15 WSS & 19 WSS, Latvian
15 WSS & 19 WSS, Latvian
Were the 15 & 19 WSS (Latvian) Divisions involved in any war crimes against civilians or enemy soldiers
The following statement was released by the Russian Federation foreign ministry : Involvement of the Lettish SS Legion in War Crimes in 1941-1945 and the Attempts to Revise the Verdict of the Nuremberg Tribunal in Latvia
it is a propaganda smear and can be expected to contain the worst accusations still vaguely credible, accumulated from the former USSR propaganda efforts against the baltic peoples. Even so, they find little to accuse the 15th/19th division of.
And when read carefully of the accusations made, it strikes me how laughable some accusations are, how poorly they know their history overall, the complete lack of evidence compared with some of the detailed war crime threads of AHF! (Not to mention blatant mistruths/mistakes concerning verifiable facts). The former USSR bureaucracy, crushing nationalism, smearing the Legion and emigre Latvian community for 50 years and they got nothing to show..
For the record : Latvian ministry of foreign affairs response : http://www.am.gov.lv/en/latvia/history/legion/
If there was any mud to sling, rest assured it would have long since been done so by the former USSR and their inheritors.But all they can offer are a few accusations, and poor ones. No proof to be had, because there isn't any. The Latvian SS divisions have records as clean as any from the western Allies.
A.
it is a propaganda smear and can be expected to contain the worst accusations still vaguely credible, accumulated from the former USSR propaganda efforts against the baltic peoples. Even so, they find little to accuse the 15th/19th division of.
And when read carefully of the accusations made, it strikes me how laughable some accusations are, how poorly they know their history overall, the complete lack of evidence compared with some of the detailed war crime threads of AHF! (Not to mention blatant mistruths/mistakes concerning verifiable facts). The former USSR bureaucracy, crushing nationalism, smearing the Legion and emigre Latvian community for 50 years and they got nothing to show..
For the record : Latvian ministry of foreign affairs response : http://www.am.gov.lv/en/latvia/history/legion/
If there was any mud to sling, rest assured it would have long since been done so by the former USSR and their inheritors.But all they can offer are a few accusations, and poor ones. No proof to be had, because there isn't any. The Latvian SS divisions have records as clean as any from the western Allies.
A.
e.polis -
Additional circumstantial evidence might be the fact that members of both divisions freely emigrated to Canada, the U.S., Australia and other countries after the war. To the best of my knowledge, no Estonian or Latvian veteran of either division has ever been prosecuted by the U.S. Office of Special Investigations, a branch of the Criminal Division/U.S. Justice Department, UNLESS they had previously committed alleged war crimes while members of a Schuma unit or a militia unit attached to Einsatzgruppe A. Since OSI has never found sufficient evidence to proceed against members of either division or their component units, except as noted in the previous sentence, then they must be viewed as have passed the scrutiny of the many who would like to bring accusations against them. This is not to say that there may have been a few individual cases carried out by members of the divisions acting on their own without orders, but that is a far cry from organized war crimes.
--Larry
Additional circumstantial evidence might be the fact that members of both divisions freely emigrated to Canada, the U.S., Australia and other countries after the war. To the best of my knowledge, no Estonian or Latvian veteran of either division has ever been prosecuted by the U.S. Office of Special Investigations, a branch of the Criminal Division/U.S. Justice Department, UNLESS they had previously committed alleged war crimes while members of a Schuma unit or a militia unit attached to Einsatzgruppe A. Since OSI has never found sufficient evidence to proceed against members of either division or their component units, except as noted in the previous sentence, then they must be viewed as have passed the scrutiny of the many who would like to bring accusations against them. This is not to say that there may have been a few individual cases carried out by members of the divisions acting on their own without orders, but that is a far cry from organized war crimes.
--Larry