ww2 obsession

stira64

im just curious why everyone is so obsessed with ww2? dont say ye arent.......cos you are! the amount of boards posts,books,computer games, films and tv shows about ww2 is amazing! i swear, if it wasnt for those 12 years of german history, those yank bastards wouldnt have much to make films about!

dont even get me started on how germans are portrayed in every film and computer game!
"ja, ich bin evil german, who ist inferior to brave american"

Mark

A combination of factors really.

World War II was the largest, greatest (not as in craic mind) and most dramatic of all wars in our recorded History.


The Basics
It appealed to the imagination with two Massive contending sides- The Allies and the Axis.

Both are now clear cut in History as good and evil respectively, again appealing to the imagination with it's somewhat romantical nature.


The Countries
The Main Powers (Britain, USA, Germany, Japan, Italy and Russia) all had (now) legendary leaders with their Powerful personalities, their fiery oratory skill, their cool names (This is a factor believe it or not, it's just not widely acknowledged. Dzhugashvili doesnt roll off the tongue like Stalin does.) and possibly most importantly;
They personified the national attitudes of the Country at the time.

The Leaders
Churchill was Britain's defiant hero, Hitler Germany's shining knight come to right the wrongs of Versailles and make their Fatherland great again.

Hirohito the Royal/Divine Imperialist setting out to carve Japan an Empire, Roosevelt the honest, impeachable and Democratic leader of America, the type of President idealized by the US founding fathers.

Stalin the gruff, strong Russian who was determined to crush Germany at any cost (This attitude spread to many Russian soldiers consequently.), Mussolini the Italian who had given them back a bit of pride in their country and introduced patriotic fervor with wild tales of bringing back the Roman Empire.


The Armies
Massive new weapons, tactics and unprecedented Army Sizes made the scope unseen before, the Fall of invincible France imprinting the severity of the war and highlighting the power of the Blitzkreig and the German War Machine.


A Tale well Told
Acts of betrayal such as Vichy and Quisling in Norway make again, a good story, and one that is worth hearing. (Interesting to note the British destruction of the Vichy French fleet in Algeria for instance, two former allies rapidly turned on each other.)

The suprise attack of Pearl Harbour drew the Pacific into a major war and started the USA's massive industrial war capacity flowing.

Coupled with the fascinating characters and the rapidly twisting "plot", it simply makes an absorbing read (Or at least it does for me....ahem.)


The Holocaust
This incredible act of evil helped to increase the Noteriety of WWII post-1945 for obvious reasons.

It showed how low humans could really go, the final result of racism, the stupidy of a belief of something so abstract and ludicrous as racial superiorty.

It dealt with pain and suffering, always guaranteed to pull in audiences.

And it became synonymous with Hitler, cementing his reputation and removing the jingoism from war.


Your Thoughts?
These are all the answers I can think of on short notice (My brother keeps telling me to hurry up so we can watch Ring. W00t!), no doubt they're are many more. Hell its because there are so many that it's so popular (Oops theres another reason).

I'd be interested to hear more personal opinions on the attraction of World War II in order to discover wheter it was just the fact that it was WWII , or if you can identify the real reasons the period holds such a fascinating "draw-you-in" factor.

simu

Another attraction of WW2 occurs to me - technological developments - exciting breakthroughs in encryption, radar, creation of the atom bomb and so on - after all we live in a society pretty much obsessed with technology.


To go off on a slightly different tangent (Mark has provided a good list of reasons why WW2 has become so embedded in the popular imagination), I think this phenomenon (i.e. WW2 as a mythology for our times) is worrying.

I know many history students who are really obsessed with WW2 and Vietnam and who have no interest in anything that happened before the 20th century. WW2 is seen as a "story" which means that ppl don't see it in historical context and that they don't see its relevance to the present day as clearly as they ought to.

I'm annoyed at how ppl seem to think that nothing happened in Germany before the 1920s. Another annoying thing is the cult of Hitler as the embodiment of evil (furthered by things such as Hitler Week on the History Channel). I was reading an article on a new film that depicts Hitler as a young man. Apparently, some ppl find it objectionable that he is depicted as a human being. This is silly, Hitler did abominable things but he was every bit as human as ppl we like to admire such as da Vinci, Mother Teresa etc and, moreover, he is not the only person to have acted in such a manner and, despite all the platitudes one hears on documentaries about never letting a Holocaust take place again, depicting the Holocaust as the product of one aberrant, fiendish mind obscures the fact that all humans are capable of extreme barbarity if circumstances are favourable to such behaviour.

Hairy Homer

Originally posted by simu

Another annoying thing is the cult of Hitler as the embodiment of evil (furthered by things such as Hitler Week on the History Channel). I was reading an article on a new film that depicts Hitler as a young man. Apparently, some ppl find it objectionable that he is depicted as a human being. This is silly, Hitler did abominable things but he was every bit as human as ppl we like to admire

Saw a neat little question once about world leaders. I'd love to get the full text for it if anyone knows. It went something like 'Identify these three national leaders:

a) Alcoholic, depressive, failed every academic examination he ever sat, believed in his country's manifest destiny to rule the world, supported eugeniscist behaviour like sterilising the mentally handicapped, turncoat who transferred his allegiance from one of his country's main political parties to its main rival and then back again. Former journalist

b) Philandering cripple who believed in the occult and consulted astrologers before making important decisions. (Can't remember much else but there was more on this guy|)

c) War hero who twice won his country's highest award for bravery in the field, vegetarian, teetotaller, artist, maintained a faithful monogamous relationship with his partner until his death. Refused to let his armies use certain weapons of mass destruction because of the terrible effects he had experienced himself.

There's more on each but you get the gist.

The answers of course are:

a) Winston Churchill
b) FD Roosevelt
c) Adolf Hitler

PS I'm not a Nazi

Victor

Quite simply because we were raised on a diet of WWII movies, which were in part propaganda. That and the whole morbid fascination thing.

FirA_Serjio

jeez mark how long do u spend on ur replys???? dat musta taken ages

Mark

jeez mark how long do u spend on ur replys???? dat musta taken ages

As long as I need ww).

Clintons Cat

I was reading an article on a new film that depicts Hitler as a young man. Apparently, some ppl find it objectionable that he is depicted as a human being. This is silly, Hitler did abominable things but he was every bit as human as ppl we like to admire such as da Vinci, Mother Teresa etc and, moreover, he is not the only person to have acted in such a manner and, despite all the platitudes one hears on documentaries about never letting a Holocaust take place again, depicting the Holocaust as the product of one aberrant, fiendish mind obscures the fact that all humans are capable of extreme barbarity if circumstances are favourable to such behaviour.

I think the film in question is Max which has been geeting a few favorable reviews alongside minor criticisms of Oversimplifications.

A good book on the whole cconundrum of over demonising/humanising Hitler isExplaining Hitler by Ron Rosenbaum

Kalina

I am interested in WW2 because of the scale of it. It must've been a terrifying thing to live in those times when the entire world was swept up in a war. Also the fantastic technology, especially the fighter planes and tanks, is amazing.

josh40

Of course, before ww 2, people were equally obsessed with ww1.Many people actually see them as the same war with a twenty year break in between.

Logically, how could Germany have justifiably have been found almost single handedly guilty of starting ww1? Clause 231, at Versailles was based soley on revenge.The Treaty of Versailles, was not a treaty that really promoted peace and a return to any kind of normal life.

Hitler was a mad man, no argument there, but a madman that became so powerful and popular within his country because the rest of Europe had "spat" on her. OK, after Versailles, attempts were made to bring Germany back into Europe, maybe Germany's aggressive , expansionist policies are to blame for hurling Europe into ww2.

What about Britain and France's policy of Appeasement, why didn't they put a stop to Hitler earlier? Why did Stalin sign the Nazi- Soviet Pact with Hitler, his arch enemy?

I know I'm rambling, but my point(at last) is, maybe we are obsessed by ww2 because we don't really buy the good versus evil story. Maybe it really, wasn't that simple. If Britain and France were the pure forces of democracy facing the evil forces of Fadcism, what took them so long?

WW2 has been simplified ans glamourised as the strong, honest forces of good against the evil genius.

I have no doubt that Hitler's ideas of race were horrific and led to mass slaughter, but they were not really his ideas. He took them to unbelievable extremes, but the actual ideas themselves had been around for years , probably even centuries and unfortunately, still exist Today.

In the inter war years, thousands of books were written on the subject of war guilt.

We are probably fascinated by how the world allowed another war to break out, a mere 20 years after the firstww. On a more gruesome note, we re also aware that this is the last world war that will actually leave survivors!A third world war would change this world beyond all recognition and we all know it.

Victor

Originally posted by josh40
Logically, how could Germany have justifiably have been found almost single handedly guilty of starting ww1? Clause 231, at Versailles was based soley on revenge.The Treaty of Versailles, was not a treaty that really promoted peace and a return to any kind of normal life.

Of course it was revenge - for the Franco - Prussian War, when the Germans imposed a similar treay on the French.

Originally posted by josh40
What about Britain and France's policy of Appeasement, why didn't they put a stop to Hitler earlier?

Quite simply because France lost 2,000,000 men in WWI - and that was winning! They wern't going to go through it again.

josh40

Actually , I don't think it was so simple!There were waiting for a firm commitment from Britain which was very slow in coming.

Treaties were always part and parcel of wars. If France was looking for revenge for the Franco- Prussian war, what were Britain and the US looking for revenge for?

Victor

Originally posted by josh40
Treaties were always part and parcel of wars. If France was looking for revenge for the Franco- Prussian war, what were Britain and the US looking for revenge for?

The Treaty of Versailles was very much a French creation designed to punish Germany. The British used it to renew (albeit temporarily) their supremacy on the seas and in theory on land.

josh40

Why was the Treaty of Versailles a French creation, it was based on Wilson's 14 points( even though they weren't really his)?

The Treaty of Versailles couldn't work because the US decided it had had enough of Europe and didn't want anything to do with the League, which was about the only hope for peace.

Hitler's biggest mistake was that he lost the war, the victors biggest mistake was they were blinded by revenge and lost the peace.

angeltoes

hi
I know someone who's obsessed with WW2 and its technology.He isn't online so
does anyone know of any offline discussions of WW2 that take place in Dublin that he could join in with.

Cheers
Angeltoes

TerrorFirmer

I have a big interest myself in WW2....all areas, but particularly the German armed forces.

And as someone said, it'd be impossible not to make a big deal out of it. To date its been the most devastating and widespread conflict on a global scale.

Irishstabber

Im one of those guys. I love WW2 and everything spouted from it.
It just a phenomenon. Everything about it was....amazing basically. Except for the atrocities of course.

But the tecnological advances. Style of warfare (blitzkrieg). People involved. The many stories that are known of different aspects of the war.
And...it, since its closer to our advanced times, was heavily documented. Use of cameras on the battlefield etc. We can't see Napoleons defeat at Waterloo like we can see the Battle of Stalingrad. We can get immersed into this war. It was also the last large scale war to be fought on this earth and so nothing newer to focus our attention on.

And the mysteries around the war are great to ponder about- Rudolph Hess' flight to Britain for eg.
The personas of the leaders are great. I myself am more into learning about Stalin and Hitler. With Roosevelt being my least favourite of the 5.
The Rise of Nazism in Germany is connected to WW2(obviosly) and is also interesting to study.

The many aspects of the war catch out attention and because thre are so many aspects so many people get lured into it.
It just a fascinating piece of history. Go WW2

Just my 2 cents.

Capt'n Midnight

Large parts of WWII get forgotten , like the fighting in the French Colonies in Africia and Asia, the invasions of Iraq , China. The war between Britan and Finland. In terms of casualties there was the Eastern war between Germany and Russia/Poland and the killing of civilians by both sides, there was the conflict between Japan and China, the rest which most of the attention goes to was mearly a side show by comparison.

WWII did introduce new technology, but much of it was irrelevant to the course of the war - Rockets and Atom bombs being prime examples. Aerial bombing didn't do as much as promised, this was evinced again soon afterwards when the North Koreans put factories underground. Despite all the stories of "Le Resistance" it reckoned that they only kept about 8,000 more german troups tied down. Only in Yugoslavia was the resistance capable of liberating the country.

Radar was the major new technology where superiority of one side over another showed results. Encryption, well it was the poles who broke the German code and the Germans did just as well at breaking allied codes. That the Japanese codes were broken did affect Midway and Yamamoto but their war was lost when they didn't take out the fuel depots with a third wave in the Pearl Harbour attack.

WWI introduced most of the other technologies, radio , aeroplanes, and it was escalating to a mainly chemical war towards the end. But most of the combatants had very similar governments so it wouldn't have made a lot of difference who won. But it wasn't all mud and trenches / biplane dogfights but that's usually how it is portrayed. The young indiana jones chronicles were very good as showing more detail about WWI

TerrorFirmer

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

The war between Britan and Finland.

I hope you meant to say Russia there.

Capt'n Midnight

MobileInfantry wrote:

I hope you meant to say Russia there.

No the invasion of Russia by Britan after WWI is not as obscure as the war with Finland, The Brits and French sent supplies to Finland during their war with Russia too, so kinda confusing at times.

ykt0di9url7bc3

Mark wrote:

The Armies
Massive new weapons, tactics and unprecedented Army Sizes made the scope unseen before, the Fall of invincible France imprinting the severity of the war and highlighting the power of the Blitzkreig and the German War Machine.

I love military history, especial the strategm and ideas from which commanders based their plans on.... so much documentation can show how armies bodly utilising their forces for engaging and defeating the enemy...

Battles like Kursk, Midway, Monte Cassino can show the development of warfare during those times and in such determine future wars... there hasnt been a war\battle to this extent between two powerful nations (hopefully this will never be the case again)

For me, Operation August Storm is the "icing on the cake" for Russian armed\tactical superiority at that period of time.

...My favourite reading in strategic military history is WW1, but WW2 gives so much more in terms of information and in the diversity of means and methods of battle

TerrorFirmer

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

No the invasion of Russia by Britan after WWI is not as obscure as the war with Finland, The Brits and French sent supplies to Finland during their war with Russia too, so kinda confusing at times.

Ah yes, but the way you said it, you made it sound as if you were referring to a British invasion of Russia during WW2! Sorry for any misunderstanding.

Victor

Capt'n Midnight, you seem a little confusing.

"The war between Britan and Finland." Weren't they allies (small A - not Allies). Britain supported Finland against the USSR, but later urged Finland to stop attacking the USSR after Germany invaded. Finland supported Germany against the USSR.

WWII?

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

Large parts of WWII get forgotten , like the fighting in the French Colonies in Africia and Asia, the invasions of Iraq , China. The war between Britan and Finland. In terms of casualties there was the Eastern war between Germany and Russia/Poland and the killing of civilians by both sides, there was the conflict between Japan and China, the rest which most of the attention goes to was mearly a side show by comparison.

WWII did introduce new technology, but much of it was irrelevant to the course of the war - Rockets and Atom bombs being prime examples. Aerial bombing didn't do as much as promised, this was evinced again soon afterwards when the North Koreans put factories underground. Despite all the stories of "Le Resistance" it reckoned that they only kept about 8,000 more german troups tied down. Only in Yugoslavia was the resistance capable of liberating the country.

Radar was the major new technology where superiority of one side over another showed results. Encryption, well it was the poles who broke the German code and the Germans did just as well at breaking allied codes. That the Japanese codes were broken did affect Midway and Yamamoto but their war was lost when they didn't take out the fuel depots with a third wave in the Pearl Harbour attack.

WWI?

WWI introduced most of the other technologies, radio , aeroplanes, and it was escalating to a mainly chemical war towards the end. But most of the combatants had very similar governments so it wouldn't have made a lot of difference who won. But it wasn't all mud and trenches / biplane dogfights but that's usually how it is portrayed. The young indiana jones chronicles were very good as showing more detail about WWI

rsynnott

Another interesting aspect that people tend to forget about was that it was the first war to use radar, to have a major dependancy on radio and encryption (and code breaking) and so on.

TerrorFirmer

rsynnott wrote:

Another interesting aspect that people tend to forget about was that it was the first war to use radar, to have a major dependancy on radio and encryption (and code breaking) and so on.

Indeed. Towards the end of the war the Germans had been developing really advanced stuff such as wire guided missles and advanced bombers. Most of it was captured by the allies, none of it being used before the war ended.

The Jet fighter was another big invention. The British won the race to get the first jet fighter into service, but the German me 262 was an extremely advanced figher that could have done extreme damage to the allies air superiority had it been introduced earlier. Apparently hitlers orders that it be used as a fighter bomber rather then a defensive figher tied it down from its true potential.

I think what Captain midnight was referring to was the British and American aid to white Russian during the 1920's Russian Civil War? (not sure of exact dates)

Either that or getting mixed up with the Russian invasion of Finland.

angeltoes

So do you guys ever meet up then ? My brother could really do with meeting people who's into world war 2 related topics such as, games, books the whole history. Come on lads Im not invisible here.

OfflerCrocGod

MobileInfantry wrote:

Indeed. Towards the end of the war the Germans had been developing really advanced stuff such as wire guided missles and advanced bombers.

Their flying wing stealth bomber is the one that really impresses me; it would have been amazing had it ever made into production. Cruise missiles was another invention they never had time to fully exploit. The amount of modern warfare that one nation developed is amazing when you look back at it; pity they were in the wrong

the_syco

WW2 German Forces - Use Babelfish to translate it

BlitzKrieg

the obsession with with ww2 in my opinion comes from a few things.


1. It is the only *true* global war. While World War 1 is considered a World war, it was no where near the scale of the second world war.


2. Been covered abit in early posts...but this is the only war that is looked at as the *justified* war. No other war has been as accepted and approved of as much as world war 2. A clear proof of this is the majority of movies that have been made of ww2. We have had comedies, action, propaganda, romance, all positive uplifting movies set in ww2. But the majority of movies set in ww1 and vietnam are highly critical and shocking.


3. World War 2 was everything World War 1 wasnt. One must remember that world war 2 had many great tragedies and losses but it went somewhere. World war 1 was a the same death and tragedy without reward. There is a sense of pride and nostalgia when someone died to put an american flag on a pacific island or was shot down on a bombing run to berlin. But there is only regret and sadness at the battles of world war 1. There was no glorious victory.

(this ties in nicely with everyones interest in technology and tactics.)

4. IT CHANGED EVERYTHING!

pre ww2.

-depression
-fascism and communism were strong and democracy was dying.
-Battleships ruled. (as did the royal navy)
-the entire social structure (women, race, class) of many countries strictly enforced


post WW2
-Economic BOOM
-Democracy is revived.
-ATOMIC BOMB AND AIR FORCE (RAF RULED)
-Social change, womens rights on the up, the beginning of the end of the colonial empires.


World War 2 is seen as the beginning of our current age...sort of the big bang of the modern world.


Personnally i lean towards the stories of world war 2 as a personal appeal. But i also love the battleships of the period. (Bismarck *whistle* beutiful ship)

Kingp35

I have a huge interest in WWII. In fact I am recently just back from Munich where I visited famous places like the town of Berchtesgaden where, among other things, Hitler had his famous holiday house more commonly known as "Eagles Nest" on the top of a mountain in the german alps(don’t get me started on the walk to get tto it!). Heinrich Himmler was also staying in this town when he betrayed Hitler and tried to arrange a deal with the Allies when he knew that Germany had lost the war.

I also visited the Dacau concentration camp which was the first ever concentration camp built by the Nazi regime. This camp was used mainly to hold POWs and was the the site of more than 30,000 executions during the war. This was a very surreal place to visit as I saw first hand and was inside the gas chambers and cremetoriums, the wall where execution by shootings were performed, which incidently had a small ditch at its base where the blood from these shootings could be drained out. Also horrific things like the standing cells in the camp bunkers where prisoners where put for days on end with no food or light and no room to even sit down. It was the most disturbing place I have ever been in my life and reading everythimg what happened there and actually standing in the same spot was not an overly pleasant experience

I think the point im getting at is to the average joe WWII is infamous because of these atrocities. Obviously Hitler was a major player in these atrocities and the holocaust but people forget about other Nazi leaders such as Himmler who had allot more to do with the Holocaust than Hitler did(he oversaw the running of all concentration and extermination camps) as although Hitler authorised it Himmler carried it out and had allot of influence in getting Hitler to authorise it in the first place. Its because of all these barabric things that went that WWII sticks in peoples minds more so than any other war in history.

On a side note for the people who are sick of seeing Hitler portrayed as evil personified watch the movie "Downfall" which treats as a human being but also shows the absolutley twisted ideals the man had and the grip that he had on those that were closest to him.

Zebra3

For me, my main interest in WWII is the war on the eastern front.

Former 'allies' battling it out.

Two different totalitarian regimes at total war, the likes of which we may never see again.

Also, the "side stories".

The Holocaust.

Russia's gulags.

The development of the V2 rockets and America's subsequent use of German war criminals in NASA.

The collapse of European empires in Asia and Africa. How different from Germany were Britain and France?

Britain attacking the French Navy in Africa.

People in the Baltics seeing the Germans as liberators from communism.

Could be here all day....