Your Job in Germany, 1945
Why Hacker News recommends it
HN commenters bring it up as a startling primary-source artifact of postwar occupation propaganda, often to draw parallels to current events or to note its Capra and Dr. Seuss involvement.
Recommended by 2 people across 2 different months, 2021 to 2026.
What it is
A 1945 US Army training film for occupation troops in Germany, supervised by Frank Capra and Theodor Geisel (Dr. Seuss), narrated by John Beal. It explains how Germans were indoctrinated with Nazi ideals and warns soldiers to stay wary and aloof, with no fraternization.
What people said
Strong rec tptacek · 2024-05 · Hacker News · on “ICC prosecutor seeks arrest warrants against Sinwar and Netanyahu for war crimes”
An absolutely wild video from the time about this: [this video] If you've never seen "Your Job In Germany", bookmark and it and make sure you do at some point. It is pretty unreal. Of course, the counterpoint here is: the reason we worried about German terrorism but didn't see it is because we trained our forces with videos like this, and we were the nice guys about it compared to the Soviets.
Recommends Animats · 2021-08 · Hacker News · on “Historian suspended by Facebook after sharing document by Goebbels”
"Goebbels had thus demanded all German soldiers, having stayed in Paris for six months, be transferred to the Eastern Front to negate any “adverse” effects of billeting in the French capital." Corrupted by the enemy, always a problem with occupying forces. The American version of this is "Your Job in Germany".[1] This was made for US occupation troops in Germany. Directed by Frank Capra and written by Theodor Geisel ("Dr. Seuss"), an unexpected collaboration that seems to work. The message: "You are in an enemy country. Take no chances. No fraternization with any of the German people." It's become harder to view this video. The YouTube version, uploaded directly by the US National Archives [
Cites mx7zysuj4xew · 2026-11 · Hacker News · on “The U.S. Is Bullying Europe Like Never Before”
There is a reason why Europe was thoroughly disarmed and pacified [this video] Europeans are genocidal lunatics. There were incidents of ethnic cleansing as late as the early 2000s. Telling countries like germany to rearm is lunacy