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Subscribe to RSSThe German Medical Association has issued a remarkably blunt and straightforward apology, more than six decades after the end of World War II, for the role it played during the Holocaust in the mass murder, sterilization and barbaric medical experiments done on Jews and many other groups.
The apology, made Wednesday at the Bundesärztekammer (German Medical Association) meeting in Nuremberg, makes no excuses.
Unanimously adopted by the delegates of the Physician's Congress, the declaration says that contrary to popular belief doctors were not forced by political authorities to kill and experiment on prisoners but rather engaged in the Holocaust as leaders and enthusiastic Nazi supporters.
The apology notes that “outstanding representatives of renowned academic medical and research institutions were involved” in organizing and carrying out the mass extermination of millions.
In the statement, the German doctors said they “remember the living and deceased victims and their descendants and ask them for forgiveness."
I don’t know if forgiveness will be forthcoming.
But in the history of apologies for crimes and abuses carried out in the name of medicine this is the most important ever made. It does nothing to soften the horror of the Holocaust but it both ascribes responsibility where it belongs and ends any further efforts to deny or obfuscate what actually happened.
My father was there to see some of it. On April 29, 1945, Army Sgt. Sidney D. Caplan was among the troops that liberated the Dachau death camp outside of Munich Germany. By the end of the war, nearly 6 million Jews and countless others had been killed.
The Nuremberg trials that followed the defeat of the German Reich showed the intimate role that medicine had played in the Holocaust. Many know about Dr. Josef Mengele's gruesome experiments, but now the actions of mainstream medicine have been acknowledged.
German medicine as field has remained silent about it all these decades – until today.
The world must still grapple with the Holocaust as genocide carried out in the name of science and medicine. But it no longer needs to try and push those involved in German medicine to speak about their role. They have done so and they deserve full credit for it.
The world should acknowledge that medicine has finally stared its worst crimes directly in the face and shuddered.
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While I deplore the murders that occurred, and it is good that they acknowledged their part and asked forgiveness, I truly believe we need to let it go now. I'm not saying forget, but rather lets stop moaning about it (just like we need to let the issue of slavery go). Those responsible are dead and gone, and while we need to 'remember' so that we don't repeat the issues, we need to move on......
The anger, resentment, and hate on these issues have hurt millions more - and will continue to do so unless we “let go”…..
"Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned." -- Buddha
Gee that's mighty big of you... And a Buddha "quote" thrown in for good measure... Gosh... Original and Sincere...
None of the Germans I know have strong feelings about this. They are over it. They are not emotional about it. They apparently admit to the realities of what was documented and made public. They held their war criminal tribunals years ago. They recently agreed to reparations of any Jews held in a Nazi 'Ghetto' for more than 9 months. The victims and their families feel the hurt. Apologies for Murder are probably hard to swallow. What is the real reason Germany announced the apology?
1978 Experimental Hepatitis B vaccine trials, conducted by the CDC, begin in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco. Ads for research subjects specifically ask for promiscuous homosexual men.
1981 First cases of AIDS are confirmed in homosexual men in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco, triggering speculation that AIDS may have been introduced via the Hepatitis B vaccine
Forgiveness is the only way to heal.
How will forgiveness heal a perpetual (on-going) institutionalized evil?
1985 According to the journal Science (227:173-177), HTLV and VISNA, a fatal sheep virus, are very similar, indicating a close taxonomic and evolutionary relationship.
1986 According to the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (83:4007-4011), HIV and VISNA are highly similar and share all structural elements, except for a small segment which is nearly identical to HTLV. This leads to speculation that HTLV and VISNA may have been linked to produce a new retrovirus to which no natural immunity exists.
Central planning which is similar to modern-day Liberalism as defined in the US today is what led to Nazism. The Germans, long before the Nazis, were attacking liberty, democracy, capitalism and individualism. Keep that in mind before you vote.
"The Germans" Could you elaborate?
I'll elaborate. Think about this when you "elect" another right wing hack backed by criminals.
14 characteristics of Fascism
Powerful and Continuing Nationalism
Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.
Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights
Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.
Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause
The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial , ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.
Supremacy of the Military
Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.
Rampant Sexism
The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and anti-gay legislation and national policy.
Controlled Mass Media
Sometimes to media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common.
Obsession with National Security
Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
Religion and Government are Intertwined
Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government's policies or actions.
Corporate Power is Protected
The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.
Labor Power is Suppressed
Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed .
Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts
Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts is openly attacked, and governments often refuse to fund the arts.
Obsession with Crime and Punishment
Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.
Rampant Cronyism and Corruption
Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.
Fraudulent Elections
Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.
Bill - And Obama has done such a stellar job too. It doesn't matter who we elect. They are ALL liars. They are ALL cheats. They are ALL crooked as hell. They are ALL rotten. Every single one of them. All we can hope for is that God will end this miserable planet's suffering and start over.
Bill: Right wing hack? You need to study history and learn how fascism gets a foothold. Most of what you posted is good, but you started off on the wrong foot.
1986 A report to Congress reveals that the U.S. Government's current generation of biological agents includes: modified viruses, naturally occurring toxins, and agents that are altered through genetic engineering to change immunological character and prevent treatment by all existing vaccines.
Please remember that the Nazis were socialists, i.e., leftists. So was Mao. So was Stalin. Calling these regimes "right-wing" is an attempt to link any politican who is right of center with evil governments. It's also an attempt to divert the historic and correct association of left-wingers with totalitarian policies.
In the American of our times, the scapegoating has been generated by the left: the liberals blame most problems on a mass blob called "the white man." Affirmative Action, a liberal program, sends white men to the back of every line. The smearing of white men is an attempt to justify Affirmative Action: "they deserve it." And "they are all privileged." Those are state-sponsored fallacies. The censoring of academics is also a liberal project. Professors are not allowed to teach certain facts or dispute "multicultural" claims. Religion? The mainline American denominations are parotting the propaganda of the multiculturalists and feminists. And many churches have re-written the lyrics of hymns that were written long ago to make them more politically correct. That makes as much sense as putting a mustache on the Mona Lisa because there are no men in that picture. There's nothing wrong with writing new hymns and seeing if they last; but the mutilation of long existing art in the name of various isms is leftist censorship.
Yet there are still people who claim the Holocaust never happened, what idiots.
The Holocaust was faked by the Jews to garner sympathy to steal the Palestinian state...I guess they will stop at nothing to get what they want
You generalize when you say "the Jews", making the rest of your statement null and void, without meaning. Generalization is a form of bigotry.
@I__lVl__l: I meant what I said, if you can't understand that, then you are a complete moron and jew-sympathizer, so therefore, YOU are "null and void"
Whatever...
Who in the hell proofreads these damn articles??? MSNBC, try employing people that actually KNOW the English language!
When do the Palestinians and their neighbors get an apology and retributions from the Nazi/Zionist Israeli's for all of their atrocities and murders, including Apartheid, starting from the 1930's to the present time.
Just keep digging and Everyone owes Everyone an apology. When will the Egyptians apologize to the Jews that built their tombs? When will Mesopotamians apologize for using workers to farm???
1987 Department of Defense admits that, despite a treaty banning research and development of biological agents, it continues to operate research facilities at 127 facilities and universities around the nation.
CW, are you really that much of an idiot??
I believe CW was being a bit of a Satirist; he knows what he said is utterly impossible :)
Sorry Arrive-1,
I know people who actually believe that the holocaust never happened.
Racism is alive and well in America.
1990 More than 1500 six-month old black and hispanic babies in Los Angeles are given an "experimental" measles vaccine that had never been licensed for use in the United States. CDC later admits that parents were never informed that the vaccine being injected to their children was experimental.
After seeing several of their "facilities" during my military service, I thank the German medical profession. Now I wait for the Japanese to apologize for thousands of medical horrors they committed on all "inferiors", including citizens of China, Korea, Phillipines, Britain, India and the US.
GuyV.
Don't hold your breath while while you're waiting for that.
fool2, that's exactly what I was going to say. I'm still waiting for America to apologize to Ireland for not helping more during the potato famine...
1994 With a technique called "gene tracking," Dr. Garth Nicolson at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, TX discovers that many returning Desert Storm veterans are infected with an altered strain of Mycoplasma incognitus, a microbe commonly used in the production of biological weapons. Incorporated into its molecular structure is 40 percent of the HIV protein coat, indicating that it had been man-made.
Now we need the Dutch to apologize for starting the slavery transportation.
1994 Senator John D. Rockefeller issues a report revealing that for at least 50 years the Department of Defense has used hundreds of thousands of military personnel in human experiments and for intentional exposure to dangerous substances. Materials included mustard and nerve gas, ionizing radiation, psychochemicals, hallucinogens, and drugs used during the Gulf War.
Where did all this start up where everyone has to go around in shame apologizing for things they did not do? Were any of these doctors in the camps? Were they members of the Nazi party?
I am responsible for my own actions. Not the actions of people who just happen to have been citizens of the same country or members of the same race. Not one of these doctors is responsible for the attrocities everyone seems so keen on asking them to apologize for.
Hey, I know, lets have a ten year old Dallas kid apologize for the shooting of JFK. (It makes as much sense as this story.)
If your father was Lee Harvey Oswald and your family never issued an apology, then yes, it would make sense for you. Families of murderers often apologize for their kin.
Very few Nazis were punished and Germany, as a whole, tried to erase all memories of the Holocaust.
I was recently in Munich and if I didn't know it own my own, I would not have realized that Hitler's rise to power began there. I did not see a single plaque or memorial.
It's way too soon to "get over it." It's also too soon to get over the murders of Africans for slave labor and the subsequent oppression of Black people.
It would be a lot easier to get over these recent atrocities if you didn't find racist and anti-semitic rants online in almost every comment section of every news article, regardless of the topic of the article. NY Post commenters are some of the worst.
For Western Europe, WWII is very recent history; to them, so is the American Revolution; so is the German war with Denmark (Germany took a good chunk of land, 1600's or so, anyone?) and compared to the religious war in the Middle East, 2000 years old. Kosovo still 'remembers' their war with the Turkish invasion. America has a more 'forgiving' culture than others but this was terrible murder and quite recent.
1995 U.S. Government admits that it had offered Japanese war criminals and scientists who had performed human medical experiments salaries and immunity from prosecution in exchange for data on biological warfare research.
There are a class of people who worship law, not the righteous intent of law, but the letters of the law itself. Let us not forget the socialist of World War Two Germany created the environment that created the Holocaust and world war; therefore, encouraging citizens of all kinds to their own part out of patriotic duty to follow the law and take it out on their own citizens. This is why Prime Minister Winston Churchill in a speech November 1941 before the American entry to the war named the German leaders "monsters," they couldn't be trusted with their own legal words.
America didn't join the war until Pearl Harbor. Millions of people (Jews) had already been murdered and we waited for Japan to attack. That 'encouraged citizens of all kinds...patriotic duty' blah blah was Japan. We should apologize the families of victims that were murdered while we waited and watched until Japan invited us to war.
1995 Dr. Garth Nicolson, uncovers evidence that the biological agents used during the Gulf War had been manufactured in Houston, TX and Boca Raton, Fl and tested on prisoners in the Texas Department of Corrections.
1996 Department of Defense admits that Desert Storm soldiers were exposed to chemical agents.
Let us not forget Pol-pot/Khmer Rouge. What about Stalin, Rwanda in the '90's, the Balkans, the Sudan today? Our species is a species that can not evolve past brutality & a species that wil justify it as needed.
Next, a German chesterfield will apologize to the Jews because Hitler once sat on it. It is 2012, enough already.
By the way, between 1932 and 1945 well over $10,000,000 Ukrainians were killed by the Russians and the Nazis but I guess those deaths were not as 'noteworthy'. No Ukrainian movies for Mr. Spielberg.
Someone send this message to "Almondhead" in Iran.
He is still trying to convince people this never happened.
omg! seriously, get over it already? What about slavery? So it happened some 2 hundred years ago right here in the good old U.S of A, and African-Americans are still pissed. Now you know what it feels like. For the jews it was 6 years of hell...for the African-Americans, it was over a hundred years. No wonder they are still pissed. Just as jews can't forget about it, neither can African-Americans. Time can never erase the pain, that is why African-Americans and jews will always remember. If you are Anglo-Saxon, none of this probably makes any sense. But, if you are in the minority group, I am sure you get it.
I never killed one jew and never had any slaves. Therefore I am not guilty. Deal with it.
Dick, it's a minority thing, you wouldn't understand. That's Joe's point. Look up the word empathy and realize that nobody said YOU are guilty. Do you have a guilty conscious?
Those who claim the Holocaust didn't happen - those who form and join neo-nazi groups - should be treated as mentally ill and rounded up and placed in mental institutions. They should lose custody of their children and not be allowed to raise them.
I think the real message of this apology by modern doctors for crimes committed 60 years ago is: don't do things today for which future generations will have to apologize.
Everyone will now want to jump on this message as applying only to the groups that they hate, and not to themselves.
Please don't
I'll take that for what it is worth. pretty bold step for the Germans. They don't like to apologize and they are not very good at it. So accept it and appreciate it. Don't tell me I don't know what I'm talking about either. Family on both sides
The holocaust is nothing more than a big Zionist lie.
Tune in once in a while to the Military Channel or to the History Channel. Then, come back and say something smart, BigSpooky.
How very bizarre! What strange combination of genetic and environmental accidents could have produced something so totally divorced from objective reality, and yet still capable of pecking on a keyboard. I'm guessing that it is exactly the type of result for which the German doctors are apologizing.
Programming and Brainwashing are working well and fine for Spooky
The History Channel? The Military Channel? Main stream media? Who do you think owns them all? Did you ever see anything about the attack on the USS Liberty on the History Channel or the Military Channel? Hell no! You probably don't even know what I'm talking about do you? Thats because you get your news and history from Zionist controled media. It is you sheep that are being brainwashed.
Are u that stupid???
And by the way,my grandfather died in 2005 with his numbers still tatooed
on his wrist!!! It was very real to him and the rest of my family!!
No, I am not stupid. I, unlike the majority of you sheep do not beleive everything I am told by the media. I never said there that there were no camps, but there were never anywhere near six million jews killed. That is just one of the many lies of the holocaust. Do a little research for yourself.
FU you're an ass!!
go back to see what you typed,you said it was a lie!!!Moron!!
Bigspooky
Are you a football fan, a bully, or do you really just need to keep that helmet on?
Kaili Elaine: If you want people to take you seriously, refrain from name calling. I never said there were not camps or that people did'nt die. It is just that the facts do not support the 6 million lie. History is written by the winners.
Do any of you even know what this is?
//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor
Ukrainian deaths are as horrible as Jewish deaths. I believe we needed better publicists...or at least one movie.
And then there was WWII-
'The total losses inflicted upon the Ukrainian population during the war are estimated between five and eight million...'
//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukraine
Worse than ANY one else during that time...ANY one.
If Pastor Charles L. Worley of North Carolina has his way, we'll have another holocaust.
http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/22/11813973-charles-worley-north-carolina-pastor-faces-backlash-outrage-over-call-for-gays-to-be-put-behind-electric-fence?lite
It's about time! Nothing can be heal and clean until people take responsibility for the WRONGNESS done...HINT - America has done some evil of its own ...
Few people care what happened during WW2. Most are concerned with making a living in these poor economic times. People die when there is a war and horible things happen. The governments of the world need to quit apologizing and trying to pretend they are only fighting the professional soldiers within a country. Hitler and the Allies understood total war was the only way to win. Hitler, Stalin, the Brits, French, and Americans all have innocent blood on their hands. Few U.S. History books explore the rapes that occured by U.S. soldiers during WWII. Likewise, few history books discuss how the USA turned down immigration requests for most German Jews to come to America. The only Jews accepted for immigration were Jews that were well educated, wealthy, or had powerful sponsors. Hitler instituted the final solution only after the Brits, French, and Germans closed their borders to Jewish immigration. I wonder how history would have unfolded if the USA had allowed a mass immigration.
Obama apologizes too