party’s like AFD with Wehner and Schmidt. Willy, always a peace of Germany. 🇩🇪
In the Vatican Benedict XVI could German John Paul II
In Protestant Leaders John Kennedy could be Billy Graham to Willy Brandt’s Martin Luther in all 4 people only Martin Luther who did not live in the 20th century he lives in 1500s others 3 all lives in the 20th century all born in 1910s
저 행동으로 독일은 큰 나라가 되었다고 생각합니다
What a legendary chancellor. I hope the British draw a page out of German diplomacy and return it's stolen goods to their former colonies
Gigachad
😢i survived. Cold war
My morher went to warsovie in late 50s
Did he ever bow in honor of those ethnic Germans expelled from their homelands in the eastern Reich, Sudetenland, etc? A few million died or were killed by Poles and Soviet soldiers on the way to rump Germany.
These Germans were expelled as a result of a war started by Germany. Also, your numbers are largely exaggerated. Germany had a total civilian loss of life of around 2,2 million.
@@DWHistoryandCulture, Im not exaggerating anything. My maternal ancestors were expelled from their homeland in what were East and West Prussia. I doubt young Germans even know or are taught much about this history in state schools in Germany today. Poles, the Soviet Red Army, and Czechs in The Sudetenland perpetrated atrocities in the last months of the war and in the aftermath against German civilian populations in these areas stolen from Germany.
@@Interlocutor67 Why Benedict XVI never visited Sudetenland when he visit Czech Republic his student and Papabile when electing Francis in 2013 Christoph Schonborn was born in Czech Republic as Sudeten German he moved to Austria after expulsion and his mother grew up in Sudetenland during 1920s, 1930s, 1040s
@@Interlocutor67 Hope you can make peace with a change that is done and will not be reversed. The German people have moved away from the sad mistakes of the past and built an amazing future. If they had obsessed over historic lands and irredentism they would still be picking through rubble for salvage.
@@jt7638 , why can’t it ever be reversed? Borders aren’t always permanent. Overcoming the war is one thing but groveling in self-abasement is quite another.
something of which is putin not capable of-. Putin will never kneel before victims of Katyn massacre
Pravý politik, rovný muž. Nasledovania hodná osobnosť Európskeho formátu.
Thanks for watching and for your kind words.
the british owes the same to the Indians...
Want a real reconcilation? Pay for war damages and return all stolen art and other objects.
Then also return to pre-war borders. And stolen art is returned.
@@AimeranCS
As a foreign to this problem. All what I can say is that Poland didn't ask for it. It was destroyed the same ways its population was. A real and honest reconciliation will be accepting proper reparations never took place. 70 years plus after, you don't see a proper monument honoring polish victims. I have no grounds in this matter whatsoever, as an historian I can only tell you that Polish territory was also shifted to the est and never asked for more territory. It could barely keep up with his already destroyed land. Just reflect about it and be honest as German people is known around the world. Be honest and accept your responsibility that's all.
No.
@@rotweiss958 Your answer screams I'm a fascist extremist who don't believe in Germany's responsibility from the damages cause by the war they created. Keep your thoughts as they are. I'm jot interested to judge or change someone's mind. However with the resent sick coup d'État that the German far right was planning, it makes me thing that there is a big extremist movement that Germany has pretended not to see but has been there since the end of the war. Your answer tells me I'm part of that movement.
@@rotweiss958 By the way, politicians and the EU decide what to do and when to do it, not you! Let's just wait and see...
Lol, will million of people walk out of their ‘graves’ or come out of the crematorium and walk again after he has kneeled?
what a dumb comment. whats happend is happend but to acknowledge the guilt and mistake is very important. you can't change the past.
No. But it was atonement nonetheless.
He was fighting the nazi party from exile in Sweden. He personally had nothing to apologize for. That is what makes this gesture so powerful.