The lacunae in my old school history books

[Malcolm Pryce]

I wonder if people here have opinions or thoughts on a phenomenon that has intrigued me of late, namely the Great Conjuring Trick played by the ruling elites on the people of the West at the end of the Second World War. Picture the scene. Many men and women in Britain in 1945 knew personally soldiers who had been tortured by the Japanese or suffered dreadful privation at their hands. This inspired a hatred so deep and visceral that I still know people today who haven't forgiven. The Germans were perhaps not so viscerally hated but everyone had seen the Pathe newsreels of the Concentration camps, and, of course, had witnessed the Blitz. Set alongside these two nations were the Russians, the brave Ivans who fought like lions to defeat the Nazi war machine and suffered terrible losses in the process. They were the ones who fought alongside the Allies, shoulder to shoulder. So that was the scenario. And then what happened? Somehow the shadowy cabal told the peoples of the West that the Ivans were now our enemies and our new friends were the Japanese and Germans whose shattered economies it was now our duty to rebuild. How on earth did they pull that off? Didn't anyone express bafflement? It seems to me from this historical vantage point that the trick had been completed by the beginning of the 50s. And no one, as far as I'm aware, ever talks about it. I first became aware of this when reading Fletcher Prouty's account of standing at the dockside in Okinawa in 1945 when a huge consignment of War materiel from the U.S. was being returned as no longer needed. But, according to Prouty, it wasn't being returned to sender, it was being shipped to a place most people hadn't even heard of, Vietnam. The point being that the Cold War was being manufactured even before the Second World War had ended. Anyone have any thoughts on this, or recommendations for further reading? My old school history books are strangely silent on this topic.

[Magda Hassan]

I know what you mean Malcolm. I had a neighbour with whom I would some times chat with when he was in his back yard looking after his greyhounds. He was a WW2 veteran and just couldn't understand after what the Japanese had done why we (Australia) would be trading with them at all let alone big time. In his mind they were still the enemy. He felt all his time spent as a soldier fighting against Japanese agression was wasted. All the deaths in vain.

But most history is always taught out of context. Certainly in those days and in our school system. Historical materialism was not taught in our schools. History was made by kings and great men not by people or classes or economic forces. WW2 is always presented as an event in itself and not as part of a process of various forces at play. The alliance of the west with the USSR was a convenient arrangement just as the alliance of the USSR with Nazi Germany served it purpose for both unlikely partners. It bought time for the USSR and helped with industrialisation and for Germany it helped them re-arm. When Nazi-Germany presented an unacceptable threat to the ruling classes of Europe an alliance with the USSR was acceptable. When Nazi-Germany was militarily defeated for the ruling classes it was back to fighting the real enemy, the working class, and those who present an alternative to their status quo and put ideas into the heads of ordinary people that they can do it for themselves and don't need bosses/kings/elites to rule over them. The western working classes were given the 'Welfare State' to keep them happy for a while and the ruling classes got to keep their heads and the vast majority of their privileges intact. The USSR has been defeated the welfare state is no longer needed and the class war has now moved into a new level of hyper-exploitation. The 'commie threat' of USSR has been defeated new enemy markets need to be invented to justify the oppression hence the 'War on Terrror' and 'War on Drugs' and why uppity leaders who think they can govern their own country and not be a US client state are targetted like Kim Jong Il, Saddam and Bashar and Gaddaffi.

As well as the Welfare State the workers of the west got 'Hire Purchase' to buy the new goods that they could not afford. People who had lived through the capitalist Depression years would only buy what they could afford. They would go with out until they could afford it. That is not good for business. Industry had done very well from the use of factories tooled up for war production and the profits that came with it. That had to continue. So the working classes were put into debt to keep them working. The Marshal Plan and the rebuilding of Japan and Germany was also very profitable business for the west. Much like Halliburton operates like today. It also kept the workers of those countries who kept the economy going and tied to Western interests under control otherwise they may have over thrown their not so great and inglorious leaders. In both countries there were huge socialist movements. In Japan it was violently put down. In Germany the country was divided.

Any works by Marx, Engles and or Lenin (and others but just for starters) on capitalism, the state, imperialism and the superstructure will cover this. It is all entirely predictable and foreseen ages ago. But certainly not taught in our schools and absent from our history books.

[David Guyatt]

I wonder if people here have opinions or thoughts on a phenomenon that has intrigued me of late, namely the Great Conjuring Trick played by the ruling elites on the people of the West at the end of the Second World War. Picture the scene. Many men and women in Britain in 1945 knew personally soldiers who had been tortured by the Japanese or suffered dreadful privation at their hands. This inspired a hatred so deep and visceral that I still know people today who haven't forgiven. The Germans were perhaps not so viscerally hated but everyone had seen the Pathe newsreels of the Concentration camps, and, of course, had witnessed the Blitz. Set alongside these two nations were the Russians, the brave Ivans who fought like lions to defeat the Nazi war machine and suffered terrible losses in the process. They were the ones who fought alongside the Allies, shoulder to shoulder. So that was the scenario. And then what happened? Somehow the shadowy cabal told the peoples of the West that the Ivans were now our enemies and our new friends were the Japanese and Germans whose shattered economies it was now our duty to rebuild. How on earth did they pull that off? Didn't anyone express bafflement? It seems to me from this historical vantage point that the trick had been completed by the beginning of the 50s. And no one, as far as I'm aware, ever talks about it. I first became aware of this when reading Fletcher Prouty's account of standing at the dockside in Okinawa in 1945 when a huge consignment of War materiel from the U.S. was being returned as no longer needed. But, according to Prouty, it wasn't being returned to sender, it was being shipped to a place most people hadn't even heard of, Vietnam. The point being that the Cold War was being manufactured even before the Second World War had ended. Anyone have any thoughts on this, or recommendations for further reading? My old school history books are strangely silent on this topic.

It always intrigued me too. It was a clever sleight of hands and I don't think everyone bought into it. There remained a distrust of Germany for a very long time it seems to me - and even today this remains in the background, to be brought out by the Sunday Mirror whenever Frau Merkel annoys the tabloid mentality types.

On Prouty I seem to remember that the war surplus was divided into two piles, one pile went to Korea and the other to French Indochina. And my distant reading of something Ho Chi Mihn said has remained with me. Back in the 1950's he wrote to the then incumbent President expressing his desire to make Vietnam adopt a democratic system of government along US lines - i.e., a Constitutional style of government. But he feelers were rejected.

My own assumption here is that this rejection was because the US had adopted the recommendations of the War & Peace Studies Group of the Council on Foreign Relations that had set out long term geopolitical and business aims for post WWII. When I last tried checking the entire study was still confidential (that was less than 10 years ago btw). What little is known is contained in Laurence H. Shoup, William Minter (1977) I[URL="http://goodtimesweb.org/overseas-war/0595324266_ImperialBrain.pdf"]mperial Brain Trust: The Council on Foreign Relations and United States Foreign Policy.

[/URL]The Chapter on page 117 of the linked pdf file headed "Shaping a New World Order: The Council's Blueprint for World Hegemony, 1939-1975" and it's ambitions for the so called "GRand Area" speaks absolute volumes.

[Magda Hassan]

And my distant reading of something Ho Chi Mihn said has remained with me. Back in the 1950's he wrote to the then incumbent President expressing his desire to make Vietnam adopt a democratic system of government along US lines - i.e., a Constitutional style of government. But he feelers were rejected.

Yes he had made overtures to the US and they were rejected. Daniel Ortega (Sandanistas in Nicaragua) also did the same thing and was also rejected.

[Jim Hackett II]

I know and knew a few veterans of both so called theaters.
Both locations held "war crime trials" for the unforgivable.

Too few know today that the Imperial Japanese military forces committed crimes against humanity at least and if not more grievous than the 3rd Reich.

The accounting of the 46 - 50 era seems to be able to ignore non-white victims.
Germany at least went through the motions of regret (maybe to get into NATO?)

Japan clings to their presumed superiority over all barbarians. The view they hold even today is that Japan didn't violate any moral restrictions at any time but would castigate the US for using atomic weapons in war.

If I didn't know veterans captured by the Japanese, I would not know for fact that:
1) Many millions of Chinese, Malayans, Burmese and other Asian civilians were killed for sport aside from the Rape of Nanking.
2) They fed ground glass to allied prisoners of war.
3) They forced American POWs to work in condemned mines to die by starvation or by "accident" in the mines.
Worked to death or killed by working conditions as SLAVES saved from death only by service rendered to the kind Emperor Hirohito.

These were materials mines deemed too dangerous to harvest even by the lowest Japanese caste.
Yes they still have those.

Japan to this day refuses to acknowledge they committed crimes in the name of their Emperor. An American preserved Emperor.
Not even in the Sneak Attack on Pearl Harbor killing people that went to sleep in peace.

They are not capable of admitting crimes against humanity, with some notable exceptions, as is Mr. Saburo Ienaga.
The Empire wants us to forgive and forget the past.
Not likely. Neither do I forgive forgetting who won the damn war and at what cost.

Both regimes I cannot forgive.
Moreover when the regime still won't face history proven as The Empire of Japan refuses to do.
Who started the war? And who lost the war?

The 3rd Reich is a little easier to forgive, it DIED.

The monarchy of Japan lives and I'll be damned if I understand what MacArthur thought he was doing in letting the Emperor rule ever.

From that morass of geopolitics after devastation on a global scale the cold war was manufactured.
Consider that in '45 as Prouty reported the man-packs of war materials for Japanese invasion were sent to Korea and Vietnam. Both in Asia?!
The two places chosen to host the next two "brush-fire" wars of the cold war. Logistics is warfare, er successful warfare.
Someone knew before the end of the 2nd war exactly where the next two wars would fall.
Both sides of the geopol game. I bet.
The Cold War was on.
Armies were poised for more devastation all over the globe. A golden opportunity.

But the Elites had to wait - people were war weary and would refuse conscription in '45.

There is a great audio interview with Fletcher Prouty "origins of the cold war" that I think maybe available at Prouty.org for listening.
I highly recommend it. It is on the Collected Works CD that Fletcher did.

[Magda Hassan]

The 3rd Reich is a little easier to forgive, it DIED.

If only that were true.

[Jim Hackett II]

The evidence indicates the Reich lives still albeit a little less obviously.

With a different mustache.
Fearfully I examine: What nation is the current host to the parasite?
Or what nations? The original nurturers, the Elite of Britain and America?
This time the sponsors are more numerous, less caucasian and more global I bet.
(Not to exclude the Elite of the US and Britain in the sponsorship roles).

A more deceptive and savvy 4th Reich.

:flames:
Not Again, not on my watch, not as long as I live free.

[David Guyatt]

The evidence indicates the Reich lives still albeit a little less obviously.

Some of the worse offenders were imported to what was then America - and now Amerika - under Paperclip and other projects. Others escaped to freedom in latin America to work for Amerika in the crushing of the indigenous peoples and in the cold war.

What happened after WWII remains a total disgrace for all those who died fighting nazism and fascism etc. The word betrayal does't even come close.

[Jim Hackett II]

Excerpt from:

THE HIDDEN ROLE OF CONSPIRACY

THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES, 1943-1990

by L. FLETCHER PROUTY, March 1993


"On Sept 14th [1944] I flew Gen. Giles, the Middle East Commander and Gen. R.J. Smith, my ATC Wing Commander to Aleppo in northern Syria. The Generals met with British commanders there and discussed plans for the arrival of that freight train. They told me there was a large, unprepared landing ground north of Aleppo near the Turkish border. The plan was to return on the 15th with enough aircraft to carry all 750 men to Cairo.

I returned to Cairo that evening and ordered the preparation of more than thirty transports. Some were to have doctors and nurses. We left early the next morning and I led the flight to that open field near the Turkish border and the railroad. We landed and waited. Finally the freight train arrived and was stopped by the British. Immediately our POW's leaped from those cars and ran to our planes, except for many who had been injured.

On the return flight to Cairo, I went back and talked with many of the men who had been shot down in air raids on the Ploesti oil fields. Among the group of men on my plane I noticed several who were not Americans. I spoke with some of them. They were Balkans, mostly Rumanians who had been selected by the OSS for this escape from the approaching Russians. They were Nazi intelligence experts.

When we arrived in Cairo, there were a number of buses there for these extra men. We learned from the POW's that they were Nazis and Pro- Nazi Rumanians who had been working on Anti-Soviet intelligence for the Germans. They were recruited by the OSS for future use, after the German surrender, to provide valuable intelligence about the Soviets and the East European regions of the Balkans.

This was astounding. As far as I know this was the first act of its kind, i.e. pro-Nazi and anti-Communist of that period. It was the first step into the Cold War that followed almost immediately after the surrender of the Germans, and while we were still active partners of the Soviets.

We now know that a large number of Nazi intelligence agents were selected from many parts of Germany. Knowledge of these contacts spread to the highest offices of the Nazi government coalescing those who would break with Hitler. This OSS action created an inner circle of "favored" Nazis, and began a new movement within Germany designed to separate the alliance between the British and Americans with the Soviets."

===============END EXCERPT====================================================

Can't say we are not warned.

[Jan Klimkowski]

Excerpt from:

THE HIDDEN ROLE OF CONSPIRACY

THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES, 1943-1990

by L. FLETCHER PROUTY, March 1993

(snip)

When we arrived in Cairo, there were a number of buses there for these extra men. We learned from the POW's that they were Nazis and Pro- Nazi Rumanians who had been working on Anti-Soviet intelligence for the Germans. They were recruited by the OSS for future use, after the German surrender, to provide valuable intelligence about the Soviets and the East European regions of the Balkans.

This was astounding. As far as I know this was the first act of its kind, i.e. pro-Nazi and anti-Communist of that period. It was the first step into the Cold War that followed almost immediately after the surrender of the Germans, and while we were still active partners of the Soviets.

We now know that a large number of Nazi intelligence agents were selected from many parts of Germany. Knowledge of these contacts spread to the highest offices of the Nazi government coalescing those who would break with Hitler. This OSS action created an inner circle of "favored" Nazis, and began a new movement within Germany designed to separate the alliance between the British and Americans with the Soviets."

And so Gehlen Org and Gladio were birthed....