Thank you for having this debate with me. I am very grateful.
But could you help me: where is the fascination many Anglo-Saxons with the era 1933-45 stem from? I must say that it was dreadful for everyone involved.
My parents witnessed it as children, and my late mother‘s first word was „ quick, basement“ in baby talk. She still could hear the sound of the Merlin engines in her mind, although she was only two when the nightmare ended. My father just barely survived an air raid when he was seven - but here I am.
Most Europeans have similar, or much worse, memories of that time. That’s why so many Europeans were able to come together in past decades, talking ro each other about their life stories- and crying bitterly at what the others all had to go through. I think this was difficult for many, but cathartic as well, and helped to overcome the great hatred, another bitter legacy of this terrible era.
For my own part, I consider other parts of history a more enjoyable topic, especially the Middle Ages, where so much has not been researched yet. I love reading ancient charters of knights, clerics, burghers and rustics and everything contained therein.
” But could you help me: where is the fascination many Anglo-Saxons with the era 1933-45 stem from? I must say that it was dreadful for everyone involved. “
The liberals and Left of the West have used what happened in Germany in that period as absolutely foundational to how they constructed the Post-War World.
At core, the world post-WW2 is based on White Guilt for what happened. And the response has to be necessary atonement - even for the populations of Allied countries.
Every border war, no matter how remote or irrelevant is claimed to be the beginning of a genocidal world war of conquest.
Any self-assertion, nationalistic claim or ethnic self interest by any Western country is absolutely forbidden because it will supposedly lead to another Auschwitz. (One country used to be exempt from this prohibition, but that has now ended.)
Jonathan Bowden was a British National Party guy who spoke with great insight about this. (at the prompt).
https://youtu.be/5y3a3vSTgPI?t=1832
I think that for many, it might be because they had family members who served in the military during that time, and possibly died, and want to know more. I had two uncles who served in the U.S. Army, one from both sides of the family. The uncle from Holland died the year before I was born. My mother's only brother born in Canada, died when I was about 16. He and his wife moved to California from New York State in the 50's, and we never saw them. My parents spoke to them, but us kids really didn't know them, and it was a shame. They had no children. It wasn't until my uncle got sick and was dying that he and my aunt moved back east and lived with us until he passed in 1964. He was only 48 when he died. Nobody knew anything about his military time. Not even my mother. I've never been able to get his military records because they were destroyed in the fire that occurred in the record center in St. Louis, Missouri in 1973. He supposedly served in the China-Burma-India theater, but there are no records to verify.
I also think that perhaps because the U.S. didn't really experience any of what the people in Europe did at the time, that they possibly seek information about that period of history. I read a lot of WWII books. I'm currently finishing up a book titled "The Bunker" by James P. O'Donnell. Also "The Avengers: A Jewish War Story" by Rich Cohen...the story about the partisan fighters in the Vilna (now in Lithuania) Jewish Ghetto," and "Fugitives: The History of Nazi Mercenaries During the Cold War" by Danny Orbach. It's about the recruitment of Nazis by the CIA for counter-intelligence. I also read books on other periods of history in France, England, Canada, this country, etc. I'm also currently reading a book titled: "A Thousand Miles Up the Nile" by Amelia B. Edwards. Written during the Victorian period, she writes about her travels up the Nile by boat, the places they stop at, and the sites they see. This is a reprint, and includes several of her original paintings and sketches she made on the trip. I had to laugh when in the reprint introduction, they warned people about stereotypes made by her in the book. I do also throw a good fiction book in the mix. I like Medieval mystery series, and mysteries from other periods.
I spent many years researching two regiments that served during our Civil War. I focused on the two black regiments that were authorized by Lincoln to be raised in the north (Boston). I spent many vacations, seated at the National Archives and Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., going through military and pension records for those men, as well as skimming newspapers on microfilm, to find as much information as I could on certain topics of the war. I throughly enjoyed those days, and loved opening a new pension record, never knowing what treasure you'd find inside. And I met a lot of great people along the way. The same goes for the manuscript collections I poured over. One in particular I found at Cornell University, was a gold mine on the 55th Massachusetts Regiment, from which my screen name came from. I've moved on from the Civil War, and enjoy books on other periods of history.
Since I've gotten into reading about British history, my only regret is that I never learned Latin, French or Old English, because I would love to be able to read the documents, records, etc., from the Medieval period that are available online. I would love to be able to pour over all those rolled up scrolls sitting on the shelves on Britain's archives and libraries. The amazing thing is that so many have survived. And thankfully, there are people out there who still have an interest in learning ancient languages so that people like me will have the benefit of their knowledge.
My wife’s father joined the Marines to stay out of Europe because he didn’t want to kill people who looked like him. This was a common feeling in Appalachia. My father’s grandmother was a “Kuper”(Prussian) which placed him on a “list” that was created in WW1. He was in Operation Torch, served in North Africa but was sent to the Pacific before he could get into Europe.
One fascinating fact of the war was regarding coffee. Coffee disappeared in Germany when the war began because of the embargo. When German officers were captured, American interrogators would give them coffee for 2 reasons
1. It made them more loquacious
2. It showed them we could get luxuries to the front lines which meant we were unstoppable logistically.
It would amaze you how many German soldiers from WW2 are Korean War veterans. If a German soldier had a relative in America, they were allowed to emigrate. My boss’s father was a radio operator for an artillery unit compromised of German WW2 veterans. They transmitted in German which the NK/Chinese could not understand.