BOOKS: In WWII, Europe was 'on trial' and 'did badly'
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- Written by Hank Berger
In the Aug. 13 New York Review of Books, Christopher Browning [aet. 71], formerly of Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma and now at UNC Chapel Hill, reviews Europe on Trial, a recent indictment of European fecklessness before, during, and immediately after World War II by István Deák [aet. 79]. -- Deák is a frequent contributor to the NYR and anything but an objective observer of the events he writes about: born in Hungary in 1928, his life was thoroughly disrupted by World War II and its aftermath. -- Europeans, Deák argues (and Browning agrees), do not see World War II as the "last 'good war.'" -- It was, rather, a "morass" in which it is hard to say that principles of justice triumphed very often. -- "World War II provided the opportunity for virtually every state to increase ethnic homogeneity by ridding itself of unwanted minorities."[1] -- Despite a few minor criticisms, Browning praises Deák's 250-page book as "a sweeping survey of some of the bleakest aspects of a bleak period in European history," one that "dispenses with comforting national myths and unexamined assumptions of national virtue. World War II was, [Deák] writes, 'one of the greatest tragedies that humans ever brought upon themselves,' in which 'compassion and good will were two qualities in short supply.'" -- COMMENT: That seems a fair assessment, but doubt is permitted whether Browning is right, in the final sentence of his review, to endorse Deák's celebration of "the remarkable transformation that has subsequently led to 'a new, unified, and better Europe,'" since a rising populism in virtually every European country criticizes today's Europe as under the thumb of a dictatorial bureaucracy that lacks democratic legitimacy. -- To many, it appears that Europe is failing again, devoted chiefly to the Euro and globalization-fueled corporate profits that promote social inequality while distorting the social fabrics of European nations beyond recognition, often rending them irreparably....
BOOKS: How much should historians 'think'?
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- Written by Henry Adams
BOOK REVIEW: 'Worse than a defeat' -- the British fiasco in Afghanistan
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- Written by Henry Adams