torpedochief

Friends,

Here is a link for you to look at; however please please do not try to contact him from this site.

Here is a warning from the man who introduced us.

But PLEASE, don't write him by this mail-contact, he will not answer you and in general he gets a little angry and says: "ahhrghhh, this internet is not a help, it is a pain and too many people don't know to use it carefully – it is the same like with the Tiger in the war, there were also to many Idiots around!" :-))))

http://www.tiger-apotheke.de/index.php

Perry S.

OK, I give. I clicked on the link and the best I can tell it's for a drug store. Looks to be in German as well so I have no idea what it says.

What do they do and why would I want to contact this cantankerous gentleman?

Perry

dyeager535

My Feedback: (1)

It's Otto Carius' Apotheke.

Play around with the links on the left(? I can't view it here either, but did earlier) and you will find all sorts of information about him and the Tiger in some of them, along with a current picture of him.

Buckeye36

My Feedback: (3)

It's Otto Carius' drug store.

Perry S.

Ahhhhh, I get it now. That's pretty cool. Thought he looked familiar but I didn't make the connection.

Perry

RSEA

Out of curiousity, I asked a good friend of mine if he has ever been to Otto's drug store, since my friend has travelled to Germany on many occasions. My friend has been collecting German militaria since the early 70's.

Anyway, this was his answer about the drug store and Carius in general:

"Yes, I have actually been to Carius’s drug store. Carius spent most of his time on the Eastern front and was in a Heer battalion. Near the end of the war, Carius served with a Jagdtiger unit on the Western Front. Carius’s book is called Tiger’s in the Mud. I don’t care too much for the book and actually gave my copy away to a student this past Christmas. Carius really likes to praise the Soviets and slam the Americans in the book. Carius is also critical of some of the Waffen-SS units too. I have heard that Carius, from time to time, has passed off fake awards that he claimed belonged to him to some unknowledgeable people (who just took him at his word). BTW, Hasso von Manteuffel, and Erich Hartmann did the same thing with fake decorations."

HAL_HUSKER

RSEA,
thanks for comments... Even when I visited his web-site a felt very strange...
but these are emotions, just emotions...

RSEA

HAL, your welcome..

Carius was a distinguished Tiger commander with around 150 or so kills (mostly Soviet) during the war. He was also in the field encountering MANY Russian tanks much like a hunter might find himself in a forest overflowing with deer. Being more than just an average competent Tiger commander, as a result, he destroyed many tanks and killed a lot of Russians.

His first hand accounts of combat in Tigers are interesting to hear, but at the same time, which hadn't been brought up by anyone on here recently are his opinions on several aspects of the war, as expressed through his book.

Here are a few other responses to his book "Tigers in the Mud":

"Carius was absolutely contemptuous of the American troops he faced during and after the war. He seemed resentful that the US didn't fight the way he wanted them to! It was "unfair" that the US had the industrial wherewithal to produce plenty of artillery and airplanes, and could thus fight primarily by taking full advantage of abundant artillery and air attacks. He was contemptuous that the US pounded and "softened up" German positions before attacking with troops or tanks instead of just sending them straight in to "die well".

Yet it seems Herr Apotheker Carius saw nothing wrong or unfair about how earlier in the war he and his crew sat protected in their, at-the-time, invulnerable Tiger as they machine-gunned, blew-up, crushed and buried alive hundreds, perhaps thousands, of exposed Russian infantrymen. Carius seems unconcerned with the possibility that he had an unfair advantage when his Tiger's 88mm gun made scrap metal out of the thinner-armored and completely outclassed T-34s and Sherman tanks he faced. Funny how that works, isn't it?"

"I found it particularly interesting how Carius's most vociferous contempt was heaped, not on the American army, but on his own countrymen. Unlike most German writers who looked with dismay at the sufferings the war brought to their own civilian population, Carius expresses his disgust for the German civilians as the war wound down in the last few months of 1945. He was appalled that Germans would seek to save what they could from an obviously lost cause - even if it meant to cooperate with the Americans. He was of the opinion, much like Hitler, that to die fighting to the last man, woman, and child would have been a far nobler end of the German nation."

karel47

he stil's stay's a nazi don't you think, they were enemy wich would take our country's in, thank god it was stopped.
Its easy to say you regret afterwards while you killed hundreds of tankcrew of usa and russia
that's my opinion

karel47

here in the ardennes Joachim Peiper was the ace here but although i like to paint my tanks in his camoschemes he still was a nazi who want to dominate us

abo

Can I get this right? He's a bit pee'd off because the US used the same tactics as the Germans did, basically blitzkrieg, only better and with more resources? You yanks should be ashamed of yourselves, how dare you?

88mm

googlydoogly

I bet he'd feel differently if he was facing IS-2s with his Panzer 38T.

Yeah, not a big fan of him. Kept complaining about his "mistreatment" durind his US captivity, but didn't really elaborate what was so cruelly done to him. The Allies should have turned him over to the Russians, so he could have seen what real mistreatment was.

karel47

yes can be but he will have his punishment done i think, you would say its time to forgive then but as you read what he thinks he still's like to believe in the nazi way.
although his a skilled modeller it still is the fact he kills hundreds of belgian, french, usa and russian troops no one can go freely with his rank as tankcommander or whatever its names in german.
War makes always civilian causulties nomatter how skilled he was

But this is far away now65 years ago, we are modellers not politisians he had to burden the past we not

yes that forword in that book would be very exclusive but aren't you afraid of the reactions?

torpedochief

I deal very little with poltics of the past and in fact am not interested. I look at Caruis as one of a few left who can share what obviously many many people like (Tiger Tanks) A chance to talk to the man who touched it smelled it, painted it, knew where the mud caked up, knew if indeed the brake turned black from shooting. That is all I am interested in.

I don't worry what people think in these reguards. In TIGER the story is how an American, a German, a British Sniper and a female Russian tanker have to work together to survive the last days of the war

HAL_HUSKER

IMHO

to my mind we (Russians + families inCIScounries + those "Alliens" that live in Baltics) still need time to forgive... even now a lot of russian families still suffer from losses.
We cannot identify (I may be mistaken but still) about5 million Soviet soldiers. When we find them all, identify, berry and glorify - than this could be time to forgive.

Because, even in fact that Stalin was preparing for something, Soviet Uinion was attacked in June 1941. And this is the fact.

Appologies for my tone.

HAL_HUSKER

exactly, that is Y I wrote that the feelings are very strange (let's put it in this way).
On the one hand we see the real legend that can tell us almost everything about Tiger, on the other hand... (see my post above)

tankfanatic

In my opinion, regardless of his knowledge and experience with these tanks, how reliable is he when he carries a very bias attitude, in a very condescending fashion. He glorifies the "good old days." When he was somebody in his regime It's no doubt that he remains a Nazi even out of uniform all these years. But what's amazing is not that he is a real life, walking talking, piece of history....the fascinating part is that he has been granted a leniency that he doesn't deserve. Part of history or not, he's a murderer, a monster and the only contribution he offered to society came with his devastating deeds.

HG1980

look at all the ppl ~i should say bout 3 generations of jewish ppl wiped out....even at the end of the war...the nazi's eben called the segregated black soldiers the n word....i guess this rubs ppl the wrong way.....i still would like to read the book....

karel47

yes i understand all your opinions, we were born after the WOII, but the deeds of the nazi regime will not be forgoten thanks to many poeple who take their time to explore thruth , stories and tales
But we are modellers lets face making models, ride them
... we don't glorify the nazi's at any way because we ride the german panzers in scale
... for us its fun
... but keep always in mind what this men were intended to do, to dominate the world ...
as i say earlier i sleep good ...
... but i can't say the same from ace Carius ,would he not the the battles over and over again, see dying his comrades, the enemy's in his dreams wich he can't command? I think that burden is realy hard to bear even after 65 years. No matter how touch he try to look ...
... i would say he may have it the past we own the future isn't it ...

... i go building my panther, its german but its stops there for me, enjoy me building...


... lets god judge ...

HAL_HUSKER

Karel,
good words...

HG1980

very good words...

sevoblast

After reading some of the posts about Hr Carius here, both pro and con, I feel I should weigh in with my opinion.

No one can judge any soldier from any army unless he has fought in that army, and I don't mean served, I mean fought. No one who has not fought, who is not a warrior, can judge any man who is or was a warrior. To call one a monster is to call all of us a monster. Ergo, I too am a monster, as I proudly served for probably more years then many of you have lived, and have seen more than my share of the nasty end of my previous vocation.

War is a hideous vocation, and that's putting it mildly. If you have not been there, you can not understand what it does to men. Some serve, finish the job, go home, and resume their productive lives. Some are forever changed, for better or worse, by the experience of combat. I know men, warriors, who have seen far worse than I've every seen or experienced, and today are rather kind and gentle, and unless you see the physical scars you would never know they were warriors. Others I have known were forever changed or traumatized by hearing one shot in the dark. Go figure. I am no doctor, and have no answers for that.

However, there comes a time when one must forgive the real or imagined transgressions of the individual soldiers. You will pointedly notice I did not say forget, but forgive. Neither an individual nor a culture can forever go on reliving past traumas. I probably more than most of you fully understand the horrid damage, both physical and psychological, done to former SSSR. No country in history has had such damage done to it and survived. The revenge by SSSR, USA, England, and France was to return such damage in kind, which they did with a thoroughness that boggles the mind. Do I feel sorry for Germany? No, Germany reaped what it had sown.

I will not go in to the why's and wherefores of the second war. Some will tell you it is a direct result of the first war, the crushing reparations visited on Germany, and the victorious nations harvested what THEY had sown. Who knows? I surely do not. However, you can rest assured that the vast majority of the soldiers in the German army no more wanted to be in France or SSSR than the locals wanted them there, nor did the French or British soldiers, nor the Soviet soldiers or American soldiers, want to be anywhere but safe and sound at the family hearth. That being said, whether you are a volunteer or a conscript, the orders are 'march or die'. So, you march and make the best of it.

As for Hr Carius, he is now an old man, and has lived thru times none of us can imagine, from the trouble and turmoil of Germany in the '20's and early 30's, to the seeming and fleeting "glory" and "success" of Hitler's government, to an end to the Germany and German culture that he knew. He fought in battles I can only imagine, and survived, and was successful at his vocation. However, it is time to let him live out his few remaining years in peace. He had his orders, and we will never know if he relished them or not. However, I am willing to bet that more than once he was frightened at what he was ordered to do. I know I certainly was. He has his own private demons and nightmares, I am sure. And in not too many years he will meet his maker and have to explain whatever he may or may not have done. It is not for us to judge him, vilify him, or praise him. That is up to a higher power than we.

And for all of those who perished in that war, either known or unknown, and those who have perished in all the wars, may God grant their souls to rest peace.

BiggTony

Very beautifully written Bob, very well indeed.

Flyn Chris

Well said Bob, well said.