I publish these pictures here not because I believe ‘atrocities’ are comparable or can be so easily judged over, but because the war in the east has always been conveniently ‘forgotten’ in the Western history books and minds of the general public. You can never remind people enough of what has happened. But above all this is just good material, unknown to me and interesting to study—so thanks to Russian Historian for sharing.

Here’s some Russian youth hanged by the Germans to make an example:

Here’s a picture of Soviet Red Army soldiers distributing food among the German population in Berlin 1945:

And here is a very silly picture that Russian Historian captioned with “very terrible atrocities indeed”. I love it.

So there you are. Regardless of the cruelty displayed in these and other pictures, isn’t it wonderful they let us look back in time? As a digital photographer a single picture means little to me; as a historian it never stops fascinating me.

I find myself sitting next to a smart, tweed-jacketed man called Ray Ellis, with thick white hair and a ruddy face. His regiment, the South Nottinghamshire Hussars, were trapped by the Germans in a corner of bleak desert known, ironically, as the Knightsbridge Box. They had already been in the desert for a year, without a day’s leave, when, under heavy attack, they were given orders ‘to fight until the last drop of ammo’. Ray it was who fired the last shot, before being captured, taken to Tripoli

From the extras of the TV series I’ve transcribed mr. Ellis’ story:

I was taken prisoner at Knightsbridge where all these men died. And then we were dragged across—I say dragged because it is too long and too horrible a story to relate at this time—dragged across the desert all the way to Tripoli. Many men died on the way of dysentery, starvation and that sort of things.[...] We had to march for water. And many men died on the way. They didn’t die of thirst because the Germans mercifully shot them as they fell to the floor. They dispatched them so they didn’t die of thirst. That wasn’t being cruel, that was being kind.

Then we were dragged all the way to Tripoli and then we went across to Naples on a cargo ship in the bottom of the hull, buttoned down and praying. It was the most frightening journey I ever made in my life, afraid of being sunk by the RAF or the Royal Navy. [..] We were a dirty, lousy, filthy, unshaven, thin, begrimed group of men. In this way they marched us through the streets as propaganda: this is the British army. And the population were cheering and mocking and I hated them. I was full of hatred.

But then something happened that has been with me for all my life. A girl came from the back of the crowd and put a peach in my hand. It was… it was fantastic. And all my life afterwards when things are being bad, I have always thought: somewhere there’s girl with a peach. Someone with another idea, another thought, who isn’t following the general trend. And as I said, that girl with the peach has stayed with me for all my life.

I find it a wonderful story illustrating not only a different kind of war from what we know from the eastern front—but I also find it amazing how little events like these are so powerful they survive for decades and are told even today, be it with mixed emotions. I hate to think of how many stories like this remain unrecorded and will soon be forever forgotten.

Safe investments

No self-respecting monarch hides a small fortune in cash under his mattress. Royal money is usually invested. At the beginning of the 20th century Russian railroads were a popular investment amongst European monarchs. Here’s why:

• railroads would surely be around for a while;
• railroads are state-owned and carry less risk than private enterprises;
• all royal families were related in one way or another and the Czar of Russia wasn’t going to turn his back to his Western family members all of a sudden.

The Western European fortunes were safely invested, the risk was low and the Russians got their railways. Generally, life was good—until the Russian revolution came along and Lenin simply declared he had no business with the Czars finances. The Russian railroads belonged to the Russians and if the Europeans wanted their money back they should turn to the Czar, not to the Russians. The Czar, however, was quite inconveniently dead and hence the money was gone.

As a consequence safer investment options were sought for the royal families. Around the start of the Second World War the Dutch queen Wilhelmina had invested considerable amounts in Dutch real estate. It seemed safe until the war lay most of the country in ruins. The Dutch government, theoretically in control of the Royal fortune, demanded even safer investments in the future. They would have to be distributed abroad so as not to be vulnerable to a single event (such as a European war) again.

A queen on a spending spree

Wilhelmina strongly opposed the new policy as she wanted to invest in her own country and people. A power struggle between the queen and the government followed. In the end, the queen reluctantly gave in. And invest she did. When the decision was made she took a personal assistant, walked outside from where she was at that very moment (the USA), took a car and drove around town buying every single piece of property that was for sale until she ran out of money to spend (I’ll spare you the financial quotum details).

Upon hearing of this, the Dutch government was in shock. What had this stupid woman done? She spent a fortune buying property at random! And yes, it was outside Europe, but in no way distributed so it was still highly risky!

Fast forward several years; when the queen went out on her spending spree she had been in New York city and the pieces of land, the small hotels and modest office-blocks she had bought are today known as down-town Manhattan—featuring some of the most expensive real estate in the world. Queen Wilhelmina’s near-incomprehensible profits put the Dutch government in a bit of an awkward position, to say the least.

An entrepreneurial spirit

Another part of the Dutch royal family’s fortune comes from stakes in private businesses. Here’s an example: in the 19th century one of royal family members lived in the Dutch Indies (now Indonesia). He was considered by the Dutch government as a loony and so they were happy to fund some of his little projects as long as it kept him on the other side of the world. One of these little projects involved some silly substance called oil. You probably know what this is leading to. Ever wondered where the prefix ‘royal’ in ‘Royal Dutch/Shell‘, one of the biggest and most profitable companies in the world, comes from? Now you know.

The fortune today

Although most these stakes have been sold today the Dutch royal family still has some shares here and there. No one knows exactly where, in what or how much, although some information can be found at the royal family’s official website (alas, no weblog). But I think queen Beatrix or crown prince Willem-Alexander won’t be needing a side-job as a call-center agent any time soon to make ends meet.

Self-determination

Taking a step back, it is a remarkable development of warfare from the classic Napoleonic battles to the slaughters of the first and second world wars. When looking for an explanation one has to look first and foremost at mass society, a common national identity and the concept of the nation state. But that wouldn’t make as good a story as one of the secondary causes. Back to the Franco-Prussian war: the Germans won the war relatively easily, but a debate sparked over a people’s right to defend itself.

The Germans at the time argued that war was a soldier’s business. Civilians live in a state, a state has an army and an army goes to war. Hence, when the army’s defeated, so is the state and it’s civilians. Easy-peasy. The more liberal Brits and French argued that state is an indivisible nation. War between nations cannot be reduced to a clash of armed forces; everyone’s involved. The people have a right to self-determination, a concept we still hold dear today.

The typically militaristic Germans lost the debate and didn’t like it one bit. In the First World War the Germans acted ruthlessly in Belgium and Northern France, more or less saying ‘okay, if the people are allowed to fight we shall treat them all as enemy soldiers.’ Thousands of ‘innocent’ civilians were killed. The Second World War would even take this further with the bulk of the 50 million casualties being civilian.

A self-destruct mechanism?

Should we call this form of war the result of the will of democratic nations under a mass society or should we call it total wars of destruction (rather than mere ‘military conquest’)? This right to self-determination is a beautiful weapon in debates on ideals and moral values, but when applied on the microscopic scale it has demonstrated horrible and gruesome effects. Are we better off with it than without it? Does Western liberal civilisation carry a self-destruct mechanism with it?

Much the same as Germany the Netherlands are loosely divided in a protestant northern half and a catholic southern half. Four major social groups can be defined: catholics, protestants, socialists and liberals. Quite remarkably, in the first half of the twentieth century every group had its own niche in society. Each had its own political party, its own broadcasting corporation, its own newspaper, its own labour union, its own sports club, and so forth.

This makes us wonder why the Netherlands were such a stable, peaceful and tolerant country while in the same period most other European countries faced severe social unrest—sometimes even revolution. The Netherlands were at the same time among the most segregated and the most stable societies in Europe. The explanation lies in pacification policy: with the country divided into four (more or less) equal parts, it was impossible to rule without some form of co-operation. A combination of political elitism and the famous Dutch tolerance held the country together.

Pacification-politics

Dutch governments have always been coalition-based, but during the pillarisation coalitions even included the opposition. Never would a majority rule a minority—both sides would always work together to come to peaceful solutions that were acceptable to everyone. Whenever an issue arose the elite—party bosses, ministers, senior civil servants or commercial top directors—would meet in private (i.e. secret) and resolve it quickly and cooperatively. The Dutch society was so polarised that every segment’s views were clear and well-defined, and no internal discussion was needed. It was a amazingly efficient way of governing.

This might seem undemocratic, but the Dutch parliament was realistic enough to see that there was no way of getting any group to agree with another on ideals in a public debate. The conception of ‘let the government govern’ minimised parliament’s interference in government business, so the co-operation between the segments’ elites could go on unharmed. As long as no one forced its will on any other and no one asked awkward questions, no one was left out in the cold. There was no reason for any of the segments to be dissatisfied.

The end of pacification

Commonly regarded as the end of the pacification policy is 1966, when a newly-formed party started calling for democratic reform. The new generation of idealists would no longer conform to the segment’s boundaries or the political elite’s secrecy. The real end of pacification and political elitism came in 2001 with the murder of Pim Fortuyn by a left-wing activist. The charismatic Fortuyn, neither typically left- or right-wing, primarily took aim at ‘the establishment’ ruling over the backs of ‘the man in the street’. Fortuyn gained popularity remarkably fast and his legacy still lives today on in his party LPF—although that party will ironically forever be associated by corruption, secrecy and elitism. The murder of film-maker and Islam-critic Theo van Gogh only added to the confusion, leaving the Netherlands, once an icon of stability, looking for a new establishment, a new identity and a new justification for tolerance. The war on terror could not have come at a worse time.

Recommended reading

If you want to know more about this subject read The Politics of Accommodation: Pluralism and Democracy in the Netherlands by Arend Lijphart, the standard work on this era. It’s a relatively easy and very interesting read.

The finest prank in history was perpetrated towards the end of the second world war, against a background of gloom and horror that made it all the more brilliant. German and allied airforces were launching bombing raids on each other’s factories with ferocious regularity. The Germans hatched a plan to deceive allied intelligence by building mock wooden factories painted in industrial colours, the hope being that the enemy would waste much of its precious ordinance on them. Soon enough the British figured out what the other side was up to, and sent a lone Avro Lancaster to an industrial area near Duisburg. The plane’s mission: to drop a wooden bomb on one of the fake factories.

Imagine the looks on the faces of the German army officials, staring at a harmless “bomb” made from wood, and looking up at the sky, where a crew had earlier put their lives in jeopardy for the sake of a jape. Even they must have been touched by the humour of it.

Go read the entire piece because there are some other good pranks in there.

Right after the war Spain lay in ruins. Total casualties are estimated around 600,000—comparable to English, French and Italian losses during WOII. The proud Spanish empire that once spanned the globe was now reduced to an authoritarian, paranoid dictatorship. Spain kept out of WOII and would continue to play a relatively minor role in European affairs until its migration to a peaceful democracy after Franco’s death in 1975. As opposed to Franco’s nationalism, Spain is today one of the most federal countries in Europe with high-levels of autonomy for each of its 17 regions.

As for the Church: it’s role in the conflict is hard to reflect upon without airing my personal, atheist views on religion as a whole. I shall therefore let you make up your own mind on that, and perhaps come back to this subject in a separate post.

Adolf Hitler must have been very pleased with the outcome of the war: he ‘beat the Soviets’, formed an alliance with Mussolini’s Italy and—most importantly—England and France seemed paralyzed by fear. The Spanish civil war also gives a sense of inevitability to the Russo-German conflict to come—fascism may have won the battle, but the war was far from over. Europe braced itself for things to come.

Looking back it is easy to deem England and France fools or even cowards, but it must be admitted that the escalation could not have been foreseen. A full-scale European conflict was not inevitable until after the 1938 conference of Munich and we can hardly blame England and France for doing all they could to keep the peace. It’s an interesting thought to think that if England and France had intervened in Spain there would not have been a Second World War. Yet it is unlikely that anyone other than the Soviet Union or the United States would have been able to supply the Republic with the quantity and quality of equipment needed to tip the scale.

The Spanish Civil War was so much defined by ideas rather than physical objectives it is nigh impossible to take an unbiased view. I’m sure many will disagree with how the war is looked upon today. When reflecting upon his time in Spain George Orwell said: ‘I am willing to believe that history is for the most part inaccurate and biased, but what is peculiar to our own age is the abandonment of the idea that history could be truthfully written.’

Stalin would not help popular front out of charity. The war had to either result in a communist Spain, or in an only minor Soviet embarrassment in defeat. The Spanish communists played a clever game with the single most important trump card in the popular front: Soviet supplies. The communist movement would receive the supplies and hence the communist movement decided on battle tactics and weapons distribution. Battalions with a non-communist commander would receive little or no supplies, while completely communist formations received tanks and airplanes. Military leaders were forced to join the communist party and the popular front grew more and more dependent on it.

Fear of a communist coup upset both the international community and the popular front itself—almost leading to a civil war within a civil war. The popular front consisted of so many movements, parties and ideologies it would have to light a fuse at some stage. At more than one occasion left-wing forces were fighting each other rather than the nationalists. Every minority feared a take-over by every other and they all tried their best the keep the others from becoming to powerful.

The nationalist propaganda put the growing unrest and communist influence to good use. In a conflict so full of fear, desperation and hatred it is telling that people actually changed sides and joined the nationalist ranks in order to fight the communists. It seemed there was no hope for the republic to survive. The militia felt it, the women and children felt it, and—most importantly—the western democracies felt it. That the republic held out for so long as it did (until 1939) not only makes us wonder if it was really that hopeless, but also illustrates the power of people fighting out of desperation.

The number of communists in the Spanish government grew fast. But in 1939 an anti-communist coup relieved the communist party and ComIntern from the blame of the imminent disaster—defeat. With the fall of Madrid at March 10 1939 all remaining hope was crushed. Within two weeks all resistance was given up. The nationalists had won.

The country was devastated. Cities burnt, houses lay in ruins and food was scarce. Europe closed its borders out of fear of refugees. The Germans, Italians and Russians pulled out, as their attention was needed elsewhere. Pope Pius congratulated Franco: ‘Lifting our hearts to God, we give sincere thanks with your Excellency for the victory of Catholic Spain.’ The defeated republican troops could only toss away their weapons and start walking, without any goal or hope.

As described earlier the rebelling nationalists found themselves outnumbered, even when the elite forces of the Army of Africa made the crossing to the mainland (in the nick of time). The republic held most major cities, natural resources and trade routes. A quick, easy victory would be difficult to obtain. Would an outnumbered band of professional soldiers, backed with state-of-the-art foreign military aid, be able to bring the masses to their knees?

The answer is yes, and for several reasons:

• The nationalists had state-of-the-art airplanes, tanks, rifles and other weaponry, whereas most republican soldiers would storm the enemy without even a rifle—let alone bullets. When German bombing aircraft were spotted people would stop and watch rather than run for cover. The resulting massacres had a great psychological impact.
• Although the republic had a professional army, most generals and experienced troops were on the nationalist side. Superiority in tactics, logistics and personal training made victories possible even against all odds—something the German army would demonstrate right until the end of WWII.
• Nationalist leadership was firm and clear.
• Unlike the republic the nationalists were not isolated by the international community, which enabled trade and short supply routes—and, effectively, better control over international media.

More than success on the nationalist side the outcome of the war was determined by failure on the republican side. There was no lack of determination under republicans in Spain. But the popular front movement was simply too diverse and complex to put up an effective, organized fight—on a national level as well as in individual battles:

• Most republican militia had no military experience and were ill-trained and -equipped.
• Socialist and anarchist ideals were strong and directly opposed sensible, military hierarchy. Militia would refuse to dig manholes, dismissing it as repression and elitism. They were slaughtered by artillery fire and German bomber aircraft.
• Through time it became harder and harder to supply the troops. In the early stages of the war militia would storm the enemy without a weapon, because the government wouldn’t hand them out. In the later stages the republic had no means to buy new stocks of weapons or ammunition as everybody but the Soviet Union—not all that keen to help—refused to intervene.
• Republicans were obsessed with the notion of the fifth column, or traitors within their ranks that would sabotage the republican cause. Fear of traitors led to witch hunts and uncontrollable paranoia.

There is some good stuff here, but these points do net yet fully explain why the popular front collapsed and Franco’s nationalists won the war. There are two very important developments not yet noted here: the civil war within the civil war and the role of the Soviet Union. To keep all this easily digestible I chopped this article in half, so expect the second half tomorrow.