World War II Podcasts

'Angry Days' Shows An America Torn Over Entering World War II

After WWII, Europe Was A 'Savage Continent' Of Devastation

 

Here are a couple of interesting interviews from NPR's Fresh Air. Both deal with aspects of World War II that have been largely ignored by our culture and its myth-making endeavours regarding 'The Good War'.

The point is not to question American involvement in World War II or to denigrate in any way those who took up arms. The salient issue is with regard to the machinations of government, the power of propaganda, and the tendency to romanticize the past and create myths.

I've written extensively about the false but ubiquitous narrative in our culture that the opening of the Western Front by Anglo-American troops in 1944 defeated Nazi Germany. This is pure myth and I'm hardly alone in pointing this out.

While some have rightly taken on the Churchill myth and exposed his rather dubious record not only as a leader but his terrible record as a military planner. It's not without reason he has been for generations labeled a war-mongerer.

In the end he was a lost man vying for power and defending an idol called the British Empire. My interest is restricted to the fact that Christians revere him, particularly those involved in Christian Militarist causes. Dobson famously had (or perhaps still has) a larger than life portrait of him hanging behind his desk. I can understand someone completely lost venerating such a man, but one who professes Christ? Something is amiss.

There is also the story (not told here) about the victorious empires waging war on their colonies throughout the late 1940's and early 1950's. The Nazi like tactics they had used before were employed once more as White 'Christian' Empires sought to re-assert their control over their Third World colonies. As terrible as the Third Reich was it must be remembered the French, Dutch, Belgian, English and American Empires had all committed similar crimes throughout Africa and Asia. World War II was in many ways a referendum on Imperialism a final curtain for five centuries of conquest and murder.

These podcasts deal with the lead up to and the aftermath of World War II. People have largely forgotten that many Americans opposed involvement in another European war. America had been going through a social transition for more than a generation. McKinley, Roosevelt, Wilson and others believed Manifest Destiny should move onto the world stage, industrialists saw new markets and yet many heartland folks, the people of the soil still viewed American as a nation of self-sufficient pioneers and farmers. There were racial issues and tensions with immigrants. It's a complicated and interesting story. And it's a story of schemers like FDR who were determined to bring the United States into the war and using vast resources to bring this about. Again perhaps it was the right thing to do, but that's not the point. This deals with larger questions regarding war, propaganda and the state.

And along those lines, the second podcast exposes the brutal and barbaric nature of war. There is no glory or honour in any of it. It brings out the worst in humanity. It is the playing field of lies and the celebration of blood and death. There are times when men will say they had no choice but to take up the sword, but those who reflect even for a moment will find no cause for pride.

The vast majority of wars are for nothing more than gold and greed and the lust for power. Lives are thrown away and many a leader betrays his countrymen. War is shameful and those who glorify will someday have their shame exposed.

While not all engaged in theft, looting and rape, many more did these things than we would commonly think or like to admit. Give men power and they will abuse it. As someone who was in the military I can attest the 'troops' are for the most part bestial and immoral pigs. And history from the conquest of North America to the taking of the Philippines, to the World Wars, to Vietnam to the Middle Eastern wars tells the same tale.

The soldier's notions of honour and dignity are contrary to Scripture's conception of these terms.

I wore a uniform and I can say two things about it.

One, I'm thankful I did not directly have to kill anyone though I am deeply ashamed that I participated in death via the chain of supply. I handled articles of death (bombs and missiles) and passed them on to the next party who pulled a trigger or pressed a button. And for what? American freedom? Far from it. Expansionism, a geo-political chess game and nothing more.

I did not 'serve' America. I served the Empire and its corporate backers and interests. I did not defend freedom. When the soldiers leave Afghanistan later this year will we suddenly lose our right to free speech or our freedom to vote? The Pashtun people (of which the Taliban are comprised) never threatened American freedom. Al Qaeda has been gone for years and there were never more than a few hundred of them in Afghanistan. Al Qaeda's war on America has nothing to do with our freedoms, it has to do with Empire, dead babies killed by American bombs and multi-nationals crushing the life out of other countries. It is fallen man's venomous response to the evils of Imperialism. A plague on both houses.

In fact these wars and those who have participated in them have done much to empower a state which seeks to eliminate our freedoms, to enslave us and the rest of the world. Again, it's as old as Babel. But I don't have to 'thank' those who are enabling it for their 'service'.

Two, I am ashamed to have even worn the uniform. I threw the medals away and I will never stand to receive so-called honour nor would I ever in any way receive social benefits resulting from my time in the legions. I am thankful that in God's Providence I played the fool and joined and I'm even more thankful that he used the episode to save me and open my eyes. And I'm thankful I was able to escape that pit in a timely manner.