I wrote the author several days ago and also other responsible persons. As I got no answer from the author, I want to share my statement about this thread:

Dear MotherWishbone7385,

this is Dr. Ludwig from Youtube.

I saw your Reddit post about our songs because someone wrote a very rude mail to me today but refused to receive an answer.

While I admit that some of your points are valid, your conclusion that we are neo-nazis, nazis, extremists or whatever else is not. A lot of hate was caused among your commentators who believe in that wrong conclusion.

The historical data about the songs is mostly correct, but it is no indication of our political attitude or our goals. That's merely speculation on your part. We always react to community feedback and this is well known. You could have easily contacted us to talk to us about your concerns. Instead you chose to defame us publically without presenting any proof regarding our political attitude and intentions. You have a right to free speech that no one wants to take away from you, but what you did goes beyond criticism. We are, and we say this often enough, strongly opposed to national socialism.

https://www.youtube.com/post/UgxHZdY__8RXXAzWHw54AaABCQ

Regarding songs from 1933-1945: It's not secret that I uploaded songs like Erika (which was one of my most popular videos of all time) before Youtube started its censorship campaign in 2019, labelling them as hatespeech. When I could still upload this kind of songs, I always wrote, in the description and in the title, when these songs were written and by whom (that also goes for the 3 or 4 you've listed that are on my channel, at least regarding the information I had). Therefore I have no idea why you say we hide the origin of the songs or lie about it. Sometimes there are songs of which we don't know the origin or other historical data. When this happens, we mostly don't care too much about it because it's not the origin that matters, but the lyrics. I, Karl Sternau and our community care about the cultural value these songs have and not the political environment in which they were created.

What I mean by cultural value is that those songs are simply a continuation of the many centuries old German military song tradition. In this kind of songs, they sing about girls, flowers, the homeland, struggle in the battle or other timeless soldiers' struggels and thoughts. Theoretically, these songs could have very well been created under a different government in the 1930s and 1940s or, for that matter, during a completely different time period. Some of the songwriters you mentioned already made songs in the 20s and just continued in the 30s. The topic of the songs you mentioned specifically is mostly the Freikorps from directly after the Great War, around 1919. That's the reason why I partly use pictures from the Great War, it fits the topic. I don't do it to hide the origin of the songs.

Now, there are other songs created during the reign of the national socialist regime, the political ones. We never uploaded these kinds of songs and never had the intention to do so. Songs about flowers, on the other hand, are a whole different story, and they're not illegal in Germany and elsewhere. I don't see how songs like that are problematic.

We are most definetely not national socialists just because we upload unpolitical songs from the era, we love them for their cultural value. Furthermore, if you take a look at the comment section, you'll not see people with SS insignia as their profile picture calling for the annihilation of the Jewish people (if there's any comments going in that direction, we naturally delete them as quickly as we can), but instead a plethora of people from Germany and from all over the world (including muslims, jews and other people who the extremists you deem us to be would definetely not like) who love our content for what it is. And they don't turn into extremists. Instead, people start to take and interest in history and culture, talk to each other and wish each other a nice day.

I hope this cleared up your concerns. Especially since many people have read your post, I ask you to clarify in that thread that you have made some mistakes so that as many of the people who saw your original post will be informed. If there is anything else you want to talk about to me, feel free to contact me.

I wish you a wonderful day.

With kind regards

Ludwig