World War II and the fog of history

ANNIVERSARIES always bring forth memories, some of them dark and conflicting, and this 60th year since the end of World War II demonstrates that there is no agreed-upon narrative of the 20th century's epic conflagration. We have seen China's violent demonstrations against Japan's teaching of its war history. Even though Japan has apologized many times for its war crimes, it cannot resist whitewashing its World War II past. Contradictory narratives run all through Europe as well. President Bush skillfully navigated the tricky shoals of Russia's commemoration of the ''Great Patriotic War" against Hitler, and the sensibilities of the Baltic States for whom 1945 merely substituted Russian tyranny for that of the Nazis. The European Commission said that the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, rather than the fall of the Nazis, marked the true ''end of dictatorship" in Europe, and the Financial Times editorialized: ''Russia also needs to acknowledge the Soviet Union's role in collaborating with Hitler in occupying Eastern Europe in 1939-1940 and in imposing its rule on the region in 1945." Russians find this astonishing. To most Russians, defeating Hitler was the greatest -- ''perhaps the only," quipped The Economist -- unquestionably good thing the Soviet Union did. Ronald Reagan called the Soviet Union ''The Evil Empire," but Vladimir Putin says today that its demise was the single greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century. Of all the Axis powers, Germany has done the most to own up to its Nazi past. Yet Germans are pointing out that they, too, were victims. Discussion of the mass deportations of Germans from other countries in the aftermath of the war, and the atrocities by Russians troops -- as many as 2 million German women were raped by Russian soldiers -- is only recently surfacing.

"Americans tend to think that Private Ryan and the Band of Brothers won the war against Hitler. Britons remember when they stood up to Hitler all alone. But with 27 million dead, more than all the Allies combined, most Russians would agree with Stalin's assessment that the British bought the time, the Americans put up the money, but the Russians paid the blood."

Very true. By the time we landed in France in 1944, the Soviets were already polishing off the bulk of the German Army in the east, leaving only a few underequipped, hopelessly outnumbered divisions to face the Western allies.

The real effect of D-Day was not to defeat the Germans, but to give the West a claim on the continent and stop the Soviets in East Europe, rather than at the Rhine or the Atlantic.

They put up a hell of a fight. I'm currently in the middle of reading the story of the 12-SS-Panzer division, which was a group of 17-18 year old kids thrown into Caen in the first days of the invasion. Facing total enemy air supremacy, and outnumbered 4 or 5 to 1, they kept Monty and the Canadians bottled up for months.

A big problem seems to have been Monty's inability to understand modern armored warfare. The author, who was the Divisional 1A at the time, noted that Monty used the tanks to support infantry assaults, where a German general would have broken out quickly by letting the armor have its head and using infantry to mop up in its wake.

Of course, Patton later corrected this failure of imagination, but by that time the front-line Panzer divisions were at 40-50% effectiveness, with no remaining heavy weapons to speak of.

"The real effect of D-Day was not to defeat the Germans, but to give the West a claim on the continent and stop the Soviets in East Europe."

You're saying this with the benefit of hindsight. Operation Overlord was intended to open a second front against a viable enemy. Something that Stalin and Molotov demanded since Germany had declared war on the US. The statement "the Soviets were already polishing off the bulk of the German Army in the east" is a boast propagated by Stalin himself to hide that fact that he froze when the Germans poured into the USSR.

The real reason why there were so many Russian KIA was because Stalin purged the military prior to the war that left the army leaderless. His "not a step back" doctrine that sent waves of untrained conscripts into a buzzsaw probably had something to do with it, too.

If we knew that the Germans were undermanned, underequipped, undertrained, etc., then why did we and our Allies go to lengths to dupe them (see: Operation Fortitude), subject our Army Air Corps and RAF crews to virtual suicide missions into the heart of Germany (see: Strategic Bombing Campaign), and take a gamble at an improbable operation (see: Operation Overlord) that could've collapsed our ENTIRE effort in the European theater?

Sure, some of the German units were reconstituted out of misfits and POWs, but most of them were battle-tested, crack units led by fanatics.

Do not undervalue the efforts of our WWII veterans.

Southeast Asians suffered horribly under the Japanese occupation, but many willingly joined the Japanese because they opposed their British, French, and Dutch colonial masters more. Indians are still unsure of whom to commemorate -- the heroic soldiers of the British Indian Army who fought and died opposing a Japanese invasion or the Indian National Army, made up mostly of Indian soldiers recruited in Japanese prison camps, who fought alongside the Japanese against their own countrymen because they believed the British were the real enemy.

This seems the most agregious example of attempted moral equivelance but the entire article is that. I am sure the facts are true but the frame of reference and the things not stated change history's meaning.

Since the Japanese were perhaps the most brutal of the Axis, with the Russians not far behind, and Japanese prison camps were things of horror, I suspect many who changed sides did so for that reason rather than any equal distaste for their "colonial masters".

True, hindsight is 20-20. And it does not denigrate the efforts of the brave American, British, Canadian, Australian, etc. soldiers in OVERLORD to say that they saved Europe from totalitarian domination. It is just that, in hindsight, they didn't save it from the totalitarians they thought they were fighting. Stalin may have asked for help, but D-Day coincided with the "Destruction of Army Group Center" campaign that gutted the German army clinging to Ukraine and opened the way into Poland and, eventually, Berlin. My argument is that D-day didn't so much get the Soviets to Berlin as much as it stopped them from going any further.

"some of the German units were reconstituted out of misfits and POWs, but most of them were battle-tested, crack units led by fanatics"

There were some very well-led, crack troops facing the allies. Of course, one side's fanatic is the others hero. Put Patton's speech into the mouth of Rommel, and you have a bloodthirsty Nazi spewing hate. Winners write the history.

Very true. By the time we landed in France in 1944, the Soviets were already polishing off the bulk of the German Army in the east, leaving only a few underequipped, hopelessly outnumbered divisions to face the Western allies.

That is certainly true from Stalin's point of view but it is far from the big picture. We equipped the Russian army so Stalin is correct about the money and it was Russian blood spilled in Russia along with much German blood, but had we not kept Japan busy and off his ass on his eastern front and German troops occupied on their western front far away from the Russians, things would have turned out quite differently.

There is a book titled The New Dealers' War, F.D.R. and the war within WWII, by Thomas Fleming, that proposes and well documents that the entire war effort was to save Stalin's butt and Communism along with it. The Communists within F.D.R.'s administration guided much of what we did and when.

A big problem seems to have been Monty's inability to understand modern armored warfare. The author, who was the Divisional 1A at the time, noted that Monty used the tanks to support infantry assaults, where a German general would have broken out quickly by letting the armor have its head and using infantry to mop up in its wake.

Monty's problem was he was a pompous blowhard who wouldn't move unless success was near guaranteed. He had to have superiority in every aspect plus additional support. He would then graciously accept the accolades of a victory that was preordained.

The statement "the Soviets were already polishing off the bulk of the German Army in the east" is a boast propagated by Stalin himself to hide that fact that he froze when the Germans poured into the USSR.

This was no boast. The German army was largely decimated in the east. About 65-80% of the German armed forces were in the east, depending on when you do the count. The Germans had already suffered about 3.5 million casualties in the east before the U.S. landed in Normandy. Within 60 days after D-day, the Germans lost another 800,000 casualties on the eastern front. (Look up 'Operation Bagration'.)

"This was no boast. The German army was largely decimated in the east."

I believe this is an issue of semantics, but it was, indeed, a boast, and you supported why Stalin could thump his chest before an awestruck British and American contingent, and why he could make demands to them.

"Within 60 days after D-day, the Germans lost another 800,000 casualties on the eastern front."

Okee dokee. We all agree that the Germans got hammered by the Soviets. Aside from his boasts, Stalin went into propaganda mode to protect his image. You'll agree that this is an easy thing to do once you start winning. Remember, the Soviets were on the brink of collapse themselves with the Germans knocking at the door of Moscow, and Stalin, himself, thought he'd be arrested for incompetence.

I have to wonder how much hindsight is involved in the memories of the German combatants. I've read a number of autobiographies of German officers who admit that by late 43-early 44 they knew they could not win the war, could barely hope to survive. Many of them claim that their motiviation was the hope that, in time, the Western allies would see Stalin and the Soviets as the real enemy and would join with them. Of course, that is what did happen once Hitler and Roosevelt were out of the picture.

Another common claim is that "unconditional surrender" was a mistake, that it encouraged even those who were sour on Naziism to keep up the fight to save the fatherland.

The real reason why there were so many Russian KIA was because Stalin purged the military prior to the war that left the army leaderless. His "not a step back" doctrine that sent waves of untrained conscripts into a buzzsaw probably had something to do with it, too.

In addition, the use of prison troops that charged the Germans with something like one rifle per 10 men inflated the kill ratio. They were expected to pick up weapons from dead Germans to fight with.

The number of Russians that died in WWII is staggering, but a major reason so many of them died was that their goverment considered them disposable and did not equip or train them.

"True, hindsight is 20-20. And it does not denigrate the efforts of the brave American, British, Canadian, Australian, etc. soldiers in OVERLORD to say that they saved Europe from totalitarian domination. It is just that, in hindsight, they didn't save it from the totalitarians they thought they were fighting. Stalin may have asked for help, but D-Day coincided with the "Destruction of Army Group Center" campaign that gutted the German army clinging to Ukraine and opened the way into Poland and, eventually, Berlin. My argument is that D-day didn't so much get the Soviets to Berlin as much as it stopped them from going any further."

Ah, the benefits of hindsight! Well, in hindsight the right thing to do for the western allies would have been to not stop in Berlin but to march onwards to Moscow. Not only would that have prevented eastern Europe from falling into the hands of the communist agressors (after all, Germany was NOT THE ONLY country that invaded Poland), but it would have saved the world a century of troubles (no Korean war, no Vietnam, no religious nuts [aka. "Freedom Fighters"] in Afghanistan and so on...).

But it's only afterwards that one knows what would have been the right thing to do ;-).

There is much truth to your comments. I think that the US Army's (and Navy and Air Corp) role in the defeat of the Wehrmacht was the greatest achievment in it's history, as the German Army was THE outstanding battlefield tactical fighting force of the war, even with the dead strategic hand of Adolph Hitler at it's controls. Never has any army (German) in history fought so well for so monstrous a cause.

In assesing our victory, we must acknowledge that we were tasked with confronting only 20% of that formidable German enemy in NW Europe. 8 of every 10 German soldiers who died in WWII were killed by the other hideous regime of the time, Stalin's Soviet Russia. Just think of our casualty lists had we had to face just another 25% of the German Army in the West. While we would not have been has inhumanly profligate as the Soviets were in expending human capital, it is safe to say that hundreds of thousands of baby boomers alive today would have perished with their fathers in the mud of European battlefields. Our losses would probably have been on a par with those that the Brits suffered in Flanders in WWI.

I am just trying to keep our victory in perspective and to make the case that even though I think that we would have ultimately prevailed, (due to certain of the Whermahct's weaknesses, logisical and strategic i.e. Hitler's direction) it would have been at the price of the greatest death toll in our history without the contributions of the Soviets. I think our fight was nearly as much to prevent the westward advance of the Red Army as to defeat the Germans. It was a good thing for the world that we stopped them by meeting? them at the Elbe River. Would have been better had we gone a bit farther east though, despite the Yalta conference agreements.

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