The Volkssturm: Berlin’s Last Defense 1945

[Rhett_Kierbow]

Not grandpa holding the Lewis gun he took from a dead British soldier in ww1

[lennonkelly-james]

Imagine surviving WW1 just to get called up again 27 years later to defend your doomed capital city.

[mathiasbartl]

The guy with the Lewis gun swings his arm properly as he marches, def not his first Rodeo.

[blewis]

Wait a minute, is that a British made Lewis gun that the Volksturm man is carrying….geez the Germans were clearing the attics and cellars weren’t they!!??

[Junker_Ju]

0:08 the situation is real bad when your using a ww1 British Lewis gun

[Trapstar]

Imagine how their situation was fucked, they were literally carring ww1 Heavy machine guns (Not Talking about Lewis gun)

[BowmanBro]

The Volksstrum is the reason why germanys ww1 vets were all basically extinct by 1970. They lived through one war as boys, and died in a second as old men. They were used, abused, and knew nothing else other than war never experiencing the false lull of peace so many experience today including myself. How puzzling our times have become...

[theyearsoldmale]

"Why is there a hole on my uniform?"

[WarInHD]

That WW1 vet marching with the Lewis Gun knows what is about to happen. He’s got that smirk on his face that says “let’s see if they can get me this time around”

[alexandertorres]

Those Germans must've felt very betrayed at that point

[iminurcloset]

those poor veteran's, Getting the same treatment as in 1918.

[Elijah-qutt]

Fun fact: they had over 12 million recruits but due to the lack of ammunitions, weapons and officers only 700k were active combatants.

[swizterlandscitezen]

And still, they were smiling, even though they knew that they would probably die. They even put on their best clothes on

[jay_soldier]

For the people who don't know what Volksstrum is, It is Militia and if you don't know what militia is, Its civilian fighters

[Theo-edvz]

Berlins last defenders were not just Volkssturm but also the french volunteer SS Division Charlemagne.

[defaulton]

" Oh, your 59? Don't care, you're being conscripted to this militia. "

[nonamepuro]

my grandmother's brother died at 15 in the volk

[arefkr]

The only army that went into war in their business attire

[REVREV]

Curious fact, most of the weapons seen in these parades that the volkstrum carried out were lent by the wermatch (regular army) only for propaganda purposes and had to be returned at the end. So the majority of militiamen did not have weapons due to the lack of resources and the few that did have had pistols, rifles of ridiculously small calibers that were used to hunt ducks and train children and in the best of cases obsolete weapons of the WW1

[JuanRamos-coip]

It's pretty sad knowing that any one who was able to hold a guns was forced to fight