"Distillation" is apt, if by that Thomas meant the extraction of the essential meaning or most important aspects of the war, for two reasons.
If war is political, its consequences should not surpass the reasons for starting it. WW2 certainly wasn't political for over 7 million Germans or their leader, nor for Japan and over 3 million of the Emperor's subjects. The war for them was an apocalypse. While for a few it was definitely a benefit, for most, it was little short of a catastrophe. It behoves all who are deciding to commence hostilities to think hard about their objectives, and how to terminate the war if the costs begin to outstrip the benefits, lest it cease to be political.
The second reason is that the atom bombings were the nadir of moral certainties. Not every war does so, and it is not to assert that all conduct in WW2 was a war crime, but WW2 saw the erosion of moral certainties on all sides.
It leaves me puzzling, though. Many involved in WW2 were also in WW1, so how did they not learn the lesson? Maybe the answer is in Orwell's thoughts here, in direct contradiction to his disagreement with Vera Brittain the year before, over which Thomas and I argued in an excellent article of his earlier in 2024. Orwell's moral certainty of 1944 that any proposal to limit the means of waging war was “sheer Humbug” changed instantly here a year later to doubting civilisation.
In Thomas' previous piece A Necessary Evil, he noted that Hiroshima wasn't the biggest act of destruction. War can become an act of violence without compromise, unaffected by political and moral considerations or moderation. On the day Japan surrendered, I believe there were no more bombs ready for dropping. Today, many states have the capability to destroy the Earth, and some several times over. That makes no sense, of that I am morally certain. Aren't you?
Thank you for this. There's a detail in here that might make sense of a piece of family history. My once-stepmother's father fought at the Battle of the Bulge. (I now call her "my aunt," because "former stepmother" sounds rather awkward and reveals a bit more family drama than anyone is entitled to know at first introduction.) She once told me that he was present at the liberation of a concentration camp. (I don't recall if she told me which one.) She also said that they had taken a look at what they found, told the German guards to run, and then, he said, "We wasted them." On another occasion, she said that her father had railed against the idea of "war crimes," saying "WAR is a crime!" I'll ask her, but I have a feeling this story may link those memories together.
I remember her father, by the way: I visited Victoria's parents' home at Christmastime every year for years. (In Minnesota, a place where I am reputed never to have set foot because clearly I know nothing about the heartland or normal folk.) He was a lovely man and an utterly devoted father of four girls; the kind of man who could fix *anything,* a typical product of the GI Bill and the postwar upward mobility it produced. He got on like a house on fire with my own grandfather, also a WWII combat veteran: They exchanged WWII stories for hours. But like many men who've seen that kind of combat, he wasn't quite right in the head. Trying to raise four daughters as if fatherhood was just like being a strict drill sergeant -- "If you don't hang up your coat properly when you walk in the door that nest of German machine-gunners will see to it that's the last damned screw-up you make!" -- caused a certain amount of tension in the household. (My father called him "Mad Bob" and made every effort to fall deathly ill with some psychosomatic affliction during the holiday season so to get out of the annual pilgrimage, which is one reason she's my *ex*-stepmother.) Like most veterans of that war (or any war), he told his family very little about what he'd seen, and she knew only what I've mentioned here and a few other unrelated anecdotes. Those were among her few memories. She was the youngest, too, so I doubt he'd have been forthcoming in discussing what he saw, war crimes. or any fallout from them. But it all fits together, doesn't it?
If you know or can find out which division your aunt's father served in, you can determine which camp he and his comrades liberated.
When I was growing up, almost all the men of my father's age were veterans of the Second World War. One of his coworkers, also a good friend, had served in the 26th Infantry Division—the Yankee Division—and was among the soldiers who liberated Gusen, a satellite site of the Mauthausen camp complex in Upper Austria. He never had much to say about that. On the whole, those Greatest Generation veterans observed a code of silence, seldom if ever speaking of the things they'd seen and done. It's much the same with veterans of later generations. My daughter Alex, who served as an MP in Afghanistan, told me a few things that she would never tell her mother or anybody else.
Incidentally, it's no coincidence that some of the best war movies ever made appeared in the early postwar period, and many of the people involved in their production were veterans. An example is "Battleground" (1949), set in Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge. The scriptwriter was Robert Pirosh, an Army veteran who fought in the battle, though not at Bastogne. James Whittmore, who won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his portrayal of Staff Sergeant Kinnie, was a Marine veteran who'd fought in the Battle of Saipan. There were several other veterans among the cast. Such was the case also with "Twelve O'Clock High," based on the novel of the same name. If you've never seen them, they're well worth your time.
I think there were multiple moral certainties, each with powerful reasons behind it: ending the war quickly; unconditional surrender, to prevent a repeat of 1918; the morally and militarily questionable concept of strategic bombing; the horrific, never-to-be-used-again nature of nuclear weapons.
The problem is that many of these moral certainties were in deep conflict with each other.
"Distillation" is apt, if by that Thomas meant the extraction of the essential meaning or most important aspects of the war, for two reasons.
If war is political, its consequences should not surpass the reasons for starting it. WW2 certainly wasn't political for over 7 million Germans or their leader, nor for Japan and over 3 million of the Emperor's subjects. The war for them was an apocalypse. While for a few it was definitely a benefit, for most, it was little short of a catastrophe. It behoves all who are deciding to commence hostilities to think hard about their objectives, and how to terminate the war if the costs begin to outstrip the benefits, lest it cease to be political.
The second reason is that the atom bombings were the nadir of moral certainties. Not every war does so, and it is not to assert that all conduct in WW2 was a war crime, but WW2 saw the erosion of moral certainties on all sides.
It leaves me puzzling, though. Many involved in WW2 were also in WW1, so how did they not learn the lesson? Maybe the answer is in Orwell's thoughts here, in direct contradiction to his disagreement with Vera Brittain the year before, over which Thomas and I argued in an excellent article of his earlier in 2024. Orwell's moral certainty of 1944 that any proposal to limit the means of waging war was “sheer Humbug” changed instantly here a year later to doubting civilisation.
In Thomas' previous piece A Necessary Evil, he noted that Hiroshima wasn't the biggest act of destruction. War can become an act of violence without compromise, unaffected by political and moral considerations or moderation. On the day Japan surrendered, I believe there were no more bombs ready for dropping. Today, many states have the capability to destroy the Earth, and some several times over. That makes no sense, of that I am morally certain. Aren't you?
Thank you for this. There's a detail in here that might make sense of a piece of family history. My once-stepmother's father fought at the Battle of the Bulge. (I now call her "my aunt," because "former stepmother" sounds rather awkward and reveals a bit more family drama than anyone is entitled to know at first introduction.) She once told me that he was present at the liberation of a concentration camp. (I don't recall if she told me which one.) She also said that they had taken a look at what they found, told the German guards to run, and then, he said, "We wasted them." On another occasion, she said that her father had railed against the idea of "war crimes," saying "WAR is a crime!" I'll ask her, but I have a feeling this story may link those memories together.
I remember her father, by the way: I visited Victoria's parents' home at Christmastime every year for years. (In Minnesota, a place where I am reputed never to have set foot because clearly I know nothing about the heartland or normal folk.) He was a lovely man and an utterly devoted father of four girls; the kind of man who could fix *anything,* a typical product of the GI Bill and the postwar upward mobility it produced. He got on like a house on fire with my own grandfather, also a WWII combat veteran: They exchanged WWII stories for hours. But like many men who've seen that kind of combat, he wasn't quite right in the head. Trying to raise four daughters as if fatherhood was just like being a strict drill sergeant -- "If you don't hang up your coat properly when you walk in the door that nest of German machine-gunners will see to it that's the last damned screw-up you make!" -- caused a certain amount of tension in the household. (My father called him "Mad Bob" and made every effort to fall deathly ill with some psychosomatic affliction during the holiday season so to get out of the annual pilgrimage, which is one reason she's my *ex*-stepmother.) Like most veterans of that war (or any war), he told his family very little about what he'd seen, and she knew only what I've mentioned here and a few other unrelated anecdotes. Those were among her few memories. She was the youngest, too, so I doubt he'd have been forthcoming in discussing what he saw, war crimes. or any fallout from them. But it all fits together, doesn't it?
Yes, it does fit together. You might be interested in this from the US Army Center of Military History:
https://history.army.mil/html/bookshelves/resmat/wwii/special-features/VE-day/index.html
If you know or can find out which division your aunt's father served in, you can determine which camp he and his comrades liberated.
When I was growing up, almost all the men of my father's age were veterans of the Second World War. One of his coworkers, also a good friend, had served in the 26th Infantry Division—the Yankee Division—and was among the soldiers who liberated Gusen, a satellite site of the Mauthausen camp complex in Upper Austria. He never had much to say about that. On the whole, those Greatest Generation veterans observed a code of silence, seldom if ever speaking of the things they'd seen and done. It's much the same with veterans of later generations. My daughter Alex, who served as an MP in Afghanistan, told me a few things that she would never tell her mother or anybody else.
Incidentally, it's no coincidence that some of the best war movies ever made appeared in the early postwar period, and many of the people involved in their production were veterans. An example is "Battleground" (1949), set in Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge. The scriptwriter was Robert Pirosh, an Army veteran who fought in the battle, though not at Bastogne. James Whittmore, who won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his portrayal of Staff Sergeant Kinnie, was a Marine veteran who'd fought in the Battle of Saipan. There were several other veterans among the cast. Such was the case also with "Twelve O'Clock High," based on the novel of the same name. If you've never seen them, they're well worth your time.
I think there were multiple moral certainties, each with powerful reasons behind it: ending the war quickly; unconditional surrender, to prevent a repeat of 1918; the morally and militarily questionable concept of strategic bombing; the horrific, never-to-be-used-again nature of nuclear weapons.
The problem is that many of these moral certainties were in deep conflict with each other.
Yes, you’re absolutely right, and all those certainties added up to deep uncertainty…