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Forgotten Crimes of WWII The OST-Hamster Battalions


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I remember reading somewhere that this fameous hamster atrocity was a propaganda ploy by the Allies. The pictures next to the Hamster seemed to say that the hamster was pointing to a large habitrail arrangement on some Russian peasent farm and the peasents starving slowly as they couldn't bring in the crop as the habitrail tubes were low to the ground and of the variety with anti-habitrail skirting in place (blocking access of the farm implements). How the hamsters laughed at the peasents in the Buy Bonds films.

The fact is, though, this picture was originally published in Signal and showed a hamster squad playfully engaged with a ball of string during a particulary boisterous R&R rotation...

I wish that as wargamers and historians we would stop being swayed by 50+ year old propaganda and deal in fact.

Sheesh.

[This message has been edited by Compassion (edited 09-10-2000).]

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Hate to disagree with Compassion, but the sad truth is that hamsters did participate in atrocities. Though most SS hamsters served in the Waffen SS, many were Algemine Hamsters, some even serving as concentration camp guards.

There are documented instances of hamsters looting and even raping civilian populations (you thought Richard Gere was the first?).

Indeed most SS hamsters were merely good soldiers, and many suffered miserably on the Ostfront. Some were used, for example, to clean out the barrels of 88mm antitank guns by running through the barrel. What happened when the gun was fired during this process you don't even want to think about.

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<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by KLilly:

Hate to disagree with Compassion, but the sad truth is that hamsters did participate in atrocities. Though most SS hamsters served in the Waffen SS, many were Algemine Hamsters, some even serving as concentration camp guards.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Granted... but I was talking about that specific picture and the propaganda war it was used for.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>

There are documented instances of hamsters looting and even raping civilian populations (you thought Richard Gere was the first?).<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Sigh...

THis was, of course a Gerbil. Them damn so-called "Uber Rodentmench" have besmirched Rodentia of all types for so long that most historians take the bad mouthing Hamsters at face value.

I invite you to dig into the histories a bit an you'll find Gerbils behind many of the most notorious "Hamster" atrocities. Not saying that some didn't happen, but not nearly with the frequency that we have been taught in the popular histories. Authors such as Ambrose canwrite very entertaining stories, but remember that he is taking the GI stories at face value. Keep n mind when reading personal accounts that not all guns were 88's, not all Panzers were Tigers, and not all rodent units were Hamsters (in fact ther were only a couple dozen of them in the west at the time of Overloard... by far most were Gerbils).

Clay-

[This message has been edited by Compassion (edited 09-10-2000).]

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Bah that photo is the much misidentified photo of an SS Hamstergrenaider with 2nd Kompanie, SS Ham.Pz.Gren.Regt 1 operating in the West, near Poteau on Dec 18 1944 during the Ardennes offensive. biggrin.gif

Regards, John Waters

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Make way evil, I'm armed to the teeth and packing a hamster!

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Actually, many Hamsters served willingly with the German military, but much to the shame of Rodentia there was a small few, the so called blond hamsters, who became members of the Waffenhamster SS. It was these Hamsters which participated in the senseless Abbeville atrocities against the Canadians, and who looted the palace d' art of its priceless water nipple collection, which has never been recovered.

That does not mean that the slave OstHamester Battalions fought willing no matter what revisionist like to think, many a Hamster ended their days underneath a Sherman tread, in what was known as a "Osthamsterpankaken" in German.

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IMHO..i firmly believe that much of the "hype" surrounding the SS Hamster Divisions came about just as much as a result of the clever manipulation of the nazi propaganda machine created by Dr. Joseph Gerbil's, as to their fierce reputation on the battlefront...

This is especially true of the infamous 1st SS Viking Panzer Hamster Division who had an almost mythical presence on the battlefield.

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All this came to an end when the 101st Airborne had the pleasure of "liberating" the habitrail known as the Hamsters Nest. The men of the Screaming Eagles spent their evenings relaxing in luxurious beds of cedar shavings while drinking wine from 17th century French porceline water nipples.

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The Hamster Armored units in particular were fierce though. Now some unkind soles will tell you that the practice of making an APC from two stainless steel colanders was cheap, but let me tell you, facing them with only an M1 as they roll to you is a scary sight. Over run attacks do not do much damage, but the fleas you get from them are humiliating.

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Alittle know fact was the Company of Hamstertroops taken prisoner at Stalingrad. The russians, who where planning on the upcoming defense of Kursk, used Brainwashing and then released these prisoners. They had heard of the new Tiger and Panther tanks and were hoping that the released brainwashed hamsters would be taken back and placed in the belly of the new cats where they would then explode a satchel charge thus destroying them. This plan failed due to the company being sent back to thier Habitrail for extended R&R. Doing this break they where all killed when a experimental V2 went off course and hit the Habitrail.

Such ends another episode of 'Secrets of WW2'

Yes now you can own the episode youve just heard buy sending your life savings to :

'Secrets of WW2'

Hampsters of Stalingrad

123 Gerbil Way

Rodent, NY

------------------

Cya on the Battlefield,

BlitzKrieg

bkolvet@home.com

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This is puzzling. The only Allied hamster unit of which I was aware was British: the Queen's South Suffolk Rodentry. They fought first in North Africa where they are better known as the famed "Desert Hamsters" regiment. A very famous unit, the QSSR was created during the American Revolutionary war and was almost wiped out at Islandwana.

Maybe this guy is a Skorzeny Hamster.

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Oh come on you people. Of course I've heard of the fable like tales my grandmother used to tell me of the SS-HampsterTruppen habitrail death camps. And especially the dreaded GerbilsBagger troops in the Ardennes who used a particularly effective weapon known as the NeverHideADingsWaffle against the allies. As I highlighted on this tactic earlier this month, I'll go over it again in detail for the newbies just joining the forum. It involved a special GerbilsBagger unit armed with a caged "Ding". Supposedly this thing was the most ferocious animal ever caught by clothed man. On the scale of the Tazmanian Devil depicted in childish cartoons. These creatures existed soley on two food groups. One being a delicacy known as the waffle, and the other was human flesh (normally only a back-up). If an allied encampment was known to be nearby, one brave soul from this unit would stealthly at night, remove the Dings next days ration of 1 waffle and hide it. Early the next morning the animal would awaken to find it's breakfast had vanished and literally freak and the cage could barely contain it. Cautiously the dumb soul would approach the cage, get the creatures attention and point in the direction of the allied encampment, make a waffle feeding motion and then undo the cage door. I guess this is all it took to prove to it the allies were responsible and it was game over in short time. Now even though my grandmother was a trusty source and would never lie to me or even stretch the truth an iota, I will never believe such foo'bish tribble unless either I see it with my own eyes or it shows up on the Disney channel. However, to this day, just in case, I never keep any waffles at home. The flesh I can't do much about. Do some research from now on and get real people...

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Thanks for Athskin!

[This message has been edited by Grognerd_Fogman (edited 09-11-2000).]

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Yes, even more dreaded is the Hamstersturmtroppenfleabagenjaegermeisterfliegershiessen (Does anyone envy German's ability to crunch together 8 words and come up with a new word? I do, must be fun on Saturday nights) of the Luftwaffe. Someone discovered that Hamsters, like Cats, can fall incredible heights without getting hurt, saving money on parachutes. Of course, if you throw them out of a plan at too high and altitude, they explode in the low pressure, so the Hamstershiessen as they were know in short had to be duct tapes (er, in this case hamster taped) to keep that from happening, and they had to hold their paws over their eyes on the way down.

Added advantage: after picking the tape off themselves, those rodents were pissed, so look out allied Armies!

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