[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” 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
German Invasion of Russia – Operations, 22 June-25 August 1941
The Mediterranean Basin
The Far East and the Pacific, 1941 – The Imperial Powers, 1 September 1939

[BroJoeK]

August 24

"British Prime Minister Winston Churchill broadcasts to the British public that “scores of thousands” of executions of civilians are being perpetrated by German troops in the Soviet Union.
In order not to reveal that British Intelligence has cracked the German radio code, Churchill makes no specific mention of the plight of Jews in the Soviet Union or elsewhere in Occupied Europe.

"Eighty-six-year-old Dr. Jacob Wigodsky, longtime leader of the Jews of Vilna, Lithuania, is arrested and imprisoned.
He will be executed a week later at Ponary, Lithuania.

"Cloth circles with "J" for Jew at the center identify these women walking on a Lithuanian street.
This symbol marked Jews for vilification and abuse as they struggled to buy the basics of life for their families.
Life soon took a more ominous turn as Einsatzkommando forces (mobile killing units) began to exterminate Lithuania's Jews.
Nearly 180,000 of Lithuania's 220,000 Jews were killed by the end of 1941."

"Estonian police march Jewish men to internment or, more probably, to their deaths.
Because of the high rate of antisemitism in the Baltic countries (Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia), the Germans could find large numbers of native people willing to assist with the extermination of the Jews.
Most of the Estonian Jews (5,000 as of 1933) escaped into the Soviet Union because Estonia was the last Baltic country to be conquered by Germany."

[jjm2111]

It’s amazing to read the newspaper analysis and compare it with the analysis from a few weeks ago. I think there definitely was some surprise about the Russians holding their own.

[dfwgator]

Leningrad in Terrible Peril

They have no idea.

[CougarGA7]

My schedule will be a bit chaotic for the next few weeks, but better late than never.

First I have this broadcast by Winston Churchill on the meeting between him and FDR

BBC Winston Churchill - Meeting With President Roosevelt

Next I have my usual notes with the second quote by Churchill being of particular interest I think.

• "This is the seventh or eighth time in this campaign that the army group has succeeded in encircling the enemy. But I'm not really happy about it, because the objective to which I have devoted all my thought, the destruction of the enemy armies, has been dropped. [P]erhaps we will overrun the Russians in from of my northern wing and thus get things going to the point that at least pressure on my eastern front is relieved...If, after all the successes, the campaign in the east now trickles away in dismal defensive fighting for my army group, it is not my fault" - Field Marshall Bock

• "Whole districts are being exterminated. Scores of thousands - literally scores of thousands - of executions in cold blood are being perpetrated by the German police-troops...We are in the presence of a crime without a name." - Winston Churchill