Ww2 Quotes

The Nazis understand everything except humour. ~ Mary Berg

You kill yourself when you hate. It's the worst disease in the world. ~ William Schiff

The hand that held the dagger has struck it into the back of its neighbor. ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt

Gentlemen, this is a story that you shall tell your grandchildren, and mightily bored they'll be. ~ Lt General Brian Horrocks

And as for returning to work as a reporter - something she'd given considerable thought to before taking over her father's inquiry agency - the Sydney newspapers had dismissed most of their women reporters home once the men started to return from the war, or else confined them to the social pages, or covering the Easter Show, which was a bit too steep a downgrade for Billie after she'd chased Nazi activity across Europe, built a good portfolio of published articles, and worked alongside the likes of Lee Miller and Clare Hollingworth.

No, she wouldn't last in that kind of work. It was an imperfect world, and her chosen profession was decidedly imperfect, but for now she had a hint of that spark again, that sense of doing something that mattered to someone. ~ Tara Moss

Our passing interrupted the road crossing, and the crowd bunched on both sides waited for us to go by as we all waited for the war to go by, thinking we can suspend or postpone living and not knowing that in war the heart grows older than it does in dreams ~ Dan Davin

Lately the commandant speaks more and more intimately of the führer and the latest thing- prayers, petroleum, loyalty- that he requires. The führer requires trustworthiness, electricity, boot leather. Werner is beginning to see, approaching his sixteenth birthday, that what the führer really requires is boys. Great rows of them walking to the conveyor belt to climb on. Give up cream for the führer, sleep for the führer, aluminum for the führer. Give up Reinhard Wöhlmann's father and Karl Westerholzer's father and Martin Burkhard's father. ~ Anthony Doerr

It is not enough to say, simply, the motherland called and we fought; woe to the dead, and to the living goes their glory. ~ A.H. Septimius

It was neither German nor Jew who ruled the ghetto - it was illusion. ~ Elie Wiesel

We're becoming slaves; the war scatters us in all directions, takes away everything we own, snatches the bread from out of our mouths; let me at least retain the right to decide my own destiny, to laugh at it, defy it, escape it if I can. A slave? Better to be a slave than a dog who thinks he's free as he trots along behind his master. She listened to the sound of men and horses passing by. They don't even realise they're slaves, she said to herself, and I, I would be just like them if a sense of pity, solidarity, the "spirit of the hive" forced me to refuse to be happy. ~ Irene Nemirovsky

One woman, called Eva, used to visit my mother and sometimes we would call in next door to visit her. Sometimes Frau Eva gave me cakes and fruit drinks. I remember she was very kind. It was not until many years later that I understood just who she was. To me, at the time, she was just a very nice woman who lived next door sometimes, although she did tend to go away, and was often not seen for several months. ~ Alfred Nestor

When this war is over we should raise a memorial in every Australian capital to the New Guinea natives so that we may never forget how much of the white man's burden was carried by the natives in this roadless jungle warfare ... so that we may remember how many Australians owe their lives to the natives who bore the wounded in their stretchers across the tortuous trail to safety. ~ Chester Wilmot

I remember seeing one elderly man look at us, and he held his hand out, and most frightening were his eyes, dark as a soulless abyss, so black that it looked as if it had been blasted from a cyclone. I felt he was looking right at me. For a moment, I thought I was looking through his sockets, past his brain and behind him; as the tears started rolling down my cheeks a godless universe was expanding within me. Then I became hysterical. ~ Alfred Nestor

Looking up, Missouri saw a formation of low-flying P-47's on the horizon, heading up the coast from Naples...Sergeant Missouri laughed aloud. "They're sending us the Air Force, Chico, and we made it with a donkey," he said. ~ Maureen Daly

There are so few people left alive from back then, you may as well be talking to them about the Black Death. Nobody recalls the shite in the 30s and that were fucking horrible. For Christ's sake, nobody wants to remember the shite in the 80s. It's all forgotten and swept under the rug by the newspapers and the BBC. They get nostalgic about the music, but they never want to mention the misery. It's all shite. As for the bloody Second World War, the politicians only talk about it when they need an excuse to go pissing about in one of those fucking Muslim countries. ~ Harry Leslie Smith

She didn't say anything, just a long, quiet "shhhh," as if she had learned that the troubles of the world could be absorbed and deafened by slow, steady wistfulness, and I suddenly understood that she'd been silencing the noise for the past twenty years. ~ Jennifer Ryan

Who was Hitler" demanded little Tracy
"He was this bloke in World War Two" explained Ben. ~ Jackie French

Nothing at all to change: what a thing to want in the midst of war. ~ Julie Orringer

I've got one thing to say: I killed a lot of germans, and I'm only sorry I didn't kill more. ~ Nancy Wake

The mind is a powerful thing. It can take you through walls. ~ Denis Avey

To die,
so young to die.
No, no, not I,
I love the warm sunny skies,
light, song, shining eyes,
I want no war, no battle cry,
No, no, not I. ~ Hannah Senesh

Hitler initially served in the List Regiment engaged in a violent four-day battle near Ypres, in Belgian Flanders, with elite British professional soldiers of the initial elements of the British Expeditionary Force. Hitler thereby served as a combat infantryman in one of the most intense engagements of the opening phase of World War I. The List Regiment was temporarily destroyed as an offensive force by suffering such severe casualty rates (killed, wounded, missing, and captured) that it lost approximately 70 percent of its initial strength of around 3,600 men. A bullet tore off Hitler's right sleeve in the first day of combat, and in the "batch" of men with which he originally advanced, every one fell dead or wounded, leaving him to survive as if through a miracle. On November 9, 1914, about a week after the ending of the great battle, Hitler was reassigned as a dispatch runner to regimental headquarters. Shortly thereafter, he was awarded the Iron Cross Second Class.

On about November 14, 1914, the new regimental commander, Lieutenant Colonel Philipp Engelhardt, accompanied by Hitler and another dispatch runner, moved forward into terrain of uncertain ownership. Engelhardt hoped to see for himself the regiment's tactical situation. When Engelhardt came under aimed enemy smallarms fire, Hitler and the unnamed comrade placed their bodies between their commander and the enemy fire, determined to keep him alive. The two enlisted men, who were veterans of the earlier ~ Russel H.S. Stolfi

Always there have been six ravens at the Tower. If the ravens fly away, the kingdom will fall. ~ John Owen Theobald

One part of him recoiled in instinctive horror at the daily waste, the inundation of destruction and death that inexorably assaulted the mind and heart; once again he saw the faculty depleted, he saw the haunted looks upon those who remained behind, and saw in those looks the slow death of the heart, the bitter attrition of feeling and care. ~ John Edward Williams

That is the way we decided to talk, free and easy, two young men discussing a boxing match. That was the only way to talk. You couldn't let too much truth seep into your conversation, you couldn't admit with your mouth what your eyes had seen. If you opened the door even a centimeter, you would smell the rot outside and hear the screams. You did not open the door. You kept your mind on the tasks of the day, the hunt for food and water and something to burn, and you saved the rest for the end of the war. ~ David Benioff

First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out--
because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out--
because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out--
because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out--
because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me--
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

Martin Niemoeller ~ Martin Niemoeller

You know what, BB? We've got dark spots on our souls. We have to live with that. War is not about doing what's right. War's about surviving."

Verner aka 'Jens'
in the novel 'The Informer' by Steen Langstrup ~ Steen Langstrup

Nonetheless the man (Hitler) had a remarkable ability to transform himself into something far more compelling, especially when speaking in public or during private meetings when some topic enraged him. He had a knack as well for projecting an aura of sincerity that blinded onlookers to his true motives and beliefs.. ~ Erik Larson

Within a decade or two, all Holocaust survivors will likely have passed away so a ticking clock is in effect in this battle between the truth and lies. Keep in mind even those survivors born in a concentration camp during WW2 would be at least 71 years-of-age when this book (the one you are reading now) was released. Those survivors old enough to clearly recall the events of that nightmare will, of course, be older and have much less time left. As the memory of the Holocaust begins to fade away, it will become easier to deny the genocide even occurred unless those of us who are truthseekers are able to embrace the memory of the genocide and educate others do the same. What's needed in this propaganda war is for the true stories of Holocaust survivors – as well as those of the Nazi perpetrators, their associates and others who witnessed the genocide – to be told loudly and clearly so that there will never, ever be room for doubt in generations to come. After all, nothing is more powerful, credible or damning than eyewitness accounts. ~ James Morcan

We discovered that peace at any price is no peace at all ... that life at any price has no value whatever; that life is nothing without the privileges, the prides, the rights, the joys that make it worth living and also worth giving ... and that there is something more hideous, more atrocious than war or than death; and that is to live in fear. ~ Eve Curie

If we don't think about our death until we die, how can we decide how we want to live? ~ Jennifer Ryan

There have been many plagues in the world as there have been wars, yet plagues and wars always find people equally unprepared. [...] When a war breaks out people say: 'It won't last, it's too stupid.' And war is certainly too stupid, but that doesn't prevent it from lasting. Stupidity always carries doggedly on, as people wold notice if they were not always thinking about themselves. In this respect, the citizens of Oran were like the rest of the world, they thought about themselves, in other words, they were humanists: they did not believe in pestilence. A pestilence does not have human dimensions, so people tell themselves that it is unreal, that it is a bad dream which will end. But it does not always end and, from one bad dream to the next, it is people who end, humanists first of all because they have not prepared themselves. ~ Albert Camus

As he journeyed alone toward the monster that is death, we could do nothing to help him, nor the others still alive; all the words of strength on our lips melted away, our love not great enough to bind them to life, and our hope not enough to will them to live. ~ Alfred Nestor

It was so kind of you to write to me about your experiences during the Occupation. At the war's end, I, too, promised myself that I had done with talking about it. I had talked and lived war for six years, and I was longing to pay attention to something - anything - else. But that is like wishing I were someone else. The war is now the story of our lives, and there's no subtracting it. ~ Mary Ann Shaffer

We must be the great arsenal of democracy. ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt

Later, I started to understand just why these children 'hated' us other children. I understood that they did not, in fact, hate 'us', but hated the fact that we were German and spoke in a language that they associated with pain, fear and the loss of their parents, uncles, grandfathers and grandmothers, their whole families, in fact. Once I understood this it affected me in all sorts of subconscious ways, ways that were to blight my life for many years and make me deny my German birth. ~ Alfred Nestor

Sergeant Missouri crouched close to the ground, pulling up his collar against the bitter, gusting winds. Show me, he thought tiredly, I'm from Missouri. ~ Maureen Daly

We were supposed to be heroes."
"There's no such thing as heroes."

Conversation between 'Alis K' and 'Borge'
The Informer by Steen Langstrup ~ Steen Langstrup

With our collective shock, what we saw seemed to be frozen into a state of suspended animation. Indelibly etched into our memories in terror, forever! My life was in slow motion, it was as if I was no longer in my body and this was a rather bad dream! It is almost impossible to describe with words what I saw, but I will try. This very experience is the one that has continued to shake me awake during the dense night of my lifetime. ~ Alfred Nestor

The Doctor: Amazing.
Nancy: What is?
The Doctor: 1941. Right now, not very far from here, the German war machine is rolling up the map of Europe. Country after country, falling like dominoes. Nothing can stop it, nothing. Until one tiny, damp little island says "No. No, not here." A mouse in front of a lion. You're amazing, the lot of you. I don't know what you do to Hitler, but you frighten the hell out of me. ~ Steven Moffat

I felt so much more than horror. I was so afraid, shocked by what I saw. There were hundreds of men, women and children hanging from the trees ... there was blood everywhere! We all saw that every person had been gutted, like a fish. My instinct was to run, but where to ... I was on a train. As I watched those around me on the train, so many others also looked like they had explosions in their eyes and they too wanted to flee. ~ Alfred Nestor

It was on 7 March 1936 that Hitler comprehensivelyviolated the Versailles Treaty by sending troops intothe industrial region of the Rhineland, which under Article 180 had been specifically designated ademilitarized zone. Had the German Army beenopposed by the French and British forces stationednear by, it had orders to retire back to base and sucha reverse would almost certainly have cost Hitler thechancellorship. Yet the Western powers, riven withguilt about having imposed what was described as a'Carthaginian peace' on Germany in 1919, allowedthe Germans to enter the Rhineland unopposed. 'After all,' said the influential Liberal politician andnewspaper director the Marquis of Lothian, who hadbeen Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in RamsayMacDonald's National Government, 'they are onlygoing into their own back garden.' When Hitler assured the Western powers in March 1936 thatGermany wished only for peace, Arthur Greenwood,the deputy leader of the Labour Party, told the Houseof Commons: 'Herr Hitler has made a statement…holding out the olive branch… which ought to be takenat face value… It is idle to say that those statementsare insincere.' That August Germany adopted compulsory two-year military service ~ Andrew Roberts

Ernie got it,' I said afterwards. 'His experience taught him that you've got to fight for what's right. It gets you into a lot of trouble but he came to the same conclusion as me.' People think it could never happen here. Don't you believe it; it doesn't take much. ~ Denis Avey

My uncle killed by sniper in WW2. We were taught snipers were cowards. Will shoot you in the back. Snipers aren't heroes. And invaders are worse. ~ Michael Moore

War was funny like that: one minute you could try and block it and have the most wonderful thoughts, the next you were back in the nightmare. ~ Mark A. Cooper

To deny the reported six million (approximately) Jews who died, or the 11 million people in total, is to ignore all the eyewitness accounts from Holocaust survivors, the non-Jewish witnesses of the millions who died the open-air massacres around Europe, the concentration camp guards, Nazi officers who admitted to gassings and other related crimes immediately after WW2, and the universal agreement of all mainstream historians who have studied this historical event inside out – not to mention every single scientist who has ever analyzed forensic evidence retrieved from the Nazi genocide. Not even the most corrupt courtroom on Earth could ignore this much evidence – for collectively these confirmations of the Holocaust equate to irrefutable proof that the reported death toll is indeed correct. It is possibly the most well-documented crime of the 20th Century, but remember for religious extremists, Nazi apologists or other anti-Semites it would never matter how much evidence you put in front of them. They would always deny the Holocaust because to admit the event occurred would be to stop believing the Jews are inferior to them. It would also require such bigots to admit the very uncomfortable truth to themselves: that their 'own kind' did these despicable things to the Jewish people. ~ James Morcan

First, people tolerate evil because they see some benefit to themselves,' he said. 'Then, they feed it in hope that it will turn into something else. Then, they appease it in hope that it will not turn against them. Then, they respect it because they fear it. Finally, someone has to step up and stamp it out! (...) ~ Walter Dean Myers

Thousands of those men and boys died here, and I have recently learned that their inhuman treatment was the intended policy of Himmler. He called his plan Death by Exhaustion, and he implemented it. Work them hard, don't waste valuable foodstuffs on them, and let them die. They could, and would, always be replaced by new slave workers from Europe's Occupied countries. ~ Mary Ann Shaffer

Goddamn it, you'll never get the Purple Heart hiding in a foxhole! Follow me! ~ Henry Pierson Crowe

I believe in the sun
even when it is not shining
And I believe in love,
even when there's no one there.
And I believe in God,
even when He is silent.
I believe through any trial,
there is always a way
But sometimes in this suffering
and hopeless despair
My heart cries for shelter,
to know someone's there
But a voice rises within me, saying hold on
my child, I'll give you strength,
I'll give you hope. Just stay a little while.
I believe in the sun
even when it is not shining
And I believe in love
even when there's no one there
But I believe in God
even when he is silent
I believe through any trial
there is always a way.
May there someday be sunshine
May there someday be happiness
May there someday be love
May there someday be peace…. ~ Unknown (written During WW2, On The Wall Of A Cellar, By A Jew In The Cologne Concentration Camp)

I often noticed that the surrounding mountains inspired Hitler. He once joked that here he stood 'above the world' in an environment comparable to Olympius, legendary mount of the gods, but that alone can never have been the motivation for himto put down his private roots on Obersalzberg. ~ Heinz Linge

Your guardian angel must have been working over time,' Penny laughed shakily.

Rose laughed as she put her arms around her sister and hugged her. 'More like the Devil taking care of his own. ~ Margaret Dickinson

As the sun rose I could see Etna, a truncated cone with a plume of smoke over it like the quill of a pen stuck in a pewter inkpot, rising out of the haze to the north of where I was treading water. ~ Eric Newby

If the ravens leave the Tower, Britain will fall. ~ John Owen Theobald

Dunkirk has fallen ... with it has ended the greatest battle of world history. Soldiers! My confidence in you knew no bounds. You have not disappointed me. ~ Adolf Hitler

Never forget" is the collective plea of Holocaust survivors. And in the first few decades after WW2 ended, it really did seem as if humanity would always remember, and perhaps even learn from, the Nazi genocide so that future atrocities may be prevented. Unfortunately, the historicity of the Holocaust has been undermined and chipped away at by the exact same sinister forces that created the genocide in the first place: racists, religious bigots and the most paranoid type of conspiracy theorists who, together, are uniting – often unwittingly – to form a new wave of anti-Semitism that will not willingly accept the obvious facts of the past. This chipping away (at the truth) began slowly and insidiously – much like the Holocaust itself – but sadly, and worryingly, it is gathering pace. ~ James Morcan

Lastly, 'Hang tough!' Never, ever give up regardless of the adversity. If you are a leader, a fellow who other fellows look to, you have to keep going. ~ Dick Winters

It would be an idyllic tropical paradise if not for the malaria, the insects, the constant diarrhea and resulting hemorrhoids, and the fact that the people are dirty and smell bad and eat each other and use human heads for decoration. ~ Neal Stephenson

At times the engine stopped, and grown-ups and children climbed out of the carriages with tins to collect water from the engine steam pipes. This was the only drinking water that we had access to, and though it was hot and very rusty, it was the best drink I felt I'd ever had. ~ Alfred Nestor

We had seen too many horrors already, and we could see and hear more explosions all around us as the war continued, very close to our hiding place; machine gun fire and the sounds of grenades – all very frightening. ~ Alfred Nestor

[The] Japanese were a people in a profound, inverse, reverse, or if I preferred it, even perverse sense, more in love with death than living. ~ Sir Laurens Van Der Post

The crematorium could not burn the bodies fast enough - so after we dug long trenches, we pulled and dragged the bodies to the edges and threw them in. You'll not believe it, but the SS forced the prisoners' band to play music as we lugged the corpses - and for that, I hope they burn in hell with polkas blaring. ~ Mary Ann Shaffer

Grief feels a lot like fear. We're afraid of it taking us over. But we owe it to ourselves, to those we have lost, to let grief in. Only then can we start to remember them with a cheer in our heart, a cheer for them and all that they were. ~ Jennifer Ryan

Posters go up in the market, on tree trunks in the Place Chateaubriand. Voluntary surrender of firearms. Anyone who does not cooperate will be shot. ~ Anthony Doerr

Even if this spring the dappled leaves should shelter our minds from the moon's pale echo we would still remember how once they were sheltered by our skulls only from the day's sun and the night's stars and never from what we feared and what we remembered ~ Dan Davin

That pistol I gave you is a piece of crap. You can't hit anything with it, not at that distance."
Staring at her with tears in his blinking eyes, he says, "I did."
Conversation between Alis K and Willy
The Informer ~ Steen Langstrup

Human nature defeats me sometimes, how greed and spite can lurk so divisively around the utmost courage and sacrifice. ~ Jennifer Ryan

And I realized that this is what it's like to be an adult, learning to pick from a lot of bad choices and do the best you can with that dreadful compromise. Learning to smile, to put your best foot forward, when the world around you seems to have collapsed in its entirety, become a place of isolation, a sepia photograph of its former illusion. ~ Jennifer Ryan

I don't mean this to sound hyperbolic but there are increasingly, albeit really minor, similarities between now and how Germany was lulled into what happened pre-WW2. ~ David Cross

A searchlight catches the plane for an instant. The cockpit is awash with searing bluish brightness. As if a revelation is about to take place. As if an angel is about to appear. He can't see the instrument panel. The finger of light has the aircraft in its grip. Holding her suspended above the city. As if she is perched on a tightrope. Visible to the whole of Berlin down below. The glare bites into his eyes, sucks strength from his legs. He kicks the rudders to the right. The starboard wing tilts down. He pulls the wheel back. Below, a shifting tableau of coloured globes slide over the tilting smoking surface of the earth. Some roads and buildings made visible by fires and incendiaries. ~ Glenn Haybittle

The Wilhelm Gustloff was pregnant with lost souls conceived of war. They would crowd into her belly and she would give birth to their freedom. ~ Ruta Sepetys

We must never forget what happened in Europe during WW2. Especially now, when hate groups are on the rise. ~ Tammy Bottner

Today we are crushed by the sheer weight of the mechanized forces hurled against us, but we can still look to the future in which even greater mechanized forces will bring us victory. Therein lies the destiny of the world. ~ Charles De Gaulle

Where they burn books, at the end they also burn people ~ Heinrich Heine

What is our policy? ... to wage war against a monstrous tyranny, never surpassed in the dark, lamentable catalogue of human crime. ~ Winston Churchill

Do I look like the mastermind of this? I just do what I'm told. They tel me to arrest the foreign-born Jews in Paris, so I do it. They want the crowd separated - single men to Drancy, families to the Vet d'hie Viola! It's done. Point rifles at them and be prepared to shoot. The government wants all of France's foreign Jews sent east to work camps, and we're starting here.'
All of France? Isabelle felt the air rush out of her lungs. Operation Spring Wind. 'You mean this isn't just happening in Paris?'
'No. This is just the start. ~ Kristin Hannah

Youth is no longer wasted on the young because it's wasted on the war instead. ~ Philip Kerr

A secret history of the US Government's Nazi-hunting operation concludes that American intelligence officials created a safe haven in the US for Nazis and their collaborators after WW2 and it details decades of clashes, often hidden, with other nations over war criminals here and abroad. ~ James Morcan

All the nut eaters and food faddists I have ever known, died early after a long period of senile decay - Winston Churchill ~ Stuart Finlay

I've just been wandering the streets at night. If I came by a German soldier out alone, I would follow him, shove the pistol to the back of his head, and shoot. Once, I even did two at the same time, but they were really drunk."


Poul-Erik aka 'Willy'
The Informer by Steen Langstrup ~ Steen Langstrup