OK, let's make it REALLY difficult... This was taken just prior to Hans und Gunter inventing the German Rodeo. You'll note that Blucher's ears are fully forward, telling his buddy Arachnid "Hold my beer and watch this!"

Simply excellent...!

Lol, nice...

They had good soldier skills.
A World War II POW camp was set up in what was Clinton, MS. about 30 minutes east of where we live.
That camp is where they sent Rommel's Afrika Corps when they were defeated.
There were 4 registered nurses and a couple of doctors assigned to the camp.
I recently read a history of the camp written by one of those nurses.
She wrote that many of the German soldiers were only 19 or 20 years old but many of those had not been home to Germany to see their parents in over 4 years. That means they were 15 or 16 when they left home to fight. She wrote that most were in bad health having both internal and external parasites and that it took as much as 6 months to get them back to normal health again. When they got back to normal health, they built the first working model of the Mississippi river basin for the Corps of Engineers to study flood control. The city of Jackson let the POW buildings and model deteriorate to nothing but instead the city built a RC airplane field, a kart race track and many soccer fields.

That was not what I envisioned the Afrika Corps to be like. Historical accounts make Rommel and his troops sound invincible.

atomicbrh wrote: Mon Aug 07, 2017 3:45 pmThat was not what I envisioned the Afrika Corps to be like. Historical accounts make Rommel and his troops sound invincible.

That was their story and they were sticking to it. When you begin training training stoicism into pre-teens, and continue the daily dose of propaganda for another ten years, their conditioning becomes nearly unbreakable. Maybe the realities of war, followed by former enemies treating them better than their own leadership, would make a difference. I hope so.

In the end, they were just badly used, abused kids. With guns.

BCloninger wrote: Fri Aug 11, 2017 2:25 pm

atomicbrh wrote: Mon Aug 07, 2017 3:45 pmThat was not what I envisioned the Afrika Corps to be like. Historical accounts make Rommel and his troops sound invincible.

That was their story and they were sticking to it. When you begin training training stoicism into pre-teens, and continue the daily dose of propaganda for another ten years, their conditioning becomes nearly unbreakable. Maybe the realities of war, followed by former enemies treating them better than their own leadership, would make a difference. I hope so.

In the end, they were just badly used, abused kids. With guns.

Bob, no worse then what the Liberal Progressives are doing to our kids in schools today.

You got that right Bob.

There appears to be a great chasm between the WWII German commissioned officers and the enlisted troops in contrast to King Leonidas who demanded the same stoicism and dedication from the Spartans. The difference in Leonidas was that he had the best interest of his troops and their families in mind. He made sure all of the 300 Spartans he took with him to Thermopylae had living, healthy male heirs to continue their lineage and take care of the family.