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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Oct 21, 2010 - 11:39am PT
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Interesting Al! Stalin was in fact conscripted for WW I but of course was disqualified as his left arm was basically paralyzed from two horse-drawn carriage accidents when he was a youth.
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richross
Trad climber
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Oct 21, 2010 - 11:42am PT
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I'll bet his favorite climbs were reich facing corners.
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Brokedownclimber
Trad climber
Douglas, WY
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Oct 21, 2010 - 11:44am PT
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Apparently during W.W. II, trips to the mountains for climbing were frequently given as rewards for various "milestones" of service. In several of his books, German fighter pilot and test pilot, Mano Ziegler describes ski trips to the Marmolada as rewards for surviving 10 flights in combat in the Me 163 rocket fighter.
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Brokedownclimber
Trad climber
Douglas, WY
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Oct 21, 2010 - 11:48am PT
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Peter-
The decoration at the Fat Hermann's throat is NOT the Grand Cross of the Iron Cross, but is in fact the "Pour le Merite," commonly known as the "Blue Max."
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Branscomb
Trad climber
Lander, WY
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Oct 21, 2010 - 11:49am PT
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Yea, after a tough day of drinking the jolly lager and terrorizing women and children and old people, what better relaxation than to go pull down on the stones? On the practical side, I'd sure hate to try and catch that whale when he winged off.
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Oct 21, 2010 - 12:06pm PT
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Another odd thing is that mountaineering, in the broad sense of the word, was also considered a very proletarian thing to do - in Soviet Russia. It was considered very egalitarian and Marxist, whether mountain hiking or serious climbing. And there were several German expeditions to climb in the USSR in the later 1920s and early 1930s, mainly in the Pamirs.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Oct 21, 2010 - 12:07pm PT
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Thanks Broken, you are right. Goering had both, but is wearing the Blue Max in the photo.
The Grand Cross of the Iron Cross:
The Blue Max (Pour le Merite):
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Josh Nash
Social climber
riverbank ca
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Oct 21, 2010 - 12:50pm PT
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Wow this is a really interesting yet slightly disturbing thread.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Oct 21, 2010 - 01:02pm PT
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Why did Goering have a Frog medal?
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Branscomb
Trad climber
Lander, WY
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Oct 21, 2010 - 01:10pm PT
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Goering was a very heavy morphine addict, to dull the pain from a bullet wound he received during the 1923 Beer Hall Putsch in Munich. Probably doing codeine as well. His addiction was well known to the other Nazi leaders, but the good old boy system prevailed and Hitler never canned his ass, even when Goering let the Luftwaffe molder while he collected jewelry, art works stolen from all over Europe, and built an amazing minature train collection. After Goerings rash promises to relieve the Stalingrad Pocket by air (fail!) and his failure to stem the Allied bombardment of German cities later in the war, he was pretty much blown off by Hitler for a functional leadership roll and was kept around as window dressing, mainly the keep the German people from getting the idea that their leaders were total bozos. Unfortunately, for the majority of Germans, they either didn't figure it out until we had reduced their country to the stone age or they were too terrorized by the incredibly efficient police apparatus that was in place to risk protest.
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survival
Big Wall climber
A Token of My Extreme
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Oct 21, 2010 - 01:15pm PT
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Hmmmm, Randisi hasn't been back.
I have a sneaking feeling that he's researching the goods, like he did on the Preuss thread!
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hb81
climber
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Oct 21, 2010 - 01:18pm PT
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Why did Goering have a Frog medal?
It's not a French medal but a Prussian medal.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Oct 21, 2010 - 01:20pm PT
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^^^^ Obviously, but isn't it at least ironic it is written in French?
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Oct 21, 2010 - 01:29pm PT
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Another odd thing about the Nazis and mountains, related to their semi-mystical beliefs. The first ascent of the north face of the Eiger was in 1938, by Heinrich Harrer, Anderl Heckmair, Fritz Kasparek, and Ludwig Vörg. Vörg was on the first ascent of the north face of Ushba, in the Caucasus. After the Eiger, the four were somewhat co-opted by the Nazis. Harrer and Heckmair managed to avoid a lot of it by going to Nanga Parbat in 1939, getting interned, and escaping to Tibet. Vörg, and I believe Kasparek also, were put in an elite division of mountain troops, who in conformity with Nazi ideals were thought to be superior soldiers, and so used in 'impossible' situations. Vörg died on the first day of the invasion of the USSR in 1941, but Kasparek survived the war.
Of course, other countries also had "elite" divisions of mountain troops. Whether they were better troops than other soldiers, apart from better training and equipment, is an interesting question.
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hb81
climber
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Oct 21, 2010 - 01:32pm PT
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Obviously, but isn't it at least ironic it is written in French?
Sure is, as nuts as they were one would expect that they'd make a re-design with a German inscripton or so...
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Oct 21, 2010 - 01:35pm PT
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Maybe they were just being sarcastic? On second thought...
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Branscomb
Trad climber
Lander, WY
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Oct 21, 2010 - 01:46pm PT
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Interestingly, when a group of Wehrmacht Mountain Troops climbed Mt. Elbrus in the Fall of 1942, Hitler wanted the participants severely reprimanded for diverting from the effort on the southern Russian front and complained to his generals about all that useless mountain climbing. I believe he actually forbid any further such "stunts" by his soldiers.
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Dolomite
climber
Anchorage
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Oct 21, 2010 - 01:54pm PT
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In the excellent Vanity Fair article on Messner that Reilly posted recently, Messner observes that at the time of the early Nanga Parbat expedition in 1934, the German Alpine Club had 600,000 members.
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hb81
climber
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Oct 21, 2010 - 03:05pm PT
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In the excellent Vanity Fair article on Messner that Reilly posted recently, Messner observes that at the time of the early Nanga Parbat expedition in 1934, the German Alpine Club had 600,000 members.
I'm wondering whether this number is really true as today it's "only" about 200,000 more. The Nazis pretty much overtook the German Alpine Club and integrated it into their public sport system.
I think there's a good chance that they "enhanced" the member numbers for propaganda issues.
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Dolomite
climber
Anchorage
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Oct 21, 2010 - 03:14pm PT
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Good question. In the early 1930s the population was around 62 million; today about 82 million, thus the proportions are roughly the same (assuming those numbers are accurate).
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