US Army in WWI German Attitudes Towards US Soldiers

Started by ArizonaTank, June 25, 2018, 11:16:01 AM

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ArizonaTank

Found this strange "what do they think about us?" document...compiled interviews, intel intercepts and letters talking about how the Germans feel about the American soldier during and after WW1.

So, it's 1919, and we just got done fighting you....so now we want to know if you like us....

Well, we probably still do the same thing today.....

"Candid comment on the American soldier of 1917-1918 and kindred topics: by the Germans; soldiers, priests, women, village notables, politicians, and statesmen."

http://cdm16040.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p4013coll7/id/212

One interesting comment by a German artillerist interviewed in 1919: "The French would not advance unless sure of gaining their objectives, while the American infantry would dash in regardless of all obstacles and that while they gained their objectives, they would often do so with heavy loss of life."

Johannes "Honus" Wagner
"The Flying Dutchman"
Shortstop: Pittsburgh Pirates 1900-1917
Rated as the 2nd most valuable player of all time by Bill James.

JasonPratt

When I read some of that to Mom, her judgment was, "A lot of boys from North Carolina and Tennessee decided they wanted to win a war this time."  ;D
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ArizonaTank

Quote from: JasonPratt on June 26, 2018, 11:58:09 AM
When I read some of that to Mom, her judgment was, "A lot of boys from North Carolina and Tennessee decided they wanted to win a war this time."  ;D

I think that is on the mark....:)  Alot of those guys had fathers or grandfathers who had been in the Civil War. 

I guess there was still a sense of the Civil War with some National Guard units.  In the movie "The Fighting 69th" (1940), there is a scene that tugs at the rivalry between two Civil War regiments in WW1.  The old 69th NY regiment ("The Fighting Irish") and the old 4th Alabama had both been at Gettysburg.  In WW1 they were renumbered the 165th and 167th Regiments respectively, and put under the 42nd Division (the Rainbow Division). In the movie anyway, the troops remembered their old rivalry and the result was fistacuffs.



Johannes "Honus" Wagner
"The Flying Dutchman"
Shortstop: Pittsburgh Pirates 1900-1917
Rated as the 2nd most valuable player of all time by Bill James.