The Uyghur Genocide: A Modern Cultural Genocide

The Uyghur Genocide is widely used to describe the human rights abuses the Chinese government has committed against the Uyghur people and other groups in Xinjiang, China since 2014. Here, Roy Williams looks at the history and the current status of the cultural genocide.

In the past I have focused my attention on studying and advocating for the recognition of genocides that have been carried out in the last century. As a historian and a genocide scholar I would not be worth the words I have written if I did not speak of genocide of the present day. The communist government of China under the leadership of Xi Jinping is currently engaged in a cultural genocide against the Uyghur Muslims of the province of Xinjiang. Nearly one million Uyghur Muslims are currently detained in concentration camps throughout the province in an effort by the communist Chinese government to destroy their cultural and religious identity in hopes of creating a monoculture based around Han Chinese ideology and racial identity. Due to the Han supremacist bent of the Chinese government and the Uyghur desire for autonomy, the government has implemented multiple human rights abuses in the name of cleansing resistance and promoting the Chinese Han monoculture of their modern empire.

When studying genocide, the reader is always faced with emotions of disbelief in wondering how humanity could allow such grievous human rights abuses to occur. The Uyghur genocide provides a poignant example in understanding how a genocide can occur with very little active resistance from the international community. While humans rights advocates and journalists may proclaim the cry of genocide in hopes of drawing action against the crimes of an authoritarian regime, the politics of inaction and self interest halt any meaningful actions by the international community in condemning and halting a genocide. If the reader takes anything from this article, I plead that they hear the plight of the Uyghur people persecuted by their government and demand action from the international community.

Background

The story of the Uyghur genocide began with expansion westward under the Manchu led Qing dynasty of China during the 1700s. The Uyghur people of Xinjiang regained independence during the Dungan revolt from 1862 to 1877. During the Republican era of China, the Uyghur people largely retained autonomy. After communism became the prevailing government ideology of China, the Chinese government began sponsoring mass migration of Han Chinese to Xinjiang to dilute the population of ethnic Uyghurs. The communist Chinese government also began to introduce programs to suppress the religious and ethnic identity of Uyghur Muslims in opposition to the ideology of the Soviet Union. 

The 1980s saw a change in government policy under Deng Xiaoping, attempting a looser society allowing for the acceptance of ethnic minorities and multiple cultures under the Chinese banner. This policy, while lauded by ethnic minorities, was ultimately deemed a failure by government officials of the politburo. Government policy of the province of Xinjiang ultimately directed its efforts against accepting cultural minorities in favor of a Han Chinese monoculture that sought to limit and suppress Uyghur Muslim cultural identity. Following a protest by Uyghurs rejecting mass Chinese Han migration to Xinjiang in the Barin township in 1990, the Chinese People’s liberation Army put down Uyghur protests with excessive cruelty resulting in the deaths of 15 Uyghurs. Uyghur sources claim that the protest originated from mandated forced Chinese abortions of 200 Uyghur women, attempting to limit Uyghur birth rates. The varying accounts relaying the cause of the protest largely exist from the Chinese government’s commitment to spreading false pro-government propaganda in defending their heinous persecution of the Uyghur Muslims. 

2014 campaign

In an effort to capitalize on the international war on terror, the Chinese government in 2014 sponsored the Strike Hard Campaign Against Violent Terrorism as an excuse to persecute Uyghur Muslims in hopes of assimilating their culture into the larger dominant monoculture of the Han Chinese. Currently under this program over 1 million Uyghurs reside in concentration camps dedicated to stamping out Uyghur culture and religious practices. The Chinese government denied the existence of such camps until recently and now claims that they exist for vocational training and eliminating extremist and separatist political motivations in Xinjiang. Under the leadership of Xi Jinping, Jinping has directed government officials to show “Absolutely no mercy”, in dealing with Uyghur resistance. Accounts from Uyghurs detained in camps tell a different story describing rampant physical, emotional, and sexual abuse. Uyghur survivor Ziawudun recounts her traumatic experiences within a Chinese concentration camp: “They wore suits”, she said, “not police uniforms.”

Sometime after midnight, they came to the cells to select the women they wanted and took them down the corridor to a "black room", where there were no surveillance cameras.

Several nights, Ziawudun said, they took her.

"Perhaps this is the most unforgettable scar on me forever," she said.

"I don't even want these words to spill from my mouth."

 "The woman took me to the room next to where the other girl had been taken in. They had an electric stick, I didn't know what it was, and it was pushed inside my genital tract, torturing me with an electric shock." 

The culture of torture and sexual abuse are used to dehumanize and destroy the Uyghur people and culture. Survivors of the reeducation camps have described how those who attempted to pray were beaten mercilessly. Women have been forced to have abortions or been sterilized to reduce the Uyghur population in favor of Han Chinese migration. Nearly one sixth of all mosques in China have been destroyed by the Chinese government with the aim to stamp out Islamic cultural identity, with estimates of the destruction hovering at over 16,000 mosques. One of the most grievous crimes against ethnic and religious minorities is China’s recent destruction of the tomb of Imam Asim, which for Uyghurs existed as a substitute for the pilgrimage to Mecca. Education efforts by the Chinese government aim to separate Uyghur children from their families, brainwash them to revere the communist authoritarian leadership of China, learn Han Chinese to forget their Uyghur language, and reject their religious heritage of Islam for state atheism. Religious clothing is also strictly discouraged as well as giving children Islamic names. Names currently banned in the province of Xinjiang by the Chinese government include Mohammed, Quran, Mecca, Imam, Saddam, Hajj, and Medina. Uyghurs also face surveillance by a dystopian police state. Genetic material is collected to track and control the Uyghur population. Millions of cameras watch the people of Xinjiang criminalizing Uyghur cultural practices. Uyghur families are also forced to allow Chinese party officials constant access to their homes where they are actively monitored for extremist or separatist tendencies. "Their goal is to destroy everyone," proclaims Uyghur survivor Ziawudun.

Current status

While the United States and 38 other countries have condemned the Chinese governments for its crimes against humanity in perpetrating cultural genocide against the Uyghur people, the genocide persists. With the prospect of a dominant China in the 21st century, it is important for the international community to stand firm in its condemnation of China. Only through increased cooperation and retaliatory measures against the Chinese government can the Uyghur genocide be ended. Tech monopolies such as Facebook and Amazon stand squarely in the way of stopping China’s human rights abuses as they do not want to lose Chinese business in condemning their actions. Amazon’s heavy reliance on Chinese cotton, which is largely produced in the province of Xinjiang, stands as a massive economic barrier to stopping the Uyghur genocide. Facebook has allowed the Chinese government to buy ad space spewing government propaganda that denies the existence of the Uyghur genocide.  "It's time our platform takes action to fight misinformation on the Uighur genocide," wrote one Facebook employee regarding the Chinese government’s use of Facebook ads in promoting denialist propaganda.   Disney has also had an active role in supporting and denying the Uyghur genocide. During the filming of the recent Disney film, Mulan, multiple scenes were shot in the province of Xinjiang, sometimes in front of Uyghur concentration camps. In the final credits of Disney’s Mulan, multiple government agencies associated with the Uyghur genocide are thanked such as the publicity department of Xinjiang. China’s government is currently producing a propaganda film entitled the Wings of Song, which denies the existence of the Uyghur genocide in favor of nationalist pro-government falsehoods. With so many large companies enriching themselves at the expense of Uyghur suffering, the road to ending genocide appears to be long. Only through increased awareness and active condemnation by the international community can the Uyghur genocide and those who support it be stopped.

What do you think of the Uyghur cultural genocide? Let us know below.

Now, read Roy’s article on the Armenian Genocide here and the 1980s Guatemalan genocide here.

Bibliography

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-54064654

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-55794071

https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/04/19/break-their-lineage-break-their-roots/chinas-crimes-against-humanity-targeting

https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/research/2020/02/china-uyghurs-abroad-living-in-fear/

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/11/16/world/asia/china-xinjiang-documents.html

https://www.uyghurcongress.org/en/genocide-and-genocide-denial/

https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-internal-tension-china-xinjiang-ads-adverts-uyghurs-2021-4

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/apr/03/china-launches-musical-in-bid-to-counter-uyghur-abuse-allegations

The Bethnal Green Tube Disaster: A World War II Tragedy

There were of many tragedies in World War II, and this is the often forgotten story of one such tragedy. In 1943, 173 people were killed at Bethnal Green station in London. Ilana Barnett explains.

The 'Stairway to Heaven' memorial to those who died in the disaster in Bethnal Green, London. Unveiled on December 16, 2017. Source: GrindtXX, available here.

A Campaign of Terror

The term ‘the Blitz’ was given by the British Press to Hitler’s bombing campaign between September 7, 1940, and May 10, 1941, which was aimed at demoralizing the people of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. Although it actually refers to the wide spread bombing of the UK, in areas such as Glasgow, Belfast, Portsmouth, Swansea, Hull, Bristol, Sheffield and Liverpool, all of which suffered horrendous damage and loss of life, it is images of London, and in particular the devastation to the East End which has become synonymous with the Blitz. In total 43,000 civilians were killed during this period, over half of those who lost their lives lived in London.

A Place of Safety

Despite tube stations (the stations servicing the underground London railway – nicknamed ‘the tube’), having played an important role during World War I, inter-war policy makers ruled out their use in future conflicts. Some of the reasons behind this decision were put forward by the politician and Member of Parliament, Sir John Anderson in his 1939 report. Anderson argued that tube shelters were a public safety hazard i.e. the real possibility of people being injured or killed from falling onto the lines as well as the increased risk pertaining to the spread of diseases due to lack of amenities such as toilet facilities. One of his most bizarre arguments was that people would develop a ‘deep shelter mentality’ and feel so safe they would never want to leave!

At first the Government’s position was tenable as the light bombings during the summer of 1940, meant that the public shelters were not heavily used but as the bombing intensified general opinion began to turn. Ignoring growing public unrest, Anderson (now promoted to Minister of Home Security) dug his heels in and issued a joint report with the Ministry of Transport on the September 17, 1940, to warn people not to use the tubes as shelters except in emergencies. Despite all the policies, warnings and reports, people used their own judgment and ignored them. Over the night of September 19/20, determined Londoners took matters into their own hands and from 4pm onwards hundreds of people in an act of mass disobedience grabbed their bedding and food and flocked down into the tube stations. Faced with a civilian rebellion on such a massive scale, the Government finally caved in and formulated a ‘deep shelter extension policy’. The policy included converting 79 stations including Bethnal Green Tube Station into suitable accommodation with bunks fitted to accommodate about 22,000 people, first aid facilities, chemical toilets, 124 canteens and the recruitment of Shelter Marshals as well as reinforcing the underground flood walls.

8:27 pm - March 3, 1943

Although the Blitz was officially considered over by the beginning of May 1941, London still suffered from intermittent raids. 

On the evening of March 3, 1943, Londoners calmly got ready to spend another night in the shelters. Many had the procedure down to a fine art, sending a member of the family down to a ‘bundle shop’ (a left luggage store) to collect bedding to be taken down to the shelter while other family members grabbed food, and gathered up the children.

The shelter at Bethnal Green Tube Station had been fitted out in the same style as the other stations and was always busy. To enter the station, you would first go down 19 steps to a landing, and then another seven to the ticket hall. From there you would take one of the escalators 80 feet down to the platform. There was room for about 7,000 people with bunks for 5,000, and the remainder having to find a space where they could. In addition, the Metropolitan Borough of Bethnal Green responsible for the running of the shelter had even built a hospital, and a library.

The siren went off at 8:17 pm, and people made their way through the inky darkness to the station, walking calmly down the steps to the landing taking care as it had been raining, and the steps were slippery. Ten minutes later everyone was startled by a loud noise, which was unlike anything, they had ever heard before. People surged forward causing a woman with a small child at the bottom of the steps to slip. An elderly man behind her lost his balance, and fell on top of her. This started a horrifying, and unstoppable domino effect with people piling on top of each other. Those entering the station were unable to see what had happened at the bottom, and continued to push forward making a bad situation even worse as people were lifted off their feet, and carried down the steps by the force of the crowd behind. The whole episode lasted only 15 seconds, at the end of which all anyone could see was a huge pile of bodies, ten deep, arms, and legs entangled with those at the bottom crushed to death. One shocked witness compared the sight to that of a charnel house, a building or vault in which corpses or bones are piled. The people already settled in the shelter were completely unaware of the tragedy which was unfolding above them.

A Terrible Sight

A policeman, PC Thomas Penn, who was bringing his wife to the shelter, luckily arrived too late to be caught up in it, but tried to assess the damage. He clambered down over the bodies finding 200 people at the bottom trapped in a small space. He then crawled back out to send a message for help, and then returned to try to help those trapped. He fainted twice.

People arriving at the scene joined in the rescue attempt. The injured were taken to a nearby hospital while the bodies were laid out on the pavement. The dead were later taken to the local mortuary at Whitechapel hospital, and when that become overcrowded were brought over the road to St John’s Church. The police surgeon told the coroner that he had been amazed that of the 300 people involved not one was found with fractured ribs.

It took a while for the scale of what had happened to sink in. 62 people had been injured, and 173 had been killed, 27 men, 84 women, and 62 children (one casualty died later in hospital from injuries sustained during the crush). The woman who had been at the front of the group survived but her child did not. The youngest to be killed was Carol Geary, she was only five months old. The loss of life was horrendous, and not a single bomb had been dropped.

The disaster affected everyone involved; those who had been trapped, the rescuers, and of course the families who lost their loved ones. For many what they had gone through, seen or heard haunted them, and left scars that never healed. One survivor’s daughter recounted how her mother once told her that every night as she laid down to sleep, she heard their dying cries, and screams.

A Government Whitewash

The news about the disaster at Bethnal Green began to circulate but fearful of the outcome of any investigation, and worried how it would affect public morale, government officials decided that the best course of action would be pretty much to hush it up. The press was censored, and not allowed to report on the incident for two days, and even when they were finally free to print their articles, they were forbidden to reveal the actual location of the disaster. Despite trying to brush it under the carpet, somehow the Nazis heard about Bethnal Green, and decided to use it for their own propaganda purposes claiming that it had been their bombs which had been responsible for the deaths.

Initially the idea of an investigation was dismissed as being unnecessary with officials agreeing with Sir Laurence Rivers Dunne that it would blow the incident out of proportion, and give encouragement to the enemy. Eventually a short statement was read out in the House of Commons which simply stated that precautions would be taken in the future to prevent anything like it happening again.

Falling on Death Ears

In his book, Mr Morrison’s Conjuring Trick: The People of Bethnal Green (deceased) v The Crown, Rick Fountain presents damning evidence against the Government, and their policy towards Bethnal Green Tube Station. He discovered letters from Bethnal Green Council to the Local Civil Defence sector of the Government sent shortly before the disaster. These letters shed new light of what was happening behind the scenes. In one letter the council asked the Government to approve plans to alter the entrance to the tube station to make it safer to avoid a bottleneck. The request was refused. Two more letters were written by the Borough Engineer to the Government asking them to agree to changes to the station’s entrance, and also the staircase, including the erection of a crash barrier to slow down the movement of the crowds. Both times the Government said no, and that a crash barrier was a waste of money.

The day after the disaster, all the changes were implemented.

The letters were hidden under the Official Secrets Act.

The Government placed all the blame on the Council.

An Avoidable Tragedy

So, what about the strange noise that had startled everyone in the shelter? Most agree now that the sound was the firing of 60 rockets from an anti-aircraft battery gun by the Royal Artillery in Victoria Park. It was a new defense weapon which had never been heard before, and should never have been tested in a built-up area.

A Sort of Justice

It was only at the end of the war that the Government, faced with mounting public pressure, finally agreed to answer questions about what actually happened that night. The Minister of Home Security, Herbert Morrison quoted from a secret report – so an investigation had been carried out. Maybe the Government was worried that one day they would be held accountable. The report cited inadequate lighting (the stairway was only lit by one 25-watt bulb), shortage of supervisors, and lack of handrails as being contributory factors but stated that it was the crowd’s irrational behavior which was most to blame. He admitted that the report was originally suppressed as they had been worried that no one would believe the findings.

Not everyone agreed with the report’s conclusions. The Shoreditch Coroner, Mr. W.R.H. Heddy, along with other officials stated that testimonies given from witnesses confirm that whilst people were hurrying, and anxious, they were not panicking. There was also nothing to suggest a stampede having taken place. The decision to hold the inquiry in secret was also condemned. 

A number of lawsuits were filed, looking for compensation including the well-documented ‘Baker v Bethnal Green Corporation’ brought by a bereaved widow. The decision was made in her favor. A number of similar cases followed. By the beginning of 1950s over £60,000 had been paid out.

Finally, a Fitting Tribute

A small memorial plaque to those that died, easily missed, was placed at the southeast entrance to the tube station, above the point where the first woman fell. Many felt this was inadequate, and a long campaign was launched to create a more fitting memorial. On December 17, 2017, the Bethnal Green Stairway to Heaven Memorial was unveiled. The memorial includes a plaque listing the names of those that died as well as 173 points of light, one for each of the victims. 

What do you think of the Bethnal Green tube disaster? Let us know below.

Now read Ilana’s article on four of the most eccentric Scottish Dukes of Hamilton here.

Saladin and Hitler: Opposite Reputations, Unusual Legacies

Saladin (1137-93) was Sultan of Egypt and Syria from 1174-93 and was in charge when Islamic forces took Jerusalem in 1187. The infamous Adolf Hitler needs less explanation. Here, Daniel Boustead considers how they were both liked by people you would not expect – Saladin by Christians due to his kindness, and Hitler by several Islamic extremist groups in the Middle East due to his Anti-Semitism.

Amin al-Husseini, Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, meeting Adolf Hitler in 1941. Source: Bundesarchiv, Bild 146-1987-004-09A / Heinrich Hoffmann / CC-BY-SA 3.0, available here: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bundesarchiv_Bild_146-1987-004-09A,_Amin_al_Husseini_und_Adolf_Hitler.jpg

Saladin and Adolf Hitler have two opposite reputations. Saladin’s stellar reputation produced positive praise amongst his enemies - his larger than life good reputation led to positive folklore stories that were written about him during Medieval times in the Christian world. In contrast Adolf Hitler’s policy of evil helped him gain prominence in the Islamic World of the Middle East. Adolf Hitler’s legacy of hatred continues to fuel the discord of the politics of the Middle East even today. Both Saladin and Adolf Hitler had unusual places in the Christian and Muslim worlds.

Saladin

Saladin’s generosity and kindness toward his enemies sometimes defied reason. In the tradition of the Second Islamic Caliph Umar, who conquered Jerusalem many years before, Saladin offered not to destroy the Holy Church of the Sepulcher ([1]). Saladin stated that even without the Church, Christians would still make a pilgrimage to the site of Jesus Christ’s tomb (1). Saladin therefore reasoned why make yourself more trouble then its worth by destroying the Holy Church of the Sepulcher? In 1187, when Saladin conquered Jerusalem, much to annoyance of Muslim critics, Saladin permitted the Patriarch of Jerusalem to purchase his freedom and his church treasures, for the normal ransom set for a single person ([2]). In 1187 Saladin permitted 10 Knights Hospitallers to remain in Jerusalem for a year to care for the sick (3).  In 1191 a Frankish women came to Saladin and said her three-month-old baby had been sold on the Arab slave market (4). The Frankish women went to Saladin as he was riding towards Tell al-Kharruba, and told her case which moved Saladin to tears. Saladin then asked that this child be brought to him. The Sultan Saladin ordered the purchase price to be paid to the purchaser and the child was taken from the purchaser. Saladin then gave this Frankish baby back to the women whom hugged it to her bosom and wept, while other people saw this moment and wept also at this sight. This Frankish woman and her baby were then taken back to the Frankish camp on Saladin’s order on horseback (4). 

Furthermore Saladin became an important protector to Eastern Christians against the Roman Catholic crusader states. The King of Georgia, the Byzantine Emperor of Constantinople, and the Catholicos of Armenia, were eager to call Saladin a friend and an ally (5). The Byzantines had friendly relations with Saladin though they never concluded agreement which would result in a military or political alliance between them. (6)

Legacy

Saladin was immortalized in fictional literature and Christian theology throughout Medieval Christian Europe. Christian theologians speculated between the natural, universal moral codes, and Christian morality (7). The Christian theologians concluded by the 13th Century C.E. that Saladin was a symbol of natural morality, because like the Pagan heroes of old he obeyed God’s natural moral laws without recourse to His church or His scriptures (7). In 1187 in a Papal Bull was issued by Gregory VIII (8). He claimed that Saladin captured Jerusalem because the Devil caused dissention in the Christian crusaders (8).  

In 1260, Saladin was romanticized in the fictional text Recits d’un Menstrel de Reims in which Saladin is shown giving the Hospitallers in the Hospital of St. John of Acre and their Grand Master hospitality (9). In Dante’s Divine Comedy Saladin goes to Hell (10). However, in Dante’s Hell Saladin is one of three Muslims who are in the “noble castle” which is emanating the light of human reason and are with the great poets, philosophers, and heroes of antiquity. The fact that these people are “virtuous pagans” forces them to be in the “noble castle” in Hell and prevents them from the torments of Hell’s other inhabitants experiences - but prevents them from being admitted into heaven. In Dante’s Hell Saladin discusses the nature of the Good and the True in this “noble castle” in Hell (10). Because of his stature Saladin was venerated by Christian theologians because they believed the Christian Crusader Knights did not have their hearts with God  - and by secular people for his chivalry. 

Hitler

In the way the Christians venerated Saladin as a noble heathen for his chivalry and kindness towards his enemies, the same could be said for how some more extreme Muslims venerated Nazi leader Adolf Hitler for his violent and destructive Anti-Semitism. How Adolf Hitler’s Anti-Semitism could become popular with a few Muslims is best summed up by George Antonius’ quote: “Arab hatred and Anti-Semitism would end, and the ancient harmony would be restored when Zionism abandoned both its ‘colonialist’ and ‘neo-crusader’ quest”(11).  Sections of Adolf Hitler’s autobiography Mein Kampf appeared in newspapers in Baghdad and Beirut in the spring 1934 (12). Mein Kampf expressed some very destructive Anti-Semitic viewpoints. In an incident on April 15, 1936 (according to the Palestinian Arab National Committee) member Akram Zu’yatir mentioned an incident where three members of Izz-ul-Din-al-Qassam’s militia, who were led by Sheikh Farhan al-Sa’di, pulled three people out of a truck on a mountain road in the Nablus region at 8:30 P.M.(13). The three men pulled three people out of the truck and asked them if they were Jews or Englishmen (13). The driver and passenger answered that they were Jews and were immediately shot on the spot by members of Izz-ul-Din-al-Qassam’s militia (13). Another person who was present “proved to the band that he was a German, a Hitlerite, and a Christian, swearing on Hitler’s honor that he was telling the truth” (13). “The three men released him. ‘For Hitler’s sake’ … with thirty five pounds sterling in his pockets”(13). This showed how a few Muslims supported Adolf Hitler for his Anti-Semitism. This event helped trigger a chain of events that ignited the 1936 Palestinian Arab uprising (13). Akram Zu’aytir describes another incident that took place in Tulkarm where “A car drove by; one of the passengers, wearing a Western-style hat, was attacked by Arab demonstrators (14). “He shouted ‘Heil Hitler’ in the direction of the demonstrators and raised his arm in the Nazi salute, then hoisted the Nazi flag over his car, while the crowd cheered him”(14). This showed how popular Adolf Hitler was with a more extreme section of Muslims and Arabs. If the crowd in this Tulkarm incident had found that the person was Jewish they would likely have killed him.

On January 11, 1941 Hitler issued Directive No.32 which stated: “after Soviet Russian armed forces have been crushed, Germany would carry out the main attack against the Suez Canal with German and Italian Forces” (15). On May 23, 1941 Adolf Hitler issued Directive No.30 which stated “Arab freedom movements in the Middle East are our natural ally against England” (16). This means that had Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy invaded the Middle East they would have liberated Arabs and Muslims from the colonial forces of Great Britain and the Germans would then have killed the Jews living in that region. This is confirmed in a meeting between the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin Al-Husseini and Adolf Hitler on November 28, 1941 (17).  Hitler not only promised to the Grand Mufti to “carry on the battle of total destruction of the Judeo-Communist empire in Europe”, but also promised to the Mufti that when the Germans reached the Middle East, that “Germany’s objective would then be solely the destruction of the Jewish element residing in the Arab sphere under the protection of British power. In that hour, the Mufti would be the most authoritative spokesman of the Arab world”(17). While, based on how the Nazis treated people in territories the Nazis invaded, it is debatable how Hitler would have behaved towards the Arabs of the Middle East, this shows a reason why some Arabs had sympathy towards Hitler.

Hitler after the war

After World War II Hitler was still considered a noble infidel by some more extreme groups. Egyptian Islamic Extremist Sayyid Qutb mentioned Hitler in a key text he wrote in the 1950s called Our Struggle with the Jews (18). In a key passage in the work Qutb states: “Then Allah brought Hitler to Rule over them. And once again today the Jews have returned to evil-doing, in the form of ‘Israel” which made the Arabs, owners of the Land taste sorrows and woe. So let Allah bring down upon the Jews people who will mete out the worst kind of punishment, as a confirmation of His unequivocal promise: ‘If you return, then We return’; and in keeping with his Sunna, which does not vary. So for one who expects tomorrow, it is close!”(18). In the aftermath of Sayyid Qutb’s execution in 1966, Qutb became a martyr and ideological inspiration for radical Islamist groups such as Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, and Hamas (19). 

Saladin and Hitler were partially accepted by communities that would have not normally praised them -  but they would leave very different legacies. Saladin was respected and had Christian sympathy, while Hitler was evil and had the support of extreme groups.

What do you think of the article? Let us know below.

Now, you can read more World War II history from Daniel: “Did World War Two Japanese Kamikaze Attacks have more Impact than Nazi V-2 Rockets?” here, “Japanese attacks on the USA in World War II” here, and “Was the Italian Military in World War 2 Really that Bad?” here.

[1] Mohring, Hannes. Translated by Bachrach, David S. Introduction by Cobb, Paul M. Saladin: , the Sultan and His Times, 1138-1193. Baltimore: Maryland. John Hopkins University Press. 2005. 66. 

[2] Mohring, Hannes. Translated by Bachrach, David S. Introduction by Cobb, Paul M. Saladin: the Sultan  and His Times, 1138-1193. Baltimore: Maryland. John Hopkins University Press. 2005. 65 to 66. 

3 Mohring, Hannes. Translated by Bachrach, David S. Introduction by Cobb, Paul M. Saladin: the Sultan and His Times, 1138-1193. Baltimore: Maryland. John Hopkins University Press. 2005. 100. 

4Shaddad, Ibn Bah al-din. Translated by Richards, D.S. The Rare and Excellent History of Saladin. New York: New York. Routledge: Taylor& Francis Group. 2002 and 2016. 144 and 147 to 148. 

5 Poole-Lane, Stanley. Saladin and the Fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. New York: New York. G.P Putnam and Sons, 1898. This edition published in 2017. 216. 

6 Mohring, Hannes. Translated by Bachrach, David S. Introduction by Cobb, Paul M. Saladin: the Sultan and His Times, 1138-1193. Baltimore: Maryland. John Hopkins University Press. 2005. 77. 

7 Tolan, John V. Sons of Ishmael: Muslims through European Eyes in the Middle Ages. Gainesville: Florida. University Press of Florida. 2008. 92. 

8 Tolan, John V. “Mirror of Chivalry: Salah al-Din, in the Medieval European Imagination”, Images of the Other: Europe and the Muslim World before 1700(Cairo Papers in Social Science 19:2) Frasetto, Michael  and Blanke, David R. eds. (Cairo Egypt: American University in Cairo Press 1996). 27-28. 

9 Tolan, John V. “Mirror of Chivalry: Salah al-Din, in the Medieval European Imagination”, Images of the Other: Europe and the Muslim World before 1700 (Cairo Papers in Social Science 19:2) Frasetto, Michael and Blanke, David R. eds. (Cairo Egypt: American University in Cairo Press 1996). 27-28. 

10 Tolan, John V. Sons of Ishmael: Muslims through European Eyes in the Middle Ages. Gainesville: Florida. University Press of Florida. 2008. 79 to 80. 

11 Calvert, John. Sayyid Qutb and the Origins of Radical Islamism. Oxford: United Kingdom. Oxford University Press. 2018. 168. 

12 Herf, Jeffery. Nazi Propaganda For the Arab World: With a New Preface. New Haven: Connecticut. Yale University Press. 2010. 24. 

13 Achcar,Gilbert. Translated by Goshgarian, G.M. The Arabs and the Holocaust: The Arab-Israeli War of Narratives. New York: New York.  Metropolitan Books and Henry Holt and Company. 2009. 135 to 137. 

14 Achcar, Gilbert. Translated by Goshgarian, G.M. The Arabs and the Holocaust: The Arab-Israeli War of Narratives. New York: New York. Metropolitan Books and Henry Holt and Company. 2009. 137. 

15 Herf, Jeffery. Nazi Propaganda For the Arab World With a New Preface.  New Haven: Connecticut. Yale University Press. 2010. 57.

16 Herf, Jeffery. Nazi Propaganda For the Arab World with a New Preface. New Haven: Connecticut. Yale University Press. 2010. 2. 

17 Herf, Jeffery. Nazi Propaganda For the Arab World With a New Preface. New Haven: Connecticut. Yale University Press. 2010. 76 to 78. 

18 Herf, Jeffery. Nazi Propaganda for the Arab World: With a  New Preface. New Haven: Connecticut. Yale University Press. 2010. 259. 

19 Herf, Jeffery. Nazi Propaganda for the Arab World: With a New Preface. New Haven: Connecticut. Yale University Press. 2010. 255. 

References

Achcar, Gilbert. Translated by Goshgarian, G.M. The Arabs and the Holocaust: The Arab-Israeli War of Narratives.  New York: New York. Metropolitan Books and Henry Holt  and Company. 2009. 

Calvert, John. Sayyid Qutb and the Origins of Radical Islamism. Oxford: United Kingdom. Oxford University Press. 2018.

Herf, Jeffery. Nazi Propaganda For the Arab World: With a New Preface. New Haven: Connecticut. Yale University Press. 2010. 

Mohring, Hannes. Translated by Bachrach, David S. Introduction by Cobb, Paul M. Saladin: the Sultan and His Times, 1138-1193. Baltimore: Maryland. John Hopkins University Press. 2005.

Poole-Lane, Stanley. Saladin and the Fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. New York: New York. G.P. Putnam and Sons, 1898. This edition published in 2017. 

Shaddad, Ibn Baha al-Din. Translated by Richards, D.S. The Rare and Excellent History of Saladin. New York: New York. Routledge: Taylor & Francis Group. 2002 and 2016. 

Tolan, John V. “Mirror of Chivalry: Salah al-Din, in the Medieval European Imagination”, Images of the Other: Europe and the Muslim World before 1700 (Cairo Papers in Social Science 19:2) Frasetto, Michael and Blanke, David. eds. (Cairo Egypt: American University in Cairo Press 1996). 7-38. 

Tolan, John. V. Sons of Ishmael: Muslims through European Eyes in the Middle Ages. Gainesville: Florida. University Press of Florida. 2008. 

A Shooting in Sarajevo: Updating First World War Historiography - Part I

Even before the guns fell silent in 1918, historians have debated the “true” causes of the First World War. In attempting to point a blaming finger, these academics also reflected the times they lived in. So where does the historiographical debate on the origins of World War I stand now? Avan Fata explains. 

Depiction of Gavrilo Princip killing Archduke Francis Ferdinand of Austria in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914. An image from Domenica del Corriere, an Italian newspaper. Image by Achille Beltrame.

The narrative remains unchanged: on 28 June 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir apparent to the Austro-Hungarian throne, was assassinated in Sarajevo alongside his wife Countess Sophie by Gavrilo Princip. Just a month later, the so-called “July Crisis” ended with Austria-Hungary’s declaration of war on Serbia. Yet what could have been a “Third Balkan War” instead escalated into a continental war, as the other great powers of Europe joined the conflict.[1] It is not uncommon for writers or documentary-makers to utilize cliché metaphors or dramatic phrases to underscore the sheer scale, brutality, and impact of the fighting between 1914-1918. Indeed, it is perhaps the event which laid the foundations for the conflicts, revolutions, and transformations which characterized the “short 20th century”, to borrow a phrase from Eric Hobsbawm.[2] It is no surprise then, that even before the Treaty of Versailles had been signed to formally end the war, people were asking a duo of questions which continues to generate debate to this day.

How did the war start? Why did it start?

Yet in attempting to answer those questions, postwar academics and politicians inevitably began to write with the mood of their times. In Weimar Germany for example, historians seeking to exonerate the previous German Empire for the blame that the Diktat von Versailles had supposedly attached to them were generously funded by the government and given unprecedented access to the archives; so long as their ‘findings’ showed that Germany was not to blame.[3] In attempting to answer how the war had started, these writers were all haunted by the question which their theses, source selection, and areas of focus directly implied: who started it? This article traces the evolution of those arguments and the contours of the debate around the events which began with a shooting in Sarajevo. 

Wartime Justification, Postwar Ponderance

The debate over the origins of the First World War began even while the war was being fought by the great powers. Governments of the great powers, in seeking to portray their involvement in the war as a just and noble act of self-defense, called upon historians to justify the country’s fighting as a just and moral decision.[4]

In some cases, this produced about-turns in the historical writings of entire academic communities. Herbert Fisher, a noted British historian who had praised Germany’s rise to power in the years before the war, changed his tone in a 1914 article titled The War, where he noted that: 

"Prussia has been made by the sword...That is one of the unalterable facts of history graven upon the mind of every German schoolboy, and shaping his whole outlook on the world.[5]"

These arguments were not debates in the traditional sense. How could they be? With the war still raging, historians were unable to engage in the international realm of discussion that had flourished in the prewar years. However, by the time the guns fell silent and the Treaty of Versailles had brought the war to an end, the opportunity arose for new debates on the origins of the War to End All Wars. 

During the interwar years, governments still sought to remove themselves of the blame of “starting” the war. They amassed multi-volume collections of thousands of archived materials (many of which had been previously classified), publishing them in the hopes that historians would find proof that their country had not been the one to engulf Europe in flames. Chief among these collections was the forty-volume Die Grosse Politik, published by the Weimar government, which contained documents dating from 1871-1914.[6]

These sources, previously inaccessible during the war, gave rise to new strains of historiography, which began to re-assess the "justifications" produced by each nation at the beginning of the war. In Britain, these collections of sources generated debates on the extent to which the German nation could be blamed for the First World War. This crusade's most prominent leader was George Peabody Gooch, a former Liberal M.P and author of distinguished historical works.[7] One of the first revisionists on the First World War, he argued alongside William Harbutt Dawson (another prominent historian on German), Raymond Beazely, and a few other British historians that the Germans were not the sole arbiters of war, and as such the peace treaty of Versailles was a flawed one.[8] Unsurprisingly, liberal parties in the Weimar Republic (and followers of a rising Nazi party) cheered the rise of these revisionist "Collective War Guilt" theses. German historians for their part, were re-mobilized to support and propagate these theses (with noticeably more nationalistic overtones). As historian Dennis Showalter describes:

"Strongly nationalistic and patriotic in orientation, matchless researchers and unrivaled polemics - controversy has long been an art form among German intellectuals - the pundits and professors rallied behind a cause lost by the soldiers. Given a previously unheard of access to government documents and frequently supported by government money, a generation of revisionists challenged and denied Germany's sole responsibility.[9]”

An Unavoidable War? 

In the 1930s, these revisionist historians found a way to wash their nations conscience clean of the war. They pointed towards “larger forces”, the “mass demands” which had compelled the statesmen of 1914 to declare war. These forces, among them Social Darwinism, nationalism, and imperialism, provided the perfect solution. By assigning blame to these invisible movements and not a physical group or nation, the problem of “war guilt” could be swept neatly aside.[10]

Politicians also helped give rise to another historiographical norm during the 1930s, the idea of an “inadvertent war”. Simply put, they portrayed the decisions for war not as deliberate, measured choices made by well-informed statesmen, but as decisions made in the dark by leaders who were unaware of the consequences. Going further, several historians propagated the belief that the military had manipulated the civilian leaders into declaring war, or, as George Quester puts it: “at the decisive moment the military took over the direction of affairs and imposed their law.”[11]

Fischer, Taylor, and Historiography during the Cold War

As the Second World War gave way to the Cold War, First World War historiography was revived. Fritz Fischer is the name most associated with this revival, in part due to his namesake "Fischer Thesis", which argued that Germany was, as the first non-German historians had argued during the war, the responsible nation. This of course went against the previously accepted idea that the war had been the collective fault of the governments at the time, and Fischer's book Griff Nach der Weltmacht (Germany's War Aims in the First World War) was hotly debated by other European and American historians alike.[12]

In an era of antiwar sentiments, the First World War was now viewed as something of a pointless conflict, with many in the public pointing towards the interwar instability and Second World War as proof of how hollow the soldiers’ sacrifice had been a half century earlier.[13] With this prevailing mood, the “inadvertent war” theses found greater popularity. A notable work in this regard is A.J.P Taylor’s “War by Timetable”, which proposed that the Great War had been inevitable, accelerated greatly by the meticulous and inflexible mobilization plans that Europe’s powers had developed by 1914.[14]

Beyond the academic debate, the Cold War also influenced popular-history works on the July Crisis. Chief among them is Barbara Tuchman’s The Guns of August, which not only agreed with the “inadvertent war” theses, but portrayed Germany as a “barbaric” and warmongering European power whose armies marched “like predatory ants” across Belgium.[15] To a Western public that was locked in a geopolitical standoff with the monolithic empire of the Soviet Union, such rhetoric may have resonated well.

Current Historiography

In the 1990s, the debate over the origins of World War I began to shift towards what it is in the 21st century. With the Cold War having ended, historians were able to adopt a more disinterested yet critical view of 1914, and the resulting journal articles and theses made several things clear: 

1.     The “larger forces” which had once borne the responsibility of starting the conflict were dismissed. The war was a result of deliberate decisions made by government officials who had a good understanding of what they were getting into. Whilst the “mass demands” may have influenced their mentalities, they did not “force” war as previous historians had argued. 

2.     The military staffs, far from “taking control” of the decision-making bodies, continued to operate within their official capacities. At no point in any of the to-be belligerents did the military concerns override the diplomatic ones that the civilian statesmen possessed.

3.     The diplomatic mentality of the statesmen had been influenced, to varying degrees, by previous diplomatic crises of the 20th century, and investigating why these precedents failed in 1914 is thus a key focus.

Further, as a result of the distance from the First World War, historians in the 1990s emphasized a multinational approach to the matter. No country operated in isolation, and its diplomatic decisions in the lead up to war were influenced by the decisions that the other parties had made. As such, the common trope of assigning “war guilt” is noticeably absent in writings from the 1990s, replaced instead with critical analyses of why and how 1914 differed from a decision-making standpoint in each of the halls of power. 

Thus, there we have a general overview of how the focuses of historiography on the First World War have shifted in the past century, and it would perhaps not be too far-fetched to suggest that these focuses may very well change within the next century too. The next part shall deal with how the current historiography approaches the July Crisis in both its practices and focuses. 

What do you think of World War One historiography? Let us know below.

[1] The other “great powers” in question are Russia, Germany, Britain, and France; joined by the United States in 1917. Other “lesser” powers, whose contributions were still considerable, later included the Ottoman Empire, Bulgaria, Romania, Italy, and Japan. This classification taken from Richard F. Hamilton and Holger H. Herwig (eds.), The Origins of World War I (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 46-50.

[2] The term was first utilized in Eric Hobsbawm, The Age of Extremes: The Short Twentieth Century (London: Abacus).

[3] Margaret MacMillan, The War That Ended Peace: How Europe Abandoned Peace for the First World War (London: Profile Books, 2014), xxix.

[4] Dennis Showalter, “The Great War and its Historiography.” The Historian 68, no. 4 (2006): 713-715

[5] Quoted in Steven W. Siak. “’The Blood That Is in Our Veins Comes from German Ancestors’: British Historians and the Coming of the First World War.” Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned with British Studies 30, no. 2 (1998): 226-7

[6] Another noteworthy synthesis of such source materials is Luigi Alberini’s three-volume The Origins of the War of 1914 (1942 – 1943), which for a time remained the work to consult on the matter.

[7] Heather Jones, “As the Centenary Approaches: The Regeneration of First World War Historiography.” The Historical Journal 56 no. 3 (2013): 860-863

[8] Catherine Ann Cline, “British Historians and the Treaty of Versailles.” Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned with British Studies 20, no. 1 (1988): 46-50

[9] Showalter, “The Great War and Its Historiography.”, 716.

[10] Hamilton and Herwig, The Origins of World War I, 25-33.

[11] Quoted in Hamilton and Herwig, The Origins of World War I, 450.

[12] Frederick A. Hale, “Fritz Fischer and the Historiography of World War One.” The History Teacher 9, no. 2 (1976): 258-260.

[13] Alan Kramer, “Recent Historiography of the First World War (Part I),” Journal of Modern European History / Zeitschrift Für Moderne Europäische Geschichte / Revue D'histoire Européenne Contemporaine 12, no. 2 (2014): 160-161.

[14] Frederick Hale, ”Fritz Fischer and the Historiography of World War One,” The History Teacher 9, no. 2 (1976): 262-267.

[15] These quotations and poor view of the work are taken from Ulrich Trumpener, “The Guns of August by Barbara W. Tuchman,” The Journal of Modern History 35, no. 1 (Mar. 1963): 94-95. 

References

Cline, Catherine Ann. “British Historians and the Treaty of Versailles.” Albion: A Quarterly                           Journal Concerned with British Studies 20, no. 1 (1988): 46-50.                                                                                   https://www.jstor.org/stable/4049797.

Hale, Frederick A. "Fritz Fischer and the Historiography of World War One." The History                 Teacher 9, no. 2 (1976): 258-79.  https://www.jstor.org/stable/492292

Herwig, Holger H., and Hamilton, Richard F., eds. The Origins of World War I. Cambridge:             Cambridge University Press, 2003.

Jones, Heather. "As The Centenary Approaches: The Regeneration of First World War                   Historiography." The Historical Journal 56, no. 3 (2013): 857-                  78.http://www.jstor.org/stable/24529097.

Kramer, Alan. "Recent Historiography of the First World War (Part I)." Journal of Modern             European History / Zeitschrift Für Moderne Europäische Geschichte / Revue D'histoire   Européenne Contemporaine 12, no. 1 (2014): 5-                28. https://www.jstor.org/stable/26266110.

MacMillan, Margaret. The War That Ended Peace: How Europe Abandoned Peace for the                First World War. London: Profile Books Ltd., 2014.

Showalter, Dennis. "The Great War and Its Historiography." The Historian 68, no. 4 (2006):        713-21. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24453743.

Steven W. Siak. ""The Blood That Is in Our Veins Comes from German Ancestors": British              Historians and the Coming of the First World War." Albion: A Quarterly Journal                                Concerned with British Studies 30, no. 2 (1998): 221-52.                 https://www.jstor.org/stable/4053522.

Trumpener, Ulrich. “The Guns of August by Barbara W. Tuchman.” The Journal of Modern History 35, no. 1 (1963): 94-95.https://doi.org/10.1086/243637.

Unsinkable Sam: The Cat that Survived Three War Ships Sinking in World War 2

Unsinkable Sam was a rather famous cat during World War 2. He managed to escape from three ships that were sunk. Nikhil Vemu explains this quite incredible tale.

HMS Cossack.

Ever imagined a cat would survive bullets and bomb blasts in a battle and finally would get into someone’s good hands to lead a peaceful, Garfield-like life thereafter?

Yes, it did exist in history, but is much forgotten. Not a fiction, not a movie. It’s the cat famously named ‘Unsinkable Sam’.

Why was the cat named so?

Though the cat was first named Oscar, he’s widely known as ‘Unsinkable Sam’ because he miraculously survived threewarships sinking in World War II when countless trained navy men died of drowning.

And how he survived three times, God knows.

Basic history of the cat

Sam, when his name wasn’t Sam, worked as a ‘ship’s cat’ for the German battleship Bismarck in World War-II.

Wait.. What? Ship’s cat? Yes, ship’s cat.

Dating back from ancient times to recent history, cats were carried along on ships by shipmen. They helped control rodents on ships, which could otherwise damage vital ropes, furniture and electrical wires. They’re called ship’s cats.

Tom and jerry episode 71 cruise cat part 2 - YouTube:

Ever watched this episode of Tom & Jerry? Tom works as a ship's cat here. He tries to kill Jerry, the mischievous rodent, on the ship.>>>

The year of his birth is unknown. He started being a ship’s cat for Germany in 1941, and died in 1955 in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

He’s a black and white patched cat, and all cats are cute, at least for me. Here’s his photo.

He worked in the ships:

• Battleship Bismarck of Germany.

• Destroyer HMS Cossack of Britain.

• Aircraft Carrier HMS Ark Royal of Britain.

I. What happened in Bismarck?

The cat was supposed to be owned by a German crewman on Bismarck. He was on-board in May 1941 for the mission ‘Operation Rheinübung’.

After a fierce battle by that only ship with 13 British and Polish ships, only 114 of over 2,100 of Bismarck's crew survived.

Hours later, the cat was found floating on a wooden board and was rescued by the rival ship HMS Cossack of the British Royal Navy, where he was named Oscar.

Why was he named ‘Oscar’?

When some crewmen of HMS Cossack found the cat in the sea, they shouted, “Oscar..! Oscar..!” Why?

Oscar (also Man Overboard), in the International Code of Signals, is an exclamation used to indicate if a person has fallen off a ship and needs immediate rescue.

After they successfully pulled him up, they felt he needed a name as he would be their new ship’s cat. If he were talking tom, he’d have spoken out his name. Unfortunately, he’s not. Also, his real owner must have died. So they newly named him after the signal as Oscar.

II. What happened in HMS Cossack?

Days were comfortable for Oscar on HMS Cossack, but they remained so only for the next few months, until a revenge torpedo launched by the German submarine U-563, hit the ship in October 1941.

Big fires spread and they were unable to drive the ship. They tried to tow the ship towards Gibraltar, a British overseas territory. However, due to the weather conditions, they had to leave the ship behind while the crew (and the cat) were inside. An explosion has blown off one-third of its forward section, killing 159 of its crewmembers.

To everyone’s astonishment, Oscar survived this blast too. He was brought to Gibraltar’s shore, and was named ‘Unsinkable Sam’ — as he survived two ships sinking till then, and that too without anyone’s help or protection.

Sam was then transferred to the Aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal, which was coincidentally a major player along with HMS Cossack in the hunt for Bismarck.

III. What happened in HMS Ark Royal?

Sam spent the least time in this aircraft carrier - only one month. In November 1941, the ship was torpedoed by German submarine U-81. Attempts were made to tow the ship to the port, but rapid water inflow made it heavier and it became tougher to tow. So the Royal Navy had to leave the ship and only rescue the crew.

Fortunately, there wasn’t much loss of life this time. Only one in all the crewmen died. All the survivors, including Sam, who was found clinging to a plank, were rescued by other ships. Sam was depicted here as “angry, but quite unharmed”.

The end of Sam’s career as ship’s cat

After the tremendous loss of Ark Royal, Sam wasn’t used as a ship’s cat anymore. He was sent ashore to let him enjoy his retired life thereafter. He safely lived the rest of his life in the ‘Home for Sailors’ in Belfast, and died of old age in 1955.

The painting of Unsinkable Sam by the artist Georgina Shaw-Baker is still preserved by the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich.

What do you think of Unsinkable Sam? Let us know below.

The 1943 Trident Conference: A Path to Victory in World War 2

The 1943 Trident Conference involved the two-key World War II allies of the USA and Britain. Prime Minister Winston Churchill traveled to Washington to meet President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Here, William Floyd Jr. looks at what happened during the conference and its impact on the later years of World War II.

Churchill and Roosevelt fishing - when taking a break from the conference. Source: FDR Presidential Library & Museum, available here.

On May 10, 1943, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, identifying himself as “Naval Person”, wrote to President Franklin Roosevelt from on board the ocean liner, “Queen Mary”, “Since yesterday we have been surrounded by U.S. Navy and we all greatly appreciate high value you evidently set upon our continued survival. I look forward to being at White House with you tomorrow afternoon, and also going to Hyde Park with you at weekend. The voyage has been so far most agreeable and Staff have done vast amount of work.”

The ocean liner “Queen Mary” had made her first voyage on May 27, 1936, as a passenger liner, primarily sailing on the North Atlantic until 1967. With the beginning of World War II, it was converted to a military ship transporting Allied soldiers. Her colors of red, white, and black were now gone under a pewter gray to make the ship less visible. She would become known as the “Gray Ghost.” On Tuesday morning, May 11, 1943, she would arrive in New York carrying her very special passengers, the Prime Minister and about one hundred staff. The ship also had 5,000 German prisoners, on board, captured in the North African Campaign and bound for POW camps in the American Southwest.

The Prime Minister and his staff would be meeting with the President and his aides to map out a plan to bring the war to a successful conclusion. Waiting at the dock to greet the Prime Minister was the President’s closest aide, Harry Hopkins, along with a special presidential train for the trip to Washington D.C. As the train came to a stop at Union Station, the limousines pulled onto the platform. The President was lifted from the lead vehicle and placed in a wheelchair. All of Roosevelt’s symptoms of stress and age seemed to go away at the sight of the Prime Minister approaching in his yacht squadron uniform. The two men beamed at each other before driving off to the conference. The President insisted that the Prime Minister stay at the White House.

The Trident Conference would become one of many between the United States and Great Britain including Casablanca, Quebec, Cairo, Tehran, Malta, Yalta, and Potsdam. Soviet leader Joseph Stalin attended the Tehran, Yalta, and Potsdam Conferences.

Objectives

The first meeting of the conference took place at the White House on May 12, 1943 at 2:30 P.M. The President, Prime Minister, and their staffs would be in attendance. The President welcomed Mr. Churchill and the British Chiefs of Staff stating that it was very appropriate that they should meet again just as Operation Torch (North African Campaign) was coming to a satisfactory conclusion. He also said that he thought the keynote should be to employ every resource of men and munitions against the enemy. Nothing that could be brought to bear should be allowed to stand idle.

He then asked the Prime Minister to open the discussion. Churchill would deliver some opening remarks and then proceeded to go through a number of objectives to consider. The first objective was the Mediterranean Theatre. The great prize was to get Italy out of the war by whatever means possible. The second objective should be taking the weight off of the USSR. Stalin had stated that the best way of taking the weight off of the Soviet front, in 1943, would be to knock Italy out of the war forcing the Germans to send a large number of troops, from the Soviet front to hold down the Balkans. The third objective, as mentioned by the President, was to apply the greatest possible numbers of our armed forces for the campaign. The fourth objective was to make it absolutely clear that his majesty’s government earnestly desired to undertake a full-scale invasion of the continent. The fifth and final objective should be aid to China and the hope that the USSR could be brought in for the fight against Japan.

In his closing statement the Prime Minister stated that he hoped his remarks would help to frame an agenda for the Combined Chiefs of Staff and serve as a guide for their discussions. The President expressed his gratitude to the Prime Minister for the open way in which he had presented his views.

The conference in Washington D.C. happened at a time of greater optimism for the Allies. There had been success in North Africa, a number of islands in the Pacific had been retaken, the Soviet Union had withstood the siege of Stalingrad, the battle of the Atlantic was turning in favor of the Allies, and preparations were going forward for Operation Husky (the invasion of Sicily).

Discussions

One of the main topics was that, if the British were interested in further operations in the Mediterranean Theatre while the Americans were insistent that these actions be limited so they would not interfere with a cross-Channel invasion in 1944. If the British would not commit themselves to the European invasion of Western Europe in 1944, then all bets were off and the United States would focus on Japan. There was much disagreement, even among those on the same side as to what the next step should be. However, Churchill and his generals were thus far right in that it was imperative to attack the Italian mainland, which was the only battlefield where Anglo-American ground forces could engage the Germans in 1943. Other topics of discussion included an increase in air attacks on Axis targets with an emphasis on the bombing of oil fields, recapturing Burma from the Japanese and reopening the supply line to China. There was also discussion of refugees leaving Europe, but no final decision was arrived at.

The President and Prime Minister had spent ample time together when they met for the 1943 conference, so they were used to each other’s moods for better or worse. They were each comfortable through the long hours of conversation. When the subject of the 1944 presidential election came up, Churchill told Roosevelt, “I simply can’t go on without you.” Churchill would write to Clementine from Washington, “Although after 12 arduous years he would gladly be quit of it. It would be painful to leave with the war unfinished and break the theme of his action. To me this would be a disaster of the first magnitude.” The United States and Britain, Churchill said in Washington, “could pull out of any mess together.” In Roosevelt’s mind, however, Churchill had become less of a force to contend with and was now a permanent part of Roosevelt’s universe, one in which he was in charge. 

During his time in Washington, Churchill would give another full -scale address to Congress. It was again a success. According to his typing secretary, Churchill spent nine and a half hours dictating it to her and it commanded the approval of the President.

After opening remarks on May 12, the first meeting would take place in Roosevelt’s oval study, a small hideaway above the Blue Room. As would be expected nautical paintings and etchings decorated the walls. The President would sit in his armless wheelchair greeting the Prime Minister and ten other men mostly from the Combined Chiefs. At this conference, the Americans were much better prepared than they had been at Casablanca where they felt they had been outfoxed by the British.

The President’s advisers worked hard to overcome what many thought was the biggest obstacle to American strategic leadership: Roosevelt himself, and his willingness to be swayed by Churchill’s oratory. The U.S. Joint Chiefs had met with Roosevelt three days before and had gotten from him a promise to press the British for a commitment to a cross-Channel invasion of Europe. They also reminded the President that a large segment of the American public considered the Japanese the real enemy. 

The President and Prime Minister would meet six times with the Combined Chiefs of Staff at the White House over the course of the conference. The Combined Chiefs, themselves, would meet almost every day in the Board of Governor’s Room at the Federal Reserve Building. On May 15 the two staffs had been able to take a rest-and-relaxation break at nearby Williamsburg, Virginia, the restored capital of 18th century Virginia. They would tour the town and feast on traditional foods of that era. Everyone from both sides seemed to enjoy themselves.

Final outcomes

Back in Washington, the meetings would continue until May 25. However, many major decisions would be reached on Wednesday, the nineteenth. On May 21, the Combined Chiefs presented their results to the President and the Prime Minister. In his diary Sir Alan Brooke, Chief of the Imperial General Staff, wrote, “We spent about one and a half hours listening to PM and President and holding forth on strategy and shivering lest either of them should suddenly put their foot right into it and reopen some of the differences which we had reconciled with some difficulty! ... Thank heaven we got through safely!” Brook spoke too soon. Three days after writing this, he again stated in his diary that Churchill, “wished to repudiate half” of the agreement, “which would have crashed the whole” agreement. Fortunately, Roosevelt’s adviser, Harry Hopkins, was able to get the Prime Minister to withdraw his revisions and only do minor rewording of some text.

The result of the Trident Conference, as that of Casablanca, for the near future pointed to the continuation of both the Mediterranean and Pacific offensives. However, barriers had been set at the Washington meetings to contain or limit the Mediterranean advance and these plans had mostly shifted to operations, which would set the stage for the planned cross-Channel invasion. There had also been progress in putting together the Pacific and European operations into tentative long-range planning in the war against both Japan and Germany. As welcome as these signs were to military planners, events would soon indicate that all the pieces in the worldwide strategic puzzle had not yet fallen into place and that the Mediterranean issue was still far from finished.

Ending the conference

At 4:00 P.M. on May 25, exactly two weeks after his arrival in Washington, Churchill walked down the corridor to the oval office. He would be leaving by flying boat from the Potomac River the next morning. After much debate, the code name for this departure would be “Neptune.” Roosevelt sat in his armless wheelchair, with Churchill now at his side, and gave a nod to let a large number of reporters in. “We are awfully glad to have Mr. Churchill back here,” the President told the gathering. “Considering the size of our problems, these discussions have been done in practically record time.” When asked about our plans for the future, Churchill replied, “Our plans for the future are to wage this war until unconditional surrender is procured from all those who have molested us, and this applies equally to Asia and Europe.”

     At the final Trident meeting with the Combined Chiefs and the President, Churchill proposed that Marshall accompany him to Algeria where they would meet with General Eisenhower. Churchill hoped to get from Ike irreversible promises to launch a campaign on the Italian mainland soon after “Husky.” Churchill also intended to try and get Marshall to accept some of his further plans in the eastern Mediterranean. However, Marshall remained skeptical as to the wisdom of invading mainland Italy. He would forcefully remind Churchill and the others that they had set a definite date for the cross-Channel attack in France for May 1, 1944.

     Eisenhower stated that the invasion of the Italian mainland would be an easy operation. Marshall disagreed. In fact, the invasion of Italy would be a bloody twenty-four month long struggle up the Italian boot that would cost the Allies more than three hundred thousand casualties, including 23,500 American deaths, and would turn most of the country into a wasteland.

What do you think of the Trident Conference? Let us know below.

Now read William’s article on three great early influences on Thomas Jefferson here.

Sources

1.     Rick Atkinson, The Day of Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy, 1943-1944 (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2007).

2.     Chapter VI-The Trident Conference-New Patterns: 1943, history.army.mil.

3.     Debi and Irwin Unger, General Marshall (New York: Harper Collins, 2014).

4.     The Trident Conference: May 1943, U.S. Government Bookstore, https://bookstore.gpo.gov.

5.     Trident Conference Home, Eisenhower Presidential Papers and Minutes of Meetings, https://www.eisenhowerlibrary.gov.

6.     Gerhard L. Weinberg, A World at Arms: A Global History of World War II (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994).

7.     Max Hastings, The World at War: 1939-1945 (New York: Random House, 2011).

8.     The Trident Conference-May 1943 by Joint History Office (U.S.)

9.     Jon Meacham. Franklin and Winston: An Intimate Portrait of an Epic Friendship (New York: Random House, 2003).

10.  Andrew Roberts, Churchill: Walking with Destiny (New York: Penguin Random House, 2018).

11.  Roy Jenkins, Churchill: A Biography (New York: Penguin Group, 2002).

12.  The Trident Conference, Defense Media Network.

The British who Fought for the Nazi’s Infamous SS

A number of British and other colonial forces joined the Nazi SS during World War Two. These were usually captured individuals who decided to join the Nazi-supporting British Free Corps (BFC). The Nazis intended to use it as a propaganda tool to divide the Allies and help in battles – but instead the incompetence of the unit meant that it was a burden on the Nazis. Steve Prout returns to the site and explains.

Kenneth Berry and Alfred Minchin, members of the British Free Corps, with German officers in April 1944.

World War Two paints the picture of the Nazi SS as a brutal, ruthless yet elite fighting force second to none.  It closely followed a strict and stringent recruitment policy based on Nazi ideology - they were the Germans Army’s military special forces recruiting only the finest.

In the final stages of the war the Germans had exhausted much of its supply of experienced soldiers. The SS widened their recruiting net to include foreign nationals in the POW camps.  The SS approached certain Britons with fascist sympathies (most of which had memberships with Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists prior to the war).  It is these British volunteers that made up a very peculiar crew when they were drafted into the SS.

John Amery – The Founder

John Amery was the son of the renowned politician Leopold Amery.  He was an ardent fascist and member of the British Union of Fascists. He led a life in complete contrast to his father with a string of business failures and numerous embarrassments. A life that ended at the gallows. 

Seeking to escape this self-inflicted stigma he left England to participate in the Spanish Civil War on the Franco side with a fellow French Fascist Jacques Doriot.  

Amery would embellish his account on his brief contribution to that war. He then travelled to France with Doriot to soon earn the disdain of the new Vichy government. This strained relationship would cause him numerous inconveniences and restrictions. Doriot helped him escape from France in 1943 to Germany where the Nazis would hear Amery’s ideas.

Amery proposed to the Germans the establishment of what would become the BFC - British Free Corps, which would be a detachment of the SS to fight on the Eastern front.  It was not an original plan as Doriot his friend had already formed a French version.

The Germans had other successes as France and Holland provided twenty thousand volunteers each, the Baltic and Russian states offered over one hundred thousand, and an Indian detachment of nearly five thousand amongst others.  The Germans now had hopes for a British detachment for propaganda purposes to upset British-Soviet relations.

The Team

Amery was hoping to replicate these successes and so he started to select a core of British and Commonwealth POWs to build his army for action on the Eastern Front in its crusade against communism.  The team he would select would be one of a very poor quality and make a very curious crew.  His participation terminated in late 1943, forced upon by the exasperated Germans. 

The original name, “Legion of St George”, was abandoned and was replaced by the “British Free Corps” suggested by new member Alfred Minchin (being his only noteworthy contribution combat or otherwise). 

The name itself, the British Free Corps, was misleading as the group was not exclusively British. New Zealanders, numerous Australians, South Africans and some Canadians were all identified post WWII.

The group would be largely comprised of “poor types”.  Listing and commenting on every member would offer no value but the ones presented in this piece largely represent the quality of this anomalous military faction. Out of a rumored one thousand who applied most would be rejected. The group never exceeded more than thirty but that reduced to seven as the war neared its end.

The Sum of the Parts 

1.The BFC’s own “Walter Mitty” 

Douglas Berville-Claye had many aliases and back-stories and cut a colorful figure. In fact, he could have been one of the first real life Walter Mitty’s. His early military career saw him failing his pilot training and swiftly going AWOL to partake in a bigamist marriage. He would spend most of his life impersonating officers, funding his life by all kinds of fraudulent means. He would deceptively work his way to an officer’s rank in the SAS where on his first mission in Crete he was captured.

After his capture he quickly fell afoul of his fellow POWs and was sent to the BFC by an officer in the German Army, Felix Steiner, who like the British before him believed his boasts and put him in an officer role.  

He pretended to be many things, fooling both the British and Germans. He was not a man committed to anything Pro–Nazi or Anti-Soviet but only to himself. If anything, he was a proficient con man and chancer caught up between two sides in the war.

His deceptive ways would continue long after the war, landing him in all kinds of trouble with the law but not for membership of the BFC - where the evidence against him was inadmissible.

2.The Deserters and Time Wasters

There were plenty of time wasters and no shortage of deserters. A few only stayed a few days before requesting to be returned to their detention camps as in the case of Robert Chipchase, an Australian. and numerous others like him. A large number were brutally coerced and would soon leave and those that remained were of little fighting value.  

If there was such a term as a “serial deserter” then Herbert Rowlands fitted that description.  He had deserted from The International Brigade in the Spanish Civil War fighting for the Republicans.  The war would see him desert the British Army to join the German side and swiftly desert again. Indeed, a man of no dedicated, commitment or cause.  Most would desert as the tide of the war turned against Germany.

3.The Womanizers

For many the BFC offered a chance to indulge in womanizing and access to alcohol away from the dull life of internment. They were oblivious to the future consequences.  William Alexander was one example.  

An Australian, Roy Barker, a man deemed by Thomas Cooper (he will have a special mention shortly) of “inferior intelligence” joined for the same women and alcohol and when the crucial call to duty arrived, he would smoke aspirin to get himself medically discharged on the eve of battle.  

George Croft was hated by fellow POWs, fled to the BFC, and would swiftly contract gonorrhea.   

Both Edward Jacobs and Charlie Munn had their conduct used as blackmail against them by the Germans. They would soon serve a short period of service before being rejected and returned to isolation camps.

4.The Criminal Faction

Eric Pleasants was not a military man at the start of the war and was removed from the Channel Islands after he was caught by the Germans with fellow prisoner and future BFC member John Leicester burgling the homes of the residents. They were both dispatched to a French prison where they would lie and pretend to be Merchant Seamen to obtain better rations, which led them to the BFC. 

Both were also classic time wasters as Pleasants’ left the BFC in January 1944 only to re-join a few short months later after finding the labor camps too harsh.  He and Lester made their intentions clear that being conscientious objectors before the war they had no plans to fight on the Russian Front.  In fact, they admitted to fellow member Minchin that they only sought a good time. The end of the war would see him incarcerated in a Soviet gulag until his release in 1952.  He made spurious claims, included killing two Soviet soldiers with his bare hands (interestingly he did not incur the wrath of the Soviets who killed others for less). The British did not prosecute, acknowledging that his punishment in the Soviet gulag was sufficient.

Roy Courlander, a New Zealander, one of the “Big Six” prominent members, was also of a criminal background.  He had been convicted on charges of burglary in New Zealand before the war.  He bizarrely posed as a White Russian Immigrant to justify his anti-Soviet views despite being London born.  His choice for joining the SS was surprising with him having a Lithuanian father of Jewish descent.

When he was assigned to recruitment drives in the internment camps or leading propaganda broadcasts, he would focus his energies undermining Amery for control of the group, sensing that he was falling out of favor with the Germans. 

Not only did Courlander turn against his country but towards the end of the war he deserted the Germany side as well. Finding that he was on the losing side he quickly deserted and joined the Belgian resistance to fight against the Germans. We are unsure of his contribution there, but it did not save him from a fifteen-year sentence at the end of the war.

Tom Perkins, a purported pre-war prison officer would find himself expelled through concealing a pistol to sell on. Interestingly, Cooper suspected that Perkins’ knowledge of prisons was not from his claim to being a prison officer but from the experiences of “being inside the cell rather than the outside.”

5.Other Undesirables

Kenneth Berry, Amery’s first and only lasting recruit, was in his post-trial considered a “young fool” who again would offer nothing to the project due to his inexperience (perhaps reflected in his seven-month prison sentence).  John Wilson, a sexually obsessed and former poor performing commando, the only officer material to be recruited quickly, showed his ineptitude in leadership and quickly had himself appointed to a liaison position to avoid actual combat.  

Hugh Cowie is also worthy of a special mention for his racist behavior and incessant scandals. He insisted on a whites only organization and saw to the removal of six Maoris who they sought to enlist.  One could argue Cowie did the allies a service by depriving the project of six willing members.  It is interesting that other accounts name a Roland Barker for these racist objections.  It is not impossible that both were guilty of sharing similar views

Frank MacLardy, a captured army medical officer (one of the Big Six), also did little to assist the movement.  He was an ardent member of the British Fascist Party prior to the war. He was not an unintelligent man being a trained Pharmacist and Treasurer of the BUF. His extreme views would result in fighting between him and his fellow BFC members. It would also be the only fighting he would be involved in.

MacLardy tried on several occasions to use his failing health as a means of repatriation and joined the BUF for a more comfortable existence. At the first sign of hostilities and not before did he make his escape and surrender to the advancing American army.  His inactivity, disruptive tendencies and general ineffectiveness served his country well with its detrimental effect on the corps.

6.The Worst of the Worst

Thomas Cooper was the only one to be branded and accused of being a war criminal.  Thomas Cooper left Britain a bitter and rejected man for Nazi Germany in 1938. He had failed to secure any positions when he applied for all sections of the armed forces and the police force. He had joined the British Union of Fascists and quickly established contact with the Nazis.

After a brief spell of private tutoring in Germany he was approached to join the SS in 1940. He was quickly drafted and served in several capacities before moving to the BFC.  He was also rumored to be complicit in numerous war crimes involving alleged genocidal activities in Krakow.  However, this was unproven - despite his retracted boasts and testimonies from former unreliable BFC members.

He remained bitter to his home country and looked forward to German victory and occupation so he could take out his revenge on those who excluded him, in his words “settle scores with people who refused him work.”

He also secretly undermined Amery for control of the group, sensing that Amery fell out of favor with the German High Command. 

Courlander’s treachery went full circle. Towards the end of the war, he deserted the German ranks after realizing that he was on the losing side and joined the Belgian resistance. It did not however save him from a fifteen-year sentence at the war’s end.

7. A few good apples

There were genuine saboteurs within the ranks.

Thomas Freeman was first to assign to the BFC the label as “poor types”.  Freeman would face no charges proving that he used the BFC as a ruse then means of escape, which he succeeded in. He helped identify several BFC members after the war.

Sergeant John Henry Brown requires special mention as he was awarded the DMC for his conduct in feeding back intelligence and subtly sabotaging the efforts of the recruitment drive.  Throughout his captivity he exploited German confidence to undermine the BFC. He was so convincing that his own side believed him to be a real collaborator.

Scharper was one of the German officers who was now responsible for recruiting. He subjected newly captured Allied soldiers to psychological and physical torture who were isolated, still in shock and vulnerable.  The idea was while in this state they would be easier to coerce into joining the BFC. He assisted other BFC members, notably Edward Martin. The effect would only be for the short term.  

Sergeant John Brown convinced Cooper that coerced recruits would not be conducive to a stable team. As they gathered in numbers in the BFC camps, being no longer isolated, the majority demanded their retraction.

Conclusion

Given the quality of the individuals it was inevitable that the BFC failed to achieve its objectives. Many were put on trial after the war, resulting in one execution and the rest barely serving a fraction of their sentences. The matter was quickly forgotten amid the post-war challenges.

This whole debacle was more of a benefit to the Allied cause (albeit unintentionally) owing to the combined ineffectiveness of these “poor types”.  The Germans had taken the worst of the British POWs and unwittingly installed a problem child inside their own military machine. The quality of the men would only result in failure. The time wasted on supervision, the running of the camps, training, discipline, recaptures of escapees and general administration on indoctrination and membership turnover meant that a piece of the German war effort had been distracted. 

A South African namely Doug Marden was given charge of the BFC in April 1945.  He would report back to his German commanders shortly before fighting that they were not fit for purpose (which was true). Subsequently they were then consigned to unimportant logistical support duties.

The intended propaganda tool to split the Allied coalition became an embarrassment as well as a spectacular failure for the Germans. Perhaps moving these errant individuals from the camps was a blessing for the many loyal ones - and keeping their shortcomings from contaminating the active Allied ranks.

Let us know what you think of the article below.

Now read Steve’s article on Britain’s relations with the Great Dictators in the inter-war years here.

Bibliography

Renegades: Hitler’s Englishmen – Adrian Weale- 1994 – Random House – (Kindle)

Britische Freikorps: British Volunteers in the Waffen SS 1943-1945 – Richard Landwehr – 1992- Merriman Press

Jewish Virtual Library

The Partition of India and the World’s Largest Forced Migration

The 1947 Partition of India followed the end of British rule in India. It divided India up to a Hindu-majority India and a Muslim-majority Pakistan. Here, Rezaul Karim Reza explains how this happened and the long-term implications.

A refugee train traveling to Punjab in Pakistan.

Whenever I pay a visit to Hili, the nearest border that divides India and Bangladesh, I kick the dirt below my boot, and inculpate the British lawyer, Cyril Radcliffe who drew the lines that divided India in 1947. The partition now does not allow me to meet the people who speak the same language, wear the same clothes, and smell the same air in Bengal. 

Although I criticize Cyril Radcliffe mostly, it was not actually Radcliffe alone to demarcate India. It was the then British Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, and the last Viceroy of India, Mountbatten. And it was the Indian politicians - Jawaharlal Nehru, Mahatma Gandhi, and Muhammad Ali Jinnah.

The End of the British Raj 

Britain faced financial hardship and lack of resources to control its overextended empire in India in 1947, just after the end of WWII, when British Prime Minister Clement Attlee decided to end the two hundred year long British colonial rule in India. Attlee sent Mountbatten as the last Viceroy of India, where he would soon transfer power to the Indian leaders. 

By then, people in the subcontinent came to know that the British were leaving, and they were going to be free soon. But a fear and suspicion swept through the Indian Muslim community, a sizable minority in the region. They thought that they would be discriminated and tortured under the Hindu dominant India, so they wanted a separate country. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the leader of Indian Muslim League, a political party established in 1906, took this opportunity. He urged the Muslims to unite for a separate country. His focus ultimately shifted on creating ‘Pakistan.’

On the other hand, the Hindus disliked the idea of breaking up India. Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru, the leaders of the Indian National Congress, which was established in 1885, disagreed with the Muslims. The disagreement between the two party leaders and the contradiction among the people resulted in violent riots and clashes between Hindus and Muslims. One such brutal clash occurred in Calcutta, the capital of the British Indian province of Bengal in 1946.

The Great Calcutta Killing

‘The Great Calcutta Killing’ or ‘The Direct Action Day’ turned the city of Calcutta into war-ravaged havoc in 1946. Corpses strewn, houses burnt, and businesses vandalized. The Muslims attacked the Hindus and the Hindus the Muslims. They abducted, raped, and killed underage girls, young ladies, and old women in broad daylight. During the four day –long violence, the death toll was between 5,000 and 10,000, with 15,000 wounded. After Calcutta, the riot passed through many other major cities across India, including Mumbai, Delhi, and Lucknow. The Hindu – Muslim riot shook the British and they thought Partition was inevitable. So, Mountbatten decided to declare ‘Partition’ and leave India in 1947, a year before planned, thinking the more they waited, the more disagreements arose.

Muhammad Ali Jinnah was happy with partition, hoping to be prime minister of newly created ‘Pakistan.’ Jawaharlal Nehru reluctantly agreed. Gandhi disagreed but it was too late because the British were in a hurry. Now, the leaders were ready to make partition happen. Mountbatten called upon Radcliffe to divide the country upon religious demography.

Radcliffe had little idea about India. He did not know anything of Bengal and Punjab. Yet, a man of such inexperience was given only five weeks to draw a map that eventually displaced millions of people. From the outdated maps and census data, he drew the map dividing Muslim majority Pakistan and Hindu majority India. But his pen cut through two key provinces of British India - Bengal and Punjab.

Divide Bengal and Punjab

Muslim majority East Bengal (Bangladesh today) joined Pakistan and the Hindu majority West Bengal went with India. In the Punjab, Sikh and Hindu majority East Punjab joined India while the Muslim majority West Punjab went with Pakistan. Now the so-called borders were set, creating two new countries – India and Pakistan. But, all of a sudden, a mass migration shook the two countries.

Forced Migration

Ethnic cleansing, arson, riots, looting, vandalism – fresh violence erupted across India and Pakistan. People started moving. Villagers started selling up and moving on. They were moving with their cattle, cats, and clothes. Women were moving with their babies in their laps and men with their belongings packed in sacks on their soldiers. Some peaceful Hindus and Muslims hugged each other and shook hands. Tears rolled down their cheeks. They said good-bye to their century old parental houses for a destination unknown. A desperate journey began. The peaceful unpaved country roads suddenly turned into migrant roads. They were all moving – Hindus to India and Muslims to Pakistan.

The displaced migrants walked on foot, rode in bullock carts, and travelled by trains. Many people walked for days and weeks to reach their unknown destiny. During the desperate journey, children starved to death, while old people coughed frequently and stopped breathing suddenly.  People died and dead bodies scattered by roadside ditches were torn apart by vultures. 

They became homeless overnight and found their shacks in the refugee camps. Diseases soon swept across those unhealthy camps and the death toll soared. The partition displaced about 15 million people, killed more than 1 million, and thousands of women were abducted and raped. Besides the brutal British legacy of ‘Divide and Rule,’ the partition kept India and Pakistan in a long-term enmity that has resulted in three major wars between the two countries. 

War

One such war broke out in 1971 when Bangladesh was eventually created in East Pakistan, some 1,200 miles from West Pakistan. Now, Bangladesh borders India. Despite having strong ties, and lasting friendship, Indian border security forces killed their Bangladeshi counterparts. The victims ranged from cattle traders to smugglers and innocent civilians. Once a friend, India is now a foe to many people in Bangladesh, especially to those who are living in the border areas.   

Prior to the Bangladesh War, India and Pakistan had two more major wars in Kashmir. Radcliffe did not draw a map for Kashmir because the Kashmiri, unlike many other Princely States, wanted to be an independent country. But it failed to be so and the dispute over Kashmir sparked tension that resulted in the first Indo –Pak War in 1947, just after the partition, and the second one in 1965.

Although the two countries have maintained a ceasefire since 2003, border skirmishes create panic among the people on both sides frequently. The legacy of the British Raj has now created enmity among the three countries – India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. 

What do you think of the article? Let us know below.

Rezaul is a substitute English teacher, a history enthusiast, and a freelance contributor based in Rangpur, Bangladesh. His works have appeared in the Christian Science Monitor and Reader’s Digest. 

Wernher von Braun – Dangerous Nazi or Hero of the Space Race? Part 3 – von Braun’s Beliefs

Wernher von Braun came to America from Germany after World War II as part of Operation Paperclip. He went on to play a major role in the Cold War’s Space Race with his expertise of rockets. However, views of von Braun are being reassessed as the terrible role he played in Nazi Germany has come to the fore in recent years. Victor Gamma looks at von Braun’s beliefs and how much responsibility he needs to take for Nazi atrocities below.

Read part 1 on Von Braun’s life here, and part 2 on the evidence here.

Von Braun with Fritz Todt, who used forced labor across the parts of Europe occupied by the Nazis. Von Braun is wearing the Nazi party badge on his suit lapel. Source: Bundesarchiv, Bild 146-1978-Anh.023-02 / CC-BY-SA 3.0, available here.

What about the photos of him wearing a swastika badge or an SS uniform? This does not prove he was an ideological Nazi either. The nature of the regime meant that gestures of at least outward loyalty must be performed. That is a characteristic of a dictatorship. During the Third Reich many people joined the Nazi party for a variety of reasons, some of which had nothing to do with loyalty to party ideology. For instance, the stellar economic performance of the Hitler regime motivated many to support Hitler and join the National Socialist party organization in some capacity. The evidence is fairly clear that this was the case with von Braun. Witnesses testify that he wore the SS uniform on certain occasions when it was required or expedient to do so and no more. In the last years of the war, Hitler grew increasingly paranoid. More and more, he only trusted those “tried and true National Socialists,” such as the SS. The wearing of the SS uniform meant protection for the wearer. Von Braun, having been arrested once, could not give Himmler any excuse to do so again.

The accusation of von Braun as an amoral sycophant devoid of any moral sense does not entirely hold up either. A more accurate view, based on numerous eyewitness testimonies and an understanding of the era, is that von Braun, like so many Germans, did not foresee the extent of the atrocities that would take place, and, once aware they were happening, overlooked them. Nonetheless, at least some of his decisions were at least partially motivated by ethical concerns. When it came time, at the end of the war, to decide which side deserved his rocket secrets, he employed moral reasoning hostile to the atheistic communist regime of Stalin. Commenting on his surrendering to the Americans in May 1945, von Braun stated:

We knew that we had created a new means of warfare, and the question as to what nation, to what victorious nation we were willing to entrust this brainchild of ours was a moral decision more than anything else. We wanted to see the world spared another conflict such as Germany had just been through, and we felt that only by surrendering such a weapon to people who are guided not by the laws of materialism but by Christianity and humanity could such an assurance to the world be best secured.

A study of von Braun’s life reveals that these sentiments reflect a developing personal moral viewpoint that evolved into a strong and fully formed religious belief system in subsequent years. Over time he progressed from a relatively irreligious technician to a man of deep and abiding faith. As director of America’s space effort he stated, "In this age of space flight, when we use the modern tools of science to advance into new regions of human activity, the Bible - this grandiose, stirring history of the gradual revelation and unfolding of the moral law - remains in every way an up-to-date book.” The above quotes are just two of dozens by von Braun.

Additionally, evidence shows plainly that the great rocketeer warmly embraced not only American citizenship but also American values. In April 1955, von Braun and his fellow German scientists became American citizens. Von Braun told the press at the time, “This is the happiest and most significant day in my life. I must say we all became American citizens in our hearts long ago.” By that time, Dr. von Braun’s personal convictions and worldview were antithetical to both the official paganism of the Nazi state or the official atheism of the Soviet Union. Wernher von Braun summed up his philosophy as follows: “The ethical guidelines of religion are the bonds that can hold our civilization together. Without them man can never attain that cherished goal of lasting peace with himself, his God, and his fellowman."

Just how Guilty?

Nonetheless, we cannot completely excuse von Braun from his involvement to some extent with atrocities, even if indirectly. His guilt is beyond doubt. The question rather, is just how guilty? After the war he attempted to portray Germany’s rocket program as unstained by the stain of atrocities going on elsewhere. Unfortunately, the record reveals otherwise. The problem began by 1942. Germany, facing desperate manpower shortages, began turning to prisoner and slave labor to meet its production needs. This included a forced-labor camp for the Peenemunde rocket program set up by the SS. After the Allied bombing of Peenemunde on August 17/18, 1943, the works, along with the laborers, were moved to underground facilities to the south, near Nordhausen, called Mittelwerk. Many of the workers came from the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp or Buchenwald. Need we say more? Up to 20,000 laborers died in those years. But how responsible was von Braun? Did he have a choice when it came to the labor supply? How involved, if at all, was he in the abuse of the workers? 

First, von Braun had nothing to do with the setting up of the entire system of utilizing prison and forced labor to meet rocket production. In Neufeld’s words, “Von Braun was certainly aware of them (prisoner exploitation) but bore no direct responsibility for their conditions.” Others were making the decision as to how to supply and manage Germany’s labor needs. Another understanding needed is that von Braun was not one to “stick his neck out.” He was a conservative, nationalist and one who lived by the axiom “to get along, go along.” Additionally, he, like many others, was most likely influenced by official Nazi propaganda that portrayed the concentration camps as places of punishment for deserving criminals or enemies of the state. General Dornberger, in fact, gave a speech in which he described the in-coming laborers as “murderers, thieves, criminals.” Nonetheless, their true nature as simply means to exploit labor or kill off vast categories of people gradually became fairly common knowledge despite the later notorious German excuse that “we didn't know.” This is the excuse that von Braun employed, which is only partly believable due to the intensity of his work-pace coupled with a conscious effort to avoid knowing too much.  

More to help?

Why didn’t von Braun do more help? Given the nature of the regime, he could hardly be expected to either refuse to work with the system or even to protest strenuously. In his own words he felt helpless to change the situation and claimed that he did at least look into the possibility of taking action: “My spontaneous reaction (on observing the atrocious conditions of the laborers) was to talk to one of the SS guards, only to be told with unmistakable harshness that I should mind my own business, or find myself in the same striped fatigues!" After his arrest in early 1944 it would have been impossible for him to speak up. Before that time, though, was he in a good position as head of rocket development and production, on the basis of production efficiency, to take some action to improve conditions for the workers? It is possible. One major obstacle, though, is that he would have come up against Brigadier General Hans Kammler. This brutal Himmler appointee was in charge of SS construction projects. He had built numerous concentration camps before being placed in charge of the secret weapons programs. It was he who supervised the construction of the new underground facilities to be used to continue the rocket program. Kammler’s attitude toward the slave-labor workforce is summed up by this quote: "Don't worry about the victims. The work must proceed ahead in the shortest time possible." Kammler was known to keep a sharp eye out for ideological deviance, which would have made it difficult for von Braun to push too hard to help the workers. Nonetheless, there is no record that von Braun made any attempt to do so. He stated later that he did not see any way to change the prisoner’s conditions. 

Von Braun’s public voice on the atrocities was not heard until twenty years after the war, when public knowledge about facilities like Dora became so widespread that the rocket engineer could no longer maintain silence. It was not until the late 1960s that von Braun was even called upon to speak directly about alleged atrocities related to slave labor used by Hitler’s rocket program. In February 1969 he testified in a war-crimes case involving former SS personnel from the Mittelwerk-Dora concentration camp. Von Braun stated: “During my visits in the Mittelwerk, I never saw a dead man nor did I ever see a beating or a killing.” There is no way to prove this assertion, despite the claims of surviving prisoners that he “must have” seen atrocities take place. Nevertheless, von Braun, as Technical Director at Peenemunde was kept very well informed of all decisions related to the use of forced labor. Furthermore, he and his team were familiar with the conditions in the labor camps. Additionally, he was involved in decision-making regarding the prisoners. After the air raid on Peenemunde, von Braun was part of the meeting that decided to move the workers to the underground site in western Germany - the Mittelwerk - where conditions for the labor force deteriorated even further. Von Braun admitted that he visited the plant at Mittelwerk several times. He admitted that he recalled the conditions were “repulsive” but that he personally never observed any actual physical abuse of prisoners, although he knew that deaths had occurred there. He claimed to have never visited the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp, where up to 20,000 died. Von Braun’s repeated downplaying or denials do not hold up to scrutiny. For example, in the same 1969 deposition, he claimed that he never received any reports of sabotage. That is technically true, but in his many visits to the Mittelwerk and meetings with the Mittelwerk overseers, the subject of sabotage could hardly have been avoided, since survivors testified that an act of sabotage did take place. 

And yet there is no evidence of any expression of concern from the young engineer about the horrors of the labor camp. The only occasion on which the rocket leader showed concern over prisoners involved his dealings with Professor Charles Sadron, a French scientist who was one of the prisoners in forced-labor. Dr. Sadron testified that on one occasion von Braun approached him to express his regret that such a respected and accomplished scientist was subject to such horrific conditions. He went on to propose that he work in von Braun’s office. In the words of Dr. Sadron, “To be sure, there is no question of accepting. I refused him bluntly. Von Braun excused himself, smiling as he left. I will learn later that, despite my refusal, he tried several times to better my lot, but to no avail.”

What do you think about Wernher von Braun? Let us know below.

Now, read the final part in the series on whether von Braun was a war criminal here.

The IRA and the Nazis: A Dark Alliance of Convenience

The collaboration between the Nazis and Irish Republican Army (IRA) is one of the little-known stories of World War II. The seeds of the relationship were sown before, during and after World War I, and the co-operation grew as World War II broke out. Daniel Boustead explains.

Sean Russell, IRA Chief of Staff from 1938 to 1939.

Irish independence

In 1912 the Ulster Solemn League and Covenant was signed by thousands of people led by Edward Carson, who were opposed to the British parliament’s Third Home Rule Bill ([1]).  The Protestant opposition to Home Rule was further evidenced by the formation of the Protestant Paramilitary force called the Ulster Volunteer Force, which forced the British government to take notice of Ulster Loyalism as a political and military force! ([2]). The largely Irish Catholic Nationalist forces then staged the Easter Uprising in 1916 against British rule in Ireland which was then put down by the British ([3]). While the Easter Uprising was a failure it left a long-lasting impact on the predominately Irish Catholic Nationalists (4). In 1919 the IRA launched their Irish war of independence against the British ([4]).The war ended on December 6, 1921 when the Anglo-Irish Treaty was signed which partitioned Ireland, into the independent 26 counties in the South to become the Irish Free State and the remaining 6 counties in North were kept under British rule ([5]). The results of the Treaty split the Irish Republican Army into two factions, the Pro-Treaty faction that later became the regular Irish Army and the Anti- Treaty Faction of the IRA ([6]). The effects of Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921 caused fierce political divides in Ireland and Great Britain that are still felt to this day. This bitterness would set the Anti-Treaty IRA on the path to collaborate with the Nazis.

Early collaboration

The early collaboration between the Nazis and the IRA started as far as back as 1936 when Anti Treaty IRA member Sean Russell, had sought German support for IRA activities (7). During this time he was engaged in talks with the German Foreign Office, regarding IRA-German cooperation (7).  Sean Russell would later become the Chief of Staff of the Anti-Treaty IRA in 1938 (8). Russell was also one of the “architects” of the S-Plan bombing campaign, against Great Britain along with Irish American, Joseph McGarrity and Jim O’Donovan (9).  Joseph McGarrity had known Sean Russell since the 1920s and it was his organization, Clan Na Gael, who supported and financed Sean Russell’s bombing campaign against Great Britain (9). Sean Russell also had announced an Anti-British bombing campaign in 1936 during a tour of the USA (9). He formerly got approval for his plan at the IRA’s General Army Council or GAC, in April 1938 at a meeting in Dublin (9). From October 1938 training for the S-Plan was commenced in Dublin by bomb making instructors Patrick McGrath and Jim- O’Donovan (9). (Seamus) Jim O’Donovan drew up the blueprint for the “S-Plan”, which called for the destruction of military targets such as communication centers, BBC transmitters, aerodromes, bridges and military installations (10). On December 2, 1938 Oscar C. Phaus, a journalist and founder of the German Bund, returned from America to Germany and was approached by the German intelligence agency the Abwehr (11). Oscar Phaus was also called Oskar Pfaus (12). The Abwehr knew little about the IRA, but felt if they were to conduct bombing attacks against the British the IRA would be a useful ally to the Nazis (11). In February 1939 Pfaus arrived in Ireland in order to liaise with the IRA (12). Pfaus made contact with the IRA’s Army Council and arranged for “S-Plan” architect Jim O’ Donovan to travel to Germany (12). Jim O’Donovan traveled to Germany repeatedly between February and August 1939 (12). In these various visits plans were made for the IRA to assist Germany against Britain through sabotage and espionage in Britain and Northern Ireland (12). The IRA believed that the Nazis could help them achieve a United 32 county Ireland and kick the British out of Ireland – so had partition not existed, the IRA-Nazi alliance would not have existed.

S-Plan

On January 16, 1939 the IRA launched their “S-Plan” campaign by setting off bombs in Manchester, London, and Birmingham (13). By July 1939, British Home Secretary, Samuel Hoare, stated that there had been 127 IRA incidents since January (13). One of these attacks had killed one man in Manchester (13). The worst of the IRA’s S-Plan bombings was in Coventry on August 25, which killed 5 people (13). Adolf Hitler’s initial response to the S-Plan was that he initially refused to fund it, fearing provoking conflict with Great Britain (14). However after Hitler declared war against Great Britain he did agree to send, money, transmitters, and spies to Ireland as a result of the S-Plan (14). On October 29, 1939 the IRA began their radio messages to the Nazis (15). 

The October 29 IRA transmission asked about arms, but the Abwehr could not help as the message had not indicated any likely supply routes (15). This transmitter was later seized by Irish police on the December 29, 1939 raid on Ashgrove House (15). The IRA never succeeded in setting up supply routes, nor did they respond to German requests to cease operations against De Valera’s government and concentrate instead on military installations in Britain and Northern Ireland (15). In February 1940 Abwehr agent Ernst Weber Drohl arrived in Ireland and quickly mislaid his radio transmitter after landing from a U-Boat (12). Drohl was quickly taken in by Irish authorities (12). Abwehr agent Herman Goertz arrived in Ireland in May 1940, and one his many aims was to prompt Northern Irish Republicans into rebellion (12). Hermann Goertz’s efforts also failed and he was quickly detained the following year (12). Shortly after Herman Goertz capture in 1941, the primary Nazi-Republican link, Jim O’Donovan, was interned and as a consequence the IRA-German connection was greatly weakened (12). On August 14, 1940 former IRA Chief of Staff Sean Russell died in the arms of his comrade Frank Ryan hundreds of miles away from Galway aboard a German U-Boat while trying to get back to Ireland (16). Sean Russell and Frank Ryan were sent to Ireland as part of a Nazi sponsored mission called Operation Dove, which was a loosely defined mission, which left Sean Russell to take any action he saw fit in Ireland (16). 

Plan Kathleen

The most noteworthy joint IRA–Nazi venture was called Plan Kathleen and it was written by new IRA Chief of Staff Stephen Hayes in early 1940 (17). Stephen Hayes took over as the leader of IRA after Sean Russell left in early 1940 for the USA to raise funds and drum up support for the IRA (17). Plan Kathleen stated with a Nazi invasion of Northern Ireland with active IRA help (17). The IRA would help the Nazis in this plan by staging uprisings in both Northern Ireland and the Irish Free State as well as overthrowing both the Dublin and Belfast governments and seizing key posts in Ireland (17). Plan Kathleen also stated that Northern Ireland would be conquered by a simultaneous IRA insurgency in Northern Ireland and the landing of German forces (17). 50,000 German soldiers would be dropped in Northern Ireland, while over 30,000 IRA soldiers would be near the Irish and Northern Irish borders near Lough Erne (17). They would then together sweep Northern Ireland and destroy British forces (17). Plan Kathleen was presented in a meeting on May 17, 1940 in the Irish Free State that was chaired by Stephen Hayes (17). German Spy Herman Goertz was present at this safe house meeting (17). The plan fell apart because Stephen Hayes had exaggerated the IRA’s strength of 30,000 men when in reality it only had 5,000 unarmed men that were available to support the proposed invasion (17). The IRA’s Plan Kathleen had also failed to give information on where or how the Northern Irish coast was fortified, how German troops were to be brought to Ireland, or how control of sea approaches were to be obtained (17). 

Plan Kathleen could have worked if the Luftwaffe had consistently bombed and destroyed not only the British radar stations, but also the flimsy wooden huts that housed the operators during the Battle of Britain (18). The IRA and Nazis would then invade Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Avoiding the alliance

Conversely, the British could have avoided the Nazi-IRA alliance threat by giving back all of Ireland to the Irish in 1921. Great Britain could then have easily moved their Royal Air Force Anti-Submarine bases as well as merchant ship ports out of Northern Ireland (19). They would then establish new bases in the Scottish Islands and the Isle of Man. This would have complemented the Anglo-American base of Iceland, which the British seized in May 1940 (20). The British government offered proposals of Irish reunification provided they joined the war on Great Britain’s side (21). The first was in June 1940 and the second after the Pearl Harbor attack in December 1941 - but both times they were rejected by the neutral Irish government (21).

In order to avoid this alliance, the British government should have given Irish reunification and asked for nothing in return.

What do you think of the IRA’s collaboration with the Nazis in World War II? Let us know below.

Now, you can read more World War II history from Daniel: “Did World War Two Japanese Kamikaze Attacks have more Impact than Nazi V-2 Rockets?” here, “Japanese attacks on the USA in World War II” here, and “Was the Italian Military in World War 2 Really that Bad?” here.

[1] English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: UK. Pan Books. 2012. 9. 

[2] English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: UK. Pan Books. 2012. 9 to 10. 

[3] English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: UK. Pan Books. 2012. 9 to 11. 

[4] English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: UK. Pan Books. 2012. 11 to 13. 

[5] English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: UK. Pan Books. 2012. 30. 

[6] English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: UK. Pan Books. 2012. 34 to 35. 

7 English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: UK. Pan Books. 2012. 63. 

8 English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: UK. Pan Books. 2012. 60. 

9 English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA.  London: UK. Pan Books. 2012. 60 to 61. 

10 Coogan, Tim Pat. The IRA: Fully Revised and Updated. New York: New York. St. Martin’s Griffin. 2002. 120 and 31. 

11 Coogan, Tim Pat. The IRA: Fully Revised and Updated. New York: New York. St. Martin’s Griffin. 2002. 212.

12 English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: UK. Pan Books. 2012. 64. 

13 English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: UK. Pan Books. 2012. 61. 

14 Thomson, Mike. “How De Valera asked UK to smear IRA chief Sean Russell”. Last Updated or Modified March 28th, 2011. BBC News.  Accessed on July 19th, 2021. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-12848272 . 

15 Coogan, Tim Pat. The IRA: Fully Revised and Updated. New York: New York. St. Martin’s Griffin. 2002. 213.

16 Coogan, Tim Pat. The IRA: Fully Revised and Updated. New York: New York. St. Martin’s Griffin. 2002. 211. 

17 Nazi Collaborators: The IRA. WMK Productions. IMG Entertainment. 2010. 

18 Mosley, Leonard. The Battle of Britain. Alexandria, Virginia. Time-Life Books Inc. 1977. 95. 

19 “Northern Ireland in World War Two-Revision 3-GSCE-BBC Bitesize”. BBC. Last Updated or Modified August 27th, 2019. Accessed on August 27th, 2019. https://www.bbc.co/uk/bitesize/guide/z2k9d2p/revision/3

20 Pitt, Barrie. The Battle of the Atlantic. Alexandria, Virginia. Time-Life Books Inc. 1977. 136. 

21 Madden, F.J.M. Teach Yourself: The History of Ireland. Chicago: Illinois . Contemporary Books. 2005. 161. 

Bibliography

Coogan, Tim Pat. The IRA: Fully Revised and Updated. New York: New York. St. Martin’s Griffin. 2002. 

English, Richard. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: UK. Pan Books. 2012.

Madden, F.J.M. Teach Yourself: The History of Ireland. Chicago: Illinois. Contemporary Books. 2005. 

Mosley, Leonard. The Battle of Britain. Alexandria, Virginia. Time-Life Books Inc. 1977.

Nazi Collaborators: The IRA.  WMK Productions. IMG Entertainment. 2010. 

“Northern Ireland In World War Two-Revision-3-GSCE-BBC Bitesize”. BBC. Last Updated or Modified August 27th, 2019. Accessed on August 27th, 2019. https://www.bbc.co/uk/bitesize/guide/z2k92p/revision/3 . 

Pitt. Barrie. The Battle of the Atlantic. Alexandria, Virginia. Time-Life Books Inc. 1977.

Thomson, Mike. “How De Valera asked UK to smear IRA chief Sean Russell”. Last Updated or Modified March 28th, 2011. BBC News. Accessed on July 19th, 2021. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-12848272.