[Homer_J_Simpson]

Free Republic University, Department of History presents World War II Plus 70 Years: Seminar and Discussion Forum
First session: September 1, 2009. Last date to add: September 2, 2015.
Reading assignment: New York Times articles and the occasional radio broadcast delivered daily to students on the 70th anniversary of original publication date. (Previously posted articles can be found by searching on keyword “realtime” Or view Homer’s posting history .)
To add this class to or drop it from your schedule notify Admissions and Records (Attn: Homer_J_Simpson) by freepmail. Those on the Realtime +/- 70 Years ping list are automatically enrolled. Course description, prerequisites and tuition information is available at the bottom of Homer’s profile. Also visit our general discussion thread.

[Homer_J_Simpson]

Selections from West Point Atlas for the Second World War
Eastern Europe, 1941: Russian Leningrad and Ukraine Offensives – Operations, 2 December 1943-30 April 1944
Allied Advance to Volturno River, Reorganization, and Attack on Gustav Line (17 January-11 May 1944)
India-Burma, 1942: Allied Lines of Communication, 1942-1943
New Guinea and Alamo Force Operations: Clearing the Huon Peninsula and Securing the Straits, 19 September 1943-26 April 1944
Cartwheel, the Seizure of the Gilberts and Marshalls, and Concurrent Air and Naval Operations, 30 June 1943-26 April 1944
The Far East and the Pacific, 1941: Original Allied Strategic Concept, May 1943; Situation in Pacific, 1 November 1943

[skeeter]

On the Belfast today there's a large placard on display with the signatures of the 36 Sharnhorst survivors.

Apparently upon fishing them out of the water Belfast's crew had asked for their autographs.

[BroJoeK]

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December 27, 1943:

• December 25: "Trucks carrying naked Jewish women make regular trips to the gas chamber at Auschwitz-Birkenau.
  Any woman who leaps from a truck is immediately shot down.

• "Late 1943: SS chief Heinrich Himmler orders that the extermination camp at Belzec be razed, as has been done at the Sobibór and Treblinka death camps.
  At all three camps, the land is to be plowed under and settled by Ukrainians."

"The Ninth Fort was a prison and killing site in Kovno, Lithuania, where at least 9000 Jews were murdered by Germans and Lithuanians in October 1941.
This young Jewish man, Abe Diskont, was one of 64 prisoners who escaped from the Ninth Fort on Christmas Eve, 1943.
He later joined partisans and died in battle against the Germans in 1944."

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[SamAdams76]

This is what the Scharnhorst looks like today...upside down under a thousand feet of seawater.