Germany deported seven Ukrainian soldiers who were training in the country on Thursday over their use of Nazi symbols, Kommersant reported. According to the report, the training of the Ukrainian soldiers was immediately halted after some were found to be wearing Nazi symbols.
German authorities announced that all Ukrainian military personnel arriving for training in Germany will now be explicitly instructed that it is prohibited to display Nazi symbols. The use of Nazi symbols is banned in both Germany and Russia. Russia has condemned Western support for Ukraine, including the training of its soldiers.
The German Defense Ministry reported that, as of September 19, 2023, about 7,000 Ukrainian soldiers have trained in Germany since the start of the war in Ukraine. Earlier in May, it was reported that Ukrainian soldiers would train in Germany on how to use the Patriot air defense system. Such a training course typically lasts between six and nine months.
Make no mistake: the problem was not that the Ukrainian soldiers were neofascists. Rather, the problem was that these soldiers picked symbols that were too obviously fascist. The dictatorship of the bourgeoisie has no hope of banishing a phenomenon that the militant petty bourgeoisie generates, so the best that it can do is encourage rebranding. In other words, if a German is going to be neofascist, he should at least be creative about it. He needs to go for something subtler like a flag of the Twoth Reich or a crossed‐out hammer and sickle and leave the black swastikas in grandpa’s basement.
Finally, a little nugget of wisdom from the comment section:
Probably another pro-Russian hoax
(Cheers to Ali Abunimah for showing me this.)
Click here for events that happened today (May 18).
1932: Joseph Goebbels arrived in Berlin.
1939: A decree from Berlin permitted Heinrich Himmler to call up older men on the outbreak of war to replace the permanent units of concentration camp guards. This would allow the younger men to be drafted into the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Regiments of a new SS Division, to be called Totenkopf.
1940: The Wehrmacht captured Antwerp, Belgium; meanwhile, the Third Reich reincorporated into its borders the territory that Germany ceded to Belgium per the Versailles Treaty. In France, Erwin Rommel’s 7th Panzer Division reached Cambrai where it halted to consolidate his supply lines; in the past 5 days the division advanced 85 miles and captured 10,000 French prisoners and tanks, suffering only 150 casualties. The French called the 7th Panzer Division the ‘Ghost Division’ for its ability to strike in unexpected and vulnerable places. Elsewhere in France, the Wehrmacht captured Petonne and Amiens.
1941: Fascist Italy annexed Dalmatia into its borders as Axis dive bombers attacked British hospital ship Aba fifty miles south of Crete, Greece. General Mosley Mayne, British commander of Indian 5th Division, had lunch with Axis commander Duke of Aosta at Amba Alagi, Ethiopia. The Axis duke agreed to leave the guns and other supplies undestroyed but still dismantle or identify mines. After sundown, Axis battleship Bismarck and cruiser Prinz Eugen departed Gotenhafen (Gdynia), occupied Poland for the North Atlantic. The fleet was commanded by Admiral Günther Lütjens aboard Bismarck. At 2227 hours, Axis submarine U‐107 sank a British ship west of Freetown, Sierra Leone leaving ten dead.
1942: Mannheim experienced a bombing raid, but the 14th and 16th Panzer Divisions of the 1st Panzer Army destroyed one hundred thirty Soviet tanks in combat in Ukraine, forcing Soviet forces to evacuate forward airfields at Izium and Petrovskaia. Axis submarine U‐162 sank Norwegian tanker Beth (sailing in service of the British Royal Fleet Auxiliary force) off Barbados at 0210 hours. U‐558 sank Netherlandish ship Fauna twenty‐five miles northwest of British North Caicos island at 0615 hours. U‐156 sank Yankee ship Quaker City 460 miles east of Martinique at 1018 hours, leaving ten dead. At 1852 hours, U‐156 fired what would be the first of four torpedoes at British tanker San Eliseo between this evening and the next morning as she unsuccessfully chased the tanker. U‐125 sank Yankee tanker Mercury Sun in the Caribbean Sea at 0606 hours. At 2150 hours, U‐125 struck again, sinking Yankee ship William J. Salman.
1943: The Axis captured Songzi, Hubei Province, and the Empire of Japan’s Navy formed the 12th Air Fleet on paper with Vice Admiral Michitaro Tozuka in command and Rear Admiral Yoshiyuki Ichimiya as the chief of staff. After sundown, Axis submarine U‐304 spotted Allied convoy SC 130 in the North Atlantic.
1944: Belgrade experienced an Allied bombing, and the Allies also assaulted Axis positions at Ninthoukgong, India.
1945: The Axis lost its Field Marshal Ferdinand Schörner to Yankee captors in Austria, but and Axis shore battery at Okinawa sunk an Allied vessel.
1981: Eleonore Baur, Axis criminal, died in Oberhaching.
1985: Erich Traub, Axis scientist, died quietly in his sleep in Rosenheim.
After all this (Ukraine and in particular the support for Pissrael's genocide), sadly I don't think Germany will ever have a good reputation in Russia or much of the world (at least, not among those with sense) again tbh.
Hell, my own partner is German (albeit not raised there, one of their parents is from there however) and I've had a fondness for the decent parts of German culture for quite a long time. But even that (the latter fondness, not my relationship with my partner obviously as I'm not judging them by their nationality/ethnicity) is poisoned now, leaves a bad taste in my mouth.