Friday, Jul 24, 2026 The claims desk. Receipts included. POWERED BY LENZ ↗
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HISTORY

The Claim

A photograph of Werner Goldberg appeared in the newspaper Berliner Tageblatt with the caption "Der ideale deutsche Soldat" ("The ideal German soldier").

Verified by Lenz ·

The Short Version

The evidence supports that Werner Goldberg’s photograph was published in Berliner Tageblatt with the caption “Der ideale deutsche Soldat.” The strongest support comes from archival and major historical reference sources. Some later retellings appear to misstate the date, but that does not materially change the core fact of the publication and caption.

Caveats

  • Some secondary accounts give a late-1939 or post-Poland timeline that conflicts with Berliner Tageblatt’s publication history.
  • A few retellings may blur Berliner Tageblatt with similarly named publications, so date-and-edition precision remains imperfect.
  • Low-quality online summaries often repeat the story without citing the original newspaper issue.

The Receipts

  1. Werner Goldberg – ‘Der ideale deutsche Soldat’

    Bundesarchiv

  2. Mischlinge (Mixed Blood) in Nazi Germany

    United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

  3. Nazi propaganda

    Encyclopaedia Britannica

  4. Werner Goldberg | German soldier

    Encyclopedia Britannica

  5. Mischlinge in the Wehrmacht: Jewish soldiers in Hitler's army

    Journal of Genocide Research (Taylor & Francis)

  6. Ein Jude war das Idealbild des deutschen Soldaten

    Der Spiegel

  7. The face of the Nazi army was that of a Jew

    Haaretz

  8. Werner Goldberg

    Jewish Virtual Library

  9. How a half-Jewish soldier became a Nazi poster boy

    The Times of Israel

  10. The Nazi poster boy who was half-Jewish

    Haaretz

+ 9 more sources — see the full list on Lenz

Filed Under

Berliner TageblattWerner Goldberg