I
am dedicating this Picture series Part I, Part II and Part III to
our ancestors, the settlers, who left their home in Germany to
provide a better future for their children and who endured
enormous hardships made many sacrifices while doing this. To the
men and women who created a paradise in an arid land with the
sweat of their brows. When you look at these pictures in Part
III, you will realize the back-breaking work our ancestors
brought forth to provide a comfortable life for their children,
their families.
I
am dedicating Part IV to my parents, who were among the
seventy-three thousand Donauschwaben deported to Russia for 5
Years. To all your children and my children, Birgitt and Robert,
and to the generations to come, as a lasting document of the
suffering and hardship their ancestors had to endure during the
post war years of World War II before they could reach
freedom. I
sincerely hope that they will understand the value of freedom
and uphold it should it ever become necessary.
I dedicate these pictures to all the survivors of this genocide,
in particular, to all the women, especially to the grandmothers,
the real heroines of the death camps who carried all the
burdens. My admiration goes to all of them. I dedicate this
picture collection to all those innocent victims, who no longer
can tell their stories, among them my grandmother, who were
forgotten and left to die merely because they were Germans.
Last, but not least, I dedicate this picture collection to my
wife, Annemarie, who helped me with her love and understanding
while I wrote of these painful times.
During
the desperate period of World War II there were many
gruesome atrocities committed by numerous societies against one
another, none of which were justified or excusable. What is also
inexcusable is that some of these atrocities have been
de-emphasized, ignored or forgotten, as in the case of the post
atrocities against the Donauschwaben in Communist Yugoslavia.
Part IV is intended to serve as a reminder of what their
families had to suffer through because of politics. There is no
greater crime than shattering the life of a family.
The
crime against the German population in Southeast Europe,
during which one third of the Donauschwaben population exposed
to the Tito Partisans in Communist Yugoslavia perished, must
also be considered among one of the worst crimes against
humanity in the 20th Century. What saddens and
disturbs me is that none of the war criminals that were
responsible for the atrocities were ever brought to justice for
their crimes, including Marshall Tito and his advisors, who
signed an agreement into law that all Germans must be
eliminated, an agreement in short known as “AVNOJ”, that
took all of our rights to exist. What is even more disturbing is
the fact that this agreement still exists in the Yugoslavian
laws of today. It is imperative that we look at all cases of
genocide regardless of who committed them or upon whom they were
committed, so that we may be able to avoid such tragedies in the
future. Life is too
precious to waste and no man has the right to assume he has the
right to take another man’s life.
Hans
Kopp
A
survivor of the death camp, Gakowa
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