#wantedintro" id="wantedintro">Editorial introduction: Seven decades ago, the civilised world, including Australia, fought a terrible and bloody war to save humanity from German Nazism, Italian Fascism and the murderous Japanese Empire. The cost to humanity was appalling: 60 million died and much of the world's productive capacity was destroyed.#fnwanted1" id="txtwanted1">1 Had the Nazis won, the cost to humanity would have been even more terrible as a new era of enslavement and mass murder would have commenced.
All this has apparently been forgotten by the mainstream newsmedia in their reporting of the Ukraine conflict. The grim images of hundreds of Ukrainian thugs in Nazi regalia hurling petrol bombs and rocks at the Berkut riot police from November last year until February has also apparently been forgotten by the reporters as they give uncritical airplay to the hysterical denunciations of those resisting the Kiev junta by the likes of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.
Now, four months after the February coup, the Nazi government that these thugs helped to power is waging a brutal war against Ukrainians, in the east of the country, who refuse to submit to the authority of the Nazi anti-Semites in Kiev.
As the East Ukrainian self-defence forces fight ever more effectively against the Kiev junta's military forces, the United States, their European puppets and the mainstream newsmedia become ever more hysterical and deceitful in their denunciations of those Ukrainians and their allies across the border. As the war against the people of East Ukraine has continued and ever more civilians are killed and their homes destroyed and even reporters are deliberately killed, Russian President Vladimir Putin has demanded of the international community that the actions of the Ukrainian government be recognised for what they are: crimes against humanity and a violation of international law, and that those responsible, including Ukraine's Interior Minister Arsen Avakov, be prosecuted accordingly.
A more detailed article by the Iranian PressTV news service, is included as an #wantedappendix">appendix.
Russia's Investigative Committee has put Ukraine's interior minister Arsen Avakov and governor of Dnepropetrovsk Region Igor Kolomoysky on international wanted list
The Russian Investigative Committee has declared Ukrainian interior minister Arsen Avakov and Dnepropetrovsk regional administration head Igor Kolomoisky internationally wanted, Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin told Interfax on Saturday.
"Investigative Committee investigators have issued a directive on declaring Arsen Avakov and Igor Kolomoisky wanted in a criminal case dealing with the use of prohibited means and methods of warfare, aggravated murder, the obstruction of professional activities of journalists, and abduction. This directive has been forwarded to the Interior Ministry's main criminal investigations department.
Avakov and Kolomoisky have been put on the international wanted list valid on the territories of all Interpol member-states," Markin said.
Avakov and Kolomoisky have been accused of organizing a number of crimes, including murder, the use of prohibited means and methods of warfare, the obstruction of professional activities of journalists, and abduction, which are covered by Russian Criminal Code Articles 33, 205, 356, 144, and 126, he said.
Russian investigative committee charges Ukrainian officials with war crimes#fnwanted2" id="txtwanted2">2
Russian investigative committee charged Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov and Dnepropetrovsk Region Governor Igor Kolomoyskyi with war crimes, the committee's official spokesman Vladimir Markin said Friday.
"Under the criminal case, launched on the grounds of a crime of using forbidden warfare, a first degree murder, interfering with the professional activity of journalists and kidnapping of people, a notice has been given of charges against Igor Kolomoyskyi and Arsen Avakov," he said in a statement.
Markin said earlier, the investigators believed the recent kidnapping of Zvezda television channel journalists and the preceding illegal detention of journalists from the same channel, as well as several other Russian journalists were conducted with the knowledge of Avakov, Kolomoyskyi and Defense Ministry officials.
On June 14, Russia's Zvezda (Star) channel reported the second detention of its journalists in Ukraine in the past two months reporter Evgeny Davydov and sound engineer Nikita Konashenkov were captured in Dnepropetrovsk and held in the Justice Ministry building. The journalists were released and arrived in Moscow two days later.
Both journalists were visibly bruised, and were ushered to an ambulance to be taken to a hospital for screening.
On Tuesday, a Russian TV journalist and a sound engineer were killed in a mortar attack near Ukrainian city of Luhansk.
A total of five media workers have been killed in Ukraine since the beginning of the year.
Read also:
It's beyond understanding that killings of journalists occur in 21st century Europe – expert
Five media workers killed in Ukraine since beginning of year - Reporters Without Borders
Russian reporters' death shows criminal essence of Ukraine's punitive operation - CSTO
East Ukrainian self-defence forces reject Kiev's ultimatum to disarm, republished from article of 22 June 2014 on PressTV.
#wantedappendix" id="wantedappendix">Appendix: Russia puts Ukraine minister, governor on wanted list
– republished from PressTV.
Russia's Investigative Committee has put Ukraine's Interior Minister Arsen Avakov and Igor Kolomoisky, the governor of the Dnipropetrovsk region, on the international wanted list over charges of war crimes.
The committee spokesman, Vladimir Markin, said Saturday that the two Ukrainian officials have been put on the international wanted list, which is valid in the territories of all Interpol member states.
Avakov and Kolomoisky are wanted in a "criminal case dealing with the use of prohibited means and methods of warfare, aggravated murder, the obstruction of professional activities of journalists, and abduction," said Markin.
The committee spokesman did not rule out the possibility of adding more Ukrainian officials to the wanted list.
"Investigators are taking measures to establish all persons from among commanders and servicemen of Ukraine's armed forces, 'the National Guard of Ukraine' and (far-right ultra-nationalist movement) Right Sector militants involved in conducting a punitive operation against the civilian population in Ukraine's southeast, which has killed many civilians," said Markin.
The spokesman continued by saying that more than 40 investigators are working with people arriving from Ukraine, who have suffered from crimes. According to Markin, the investigators have so far questioned 2,400 eyewitnesses and over 1,000 people who have arrived in Russia from Ukraine's troubled east and who have filed applications to Russian investigators for the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).
On June 20, Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko ordered the government forces to observe a week-long unilateral ceasefire in the country's southeastern region. However, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Saturday that he is concerned that despite the truce, Kiev's military operation "is increasing."
Ukraine's mainly Russian-speaking parts in the east have been the scene of deadly clashes between pro-Russia protesters and the Ukrainian army since Kiev launched military operations in the southeastern regions in mid-April in a bid to root out the protests there.
The government in Kiev says it is targeting armed protesters, but reports say many civilians have been caught in the fighting. According to the United Nations, at least 356 people, including 257 civilians, have been killed in the clashes since May 7.
CAH/HJL
Footnote[s]
#fnwanted1" id="fnwanted1">1. #txtwanted1">↑ Even if the Second World War could not have been avoided — and some political participants believe it could have been, notably UK Labor politician Konni Zilliacus (1894-1967), — the death toll should not have been anywhere near as great for the Western Allies. (As terrible as these losses were, they were still only a fraction of the death toll suffered by countries like the Soviet Union, Poland and China.) The Second World War, in the West could easily have ended by 1943. The overthrow of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini in July 1943 and the all-too-brief liberation of the entire Italian Peninsula from the yoke of fascism is only one of a number of examples where the opportunity for a quick victory over Nazi Germany was thrown away. Evidently because the manufacturers of the Western Allies' war materials stood to gain far more by prolonging the war than by ending it, the war was needlessly prolonged. This will be the subject of another article. How the terrible defeats of 1941 and the vastly more terrible death toll — at least 20 million — suffered by the Soviet Union in that war, could have been avoided will be the subject of another article too. - Ed
#fnwanted2" id="fnwanted2">2. #txtwanted2">↑ At times, the link to the Voice of Russia web-site is not good in Australia. When I clicked on the link my browser displayed the message: "502 Bad Gateway — nginx". In fact, no pages from Voice of Russia (http://voiceofrussia.com/) can be downloaded at the moment. - 10:31PM 22 June 2014, Ed
Comments
Matthew Mitchell
Mon, 2014-06-23 12:12
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Thanks James - look forward to the next edition
Very interesting. I look forward to the article you mention you will write in your note regarding Western interests prolongiong the second world war.
Perhaps the access to some news websites might be a forewarning of what to expect with the loss of net neutrality , which is another thing on the agenda of large and multinational organisations.
James Sinnamon
Mon, 2014-06-23 17:20
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Western allies saved defeated Nazi armies in the Mediterranean
Matthew Wrote:
I will deal with this later. But, briefly for now:
As I mentioned above, Italy was completely liberated by the Italians themselves when they overthrew Mussolini's fascist tyranny in in July 1943. Yet somehow, the German Army managed to reconquer almost all of the Italian peninsula again, and the Western allies had to fight for 20 bloody and destructive months all the way up the Italian Peninsula again. According to Wikipedia the Western allies suffered over 300,00 casualties, from 3 September 1943, until the war in Italy ended 20 months later on 2 May 1945. 152,940 Italian civilians also died.
So, how did the Western allies and their the supposed Italian allies allow this to happen? I believe the Allies had total air superiority at the time. If they didn't they were certainly still able bombard much of Nazi-occupied Europe from the air. Compared to cost the effort and required to bomb German cities, it should have required little effort to stop German infantry, artillery and tanks crossing the the Austrian/Italian border by rail at the Brenner Pass.
One book, which touches on this aspect of Southern European history, is "Captain Correlli's Mandelin" (1994), which, in 2001, was released as a film starring Nicholas Cage. It describes how the Germans fought and massacred Italian soldiers in Greece who had sided with the Allies.
After the war, one Italian general was executed by the British as a war criminal, I believe in 1946. (I forget the details, including his name, but I watched a documentary on ABC television, possibly in 2006, or possibly earlier. If anyone else knows of this matter or of the documentary, please let me know.) The "war crime" for which this Italian General was executed was that, under his command, three British prisoners of war were killed while trying to escape captivity. His real crime in the eyes of his Western allied executioners was that he was the one Italian general to seriously fight against the German invasion of Italian Italy in 1943. No doubt, his continued presence in Italy would have make it very difficult for the CIA to rort the Italian elections in 1948, causing the Italian Communist Party (PCI) to lose to 'former' fascist candidates.
In Greece, communist partisans, fought heroically against the Nazi occupation from 1941 until 1944. I will cite, what I posted to the ABC web site on 17 July 2011:
Another critical aspect of the book not touched on in the above contribution, is that in 1944, after the British Army had landed the Communist Greek Partisans were ordered, by the British and the Greek Communist Party (KKE) under instructions from Stalin, to allow the defeated Germans to retreat:
Italy and Greece are only two examples. Another is the Second Battle of El Elamein in Egypt 1942. An account I read recently (the title of the book was something like "Great Battles of the Second world War" – I will cite later) showed that British 8th Army, led by General Montgomery, particularly with total air superiority, could easily have prevented the retreat of Rommel's Afrika Corps and ended the whole North African desert war then and there, but he chose not to. So, instead, the war in North Africa lasted until May 1943. The Americans were required to land in Algeria and Morocco in November 1942 instead of launching the Second Front in Europe, promised to Stalin.
Matthew Mitchell
Tue, 2014-06-24 17:30
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Communists in Italy after the war
Thank you.
Now I do remember something - very vague - so please bear with me. I think they (the Allies, but mainly US) allowed the Italian resistance to be unsupported and thus slaughtered by the Germans and through lack of support towards the end of the war because – as you suggest – these people were the war heroes, and were organised and would have resisted, or offered alternatives to the CIA appointed leaders at the end of the war. I think those that made it through may also have been targeted as communists, and rounded up after the war. I will try and recall where I read this information, and if I can I will post it here. Someone else might know about this however - so if you anyone does - please do reply.
admin
Wed, 2014-06-25 02:03
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1948: CIA supports 'former' fascists against liberation fighters
Matthew, my apologies for being so slow to reply. Thank you for your interest. As the Second World War is now being re-fought in Ukraine, I think this issue is vitally important. Whilst I support the Russian Government and anti-Nazi Ukrainians in Crimea and East Ukraine, their overly simple understanding of the Second World War, which seems largely similar to what is shown on RT and Voice of Russia, makes it harder to politically undermine the fascist Ukrainian regime they are defending themselves against.#fnSubj1" id="txtSubj1">1
Matthew #comment-126057">wrote:
I have lost the article I read. I am confident the citations can be supplied by some knowledgable person out there. Anyone who can confirm (or disprove) what I write, is encouraged to do so. What I recall is this: After Rome was liberated, the Americans ceased their offensive against the Germans. They also ordered the Italian partisans to cease operations. The occuppying Germans, no longer pinned down by an allied offensive from the south or partisan attacks in their rear, were free to concentrate their own forces to attack the partisans. The partisans suffered heavy casualties as a result.
Matthew wrote:
Chapter 2 "Italy 1947-1948: Free elections, Hollywood Style" (pp23-31), of The CIA: A forgotten history (1986) by William Blum, covers this. The United States spent a massive amount of money to support the Christian Democrats against the Coalition of the PCI and PSI (Socialist Party of Italy). Amongst other measures, "the State Department ... ruled that any Italians known to have voted for the Communists would not even be allowed to ... enter [the United States]" which many Italians considered a "terrestrial paradise".
Matthew wrote:
Possibly after the electoral defeat of 1948, it seems likely that Communists would have been persecuted. But, immediately after the end of the Second World War, even though they did not form government, the communist partisans were a powerful and armed force. It would not have been wise for the CIA and their Italian allies to attempt to persecute the communists in those years.
#fnSubj1" id="fnSubj1">1. #txtSubj1">↑ As I said elsewhere, given the brutality that Ukrainians had endured at the hands of Stalin, from the late 1920's, it is hardly surprising that many Ukrainians including the Stepan Bandera made the terrible mistake of embracing the Nazi invaders as liberators in June 1941. The fact that the Nazi occupiers "arrested the newly formed [Ukrainian] government and sent them [including Stepan Bandera] to concentration camps in Germany ... until September 1944" (see Wikipedia) suggests to me that Stepan Bandera was hoodwinked by Nazi promises which they never intended to keep for Ukranians, whom they considered to be inferior 'untermenschen'. It is ironic that Ukranians are resurrecting this Nazi dream that was their nightmare.
Mark (not verified)
Thu, 2014-06-26 15:33
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International War Crimes Wanted List
James Sinnamon
Sun, 2014-06-29 10:06
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Debate: Could Second World War have ended in 1943?
The following was posted to a discussion on johnquiggin.com. Further discussion, #comment-236471">there or here, is encouraged.
#comment-236469">J-D (@ #13) writes that I have provided no evidence that the Second World War could have ended in 1943.
Have you looked at the article, which I linked to, J-D?
At (#comment-236462">@ #9) I pointed out that the Italians liberated the whole of Italy themselves when they overthrew Mussolini in July 1943. Surely you must ask yourself why the subsequent invasion of the whole Italian peninsula by Italy's former ally, Nazi Germany, was not prevented, with the British and American armies in Sicily and with total (as I believe I recall) air superiority over Italy all the way up to the Brenner Pass at the Austrian border through which all of Germany's ground forces had to move by rail?
Can't you see that if Italy had remained liberated after July 1943, as surely must have been possible, that the war could have finished that year?
As I showed in my linked article, the Western allies threw away other opportunities to quickly liberate large areas of occupied territory and capture or eliminate large numbers of German soldiers on the ground. Surely if they hadn't thrown these opportunities away, the war could have ended much sooner than may 1945. 'Lost' opportunities to more quickly end the war also include:
1. During the British invasion of Greece in 1944, the British, with total air superiority over the skies of Greece, allowed nearly all of the occupying German armies to escape as the British turned their guns on ELAS resistance fighters and re-armed Greeks who had collaborated with the Nazis. ELAS fighters, who controlled the mountains above the roads through which the German Armies had to retreat, were prevented from attacking the retreating Germans.
2. After the Second Battle of El Alemain from October to November 1942, Rommel's forces were allowed to retreat, when their retreat could easily have been cut off on the ground and with aerial bombardment. (I have momentarily mislaid a book with a title somewhat like "Great Battles of the Second World War" in which this was shown. I will cite from this book when I find it.)
The introductory paragraph at the top of this post is formatted as follows: "<p style="font-size:80%;line-height;120%;background-color:#EDF5FA;"> " The following was <a href="http://johnquiggin.com/2014/06/28/the-100-years-war/comment-page-1/#comment-236471">posted</a> ... <\p>" - James
admin
Mon, 2014-07-07 11:36
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Debate continued: Could Second World War have ended in 1943?
The comment below was #comment-236593">posted to the #comment-126015">abovementioned forum discussion on johnquiggin.com. Minor grammatical and factual errors have been corrected and further links, which cannot be added to posts on johnquiggin.com (as a precaution against forum spam) have been added here. The account of the shameful conduct by the British Army at the start of the First IndoChina War in Hanoi in August 1945 has been expanded.
J-D (#comment-236517">@ #7, 1 Jul 2014) wrote:
Nor is it an "established fact" that the British and Americans, with total air and naval supremacy could not have prevented Germany's conquest of Italy in July 1943.
What is an established fact is that they didn't even try.
Nor did the commanders of the Italian Army serving the new supposedly anti-fascist government. The one Italian general who did try to prevent the German invasion was tried and executed as a war criminal by the British in 1946. Whilst few Italians, who had killed Ethiopians in 1936 with poison gas were, in any way, held to account for their crimes, this general was tried and executed. His "war crime" was that three British soldiers were killed attempting to escape from prisoner-of-war camps under his command. (The name of the Italian General escapes me, but I watched a documentary on ABC TV about it, possibly around 2006).
It is also an established fact that the Americans and British conquered the rest of the Italian Peninsula in the most inept and unimaginative way possible over the next 21 months. Instead of using their naval and air supremacy imaginatively (with the arguable exception of the ineptly managed seaborne landing at Anzio in January 1944), they fought bloody battles of attrition all the way up the peninsula at a cost of over 300,000 allied dead and wounded in a addition to 159,000 Italian civilians dead.
I have #comment-126015">already shown that, in 1944, after the British landed in Greece, they disarmed resistance fighters whilst secretly re-arming those Greeks who had collaborated with the Nazi invaders. The British subsequently unleashed these former Nazi collaborators onto their fellow countrymen in a bloody civil war. In the meantime, partisans who could have blocked the retreat of Germans along roads beneath mountains they controlled, were prevented from doing so.
Similar events occurred in Vietnam and Korea. In Korea, the Americans rearmed Koreans who had collaborated with the Japanese, whilst brutally repressing those who had fought against the Japanese.
In Vietnam in August 1945, the British started shooting Viet Minh who had resisted the Japanese, before they handed Vietnam handed back to its former colonial rulers, the French. Somehwhat like what they had done the previous year in Greece and as the Americans were doing in Korea, the British armed captured Japanese soldiers and turned them on the VietMinh. (It is hard to find sources which confirm this on the web. This episode, right at the start of the Cold War, has been overlooked in recent years, even by dissident bloggers. One source, which is far better than most, but still flawed in some repects, is "The Vietnam Wars" (1992) by Marilyn Young. The only resource I could find on the Web is a Wikipedia page, Wikipedia page which, whilst very detailed and informative, is not without serious flaws and is biased.)
Given all the above crimes of the British and American military commanders in the Second World War and in subsequent years, why shouldn't we presume that they also allowed the Germans to reconquer Italy in July 1943, with all its terrible consequences, for the worst possible motives?
admin
Mon, 2014-07-07 23:51
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How the Second World War could have been prevented
The following has been #comment-236657">added to the forum discussion on johnquiggin.com and, as of 2:46pm on 8 Jul 2014, is awaiting moderation.
alfred venison (@ #comment-236614">#35) wrote:
The whole world would have been enslaved for decades, if not centuries, by the Nazis and their allies had it not been for the courage and sacrifice of many millions in the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and China. However, much of the credit also belongs to the Western democracies, particularly the United States President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR). Without the entry of the United States into the war, even the sacrifice of the Soviet people may not have prevented victory by Nazi Germany. [1]
Humanity lost an opportunity to prevent the Second World War and a further 60 million deaths, when the when the Russian Revolution of October 1917 failed to spread to the rest of Europe. Chances to end war forever were lost on a number of occasions. These include:
* Germany in 1919, 1920 or 1923[2]. If revolution had succeeded on any one of these occasions, mention of Hitler's Nazi Party would be no more than a footnote in some history books. Further chances were lost, again in Germany in 1933, when Stalin effectively ordered the German Communist Party (KPD) to surrender to the Nazi putschists at a time when rank-and-file members of the KPD and the Social Democratic Party (SPD) were screaming out for united action.
* Spain (1936-1937), where Stalin's meddling caused anti-fascist Spaniards to seize defeat from the jaws of victory.[3],[4]
Footnote[s]
[1] Had America not entered the war, the triumph of Nazi Germany over the Soviet Union, even with the heroism and the terrible sacrifice of the Soviet people, would have been almost certain. In 1941, Americans, who had lost nearly 117,000 lives in the pointless slaughter then known by some as "The Great War", were firmly opposed to entering the Second World War. Almost every other war fought by America in its history has not been just, but, on this occasion, the peril that humanity faced at the hands of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy and the Japanese Empire made America's entry into the war not only justified, but necessary. FDR understood this and resorted to means that, at face value, seem unconscionable, reckless and Macchiavellian. As documented in "Day of Deceit" (1999) by Robert Stinnett FDR tricked the Japanese Empire into "firing the first shot" by launching the attack on the United States naval base at Pearl Harbour. (The otherwise excellent historian Oliver Stone disputes this.) After the attack, opposition to war amongst the American public vanished. Almost certainly the entry of the United States into the Second World War prevented the triumph of Nazi Germany and its allies.
[2] The Lost Revolution: Germany 1918-23 (1997) by Chris Harman (1942-2009).
[3] Homage to Catalonia (1938) by George Orwell (1903-1950)
[4] Revolution and Counter-revolution in Spain (1938) by Felix Morrow (1996-1988). Sadly, a free on-line version of the book seems no longer to be available.
DennisK (not verified)
Thu, 2014-07-10 15:02
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The west is comitting suicide
admin
Sat, 2014-07-12 00:10
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How do you explain the heroism of Soviet people against Nazis?
DennisK,
No-one here has attempted to cover up or apologise for the monstrous crimes of Stalin against Russians, Ukrainians, Poles, Caucasians, Crimean Tatars, other East Europeans and Germans.
However, to equate Stalin's crimes with those of the Nazi Third Reich is contrary to the evidence.
If the "Communists" were no better than the Nazis, how do you explain the great heroism and terrible sacrifice of the Soviet people, including Ukrainians, against the Nazi invaders during the Second World War?
Make no mistake. The victory of the Red Army saved humanity from entering new era of death and slavery.
Today, in 2014, the same fate awaits humanity if the Nazis are allowed to win in Ukraine.
Captain Obvious (not verified)
Sat, 2014-07-12 10:39
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"If the "Communists" were no
James Sinnamon
Tue, 2014-07-15 02:00
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Humanity remains indebted to Red Army
Captain Obvious #comment-126894">wrote:
So, on which Internet pages can your own claims can be verified?
Captain Obvious wrote:
The Nazi German invaders and their Romanian, Bulgarian and Hungarian allies were not fascist invaders? Are you saying that they were liberating the Soviet Union from communist tyranny?
13,684,692 Soviet civilians died as a result of the Nazi invasion in addition to 8.7 million military dead according to one estimate. That is a total of 22,400,000 who died as a result of the Nazi invasion. Add to that:
... killed by the Nazis and their allies.
Between 6 million Jews and between 130,565 and 285,650 Romanies perished in the Nazi death camps. (Some of these deaths are included in the figures above.) Hitler planned to exterminate 25 million inhabitants of Eastern Europe and Russia in order to create "lebensraum" on which German ubermenschen were to settle and breed.
No-one has attempted to deny the political repression carried out by the Soviet Union in Eastern Europe, nor excuse the brutality of some Red Army soldiers towards the people of Germany and other Eastern European countries, but how anyone can claim that instances of rape by brutalised soldiers, who had just gone through such a horrific ordeal and had seen so many of their own people perish, is worse than the war crimes and attempted genocide by the Third Reich is beyond me.
DennisK (not verified)
Sat, 2014-07-12 15:36
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The point is not to equate,
DennisK (not verified)
Sat, 2014-07-12 16:01
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Fascism today
admin
Sun, 2014-06-29 14:45
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Why do historians isolate Gallipoli campaign from wider context?
The following was #comment-236477">added to the #comment-126253">abovementioned discussion.
Australian losses, on the Western Front in the 18 months from March 1916 until November 1918, were far higher than at Gallipoli in the 8 months from April until December 1914. Over 50,000,#fnWar1" id="txtWar1">1 or, on average, 1,571 per month, died on the Western front compared to 8,141 or 1,017 per month at Gallipoli. If we put aside the fact that no side's cause had merit in the First World War, the plan to attack Gallipoli, even if it failed, showed vision and initiative compared to the unimaginative and bloody war of attrition subsequently fought on the Western Front.
Almost none of the ostensibly objective and critical histories of the Gallipoli campaign discuss the campaign in its wider context – the nearby Balkans campaign, which was a resumption a the Balkan Wars of 1912-13, or the Ottoman military campaign against Armenians, which ended in attempted genocide of Armenians and the eventual rescue of some in 1920 in the newly formed Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic established by Lenin and Trotsky.
An exception is Bruce Page, in the "The Murdoch Archipelago" (2003). He shows how Rupert Murdoch's father, Keith Murdoch, who has been lionised for his denunciation of the Gallipoli campaign and the supposedly incompetent British generals in command, had little to say about the subsequent even more terrible carnage of Australians on the Western Front.
Footnote[s]
#fnWar1" id="fnWar1">1. #txtWar1">↑ This approximate figure is arrived by subtracting, from Australia's First World War death toll of 60,0000 (I couldn't find any figure more accurate than this unlikely multiple of 10,000 even on the Australian War memorial Web site) the following: 1,394 in Egypt and Palestine, 171 naval fatalities to get 50,294.
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