Gunter Grass Admits to Serving in Hitler's Waffen SS

[Otto]

This is all true, Michael. I cannot find a wrong word in it, but what
remains is that he didn't tell for decades despite the fact that he
personally did no wrong when he was 17 years old.

When you're the "good conscience" of your nation you shouldn't have
such secrets.

Or is it just clever marketing ! ?

Otto

2006/8/14, Michael J. Hußmann <michael at michael-hussmann.de>:
> Otto (ottosell at googlemail.com) wrote:
>
> > Now his reputation is gone forever.
>
> Why? He was a dyed-in-the-wool Nazi then, and had never denied that.
> Most German kids in his generation were, especially when there was
> nothing -- his parents, say -- to counteract the constant indoctrination
> by teachers, the Hitlerjugend, newspapers, radio etc.. So, even when the
> fact was unknown before, his volunteering for submarine service and/or
> the Waffen SS is perfectly consistent with his character at the time. We
> already knew that much, so why should we feel shocked now? Grass'
> reputation never rested on his behaviour as a 17 year old in Nazi Germany.
>
> - Michael
>
>
> Michael J. Hußmann
>
> E-mail: michael at michael-hussmann.de
> WWW (personal): http://michael-hussmann.de
> WWW (professional): http://digicam-experts.de
>
>
>