Are Hogan and Klink Really Enemies?

I love Hogan’s Heroes, not because I’m intrigued by the absurd premise of a sitcom set in a POW camp in Nazi Germany, not because I’m fascinated watching Hogan, LeBeau, Newkirk, Carter, and Kinchloe mastermind preposterous underground activities to sabotage the Third Reich from within the barbed wire fence of Stalag 13, and not because I’m astonished by the blatant similarities between Hogan’s Heroes and the 1953 movie Stalag 17, starring William Holden (which also featured a buffoonish and rotund Sergeant Schultz).

Sure, I’m amazed that Hogan’s Heroes portrays life in a German POW camp as cushy compared with a brutally hellish concentration camp.

I’m equally awed to see Nazis portrayed as bumbling idiots when in actuality they were highly intelligent and compulsively systematic genocidal butchers.

And I’m overwhelmed by the ridiculous number of fugitives who escape from Germany via Hogan’s extensive network of tunnels and his radio contact with London.

I’m also astounded by how many Jews starred in the show: