Whats with all the Fuhrer in title?

Watching Das Boot TV show.

There are German officers who introduce themselves with Fuhrer in their title.

I thought there was only one Fuhrer: Adolf Hitler.

Examples from the show are: Standartenfuhrer, Sturmbarnfuhrer, Untersturmfuhrer, Grouppefuhrer, etc., etc., and Heinrich Himmler is mention several times as Reichsfuhrer:

Fuhrer of the Reich? Again I say I though the only Fuhrer of the Reich was Adolf Hitler.

I always get the impression from watching World War 2 films and TV shows that the Nazis were obsessed with ranking and position. In the U.S. Army for example, you have private, corporal, different sergeant, 2nd and 1st Lt, Capt, and on to General 1-5 stars. Simple.

In the Nazi Germany, they have so many ranks it's difficult to figure out many of them and who is higher and who is lower in the chain of command.

"fuehrer" simply means "leader" in German. There is the singular "Der Fuehrer" which refers to Hitler but then you have just the generic word "fuehrer" which means "leader" and is often used for military ranks and other terms.

They are just varying ranks. Himmler wasn't the only Reichsfuhrer but the most well known.

Thanks Panzer and Chucky.

I was right about the Nazi. Look at this Wiki entry. How did they keep track of who is who? Someone came up to me and said something to me and I would be: who are you? You could had stole that uniform!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranks_and_insignia_of_the_Nazi_Party

Quite a few Fuhrer in this group:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranks_and_insignia_of_the_Nazi_Party#Senior_Nazi_Party_titles

I can't even....

Private Second class, Private First class, Corporal, Lance Corporal, Sergeant, Staff Sergeant, Sergeant First class, Master Sergeant, First Sergeant, Sergeant Major, Warrant Officer, Chief Warrant Officer, Second Lieutenant, First Lieutenant, Captain, Major, Lieutenant Colonel, Colonel, Brigadier General, Major General, Lieutenant General, General


So what's that you were saying Fly Boy? I ignore most of your posts, but occasionally I cannot.

Those are all ranks in the SS and Waffen SS.

Quite what they are doing in a drama that's nominally about U-Boats - apart from introducing extraneous 'baddie' characters we can all go 'Booo!' at, while providing the bad guys for an extraneous sub-plot about the French Resistance complete with the required 'strong female character' - I have no idea, and am not going to waste my TV-watching time trying to work out, interested though I am in WW2 naval warfare. I'm not remotely interested in whitewashing the Nazis - I well recall the strength of feeling to Nicholas Monsarrat's introduction to 'U-Boat 977' - but this I can do without quite happily.

Well I am sorry I do not know the exact title of all the rankings in the U.S. Army from lowest to highest.

I am saying I thought there was only one person in Nazi Germany with Fuhrer in the title just like in the U.S. Army, there is only one with Supreme Commander.

But seems the Nazi use the title Fuhrer freely and give it out to anyone like they were passing out candies.

Same with their Iron Cross. I also get the impression everyone has one or can get one and don't have to do much to get one unlike the Congressional Medal of Honor or the Purple Heart which requires extraordinary courage and deed and sacrifice for someone in the U.S. Military to receive it.

You might have said more.

I'll just highlight this. Iron Cross equals Medal of Honor. Got it.

I'm sure all who earned an Iron Cross will be glad to know NoFLyBoy thinks they didn't earn it with courage. What do you think they awarded the Iron Cross for?

What's the wiki say?

You are not making sense. I was very clear. As I've already said, I do not know the exact title of all the rankings in the U.S. Army from lowest to highest.



I get the impression you admire all the Nazis who earned the Iron Cross. What does Wiki say you ask? I don't know. I didn't look it up on Wiki. I don't look everything up on Wiki.

Do you voice ask Google Assistant or Siri to find everything? I don't ever use Siri on my phone. As a matter of fact Siri is disabled on my phone.

There is always someone in a forum who if he doesn't agree or like other's post, they become hostile and condescending. We are just discussing the usage of Fuhrer title in Nazi Germany. You act like I am being tested in class on a exam or something and OPENLY criticize me for not knowing the entire U.S. Army ranking by title from lower to higher.

Lame.

Yup, you said it. You are lame and rude especially when you said .

You can't even what? You can't even believe someone doesn't know all the U.S. Army ranks and their titles from lowest to highest? I wasn't aware that is required knowledge for everyone in the U.S. population.

Well, I can't even.... BELIEVE I cannot ask a honest simple question about Nazi titles from watching a show WITHOUT BEING FLAMED.

WTaF? The Purple Weenie is notorious for being handed out like candy - some gathering a dozen or more for various minor injuries. Slightly more significant than a campaign medal, at least in theory, but not by much.

Iron Cross, First Class with Oak Leaves, is rare - I don't know whether it is as rare as the Victoria Cross or CMoH, but it is a higher standard of bravery medal.
Ultimately all medals are political/morale trinkets, not corresponding to actual concern for servicemen or valour. (see for example the plethora of VC given at a minor defensive action in Janurary 1879, not untypical of colonial clashes, but following on from a embarrassing defeat garnering a disproportionate positive press).

Before you ask a question NFB, you could always do an Inet search first.

Those are (kind of civilian) ranks in the NSDAP (=Nazi) party. Those are used at the various levels of the party hirarchy and regional organisation.
As has been said, the ranks in the OP refer to military ranks in the (Waffen-)SS.

I believe it was your conclusion of "Simple" that garnered the incredulous reaction.

Gosh. They are mostly all Fuhrer.

Thanks, Who!

Well, if watching a few TV episodes helped to dispel the impression that Nazi Germany was well organized with a strict hierarchy going straight from Hitler to the lowest private, it has probably achieved more education than one could reasonably expect.
Hitler deliberately set up competing organizations and hierarchies that would battle each other for his approval so that they wouldn't find the time to plot against him.


As mentioned before, "Führer" meant just "leader" as such it's actually a relatively neutral word even today, although of course historical connotations are often still there and can be rhetorically exploited (if your agenda is anti-authoritatian). So you could be the leader of any organization or sub-organization, and then there were entire rank systems based on neo-pagan/pseudo-aryan words "+führer". But of course there was only one who was "Der Führer" without the need for further specification.

Reichsfuhrer SS I believe simply means National leader of the SS. Others are Standard Leader, Group Leader etc. There's only one Leader just like there's only One Yorkshire Ripper.

Anyone with [something]fuhrer, middle management who loves fighting amongst themselves and wearing funny clothes, The Fuhrer, big kahuna with the ban hammer.

Everything I know about German ranks and insignia's I learned from watching Hogan's Heroes.

They were pretty accurate, right guys?

Guys??

"Führer" in German is used in many different contexts. For example, I am a Führer aswell, because I have a "Führerschein" which translates to "drivers license". So I am literally the leader of my car. Which is a Fiat, so maybe it's a Duceschein?

It doesn't always mean leader, it is often used in regards to vehicles, like cars, or trucks, construction machines and so on. A "Kranführer" for example, in this context the best translation would probably be "operator", a crane operator.

So, it sounds as though a more literal translation of the word would be controller. Hitler was not just a Fuhrer, he was THE Fuhrer. The one in control of everything.

You drive or lead a team of oxen or horses. The meanings for leading and driving of a machine seem to follow from that.

The Iron Cross of the World War II era was not equivalent to the Medal of Honor. Probably, the Iron Cross First Class was roughly equivalent to the US Bronze Star. The Iron Cross 2nd Class was a step below that . . . not quite automatic like the Combat Infantry Badge, but not too far off.

The rough German equivalent to the Medal of Honor would have been the Knight's Cross, though, since by the end of WWII there 5 different grades of the Knights Cross (with the top grade, Knight's Cross with Golden Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds - evidently made with real gold and diamonds - was pretty much created specifically for Ernst Rudel), it is hard to say which one is exactly parallel to the Medal of Honor.

There was also the Grand Cross of the Iron Cross even higher up, but that was only awarded to Herman Goering for his "excellent" handling of the Luftwaffe in the Battle of France.

Excellent handling? He lost. Got his fat butt handed to him by the brave men and women of England.

Sarcasm

Thank you all for the answers about the Fuhrer title and the Iron Cross.

That is the Battle of Britain, which was only won because Hitler interferred at the crucial moment.

In the Battle of France the Luftwaffe destroyed 2400+ enemy planes, for a loss of 1100 of their own planes.

I think the Welsh, Scots and Irish who fought or contributed might be a tad miffed at that statement! Not to mention all the Commonwealth and Empire airmen & women.
Also the brave men who had escaped from occupied countries experiencing much danger and travail to come to Britain to continue the fight.
Highest scoring squadron was comprised of Polish airmen. Recognition of their contribution was egregiously denied due to political appeasement of Stalin at the end of the conflict.
Within that squadron (303) flew the top scoring pilot of the battle, Josef Frantisek who was Czech.
Their were also a number of pilots from your country who flew and fell, who had had to surrender their US citizenship to volunteer to fly for the RAF.

What? And not let his stream of consciousness spill out onto the forum every day? How would we cope?

LOL

Well, you have to try and look at the silver lining in every cloud. The posts from NoFlyBoy do help in preventing SimHQ from becoming a barren wasteland of inactivity.

The influx of new members is constant,but very few make more than a dozen posts if any at all. I understand that they may often lurk and not feel the urge to post and that's ok.

I can't be the only one who looks forward to NFB's posts? Just like a box of chocolates,you never know what you're gonna get.

They are bite sized and brown, but they certainly are not all chocolates.

+1

You are right. It was late at night and my brain had gone to sleep. But Goering did had his fat butt handed to him by the brave men and women of England at the Battle of Britain.

Hitler did shoot himself in the foot several times during World War 2 with his interferences which without them, the war may have ended differently for him and Germany.

Hitler and some of the military leaders in the Reich made many serious mistakes during the war but the ultimate top two fatal errors that lead to Germany's destruction were made by Hitler.


1. The invasion of the USSR.

2. The declaration of war on the US.


Once Germany was at war with most of the world it could NOT achieve victory. It was simply a case of delaying the inevitable and it's quite impressive actually that the German war machine survived for as long as it did once it was at war with the British Empire, the US and the USSR.

Before those, Hitler already made mistakes: allying with Italy and then having to clean up Mussolini's messes in Greece and North Africa and Mediterranean. Starting World War 2 when he didn't have a surface Navy fleet that was a match for the Royal Navy. Stopping the advance of his troops at Dunkirk and allowing the BEF to escape: it wasn't on his order but he also didn't stop it.

During the Battle of Britain, Hitler should had kept the bombing pressure on the RAF airfields and destroy the RAF before starting bombing runs on London.But even if the RAF was destroyed, Operation Sea Lion and an ground troop invasion of England and winning it to take London and forcing England to capitulate would had been impossible.

Then during Operation Barbarossa, Hitler made the mistake of diverting Army Group Center away from Moscow when they were a few KM away from taking in November 1941 to go South and take the caucuses with the oil fields in the UKRAINE. Also by that time the weather has turned and everything was turning from mud to ice slowing the German advance. Operation Barbarossa began in June 1941 and it was delayed by 5 weeks because Hitler's armies were busy in Greece and Yugoslavia.

Imagine if it began sooner in April 1941 and the Wermacht was within sight of the Kremlin in September 1941 instead of November, when the weather and grounds were still dry for the German armor to continue to advance and take Moscow in September. Stalin would probably had sued for peace, probably or most likely not since he was crazy like Hitler and would had continued the fight.

None of those were FATAL mistakes that lead to the ultimate destruction and defeat in 1945. Had Germany stayed at war with only Britain the war would have been a protracted stalemate. Neither side was strong enough to defeat the other. Once Germany invaded the USSR and then declared war on the US a few months later, the entire situation drastically changed.

It was a wet spring so the Greece/Yugo expedition let the ground dry out.

Imagine if Hitler would had taken Moscow in September 1941 and then offered Stalin an armistice. I think Stalin may have taken it. By that time in late 1941, Stalin had so many casualties and so many taken POW, over 3 millions POW I think. Then Hitler can go back to fighting England and USA was not in the war yet. Of course you are correct when you say he should not had declared war on the USA but that's because he was backing up his ally Japan.

Incorrect. The Tripartite Pact signed between Germany, Italy and Japan was a DEFENSIVE alliance agreement so Hitler was under no treaty obligation to go to war with the USA since it was Japan which initiated hostilities. Hitler declared war on the USA due to its generous military aid to Britain and role in escorting trans-Atlantic convoys even though it was officially "neutral".

If Hitler hadn't behaved like an unhinged Nazi, Germany might have won WW2. But then we wouldn't know it as "WW2". Or Stalin would have attacked a few years later, which he seems to have planned anyway. But Hitler being Hitler, he simply could not not attack the USSR, and lead the war effort in the way that he did. So it's a completely pointless debate.

Reminds me of a story told me by a lecturer who was with a party of students in the Rhineland (1970s?) who asked their older German host while they were waiting for the youth leader who was to be their guide 'Wo ist der fuehrer?' The old guy replied, straight faced and apparently somewhat sadly, 'Der fuehrer ist tot.' I think that probably disproves notions of Germans lacking a sense of humour!

I have several German friends and I can tell you that this stereotype is totally wrong! It's simply that Germans excel at BLACK humor and not so much the slapstick humor that we see so often in English speaking countries.

This may help sorting out all those silly whatsIt Fuhrer ranks and iron cross stuff.

It helped me a lot this AM.

That right there Nixer is one of my top 3 all time favorite Monty Python sketches. Simply brilliant.

I don't think that there is a highly subjective such as sense of humor that can be adequately characterized by national stereotypes, as much fun as it may be wielding them, especially in an internet debate. I know of Germans who have no sense whatsoever of black humor, personally I love it dry, black, or absurdist (and occasionally the plain silly), and of course I love playing with the expectation that I have no sense of humor by trying to stay deliberately stonefaced and robotic in response if I sense that someone wants to test exactly that.

Of course we all have our prejudices. I'm not sure I should try black and/or blasphemic jokes with strangers in the US bible belt although I'm sure that there will be the one or other outcast in these communities who'd get it. I'm drawing the line when it comes to handicaps although, of course, it's another form of excluding people by denying their right to be mocked at, so if in doubt, I'd go with equal opportunity mockery. Some blind people know great jokes about blindness. The question always is, do you go for the humor, or is the intent to denigrate someone with cruel jokes. Needless to say, what's funny for some is cringeworthy for others, and a lot depends on cultural and personal background and situational context.
I mean, just think of the "danger seeker" skit in the Kentucky Fried Movie. I wouldn't characterize it as "racist" per se since the N word is issued in the context of deliberately provoking a dangerous response but I suppose you could tell the same joke in a different way where you provoke a potentially violent response without using a slur. So we're back to the question about equal opportunity mockery...

I wouldn't try black humour in the liberal areas these days. Likely to get one turned into strange fruit.

All I know, off the top of my head, is that my DVDs of “Blazing Saddles” and "Life of Brian" were, are, and always will be...

All the more it may be necessary. If certain topics are declared taboo by quasireligious zealots, its the satirists' holy duty to target particularly these taboos. But, of course, this comes with considerable personal risk. As open societies, we've had come farther a while ago. I mean, Monty Python were never against authority per se, just stupid authority. So whenever the laws of what's permissible to say become too rigid and try to force conformity, if you want to keep your open society you have to speak up against it.
:o