Marines posed with Nazi SS symbol in Afghanistan

[Terminal Blue]

Nazis also used an eagle.
Also, a skull/crossbones.

Both of which are generic symbols, the former dates from before Germany's founding and is still in use in a variant of the present day flag. There are various forms of the eagle which are dodgy (obviously, those with swastikas on) but 'an eagle' is incredibly generic.

The skull and crossed bones as a German military symbol originates with the Prussian 5th Hussars in the 18th century. It's still used in some German military uniforms today, and has also been adopted in many regimental insignia from around the world. There's one particular form of the symbol which is a bit dodgy, which is this one..

Spoiler

The sig rune is not a generic symbol. It doesn't depict anything, It has no meaning whatsoever outside of German occultism and fascist imagery, apart from the common misconception that it's a letter 's'. The historical rune upon which its based doesn't even look anything like that (and in fact looks much more like an 's').

It looks nothing like the freaking Nazi symbol.

..it's a replica of a flag which was actually used by the SS. It was probably bought from a Nazi memorabilia specialist, as that's the only place you can generally get those flags.

 

[[zonking great]]

God. I can't believe some you people are defending those moronic snipers.
American ignorance much?

 

[Terminal Blue]

2. the first paragraph of the news story says the SS was "a special unit that murdered millions of Jews, gypsies and others" and 2. "committed mass atrocities in WWII" anyone who knows anything about ww2 combat knows the SS didn't kill Jews, that was the military wing of the gestapo and the SS was an elite fighting unit that fought on the front line in Russia and Europe

Spoiler

This is an Allgemeine SS (General SS) uniform. People wearing this uniform staffed the death camps, formed organized murder squads and carried out the systematic murder of millions of people.

(Okay, I'll leave this in to show my ignorance, because actually I don't know very much about this, just enough. Nonetheless, I'm actually wrong. It was the SS Totenkopfverbände who staffed the death camps and concentration camps, there were many different services within the SS.)

Spoiler

These are various examples of Waffen SS (Armed SS) uniforms. People wearing these uniforms fought on the front line in Russia and Europe.

There was no 'military wing of the gestapo', the Waffen SS were the military wing of the SS. Both ultimately fell under the command of Heinrich Himmler. Both used the double sig rune as their main symbol, particularly on flags.

 

[Phisi]

Meh, they probably were looking for some stylised 'S's to mean Sniper Scout and they found them, pity they already were associated with something else. For me it is kinda like the guy who accidently makes a swastika out of their mob farm in Minecraft.It is entirely possible that none of them knew it's meaning.

 

[Guffe]

So people working for the biggest military force in the world does not know what they're worst enemies second most dangerous special force 70 years ago had as a logo...
You do anything else than practice shooting down stuff over there?

 

[Rinshan Kaihou]

I knew what the Nazi SS was, but I didn't know what the symbol for it was. So if I had seen that picture, without knowing in advance what it represented, I still wouldn't. And I can completely believe that they didn't either. Well, maybe the owner of the flag did, but it's entirely possible that the others did not.

 

[5t3v0]

Eh, it's just a symbol, a pretty badass, wicked cool symbol at that. The Nazi Schutzstaffel were bad, the symbol is not. But people will get offended over any little trivial thing. I remember when using the Swastika was a cool and okay thing to do, then some asshole uses it, and suddenly it's not okay because it'll offend people.

Not that I condone or oppose it (and I don't have time to read the whole thread) but this comment made me think of the trope "Hitler Ate sugar"

Also, I think it was TVtropes where I read that a US unit/Company/Platoon, when they met up with the british during their entry in the 2nd world war used Swastika symbols/Inverted Swastika symbols without realising the implication to the british. They quickly removed the Symbol from the uniform though [citation needed]

 

[[zonking great]]

]God. I can't believe some you people are defending those moronic snipers.
American ignorance much?

Anti-american bias much?

Bringing the truth. It often hurts Americans. *ruffles Buretsu's animephile hair* It's ok sonny, just close your eyes. Everything will go away. Patronisation Man, AWAY!

 

[Henkie36]

If they mean what they say about ''they don't know any better'', then I'd call it dangerous to have those marines waving guns around, they might not know which end is the front of the gun. Probably the second best known symbol from WWII, and they thought it would be funny to use it as their own? Come on, this is just stupid and incredably disrespectful.

 

[masticina]

Keep it classy America keep it classy!

 

[Durgiun]

There's also an author who uses the SSs in his last name. I can't remember how it name goes, but I think starts with a W.

 

[Arakasi]

I honestly think it was just ignorance and that everyone should get over it.
They probably did think it was just Sniper Scouts or something non-descript, and thought 'hey, cool, they're in a lightning bolt shape'.

Sure perhaps they should have been taught history better, but that's not nessecarily their fault.

Besides, symbols mean different things in different contexts.

Spoiler

 

[Zeckt]

It's possible this was just a really, really stupid mistake and I can forgive them for it. However, I won't ever forgive the urination and the mutilation photo's.

 

[Tomeran]

That isnt the SS-symbol. Its similar, but its not identical. To all that argue that its an exact match, it even says in the article that its only "similar".
Look it up at wiki and you'll see what im talking about. The SS symbols for the old nazi units were slightly curved and surrounded by a black circle.

That being said, it is not okay to miss the quite obvious shitstorm that would come out of this, since the similarities are quite obvious. It was probably not their intention, but it was really stupid to miss this kind of thing. And if it was done on purpose, it was even more stupid. I can buy that one or two or three or maybe even most of them didnt know the symbolism, but all of them? No way.

However.

As someone else hinted in this thread earlier, this is no big deal. There are way way worse images out there.

 

[sapphireofthesea]

Honest mistake my ass.

This is completely despicable. I like how the defense is 'They're marines, they wouldn't knowingly do that'. What does that even mean? I didn't realize the US military force was now considered to be infallible. I think they should've at least sent out a memo, or something.

In all seriousness, I am up on my World War 2 history more than alot of people and I was unaware of there even being an official symbol for the SS division. Do you think many in the army are that informed about 70 year old insignias from a time most wish to forget or religate to history museums.

Yes there might be some fault here, but equally, it could be completely unwitting on someones part (though I didn't hear any 's' in the name connected to the situation. It is really going to have to be a matter for an investigation based on what was said around the matter, i.e. if they were asked simply to pose with the american flag with an excuse given about the lettering, or if they were given some other story, because only a few people would have looked at it and said, 'that looks alot like an SS symbol' (for previusly mentioned reasons).

I think there is a legit situation here for investigation and I couldn't even rightly call them stupid if no one told them it was a WW2 symbol, as I would have done the same (having to double check what the SS symbol looked like).