#world wars

[scotianostra]

Remembrance Garden on Princes Street, Edinburgh this afternoon.

[legok9]

Doctor Who + World War Posters

Doctor Who Magazine #320 by Daryl Joyce

The Eleventh Doctor #3.7 by Simon Myers

The Ninth Doctor #1 Pop Culture Paradise by Mariano Laclaustra

[supercomputer-lizard]

I’m just wondering about history recently and I do polls, so have this

[samanthajameswriter]

Riding the Night: Inside The American Ambulance Field Service ( World War I - 1916)

[puchi-the-garlic]

She never looked nice. She looked like art, and art wasn’t supposed to look nice. And she knew that. She wore dark red lipstick the colour of blood, and not just any blood, but period blood. She wore smokey eyes and didn’t bother hiding the dark circles from insomniac nights and had a perfectly winged eyeliner that she had read in sixth grade made you look like a cat and she loved cats though she was, as she begrudgingly admitted to her animal lover friends, afraid to touch them. Her nose was radically different from what the rest of her family had and someone said it made her look like a Greek sculpture. She refuses to wear high heels unless it is a wedding and she loves standing taller than the people who used to look down on her. She practically lives in her well-worn sneakers that she bought with the money from her first salary because the heels prescribed by the boss at work were ergonomically stupid and anyway, she would like to have her spine and muscles intact in old age. She had a small little birthmark right beneath the outer of her left eye, on her high cheekbones that her uncle had told her resembled her country. She has two very slightly crooked front teeth, hardly visible unless you are asked to look at them because though she intended to, she never could bring herself to take the initiative and wear braces because it hurts and she hated things that brought her pain. She always carries a picture of her parents in her purse and a bottle of perfume. She goes to the movies without buying popcorn because she hadn’t been to the theatre for five years once and the first time after, she forgot to buy them and anyway, it’s difficult to hear with the constant chewing. She writes little letters and half-finished stories, pores over ancient texts and is a treasure trove of little facts. She knows all the Greek stories, despises Zeus and the gods and adores mythology, be it Celtic, Indian, Chinese, Norse or Japanese but loves folklores the best. She knows suspiciously too much about Unit 731, Operation Nightingale, the Nazca lines, poison, the history of chocolate, the world wars and Europe after the French Revolution for a medical student but who cares, she’s fascinating. She appears cold but those who have known her for years would tell you that she’s an empath and her fault is caring too much. She speaks bits and pieces of several languages, all influenced by the books and series she’d seen and loved. You could ask her what ‘What’s for dinner?’ was in Thai but she wouldn’t be able to tell you the classes of tones in it. She is a fashionista and abides by the teachings of her father who taught her what fashion really is and made her see how even a small wardrobe is enough to last you years because he never seemed to buy himself something unless his existing clothes were too worn and that was rare because he took extremely good care of his belongings, good enough to still be able to use the same sunglasses he wore during his college days. She is a wonderful cook but rarely cooks her native dishes because she’s a picky eater who thrives on pasta and Chinese and the fish curries her mother makes are still the best things that graced her mouth. She is a mosaic of information and experience. She is everything and nothing, all at once. She is human, and perfection is her flaw. She is art.

[badhistorymemes]

Common WW2 Historian L

[awesomecooperlove]

🔥😡🔥

[writer-of-various]

If the WW2 Crew were in WW1

Nancy: We've come a long long way boys! Now it's time for 'Merica to show its teeth! AFFIX BAYONETS! CHARGE!!!!

Daniels: *charges forward but trips*

Zussman: *catches Daniels*

Pierson: COME ON BOYS! GO GO GO!

Turner: Keep charging! We're almost there!

Stiles: *out of breath* I'm going to die...

Aiello: *pushing Stiles and Daniels forward with Zussman*

[edenthepanman]

A buncha little drawings. Bad quality

[russkiy-blin]

Должен ли я рисовать во время Второй мировой войны? Это застряло у меня в голове на день или два, я действительно не знаю, что делать. Предложите в комментариях. Вы можете ввести: русский, итальянский, румынский и английский

[us-military-official]

79 years ago this month, The US "liberated" the Japanese island of Saipan. I'll describe here why, of many territorial changes during WW2, Saipan most certainly was not "liberated"

[Trigger warnings]: Most any triggers associated with war. Including but not limited to: racism, oppression, US internment camps, suicide, infanticide, truly horrific propaganda, explainations (NOT excuses) for the Imperial Japanese Government and Military's actions throughout the war

Note: I've written the intro and this post has already become excessively long. Please realize it will not be exhaustive, complete, or perfect. I intend primarily to call attention to the US' past mistakes, especially that we have buried the history within our own country. If you feel something is important to add, be it context, corrections, or anything else, I invite you to leave it in the notes. My research and understanding of history is constantly evolving, as everyone's should be, and more information should be accepted but also fact checked.

Final (after writing) Note: You will find some trace humor in this post. Not because the situation is humorous or light, but in fact the opposite. Any joke or humorous organization, or what have you, is because I've been writing this for (checking and doing math) around two hours. I've cried, I've been angry, I AM angry, and I needed to make it emotionally readable and writable. (although I did stop myself from an outright joke or two, to not make light of the situation) There are points where I am utterly unserious around this terribly serious event. I do not handle uninterrupted seriousness well--

-- All comments, information, questions (though perhaps you can research for yourself and com back to comment what you learned!) and yes even opinions and thoughts are welcome in the notes. Hate is not. No one who reads this post will interact with any hate in the notes, and everyone who read will block you. This is not strictly a no-trolls-allowed-zone, but it is a no-troll-food zone. You have been warned, and thank you for reading this already too-long Tumblr post

The Battle of Saipan took place in June and July of 1944. The US army, particularly the air force, wanted the island as a staging point to send bombers on raids to Tokyo

With US victory in the battle impending, the Imperial Japanese leaders redoubled propagandizing to the citizens of the island. Most of these citizens were native to the island and didn't consider themselves "racially" (the term used by the Imperial government) Japanese. Many more were Korean slave laborers deported from territory occupied by the IJA.

This propoganda was largely focused on convincing soldiers and civilians not to surrender. They accused American soldiers of using their (IJA) own terror tactics. Mutilation of the dead, enslavement, and worse.

But as I'm wont to do, I'll be going into the details of the good ol' USofA's role in the mass suicides in Saipan. The Japanese Empire bears enormous blame, and I will not trivialize that. The US also bears enormous blame. Since calling out my country is why I'm here, and because the US' role in Imperial Japan's policies and culture is very unknown in the US, that's my focus

In early 1944- hmm nope we gotta go back further.

In February 1942- wait. fuck. a little further.

in July 1941 the USA- okay I promise this is the last one. deep breath, this is quite a time jump.

In 1919 Japan proposed an amendment to the Treaty of Versailles. It was called the Racial Equality Proposal. It did gain widespread support. Several countries, notably the USA, opposed the proposal and prevented its acceptance.

Japan was the only non-western world power allowed to the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. The Japanese Empire's government sought closer relations with the western powers and integration into their systems.

Details on the proposal, as with most aspects of political history, could be a series of posts in itself. Here are what I consider the most important points and context for my discussion:

Japan was seeking equality among races only of UN-predecesor, the league of Nations, states. This proposal came in 1919, and legal segregation existed in the US until at least 1968. The US, Australia, New Zealand, and Canda had taken or did take steps to inhibit Japanese immigration.

I will note that The Japanese Empire did hold ideas of their own racial superiority over other Asian people and people further abroad as well. Also that one driving force behind the proposal was Japanese suspicion that the predominantly white and western empires of the LoN would use it to exercise control over the Japanese people they themselves considered inferior. The proposal was intended largely to convince opposition within Japan to join the LoN.

-----

In July 1941, the second great war is raging. France has fallen. Less than a month has passed since Hitler broke the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact and invaded the Soviet union. The US population is reluctant to enter another world war (although FDR, for his myriad upon myriad faults, sees that the world must stand together) but is sending enormous amounts of supplies from military to basic necessities to the Allied Powers. The Germany-Japan-Italy axis won't be broken until 1943

Then the US makes what some call a strategic blunder, and others call FDR's 4D chess mastermind gambit to end the war. The truth is somewhere in between, or perhaps on a different scale altogether.

On July 28, 1941 the US freezes all Japanese assets that they hold and cease all oil shipments to Japan, which is using oil to maintain sea lane supplie routes to Indochina, where the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) is taking yet more territory, as well as powering their war planes and armor.

Japan sees the western colonies in Asia as strategic encroachment, as unjust rule by ideas of white racial superiority, and most importantly, a potential source of resources. Food, oil, rubber, slave laborers, comfort (sex slave) women, and on and on.

I cannot go into the strategic ideas of pearl harbor and the invasion of the Philippines and other European Asian colonies in detail here. The overall IJA strategy is thus: delay American reaction, take territory, make retaking it too expensive for the Allies, negotiate peace.

---

February 1942. The US is recovering from the total shock of pearl harbor. Colonies have been lost. Soldiers and non-combatants massacred and worse. The Allies have agreed at 1941's end: none will make seperate peace with any Axis power, and nothing short of unconditional surrender will be accepted.

This month, the US creates internment camps for all Japanese-americans. Citizens, recent immigrants, children, people with power, people with money, people with nothing. Multiracial families are broken apart. The US propagandized these camps as places where Japanese-Americans could live normally without the ability to accrue intelligence or pass it to the Japanese Empire. In reality, they were mass prison camps.

Since then, the US has committed repeated instances of what are now recognized as war crimes against Japan. The US hasn't been much, if any, better to the people in territories it has retaken.

---

The Battle of Saipan begins in June 1944. D-Day has passed, Allied Normandy, France beacheads have become captured harbors and inland positions. Attrition among Japan and Germany's forces point to total defeat without a real change, and the Allies greatly outproduce them in war material. The Japanese Empire, civilian government and armed forces alike, is putting its endgame into practice.

The Imperial Japanese Army (and other branches) is in fact independent from the government, although both are subordinated totally to the emperor.

The endgame? Cost the Allies, America in particular, more lives than domestic support can tolerate. Force a negotiated peace. Fight to the last soldier on every island, on every hill, with every bullet, and with bayonets and rocks when the bullets and shells run out

Unfortunately for the Empire, the US is going to take Saipan. The deep problem here? If news of American soldiers bringing gifts and befriending the people of the island, the mandate to give their lives for the emperor might falter. Why fight to the last when the Americans only seem to want the war to end?

So American soldiers must be portrayed as horrifically as American propogandists portray Japanese people. American soldiers must be killers, monsters, rapists, anything that will keep the people of the island from letting themselves be taken.

Eventually no war supplies remain. So the Empire gives the soldiers, civilians, slaves, and other inhabitants their final order. Die in the name of the emperor. So the population of Saipan, soldiers and non-combatants, committed mass suicide.

Here I will leave another trigger warning. If you do not wish to read graphic details, please skip the next paragraph.

--------

Soldiers on Saipan pulled grenade pins and held them. People threw themselves from cliffs onto the rocks by the thousands. Parents walked into the sea, or jumped with, or threw their children ahead of them. Because surely even this was better than what the American barbarians would do to anyone captured.

This was proven largely false as time went on, but the will of the Japanese people did not break. The will of the Army Staff didn't break after two atomic bombs. They tried to prevent the emperor from surrending, but they failed.

But why did the people of Saipan, not primarily people who called themselves Japanese, believe what they were told? The reasons are many of course, and probably impossible to truly ever completely understand. But I posit the following

America forced Japan's partial surrender with inhuman threats via Admiral Perry's "gunboat diplomacy" in the 1850s, and forced the nation the rejoin the international community that had already treated the nation horrifically.

American policy was that Asian people were inferior to white people.

America invaded other Asian island nations and made them colonies, despite their semi-recent anti-imperialism bent

America participated in bombing to intentionally create murderous firestorms in German and Japanese cities that killed more civilians than both atomic bombs.

America sent pilots on near-suicidal, never before seen raids of Tokyo from carriers at maximum distance to punish Japan for Pearl Harbor. The intention was to burn down the most flammable targets: civilian housing

Germany and the Allies traded war crime for war crime like it was a game of chicken where enemy civilian lives, white civilian lives, superior in importance within America by law, were worth less than nothing.

America classified anyone with a traceable Japanese heritage in the United States as a hostile agent and imprisoned them. Right down to the children and the proud American citizens who happened to be from Japan, or have a great great great grandparent from Japan.

What if you were on Saipan? Would you have said "surely we can trust the Americans? Surely they're here to liberate, to save, to restore peace?"

Would you have said that after a hundred of your friends chose death with and for their families? How about after a thousand?

around 26,000 civilians were on the island before the battle. American soldiers interned around 18,000 after the battle ended.

The US government will still cite justifications for Japanese-american internment, even if it isn't totally unapologetic. Many Americans believe we were the liberators and even the primary or sole heros of the war.

We don't talk about the abhorrent propoganda the US put out about Japanese people, as a race. Terrifyingly similar propoganda to how the Nazis portrayed their enemies, in particular Jewish and Slavic people: untermensch. subhuman.

In the few documentaries I've ever found that mention Saipan, the evil is the Japanese Empire. The government, the armed forces, the emperor.

I've never heard so much as one sentence about the role of the US. the 100 years our country spent boring their racial, their cultural, their religious, their might, their moral superiority into the minds of friend and foe alike.

Not so much as "The people of Saipan, caught between their government's propoganda and American hate"

I've never heard "These people who knew that every Japanese person in America was declared a criminal by default, acted in fear"

I've never heard "The people trapped on the island who wondered if the war crimes that happened on the mainland would happen here. They knew that America answered war crime with war crime, and Japan had committed plenty itself"

So in this anniversary month of the suicides of as many as 8,000 civilians ahead of the approaching American forces, I wanted to share the context that I had to dig for and piece together myself.

I'm aware this is a nigh unreadable post. But if one American skims it and questions what they've been taught, it was worth writing

if one person anywhere reads this and thinks "we should try harder to consider the causes, and effects, and context of our actions" it was worth writing.

I hope you'll take a moment to remember the people who came (and those who come today) to America for a better life only to receive discrimination and then imprisonment. A moment for the people whose government found it all too easy to radicalize them.

And a moment for the eight thousand people who were so afraid of America, and rightfully so, that they chose to die pointlessly lest they become yet more Japanese victims of American hate.

------

and of course: this is a Tumblr post. I have not sited my few barely used sources. I have not covered this one event even, in any real depth. And I certainly haven't covered it without bias. I'm not sure anyone who knows the truth could do that.

so do your own research. don't take me at my word, but go look into the context named here and otherwise. Learn about the history my government hides, and the history yours hides too. Because it's there

and know that the words "Never Forget" and "Never Again" about the Holocaust, the war crimes, and the rampant disregard for humanity are just that, words.

You can't "Never Forget" if you don't know what happened. We can't ensure "Never Again" if we don't understand the causes, the mistakes, and how we avoid them.

[sincerely-sarah]

Stars | Sincerely, Sam

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This is late but in honor of Holocaust Remembrance Day just last week, this is a tribute haiku I wrote for my Holocaust Studies course last spring. It is so important we remember those who lost their lives and never forget the tragedy to see that such a thing may never happen again.

[luanpaixao]

A URSS ganhou a II Guerra Mundial. Sozinha, foi responsável por combater 1/3 das forças nazistas em campo de batalha. O Reino Unido, a França e os EUA só participaram

[hycinthrt]

people are calling what happened today in gaza “the flour massacre”

the flour massacre

these people just wanted to get food for their families, something as basic as flour, one of the things that the very core of humanity is built on, and israel used it as a trap to murder them in cold blood

evil is not enough of a word. there is not a word to describe what they are doing to palestine. they are bleeding her out, they are torturing her and crushing her and hoping that nothing is left to remember her by when they are done. how can anyone stand and watch what is being done with indifference? how can you watch this level of human suffering, this crime against life and feel nothing, do nothing

[drsonnet]

Hind Rajab was a 5 year old girl in Gaza who was killed while she hid alone in a car, along with the paramedics who tried to rescue her. Yesterday students at Columbia seized the administration building and renamed it in her honor.

Gadzooks Bazooka Instagram: gadzooks_bazooka

Remembering #HindRajab & children in #Gaza: This is what the mother of the child, Hind Rajab . https://tmblr.co/ZTeZMyfB_GHeeu00

Update (July, 2024)

UPDATE FROM

@sunnydice: (and please don't forget Layan Hamadeh , her 15 yr old cousin who was trapped with her or Yusuf Zino and Ahmed Al-Madhoun who bravely volunteered to try to save hind and were murdered by the IOF )

DrSonnet — هذا ما قالته والدة الطفلة هند رجب عندما سمعت بخبر... (tumblr.com)

[whereserpentswalk]

The nazis that you see in movies are as much a historical fantasy as vikings with horned helmets and samurai cutting people in half.

The nazis were not some vague evil that wanted to hurt people for the sake of hurting them. They had specific goals which furthered a far right agenda, and they wanted to do harm to very specific groups, (largely slavs, jews, Romani, queer people, communists/leftists, and disabled people.)

The nazis didn't use soldiers in creepy gas masks as their main imagery that they sold to the german people, they used blond haired blue eyed families. Nor did they stand up on podiums saying that would wage an endless and brutal war, they gave speeches about protecting white Christian society from degenerates just like how conservatives do today.

Nazis weren't atheists or pagans. They were deeply Christian and Christianity was part of their ideology just like it is for modern conservatives. They spoke at lengths about defending their Christian nation from godless leftism. The ones who hated the catholic church hated it for protestant reasons. Nazi occultism was fringe within the party and never expected to become mainstream, and those occultists were still Christian, none of them ever claimed to be Satanists or Asatru.

Nazis were also not queer or disabled. They killed those groups, before they had a chance to kill almost anyone else actually. Despite the amount of disabled nazis or queer/queer coded nazis you'll see in movies and on TV, in reality they were very cishet and very able bodied. There was one high ranking nazi early on who was gay and the other nazis killed him for that. Saying the nazis were gay or disabled makes about as much sense as saying they were Jewish.

The nazis weren't mentally ill. As previously mentioned they hated disabled people, and this unquestionably included anyone neurodivergent. When the surviving nazi war criminals were given psychological tests after the war, they were shown to be some of the most neurotypical people out there.

The nazis weren't socialists. Full stop. They hated socialists. They got elected on hating socialists. They killed socialists. Hating all forms of lefitsm was a big part of their ideology, and especially a big part of how they sold themselves.

The nazis were not the supervillians you see on screen, not because they didn't do horrible things in real life, they most certainly did, but because they weren't that vague apolitical evil that exists for white American action heros to fight. They did horrible things because they had a right wing authoritarian political ideology, an ideology that is fundamentally the same as what most of the modern right wing believes.