22 June 1941 "Operation Barbarossa": Germany Attacks the USSR

The surprise attack by Nazi Germany on its erstwhile Soviet ally was fateful in numerous regards. It was the beginning of the full ideological and genocidal war against the twin enemies of Bolshevism and the "inferior" races of Slavs and Jews. As such, it was marked by deliberate disregard for even the minimal rules of warm, epitomized by the "Commissar Order" of 6 June, which mandated the summary execution of Soviet political officers.

As one commander explained to his troops, every officer was entitled to undertake executions on his own authority. The "decimation" and "burning down of villages as a punitive measure" were also among the acceptable actions, though these latter required clearance from a battalion commander.

Historian Felix Römer of Mainz published a new book on the Commissar Order last fall (here conveniently summarized in his article for Die Zeit) that detailed more clearly than ever just how extensive the crimes were and how cooperative (contrary to the apologetic myths) the regular army proved to be. Whereas traditional accounts claimed that many officers passively ignored or actively disobeyed the order, Römer finds hard proof that some 60 percent of officers promulgated it, and that, in all probability, fully 90 percent did so. Far from the few hundred cases once spoken of, Römer finds documentation for nearly 4000 executions of political officers and functionaries.

Horrible as this number is, it constitutes only an infinitesimal fraction of the 27 million Soviet dead between 1941 and 1945. The Commissar Order was the symbolic as well as practical trigger of what the German leaders promised would be a new way of warfare. It was moreover significant that the Nazis justified their policies as a response to what they characterized as the inhumanity of their Judeo-Bolshevik opponents, who would fight "with the most extreme cruelty and treachery." (Decades later, Ernst Nolte seemed to argue on similar grounds to excuse Nazi crimes as a preemptive defense against the genocidal policies that Germans could expect of the Bolsheviks.)

Enforcement of the order ceased only in 1942 when the generals, motivated by practical rather than ethical concerns, found that such ruthless methods (understandably enough) only increased Soviet resistance.

As the war began to turn in the Soviets' favor, they increased the efforts to persuade Wehrmacht troops to surrender rather than face certain death. One of the challenges that they faced was to assure the Germans that captivity was indeed the only hope of survival rather than just another path to death—in other words, that the Germans could expect to be better treated than they treated their Red Army captives.

A 1942 safe-passage leaflet contained rosy accounts of German POWs wearing swimming trunks in southern climes and happily cultivating vegetables. More important, it explicitly addressed German crimes, for in it, Wehrmacht POW's expressed their regret at having incinerated Soviet villages and described themselves as moved to tears that the Russians behaved so kindly "to us swine."

The bottom of the second page (above), contains a tear-off section intended to guarantee the bearer safe passage. It reads:

German soldiers who surrender to the Red Army are guaranteed: life, good treatment, and return home after the end of the war.

The line below assures Germans that if they surrender with hands raised, no one will shoot.

Although the Soviets, unlike the Germans, did not have a policy of deliberate extermination of prisoners, conditions for the average German POW bore little resemblance to what the pamphlet described, or certainly not for long. As the tide of war turned, the number of prisoners increased beyond the Soviet capacity to care for them, and the mounting toll from German atrocities did not make the USSR any more inclined to be lenient toward the captive invaders. Conditions improved only briefly late in the war, when the Soviets needed prisoners for labor, But as Max Arthur puts it, “In 1945, in Soviet eyes it was time to pay. For most Russian soldiers, any instinct for pity or mercy had died somewhere on a hundred battlefields between Moscow and Warsaw.” Death rates among POWs on both sides of the eastern front were around 60 percent. Among prisoners on both sides on the western front, by contrast, it was under 4 percent.

Read last year's post.

[updated 2016]

Getting back in the groove

For a variety of reasons, I decided not to attempt to maintain a regular posting schedule during our very full and successful study abroad course in Prague and Kraków from May through mid-June. Instead, it seemed simpler and wiser to digest some of the results of those travels and post them in the accustomed form here.

We did, however, create a course blog, on which some of the students posted during the trip, and we'll link to that later, as well.

In the meantime, it's an especially busy season because, after an unusual Town Meeting that was was divided between May and June, we can also look forward (a peculiar idiomatic phrase) to yet another Special Town Meeting in late July. The principal reason for the latter is the adoption of new local options taxes, which is dictated by the state calendar and new fiscal year. However, this year's May and June sessions provided some unexpected tensions--some of which bear, directly or indirectly, on historic preservation matters--which may not have subsided by then.

Keep posted.

17 June: Bunker Hill Day--and where's the spirit of revolution today?

Boston, and Bunker Hill from the east, with Charlestown and the monument on the right: engraving by W. H. Barlett, from one of the many 19th-century editions of American Scenery

The 17th of June may be the former day of national unity in Germany, but the anniversary of a celebrated Revolutionary War battle has again emerged as a divisive date here in Massachusetts.

That some local and state employees have the day off irritates Republican lawmakers, who charge that legally mandated "hack holidays" such as Bunker Hill Day and Evacuation Day (March 17—yes, coincidentally, St. Patrick's Day) for the few constitute an insult to all the rest of us who have to work, and moreover result in great overtime costs and losses of productivity (though they produced no evidence to support this claim). Some Democrats responded by insisting on the historic importance of the Revolutionary holiday and drily noting that the Commonwealth might be better served if Republicans focused their energy on ethics reform and other more susbtantive matters.

Bunker Hill (actually Breed's Hill, as most of us know) was of course the first full-scale battle of the Revolution after the initial clashes at Lexington and Concord. Although the besieged British forces from Boston succeeded in taking the fortified height from the rebels, the fact that the latter had stood their ground through three assaults was a symbolic victory.

The huge granite obelisk (221 feet tall) that marks the site has a story of its own. After the legislature declined to fund the project, conceived for the fiftieth anniversary of the battle, it fell to citizens' volunteer groups—in particular, the women of the Ladies' Fair at Quincy Market—to raise the necessary funds (a process that, ironically, anticipated the struggle we here in Amherst faced in microcosm when we sought to create the now immensely popular history mural in West Cemetery). Although the laying of the cornerstone in 1825 was occasion for a huge festival, marked, inter alia, by the oration of Daniel Webster and the presence of the Marquis de Lafayette, then making his triumphal American return tour, the project was not completed till the formal dedication in 1843, marked by festivities almost as impressive. (MassMoments provides a nice synopsis.)

The story is told in capsule form on the commemorative cup plate produced by the prolific Boston and Sandwich Glass Company, the motto of which reads:

CORNERSTONE LAID BY LAFAYETTE JUNE 17 1825

FINISHED BY THE LADIES 1841

This was but one of a host of commemorative products that appeared in a steady stream for decades. The battle and site were memorialized in speeches, poems, prints (see above), and souvenir objects

It is ironic that Republicans and other right-wingers, who have appropriated the symbolism of the "Tea Party" as a protest against the policies of the Obama administration, show such little interest in the real history or principles of the Revolution from which they claim inspiration.

Democrats also pointed out that the anti-Bunker Hill Day argument was moot because the holidays were built into legally binding contracts and could not be changed in the immediate future anyway. In one further ironic development, we see more evidence of the growing tendency to blame workers and contracts for economic ills that are largely structural, and to take away the gains of decades of struggle and collective bargaining for the sake of short-term convenience. The disease has hit even "progressive" Amherst, in which an unholy alliance of soi-disant leftists and right-wing fiscal conservatives are united in crying that we must get rid of Cost-of-Living Allowances (COLAs) and other wage increases for town employees. All a sudden, those who resist many an eminently rational administrative measure are telling us that we must extract concessions from those on the town payroll, whether by coercion—there are ways to break contracts, they blithely assure us—or cooptation: please, call all your friends among the unions! one enthusiast implored at Town Meeting. For some reason, they see cutting services to fit budgetary constraints as a great evil, but find no such problem in cutting the pay of those who provide the services.

17 June: "Day of German Unity"

The original Day of German Unity (Tag der deutschen Einheit) commemorates the disturbances of 17 June 1953, when workers in East Germany (German Democratic Republic) rebelled, first, nominally against increased labor requirements, and eventually or more generally, against the Stalinist system. The Volkspolizei and Soviet forces put down the demonstrations with force, and further repressions, ranging from jail terms to executions, followed.

The holiday, created in West Germany (the Federal Republic), served as a Cold War propaganda device and reminder that the West German constitution (Grundgesetz; Basic Law) was officially treated as a provisional document and provided for eventual reunification with Eastern German territories whenever circumstances allowed.

Today, the original holiday has receded from memory. Following the reunification of the German states in the wake of the collapse of communism, on 3 October 1990, that date replaced the earlier one as the day of commemoration--turned celebration.

Although the former soon came to serve mainly as a convenient holiday (in the sense of a day off from work) rather than a real occasion of historical significance in the popular mind, it is far from clear that the new date will fare much better. For most Germans and foreigners alike, the date of the "Fall of the Wall" on 9 November, which moreover coincides with a series of fateful anniversaries in German history--the November Revolution that overthrew the Kaiser in 1918, Hitler's failed coup attempt of 1923, and the Kristallnacht pogrom of 1938--remains a much more memorable occasion than 3 October. Governments can proclaim historical holidays, but the people themselves create them.

27 May 1942: Assassination of Reichsprotektor Reinhard Heydrich by Czech Paratroopers

On this day in 1942, paratroopers sent by the Czechoslovak government-in-exile in London assassinated Reinhard Heydrich, the ruler of the Nazi-occupied "Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia." Heydrich was not only the "Reichsprotektor," but also the architect of the SS security apparatus and a driving force behind the extermination of European Jewry.

The attack mortally wounded Heydrich, who died on 4 June. The reprisals that followed are, if possible, even better known than the assassination itself. In particular, the massacre or deportation of the innocent villagers of Lidice became a synonym for the state terror and collective punishment under Nazi occupation. (That such terms are nowadays cavalierly applied in vastly different and incommensurate contexts is a sad irony worth noting, even though we cannot discuss it in detail here.)

The motivations and calculations behind the assassination were complex, and in part because of the ferocity of the Nazi response, details remained murky long afterward.

Reflecting on the difficult choices and consequences some three decades later, former Chief of Czechoslovak Intelligence František Moravec concluded:

Perhaps 5,000 Czechs paid with their lives for the death of a single Nazi maniac. The cost and the worth of the killing of Heydrich has been the subject of much controversy. It is certainly true that the price paid for Heydrich was much higher than the figures indicate, for the Nazis executed systematically the very best of the nation. On the other hand, it is quite clear that had Heydrich lived he would have done no less. The eradication of the Czechoslovak nation and its amalgamation into the Reich, including the systematic murder of its leaders, was the assignment with which he came to Prague.

In my opinion, the problem of cost can be reduced to a simple principle, so well understood by the parachutists Kubis and Gabcik: freedom and, above all, liberation from slavery have to be fought for, and this means losses in human lives.

The ethical and strategic dilemmas remain as relevant today as they were then. Among other things, it is bracing to be reminded of an age in which leaders calmly and resolutely--though not at all lightly--made such calculations involving both political principles and human lives. Our otherwise commendable modern desire to avoid loss of human life "at all costs" may blind us to the equal or greater costs of inaction.

Because I was for the first time present in the Czech Republic on the occasion of these anniversaries, I'll return to these topics in a more systematic way in the near future.

Practical Things You Can Learn from Studying Science. Lessons from history

A recent article by John Malone and Brian Oliver, "The genomic 'inner fish' and a regulatory enigma in the vertebrates," in the Journal of Biology (an OpenAccess publication, always a good thing) managed to include one of my favorite scientific anecdotes:

Even before the origin of species by descent from a common ancestor was posited, it was realized that groups of animals had related morphologies. Georges Cuvier, the father of comparative anatomy, viewed anatomical structures though the lens of form and function. Similar looking anatomical structures should have similar function, and anatomy could be used diagnostically to group organisms – a theory he termed "the correlation of parts" [1]. A famous story illustrates the idea. One of Cuvier's students dressed as the Devil with horns on his head and hoof-shaped shoes burst into Cuvier's bedroom when he was asleep and said, "I am the Devil. I have come to devour you!" Cuvier woke up and replied, "I doubt whether you can. You have horns and hooves. You eat only plants."

Cuvier thereupon rolled over and went back to sleep.

Run It up the Flagpole and See. . . what?

This was the sight that greeted visitors as they came up the main drive onto the Hampshire College campus shortly before Commencement.

The question is: why?

The College always sets out the flags of United Nations member states on festive occasions. So, nothing unusual there. And, given that the flags are arranged in a circle, every flag will by definition be next to two other flags. There are a total of 192 UN member states. Are you with me? So far, so good. This is the United States, so one could reasonably assume (yes, even in Amherst), that the Stars and Stripes would be front and center. And, either because this is Amherst, or simply because we try to fly the flags of all nations of the world, one could also surmise that the UN flag might be highlighted (the Town flies it on the Common, alongside the national flag). So, the US and UN flags are next to each other. Each therefore has a chance of being next to only one national flag out of the 191 remaining.

The flags next to the US flag are the UN flag and that of Israel.

What, as the saying goes, are the odds of that?

Yes, this could be your chance, by demonstrating understanding of statistical methods, to pass your quantitative skills requirement.

We don't like multiple-choice tests at Hampshire. In fact, most of us don't give tests at all, preferring essay assignments. But for the sake of argument, humor me, and give it a try.

As a cultural historian, of course, I see just these basic choices:

• random, statistical chance (both the US and UN flags have a chance of being next to any one of the 191 other flags)
• there may be some meaning to the choice, but it was just something those guys in Physical Plant did on their own when they set up for graduation, so it's anyone's guess and has no official meaning
• the College, reeling from the bad publicity occasioned by the divestment issue and other controversies involving the Middle East, quite deliberately sought to send the implicit message—in particular to parents and prospective donors—that it is neither anti-Israel nor antisemitic

Which is it? You decide.

Emily Dickinson Poetry Walk

The Emily Dickinson Poetry Walk, held annually on the weekend closest to the date of her death, by tradition concludes at her graveside, where there are a few formal remarks and readings from her works and a toast (seltzer rather than champagne these days, alas). Attendees are also invited to step forward and read their favorite poems.

Herewith, a few images of the afternoon's event, which drew one of the largest crowds in recent memory.

Then: the Dickinson Family plot, in an old photograph, on the sign marking the final stop on the poetry walk.

These are the original family grave monuments: matching, but cubical in form and simple. Emily's stone originally bore only her initials, "EED." Early in the twentieth century, her niece Martha Dickinson Bianchi, who came to assume the role of keeper and quasi-creator of the Dickinson poetic legacy, replaced the simpler markers with larger, upright ones, bearing sententious inscriptions (below). She created similarly uniform stones for members of the Austin Dickinson family in Wildwood Cemetery (a modern "rural" or "park" cemetery, in whose creation Austin played a major role).

Now: the Dickinson plot today, with the gravestones that Martha Dickinson Bianchi substituted for the originals. Emily's, as is well known, bears the poetic-philosophical epitaph, "Called Back."

Tributes—a bouquet and a program—left by dancers from Amherst Ballet's production of "Emily of Amherst" on the preceding night are still present.

Restoration of the badly deteriorated and improperly repaired iron fence (see details below) is on the list of the Historical Commission's Community Preservation Act projects for the coming fiscal year.

The throng arrives, via the Gaylord Gate, making its way from the 1730 Knoll (where landscape restoration is in progress) to the post-1870 section of the cemetery, in which the Dickinson plot is located.

Literary scholar, Dickinson aficionado—and Town Meeting Moderator—Harrison Gregg reads Emily's poetry:


The crowd assembles. A guest offers song as well as poetry.

[updated images]

West Cemetery Landscape Restoration: Second Planting

This weekend, just in time for the Emily Dickinson Poetry Walk and close on the heels of Town Meeting's approval of a long list of Historical Commission projects, the second phase of West Cemetery landscape preservation got underway.

The Stockbridge School fraternity, Alpha Tau Gamma (ATG), continued its efforts to bring back a meadow-like environment on the 1730 Knoll, the oldest and most threatened part of the Cemetery. Volunteers planted 120 creeping phlox, two dozen creeping thyme, a dozen rudbeckia, and five lupines.

Volunteers efforts such as these are the spearhead of the restoration process, but do not end there. The new CPA funds that will become available with the start of Fiscal Year 2010 will begin to finance the larger and more ambitious restoration efforts, including tree plantings. ATG will, however, be involved here, as well, contributing labor and maintenance services as appropriate.

In this way, the Historical Commission hopes to maximize the use of resources by drawing upon volunteer donations of materials and labor wherever possible, while turning to public funds and Town staff for implementation of the more ambitious aspects of the plan.

May 15: The Cemetery is Alive on the Anniversary of Emily Dickinson's Death

The spirit of Emily Dickinson seemed tangible in West Cemetery as night waned on the anniversary of her death. Following the very successful premiere of "Emily of Amherst" by Amherst Ballet, members of the company spontaneously decided to pay a nocturnal visit to the poet's grave.

Most had never been to the plot or even the Cemetery before, although a few had begun to acquaint themselves with the site in preparation for the production. Scene 1 of Act Two, "Becoming a Poet," is set there, where her "departed friends" emerge from behind their tombstones. One can easily visit, or just locate virtually, the monuments of Sophia Holland (1828-44) Jennie Grout ?-1851), Abby Haskell (?-1851), and Martha and Ellen Kingman (both ?-1851). The grave of tutor and friend Leonard Humphrey (1824-50) is elsewhere.

A passage recited at the opening of the act suggests how the experience of loss brought Dickinson early on to ponder the fact and symbolism of death and prospects for an afterlife:

I write to Abiah tonight, . . . because I am feeling lonely; some of my friends are gone, and some of my friends are sleeping the churchyard sleep—the hour of evening is sad—it was once my study hour—my master has gone to rest, and the open leaf of the book, and the scholar at school alone, make the tears come, and I cannot brush them away; I would not if I could, for they are the only tribute I can pay the departed [Leonard Humphrey].) You have stood by the grave before; I have walked there sweet summer evenings and read the names on the stones, and wondered who would come and give me the same memorial; but I have never laid my friends there, and forgot that they too must die; . . . To those bereaved so often that home is no more here, and whose communion with friends is only in prayers, there must be much to hope for, but when the unreconciled spirit has nothing left but God, that spirit is lone indeed. I don't think there will be any sunshine, or any singing-birds in the spring that's coming. I shall look for an early grave then, when the grass is growing green.

——to Abiah Root, 1850

For good reason, then, did the "Reader's Guide" to Dickinson's poetry, produced by the NEA and Poetry Foundation for this year's "Big Read" and distributed free to the audience at the ballet, cite the place of immortality as Dickinson's "flood subject."

As the group moved through the cemetery, a simple stroll took on mysterious qualities when the orange haze from the lamps near the Gaylord Gate gave way to increasing darkness and a more restrained, though not somber mood. Near the grave itself, the glow from cell phone screens had to provide most of the light. The dancers investigated the iron fence and monuments and gave Emily the memorial that she craved and doubted. The dancers paid tribute by leaving gifts of flowers—the very bouquets that they had received from friends and family but a short time ago—or striking ballet postures before the family plot.

They also recited Dickinson's letters and poems, chiefly from those used in the ballet, though someone, a parent perhaps, had thought to bring the collected verse, and so the tribute grew. There was a momentary shiver when a fiddler struck up a tune from the opacity somewhere between the 1730 Knoll and the newer section of the cemetery where we stood. In an instant, we relaxed, and he soon came over to join us. A short time later, a group of college women—clearly on their way from a party, but one that had somehow prompted them to want to render their homage to Emily—wandered our way in need of directions, which we gladly supplied.

>

As the gathering closed, someone instinctively reached for the poem that introduced Act Four, "Legacy," on Emily Dickinson's posthumous fate:

The Poets light but Lamps ~

Themselves — go out —

The Wicks they stimulate

If vital Light

Inhere as do the Suns ~

Each Age a Lens

Disseminating their

Circumference —

The reader cried, and she was not alone in doing so.

[updated images]