One-stop shopping for discussion of WWII’s origins, the fighting, the people, the technology, and its lasting effects.
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The last survivor of the Arizona died two days ago. We’re fast approaching a Harry Patch moment in our history, and the world will be a far different place when that happens.
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Between 1942 and 1945, the number of newspapers published by and for American servicemen exploded from less than 500 to nearly 4,000. Two of them belonged to the only all-Black divisions to see combat during the war, and one would quickly establish a reputation as one of the finest service publications in the US military.
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Seems like an understandably complicated reception…
April 13 was the The Day of Remembrance for Victims of Katyn Massacre, commemorating the Soviet NKVD massacre of 22,000 Polish officers and intellectuals, at Stalin’s behest.
I’m sure Putin sent his thoughts & prayers.
79 years ago, the Battle of Berlin was reaching its crescendo, with Weidling taking command of German forces in the city and Schörner’s offensive failing to the north. Konev and Zhukov were racing each other for the prize of Berlin, spending their soldiers’ lives with little more concern than they were giving to those of the Germans.
There would be no repeat of the Miracle of the House of Brandenburg, and the carnage was unimaginable: nearly 100k Soviets and 250k Germans killed, hundreds of thousands wounded, millions raped, and utter devastation of what had been the most sophisticated and modern European capital.
Happy April 30th to all who celebrate.
A strong recommend to Richard Evans’ book on the conspiracy theories surrounding Hitler’s death (and several other enduring conspiracies associated with the Nazis) that debunks the poor history surrounding the myths and the reason for their propagation.
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Popular response to the Gaza protests has had me thinking of the moral and physical courage of the White Rose, and what people like Alexander Schmorell, Hans and Sophie Scholl, Kurt Huber, Willi Graf, Christoph Probst, and Alexander Schmorell knew they were facing. And they acted anyway.
It gets more stunning as time passes, not less.
https://www.weisse-rose-stiftung.de/white-rose-resistance-group/
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80 years ago Keith Douglas was preparing to invade France with the Sherwood Rangers Yoemanry after having fought and being wounded in North Africa. Having gone AWOL from his position in the rear to join the front lines as a tank commander, he wrote “My batman was delighted with this manoeuvre. ‘I like you, sir,’ he said. ‘You’re shit or bust, you are.’ This praise gratified me a lot.”
He died under mortar fire outside Audrieu on June 9th, 1944, dismounted from his tank and scouting ahead. His memoir Alamein to Zem Zem was published in 1946.
He wrote Aristocrats: 'I Think I Am Becoming a God in Tunisia in 1943:
The noble horse with courage in his eye,
clean in the bone, looks up at a shellburst:
away fly the images of the shires
but he puts the pipe back in his mouth.
Peter was unfortunately killed by an 88;
it took his leg away, he died in the ambulance.
I saw him crawling on the sand, he said
It’s most unfair, they’ve shot my foot off.
How can I live among this gentle
obsolescent breed of heroes, and not weep?
Unicorns, almost,
for they are fading into two legends
in which their stupidity and chivalry
are celebrated. Each, fool and hero, will be
an immortal.
These plains were their cricket pitch
and in the mountains the tremendous drop fences
brought down some of the runners. Here then
under the stones and earth they dispose themselves,
I think with their famous unconcern.
It is not gunfire I hear, but a hunting horn.
80 years later, and it’s still such a vast undertaking that it’s difficult if not impossible to get one’s head around.
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Operation Blau launched June 28, reminding everyone in short order that the horrors of the Eastern Front were just getting started in 1941. A disaster from conception to execution, its fumbling only exceeded by its destruction.
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That’s really interesting stuff. I just learned about the Smoking Snakes in Italy this year, too!
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Brazil and Mexico were the only Latin American Nations to send fighters abroad to fight the Axis Powers. But Brazil was the only one to send troops to fight on ground.
I remember watching a documentary on TV some years ago with a scene that really moved me. The director of this film went to a residential project where many war veterans lived. He sought interviews with these men. Suddenly this man appears, very excited, carrying a large colorized portrait of a man with a thin mustache as was fashionable in the 1940s. He starts talking about his life and when the director asks if the man in the photo was him when he was younger, he declares that it was not him, but his brother. The director smiles and then asks to speak to his brother. The man changes his expression and, crying, explains that it will be impossible, as his brother was left behind on some mountain in Italy.
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[Photographer Robert Capa: Debunking the myth – DW – 09/08/2020]
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Been thinking about this lately for some reason.
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ETA
https://pastwrongsfuturechoices.com/
Make history. As a research community, we are dedicated to supporting new scholarly and creative perspectives on the mistreatment of civilians of Japanese descent during the 1940s, the history that led to that point, and the legacies that followed after.
Create exhibitions. Contemporary art and new historical interpretations will tell powerful histories of Nikkei people in museums and galleries, and provide opportunities to create platforms for exploring broader historical and current social justice issues.
Build archives. Our digital archives will draw together records of the Japanese diaspora, while community sessions will support localities to preserve, learn, and teach their own histories.
Teach teachers. New resources and intensive training will enable teachers to explore the experiences of people of Japanese descent as a case of global racism, with broad relevance and application for curricula relating to citizenship and intercultural understandings.
Produce movies. Documentary film will bring this history to life, integrating global and local stories and connecting Nikkei experiences with those of other descendants of injustice.
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