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My grandfather who fought in WWII (British) developed a close friendship with a German veteran in his later years. I think they met in southern Spain where they
by sjclemmy 10y ago
My grandfather who fought in WWII (British) developed a close friendship with a German veteran in his later years. I think they met in southern Spain where they both spent a lot of time in their retirement in the 1980s. I doubt their story was as spectacular as this, but there was clearly some experience they both shared that led to the friendship. I'm not suggesting they knew each other in the war (but who knows?), but the fact they both went through similar experiences allowed them to develop a bond.
I wonder how common this is?
- jbmorgado 10y agoI would guess it is not something difficult to do in this scenario. We are talking about a war where young men get drafted and sent to the carnage, most of them don't go there voluntarily out of some ideology. So it's easy to see some years later that you were just being used and form a bond with someone that was exactly in the same situation as you were but using different colors. All in all, those two men had more in common with each other than with the men from their own country that were waging war from whiting their palaces and sending them to their deaths.
- 13of40 10y agoI was an anti-aircraft missile gunner in the US Army in a previous career, and I've got a good friend who used to be an officer in the Soviet air force. When you get down to it, we both spent years training on how to murder each other dead, for reals, but when our families get together for a barbecue it's just a running joke.