Talk:Erich Raeder

Untitled
Why was Karl Dönitz taken out as successor of Erich Raeder? Why would Erich Raeder be the last Großadmiral. As I see it, Karl Dönitz took that office in 1943. GeneralPatton? --BigBen212 06:11, 4 Jun 2004 (UTC)
 * You are right, the bit about Raeder being the last Großadmiral was here before I started improving the article and keeping it was an oversight on my part. --GeneralPatton 03:01, 5 Jun 2004 (UTC)
 * Ok, thanks. I didn't want to change it without making sure first.--BigBen212 21:57, 5 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Navy titles
The Reichsmarine link is being redirected to "German Navy", but the German Navy it is taking about is the present day German Navy of the Federal Republic of Germany, the Deuthsche Marine (1990-present), not the Weimar Republic's navy. The Vorläufige Reichsmarine was a distinct phase of the German Naval history (1919-1935) as the Imperial Navy, the Kaiserliche Marine (1871-1918) and the Navy of the Third Reich, the Kriegsmarine (1935-1945). Having Reichsmaine in red type indicates that an article needs to be written about it. Someone needs to write about the Vorläufige Reichsmarine in its own right (perhaps me). Redirecting the link to the present day German Navy is misleading. Hunter2005 06:48, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

The Bundesmarine is the latest incarnation of the Germany Navy - the Reichsmarine preceded it. That is not incorrect. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.18.71.108 (talk) 16:50, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

Raeder's Grand Strategy for Victory
I removed a considerable segment that dealt with a "critical" view of this strategy. A full-fledged overview of his plan would sure be great (including verifiable criticism), but that might be more suitable in a new article. As it stands, I feel the criticism isn't neutral and might even constitute original research. If it is to be reverted, it should be rewritten with less of a slant. Additionally, there needs to be more background information concerning this military plan, as it feels a bit "thrown out" in the article. It looks like there's a good bit of information on the German Wikipedia that could be incorporated, but I don't feel comfortable enough doing this. By the way, is this the guy whose sentencing was opposed by several U.S. military officials? Nezbie 17:26, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

I wrote the segment dealing with a criticism of this strategy. None of it is original work -- many of the supply constraints faced by Erwin Rommel, along with the General Staff's views on the supplies necessary to take the Suez Canal are available in the work cited below (Rommel's War in Africa) ("This motor transport requirement unacceptable!", as well as an assessment that major obstacles could not be traversed if opposed), and are well known. It is also a well known fact that the USSR did not crumble and surrender immediately in the face of German troops right outside Moscow,  While the rest of the article is sound, the section of the 'Grand Strategy for Victory', to me, feels slanted heavily in an ahistorical direction -- we know that historically Rommel was defeated in Africa, while any grand hand-waving plans for German victory clearly never occured. We know that the United States constructed the B-29 specifically to deliver payloads to Europe. We know that the United States developed the atomic bomb. We know that Japan never invaded India. We know that the United States fought a two front war against Germany and Japan. We do NOT know that any of the claims made by this strategy would have held true. None of these facts are 'original scholarship'. As it stands, this article presents this strategy as the alternate which could have won the war when this claim is clearly extremely tenuous. Either this strategy should be removed, or criticism permitted.

DingoWallaby 18:40, 24 April 2006 (UTC)


 * First off, I'm not against the criticism or its presence in a section detailing Raeder's plan. But that's one of the problems: we're dealing with a segment that dwarfs the rest of the article. The entire segment detailing his strategy, including criticism, would probably be better off in a more aptly named new article, which would then be linked from this one. I believe a more suitable approach would be similar to that of Alfred Graf von Schlieffen vs. Schlieffen Plan. I agree that the previous iteration of the article was misleading in presenting the strategy as a means through which Germany could have won the war, but presenting the plan of someone of historical significance, no matter how flawed, cannot really be viewed as being biased (the wording and presentation on the other hand, were indeed rather slanted). Even if history did prove some of his reasoning to be flawed, omitting unrealistic aspects of this strategy would be a travesty. My previous action may have been a bit out of step, but several comments and wording issues led to my decision (and my non-neutral/original research objection):
 * -"Unfortunatly for Nazi Germany, Hitler didn't agree with Raeder's plan and Hitler embarked on a course that would result in Germany's defeat in World War II."
 * -"with respect to the British and Australian troops in southeast Asia, the defeat of the Imperial Japanese Navy was largely an American affair"
 * -"Far more likely, Stalin, realizing that Hitler has moved a large portion of the German Army south, declares that everybody in the first Soviet tank to enter Berlin will become a Hero of the Soviet Union."
 * In any case, if you do decide to start out a new article detailing Raeder's strategy and relevant criticism, I'd gladly help out. Nezbie 20:02, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

The statement beginning "Unfortunatly (sic)" ... was not mine but that of whomever added the bit about Raeder's strategy. The bit also used to be prefaced with a statement like, 'This strategy would have guaranteed Hitler's victory' or something along those lines. Further, I do not believe that this is even an accurate summation of Raeder's Mediterranean strategy; this is an offshoot of the foreward to the book "How Hitler Could Have Won World War II", except even more slanted towards some sort of theory of inevitable Nazi victory. You are correct in that this article is not the correct place to discuss this 'strategy', but I believe that if Raeder's Mediterranean strategy is to be presented (in this article or somewhere else) it needs to be written from a more neutral viewpoint and/or presented with a criticism.

DingoWallaby 23:01, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, Raedar's whole view of WWII was that it was a horribly premature gamble on the part of Hitler and the Nazis and that it left the Kreigsmarine with nothing to do "but die gallantly". It's not that he gave up, but he certainly wasn't a megalomaniac proposing inevitable world-conquest. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.254.246.251 (talk) 13:07, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Resignation/demotion
This article states that Raeder was "demoted" to Admiral Inspector in January 1943, and that he "resigned and retired" in May 1943. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Raeder remained at the rank of Großadmiral through the end of the war, i.e. he was never demoted.

I'm also under the impression that he resigned as Commander-in-Chief in January 1943 (not forcibly removed) and that he held the post of Admiral Inspector also through the end of the war (did not resign in May '43). Admiral Inspector as I understand it was entirely an honorary position and created especially for him upon his retirement.

24.21.178.83 02:25, 4 May 2006 (UTC) He resigned. Paradoxically, it was the only way he get Hitler to listen to him about not scrapping the surface fleet. Hitler didn't want him gone and is supposed to have asked him to reconsider. I don't believe there was ever any "demotion".

It says in the article about Spandau Prision that Raeder Hated Doenitz after he took the position as Grand Admiral and Commander in Chief of the Navy, but didn't Raeder Recommend Doenitz as his Replacement?

Raeder or Not?!
The picture really does not look like Raeder at all. It should be removed...

"Admiral Raeder together with Hitler. The officer pictured with Hitler is not Raeder, but a Naval captain."

So, the officer pictured with Hitler is both Raeder and not Raeder? If it is Raeder, why talk about a Captain, if it isn't Raeder, why is it on the Raeder page?!

Edit: From the picture it looks to be Raeder, but I'm no expert and I didnt put the picture up.

--81.151.163.142 00:25, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

I'll admit he looks like Raeder, but he can't be – the sleeve indicates the rank of Kapitän and Raeder held higher rank long before Hitler came to power.

If no one objects, let's remove this image, as it has no business on Raeder's page.

Alkari 00:54, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

I have removed the image. Alkari 09:20, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Dare I say it it but, this is one of those guys who looks totally different without his hat. With the admirals cap, this guy looks aquiline, well-meaning, and a bit ineffectual. Without it he looks like a dockyard brawler who'll kill you for your lunch money. I submit that both sides be entered into the images. Insert non-formatted text here

Pronunciation
I once thought that Raeder was a English rendering of Räder, but I saw on the German Wikipedia that the spelling is actually Raeder. I wonder now what the pronunciation is: is it like Räder or like Rahder? Cases of a "e" working as a prolonger after an A are rare, but so is the "ae" spelling. 78.53.207.46 (talk) 17:51, 10 July 2009 (UTC)


 * The letter "e" after a back vowel ("a", "o", or "u") is not merely an English way of rendering the umlaut. It was actually the original German way of showing that a back vowel is to be "frontalised".  What we know as the umlaut represents the final development in an evolution of printers' abbreviations:  To save line and character space, printers began rendering the postvocalic "e" as a small letter (in size comparable to or slightly smaller than modern superscript or subscript) placed directly above the vowel.  This small "e" above the vowel was further abbreviated to the two dots we know as the modern umlaut.  Many German families and/or individuals retained the older orthography when spelling their surname; this is another example of how proper names represent "frozen forms" that are more resistant to linguistic and orthographic change than are other words.  165.176.7.3 (talk) 15:44, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Size split?
Support - Article is over 250 kB and thus its sections should be split out. Thoughts?--Jax 0677 (talk) 03:52, 7 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Support The article is way too long for the reader.--Georgethewriter (talk) 23:48, 3 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Support This article is absolutely overwhelmingly long. However, it cannot be dealt with using the chainsaw approach. At this level we need a readable article that summarises Raeder's life. Perhaps aim for about 50k length. The contents of this article can then be split out into detailed articles for those who need it. Op47 (talk) 17:30, 2 March 2013 (UTC)


 *  Reply  - I will leave the tags in place until the article is dramatically shortened. --Jax 0677 (talk) 23:20, 3 March 2013 (UTC)


 * It should be trimmed, first of all, before one can consider splitting. Drmies (talk) 20:22, 18 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Well, it is worth noting that the article on Hitler is 150k long and this one is 275k. Kinda disproportionate.  OGBranniff (talk) 22:56, 18 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Comment A big chunk of this article's size lies in its 400+ inline citations. Most of them are formatted with too much information. For example, cite #237 ("Weinberg, Gerhard A World in Arms, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005 page 175.") could be shortened to simply "Weinberg 175." Paper Luigi  T • C 08:06, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

Copying and pasting copyright violations
This article is too long, according to the template message.

I want to know how an article could become as long as this one without substantial copying from other sources and quite likely copyright violations. PatrickDunfordNZ (talk) 23:50, 17 October 2013 (UTC)

WWII Section
IMHO, the WWII section is far too critical of Raeder, and very poorly written (not to mention uncited). I know it's just a quick reference to the extended article on it, but everything written so far is very condemning of him. Not to mention whomever the armchair general is that wrote it seems to think he has more strategic know-how than Sun Tzu. I am rewriting it now.

--166.62.191.40 (talk) 01:22, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Fellgiebel
Re this revert, what is the purpose of keeping the Fellgiebel source in the article? K.e.coffman (talk) 20:14, 4 January 2017 (UTC)


 * per BRD, please advise. K.e.coffman (talk) 23:04, 5 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Please explain why it should be removed. You appear to be strafing through these kinds of articles implementing a style guide of your own, dismissing prose, removing external links, destroying references, and yet there's no actual consensus to do any of it.  You'll note that your changes to the lists have been removed and rightly so.  Please stop taking it upon yourself to degrade the quality of articles.  Thanks!  The Rambling Man (talk) 23:10, 5 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Sure, I'd be happy to elaborate. The reason that I removed Fellgiebel was
 * WP:Citation overkill, which I first became via this discussion at the Manstein article (diff): Is there actually a dire need to have these citations in the article at all?, in re: this addition to the article. Seemen, Fellgiebel were subsequently removed from the article, due to "excessive citations": diff 1 & diff 2. This is a GA article.
 * Citation overkill is an essay and generally appears to the citing of the bleeding obvious. I.e. it's purely optional and in any case, doesn't apply here.  Whether or not you've decided that it's best to remove this, I have decided otherwise, and as such it needs a bigger debate if you continue to object.  Whether or not it's a GA is of no relevance.  The Rambling Man (talk) 19:42, 8 January 2017 (UTC)
 * The article List of Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross recipients (A) states that "For many years Fellgiebel's book was considered the main reference work on this topic, and it has now been superseded by Scherzer's work".
 * That an article states that a source has been "superseded" is in no way an excuse to excise the former reference, in fact it's a good reason to keep it as far as a detailed and electric encyclopedia. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:42, 8 January 2017 (UTC)


 * So I don't believe I'm alone in not seeing the need for multiple citations in case of material that's unlikely to be challenged, especially if one of the sources is dated / non-independent of the topic and has been superseded by another source.
 * Given the above, how does the presence of Fellgiebel enhance the article? K.e.coffman (talk) 22:45, 6 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Given the above, how does the excision of Fallgiebel enhance the article? The Rambling Man (talk) 19:42, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

About the Third Opinion request: The 3O request made in regard to this dispute has been removed (i.e. declined). Like all other moderated content dispute resolution venues at Wikipedia, 3O requires thorough talk page discussion before seeking assistance. If an editor will not discuss, consider the recommendations which are made here. — TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 17:03, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

"two types of "politics": parteipolitisch and staatspolitisch "
"The military argued that there were two types of "politics": parteipolitisch (party politics) which was the responsibility of the politicians, and staatspolitisch (state politics) which was the responsibility of the military"

"politisch" means "political" (adjective). "Politics" (noun) is "Politik", so Parteipolitik, Staatspolitik - capitalized, since they are nouns. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.179.243.243 (talk) 18:23, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

Merge proposal
I propose merging the clumsy and unnecessary article: Erich Raeder resignation and later into this article. The subject's resignation is not important enough to warrant its own article Billsmith60 (talk) 22:59, 9 December 2023 (UTC)


 * Also, the hacksaw approach supported in 2014 – simply chopping the article into smaller parts – does not solve any questions of size. Rather, it reinforces the need for the article to undergo a nut-and-bolt revision to make it both readable and manageable, if it is still too long Billsmith60 (talk) 23:15, 9 December 2023 (UTC)


 * support, it does not make sense to split the article down the middle like this, leaving out much relevant content from the main bio article. -- I see it's been a while; hopefully, someone would undertake the work. --K.e.coffman (talk) 10:44, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
 * At least two subarticles - whose titles I've normalized - should be joined together: Pre-World War II career of Erich Raeder, Interwar naval service of Erich Raeder. The same applies to Erich Raeder during World War II and Resignation and post-war life of Erich Raeder. Merging all four would make the main article too large, but WP:SS should be applied to condense the main points into the main article.  Sandstein   21:00, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Oppose merge as we all seem agreed that the articles are WP:TOOLONG to be merged; until it can be demonstrated that shorter articles are sufficient, then a merge is impractical. Klbrain (talk) 19:54, 22 June 2024 (UTC)