Second World War Books

Book SynopsisBetween 1933 and 1945, Nazi Germany systematically destroyed an estimated 100 million books throughout occupied Europe, an act that was inextricably bound up with the murder of 6 million Jews. By burning and looting libraries and censoring ""un-German"" publications, the Nazis aimed to eradicate all traces of Jewish culture along with the Jewish people themselves.""The Holocaust and the Book"" examines this bleak chapter in the history of printing, reading, censorship, and libraries. The topics include the development of Nazi censorship policies, the celebrated library of the Vilna ghetto, the confiscation of books from the Sephardic communities in Rome and Salonika, the experience of reading in the ghettos and concentration camps, the rescue of Polish incunabula, the uses of fine printing by the Dutch underground, and the suppression of Jewish books and authors in the Soviet Union. Several authors discuss the continuing relevance of Nazi book burnings to the present day, with essays on German responses to Friedrich Nietzsche and the destruction of Bosnian libraries in the 1990s.The collection also includes eyewitness accounts by Holocaust survivors and a translation of Herman Kruk's report on the Vilna ghetto library. An annotated bibliography offers readers a concise guide to research in this growing field.Trade ReviewBecause the essays are anchored so soundly in historical sources, Rose's premise of history itself as 'book-bound' is amply supported and illustrated throughout the volume. The scholarship is not only sound, but such an extended collection is a breakthrough for Holocaust scholarship - the first of its kind. It adds cultural and literary destruction to the terrible sum of human losses suffered during the Holocaust. - James E. Young, author of The Texture of Memory: Holocaust Memorials and Meaning ""Jewish scholars and students of modern history will find this volume to be a significant and unusual supplement to Holocaust research and a convincing argument for the centrality of books and reading as subjects of historical research."" - Publishers Weekly ""Fascinating and wrenching reading for any booklover."" - Umbrella

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Book SynopsisFirst comprehensive look at how today's German literary fiction deals with questions of German victimhood. In recent years it has become much more accepted in Germany to consider aspects of the Second World War in which Germans were not perpetrators, but victims: the Allied bombing campaign, expulsions of "ethnic" Germans, mass rapes of German women, and postwar internment and persecution. An explosion of literary fiction on these topics has accompanied this trend. Sebald's The Air War and Literature and Grass's Crabwalk are key texts, but there are many others; the great majority seek not to revise German responsibility for the Holocaust but to balance German victimhood and German perpetration. This book of essays is the first in English to examine closely the variety ofthese texts. An opening section on the 1950s -- a decade of intense literary engagement with German victimhood before the focus shifted to German perpetration -- provides context, drawing parallels but also noting differences between the immediate postwar period and today. The second section focuses on key texts written since the mid-1990s shifts in perspectives on the Nazi past, on perpetration and victimhood, on "ordinary Germans," and on the balance between historical empathy and condemnation. Contributors: Karina Berger, Elizabeth Boa, Stephen Brockmann, David Clarke, Mary Cosgrove, Rick Crownshaw, Helen Finch, Frank Finlay, Katharina Hall, Colette Lawson, Caroline Schaumann, Helmut Schmitz, Kathrin Schödel, and Stuart Taberner. Stuart Taberner is Professor of Contemporary German Literature, Culture, and Society at the University of Leeds. Karina Berger holds a PhD in German from the University of Leeds.Trade Review[A]n impressive testament to collaborative research. The . . . essays . . . all offer highly stimulating discussions of individual texts and topics, and can be read as self-contained pieces, but the book is far more than the sum of its parts: the coherence of its argument suggests not only masterly editing, but also the real benefits of scholars with related interests working together over an extended period. [This book] will be of interest to students, specialists, and general readers alike, and given the implications of the topic, deserves the widest possible audience. * JOURNAL OF EUROPEAN STUDIES *Contributes to a growing body of research on the evolution of memory politics in post-unification Germany... Adds important inflections to current debates... Important, thought-provoking, and fittingly nuanced. * MODERN LANGUAGE REVIEW *The individual essays make a compelling and well-conceived contribution to an important and on-going discussion that in the ten years of its existence has gained in nuance and sophistication. * MONATSHEFTE *Provides a valuable overview about the range and complexity of literary accounts on 'German suffering. * GERMAN STUDIES REVIEW *Provocative yet accessible to a wide audience. * CHOICE *The volume adds support to the argument that the notion of 'German victims' did not begin with the fall of the Berlin Wall. * GERMAN QUARTERLY *Clearly structured, with a common theme that gives the work cohesion.... Will certainly stimulate academic debate and scholarship for years to come. * H-NET GERMAN *Has an impressive array of contributions. . . . [C]ertainly demonstrates the complexities of the current debates. * THIS YEAR'S WORK IN MODERN LANGUAGE STUDIES *Table of ContentsIntroduction - Stuart Taberner and Karina Berger W. G. Sebald and German Wartime Suffering - Stephen Brockmann The Natural History of Destruction: W. G. Sebald, Gert Ledig, and the Allied Bombings - Colette Lawson Expulsion Novels of the 1950s: More than Meets the Eye? - Karina Berger "In this prison of the guard room": Heinrich Böll's Briefe aus dem Krieg 1939-1945 in the Context of Contemporary Debates - Frank Finlay Family, Heritage, and German Wartime Suffering in Hanns-Josef Ortheil, Stephan Wackwitz, Thomas Medicus, Dagmar Leupold, and Uwe Timm - Helmut Schmitz Lost Heimat in Generational Novels by Reinhard Jirgl, Christoph Hein, and Angelika Overath - Elizabeth Boa "A Different Family Story": German Wartime Suffering in Women's Writing by Wibke Bruhns, Ute Scheub, and Christina von Braun - Caroline Schaumann The Place of German Wartime Suffering in Hans-Ulrich Treichel's Family Text - David Clarke "Why only now?": The Representation of German Wartime Suffering as a "Memory Taboo" in Günter Grass's Novella Im Krebsgang - Katharina Hall Rereading Der Vorleser, Remembering the Perpetrator - Rick Crownshaw Narrating German Suffering in the Shadow of Holocaust Victimology: W. G. Sebald, Contemporary Trauma Theory, and Dieter Forte's Air Raids Epic - Mary Cosgrove Günter Grass's Account of German Wartime Suffering in Beim Häuten der Zwiebel:Mind in Mourning or Boy Adventurer? - Helen Finch Jackboots and Jeans: The Private and the Political in Uwe Timm's Am Beispiel meines Bruders - Frank Finlay Memory-Work in Recent German Novels: What (if Any) Limits Remain on Empathy with the "German Experience" of the Second World War? - Stuart Taberner "Secondary Suffering" and Victimhood: The "Other" of German Identity in Bernhard Schlink's "Die Beschneidung" and Maxim Biller's "Harlem Holocaust" - Kathrin Schodel

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Book SynopsisThe dramatic story of a Jewish child's rescue at Buchenwald and its use as propaganda in both East and united Germany. At the notorious Buchenwald concentration camp, communist prisoners organized resistance against the SS and even planned an uprising. They helped rescue a three-year-old Jewish boy, Stefan Jerzy Zweig, from certain death in the gas chambers. After the war, his story became a focus for the German Democratic Republic's celebration of its resistance to the Nazis. Now Bill Niven tells the true story of Stefan Zweig: what actually happened to him in Buchenwald, how he was protected, and at what price. He explores the (mis)representation of Zweig's rescue in East Germany and what this reveals about that country's understanding of its Nazi past. Finally he looks at the telling of the Zweig rescue story since German unification: a story told in the GDR to praise communists has become a story used to condemn them. Bill Niven is Professor of Contemporary German History at the Nottingham Trent University, UK.Trade Review[A] very well edited review of Dampier's excellent journals.. [His] reputation has been rehabilitated and enhanced more recently. This fine book has contributed substantially. * AUSMARINE *In this original and thoroughly researched analysis, Bill Niven picks his way with admirable clarity through the tangled webs of spin and counter-spin, never claiming to attain a definitive narrative of what 'really' happened, but also not shrinking from some robust censure of overt distortion or partisanship. * TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT *

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Book SynopsisDuring the early years of World War II in the Pacific theatre, against overwhelming odds, young American airmen flew the longest and most perilous bombing missions of the war. They faced determined Japanese fighters without fighter escort, relentless anti-aircraft fire with no deviations from target, and thousands of miles of over-water flying with no alternative landing sites. Finish Forty and Home, by Phil Scearce, is the true story of the men and missions of the 11th Bombardment Group as it fought alone and unheralded in the South Central Pacific, while America had its eyes on the war in Europe. The book opens with Sgt. Herman Scearce, the author's father, lying about his age to join the Army Air Corps at 16. The narrative follows Scearce through training and into combat with his new crewmates, including pilot Lt. Joe Deasy, whose last-minute transfer from training duty thrusts the new crew into the squadron commander’s role.After bombing Nauru, the squadron moves on to bomb Wake Island, Tarawa, and finally Iwo Jima. These missions bring American forces closer and closer to the Japanese home islands and precede the critical American invasions of Tarawa and Iwo Jima. The 42nd Squadron’s losses through 1943 were staggering: 50 out of 110 airmen killed.Phil Scearce explores the context of the war and sets the stage for these daring missions, revealing the motivations of the men who flew them: to finish forty combat missions and make it home again. He based his story upon substantial research at the Air Force Historical Research Agency and the National Archives, interviews with surviving airmen, and interviews and correspondence with the survivors of men who were lost. His is the first book to document America's bomber offensive in the early days of the Pacific War.

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Book SynopsisIn an increasingly urbanized world, urban terrain has become a greater factor in military operations. Simultaneously, advances in military technology have given military forces sharply increased capabilities. The conflict comes from how urban terrain can negate or degrade many of those increased capabilities. What happens when advanced weapons are used in a close-range urban fight with an abundance of cover?Storming the City explores these issues by analyzing the performance of the US Army and US Marine Corps in urban combat in four major urban battles of the mid-twentieth century (Aachen 1944, Manila 1945, Seoul 1950, and Hue 1968). Alec Wahlman assesses each battle using a similar framework of capability categories, and separate chapters address urban warfare in American military thought.In the four battles, across a wide range of conditions, American forces were ultimately successful in capturing each city because of two factors: transferable competence and battlefield adaptation. The preparations US forces made for warfare writ large proved generally applicable to urban warfare. Battlefield adaptation, a strong suit of American forces, filled in where those overall preparations for combat needed fine tuning. From World War II to Vietnam, however, there was a gradual reduction in tactical performance in the four battles.

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Book SynopsisStilwell and Mountbatten in Burma explores the relationship between American General Joseph “Vinegar Joe” Stilwell and British Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten in the China-Burma-India Theater (CBI) and the South East Asia Command (SEAC) between October 1943 and October 1944, within the wider context of Anglo-American relations during World War II. Using original material from both British and American archives, Jonathan Templin Ritter discusses the military, political, and diplomatic aspects of Anglo-American cooperation, the personalities involved, and where British and American policies both converged and diverged over Southeast Asia. Although much has been written about CBI, Stilwell and China, and Mountbatten, no published comparison study has focused on the relationship between the two men during the twelve-month period in which their careers overlapped. This book bridges the gap in the literature between Mountbatten’s earlier naval career and his later role as the last Viceroy of British India. It also presents original archival material that explains why Stilwell was so anti-British, including his 1935 memorandum titled “The British,” and his original margin notes to Mountbatten’s farewell letter to him in 1944. Finally, it presents other original archival material that refutes previous books that have accused Stilwell of needlessly sacrificing the lives of his men during the 1944 North Burma Campaign, merely out of hatred for the British.Trade ReviewRitter displays a good sense of the strategic background to Anglo-American relations in World War Two and the China-Burma-India theatre. There were genuine and awkward differences between American and British policy regarding China and colonialism in Asia. He has applied a confident intellectual grasp to a complex layering of events and personality, and constructs a fascinating and highly relevant argument out of some complicated material."" - Alan Warren, author of Burma 1942

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Book SynopsisU.S. Marine George Burlage was part of the largest surrender in American history at Bataan and Corregidor in the spring of 1942, where the Japanese captured more than 85,000 troops. More than forty per cent would not survive World War II. His prisoner-of-war ordeal began at Cabanatuan near Manila, where the death rate in the early months of World War II was fifty men a day. Sensing that Cabanatuan was a death trap, he managed to get transferred to the isolated island of Palawan to help build an airfield for his captors.Malaria and other tropical diseases caused him to be sent to Manila for treatment in 1943 (a year later, 139 of his fellow POWs were massacred on Palawan). After another year of building airfields, Burlage survived a 38-day voyage in the hull of a Japanese hell ship and ended the war as a miner for Mitsubishi in northern Japan. By sheer luck, strength, and a bit of sabotage, he survived and was freed in September 1945 after the Japanese surrendered. He had endured starvation and torture and lost half of his prewar weight, but no one had killed him.After the war Burlage became a journalist and wrote about his POW experiences. His daughter Georgianne discovered his writings after George passed away in 2008, and edited them with additional historical material to provide context for his World War II experiences in the Pacific.

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Book SynopsisDuring World War II the United States mobilized its industrial assets to become the great “Arsenal of Democracy” through the cooperation of the government and private firms. The Dallas Story examines a specific aviation factory, operated by the North American Aviation (NAA) company in Dallas, Texas. Terrance Furgerson explores the construction and opening of the factory, its operation, its relations with the local community, and the closure of the facility at the end of the war. Prior to the opening of the factory in 1941, the city of Dallas had practically no existing industrial base. Despite this deficiency, the residents quickly learned the craft of manufacturing airplanes, and by the time of the Pearl Harbor attack the NAA factory was mass-producing the AT-6 trainer aircraft. The entry of the United States into the war brought about an enlargement of the NAA factory, and the facility began production of the B-24 Liberator bomber and the famed P-51 Mustang fighter. By the end of the war the Texas division of NAA had manufactured nearly 19,000 airplanes, making it one of the most prolific U.S. factories.

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Book SynopsisJoe Olexa enlisted in the US Army in December 1940, figuring that if he was going to be in a war, he might as well start training. Assigned to the 1st Infantry Division, nicknamed “The Big Red One,” he served in Company L of its 26th Infantry Regiment for the next four years. Along the way he trained with the division in maneuvers in the United States; shipped to England in 1942; landed at Oran, Algeria, in the Operation Torch landings of November 1942; and fought in Tunisia, Sicily, Normandy, Belgium, and Germany. Olexa was one of the first group of enlistees that brought the division up to full strength in the buildup prior to Pearl Harbor, and was a sergeant by the time he went overseas. He served as a squad leader, platoon sergeant, and acting platoon leader, outlasting nearly all the men in his company. His memoir features accounts of unusual adventures in Tunisia when his battalion was detached from the rest of the division, and presents a detailed and intense account of his platoon’s experiences at El Guettar. Later, Olexa became a “Sea Scout,” going ashore on Sicily the night before the invasion to provide signals to guide landing craft onto the beach at Gela. After landing on Omaha Beach on D-Day, Olexa was selected by his battalion commander to hunt snipers and lead patrols in addition to his usual duties, and he fought in Normandy until wounded in late June. He rejoined his company in mid-September 1944 and was heavily involved in the capture of Aachen in October. His memoir, originally composed in the late 1970s and expertly edited and annotated by James Smither, offers remarkable insights into the experiences of an ordinary soldier who found himself in truly extraordinary situations.

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Book SynopsisMy Darling Boys is the story of a New Mexico farm family whose three sons were sent to fight in World War II. All flew combat aircraft in the Army Air Forces. In 1973 one of the boys, Oscar Allison, a B-24 top turret gunner and flight engineer, wrote a memoir of his World War II experiences. On a mission to Regensburg, Germany, his bomber, ravaged by German fighters, was shot down. He was captured and spent fifteen months in German stalag prisons. His memoir, the core of this unique book, details his training, combat, and prisoner-of-war experience in a truthful, introspective, and compelling manner.Fred H. Allison, the author and Oscar’s nephew, gained access to family letters that supplement Oscar’s story and bring to light the experiences of Oscar’s brothers. Harold Allison, the author’s father, was sidelined from combat as a bomber copilot due to a health condition. The letters also tell of the brother who did not come home, Wiley Grizzle Jr., a P-51 fighter pilot. Wiley’s last mission brought his squadron of Mustangs into a pitched battle with German fighters bound for the front to attack American troops.The letters also introduce the boys’ family, who fought the battle of the home front on their farm in New Mexico. Allison reveals the burden home folks bore for their boys in combat and then the emotional trauma from the dreaded War Department letters announcing “missing in action” or “killed in action.” Allison conducted extensive research in the official records and in secondary sources to give context to the memoir and letters. My Darling Boys brings a new and important aspect to personal accounts of World War II combat, giving the reader a unique blend of first-person military action tied to the home front family.Trade Review“This is a distinctive memoir. Because this work focuses on three brothers at war but also on the home front and what their family experienced, it gives the reader a wider lens through which to view Americans’ experiences in the war.” - Robert S. Ehlers Jr., author of The Mediterranean Air War: Airpower and Allied Victory in World War II “Allison has provided much context concerning family history, as well as background for significant issues related to WWII. The context provided for the personal letters is nearly always well timed, well placed, and vital to the impact of the letters. The way Allison dealt with the letters related to Oscar's shootdown and imprisonment is to be commended, and the way he introduced the letters related to Wiley’s death and subsequent search for answers is quite moving.” - Kelly Crager, author of Hell under the Rising Sun: Texan POWs and the Building of the Burma-Thailand Death Railway “Fred Allison shares his family’s World War II experiences with the skilled analysis of a professional historian. Based on a surviving uncle’s memoire of the war, and the quest to learn of another uncle who never returned, Allison guides us through family letters, interviews, and the history of the period - the “Good War” and its effect on the Homefront. My Darling Boys is a moving and personal insight of those who served, and their families who waited for them to come home.” - Gene B. Preuss, public historian, University of Houston-Downtown “The Darling Boys were the quintessential young men of America who went off to fight in World War II. In this very sweet tale, Fred Allison, a preeminent military historian, weaves family legends, memoirs, and war letters together with deep historical and archival research into a compelling narrative of three young Depression-era members of the Allison family as they became combat aviators and served in the European theater. His research is masterful, and the personal narratives are enriching. It is a great story of aerial combat in that war, the travail of those who waited at home, and the role of American families in supplying us with those heroic young warriors. This book is an enjoyable, touching, and first-class read and reminds us of the human costs of war--both for the warriors who go forth into battle and for those who wait for them at home.” - Colonel (ret.) Darrel Whitcomb, combat veteran and military historian

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Book SynopsisThis is the first history of the U.S. Army Air Corps unit that incorporated Gen. Claire Chennault's famous "Flying Tigers." During the dark days immediately after Pearl Harbor, most news from the Asian front was bad—with the exception of reports about the Flying Tigers and their successors, the 23rd Fighter Group. Day after day in the deadly skies over China, the 23rd's shark-mouthed P-40s outfought the Japanese. No single American fighter group in World War II performed more varied missions, was more successful, or was more central to the war effort in its theater of operations. By the end of the war, the 23rd had tallied nearly six hundred aerial victories and destroyed nearly four hundred more Japanese aircraft on the ground. Carl Molesworth's Sharks Over China is based on his interviews with the group's survivors and contains numerous rare photographs. Trade Review"Drawing on interviews, diaries, letters, and unit histories, Molesworth has stitched together a chronicle of a gutsy, resourceful outfit whose tasks included escorting bombers, bombing bridges, strafing troop trains and raiding enemy airfields. Absorbing reading for WWII aerial-combat buffs."—Publishers Weekly"[A] meticulous chronicle of . . . the closest thing to a guerrilla air force the world has ever seen."—Air & Space

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Book SynopsisCharts the resettlement of the Ukrainian capital after Nazi occupation and the returning Soviet rulers' efforts to retain political legitimacy. Kyiv as Regime City charts the resettlement of the Ukrainian capital after Nazi occupation, focusing on the efforts of returning Soviet rulers to regain legitimacy within a Moscow-centered regime still attending to the warfront. Beginning with the Ukrainian Communists' inability to both purge their capital city of "socially dangerous" people and prevent the arrival of "unorganized" evacuees from the rear, this book chronicles how a socially and ethnically diverse milieu of Kyivans reassembled after many years of violence and terror. While the Ukrainian Communists successfully guarded entry into their privileged, elite ranks and monitored the masses' mood toward their superiors in Moscow, the party failed to conscript a labor force and rebuild housing, leading the Stalin regime to adopt new tactics to legitimize itself among the large Ukrainian and Jewish populations who once again called the city home. Drawing on sources from the once-closed central, regional, and local archives of the former Soviet Union, this study is essential reading for those seeking to understand how the Kremlin reestablished its power in Kyiv, consolidating its regime as the Cold War with the United States began. Martin J. Blackwell is Visiting Professor of History at Stetson University in DeLand, Florida.Trade ReviewWell-written, accessible to scholars and general readers alike, with a balanced, logical structure, advancing compelling arguments substantiated by the wealth of archival sources, the book is a welcome addition to the historiography of the postwar Soviet Union. * AB IMPERIO *An excellent source of information on the rich and complex period at wars end, and will be interesting to scholars of Soviet history, Ukrainian and Jewish history, and urban history as well. * ENGLISH HISTORICAL REVIEW *[Blackwell's] use of Kyivan archival material is impressive...scholars interested in the history of Kyiv and the Great Patriotic War will find this work extremely valuable. * THE RUSSIAN REVIEW *Blackwell's useful monograph is a tightly knit examination of multiethnic Kyiv between November 6, 1943 and early 1947. * SLAVIC REVIEW *Table of ContentsIntroduction "The Capital Is Being Settled All Over Again": Resettlement from Fall 1943 to Fall 1944 "There Was No Real Battle against Illegal Entry": Resettlement from Fall 1944 to Fall 1946 "People Are Going for the Party Who Are Forcing Us to Be Justifiably Careful": The Reassembled Elite "A Textual Implementation of the Law . . . Was Not Carried Out": The Reassembled Masses "The State's Dignity Is Higher Than His Own Dignity": The Relegitimization of Soviet Power "Tashkent Partisans" and "German Bitches": Relationships with Soviet Power Conclusion Notes Index

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Book SynopsisFranklin Roosevelt instinctively understood that a politician of his era who was unable to control his own body would be perceived as unable to control the body politic. He therefore took great care to hide his polio-induced lameness both visually and verbally. In FDR's Body Politics. Davis W. Houck and Amos Kiewe draw on never-before-used primary sources to analyze the silences surrounding Roosevelt's disability, the words he chose to portray himself and his policies as powerful and health-giving, and the methods he used to maximize the appearance of physical strength. They examine his broad strategies, as well as the speeches Roosevelt delivered during his political comeback after polio struck, to understand how he overcame the whispering campaign against him in 1928 and 1932. Ultimately, this is a story of triumph and courage that reveals a master politician's understanding of the body politic in the most fundamental of ways.

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Book SynopsisThis work examines the ominous prelude to the Battle of the Bulge and reveals one of the US Army's bloodiest nightmares of World War II. In late 1944, the American army had pushed through Belgium almost unopposed. As small units advanced into the hilly woods south-east of Aachen, Germany, they encountered a forest bristling with German troops. The face-off took place in some of Germany's most rugged territory and in rain, sleet and freezing temperatures. For weeks US commanders ordered units of as many as seven divisions into the woods to be chewed up by German infantry and artillery. The book's description of the battle is based on government records, a large selection of first-hand accounts from veterans of both sides, and the author's visits to the battlefields.Trade Review... deserves a place on every soldier's bookshelf. - Army magazine

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Book SynopsisA never-before-published account of the experience of an American officer at the hands of Japanese captors, ""Prisoner of the Rising Sun"" offers new evidence of the treatment accorded officers and shows how the Corregidor prisoners fared compared with the ill-fated Bataan captives. When Japanese aircraft struck airfields in the Philippines on December 8, 1941, Col. Lewis C. Beebe was Gen. Douglas MacArthur's chief supply officer. Promoted to brigadier general, he would become chief of staff for General Wainwright in 1942. Beebe kept diary records of the Japanese invasion of the Philippines, their advance to Manila and capture of the Bataan Peninsula, and their assault on Corregidor. When Japanese troops took Corregidor, Beebe was among those captured. During his captivity, Beebe recorded in his diary descriptions of poor rations, inadequate medical care, and field work in camps in the Philippines, on Taiwan, and in Manchuria. He also describes the sometimes greedy behavior of his fellow captives, as well as a lighter side of camp life that included POW concerts and Red Cross visits. Annotation and an epilogue by General Beebe's son, Rev. John M. Beebe, add details about his military career, and an introduction by historian Stanley L. Falk places the diary in the context of the broader American experience of captivity.

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Book SynopsisDuring World War II, the home front offered unprecedented levels of moral, financial, and labor support for the war effort. This was no accident. Through the U.S. Treasury Department's war bond drives, Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration strategically cultivated national morale by creating the largest single domestic propaganda campaign known to that time. Donald Duck and Bugs Bunny joined Judy Garland, Dorothy Lamour, and Lana Turner to urge Americans to buy war bonds, helping to create a virtual army of home front soldiers. Dr. Seuss drew cartoons, Irving Berlin wrote songs, and Norman Rockwell designed posters to help raise over $185 billion for the struggle, most of it coming from average citizens who well remembered the poverty of the Depression. In ""Mobilizing the Home Front"", James J. Kimble marshals archival documents, public appeals, and a wealth of internal memoranda, reports, and surveys to offer a new understanding of the government's eight war bond drives and the psyche of the nation at war. With roots in propaganda studies, military history, rhetorical criticism, and peace studies, this book adds new dimensions to our understanding of the waging of war by the ""Greatest Generation.

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Book SynopsisThe Second World War stands as the most devastating and destructive global conflict in human history. More than 60 nations representing 1.7 billion people or three quarters of the world's population were consumed by its horror. Not surprisingly, therefore, World War II stands as a landmark episode in history education throughout the world and its prominent place in school history textbooks is almost guaranteed. As this book demonstrates, however, the stories that nations choose to tell their young about World War II do not represent a universally accepted ""truth"" about events during the war. Rather, wartime narratives contained in school textbooks typically are selected to instil in the young a sense of national pride, common identify, and shared collective memory. To understand this process War, Nation, Memory describes and evaluates school history textbooks from many nations deeply affected by World War II including China, France, Germany, Japan, USA, and the United Kingdom. It critically examines the very different and complex perspectives offered in many nations and analyses the ways in which textbooks commonly serve as instruments of socialisation and, in some cases, propaganda. Above all, War, Nation, Memory demonstrates that far from containing ""neutral"" knowledge, history textbooks prove fascinating cultural artefacts consciously shaped and legitimated by powerful ideological, cultural, and sociopolitical forces dominant in the present.

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Book SynopsisThe Second World War stands as the most devastating and destructive global conflict in human history. More than 60 nations representing 1.7 billion people or three quarters of the world's population were consumed by its horror. Not surprisingly, therefore, World War II stands as a landmark episode in history education throughout the world and its prominent place in school history textbooks is almost guaranteed. As this book demonstrates, however, the stories that nations choose to tell their young about World War II do not represent a universally accepted ""truth"" about events during the war. Rather, wartime narratives contained in school textbooks typically are selected to instil in the young a sense of national pride, common identify, and shared collective memory. To understand this process War, Nation, Memory describes and evaluates school history textbooks from many nations deeply affected by World War II including China, France, Germany, Japan, USA, and the United Kingdom.It critically examines the very different and complex perspectives offered in many nations and analyses the ways in which textbooks commonly serve as instruments of socialisation and, in some cases, propaganda. Above all, War, Nation, Memory demonstrates that far from containing ""neutral"" knowledge, history textbooks prove fascinating cultural artefacts consciously shaped and legitimated by powerful ideological, cultural, and sociopolitical forces dominant in the present.

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Book SynopsisIn February 1945, some 80,000 U.S. Marines attacked the heavily defended fortress that the Japanese had constructed on the tiny Pacific island of Iwo Jima. Leaders of the Army Air Forces said they needed the airfields there to provide fighter escort for their B-29 bombers. At the cost of 28,000 American casualties, the 3rd, 4th, and 5th Marine Divisions dutifully conquered this desolate piece of hell with a determination and sacrifice that have become legendary in the annals of war, immortalized in the photograph of six Marines raising the American flag on Mount Suribachi.But the Army Air Forces' fighter operations on Iwo Jima subsequently proved both unproductive and unnecessary. After the fact, a number of other justifications were generated to rationalize this tragically expensive battle. Ultimately, misleading statistics were presented to contend that the number of lives saved by B-29 emergency landings on Iwo Jima outweighed the cost of its capture.In The Ghosts of Iwo Jima, Captain Robert S. Burrell masterfully reconsiders the costs of taking Iwo Jima and its role in the war effort. His thought-provoking analysis also highlights the greater contribution of Iwo Jima's valiant dead: They inspired a reverence for the Marine Corps that proved critical to its institutional survival and its embodiment of American national spirit. From the 7th War Loan Campaign of 1945 through the flag-raising at Ground Zero in 2001, the immortal image of Iwo Jima has become a symbol of American patriotism itself.Burrell's searching account of this fabled island conflict will advance our understanding of World War II and its continuing legacy for the twenty-first century. At last, the battle's ghosts may unveil its ultimate, and most crucial, lessons.

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Book SynopsisA member of the famed Screaming Eagles of the 101st Airborne Division, Donald J. Rich went ashore on D-Day at Utah Beach, was wounded in the bloody conflict at Carentan, landed in a flimsy plywood-and-canvas glider on the battlefields of Holland, and survived the grim siege with the ""Battling Bastards of Bastogne"" during the Battle of the Bulge. Glider Infantryman is his eyewitness account of how he, along with thousands of other young men from farms, small towns, and cities across the United States, came together to answer the call of their nation. It is also a heartfelt tribute to the many thousands who gave their lives in this struggle. Coauthored by Kevin Brooks, the son of Rich's best friend and World War II comrade, Glider Infantryman covers a span of nearly three years; his return home, five months after the war's end, as a toughened bazooka gunner and veteran of five campaigns. Rich's first-person narrative includes vivid coverage of the action, featuring an especially rare account of arriving on a combat landing zone by glider. Detailed, day-to-day depiction of some of the heaviest fighting in Holland follows, including the action at Opheusden, the centre of the infamous ""Island."" Later highlights include the Battle of the Bulge, where Rich recounts his experiences in some of the hottest defensive fighting of the European Theatre, including the epic tank battles at Marvie, Champs, and Foy.

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Book SynopsisDuring the summer of 1940, the fate of the world hung in the balance as Adolf Hitler's powerful air force, the Luftwaffe, contested the skies above southern England with Britain's Royal Air Force. A handful of brave but outnumbered RAF pilots, many hailing from outside the United Kingdom, fought desperately to hold the Nazi juggernaut back and, in doing so, defend Britain from invasion. In Prime Minister Winston Churchill's immortal words, those brave RAF pilots were ""the few"" on whom so much depended. The brand-new The Battle of Britain traces the origins and course of the Battle of Britain, examining the reasons why Great Britain found itself in such a desperate situation in the summer of 1940, and why, for all their advantages, the Germans were confounded at what seemed to be the brink of victory.

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Book SynopsisAt the height of World War II, five hundred Army flight nurses served with the Army Air Forces as members of thirty-one medical air evacuation squadrons located throughout the world on both the European and Pacific fronts. Their work was not insignificant—over one million patients were evacuated by air between January 1943 and May 1945. These specially trained Army nurses took nursing to new heights. Often decorated for their accomplishments, they exemplify the ability of a group of nurses to cope successfully with the challenges of war.In her comprehensive book, author Judith Barger brings together information that is becoming less accessible as the former nurses succumb to age, infirmity, and death. Barger interviewed twenty-five of these pioneering women in 1986 when their recall of their service experiences was still vivid and informative. Building on Barger's earlier research, their stories and the numerous complementary photographs included in the volume bring to life this long overdue tribute to Army flight nursing in World War II.Beyond the Call of Duty offers the only in-depth account of the events leading up to the formation of the military flight nurse program, their training for duty, and the air evacuation missions in which they participated. Readers of military history, women's history, and nursing history will find all three interests represented in this book, which gives new meaning to a phrase in the Flight Nurse Creed of 1943: "I will be faithful to my training, and to the wisdom handed down to me by those who have gone before me.

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Book SynopsisUnlikely Allies offers the first comprehensive and scholarly English-language analysis of German-Ukrainian collaboration in the General Government, an area of occupied Poland during World War II. Drawing on extensive archival material, the Ukrainian position is examined chiefly through the perspective of Ukrainian Central Committee head Volodymyr Kubiiovych, a prewar academic and ardent nationalist. The contact between Kubiiovych and Nazi administrators at various levels shows where their collaboration coincided and where it differed, providing a full understanding of the Ukrainian Committee's ties with the occupation authorities and its relationship with other groups, like Poles and Jews, in occupied Poland.Ukrainian nationalists' collaboration created an opportunity to neutralize prewar Polish influences in various strata of social life. Kubiiovych hoped for the emergence of an autonomous Ukrainian region within the borders of the General Government or an ethnographic state closely associated with the Third Reich. This led to his partnership with the Third Reich to create a new European order after the war. Through their occupational policy of divide to conquer, German concessions raised Ukrainians to the position of a full-fledged ethnic group, giving them the respect they sought throughout the interwar period. Yet collaboration also contributed to the eruption of a bloody Polish-Ukrainian ethnic conflict. Kubiiovych's wartime experiences with Nazi politicians and administrators-greatly overlooked and only partially referenced today-not only illustrate the history of German-Ukrainian and Polish-Ukrainian relations, but also supply a missing piece to the larger, more controversial puzzle of collaboration during World War II.Table of Contents Maps Preface 1. The Makings of Ethnic Struggle in Interwar Poland 2. Ukraine—The German Fete 3. "Small Deeds and Great Works" 4. Grateful Traitor 5. Token Concessions 6. "The Basis for Every Nation Is Territory" 7. "They Rejoice in Our Success for Ukraine" 8. Fight and Flight Epilogue Abbreviations Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisUnlikely Allies offers the first comprehensive and scholarly English-language analysis of German-Ukrainian collaboration in the General Government, an area of occupied Poland during World War II. Drawing on extensive archival material, the Ukrainian position is examined chiefly through the perspective of Ukrainian Central Committee head Volodymyr Kubiiovych, a prewar academic and ardent nationalist. The contact between Kubiiovych and Nazi administrators at various levels shows where their collaboration coincided and where it differed, providing a full understanding of the Ukrainian Committee's ties with the occupation authorities and its relationship with other groups, like Poles and Jews, in occupied Poland.Ukrainian nationalists' collaboration created an opportunity to neutralize prewar Polish influences in various strata of social life. Kubiiovych hoped for the emergence of an autonomous Ukrainian region within the borders of the General Government or an ethnographic state closely associated with the Third Reich. This led to his partnership with the Third Reich to create a new European order after the war. Through their occupational policy of divide to conquer, German concessions raised Ukrainians to the position of a full-fledged ethnic group, giving them the respect they sought throughout the interwar period. Yet collaboration also contributed to the eruption of a bloody Polish-Ukrainian ethnic conflict. Kubiiovych's wartime experiences with Nazi politicians and administrators-greatly overlooked and only partially referenced today-not only illustrate the history of German-Ukrainian and Polish-Ukrainian relations, but also supply a missing piece to the larger, more controversial puzzle of collaboration during World War II.Table of Contents Maps Preface 1. The Makings of Ethnic Struggle in Interwar Poland 2. Ukraine—The German Fete 3. "Small Deeds and Great Works" 4. Grateful Traitor 5. Token Concessions 6. "The Basis for Every Nation Is Territory" 7. "They Rejoice in Our Success for Ukraine" 8. Fight and Flight Epilogue Abbreviations Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisMy Seven Lives is the English translation of the best-selling memoir of Slovak journalist Agneša Kalinová (1924-2014): Holocaust survivor, film critic, translator, and political prisoner. An oral history written with her colleague Jana Juráňová My Seven Lives provides a window into Jewish history, the Holocaust, and the cultural evolution of Central and Eastern Europe. The conversational approach gives the book a relatable immediacy that vividly conveys the tone and temperament of Agneša, bringing out her lively personality and extraordinary ability to stay positive in the face of adversity.Each chapter reflects a distinct period of Agneša's long and tumultuous life. Her idyllic childhood gives way to the rise of Nazism and restrictions of the anti-Jewish legislation, which led to deportations and her escape to Hungary, where she found refuge in a Budapest convent. Surviving the Holocaust, she returned to Slovakia and married writer J?ín Ladislav Kalina. They embraced communism, and Agneša began her career as a journalist and film critic and became involved in the Prague Spring, ending with the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. Agneša and her husband lost their jobs and were imprisoned, which led to their decision to immigrate to West Germany. She found a new career as a political commentator for Radio Free Europe, and after decades of political oppression, Agneša lived to see the euphoric days of the Velvet Revolution and its freeing aftermath.My Seven Lives shows the impact of an often brutal twentieth century on the life of one remarkable individual. It's a story of survival, perseverance, and ultimately triumph.Trade Review"This book is not a conventional autobiography, but takes the form – commonly used in Central Europe – of a transcribed dialogue between the subject and a friendly interlocutor [...] As impressive as Kalinová’s recall of names and events is her lack of bitterness. Refusing to let herself be defined by the loss of family in the Holocaust and of her career in middle age, she says: “I’ve always regarded life as a kind of adventure: let’s see what it throws at me and how things will pan out.”" - Times Literary SupplementTable of Contents Preface 1. Childhood and Adolescence 1924–1942 2. War—Deportations—Escape—Return 1942–1945 3. Bratislava After the War 1945–1956 4. From Oppression to Freedom and Back Again 1956–1969 5. Normalization and Emigration 1969–1978 6. Exile 1978–1990 7. Returns 1990–1995 What Happened Next Farewell to Agneša Kalinová Appendix: Biographical Notes on Selected Individuals Mentioned Notes Index

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Book SynopsisMost accounts of the Holocaust focus on trainloads of prisoners speeding toward Auschwitz, with its chimneys belching smoke and flames, in the summer of 1944. This book provides a hitherto untold chapter of the Holocaust by exploring a prequel to the gas chambers: the face-to-face mass murder of Jews in Galicia by bullets. The summer of 1941 ushered in a chain of events that had no precedent in the rapidly unfolding history of World War II and the Holocaust. In six weeks, more than twenty thousand Hungarian Jews were forcefully deported to Galicia and summarily executed. In exploring the fate of these Hungarian Jews and their local coreligionists, A Summer of Mass Murder transcends conventional history by introducing a multitude of layers of politics, culture, and, above all, psychology—for both the victims and the executioners. The narrative presents an uncharted territory in Holocaust scholarship with extensive archival research, interviews, and corresponding literature across countries and languages, incorporating many previously unexplored documents and testimonies. Eisen reflects upon the voices of the victims, the images of the perpetrators, whose motivation for murder remains inexplicable. In addition, the author incorporates the long-forgotten testimonies of bystander contemporaries, who unwittingly became part of the unfolding nightmare and recorded the horror in simple words. This book also serves as a personal journey of discovery. Among the twenty thousand people killed was the tale of two brothers, the author's uncles. In retracing their final fate and how they were swept up in the looming genocide, A Summer of Mass Murder also gives voice to their story.Table of Contents List of Illustrations The Main Characters: Survivors, Witnesses, Rescuers, Perpetrators Author's Note Preface 1. Prologue: A Primer to the Holocaust 2. The Ostjuden: The Galicianer in the Hungarian Imagination 3. Galicia: An Exile into the Unknown 4. Kamenets-Podolsk: The Anatomy of a Massacre 5. Galicia 1941 – 1942: The Delirium of Murder 6. Weapon of War: Rape and Sexual Violence 7. Return from the Abyss: Rescue and Survival 8. Opening Old Wounds: Responsibility and Consequences 9. Requiem for a Deportation: Unanswered Questions Epilogue: Looking for Closure Acknowledgments Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisWhen war came, the authorities in London and Berlin operated evacuation schemes that sent children into billets and camps in rural reception areas. The children’s exodus either happened orderly and followed years of planning and discussion amongst policy makers (London), or haphazardly following the sudden realisation that the war would not be fought exclusively elsewhere (Berlin). As policies, the government evacuation schemes were bold, controversial and - considering their distinct political contexts - surprisingly similar; as were some of their consequences: the recipients did not accept them uncritically, the municipalities failed to evacuate the majority of children from the cities under attack, and private provision catered for a lot more children than the official schemes.This study of the British evacuation and Third Reich Kinderlandverschickung is an original and important contribution to the existing scholarship in two ways. First, it stays in the cities (rather than leaving with the evacuees towards the already well-researched evacuation experience) in order to show the scheme’ geneses, but also to appreciate issues related to their operational conduct in the face of stray children, closed schools and rebellious parents in town. Second, the study explores the evacuation schemes in the two warring capitals in comparative perspective, thus critically analysing how policy was developed and executed in the face of shifting and differing political contexts and acute sociological challenges. This study traces local developments through sources, from the earliest plans contemplated in London during the 1930s to the collapse of the Third Reich and delayed return of Berlin children in 1946. It covers operational aspects and explores themes of agency, citizenship, childhood, schooling and the relationship between state and individual.The robust historical research, combined with a strong central narrative, should appeal not only to historians of education or military historians, but also to policy makers, educators, former evacuees and all readers with a private or professional interest in wartime childhoods and evacuations.

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Book SynopsisWhen war came, the authorities in London and Berlin operated evacuation schemes that sent children into billets and camps in rural reception areas. The children’s exodus either happened orderly and followed years of planning and discussion amongst policy makers (London), or haphazardly following the sudden realisation that the war would not be fought exclusively elsewhere (Berlin). As policies, the government evacuation schemes were bold, controversial and - considering their distinct political contexts - surprisingly similar; as were some of their consequences: the recipients did not accept them uncritically, the municipalities failed to evacuate the majority of children from the cities under attack, and private provision catered for a lot more children than the official schemes.This study of the British evacuation and Third Reich Kinderlandverschickung is an original and important contribution to the existing scholarship in two ways. First, it stays in the cities (rather than leaving with the evacuees towards the already well-researched evacuation experience) in order to show the scheme’ geneses, but also to appreciate issues related to their operational conduct in the face of stray children, closed schools and rebellious parents in town. Second, the study explores the evacuation schemes in the two warring capitals in comparative perspective, thus critically analysing how policy was developed and executed in the face of shifting and differing political contexts and acute sociological challenges. This study traces local developments through sources, from the earliest plans contemplated in London during the 1930s to the collapse of the Third Reich and delayed return of Berlin children in 1946. It covers operational aspects and explores themes of agency, citizenship, childhood, schooling and the relationship between state and individual.The robust historical research, combined with a strong central narrative, should appeal not only to historians of education or military historians, but also to policy makers, educators, former evacuees and all readers with a private or professional interest in wartime childhoods and evacuations.

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Book Synopsis“Execute against Japan should be required reading for naval officers (especially in submarine wardrooms), as well as for anyone interested in history, policy, or international law.” - Adm. James P. Wisecup, President, US Naval War College (for Naval War College Review)Trade Review“ . . . until now how the Navy managed to instantaneously move from the overt legal restrictions of the naval arms treaties that bound submarines to the cruiser rules of the eighteenth century to a declaration of unrestricted submarine warfare against Japan immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbor has never been explained. Lieutenant Holwitt has dissected this process and has created a compelling story of who did what, when, and to whom.” - The Submarine Review “Although the policy of unrestricted air and submarine warfare proved critical to the Pacific war’s course, this splendid work is the first comprehensive account of its origins—illustrating that historians have by no means exhausted questions about this conflict.” - World War II Magazine“US Navy submarine officer Joel Ira Holwitt has performed an impressive feat with this book. . . . Holwitt is to be commended for not shying away from moral judgments . . . This is a superb book that fully explains how the United States came to adopt a strategy regarded by many as illegal and tantamount to ‘terror’.” - Military Review

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Book SynopsisThe First Washington Conference, codenamed Arcadia, was a secret meeting held in the days immediately following the entrance of the United States into World War II. It was the first meeting between the United States and Britain to determine military strategy. Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and their top military advisors spent hours making major decisions that would determine the direction of the Allied war effort. The main achievement of the conference was the 'Europe first' decision, declaring that the defeat of Germany was the highest priority.Neither side knew what to expect before this momentous meeting. Before the war, the British and the Americans had differing strategic concerns, especially about the Pacific and East Asia: differences of such contrast that the conference was in jeopardy of ending early if not resolved. The narrative uses a chronological approach that examines in detail each day of the conference. This day-by-day methodology shows the gradual development of rapport between the allied chieftains, why and how it forged relationships, and the undercurrent of tension as each ally sought to ensure its national interests while cooperating with the other in a grand alliance.Historian and retired Brigadier General John F. Shortal skillfully unravels the inside story of this pivotal meeting. He shows how the working and personal relationships between Roosevelt and Churchill, as well as their military chiefs of staffs, first took root and then blossomed during the conference. Code Name Arcadia makes a major contribution not only to the history of World War II, but also to our understanding of the power structure of the postwar world.

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Book SynopsisDoes it seem strange to think of a museum as a weapon in national defense?" asked John Hay Whitney, president of the Museum of Modern Art, in June 1941. As the United States entered the Second World War in the months to follow, this idea seemed far from strange to museums. Working to strike the right balance between education and patriotism, and hoping to attain greater relevance, many American museums saw engagement with wartime concerns as consistent with their vision of the museum as a social instrument.Unsurprisingly, exhibitions served as the primary vehicle through which museums, large and small, engaged their publics with wartime topics with fare ranging from displays on the cultures of Allied nations to "living maps" that charted troop movements and exhibits on war preparedness. Clarissa J. Ceglio chronicles debates, experiments, and collaborations from the 1930s to the immediate postwar years, investigating how museums re-envisioned the exhibition as a narrative medium and attempted to reconcile their mission with new modes of storytelling.

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Book SynopsisDespite Puerto Rico being the hub of the United States' naval response to the German blockade of the Caribbean, there is very little published scholarship on the island's heavy involvement in the global conflict of World War II. Recently, a new generation of scholars has been compiling interdisciplinary research with fresh insights about the profound wartime changes, which in turn generated conditions for the rapid economic, social, and political development of postwar Puerto Rico. The island's subsequent transformation cannot be adequately grasped without tracing its roots to the war years. Island at War brings together outstanding new research on Puerto Rico and makes it accessible in English. It covers ten distinct topics written by nine distinguished scholars from the Caribbean and beyond. Contributors include experts in the fields of history, political science, sociology, literature, journalism, communications, and engineering. Topics include US strategic debate and war planning for the Caribbean on the eve of World War II, Puerto Rico as the headquarters of the Caribbean Sea frontier, war and political transition in Puerto Rico, the war economy of Puerto Rico, the German blockade of the Caribbean in 1942, and the story of a Puerto Rican officer in the Second World War and Korea. With these essays and others, Island at War represents the cutting edge of scholarship on the role of Puerto Rico and the Caribbean in World War II and its aftermath.

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Book SynopsisIn an absorbing work peopled with world leaders, generals and ordinary citizens who fought on both sides of the Second World War, Alone brings to resounding life perhaps the most critical year of twentieth-century history. May 1940 was a month like no other, as the German war machine blazed into France while the supposedly impregnable Maginot Line crumbled, and Winston Churchill replaced Neville Chamberlain as prime minister in an astonishing political drama as Britain, isolated and alone, faced a triumphant Nazi Germany. Against this vast historical canvas, Michael Korda relates what happened and why, and also tells his own story, that of a six-year-old boy in a glamorous family who would himself be evacuated. Alone is a work that seamlessly weaves a family memoir into an unforgettable account of a political and military disaster redeemed by the evacuation of more than 300,000 men in four days—surely one of the most heroic episodes of the war.Trade Review"Anyone wanting to explore the history behind Christopher Nolan's recent film could do a lot worse than start here." -- Times Literary Supplement"... he [Korda] offers two books for the price of one, interweaving a historical narrative of the events of 1939–1940, climaxing with Dunkirk, and a succession of vivid fragments of autobiography." -- Max Hastings - The New York Review of Books"... a superb retelling of the extraordinary story of May 1940, which in my view can never be told enough... his [Korda's] work addresses all the latest research and analysis of other historians. He has a fine eye for telling detail, as well as for the big issues and all the personalities involved... An exciting work of history; I loved it." -- Andrew Roberts, Books of the Year 2017 - BBC History Magazine"The incredible, almost miraculous story of what happened at Dunkirk in the year 1940—and why—is unfolded in Alone with great narrative skill and superb delineation of a highly interesting cast of characters, including, importantly, the author himself and his own remarkable family." -- David McCullough"Ultimately, this is a title which offers an absorbing and well-written tale of political intrigue and military campaign... set within, is the fascinating tale of a family, as well as armies, rescued from the brink of disaster." -- Britain at War Magazine"His [Korda's] attention to detail when relating specific events is superb and will make the military reader feel as if they are there among the action." -- Soldier Magazine"[Alone] vividly brings to life events which saw Britain stand alone as the only nation with the resolve and courage to defy Hitler." -- Sunday Post Scotland"This account of the events surrounding Dunkirk is a no-brainer for my top read of 2017." -- Soldier Selects 2017 - Soldier Magazine"Entertaining... This crucial time is recounted by someone who witnessed those years as a child. Korda, a longtime book editor before becoming a full-time author, is like a charming dinner party host offering his personal experience of history... A fine introduction for anyone new to this fulcrum point of the 20th century." -- Thomas E. Ricks - The New York Times Book Review

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Book Synopsis Many myths have grown up around President Harry S. Truman’s decision to use nuclear weapons against Imperial Japan. In destroying these myths, Truman and the Bomb will discomfort both Truman’s critics and his supporters, and force historians to reexamine what they think they know about the end of the Pacific War.Myth: Truman didn’t know of the atomic bomb’s development before he became president. Fact: Truman’s knowledge of the bomb is revealed in his own carefully worded letters to a Senate colleague and specifically discussed in the correspondence between the army officers assigned to his Senate investigating committee.Myth: The huge casualty estimates cited by Truman and Secretary of War Henry Stimson were a postwar creation devised to hide their guilt for killing thousands of defenseless civilians. Fact: The flagrantly misrepresented “low” numbers are based on narrow slices of highly qualified—and limited—U.S. Army projections printed in a variety of briefing documents and are not from the actual invasion planning against Japan.Myth: Truman wanted to defeat Japan without any assistance from the Soviet Union and to freeze the USSR out of the postwar settlements. Fact: President Franklin D. Roosevelt and President Truman desperately wanted Stalin’s involvement in the bloody endgame of World War II and worked diligently—and successfully—toward that end. Using previously unpublished material, D. M. Giangreco busts these myths and more. An award-winning historian and expert on Truman, Giangreco is perfectly situated to debunk the many deep-rooted falsehoods about the roles played by American, Soviet, and Japanese leaders during the end of the World War II in the Pacific. Truman and the Bomb, a concise yet comprehensive study of Truman’s decision to use the atomic bomb, will prove to be a classic for studying presidential politics and influence on atomic warfare and its military and diplomatic components. Making this book particularly valuable for professors and students as well as for military, diplomatic, and presidential historians and history buffs are extensive primary source materials, including the planned U.S. naval and air operations in support of the Soviet invasion of Manchuria. These documents support Giangreco’s arguments while enabling the reader to enter the mindsets of Truman and his administration as well as the war’s key Allied participants. Trade Review"Giangreco's close analysis of these documents is thought-provoking, and makes a strong case that Truman believed dropping the bomb would save lives. Readers will come away with new insights into a world-changing event."—Publishers Weekly"Truman and the Bomb is relevant to today's national security professionals. Giangreco delivers a highly readable account that touches on the political and military aspects of a key presidential decision during war. This momentous decision during World War II is still felt today."—Clayton K. S. Chun, Parameters"Giangreco is a most able and indefatigable military historian who has made important contributions to the long-running debate over the use of the atomic bombs in August 1945."—Wilson D. Miscamble, Missouri Historical Review“D. M. Giangreco’s sweeping critique of revisionist interpretations of President Truman’s decision to use the atomic bomb against Japan is certain to stir renewed controversy. Giangreco vividly recreates the passion and emotion of the summer of 1945 in a first-rate account of the decision to use the weapon and the postwar historiography surrounding its use. Relying on documentary evidence, he highlights the stark difference between accuracy and opinion in historical writing.”—Edward J. Drea, author of Japan’s Imperial Army: Its Rise and Fall“Those who continue to cling to the belief that there was another way forward than dropping the atomic bombs, and who wish to retain their intellectual integrity, must read this book. D. M. Giangreco continues to lean on the stake driven through the heart of obsolete arguments from the 1960s antiwar movement, popular culture, and 1980s antinuclear academia that continue to reach out from the grave today.”—Sean M. Maloney, author of Emergency War Plan: The American Doomsday Machine, 1945–1960“[D. M. Giangreco has] demolished the claim that President Truman’s high casualty estimates were a postwar invention.”—Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.“Dennis Giangreco has rendered obsolete most of what has been written on the subject.”—Robert James Maddox, professor emeritus of history at Pennsylvania State University and author of key books and articles on the history of the atomic bomb and American foreign policyTable of Contents List of Illustrations Foreword John T. Kuehn Prologue: The Debate 1. The Manhattan Project: What Did Truman Know and When Did He Know It? 2. Projects Milepost and Hula: America’s Hidden Role in the Soviet Invasion of Manchuria 3. Roosevelt, Stalin, and Poland: The Tehran, Moscow, and Yalta Conferences 4. A New President: “The Storm Broke Almost at Once” 5. Truman’s White House Meeting: “My Hardest Decision” 6. “I’ve Gotten What I Came For”: Potsdam, the Bomb, and Soviet Entry into the War Appendixes A. Air-Raid Casualties and Property Damage in Japan B. Memorandum on Ending the Japanese War C. The Historiography of Hiroshima: The Rise and Fall of Revisionism Michael Kort D. The Manhattan Project: A Chronology of Its Expansion and Subsequent Congressional Investigations E. “Between You, the Boss [Truman], and Me” F. Secretary of War Henry Stimson to Truman on Atom Bomb Development G. U.S. Navy Combatant Ships under Project Hula H. Agreement regarding the Entry of the Soviet Union into the War against Japan I. Secretary Stimson’s Proposed Program for Japan J. Proposal for Increasing the Scope of Casualties Studies K. Discussion of American Casualties at President Truman’s Meeting with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Service Secretaries, June 18, 1945 L. General Thomas Handy’s Atomic Bomb Authorization M. Atomic Bomb Press Release N. Potsdam Declaration, July 26, 1945 O. Truman-Stalin Meeting at Potsdam P. Tripartite Military Meeting of the U.S., Soviet, and British Chiefs of Staff, July 26, 1945 Q. Planned U.S. Naval and Air Operations in Support of the Soviet Invasion of Manchuria R. Extract from the Log of the President’s Trip to the Berlin Conference, July 18, 1945 Notes Index

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Book SynopsisThe U.S. Army attacked three villages near the German-Belgium border, surprising the Germans who surrendered with little resistance. The German army regrouped and counterattacked. A brief but horrific battle ensued, and as the enemy pressed forward, the Americans retreated in haste, leaving behind their wounded and their dead. Discussion of this week-long conflict that began on All Souls Day, November 2, 1944, has been confined to officer training school, in part due to its heavy losses and ignominy. After the war the U.S. Army returned to the battlefield to bring home its fallen. To its dismay it found that many of these men had vanished. The disappearances were puzzling and for decades the U.S. government searched unsuccessfully for clues. After poring over now-declassified battlefield reports and interviewing family members, the authors reconstruct a spellbinding story of love and sacrifice, honor and bravery, as well as a portrait of the gnawing pain of families not knowing what became of their loved ones. Ultimately this work of history and in-depth contemporary journalism proffers a glimmer of light in the ongoing search.Trade Review“Pereira and Wilson have fashioned a compelling story about a battle that was doomed from the start, and what it was like to wait for decades for word of a missing relative. . . . A moving account of not just a seminal battle but the lasting effects on those waiting for decades to know what happened to their loved ones.”—David Keymer, Library Journal“You might think that by now every story about World War II has been told. Think again. This book, based on in-depth investigative reporting, tells a compelling story that you’ve never heard about. It’s a story that has needed to be told and is one you’ll want to read.”—Joe Bergantino, cofounder of the New England Center for Investigative Reporting“An impressive historical investigation into the battle on All Souls Day and into the men and the mystery of the lost battalion. . . . It is a remarkable and impressive effort to apply investigative journalism skills to bring to life a battle buried in the annals of World War II.”—Brett Arends, author and columnist for Dow Jones publications“Historians usually dissect an event and then analyze its impact over time. In All Souls Day the authors do the opposite. They start with the loss felt by American families of soldiers killed under mysterious circumstances during World War II and then work their way back in time to uncover what really happened and give those families some closure. It’s an investigative masterpiece that exposes the horror of war on so many levels.”—Bruce Mohl, editor of Commonwealth Magazine: Nonprofit Journal of Politics, Ideas, and Civic Life“Written in a style that is reminiscent of Tom Brokaw’s The Greatest Generation, the authors tell a remarkable . . . story about the lives, valor, and sacrifices of select men from the 28th Infantry Division who fought in the Battle of the Hurtgen Forest but never came home. It is also a story of their families’ search for closure. This is a story every American should read to remind them that our freedom and way of life have a high price if we intend to keep it.”—Edward D. Jennings, assistant professor in the Department of Command and Leadership, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College“I attended the funeral of Staff Sergeant John J. Farrell Jr. out of respect for his service, courage, and sacrifice as an American soldier, and to show his family and fellow Hurtgen Forest veterans that loyalty and commitment between soldiers spans generations. In my mind he is an American hero. There is no nobler a cause than the preservation of a Soldier’s life through the telling of his history.”–Thomas Sellars, Brig. Gen., U.S. Army (Ret.)“No family, no community, and no nation rests fully until its sons and daughters in arms have come home. In that spirit, we should all honor and encourage the work expressed in this book.”—Deval Patrick, former governor of MassachusettsTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction: The Price of Bravery 1. Molly and Peggy 2. They Can’t Find Jack 3. If You Were Young and Strong and Male 4. Under the Gaze of a Zen Master 5. In the Stillness of a Predawn Hour 6. The Autumn of Its Reign 7. Replacement Depot No. 15 8. Tucked into the Alluvial Folds 9. Flashes of Fire Danced like Distant Lightning 10. I Felt Like a Little Napoleon 11. Like Caskets Tossed from the Deck 12. If I Leave Now, Would It Be Desertion? 13. From the Lower Levels of Dante’s Inferno 14. Am I Wounded Badly? 15. It Had a Bittersweet Sound 16. Zwei Amerikanische Soldaten Notes Index

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Book SynopsisThe first English-language monograph on Hermann Broch's literary and theoretical work on mass hysteria. Winner of the 2023 Radomír Luža Prize for the Best Manuscript in Austrian/Czechoslovak Studies in the World War II Era Austrian Jewish author Hermann Broch (1886-1951), a leading figure of European Modernism, spent decades attempting to understand the phenomenon of mass hysteria. With his work, he hoped to help protect society from the allure of mass hysteria, embodied in the fanatical appeal of National Socialism. He was torn between two approaches to the problem: using literature to diagnose and expose the irrational knowledge that underpins mass hysteria, and employing theory as a more precise and effective means of doing the same. In this first English-language monograph on the topic, Brett E. Sterling traces the development of Broch's understanding of the mass from an initial confrontation in 1918 to a recurring theme in his fiction and ultimately to the monumental but incomplete Massenwahntheorie (Theory of Mass Hysteria, 1939-48). In thorough readings of Broch's major fictional and theoretical works, the analysis centers on the question of how his literature and theory provide distinct but complementary approaches to conceiving and representing the elusive figure of the mass and the attendant experience of mass hysteria. With political extremism and conspiratorial thinking on the rise, Sterling makes the case that Broch's insights into mass hysteria - literary as well as theoretical - are of renewed relevance to a contemporary audience.Trade ReviewThis is one of the best and clearest investigations of Hermann Broch's work that has appeared in recent years. . . . It is the first monograph devoted to the representation and analysis of the modern mass in Broch's narrative and essayistic works. * Journal of Austrian Studies *Notoriously, Hermann Broch never makes it easy for his readers, be it in the tortuous style or the challenging subjects of his writing. Yet as Sterling shows throughout this lucid and thought-inducing study, everything that so exercised Broch during the 'age of extremes' has, alas, become current again today. * Modern Language Review *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction 1: First Encounters, 1918-1929 2: The Power of Literature 3: The Mass Takes Shape: Literary Representations 4: Theory and Its Discontents: The Massenwahntheorie 5: The Threshold of Experience: Die Verzauberung Conclusion Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisFirst English translation of the memoirs of Austrian Romani Holocaust survivor, writer, visual artist, musician, and activist Ceija Stojka (1933-2013), along with poems, an interview, historical photos, and reproductions of her artworks. "Is this the whole world?" This question begins the first of three memoirs by Austrian Romani writer, visual artist, musician, and activist Ceija Stojka (1933-2013), told from her perspective as a child interned in three Nazi concentration camps from age nine to twelve. Written by a child survivor much later in life, the memoirs offer insights into the nexus of narrative and extreme trauma, expressing the full spectrum of human emotions: fear and sorrow at losing loved ones; joy and relief when reconnecting with family and friends; desire to preserve some memories while attempting to erase others; horror at acts of genocide, and hope arising from dreams of survival. In addition to annotated translations of the three memoirs, the book includes two of Stojka's poems and an interview by Karin Berger, editor of the original editions of Stojka's memoirs, as well as color reproductions of several of her artworks and historical photographs. An introduction contextualizes her works within Romani history and culture, and a glossary informs the reader about the "concentrationary universe." Because the memoirs show how Stojka navigated male-dominated postwar Austrian culture, generally discriminatory to Roma, and the patriarchal aspects of Romani culture itself, the book is a contribution not only to Holocaust Studies but also to Austrian Studies, Romani Studies, and Women's and Gender Studies.Table of ContentsPreface Abbreviations Introduction Writings by Ceija Stojka 1: "Auschwitz Is My Overcoat": Poem 2: We Live in Secrecy: Memories of a Romni-Gypsy: Memoir (1988) 3: "Slobodoj Mange"/"I Have the Freedom": Poem 4: Travelers in This World: From the Life of a Romni-Gypsy: Memoir (1992) 5: Am I Dreaming I'm Alive? Liberated from Bergen-Belsen: Memoir (2003) "You mustn't be anyone else": Interview with Ceija Stojka 6: "Ceija Stojka in Conversation with Karin Berger (1987) Glossary Appendix: Notes on Names and Family Members Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThe first transnational study of the memory of the Kindertransport and the first to explore how it is represented in museums, memorials, and commemorations. The Kindertransport, the rescue of ca. 10,000 Jewish children from the Nazi sphere of control and influence before the Second World War, has often been framed as a "British story." This book recognizes that even though most of the "Kinder" were initially brought to the UK and many stayed, it was more than that. It therefore compares British memory of the Kindertransport to that of other host nations (the US, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand). It is the first book to ask how the Kindertransport is remembered both in the countries of origin, particularly Germany, and in the host nations, as well as the first to analyze how it is represented in museums, memorials, and commemorations. Seeing memory of the Kindertransport in the host nations and in Germany as significantly different, the study argues that the different national memory discourses around the Nazi persecution of Jews shape the respective countries' images of the Kindertransport, and that those images in turn shape the discourses - especially in Britain. Yet while national memory frameworks remain crucial to how the Kindertransport is remembered, the book also documents the increasing significance of transnational memory trends that link the host nations with each other and with the countries from which the children originated.Table of ContentsAcknowledgments List of Abbreviations Introduction: Kindertransport Memory and Representation 1: British Memory of the Kindertransport 2: American and Canadian Memories of the Kindertransport 3: Memories of the Kindertransport in Australia and New Zealand 4: German Memory of the Kindertransport Conclusion Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisAn examination of territorial changes between Czechoslovakia and Hungary and their effects on the local populations of the borderlands in the World War II era The movement of borders and people was a remarkably common experience for mid-twentieth-century Central and Eastern Europeans. Such was the case along the border between Czechoslovakia and Hungary, where territory changed hands in1938 and again in 1945. During the intervening period and beyond, residents of the borderland were caught in a nearly continuous onslaught of ethnic cleansing - expulsion of Czech and Slovak "colonists," Jewish deportations during the Holocaust, and postwar population exchanges - that was meant to reshape the territory first in the desired image of the Hungarian state and later on in that of Czechoslovakia. Borders on the Move examines the impact of border changes and migrations on this region between 1938 and 1948. It investigates the everyday consequences of geopolitical events that are well-known from the perspective of international and national histories, but does so explicitly in the context of the borderland. Making skillful use of state and local archival sources in Hungary and Slovakia, author Leslie Waters illuminates the catastrophic effects of state action - including sweeping wealth redistribution and the expulsion of those perceived as enemies of the state - on individuals. This engagingly written and far-reaching work will be invaluable to scholars of the Holocaust and of East Central Europe as well as to those who study forced migration, population exchange, and inter-ethnic relations.Trade ReviewLeslie Waters' Borders on the Move is a model academic monograph. [...] a well written and researched account of borderland life and lives during World War II in Hungary and Slovakia. It will be of interest to historians and other scholars of borderlands, the Holocaust, ethnic cleansing, national identities and Central and Eastern Europe. -- EUROPE-ASIA STUDIESLeslie Waters's Borders on the Move is an important work for both international historiography and Hungarian and Slovak historiographies. * HUNGARIAN CULTURAL STUDIES *Table of ContentsGlossary Introduction Shifting Borders and Shifting Populations Territorial Reintegration War and Radicalization The Holocaust in the Borderland Return to Czechoslovakia Conclusion Bibliography

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Book SynopsisThe thirst for post-World War II justice transcended the Cold War and mobilized diverse social groups. This is a story of their multilayered and at times conflictual interactions. In this edited collection, sixteen historians develop a new approach to the trials against persons accused of war crimes and mass murder in Europe during the ascendancy of Nazism and the Second World War (1933-1945). Focusing on the social aspects of the demand for justice and making use of previously underexploited local and international sources, contributors put to the test the notion of "show trials" and explore a range of judicial and political cultures from Germany to the Soviet Union. Essays uncover the expectations around accountability and forms of mobilization on the part of a range of citizens involved in the trials: survivors, witnesses, perpetrators, Nazi hunters, and civic activists. In addition to the perspective of these citizens, contributors invoke the expertise of reporters, filmmakers, historians, investigators, and prosecutors who shaped public representations of justice. These shaping efforts, the authors show, often supported the desire of political authorities to benefit from the publicity of the trials and to contain the spontaneous dissemination of information. The book's close examination of interactions between citizens and authorities thus demonstrates the extent and limits of what might be called a "coproduction" of justice, in the process shedding light on the interdependence between historical knowledge and legal prosecution of mass crimes.Table of ContentsTable of Figures Introduction V. Voisin, E. Le Bourhis, and I. Tcherneva List of Abbreviations Part I - Justice and visibility Shaping the Spectacle: Politics and Professional Practices Chapter 1. Justice in Mantle Coats: Shooting the Bulgarian People's Courts in Revolutionary Times, 1944-1945 Nadège Ragaru Chapter 2. The Nuremberg Trials - To Stage or Not to Stage: Conflicting Visions and Creative Differences Sylvie Lindeperg/Camille Noûs Chapter 3. Evidence and Soviet Rhetorical Devices: Staging Justice at the Nuremberg Trial Victor Barbat Disclosing Data: Doubt and Uncertainty Chapter 4. Tensions Between Secrecy and Publicity: Internment, Investigation, Extradition, and Convictions in the Soviet Occupation Zone in Germany, 1945-1950 Enrico Heitzer and Julia Landau Chapter 5. Concentration Camp Crimes on Trial, on TV, and in Civic Education. Bonn 1958-1959 Götz Lachwitz Chapter 6. Law and Accountability, Secrecy and Guilt: Soviet Trawniki Defendants' Trials, 1960-1970 David Alan Rich Part II - Justice and social mobilization From Rumor to Testimony: Challenges in Voluntary Social Involvement Chapter 7. Rehabilitation of individuals suspected of collaboration: The Jewish Civic Court by the Central Committee of Jews in Poland, 1946-1950 Katarzyna Person Chapter 8. Risks and Results of Citizens' Commitments: The Kačerovski Case in Riga, 1958-1963 Eric Le Bourhis and Irina Tcherneva Chapter 9. Mediators behind the Scenes: The World Jewish Congress and the International Auschwitz Committee during the Preparations for the First Auschwitz Trial in Frankfurt Katharina Stengel Individual and Collective Advocacy Chapter 10. Accusing Hans Globke, 1960-1963: Agency and the Iron Curtain Jasmin Söhner and Máté Zombory Chapter 11. The Fils et Filles des Déportés Juifs de France and the Lischka Trial in Cologne, 1971-1980 Anne Klein and Birte Klarzyk List of Contributors Index

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