Nazi POW during WWII in rural America are said to have been given a great life such as somewhat free access to roam, and in some cases even were taken in by families as helpful labor.

They also worked jobs on nearby farms. ‘If it hadn’t been for the POWs, a lot of the crops would have rotted in the fields,’ May said. William Barnes remembers as a young boy, working alongside POWs near Ottawa. ‘And you never worried about your own safety?’ KMBC’s Kris Ketz asked Barnes. ‘Oh, no. No, and it never occurred to me or my parents either. They were just very nice people. They were very happy,’ Barnes said. […] ‘I think there was just, they could see that they were of European origins and had much more seemingly in common with people out here,’ said Virgil Dean, a Kansas historian. It was a complicated time but at least here, a world at war finally ended with enemies no longer. …your best allies,’ May said.

Nazis as “best allies” of America, and this was during WWII?

Rural Americans hated the Japanese. There is no way this would have been the same story given the racism of America. Yet somehow Nazis were described as “best” and “seemingly in common” because they all shared their “European origins”.

Notice the problem?

Let me make an even finer point. American farmers of Japanese heritage, dedicated hard-working loyal Americans, were put into concentration camps by California (in a campaign led by racist Agriculture industry that intended to unfairly advantage white farmers) at the same time Nazi German soldiers were sent to farms in America to save “a lot of the crops”. Completely backwards and illogical.

Now you might say soldiers in the Nazi military were just regular guys who didn’t believe in Nazism, to which I’ll point you back to why this wouldn’t work for Japanese POW. There is more to this story than just whether or not a POW is a nice guy.

When people ask why resistance cells didn’t seem to rise up and continue to attack American soldiers after WWII, consider for a minute whether the defeated Nazis were instead seen as being on the same side and taken in as allies instead of enemies.

In other words, look at how America’s sudden rise of pro-Nazism after 1948 (e.g. Dixiecrats, rejection of civil rights) manifested in Confederate flags suddenly waving again after being completely obscure/ignored before WWII.