SS Viewpoint – Volume Eight: Soldier and War

$10.00

Translated from the SS newspaper Das Schwarze Korps, select articles from 1941 to 1945. Each volume is focused on a specific theme. If you enjoyed our SS Culture and SS Creed series, you’ll enjoy this series as well.

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Each SC volume has 40-51pp.

The successes of the German soldier are the fruit of his psychological attitude. It encompasses within itself the final consequence of the warrior: readiness for death. But the readiness for death of Germanic man is not that self-tormenting flirtation with death that belongs to the oriental and is praised by oriental religions as a special virtue, as a commendable disregard for the earthly existence.

We love this earthly life, we seek in it the highest test and final fulfillment of our existence. We do not throw life away in order to trade it for a doubtful prospect for a better beyond. And our readiness for the final consequence of fighting spirit, for sacrifice of life, stems only from the certainty of a higher necessity. The oriental sacrifices his life in the belief that the sacrifice would bring him or his immortal soul personal advantages. Germanic man sacrifices it for the life of his children, of his family, of his clan, of his folk.

But if the fallen of the war die for the community, if their readiness for death provides the proof that the life of the man belongs to the community, then this tenet must hold true for all members of the folk, for the non-combatants as well. After all, we have no warrior caste with its own rights and duties. Whether or not one is a warrior, initially depends on secondary things. The difference is first made by the fact that it is more dangerous to stand behind an anti-tank gun than behind a shop counter. So why should the totally subordinate question whether one, due to his age or profession, does not stand at the front give him the right to value his life and his purpose of existence differently than the soldier?