Dutch Gratitude Day

I went out this morning to see what our neighbors had done in the way of Halloween decorations.


It didn't seem to me that they had done a lot, though there were a number of skeletons.  More noteworthy were the Japanese maples that seem to be at their  peak color.

I think today could be called "Japanese Red Maple Tree Day."

Actually there was just last week another celebration.  PM Justin Trudeau went to the Netherlands and to greet him the Dutch put on another of the numerous Dutch Gratitude Days (my name, not theirs) that have been put on since the Second World War.

The reason for it goes back to 1945 when, after years of Nazi occupation, the Netherlands were liberated by Canadian forces, just in time to keep the Dutch from starving to death.  The Dutch have never forgotten this merciful intervention.

Who does that kind of thing?  As far as I know, only the Dutch.

I believe that this story sheds more honor on the Dutch than on Canada, though certainly it is one of the best episodes in Canadian history.  Bravo to all who were actually there, and their worthy descendents.

Note:

Apparently, Mons in Belgium has not forgotten the Canadians.

Plunder in history: more from Coates

Ta-Nehisi Coates:

In Postwar, Tony Judt evokes the chaos of living under the thumb of Nazi Germany: It is misleading to think of the German occupation of continental Europe as a time of pacification and order under the eye of an omniscient and ubiquitous power. Even in Poland, the most comprehensively policed and repressed of all the occupied territories, society continued to function in defiance of the new rulers: the Poles constituted for themselves a parallel underground world of newspapers, schools, cultural activities, welfare services, economic exchange and even an army—all of them forbidden by the Germans and carried on outside the law and at great personal risk. But that was precisely the point. To live normally in occupied Europe meant breaking the law: in the first place the laws of the occupiers (curfews, travel regulations, race laws, etc) but also conventional laws and norms as well. Most common people who did not have access to farm produce were obliged, for example, to resort to the black market or illegal barter just to feed their families. Theft—whether from the state, from a fellow citizen or from a looted Jewish store—was so widespread that in the eyes of many people it ceased to be a crime. ...

As occupying forces, both Nazis and Soviets precipitated a war of all against all. They discouraged not just allegiance to the defunct authority of the previous regime or state, but any sense of civility or bond between individuals, and on the whole they were successful. If the ruling power behaved brutally and lawlessly to your neighbour—because he was a Jew, or a member of an educated elite or ethnic minority, or had found disfavour in the eyes of the regime or for no obvious reason at all—then why should you show any more respect for him yourself? Judt is, I think, in speculative but interesting territory. There's nothing about a social contract that necessitates equality among shareholders. What happens when some shareholders pay in more, but get out less? What is the message that a Power sends to its subjects when it says to them "Some members of society enjoy the protection of the State, and others are outside of the law?" And what happens when a whole sector of society is effectively branded as the rightful field for plunder?.... 

The ‘right’ of possession was shown to be fragile, often meaningless, resting exclusively on the goodwill, interests or whim of those in power. There were winners as well as losers in this radical series of involuntary property transactions....hundreds of thousands of ordinary Hungarians, Poles, Czechs, Dutch, French and others became complicit in the Nazi genocide, if only as its beneficiaries. It is important to remember the ordinary beneficiaries who do not always wear the swastika. It is important to remember that atrocity is not simply insanity, that it is often not insanity at all, but hard interest, that even in the Holocaust there were interests, that there were winners and that they saw themselves as such. 

In our own land, we have long observed this. To better avoid the painful fact that there were "winners" in a slave society, that those winners were not merely great planters, to avoid the fact that ordinary Americans are indicted in all that came from slave society, we discuss the "race problem" as though it were a problem of manners and civility. I am sure the average African-American in 1963 could empathize with the dream of little white boys and little black girls hold hands. But he likely would have settled for a day when white people would no longer see he and his family as a field for plunder. Judt is not wrong to focus on property. Theft is the essence of atrocity--if only the theft of dignity and life. Indeed, where I forced to to offer one word to sum up black people's historical relationship to the American state, "Theft" is the first that would come to mind. Theft of labor and theft of family in slavery. Theft of life through lynching and pogrom. Theft of franchise in half the country. Theft through mortgages for some and contract loans for others. Theft through unemployment insurance for some, and debt-peonage for others. Theft of tax dollars which support "public" libraries that do not want you, "public" pools that will not have you, "public" schools that will not teach you and "public" universities that will riot at the sight of you. 


Should we conclude that theft is the marker of the black human's interaction with his government, that she lives, not under the aegis of the state, but in its cross-hairs, we head into dangerous waters. No. They went that away. These are not the facts you're looking for. Better to move along and go about your own private business. Better to forget this entire ugly everything. Better to focus on civility, your local diversity workshop and the reduction of harsh and intemperate language. Better to forget that indigestible truth--behind every great atrocity, stands some particular winner.

Before Pearl Harbor: The United States at War

Brad DeLong the economist blogger has been for quite a while been running a feature called Liveblogging World War II. In it he posts a document or news item from 60 years ago exactly.

What I've learned is that the USA was essentially at war well before Pearl Harbor.  Note today's entry, April 10, 1941:

USS Niblack (DD 424) drops depth charges against a German U-boat while attempting to rescue the crew of a torpedoed Dutch freighter.

And various belligerent statements by FDR about the war in Europe are also remarkable.

Image: USS Niblack

Rosie the Riveter and Geraldine Doyle

An excellent piece from the Washington Post on the facts behind the famous poster and the cello-player behind the image.

Re-enactment, wargaming, and the Russian front ...

...among other atrocities.

Are you, or have you ever been, a reenactor, a historical recreationist, or wargamer? do you know anyone who has ever dressed up in the Wehrmacht uniform for fun? Are you sure?

Then you may be interested in this article by Robert Citino from history.net, which I was referred to by Brad DeLong, to whom thanks:

Last week I was contacted by Joshua Green, Senior Editor at Atlantic Monthly.  Seems there is a candidate running for Congress in northwestern Ohio who has been part of a Waffen-SS re-enactor group. Their aim, like that of re-enactors everywhere, was to "live history," in this case the history of the 5th SS Panzer Division, a multinational mechanized formation nicknamed "Wiking."  Green wanted to know my thoughts about the Division and those who would re-enact it.  I said some negative things, and I stick by them:

What you often hear is that the [Wiking] division was never formally accused of anything, but that's kind of a dodge. The entire German war effort in the East was a racial crusade to rid the world of 'subhumans,' Slavs were going to be enslaved in numbers of tens of millions. And of course the multimillion Jewish population of Eastern Europe was going to be exterminated altogether. That's what all these folks were doing in the East. It sends a shiver up my spine to think that people want to dress up and play SS on the weekend.

... 

But there is one further thing I've noticed:  the number of notes I've gotten from re-enactors protesting their innocence and accusing me of accusing them of–I don't know–all being Nazis, I guess.  Such notes I consider to be completely unnecessary.  In my line of work, I know somewhere between 100 and a bazillion re-enactors of all stripes.  It seems like a neat hobby, and for those who really do the prep work involved in a good re-enactment, it can be a learning experience of the first order.  They take their fair share of grief from outsiders, I suppose, but I say:  Here's to the re-enactors!

While I had a ball, especially back in graduate school when I actually had time to set up and play a monster game like Drang nach Osten, I can tell you one thing about those days.  There was a fringe element in the hobby that worshiped the Wehrmacht, the Waffen-SS, and, I sometimes suspected, Hitler himself.  Ask anyone who was wargaming back in the 70's and 80's, and I'm sure they'll confirm what I'm saying. 

...

 We loved the games, in other words, but a lot of us were embarrassed about what seemed to be a kind of adolescent crush on the Wehrmacht.

 So, to all my re-enactor friends, I say this:  I really don't think it's good for the anyone in the "Living History" community to be dressing up in the uniform of a criminal organization.  The war in the east was more than a mere military campaign, and the Waffen-SS wasn't just "soldiering."  They were fighting a "war of extermination" (Vernichtungskrieg).  The historical record of the Waffen-SS is as clear as you can get, it isn't a pretty one, and I think there are better ways to spend your free time.

*****
PS:  For a discussion of the "Wehrmacht problem" in the wargaming and scholarly community alike, take a look at the interesting recent book by Ronald M. Smelser and Edward J. Davies II, The Myth of the Eastern Front:  the Nazi-Soviet War in American Popular Culture.  I don't agree with everything the authors have to say, but it was a fascinating book to read.

 Me, I sometimes have problems sharing the enthusiasm of my friends for Henry V's victory at Agincourt. I have a hard time seeing the difference between the slaughter of prisoners at Agincourt and the slaughter at Nicopolis. But then, you may ask, why have you spent so much time in armor yourself?

An episode in universal history: the face of war

Someone told me this story this evening.

A Hungarian woman carrying bread passed by an internment camp where Polish PoWs were being held. Some of the prisoners called out to her and she gave them some of her bread. The German guards were incensed and began to shout at her. The woman drew herself up to her full, stern-mother height and said, "Don't fuss, when it is your turn I will give you some."

Eighteen months later, the camp was indeed full of Germans...
Image: American intelligence troops search German Prisoners Of War in the Menil la Tour prison camp.

More from English Russia

The amateur photojournalists (meant as a compliment) of English Russia continue to present us with great images of "1/6 of the Earth's surface." Today I went back to the site and found two treasures: a portfolio of views of Northern Russia (region unspecified) and a group of pictures from Nazi-occupied Russia.

In connection with the first, I was struck by how little this cold landscape looks like my cold part of Canada (though we had clear blue skies today). In connection with the second, I found it interesting to see how many people used the German presence as an opportunity to hold religious processions.