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**pimpf** · 09-20-2009, 01:12 AM

**Nordfront** · 09-20-2009, 01:59 AM

Pretty famous picture.

Shoulder board doesn't look like SS-Untersturmführer's board.

Maybe he was Volksturm-officer who got/took himself FJ-helmet and FG-42 from LW? I think they were using whatever they could get in Berlin in April 1945...

**Ian Hulley** · 09-20-2009, 03:45 AM

Looks like a posed photo with a 'whatever they could throw at it' type uniform ... a bit like the captured Auschwitz staff photos.

Ian

**Felix** · 09-20-2009, 05:22 AM

There hardly exists any real soviet documentary photos. This is an example of another staged propaganda photo. A dressed up german corpse to show that the soviets has beaten the nazis and are so heroic and their ideology is much better. A photo good enough for the Soviet newspapers. No one should doubt that communism is the best.
Maybe it is even a doctored tunic by the soviet propagandas.

//Felix

**PBR** · 09-20-2009, 05:49 AM

Doesn't looks like an SS-adler to me....

**Rob E.** · 09-20-2009, 05:57 AM

I believe it to be staged as well for propaganda purposes.

**Nordfront** · 09-20-2009, 06:34 AM

Yes, that foto is somewhat staged for sure. Question was about the uniform.

I doubt that russians had to make a fantasy tunic for the corpse... For sure there were plenty of corpses with real tunics available? If that FJ stuff was put beside him for the foto, who knows.

**Zauberflöte** · 09-21-2009, 08:40 AM

Actually guys, I do not think it is a staged picture at all…yes of course the purpose of shooting it was propaganda, but the uniform setting does not strike me as weird at all, it is totally convincing and authentic. He might have been looted (hence the tunic pockets stand open).

Not clearly shown in this picture, but he’s wearing a Danish flag under the eagle thus a Freikorps Danmark member, which makes sense, as they did fight in Berlin along side “NORDLAND”.
The fact that he is wearing a Heer eagle doesn’t bother me at all, this was very common and to be seen in many period pictures. At this stage in the fighting everyone used everything and there was no such a thing as a rule or protocol… would you in his case not grasp a FG42 when you had the opportunity?

**Ian Hulley** · 09-21-2009, 11:40 AM

Originally posted by Zauberflöte View Post

Actually guys, I do not think it is a staged picture at all…yes of course the purpose of shooting it was propaganda, but the uniform setting does not strike me as weird at all, it is totally convincing and authentic. He might have been looted (hence the tunic pockets stand open).

So you're happy that the collar and shoulder insignia don't match up as well as all the other anomolies and given the Russian penchance for these staged propoganda shots ?

**Gran Sasso** · 09-21-2009, 11:44 AM

This foto is for sure staged in some way, e.g. he was pulled there at his legs, therefore his tunic is "up", exposing his undershirt - and a para-helmet would not come to rest in this position (there is a 5% chance, that it will come to rest like this, but normally it will end the other side up), when fallen from a head.

**Nordfront** · 09-21-2009, 02:09 PM

oNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>EN-US</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:LidThemeComplexScript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w

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ontBreakConstrainedForcedTables/> <w

ontVertAlignInTxbx/> <w:Word11KerningPairs/> <w:CachedColBalance/> </w:Compatibility> <m:mathPr> <m:mathFont m:val="Cambria Math"/> <m:brkBin m:val="before"/> <m:brkBinSub m:val="******45;-"/> <m:smallFrac m:val="off"/> <m:dispDef/> <m:lMargin m:val="0"/> <m:rMargin m:val="0"/> <m:defJc m:val="centerGroup"/> <m:wrapIndent m:val="1440"/> <m:intLim m:val="subSup"/> <m:naryLim m:val="undOvr"/> </m:mathPr></w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><style>  </style> I am repeating myself here, but it doesn't make sense to me.

That tunic is very weird for sure, but I don't believe that Russians would have made up some fantasy tunic just for this photo and put on a corpse?

There must have been thousands and thousands of German casualties all over the place.

Off course if that photo was taken some time after the war and totally staged then, that it is a different story... But still there would have been plenty of real tunics available.

**Ian Hulley** · 09-21-2009, 02:23 PM

Imagine how many tunics, peaked caps and sidecaps the Russians and Poles captured, yet the used the same tunic and 2 caps to photograph all the Auschwitz staff and guards they caught.

Ian

**nutmeg** · 09-21-2009, 02:29 PM

The body may have been dragged to that spot but it doesn't look staged to me. Not really much reason to stage something like this when dead bodies were all over the place.

**billbert** · 09-21-2009, 02:59 PM

I was thinking he was maybe a Skorzeny commando with a Berlin posting..JMHO Billbert

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KIA: FJ helmet, FG 42, SS uniform???

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