Author: crum.202

Poland Moving Backwards

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In September of 1939 Nazi Germany invaded Poland, thereby starting WWII. Within weeks Poland fell, leaving the country subjected to German occupation for the rest of the war. Under the occupation many Poles were exiled or killed in an attempt to create Lebensraum for the Third Reich. Additionally, more than 3 million Polish Jews died as a result of anti-Semitic laws enacted by both the Polish government and the Nazis. Numerous concentration camps were established in Poland as part of the Final Solution enacted by the Nazis. What began as a plan to simply work to death Jews and other groups deemed subhuman by the Nazis, the Final Solution morphed into the systematic killing in concentration camps, many of which were in Poland.

As with almost every country involved in WWII, the effects of the war are clearly evident, even to this day. However, while most countries have made concerted efforts towards coming to terms with the atrocities of the war, it seems Poland is moving backwards. The concentration camps in Poland are now a source of controversy in academia and Polish national history. Recently, a law was passed in Poland that outlawed both the term “Polish death camps” and talking about Poland’s complicity in the Holocaust. The former is a historical misnomer, but the latter is the core of an academic debate that is far from reconciled. While the Polish people, gentile and Jew alike, were affected by Nazi occupation, there was a degree of collaboration from the some ethnic Poles in the systematic killing of Jewish people. Jan Gross’s Neighbors tells a story of a small town in Poland, Jedwabne, who under Nazi occupation, helped facilitate the execution of almost all of the town’s Jews. To ignore instances like Jedwabne and others like it is a historical fallacy that is reckless and detrimental to the history of the Holocaust. At no surprise, this controversy was apparent during our time in Poland. In one instance, on the way to Auschwitz, our Polish tour guide made a very clear point that although the concentration camps were in Poland, the Poles were in no way associated with or responsible for them. Her statement was not surprising given the present controversy. It is understandable that the Polish people do not want to be remembered as Nazi collaborators, however, it is counterproductive to deny any association. This law threatens the integrity of productive historical exploration and is a true travesty to academic freedom.

The Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial.

From Potsdam to Today

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At the end of WWII, Germany was in shambles. On their recent historical scorecard, they tallied two lost wars, the genocide of over 6 million Jewish people, and the failure of numerous attempts at a unified government. At the Potsdam Conference in 1945, Germany’s postwar fate was decided; their new economy was planned, its borders were redrawn, and the country was divided among the Allies. An independent German government ceased to exist and was replaced by the governing forces of the Allied powers. These measures were taken to ensure lasting peace in a post-WWII world. For much of the next half century, the world watched Germany, curious to see how they would rebuild under such circumstances. In the West, occupied by the Americans, British, and French, was the Federal Republic of Germany, and in the East, occupied by Russia, was the communist German Democratic Republic. Germany’s ensuing “rebuilding” period took place under the tension of the Cold War, a conflict between democracy and communism that would not be resolved until the 1990s. Nonetheless, Germany slowly began to rebuild themselves, and today is considered an exemplar of reconciling one’s brutal history.

Cecilienhof Palace, where the Potsdam Conference of 1945 was held.

No modern war, with the exception of the Civil War, has been fought in the continental United States. To see the physical and political remnants of a war almost 75 years later was an informative experience. The effects of the war and the ensuing occupation is echoed throughout Berlin, the epicenter of German culture and politics. The Reichstag building reverberates Germany’s new idea of democracy and attempts to deal with their turbulent past. In very particular details, the Reichstag building symbolizes the German government’s attempt at a truly democratic political system. Today, the Reichstag building is where the Bundestag, or German parliament, meets. Upon entering the building, visitors instantly notice how devoid it is of decoration. This is because each decoration with cultural influence from one state must be matched with the same type of decoration for every other state. As a result, the Reichstag must either be distractingly filled with decorations, or lack any decoration at all. In the interest of parsimony, they chose the latter. Another aspect of the building that is hard to miss is the large glass dome on the top. This dome symbolizes the transparency of the government, allowing citizens to look down into the main hall where their representatives are. Inside the chamber, the stands for the public are placed above the representatives to symbolize the people being above their elected officials. These particular details, aimed at pleasing all citizens, clearly demonstrate that Germany is determined to move on from their dark past. Finally, one of the most striking remnants of the war is the Russian graffiti that has been memorialized on the walls of the Reichstag. When Russia invaded Berlin in 1945, many soldiers left graffiti on the inside of the Reichstag, which was preserved and now displayed in the Reichstag. To me, this is a statement from the German government that they are not ashamed by their distressing past.

Graffiti from Soviet invasion in 1945. Notice the different dates in the graffiti.

The intense pressure on post-war Germany to deal with the mistakes of their past led to their display of an objective public history of the war. Throughout Berlin there are numerous other instances of the memorialization of their transgressions. The German History Museum presents a narrative that does not shy away from the atrocities committed during the war or attempt to overstate any resistance to the Third Reich. The Topography of Terror Museum is wholly dedicated to documenting the atrocities of the Nazi regime. The many pieces of the Berlin Wall throughout the city commemorate a pressurized period of German history. In many ways, there is no attempt at presenting a nationalistic view of German culture, something completely different from the United States and our ethnocentric attitudes. There are many aspects of American history that are glossed over in the interest of forgetting our dark past. While there are attempts at memorializing our wrongdoings in the United States, we should take an objective look at how we present our darkest moments at a country in the same way Germany has attempted to do so.

The main hall of the Reichstag.

An Overstated Resistance

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According to Sartre’s, “Paris Under Occupation,” the French’s misfortune under German occupation is understated because of their atypical experience. They escaped the fighting, so to many, including the British, they escaped sacrifice. However, the Parisians existed in a limbo where they lived in a skeleton of what used to be a lively city. During this time, Paris lost her identity to the Germans causing anguish among the already war-weary Parisians. Today, unsurprisingly, Paris has regained her status as the epicenter of French cultural and political life. However, like most countries affected by the war, the city is filled with artifacts and reminders of the war and its heroes. For instance, as evident from the abundance of things named after him, Charles de Gaulle, leader of the Free French during the war, is an integral figure in French history.

The Eiffel Tower, one of the most recognizable features of the city, stands as a national symbol of Parisian culture in the now thriving city.

In the Musée de l’Armée there is an apparent dichotomy between Vichy and the Free French. After France’s fall at the beginning of the war and the signing of an armistice, France was partitioned into a free and occupied zone. In the former, Phillipe Petain, a war hero and a political favorite among the rural conservatives and urban liberals alike, set up a new French state. Vichy France, the name of the new state, was set up in collaboration with their Nazi occupiers, adhering to and sometimes anticipating what they thought would please the Germans. Vichy executed anti-Semitic policies, deported thousands of French Jews, and implemented conscription laws that required French citizens to go to Germany to work. After the war, the collaborators of Vichy were denounced and punished. Although the French do not ignore the collaborationist state in their history, it seems they chose to emphasize the resistance led by Charles de Gaulle more than Vichy. Even more so, de Gaulle is often lumped into the Allied alliance with Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt.  A lot of the rhetoric used by the museums insists that de Gaulle’s contributions were as important, if not more important, than the Anglo-American contribution. One section of the museum boasts the role of French paratroopers on D-Day, something we had not previously studied in class. Finally, to tie together the WWII section of the museum, we watched a film in the Charles de Gaulle wing. The film, while educational and entertaining, had obvious biases towards the importance of the Free French and de Gaulle. The French emphasis on the resistance rather than collaboration implies the French remember the actions of side that won and ignore the cooperation with the Nazis and anti-Semitic policies of the other. Another instance of the French failing to come to terms with their involvement during the war is shown in their commemoration of those deported during the war. Although French Jews were largely deported to concentration camps, their Memorial des Martyrs de la Déportation fails to mention them and instead focuses deported people as a whole. Additionally, in the Musée de l’Armée, the Holocaust is all but skipped over. There is a tiny room that is very easily missed and focuses mainly on political prisoners.

A display from the Holocaust section of the Musée de l’Armée. In english it reads, “the deportation of political resistors, political hostages.” There was little mention of Jewish victims of the Holocaust and instead focused on political prisoners.

The Caen Memorial Museum in northern France mirrors a similar dichotomy between the Free French and Vichy. The museum begins with a broad overview of the interwar period down a winding decline to symbolize the deteriorating nature of the political state. Directly after this, without mention to anything specific about the French interwar period, France fell. Additionally, the museum posed the fall of France in a passive way, as if France was taken from them, despite the fact that an armistice was signed. Similar to the Musée de l’Armée, the museum mentioned Vichy and Petain once before moving on to an extensive discussion of the resistance. Finally, it seems that the French were again lumped together with the Allies, boasting when the Allies were doing well and disassociating themselves from the Allies’ mistakes. I believe this is the French’s way of avoiding responsibilities for the faults of World War II. While the French were certainly on the Allies power’s side, they were not an integral part of the D-Day landings and war effort as a while, as they portrayed themselves to be.

While it is apparent that they French have not entirely came to terms with the war, it is important to remember the comfort of the American experience. It is quite easy to become critical of other countries historical memory, especially because the United States benefitted from their involvement in the war. While the French must come to terms with their history on their own, there is an important lesson to be learned. Although the war experience was different in every country, in order to conduct meaningful and productive public history, one must take objective look at our own experience and convey it in an unbiased manner, something that even the United States has issues with.

A serene sunset on the Seine.

The Blitz and the People

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The year is 1940 and your nation has just entered the war. As early as 1938, the government had been distributing gas masks in anticipation of what was happening in this very moment. You hear the rumble of your possessions in your home as they rock back and forth from the bombs raining down around you. Suddenly, the noise stops, the shaking halts, and you come out from the government-issued fortification in what used to be your family’s summer garden. Despite the terror of the bombs from German planes, your family, your neighbors, and even the Prime Minister boasts their confidence in Great Britain, and you feel a mix of rage and resiliency. After months of bombing, this becomes regular and you adjust to this as normal life. Your community comes together to clean up after each bombing without prompt from officials of the government.

This is the image Mr. Michael Handscomb shared with the group over a dinner of vegetarian lasagna and Guinness beef last Thursday evening. Mr. Handscomb, a close friend of the OSU World War II program, not only shared lessons about living life to its fullest and his favorite memories, but also about the war experience in England from his perspective as a Londoner. Although Mr. Handscomb was still in his youth during the London Blitz, he shared a personal and vivid narrative of the British resiliency that held strong during World War II, including a spectacular Churchill impersonation. Mr. Handscomb’s talk illuminated an important layer of the British WWII experience; for Great Britain and many other European countries alike, the devastation of war extended to the home island. For Americans on the home front, it was easy to carry on with normal life from the safety of North America, but for the British people, the “keep your nose up” mentality allowed them to cope with the constant bombing, lost loved ones, and doing without. Mr. Handscomb described the normality of bombing in London and their lack of fear. He also described how he and his father would go out after each bombing a help their community clean up. These anecdotes support the idea that the heroism during the Blitz can be attributed to everyday citizens. His narrative also reveals an important theme of national unity among the Brits. His fanfare description of VE Day, the official end of the war in Europe, shows the immense relief the end of a six-year war brought to the British people. Additionally, although it was long after the end of the war, Mr. Handscomb’s vivid description of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth and the sense of national unity paints an image of nationalism among the Brits.

Comrades Katie and Riley present Mr. Michael Handscomb his own Ohio State scarf as a thank you for sharing the evening with us.

Mr. Handscomb’s image of resilient mentality and the valor of the average citizen is an integral part of the WWII identity of Great Britain and is echoed in many sites throughout London. Perhaps the strongest memorial of these two themes of British memory is at a memorial tucked away by St. Paul’s Cathedral that I happened upon by accident. The bronze statue depicts three firefighters during the Blitz with one man pointing back to St. Paul’s Cathedral. This memorial is a powerful remembrance of the ordinary civil servants during the war. This memorial reminds me of a piece we read in seminar from Ritchie Calder named “London Takes It” where he describes the heroic acts of the “amateur” firefighters and others who volunteered during the Blitz. The firefighter pointing back to St. Paul’s Cathedral, a national symbol of Great Britain, represents the British people’s unyielding bravery during the Blitz.

The National Firefighters Memorial dedicated to the brave civil servants that fought gallantly during the Blitz. It stands proudly in front of St. Paul’s Cathedral as a national reminder of the heroism of ordinary citizens during WWII.

Between Mr. Handscomb’s first-hand account of the Blitz and the poignant memorial of the bravery of ordinary citizens, the national memory of this turbulent time in British history is evident. In almost every cathedral, museum, or conversation of locals, the people’s experience during the war becomes evident; the war effected every citizen of London and beyond and the British people are proud of the resiliency they held during the war.