65 Years: V-E Day!

From Deutsche Welle:
"Defeat or liberation? Germany looks back 65 years to the end of WWII"

Today is the 65th anniversary of V-E Day (Victory in Europe Day.) Countries in Western and Central Europe celebrate either their liberation from German occupation or their victory over German air raids. Countries not in Europe (ie the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, etc) celebrate their part in defeating the Germans. Countries in Eastern Europe tend to celebrate Victory Day tomorrow.

After 65 years there are still many people alive who actively participated in the war (as soldiers, victims, workers in war factories, etc) and we need to thank those that helped end the war (some have called them the "Greatest Generation"), remember those who died in it and question those who started it. While no blame should be placed on those Germans that were born from 1928 onwards those that were born before 1928 need to openly come to terms with what they did and did not do during the war. Seeing bad things happen and doing nothing is just as bad as personally doing the bad thing.

I am curious to see how Germans today feel about the end of the war. Do they believe the Allies liberated them or that we defeated them (as the article above suggests?) I think this question is different for the different German generations. Those that were old enough during the war probably see things differently then all the other generations born after the war and have grown up knowing the whole horrors of what their country did.

V-E Day is the first major step in ending a war that killed an estimated 40-60 million people covered every part of the globe. While the Germans started the European war and actively strove to wipe out millions upon millions of people (an estimated 20 million in the USSR alone) we shouldn't forget that the Japanese also were involved - in the Asian war, but that is for another day (V-J Day.) Even though 65 years have passed and many people are trying to rewrite history to portray themselves as victims or just in a better light the facts are the facts and no one person or country can change them. The fact is the Germans started the war, occupied most of Europe, created concentration and death camps, bombed cities and towns and enslaved millions. The Allies (the Americans, British and Soviets) defeated the Germans and all the evil they created and liberated the world from the Nazis.

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,5546769,00.html