MovieChat Forums > Valkyrie (2008) Discussion > Were the plotters really much better tha...

Were the plotters really much better than Hitler and his gang?


Because usually history teaches us that they are more about gaining power than actually bettering people's lot.

Just look at Trotsky, Brutus, the Confederacy, etc.

Of course these examples come from people whom failed and their side lost, hence they are deemed today as traitors or at best as losing rival factions, not heroes like these ones (their side wining, and thus able to dictate history).

And while Stauffenberg sure seems to have been not such a bad guy, was he actually a good one? Because what I've read about him is pretty mixed (didn't mind enslaving Poland nor east Russia to benefit Germany), and I highly doubt he would be so highly regarded had Germany won the war.

In fact, seems quite similar to Brutus, whom HBO's Rome pains to portray as complex as possible and explain his reasons, misgivings, and also character flaws others used to their advantage.

Since Cassius and Brutus failed (they killed Caesar but not Anthony, and thus their side lost then and forever), they are regarded not as saviours but as traitors (we all know how when they shouted their victory the streets became dead silent since the common people simply did NOT support them), regardless of what good reasons they may have had.

The plotters here were in pretty much the same situation (they were a minority without any real common people's support, whom themselves seemed to have wanted a more vanilla version of Nazism but still shared several Nazism's key ideas).

Or am I totally off?

Maybe it's my Mexican history that makes me doubt anything the "official" history says (our official heroes and villains changed dramatically when Neoliberalism came in the 80's, showcasing how malleable history is)

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B-70A
whirlwind

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Whatever

Next?

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I dont know much about Stauffenberg and his fellows, but my guess would be that he and the others were mainly dissatisfied with Hitler's military strategy. They saw the defeat coming and wanted to limit the damage. So, maybe they were better in the sense that they saw that Germany was going in the wrong direction politically and militarily. However, I wouldnt assume that they were anything else than children of their time; not necessarily antisemites, but not pure democrats and liberals either. They were probably what today you would call pro-military republicans/conservatives.

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A fair comparison. They simply weren't crazy or sycophantic compared to other military officials.

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To use your words, “you’re totally off.”

There hasn’t been a war or battle in the history of humankind where acts of evil as well acts of good were not enacted on both sides of the opposing forces.
There were absolutely honorable men and women who served in the German army during WWII. It wasn’t as though the majority of those serving in the German army during WWII were fighting for the eradication of the Jewish faith and culture. This was a politically orchestrated atrocity. Many Germans, including Stauffenberg were fighting because they were soldiers, and their country called on them to serve. Stauffenberg wasn’t a Nazi, he was a German soldier, and there is a difference.
As an Infantry soldier myself I’ve witnessed acts of evil as well as good from American soldiers, as well as those I’ve faced in battle. Point being, it was the evil I witnessed by some of my fellow bother’s in arms that impacted me the most. And I can tell you emphatically that standing up to acts of evil, immorality, unethical behavior, when it’s your brothers or sisters who are engaging in it, takes a tremendous amount of courage.
If anything, Stauffenberg stands out as an exemplary example of how one should act when put in a similar position. A position, in which doing the right thing will most likely cost you everything.

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If you're trying to get rid of Hitler, you're automatically much better.

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