What does his mean for Goebbels?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8055329.stm (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8055329.stm)
QuoteSpain's Franco 'had one testicle'
A new book claims the Spanish dictator, General Francisco Franco, may have had more in common with Adolf Hitler than previously known - having one testicle.
Much like the Nazi leader, Franco's loss stemmed from an injury he suffered in battle, his doctor's granddaughter told the historian Jose Maria Zavala.
Franco was wounded in the lower abdomen at El Biutz, near Ceuta, in June 1916.
Biographers have long speculated this affected the reproductive organs of the dictator, who ruled from 1939 to 1975.
However, he did have a daughter, Carmen Franco y Polo, in 1926.
Last year, documents came to light containing an account by a medic who treated Hitler during the Battle of the Somme in 1916.
Dr Johan Jambor told his priest that Hitler had been injured in the abdomen and had lost a testicle. He said the first question Hitler had asked him was: "Will I be able to have children?"
'Monorchid'
In his new book, Mr Zavala quotes Dr Ana Puigvert as recalling that her grandfather, Antonio Puigvert, a urologist known to have had Franco as a patient, had told her the dictator had confided in him.
"Franco was monorchid - he had only one testicle," she said.
Franco was a captain in the Spanish army when, in late June 1916, he was shot in the lower abdomen while defending the modern-day Spanish enclave of Ceuta on Morocco's Mediterranean coast.
In 1936, he joined the military uprising that led to the Spanish Civil War and assumed leadership of the fascist Falange Party.
Three years later, with the aid of Nazi Germany and fascist Italy, he won the war and established a dictatorship. Franco kept Spain neutral during World War II, after which he declared Spain a monarchy with himself as regent.
In 1969, he announced that on his death he would be succeeded by Juan Carlos I, grandson of Spain's last reigning king, hoping that he would maintain his regime.
However, after his death in 1975, the new king moved to dismantle the authoritarian institutions and restore democratic rule.
Blimey.
Never trust a man with damaged equipment it would seem is the lesson.
For some reason, I never suspected either of lacking balls.
"Kept Spain Neutral". LOL. Check the record.
How did Hitler loose a ball? Always thought that was a myth.
Can one be fertile with only one testicle? Do they both have some kind of symbiotic role or do we have two just in case some falling rock landed in an inconvenient location when running down a mountain?
Quote from: Queequeg on May 19, 2009, 05:15:12 PM
How did Hitler loose a ball? Always thought that was a myth.
Can one be fertile with only one testicle? Do they both have some kind of symbiotic role or do we have two just in case some falling rock landed in an inconvenient location when running down a mountain?
He lost the ball fighting to revive the Byzantine Empire.
Quote from: Brazen on May 19, 2009, 05:56:26 AM
What does his mean for Goebbels?
I've always wondered why even in German it's Goebbels and not Göbbels same with Hoepner. While the anglo-saxon spelling is Goering, it is spelled Göring in German. :mellow:
Quote from: Ape on May 19, 2009, 07:05:31 PM
I've always wondered why even in German it's Goebbels and not Göbbels same with Hoepner. While the anglo-saxon spelling is Goering, it is spelled Göring in German. :mellow:
I always assumed it was an either-or case, since Low German tends to use the Anglo-Saxon alternatives a lot more than High German, especially on ess-zetts ("ß") written out as "ss" (like "Straße" becoming "Strasse").
Quote from: Queequeg on May 19, 2009, 05:15:12 PM
Can one be fertile with only one testicle? Do they both have some kind of symbiotic role
:lol:
They just produce sperm, the second one is insurance.
Quote from: Peter Wiggin on May 19, 2009, 09:25:18 PM
Quote from: Queequeg on May 19, 2009, 05:15:12 PM
Can one be fertile with only one testicle? Do they both have some kind of symbiotic role
:lol:
They just produce sperm, the second one is insurance.
Assuming theres no damage to the vas deferense (or however it's spelt). I mean getting shot in the nut sack would probably mess you up nicely :P
Quote from: AnchorClanker on May 19, 2009, 05:12:11 PM
"Kept Spain Neutral". LOL. Check the record.
:unsure: Sending off a band of troublesome, highly-motivated volunteers/fanatics to serve on the Eastern Front as a sop to Hitler while keeping from any other major commitments always struck me as rather astute.
Quote from: AnchorClanker on May 19, 2009, 05:12:11 PM
"Kept Spain Neutral". LOL. Check the record.
That's one of the most astounding misconceptions about Franco. We have plenty of documents prepared by his personal staff that assumed as a matter of course that Spain would declare war; the question was 'when'.
The answer was that the country was in so bad shape after the Civil War that Spain would suffer a biblical famine if subject to a British naval blockade (Actually, things got really ugly without war, 1944 was nicknamed "The Year of Hunger"). Even if the Germans were able and willing to supply everything needed, the railroads across the French border would be unable to support such a high volume of traffic. That meant that Franco had to wait until the Axis conquered Egypt. Gibraltar would be automatically out of play as a naval base even if it didn't fall, and that would force the British Navy to leave the Mediterranean.
If Rommel (or Graziani) had succeeded, Spain would have declared war and I'm very much afraid Franco would have discovered that even with the Royal Navy out of the 'Mare Nostrum' only a trickle of supplies reached Spanish harbours. After all Italy was a big food _importer_ even in times of peace...
Quote from: DontSayBanana on May 19, 2009, 09:14:14 PM
Quote from: Ape on May 19, 2009, 07:05:31 PM
I've always wondered why even in German it's Goebbels and not Göbbels same with Hoepner. While the anglo-saxon spelling is Goering, it is spelled Göring in German. :mellow:
I always assumed it was an either-or case, since Low German tends to use the Anglo-Saxon alternatives a lot more than High German, especially on ess-zetts ("ß") written out as "ss" (like "Straße" becoming "Strasse").
Dunno, I just went by wikipedia
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goebbels (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goebbels)
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erich_Hoepner (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erich_Hoepner)
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_G%C3%B6ring (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_G%C3%B6ring)
Quote from: Queequeg on May 19, 2009, 05:15:12 PM
How did Hitler loose a ball? Always thought that was a myth.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article1945960.ece (http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article1945960.ece)
Thank Canaris for keeping Spain out of the war
Quote from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_FelixFollowing the fall of France to Germany in June 1940, Hermann Göring advised Adolf Hitler to occupy Spain and North Africa rather than invade Britain. As early as June 1940, before the armistice with France had been signed, General Heinz Guderian also argued for seizing Britain's strategically important naval base of Gibraltar. Guderian even urged Hitler to postpone the armistice so that he could rush on through Spain with two Panzer divisions, take Gibraltar, and then invade French North Africa. General Alfred Jodl, chief of Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) operations, presented Hitler with a formal plan to cut off Britain from its eastern empire by invading Spain, Gibraltar, North Africa, and the Suez Canal instead of invading the British Isles.
On July 12, 1940 the OKW set up a special group for the necessary planning. On July 22, 1940 Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the head of the Abwehr and an acknowledged expert on Spain, travelled with several other German officers to Madrid, Spain, where they held talks with General Francisco Franco and General Juan Vigón, his Minister of War. They then travelled on to Algeciras where they stayed some days to reconnoiter the approaches to Gibraltar. They returned to Germany with the conclusion that Franco's regime was reluctant to enter the war. However, it has since become known that Canaris was disloyal to Hitler and actually encouraged Franco not to join the Axis, since an Allied victory was almost certain. Canaris' team did however determine that Gibraltar might be seized through an air-supported ground assault involving at least two infantry regiments, three engineer battalions, and a dozen artillery regiments. Canaris declared that without 15 inch heavy assault cannon - which he knew were unavailable - Gibraltar could not be taken. When he reported to Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel he gave his personal opinion that even if Germany were able, with the cooperation of Spain, to seize Gibraltar, the British would land in Morocco and French West Africa.[2]
On July 18 Franco claimed Gibraltar. He did not expect the British to accede to the claim and made it to keep Germany from attempting to take it.
In August Canaris met with Franco's brother in law, Ramón Serrano Súñer, who was about to become Spain's Foreign Minister. Canaris urged Súñer to do what he could to convince Franco to stay out of the war. Soon after, Franco dispatched Súñer to Berlin to get an idea of Hitler's attitude, since Canaris had assured him that Germany would not forcibly intervene in Spain, and he met Hitler on September 16, where Hitler did not press very hard regarding Spain's involvement in the war, perhaps because he planned to meet Franco himself very soon.[2]
Canaris met with Franco around the same time and warned him that if Spain joined the Axis, the Spanish islands - even mainland Spain itself - would be at risk from British attack. Knowing that Franco feared a hostile German invasion of Spain if refused to cooperate, Canaris informed him that Hitler had no such intention due to the planned invasion of Russia. Canaris also surprised Franco by admitting that he was convinced Germany could not win the war.
On August 8, made confident by Canaris' secret talks with him, Franco presented extravagant terms for his cooperation to the German Ambassador to Spain, Eberhard von Stohrer; he said that he would only join Hitler if Spain were promised Gibraltar and French Morocco. Germany must also promise military and economic assistance in the form of wheat and oil to help Spain's faltering economy. Additionally, German forces must first land on the British mainland in a full-scale invasion.
This provoked Hitler to send Canaris to Spain again in an effort to convince Franco to join the Axis and soften his "outrageous" demands. To the contrary, Canaris once more reminded Franco that it would be foolish to join the side that was doomed to lose the war.
On August 24 Hitler approved a general plan for seizing Gibraltar. In October he met with Franco at Hendaye, France, and proposed that Spain enter the war on the Axis side in January 1941; Gibraltar would be taken by special Wehrmacht units and turned over to Spain. Franco however refused the offer, emphasizing Spain's need for large-scale military and economic assistance and Hitler took offence when Franco expressed doubts about the possibility of a German victory. Franco pointed out that even if the British Isles were invaded, Britain's fleet would continue to fight from Canada with US support.
A meaningless memorandum of understanding was signed at Hendaye by Franco and Hitler, neither side getting what they wanted. Hitler is reported to have later told Benito Mussolini, "I would rather have four teeth out than go through that again!"[3]
Extravagant? Gibraltar and French Morocco seem like very moderate demands to me, I have read far worse. Of course losing Morocco wouldn't please the French, but Franco could hardly be expected to enter a world war just to acquire a tiny little piece of rock like Gibraltar.
The part about the British fleet keeping on the fight from Canada is significative, I think. You see, even if Britain fell, Spain could be blockaded and starved from Alexandria, Malta and bases on North Africa & Canary Islands.
Do you really think the british would have kept fighting after losing England?
I'm inclined to think that with the loss of Churchill, the brits would have accepted the first magnanimous offer Hitler would have done.
Quote from: Alatriste on May 20, 2009, 05:50:22 AM
The part about the British fleet keeping on the fight from Canada is significative, I think.
Dunno about that... but Churchill did try his best to convince FDR that Germany might end up with the Royal Navy in case of a British Surrender.
Quote from: Siege on May 20, 2009, 06:16:52 AM
Do you really think the british would have kept fighting after losing England?
I'm inclined to think that with the loss of Churchill, the brits would have accepted the first magnanimous offer Hitler would have done.
Who knows? After Barbarossa, probably. After Pearl Harbour, almost certainly. For starters, the Germans never had a realistic chance to invade England, making serious analysis next to impossible because the answer depends on which things we alter to make Seelöwe succeed.
But - and I'm surprised I have to signal this to you - magnanimity never was Hitler's thing. For example, in 1940 and 1941 he could have got France on his side very easily, Vichy authorities were perfectly ready to go to war against Britain and the USSR if Germany forgot that little 1939 mistake of theirs, but he didn't want to tie his hands. While as far as I know he never said or wrote anything definite, there can be little doubt he wanted to impose a harsh peace on France, one worse than Versailles.
Oh, and for the record I can't but understand the French. After Mers-el-Kebir, Dakar, Syria and Madagascar the least that can be said is, British had made a habit of attacking them long before Operation Torch...