MovieChat Forums > The Great Escape (1963) Discussion > Why Escape? Their conditions weren't tha...

Why Escape? Their conditions weren't that bad!

posted 7 years ago by VidaBoheme
37 replies | jump to latest

I understand that no one wants to be kept as a POW, but the German Commander made it pretty clear that they basically wanted to coexist peacefully until the end of the war. Granted, none of them could predict that the war would end in a year, so maybe they felt that they would be trapped in the camp for too long? But I saw no mistreatment from the guards, short of killing a guy for climbing the fence. In retrospect, they should have all stayed put for another year, and all of them (most likely) would have stayed alive.

[–] Anotherday (8611) 4 years ago

Three reasons:

1. A Soldier's duty is to escape if possible
2. The enemy will waste more money, time, and manpower trying to keep POW's locked up and that takes enemies off the fro t line.
3. If an escape succeeds, the information can be used to take out an enemy stronghold and free other soldiers.

Bonus: as good as it looked in the film, it was still pretty desperate. Sergeant Major of the Arm, William G. Bainbridge was captired by German troops in 1944. He and his men were put into one of those camps for a couple months. He lost 60lbs. He wasn't an officer, but POW camps are no laughing joke.

Extra bonus: my great uncle was sent to Mauthausen for 6 months about three years after the germans annexed Austria. He lost about 80lbs in that time. The only reason he didn't die in Mauthausen was because the Germans took prisoners and put them in the Russian front. He died within 3 months. We still have no record of why he was arrested. Those documents were burned when the Allies were closing in on Lintz.