It does, but Nazi control over Germany shaped and changed the kennels significantly. The Verein fur Deutsche Schaferhunde (the breed organization for the GSD at

It does, but Nazi control over Germany shaped and changed the kennels significantly. The Verein fur Deutsche Schaferhunde (the breed organization for the GSD at the time) was relinquished to Nazi control a few years before the founder of the breed, Von Stephanitz', death. Nazi influence on breeding and the use of dogs for experiments (Hitler's "beloved" German Shepherd, Blondi, was famously fed a cyanide pill to test its effectiveness) had quite an impact. Many of the best bloodlines have vanished because of this (in Blondi's case, her puppies were shot and killed after her death) but because of the dogs military value, this was of course not the fate of all of them. The ancestry of the "working line" dogs we have today can be traced back to these same dogs that fought alongside soldiers in WWII. What's left of them, anyway.