[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 delivered daily to students on the 70th anniversary of original publication date. (Previously posted articles can be found by searching on keyword “realtime”.)
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.

[Homer_J_Simpson]

On the evening of Sunday, October 22, Propaganda Minister Goebbels personally took to the air - this writer well remembers the broadcast – and accused Churchill of having sunk the Athenia. The next day the official Nazi newspaper, the Voelkischer Beobachter, ran a front-page story under the headline CHURCHILL SANK THE “ATHENIA” and stating that the First Lord of the Admiralty had planted a time bomb in the ship’s hold. At Nuremberg it was established that the Fuehrer had personally ordered the broadcast and the article – and also that though Raeder, Doenitz and Weizsaecker were highly displeased at such a brazen lie, they dared not do anything about it.

William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich

[Genoa]

Bush’s fault.

[abb]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Edinburgh_(16)

Edinburgh was launched on 31 March 1938, and was immediately attached to the 18th Cruiser Squadron at Scapa Flow, in Scotland, as part of the British Home Fleet. For a time, she was assigned to patrol between Iceland and the Faroe Islands, but in 1939, she was transferred to the 2nd Cruiser Squadron, serving with the Humber Force.

However, Edinburgh was still in the Firth of Forth when the Luftwaffe made their first raid on the naval bases at Rosyth on 16 October 1939. She sustained minor damage from the attack, but no direct hits.

[KarlInOhio]

The "Freedom of the Press" cartoon on page 12 is just as valid today with the swastikas replaced by Obama O's.

[GeronL]

I guess the phoney war could also have been called “Pre-game warm-ups or practice”.

[BroJoeK]

Three excellent quotes:

PROBLEM: "The war will come to an end some day, and those of us who are realistic know that in its wake the world will face a refugee problem of different character and of infinitely greater magnitude." -- President Roosevelt

UNINVOLVED: "Conscious of the duties proper to our office as supreme pastor, we will not, without its being requested of us, let our action, always directed toward the salvation of souls, become involved in purely temporal controversies of territorial competitions between States." -- Pope Pius XII

SAVAGERY: "This bombing from the air and use of poison gas on civilians means that the world has gone back to savagery." -- Herbert Hoover

History's judgment is that both President and Pope were too naive. Hoover, probably without realizing it, was eerily prescient.