Earl R. Beck's "Under the Bombs"

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that Earl R. Beck in his book "Under the Bombs: The German Home Front, 1942-1945" claims to be only telling the story of the bombing of German cities by the Allies in WWII without any analysis of the circumstance surrounding this action. The author states that Beck provides examples that much of the bombing was not done over harbors, bridges, factories or rail lines but in the center of the cities, where the most destruction was of private homes and the families that lived in them; Beck shows no consideration for the horrific actions of the Nazi's. The paper concludes that the book was poorly written and the ideas presented problematical; the author feels that Beck has a warped idea of justice and fairness, in peace as well as in war: To paraphrase George Santayana, those who forget history are condemned to repeat it.

From the Paper:

"The reverses in the East made the Nazis more bloodthirsty. This included their own people, who were tried for everything from petty thievery to treason. The idea was to find everyone guilty. It seems there were still eleven guillotines operating in Germany, and the motto for those handling the trials was "liquidate and expropriate" The Nazis' fury at defeat outside their native land had now turned inward, and was aimed at those "defeatists" who did not want to see all the young German men slaughtered. (They obviously feared Russia much more than France or Britain.)"

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