The priests who survived the atomic bomb
The remarkable survival of the Jesuit Fathers in Hiroshima has echoes in the Bible and in the story of Fatima
By Donal Anthony Foley on Thursday, 5 August 2010
This Friday, August 6, will see the Feast of the Transfiguration celebrated in the Church. It commemorates the occasion when Christ, accompanied by Peter, James, and John, went up a high mountain – traditionally identified with Mount Tabor in Galilee – and was there “transfigured” before them, so that “his face shone like the sun, and his garments became as white as light” (Mt 17:2).
The Greek word for transfiguration is metemorphothe, from which we get the word “metamorphosis”. So the Transfiguration was a complete and stunning change in the appearance of Jesus, as his divinity shone through his humanity, in a way which completely overwhelmed the awestricken disciples. Its purpose was to prepare them for the reality of the crucifixion, so that having once seen – in some sense – his divinity, they would be strengthened in their faith.
August 6 is also an important date in world history: the fateful day on which the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima in Japan. On that day, a Monday, at 8.15 in the morning, an American B-29 bomber, Enola Gay, dropped its bomb “Little Boy”, which fell to a predetermined detonation height of about 1,900 feet above the city. It exploded with a blinding flash, creating a giant fireball, which vaporised practically everything and everyone within a radius of about a mile of the point of impact. It is estimated that up to 80,000 people were directly killed by the blast, and by the end of the year, that figure had climbed considerably higher, due to injuries and the effects of radiation. Over two thirds of the city’s buildings were completely destroyed.
But in the midst of this terrible carnage, something quite remarkable happened: there was a small community of Jesuit Fathers living in a presbytery near the parish church, which was situated less than a mile away from detonation point, well within the radius of total devastation. And all eight members of this community escaped virtually unscathed from the effects of the bomb. Their presbytery remained standing, while the buildings all around, virtually as far as the eye could see, were flattened.
Fr Hubert Schiffer, a German Jesuit, was one of these survivors, aged 30 at the time of the explosion, and who lived to the age of 63 in good health. In later years he travelled to speak of his experience, and this is his testimony as recorded in 1976, when all eight of the Jesuits were still alive. On August 6 1945, after saying Mass, he had just sat down to breakfast when there was a bright flash of light.
Since Hiroshima had military facilities, he assumed there must have been some sort of explosion at the harbour, but almost immediately he recounted: “A terrific explosion filled the air with one bursting thunderstroke. An invisible force lifted me from the chair, hurled me through the air, shook me, battered me [and] whirled me round and round…” He raised himself from the ground and looked around, but could see nothing in any direction. Everything had been devastated.
He had a few quite minor injuries, but nothing serious, and indeed later examinations at the hands of American army doctors and scientists showed that neither he nor his companions had suffered ill-effects from radiation damage or the bomb. Along with his fellow Jesuits, Fr Schiffer believed “that we survived because we were living the message of Fatima. We lived and prayed the rosary daily in that home.”
There is actually a biblical precedent for what happened to the eight Jesuits, in the book of Daniel. In Chapter 3, we read of the three young men who were thrown into the fiery furnace at the orders of Nebuchadnezzar, but who survived their ordeal and even walked around in the midst of the flames, accompanied by an angel who looked like “a son of the gods”.
After this first bombing, the Japanese government refused to surrender unconditionally, and so a second atomic bomb was dropped on the city of Nagasaki three days later on August 9. Nagasaki had actually been the secondary target, but cloud cover over the primary target, Kokura, saved it from obliteration on the day. The supreme irony is that Nagasaki was the city where two-thirds of the Catholics in Japan were concentrated, and so after centuries of persecution they suffered this terrible blow right at the end of the war.
But in a strange parallel to what happened at Hiroshima, the Franciscan Friary established by St Maximilian Kolbe in Nagasaki before the war was likewise unaffected by the bomb which fell there. St Maximilian, who was well-known for his devotion to the Blessed Virgin, had decided to go against the advice he had been given to build his friary in a certain location. When the bomb was dropped, the friary was protected from the force of the bomb by an intervening mountain. So both at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, we can see Mary’s protective hand at work.
The apparitions at Fatima in Portugal took place in 1917, when from May to October three young children, Francisco and Jacinta Marto, and their cousin, Lucia dos Santos, saw the Blessed Virgin six times, culminating in the “miracle of the sun” on October 13, when 70,000 people saw the sun spin in the sky and change colour successively, before falling to the earth in a terrifying manner. Many of those present thought it was the end of the world, but the sun reassumed its place in the sky to great cries of relief.
The essence of the Fatima message concerns conversion from sin and a return to God, and involves reparation for one’s own sins and the sins of others, as well as the offering up of one’s daily sufferings and trials. There was also a focus on prayer and the Eucharist at Fatima, and particularly the rosary, as well as the Five First Saturdays devotion, which involves Confession, Holy Communion, the rosary and meditation, for five consecutive months with the intention of making reparation to Our Lady (for more details visit Theotokos.org.uk).
It’s interesting to reflect, then, on the theme of “transfiguration” which links these various events. Christ’s face shone like the sun on Mount Tabor, and at Fatima, Our Lady worked the great miracle of the sun to convince the huge crowd which had gathered there that the message she was giving to mankind was authentic. Consider, too, that the poor people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki suffered as man-made “suns” exploded in their midst causing horrific devastation. But at Hiroshima the eight Jesuits, who were living the message of Fatima, and particularly the daily rosary, were somehow “transfigured,” protected by God’s divine power, from the terrible effects of the bomb.
Surely there is a message here for all of us, that living the message of Fatima, in a world which grows ever more dangerous, and which is still threatened by nuclear war, is as profound a necessity for us as it was for Fr Schiffer and his companions
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Friday, January 7, 2011
Russia Plans for a Stalinist Monument
Russia plans Stalinist monument
Thursday, 20 April 2006, 11:09 GMT 12:09 UK
Joseph Stalin: Still viewed with nostalgia by some Russians
A huge memorial featuring a statue of Soviet supreme ruler Joseph Stalin at its centre is to be rebuilt in a remote village in Russia's far north.
The memorial was built in Kureika near the Arctic Circle in the 1950s, at the height of Stalin's personality cult, by inmates of the Gulag prison system.
Officials in the region insist the new project is not politically motivated, but is aimed at developing tourism.
Critics say it is another sign that Stalin's crimes are being glossed over.
Alexei Babiy, a member of the Russian human rights group Memorial, said the project was part of a large-scale state campaign to rehabilitate Stalin.
The Kureika memorial, measuring 400 sq metres (4,304 sq ft), is to be rebuilt using original diagrams and photographs.
Stalin had spent time in Kureika during his internal exile under the tsarist regime later overthrown by the Bolsheviks.
The original memorial was closed in 1961, at the time of Nikita Khrushchev's drive to undo the worst Stalinist excesses, and in 1995 a fire virtually destroyed the dilapidated building.
An aide to the Krasnoyarsk regional governor, Yevgeny Pashchenko, told Interfax news agency that "this initiative came from businessmen who have long been involved in local tourism - it's a purely commercial project to attract tourists, it has no political overtones".
Russia's Itar-Tass news agency reports that demand has grown for tours to the sites of notorious Gulag labour camps.
An opinion poll carried out by Russia's VTsIOM research centre in March 2005 showed that 42% of Russians felt the country "needs another Stalin", compared with 52% who disagreed, Itar-Tass reported.
Stalin, who died in 1953, is revered by some Russians for his role as a war leader but reviled by others who point to the millions persecuted under his iron dictatorship.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4926284.stm
Thursday, 20 April 2006, 11:09 GMT 12:09 UK
Joseph Stalin: Still viewed with nostalgia by some Russians
A huge memorial featuring a statue of Soviet supreme ruler Joseph Stalin at its centre is to be rebuilt in a remote village in Russia's far north.
The memorial was built in Kureika near the Arctic Circle in the 1950s, at the height of Stalin's personality cult, by inmates of the Gulag prison system.
Officials in the region insist the new project is not politically motivated, but is aimed at developing tourism.
Critics say it is another sign that Stalin's crimes are being glossed over.
Alexei Babiy, a member of the Russian human rights group Memorial, said the project was part of a large-scale state campaign to rehabilitate Stalin.
The Kureika memorial, measuring 400 sq metres (4,304 sq ft), is to be rebuilt using original diagrams and photographs.
Stalin had spent time in Kureika during his internal exile under the tsarist regime later overthrown by the Bolsheviks.
The original memorial was closed in 1961, at the time of Nikita Khrushchev's drive to undo the worst Stalinist excesses, and in 1995 a fire virtually destroyed the dilapidated building.
An aide to the Krasnoyarsk regional governor, Yevgeny Pashchenko, told Interfax news agency that "this initiative came from businessmen who have long been involved in local tourism - it's a purely commercial project to attract tourists, it has no political overtones".
Russia's Itar-Tass news agency reports that demand has grown for tours to the sites of notorious Gulag labour camps.
An opinion poll carried out by Russia's VTsIOM research centre in March 2005 showed that 42% of Russians felt the country "needs another Stalin", compared with 52% who disagreed, Itar-Tass reported.
Stalin, who died in 1953, is revered by some Russians for his role as a war leader but reviled by others who point to the millions persecuted under his iron dictatorship.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4926284.stm
Huge cross marks Stalin purges
Huge cross marks Stalin purges
The cross honours the memory of tens of thousands of Stalin's victims
A giant cross commemorating the victims of Stalinist purges in the 1930s has been erected at a ceremony near Moscow.
The wooden cross - 12.5m high (41 ft) and 7.6m wide (25 ft) - was placed in Butovo, at the site of a former execution ground.
At least 20,000 people were killed there by Stalin's secret police, the NKVD. The first killings occurred exactly 70 years ago.
Hundreds of people attended the ceremony south of the capital.
Events marking the 70th anniversary of Stalin's drive to purge opponents of his regime have been held throughout Russia.
The relatively small-scale ceremonies have been organised by religious or human rights groups rather than the government.
I was seven when my neighbour, a priest, was taken away - he disappeared without a trace
Yulia Shcherbakova, witness of the Stalinist repression
The BBC's James Rodgers in Butovo says the execution ground had previously been a firing range.
It did not seem necessary to change its name after 8 August, 1937, he adds.
Yulia Shcherbakova - now in her 70s - wanted to explain her personal tie to Stalin's terror.
"It's terrifying to think back. I remember people in our small house being arrested - people who lived below and above," she told the BBC.
"I was seven when my neighbour, a priest, was taken away - he disappeared without a trace. And everyone was afraid to mention his name."
Activists' fears
The Siberian pine cross was erected as a centrepiece to a new memorial to Stalin's victims in Butovo.
JOSEPH STALIN'S PURGES
Orchestrated by Stalin in 1930s to cement his rule
5 Aug 1937 - order N00447 for mass executions of "anti-Soviet elements" issued
Targeted Communist Party opponents, but also the army, the intelligentsia and peasants
Hundreds of thousands of people executed by NKVD by 1938
Millions arrested and sent to labour camps
Mass executions end in Nov 1938, but arrests continue until Stalin's death in 1953
Those executed there in 1937 and 1938 included about 1,000 priests, monks and nuns.
No-one knows precisely how many are buried at the site.
The cross was constructed at the Solovetsky Monastery in northern Russia, which was itself turned into a notorious prison camp by the Soviet authorities in the 1920s.
The cross was delivered by boat, and part of its route followed the White Sea Canal, a Stalinist construction project which claimed the lives of thousands of convicts.
Seventy years after what is known as "the great purge", only a few thousand survivors remain.
Human rights groups say they have never been properly compensated, and most struggle to get by on a small state pension.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6936478.stm
The cross honours the memory of tens of thousands of Stalin's victims
A giant cross commemorating the victims of Stalinist purges in the 1930s has been erected at a ceremony near Moscow.
The wooden cross - 12.5m high (41 ft) and 7.6m wide (25 ft) - was placed in Butovo, at the site of a former execution ground.
At least 20,000 people were killed there by Stalin's secret police, the NKVD. The first killings occurred exactly 70 years ago.
Hundreds of people attended the ceremony south of the capital.
Events marking the 70th anniversary of Stalin's drive to purge opponents of his regime have been held throughout Russia.
The relatively small-scale ceremonies have been organised by religious or human rights groups rather than the government.
I was seven when my neighbour, a priest, was taken away - he disappeared without a trace
Yulia Shcherbakova, witness of the Stalinist repression
The BBC's James Rodgers in Butovo says the execution ground had previously been a firing range.
It did not seem necessary to change its name after 8 August, 1937, he adds.
Yulia Shcherbakova - now in her 70s - wanted to explain her personal tie to Stalin's terror.
"It's terrifying to think back. I remember people in our small house being arrested - people who lived below and above," she told the BBC.
"I was seven when my neighbour, a priest, was taken away - he disappeared without a trace. And everyone was afraid to mention his name."
Activists' fears
The Siberian pine cross was erected as a centrepiece to a new memorial to Stalin's victims in Butovo.
JOSEPH STALIN'S PURGES
Orchestrated by Stalin in 1930s to cement his rule
5 Aug 1937 - order N00447 for mass executions of "anti-Soviet elements" issued
Targeted Communist Party opponents, but also the army, the intelligentsia and peasants
Hundreds of thousands of people executed by NKVD by 1938
Millions arrested and sent to labour camps
Mass executions end in Nov 1938, but arrests continue until Stalin's death in 1953
Those executed there in 1937 and 1938 included about 1,000 priests, monks and nuns.
No-one knows precisely how many are buried at the site.
The cross was constructed at the Solovetsky Monastery in northern Russia, which was itself turned into a notorious prison camp by the Soviet authorities in the 1920s.
The cross was delivered by boat, and part of its route followed the White Sea Canal, a Stalinist construction project which claimed the lives of thousands of convicts.
Seventy years after what is known as "the great purge", only a few thousand survivors remain.
Human rights groups say they have never been properly compensated, and most struggle to get by on a small state pension.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6936478.stm
Stalin statue removed in Georgian home town
By Margarita Antidze
GORI, Georgia | Fri Jun 25, 2010 11:17am EDT
GORI, Georgia (Reuters) - Authorities removed a towering statue of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin from the central square of his native city in the dead of the night on Friday, carting away the monument to Georgia's most famous native.
The 6-meter-high bronze statue will be replaced by a monument to victims of Georgia's 2008 war with Russia and of Stalin's repression, officials said -- a rebuke to Moscow.
In an unannounced operation that began after midnight and was over before dawn, municipal workers and police took the statue down from its stone pedestal in the small city 80 km (50 miles) west of the capital, Tbilisi.
The statue's removal drew a mixed reactions in Gori, where it was erected a year before Stalin's death in 1953.
"How could they remove it? ... Stalin was a great individual and the most famous Georgian in the world," Irina, who gave only her first name, told Georgian public television.
"Stalin's monument was a symbol of our town," she said.
Outward signs of Stalin's pervasive personality cult were swept away after his death across Georgia and the rest of the Soviet Union, but he is revered by many in Gori.
Another resident, who identified herself as Maya, called it "the right decision. It's more logical to have a memorial to victims of war than a huge Stalin monument."
Widely reviled as a dictator responsible for millions of deaths, Stalin is held up as a hero by supporters across the former Soviet Union who say the country could not have defeated Nazi Germany or become a superpower without his leadership.
For many Georgians including pro-Western President Mikheil Saakashvili, the monument was a symbol of Moscow's lingering influence two decades after the small nation gained independence in the 1991 Soviet collapse. Resentment of Russia flared with the five-day war in August 2008.
"There is no place for such an ugly idol in Georgia," Culture Minister Nika Rurua said.
Officials said, however, that the monument would be moved to the courtyard of Gori's Stalin museum -- not discarded.
"A new monument dedicated to victims of the Russian aggression will be erected at this place," Zviad Khmaladze, a city council leader in Gori, said in televised comments.
Gori was the hardest-hit Georgian city in the 2008 war. Bombs hit the main square near the statue and buildings nearby.
The new monument will also commemorate victims of Stalin's repression, Rurua said.
The Kremlin is likely to bristle at a monument equating Russia's current leaders with Stalin, and the 2008 war -- which Moscow says was a morally justified response to Georgian aggression -- with the dictator's crimes.
Saakashvili praised the statue's removal when asked about it at a news conference.
"I support the decision of the municipality and the Culture Ministry completely, as a museum of occupation and monuments to those who orchestrated that occupation cannot exist in this country at the same time," Saakashvili said.
He was referring to a museum that opened in Tbilisi during his presidency on the years when Georgia was a Soviet republic.
Russian troops occupied Gori for two weeks after the 2008 conflict, which erupted when Georgia tried to recapture the Russian-backed separatist province of South Ossetia, just north of the city.
Russia recognized South Ossetia's independence after the war and has strengthened its grip on the rebel region.
Gori hosts some smaller statues and busts of Stalin as well as the museum dedicated to the late leader, who was born in Gori in 1879 and ruled the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death.
Mainly elderly supporters gather outside the colonnaded museum twice a year, on his birthday and the day of his death.
(Editing by Steve Gutterman and Myra MacDonald)
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE65O3CL20100625?pageNumber=2
GORI, Georgia | Fri Jun 25, 2010 11:17am EDT
GORI, Georgia (Reuters) - Authorities removed a towering statue of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin from the central square of his native city in the dead of the night on Friday, carting away the monument to Georgia's most famous native.
The 6-meter-high bronze statue will be replaced by a monument to victims of Georgia's 2008 war with Russia and of Stalin's repression, officials said -- a rebuke to Moscow.
In an unannounced operation that began after midnight and was over before dawn, municipal workers and police took the statue down from its stone pedestal in the small city 80 km (50 miles) west of the capital, Tbilisi.
The statue's removal drew a mixed reactions in Gori, where it was erected a year before Stalin's death in 1953.
"How could they remove it? ... Stalin was a great individual and the most famous Georgian in the world," Irina, who gave only her first name, told Georgian public television.
"Stalin's monument was a symbol of our town," she said.
Outward signs of Stalin's pervasive personality cult were swept away after his death across Georgia and the rest of the Soviet Union, but he is revered by many in Gori.
Another resident, who identified herself as Maya, called it "the right decision. It's more logical to have a memorial to victims of war than a huge Stalin monument."
Widely reviled as a dictator responsible for millions of deaths, Stalin is held up as a hero by supporters across the former Soviet Union who say the country could not have defeated Nazi Germany or become a superpower without his leadership.
For many Georgians including pro-Western President Mikheil Saakashvili, the monument was a symbol of Moscow's lingering influence two decades after the small nation gained independence in the 1991 Soviet collapse. Resentment of Russia flared with the five-day war in August 2008.
"There is no place for such an ugly idol in Georgia," Culture Minister Nika Rurua said.
Officials said, however, that the monument would be moved to the courtyard of Gori's Stalin museum -- not discarded.
"A new monument dedicated to victims of the Russian aggression will be erected at this place," Zviad Khmaladze, a city council leader in Gori, said in televised comments.
Gori was the hardest-hit Georgian city in the 2008 war. Bombs hit the main square near the statue and buildings nearby.
The new monument will also commemorate victims of Stalin's repression, Rurua said.
The Kremlin is likely to bristle at a monument equating Russia's current leaders with Stalin, and the 2008 war -- which Moscow says was a morally justified response to Georgian aggression -- with the dictator's crimes.
Saakashvili praised the statue's removal when asked about it at a news conference.
"I support the decision of the municipality and the Culture Ministry completely, as a museum of occupation and monuments to those who orchestrated that occupation cannot exist in this country at the same time," Saakashvili said.
He was referring to a museum that opened in Tbilisi during his presidency on the years when Georgia was a Soviet republic.
Russian troops occupied Gori for two weeks after the 2008 conflict, which erupted when Georgia tried to recapture the Russian-backed separatist province of South Ossetia, just north of the city.
Russia recognized South Ossetia's independence after the war and has strengthened its grip on the rebel region.
Gori hosts some smaller statues and busts of Stalin as well as the museum dedicated to the late leader, who was born in Gori in 1879 and ruled the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death.
Mainly elderly supporters gather outside the colonnaded museum twice a year, on his birthday and the day of his death.
(Editing by Steve Gutterman and Myra MacDonald)
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE65O3CL20100625?pageNumber=2
Saturday, October 30, 2010
The Fuhrer in the Making - Book Review
When Nazi Germany took over Austria in March 1938, there was an outburst of not just anti-Semitism but outright sadism against the Jews. They were, among much else, made to scrub the slogans of the previous regime off walls and pavements. Then the expropriations started. An elderly Jewish couple who lost their shop appealed to Hitler in Berlin. Did His Excellency the Chancellor, they wrote, perhaps remember that as a young painter before the war selling his paintings on the corner of the Siebensterngasse, he would when it rained drop in at a certain shop and be given a cup of tea? Could he now see his way to helping the people who had treated him with such kindness? Hitler marked that the letter should be ignored, and the old couple surely went to a death camp.
We owe our knowledge of this fact to a remarkable 1999 book: "Hitler's Vienna" by Brigitte Hamann. Her extensive research revealed that Hitler was not really an anti-Semite until after World War I. What had happened in those crucial wartime years is the question that Thomas Weber now answers in "Hitler's First War." Like Ms. Hamann, he has searched out original documents and found new material. Like her, he fundamentally alters our understanding of one of the most studied figures of the 20th century.
Hitler wrote about his war experiences in "Mein Kampf" (1925), and biographers have generally relied on his account. He put himself across as a soldier-hero: a "runner" carrying messages back and forth through machine-gun fire and artillery, twice decorated with the Iron Cross for bravery, wounded and then, toward the end of the war, blinded by poison gas. He learned of the end of the war at a military hospital in Pasewalk, not far from Berlin, and he wept.
In Hitler's version, the weeping soon turned vindictive against the soft-brained academics, Jews and members of the left who, he alleged, had caused Germany to lose the war. Remaining in the army, he was sent to Bavaria to fight against left-wing revolutionaries. (And yet Mr. Weber has discovered that, briefly at the turn of 1918-19, and unmentioned in "Mein Kampf," Hitler wore a red brassard and supported the short-lived Bavarian Soviet Republic.) Demobilized, he became an informer for the army's propaganda unit— though whether he volunteered or was coerced because of his short-lived involvement with the Bavarian Soviet Republic, Mr. Weber admits we cannot know—and was sent to monitor a meeting of the obscure German Workers' Party, soon to be re-named National Socialist German Workers' Party. Hitler was deeply impressed by the party's hypernationalism and anti-Semitism and joined within a week of attending his first meeting. He also found that he was a tremendously effective public speaker. The speeches do not translate: What sounds superb in one language can sound plain comic in another. But desperate Germans were soon paying to hear Hitler speak, and, as the party's chief source of revenue, he took over the leadership.
How did the young Hitler—diffident, gauche, without solid political convictions—turn into the fascist demagogue of 1922? There is no simple answer to this question, but "Hitler's First War" debunks some of the standard responses. Biographers have long assumed that the war marked a turning point: the comradeship of the trenches, the common soldier's hatred of the profiteers in the rear and the sense of betrayal with the peace made in 1918. Yet there was the nagging question of why the brave, decorated soldier of "Mein Kampf" was not promoted. Hitler served more or less for the whole of the war and never rose above the rank of corporal, which, given that he undoubtedly had leadership qualities, comes as a considerable surprise.
With some luck and a lot of diligence, Mr. Weber has discovered the missing documents of Hitler's war service, and it is fair to say that very little of Hitler's own account survives the discovery. There were indeed two Iron Crosses, but his regimental runner's job was not necessarily dangerous, and he lived in relative comfort at the regimental headquarters away from the front lines. Ordinary soldiers referred to such men as Etappenschweine ("rear pigs") —all armies have such a word: "cushy number" and "base wallah" are British examples. Officers had to dish out a quota of medals, and if you did not offend them they would just put your name on the list. Hitler was not, it appears, particularly courageous. He was just there. And, as it happens, a Jewish superior officer, Hugo Gutmann, recommended Hitler for his first Iron Cross. He was not thanked for this act in later life—though his fate, emigration to the United States, was greatly preferable to that of the old couple in Vienna.
There also wasn't much comradeship. When Hitler broke surface in politics, he asked his old comrades in the regiment for support and discovered that on the whole they had not liked him one bit. Men who had fought at the front in World War I were, moreover, not at all keen on staging a second war, and extraordinarily few of Hitler's old comrades went along with Nazism. Most supported the Weimar Republic. Mr. Weber's research shows that it's not really possible to connect the brutalization of men in the trenches to the birth of National Socialism.
It is very much to Mr. Weber's credit that he has managed to dig out the details, and we can place his book together with Ms. Hamann's as a triumph of original research in a very stony field. The conclusion that might be drawn is that Hitler was far more of the opportunist than is generally supposed. He made things up as he went along, including his own past. If we still haven't answered the question of what turned Hitler into an anti-Semitic idealogue, at least attention has been shifted to the Bavarian years of 1919-22. Ms. Hamann and Mr. Weber point the way forward for the next scholar's diligent researches.
—Mr. Stone is a professor of modern history at Bilkent University in Ankara, Turkey.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703673604575550730579575058.html?mod=WSJ_Books_LS_Books_5
We owe our knowledge of this fact to a remarkable 1999 book: "Hitler's Vienna" by Brigitte Hamann. Her extensive research revealed that Hitler was not really an anti-Semite until after World War I. What had happened in those crucial wartime years is the question that Thomas Weber now answers in "Hitler's First War." Like Ms. Hamann, he has searched out original documents and found new material. Like her, he fundamentally alters our understanding of one of the most studied figures of the 20th century.
Hitler wrote about his war experiences in "Mein Kampf" (1925), and biographers have generally relied on his account. He put himself across as a soldier-hero: a "runner" carrying messages back and forth through machine-gun fire and artillery, twice decorated with the Iron Cross for bravery, wounded and then, toward the end of the war, blinded by poison gas. He learned of the end of the war at a military hospital in Pasewalk, not far from Berlin, and he wept.
In Hitler's version, the weeping soon turned vindictive against the soft-brained academics, Jews and members of the left who, he alleged, had caused Germany to lose the war. Remaining in the army, he was sent to Bavaria to fight against left-wing revolutionaries. (And yet Mr. Weber has discovered that, briefly at the turn of 1918-19, and unmentioned in "Mein Kampf," Hitler wore a red brassard and supported the short-lived Bavarian Soviet Republic.) Demobilized, he became an informer for the army's propaganda unit— though whether he volunteered or was coerced because of his short-lived involvement with the Bavarian Soviet Republic, Mr. Weber admits we cannot know—and was sent to monitor a meeting of the obscure German Workers' Party, soon to be re-named National Socialist German Workers' Party. Hitler was deeply impressed by the party's hypernationalism and anti-Semitism and joined within a week of attending his first meeting. He also found that he was a tremendously effective public speaker. The speeches do not translate: What sounds superb in one language can sound plain comic in another. But desperate Germans were soon paying to hear Hitler speak, and, as the party's chief source of revenue, he took over the leadership.
How did the young Hitler—diffident, gauche, without solid political convictions—turn into the fascist demagogue of 1922? There is no simple answer to this question, but "Hitler's First War" debunks some of the standard responses. Biographers have long assumed that the war marked a turning point: the comradeship of the trenches, the common soldier's hatred of the profiteers in the rear and the sense of betrayal with the peace made in 1918. Yet there was the nagging question of why the brave, decorated soldier of "Mein Kampf" was not promoted. Hitler served more or less for the whole of the war and never rose above the rank of corporal, which, given that he undoubtedly had leadership qualities, comes as a considerable surprise.
With some luck and a lot of diligence, Mr. Weber has discovered the missing documents of Hitler's war service, and it is fair to say that very little of Hitler's own account survives the discovery. There were indeed two Iron Crosses, but his regimental runner's job was not necessarily dangerous, and he lived in relative comfort at the regimental headquarters away from the front lines. Ordinary soldiers referred to such men as Etappenschweine ("rear pigs") —all armies have such a word: "cushy number" and "base wallah" are British examples. Officers had to dish out a quota of medals, and if you did not offend them they would just put your name on the list. Hitler was not, it appears, particularly courageous. He was just there. And, as it happens, a Jewish superior officer, Hugo Gutmann, recommended Hitler for his first Iron Cross. He was not thanked for this act in later life—though his fate, emigration to the United States, was greatly preferable to that of the old couple in Vienna.
There also wasn't much comradeship. When Hitler broke surface in politics, he asked his old comrades in the regiment for support and discovered that on the whole they had not liked him one bit. Men who had fought at the front in World War I were, moreover, not at all keen on staging a second war, and extraordinarily few of Hitler's old comrades went along with Nazism. Most supported the Weimar Republic. Mr. Weber's research shows that it's not really possible to connect the brutalization of men in the trenches to the birth of National Socialism.
It is very much to Mr. Weber's credit that he has managed to dig out the details, and we can place his book together with Ms. Hamann's as a triumph of original research in a very stony field. The conclusion that might be drawn is that Hitler was far more of the opportunist than is generally supposed. He made things up as he went along, including his own past. If we still haven't answered the question of what turned Hitler into an anti-Semitic idealogue, at least attention has been shifted to the Bavarian years of 1919-22. Ms. Hamann and Mr. Weber point the way forward for the next scholar's diligent researches.
—Mr. Stone is a professor of modern history at Bilkent University in Ankara, Turkey.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703673604575550730579575058.html?mod=WSJ_Books_LS_Books_5
Beetle - The Life of General Walter Bedell Smith (D K R Crosswell)
By ANTONY BEEVOR
There have been countless biographies of the generals of World War II, and many are excellent. This biography of Walter Bedell Smith, Eisenhower's chief of staff, is one of the best. Smith has never received the attention and the credit that he deserves. A chief of staff is perhaps bound to be an unsung hero, but "Beetle" Smith was far more than just a tough and able administrator. In the words of a fellow officer, he possessed "all the charm of a rattlesnake." Yet the bad-cop routine—one he used almost entirely with fellow Americans and not with Allies—was forced upon him because Eisenhower, his supreme commander, desperately wanted to be liked by everybody.
Like almost every key U.S. Army officer in World War II, Smith (1895– 1961) was spotted by George C. Marshall. After serving as Marshall's right-hand man in Washington, Smith moved to Europe as Eisenhower's chief of staff in 1942. His first operational task, while based in London, was to coordinate the North African landings codenamed Operation Torch. Although the invasion was a success, problems mounted rapidly. The most serious was the supply chain, which Smith tried to reorganize radically, but Eisenhower was reluctant to take hard decisions.
In addition to all his operational duties, Smith was also left to handle the press, and political and diplomatic relations, acting as Eisenhower's "primary shock-absorber." The politically naïve Eisenhower had suddenly discovered the pitfalls of supreme command, especially when it involved the latent civil war of French politics. His decision to make use of Admiral François Darlan, the head of the Vichy French navy, to defuse opposition to the Allied landings in North Africa produced a storm of condemnation in the U.S. and Britain, especially as Vichy's anti-Jewish laws were left in place. Eisenhower complained to an old friend of his role as supreme commander: "I am a cross between a one-time soldier, a pseudo-statesman, a jack-legged politician and a crooked diplomat." These first trials, and especially the failures in the advance on Tunisia, did not constitute Eisenhower's finest hour. He was close to a breakdown by January 1943, and his weak performance briefing the Com bined Chiefs of Staff at the Casablanca conference—Roosevelt thought him "jittery"—nearly led to his resignation. He confided to Patton that he thought "his thread [was] about to be cut." But the British did not insist on his removal, and with Smith's steady advice Eisenhower weathered the storm.
Eisenhower and Smith were both caught up in the great strategic debate within the Allied camp. Marshall wanted the invasion of France to have every priority and remained deeply suspicious of British attempts to postpone it by diverting efforts to the Mediterranean theater because of their material and manpower shortages. As in the Napoleonic wars, British strategy was to avoid a major continental engagement until, making use of the Royal Navy, the enemy had been worn down at the periphery. American doctrine was the very opposite: using industrial supremacy to fight a battle of equipment (Materialschlacht) and confronting the enemy in a head-on land engagement. Mr. Crosswell quotes the boast of one U.S. general: "The American Army does not solve its problems, it overwhelms them."
But Marshall's plans for an early invasion of Northwest Europe were thwarted by Churchill, who went directly to Roosevelt. As things turned out, Churchill proved to be right to postpone D-Day, albeit for the wrong reasons. He longed to attack the "soft under-belly of Europe" through Italy and into central Europe to forestall a Soviet occupation after the war. (Roo sevelt, Marshall and Eisenhower all failed to foresee the Stalin's ambitions.) Marshall, on the other hand, was wrong because any attempt to mount a cross-Channel invasion in 1942 or even 1943 would have ended in disaster. The U.S. Army was simply not ready, the shipping and landing-craft were not available and the Allies lacked air supremacy.
The stress of Smith's job, especially dealing with the rival egos of Eisenhower's army group and army commanders—to say nothing of the constant political interference from Churchill—contributed to his irascibility and ulcers. His infrequent escapes from his desk revolved around needlepoint, fishing and collecting objets d'art. Smith was, in Mr. Crosswell's words, both "a loner and an inveterate collector all his life."
Eisenhower has always received the credit for the close Allied cooperation, but in "Beetle" we find that Smith achieved much of it working behind the scenes. Eisenhower knew this and wrote to Marshall about the necessity of promoting him. "Smith seems to have a better understanding of the British and is more successful in producing smooth teamwork among the various elements of the staff than any other subordinate I have." Yet Eisenhower's feelings about Beetle seem to have been ambivalent, even though he depended on his abilities to an extraordinary degree. They were never close friends, and Eisenhower failed to give Smith the credit he deserved. Smith's ability to get on well with the British also often led to accusations that he was prejudiced in their favor. Yet he was brilliant in containing inter-Allied explosions, especially those provoked by the prima donna Bernard Montgomery. Major turf wars w ere avoided by Smith's skilled handling of the insufferable British general. When Montgomery came to Eisenhower's headquarters in Algiers in 1943, he said to Smith: "I expect I am a bit unpopular up here." Smith replied: "General, to serve under you would be a great privilege for anyone, to serve long side you wouldn't be too bad. But, say, General, to serve over you is hell."
Montgomery, however, was not the only senior commander to exploit Eisenhower's failure to establish firm control and his attempts to compromise. American generals like Omar Bradley and George Patton also played games and threw tantrums, which Smith had to resolve. "The trouble with Ike," Smith observed, "is that instead of giving direct and clear orders, [he] dresses them up in polite language; and that is why our senior American commanders take advantage." Eisenhower's reliance on charm and manipulation all too often failed to work. Patton likened him to a politician running for office rather than a real commander.
This book, which manages to be both brutally honest and fair, does little to bolster the Ike myth, but clearly shows his moment of glory during the Ardennes offensive in December 1944, when he really did at last take a grip. But Eisenhower quickly lost it again during the rest of that terrible winter. And perhaps predictably, it was Smith who had to fire a semi-deranged Patton in September 1945 after his outrageous remarks attacking denazification.
Smith was disappointed not to get Eisenhower's job after the end of the war. But his talents for tough negotiation were not ignored. He was appointed to Moscow as ambassador, and Eisen hower said that it would "serve those bastards right." Although in bad health, Smith was called upon again, in 1950, to reorganize the fledgling CIA. He was appalled by the gifted amateurs in covert operations, who clearly were out of their league up against the ruthless KGB. On becoming president, Eisenhower again called on Smith—to serve under John Foster Dulles at the State Department—and Smith dutifully obeyed. His main role was dealing with the collapse of French Indochina and the Geneva conference in 1954. Struggling against ill health, partly due to a diet of cigarettes, "bourbon and Dex edrine," Smith died in 1961.
Mr. Crosswell's account both of Smith's life and of supreme command in Europe is expert and written in good clean prose. Almost a third of it is devoted to logistic problems, which have never received the importance they deserve, especially for the war in Northwest Europe. Although strangely structured, with Smith's postwar career at the beginning, the book provides a vital addition to our understanding of the politics and problems of allied warfare.
—Mr. Beevor is the author of "D-Day: The Battle for Normandy" (Penguin).
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304510704575562073415363844.html?mod=WSJ_Books_LS_Books_5
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Steering mistake sank the Titanic
Titanic sunk by steering mistake, author says
Reuters
Reuters - Thursday, September 23 2010
LONDON - The Titanic hit an iceberg in 1912 because of a basic steering error, and only sank as fast as it did because an official persuaded the captain to continue sailing, an author said in an interview published on Wednesday.
Louise Patten, a writer and granddaughter of Titanic second officer Charles Lightoller, said the truth about what happened nearly 100 years ago had been hidden for fear of tarnishing the reputation of her grandfather, who later became a war hero.
Lightoller, the most senior officer to have survived the disaster, covered up the error in two inquiries on both sides of the Atlantic because he was worried it would bankrupt the ill-fated liner's owners and put his colleagues out of a job.
"They could easily have avoided the iceberg if it wasn't for the blunder," Patten told the Daily Telegraph.
"Instead of steering Titanic safely round to the left of the iceberg, once it had been spotted dead ahead, the steersman, Robert Hitchins, had panicked and turned it the wrong way."
Patten, who made the revelations to coincide with the publication of her new novel "Good as Gold" into which her account of events are woven, said that the conversion from sail ships to steam meant there were two different steering systems.
Crucially, one system meant turning the wheel one way and the other in completely the opposite direction.
Once the mistake had been made, Patten added, "they only had four minutes to change course and by the time Murdoch spotted Hitchins' mistake and then tried to rectify it, it was too late."
Patten's grandfather was not on watch at the time of the collision, but he was present at a final meeting of the ship's officers before the Titanic went down.
There he heard not only about the fatal mistake but also the fact that J. Bruce Ismay, chairman of Titanic's owner the White Star Line persuaded the captain to continue sailing, sinking the ship hours faster than would otherwise have happened.
"If Titanic had stood still, she would have survived at least until the rescue ship came and no one need have died," Patten said.
The RMS Titanic was the world's biggest passenger liner when it left Southampton, England, for New York on its maiden voyage on April 10, 1912. Four days into the trip, the ship hit an iceberg and sank, taking more than 1,500 passengers with it.
Reuters
Reuters - Thursday, September 23 2010
LONDON - The Titanic hit an iceberg in 1912 because of a basic steering error, and only sank as fast as it did because an official persuaded the captain to continue sailing, an author said in an interview published on Wednesday.
Louise Patten, a writer and granddaughter of Titanic second officer Charles Lightoller, said the truth about what happened nearly 100 years ago had been hidden for fear of tarnishing the reputation of her grandfather, who later became a war hero.
Lightoller, the most senior officer to have survived the disaster, covered up the error in two inquiries on both sides of the Atlantic because he was worried it would bankrupt the ill-fated liner's owners and put his colleagues out of a job.
"They could easily have avoided the iceberg if it wasn't for the blunder," Patten told the Daily Telegraph.
"Instead of steering Titanic safely round to the left of the iceberg, once it had been spotted dead ahead, the steersman, Robert Hitchins, had panicked and turned it the wrong way."
Patten, who made the revelations to coincide with the publication of her new novel "Good as Gold" into which her account of events are woven, said that the conversion from sail ships to steam meant there were two different steering systems.
Crucially, one system meant turning the wheel one way and the other in completely the opposite direction.
Once the mistake had been made, Patten added, "they only had four minutes to change course and by the time Murdoch spotted Hitchins' mistake and then tried to rectify it, it was too late."
Patten's grandfather was not on watch at the time of the collision, but he was present at a final meeting of the ship's officers before the Titanic went down.
There he heard not only about the fatal mistake but also the fact that J. Bruce Ismay, chairman of Titanic's owner the White Star Line persuaded the captain to continue sailing, sinking the ship hours faster than would otherwise have happened.
"If Titanic had stood still, she would have survived at least until the rescue ship came and no one need have died," Patten said.
The RMS Titanic was the world's biggest passenger liner when it left Southampton, England, for New York on its maiden voyage on April 10, 1912. Four days into the trip, the ship hit an iceberg and sank, taking more than 1,500 passengers with it.
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