Tuesday, November 14, 1944. The death of Leigh-Mallory.

Sarah Sundin's blog has a bunch of interesting items:

Today in World War II History—November 14, 1939 & 1944: 80 Years Ago: British Air Chief Marshal Sir Trafford Leigh-Mallory dies in plane crash in the Alps. French First Army opens assault toward Belfort Gap in France

Leigh-Mallory was a lawyer by training and had just applied to be a barrister after obtaining his education when the Great War broke out.  He immediately joined the British Army and transferred to the Royal Flying Corps in 1916.  He thought of resuming his legal career after the war, but regarded his chances of having a successful legal career as poor in the post war United Kingdom, so he stayed in the RAF.

He was intensely Christian, although very private, and donated a portion of his salary to charity, something that was not widely known during his life.  In a private writing, he intimated that he'd seen the ghost of  women's right campaigner Emily Langton Massingberd at Gunby Hall in Lincolnshire, a building he subsequently intervened in order to prevent its destruction during the Second World War.

The Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia was founded in Prague, with the sponsorship of Nazi Germany.

Had such an organization existed earlier in the war, and been sincere, it might have achieved something.  Of course, in reality, liberating the Russian people was never something the Germans had in mind. Quite the opposite was the case.

As its first act, it adopted a manifesto, which read:

MANIFESTO

The Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia

Dear compatriots! Brothers and Sisters!

In an hour of difficult trials we must decide the fate of our Motherland, our peoples, our personal fate.

Humanity is undergoing an epoch of tremendous upheavals. The ongoing world war is a deadly fight of opposing political systems.

Fighting are the powers of imperialism headed by the plutocrats of England and the USA, the greatness of which is built upon the persecution and exploitation of other nations and peoples. Fighting are the powers of internationalism headed by the clique of Stalin, dreaming of a world revolution and the destruction of the national independence of other countries and peoples. Fighting are freedom loving nations, thirsting to live their own life, directed by their personal historical and national development.

There is no greater crime than to destroy, as Stalin is doing, countries and suppress peoples, who are trying to preserve the land of their ancestors and with their personal effort create upon it their own happiness. There is no greater crime than to persecute another nation and force one’s will upon it.

The powers of destruction and enslavement are covering their criminal aims with slogans of defense of freedom, democracy, culture, and civilization. Under the defense of freedom they understand the forceful pushing of their political system onto other governments. Under the defense of culture and civilization they understand the destruction of monuments to culture and civilization that were created by the millennial efforts of other peoples.

For what are the peoples of Russia fighting in this war? For what are they condemned to countless sacrifices and sufferings?

Two years ago Stalin could still fool the peoples with words about the patriotic liberational character of the war. But now the Red Army has crossed the state borders of the USSR and has broken into Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Hungary, and is drowning with blood foreign lands. Now the true character of the war dragged on by the Bolsheviks is clear. Its aim – to strengthen even more the lordship of the Stalinist tyranny over the peoples of the USSR, to establish this lordship throughout the entire world.

The peoples of Russia have for over a quarter of a century experienced upon themselves the weight of the Bolshevik tyranny.

In the revolution of 1917, the peoples that inhabited the Russian empire tried to seek a realization of their desires for fairness, general well-being, and national freedom. They rebelled against the outlived tsarist government, which did not want to nor was capable of destroying the reasons that created social unfairness, the remnants of serfdom, economic and cultural backwardness. But the party and leaders, who did not decide upon the brave and effective reforms after the overthrow of tsarism by the peoples of Russia in February of 1917, with their two faced politics, conciliatory attitude, and lack of desire to take upon themselves responsibility for the future – did not justify itself before the people. The people naturally went behind those who promised them an immediate peace, land, freedom, and bread, who put out the most radical slogans.

The people are not guilty for the fact that the party of Bolsheviks, having promised to establish public order, under which the people would be happy and in who’s name were brought countless victims – that this party, having taken power, by the people’s hands, not only did not fulfill the demands of the people but eventually strengthening its apparatus of power took from the people their fought for rights, placed them into constant neediness, lack of rule, and the most irresponsible exploitation.

The Bolsheviks took from the peoples of Russia their right for national independence, development, and originality.

The Bolsheviks took from the people the freedom of speech, freedom of conviction, freedom of privacy, freedom to choose one’s place of residence and freedom of movement, freedom of planning and opportunity for each person to take their place in society in relation to their abilities. They substituted these rights with terror, party privileges and arbitrariness, committed against the person.

The Bolsheviks took from the farmers the land they fought for, the right to freely labor on land and freely use the fruits of their labor. Having cuffed the farmers with their kolhoz organization, the Bolsheviks turned them into servants of the government without rights, more exploited and repressed.

The Bolsheviks took from the workers their right to freely choose a profession and place of work, to organize and fight for better conditions and compensation for their labor, to influence production and made workers into slaves of government capitalism without rights.

The Bolsheviks took away from the intelligencia the right to freely create for the benefit of the people and tried to use force, terror, and bribery to make it a weapon of their lying propaganda.

The Bolsheviks condemned the people of our motherland to constant poverty, hunger, and dying out, to a spiritual and physical enslavement and, finally, forced them into a war for alien interests.

All of this is masked by lies about the democracy of the Stalin constitution, about the construction of a socialist society. Not one country in the world did not know and does not know such a low living standard in the face of such large material resources, such lawlessness and denigration of the person, as this was and remains in the Bolshevik system.

The peoples of Russia disbelieved Bolshevism, in the face of which the government is an all consuming machine, while the people – its rights deprived, destitute, and overall deprived slave. They see the serious danger that is hanging over them. If Bolshevism could at least temporarily establish itself on the blood and bones of the peoples of Europe, the many year battle of the peoples of Russia that cost countless sacrifices would be fruitless. Bolshevism would use the exhaustion of peoples in this war and finally deprive them of the capability to resist. Therefore the efforts of all peoples should be directed at the destruction of the monstrous machine of Bolshevism and on the offering of rights to every person to live and create freely, in scope of their strength and capabilities, for the establishment of order, defending a person from arbitrary rule and not permitting the theft of the results of one’s labor by anyone, including the government.

COMING FROM THIS, THE REPRESENTATIVES OF THE PEOPLES OF RUSSIA, IN FULL UNDERSTANDING OF THEIR RESPONSIBILITY BEFORE THEIR PEOPLES, BEFORE HISTORY AND ANCESTRY, WITH THE AIM OF ORGANIZING THEIR GENERAL BATTLE AGAINST BOLSHEVISM: CREATED THE COMMITTEE FOR THE LIBERATION OF THE PEOPLES OF RUSSIA.

The aims of the Committee of Liberation of the Peoples of Russia are:

a. The overthrow of Stalin's tyranny, the liberation of the peoples of Russia from the Bolshevik system, and the restitution of those rights to the peoples of Russia which they fought for and won in the people's revolution of 1917

b. Discontinuation of the war and an honorable peace with Germany

c. Creation of a new free people's political system without Bolsheviks and exploiters

As the basis for a new government for the peoples of Russia the committee places the following major principles:

1) The equality of all peoples of Russia and a real right for national development, self determination, self rule, and governmental independence.

2) The confirmation of a popular worker front, before which the interests of the government are subordinate to the goals of raising the well-being and development of the nation.

3) The preservation of peace and the establishment of peaceful relations with all nations of the world, an all round development of international collaboration.

4) Wide ranging government actions for the strengthening of the family and marriage. A true equality for women.

5) The liquidation of forced labor and the granting to the laborers a real right to free labor which creates their material well-being, the confirmation of a wage for all types of labor in an amount that can support an appropriate standard of living.

6) The liquidation of collective farms, the free return of land to the private ownership of farmers. The freedom to determine labor land usage. The freedom to use the products of one’s personal labor, the abolishment of forced requisitions, and the cancellation of all debts to the Soviet government.

7) The establishment of protected private labor ownership. The reestablishment of trade, crafts, domestic industry, the granting of the right of private initiative and an opportunity for it to participate in the economic life of the nation.

8) Granting the intelligencia the opportunity to freely create for the well-being of their people.

9) Granting social justice and defense of laborers from any exploitation, regardless of their origin and former activities.

10) The creation for all without exception the real right for free education, medical care, vacation, and senior welfare.

11) The destruction of the regime of terror and force. Liquidation of forceful repopulations and mass exiles. The establishment of a true freedom of religion, conscience, speech, assembly, press. A guarantee of the protection of person, property, and home. The equality of all before the law, the independence and clarity of the court.

12) The liberation of political opponents of Bolshevism and the return to the motherland from the jails and camps of all who were repressed for their battle against Bolshevism. No revenge and persecution for those who stop their battle for Stalin and Bolshevism, regardless of whether this was done by necessity or by conviction.

13) The reestablishment of national property ruined during the war – cities, villages, factories, and plants at cost to the government.

14) Government support of invalids of the war and their families.

The destruction of Bolshevism is the uncompromised aim of all progressive powers. The Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia is certain that the united efforts of the peoples of Russia will find support amidst all free loving peoples of the world.

The Liberation Movement of the Peoples of Russia is a continuation of a many years long battle against Bolshevism, for freedom, peace, and fairness. The successful completion of this battle is now provided for by:

a) The accumulation of greater experience than during that of the revolution of 1917.

b) The accumulation of growing and organized military forces – the Russian Liberation Army, the Ukrainian Liberation Forces, Cossack forces and national detachments

c) The accumulation of anti-Bolshevik armed forces in the Soviet rear.

d) The accumulation of growing oppositional powers within the people, government apparatus, and army of the USSR.

The Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia sees the main condition for victory over Bolshevism in the UNITY OF ALL NATIONAL FORCES AND SUBORDINATION TO THE COMMON TASK OF OVERTHROWING THE BOLSHEVIK POWER. This is why the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia supports all revolutionary and anti-Stalin, anti-Bolshevik opposition while at the same time decisively rejecting all reactionary projects that are tied to the suppression of the people’s rights.

The Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia welcomes the assistance of Germany on those conditions that do not affect the honor and independence of our motherland. This help is currently the only realistic opportunity to organize an armed struggle against the Stalinist clique.

With our battle we have taken upon ourselves the responsibility for the fate of the peoples of Russia. With us are millions of the best sons of our motherland, having taken up arms and already having shown their courage and readiness to give their life in the name of liberating our motherland from Bolshevism. With us are millions of people who left from Bolshevism and are giving their efforts to the common cause of battle. With us are tens of millions of brothers and sisters, suffering under the oppression of the Stalinist tyranny and awaiting the hour of liberation.

Officers and soldiers of the Liberation forces! With the blood spilt in our joint struggle, our battle friendship with warriors of different nationalities has been strengthened. We have a common cause. We must also have a common effort. ONLY THE UNITY OF ALL ARMED ANTI-BOLSHEVIK FORCES OF THE PEOPLES OF RUSSIA WILL LEAD TO VICTORY. Do not drop from your hands the arms you have received, fight for unity, selflessly fight with the enemies of the people – Bolshevism and its associates. Remember, you are being expected by the tortured peoples of Russia. Liberate them!

Compatriots, brothers and sisters who are located in Europe! Your return to the motherland as citizens with full rights can only be possible with the victory over Bolshevism. You are in the millions. Upon you hinges the success of battle. Remember, that you are working for a common cause, for the heroic liberation forces. Multiply your efforts and your feats of labor!

Officers and soldiers of the Red Army! Cease the criminal war that is aimed at the oppression of the peoples of Europe. Turn your weapons against the Bolshevik usurpers who have enslaved the peoples of Russia and condemned them to hunger, suffering, and lawlessness.

Brothers and sisters in the motherland! Strengthen your battle against the Stalinist tyranny, against the occupational war. Organize your powers for a decisive fight for your rights that have been taken away, for fairness and well-being.

The Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia calls you all to unity and to a battle for peace and freedom!

PRAGUE, NOVEMBER 14, 1944

The chairman of the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia

General Lieutenant A. Vlasov

The committee never encompassed all of the Russian groups then aligned with the Germans, and was iself oddly mixed, with some members being Communists.  Andrey Vlasov was the movements head, and was not trusted by the Germans, for good reason.  Late in the war, the armed expression of the movement would switch sides and fight against the Germans at Prague.

Vlasov, like Stalin, had started off as a Russian Orthodox seminary student but dropped out of that pursuit after the Russian Revolution and joined the Reds during the Russian Civil War.  He became a Communist in 1930 and was a Soviet military advisor to Chiang Kai-shek.  He was captured by the Germans in 1942 and was recruited to the anti Soviet side.  His opposition to Stalin's rule was sincere.  He was executed by the Soviets in 1946.

Norway's government in exile in the UK announced that Norwegian troops were operating alongside of Soviet troops in the country's far north.

92,000 Ahiska Turks were forcefully deported from the Meskheti region of Georgia by the Soviet Union.

German resistance members Walter Cramer, Bernhard Letterhaus and Ferdinand von Lüninck were hanged at Plötzensee Prison in Berlin.

The Aktsu Maru was sunk by the USS Queenfish.

Last edition:

Monday, November 13, 1944. Air service returns to London.

Labels: 1930s, 1939, 1940s, 1944, Aircraft, Army, Bill Mauldin, Bulgaria, Bulgarian Army, Cartoons, France, Imperial Japanese Navy, Transportation, U.S. Navy

Sunday, November 12, 1944. Carving off part of China, Tirpitz sunk, Hitler takes time to release a long Beer Hall message, Dog Faces in chow line.

Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, Uzbeks, Tatars, and some White Russians rally in Ghulja declared the independence as the Second East Turkistan Republic within the northern borders of China, which would be a Soviet vassel, making the White participation rather odd.

The republic would last until 1946/49 and found itself at war with the Republic of China the entire time.

The Royal Air Force sank the Tirpitz near Tromsø.

Hitler released a long message to members of the Nazi Party on the more or less anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch.

National Socialists! Party Comrades!

The requirements for waging total war have compelled me to postpone the commemoration from November 9 to the next available Sunday. Likewise, work at the headquarters does not allow me to leave it even for a few days at this time. Besides, I regard it less as my task today to give speeches than to prepare and implement those measures that are necessary to force our way through this fight. After all, as in the time of crisis in the year 1923, I am today moved by only one dominating thought: now really to risk everything for the necessary success! And just as the dead comrades were rightly told ten years later that the victory was theirs in the end, so the victory must and will belong in the end to the fighting front and the no less heroically fighting homeland in the great struggle of to be or not to be.

In the past, I repeatedly pointed out that it is necessary for a nation to appreciate and honor its great men. Especially in grave times, a despairing nation can gather courage and strength for the present from its behavior in the past. How much more does this apply to a nation that behaves as boundlessly bravely as the German one! It will be able to learn the only correct lesson for the present from the struggle of its great men, namely, that Providence in the end helps only him who does not despair and takes up the struggle against the adversities of the time and, therefore, in the end decides his own destiny.

Insofar as the Almighty opened our eyes in order to grant us insight into the laws of His rule, in accordance with the limited capabilities of us human beings, we recognize the incorruptible justice which gives life as a final reward only to those who are willing and ready to give a life for a life. Whether man agrees to or rejects this harsh law makes absolutely no difference. Man cannot change it; whoever tries to withdraw from this struggle for life does not erase the law but only the basis of his own existence.

As the National Socialist movement began its struggle to win over the German human beings, every insightful person realized the impending internal collapse of the Volk and nation. The inevitable consequence of this was an increasing threat to our national existence, a slow decline in our birthrates, together with a slow national death many times the number of the dead of the World War. After all, this corresponded to the objective of our enemies. By economic strangulation of the Reich, they intended to destroy the basis for the material existence of the German nation. Thereby, they hoped to realize Clemenceau’s demand for the reduction of the German Volk by twenty million people. The struggle of the years 1914 through 1918 cost two million people their lives, but there were twenty million that had to be taken out of our Volk according to the wishes of the democratic benefactors of mankind. Today, this demand has gone up to forty million. However, since it is not up to people themselves to stop backward movements in the life of a nation whenever there is a need for it, nobody could say when this process of shrinking the substance of our Volk would come to an end. In the same matter, another natural realization forces itself on us: the world does not know any empty spaces! Nations which are numerically or biologically too weak and no longer able satisfactorily to fill their Lebensraum will in the most favorable scenario be put on a reservation that corresponds to their value and size. Other life will flow into the now empty spaces. In accordance with Providence’s law, other nations-and, regrettably, often primitive races-will then take up the fight for existence in an area that an aging nation has lost due to cowardice and weakness, that is, unfitness for life. So, in the year 1919, we faced the realization that only a reform of our Volk from head to foot would in the long run enable it to resume successfully this struggle for existence. Only a complete turning away from the phraseology of the democratic corruption of nations and the Bolshevik destruction of nations could return to our Volk its natural vitality and thus secure the conditions for a successful defense of life in the future.

According to this realization, the National Socialist movement entered the fight. Confronted with these great objectives, the proletarian as well as the bourgeois state of classes had to pale in insignificance. What still appears as the ideal to the existing classes had, in the eyes of the young movement, already proven to be insanity, a deadly poison for our Volk. The intention to erect, for the first time in our history, a Volksstaat encompassing all Germans could be realized only by the mobilization of the entire strength of the nation. By so doing, the synthesis between nationalist and socialist ideas was best able to produce that strength necessary as a prerequisite for such a fight. The proclamation of the young nationalist and socialist Volksstaat immediately elicited the hatred of all those opponents at home and abroad who had represented the earlier system of Germany’s fragmentation and impotence: the parties, small parties, groups, ranks, professions, organizations, classes, and finally creeds as the main beneficiaries of the inner-German divisions, and abroad, the democratic-Marxist world hostile to us as the main party interested in Germany’s impotence. The hatred of this conspiracy of our enemies at home and abroad has since then loyally followed the movement throughout the years of fighting, before and after the seizure of power. It has persecuted us with the refinement and brutality of which that system was capable at the time. Since the march on the Feldherrnhalle, thousands of murdered National Socialists and tens of thousands of wounded have become the victims of this only true aggression.

Since the day of the seizure of power, the old enemies all the more refused to change. Instead, their hatred increased. At the most, they adapted their methods to the new situation. As the ultimate inspiring and driving force, Jewry has not allowed any opportunity to pass since the year 1933, as at the time of the struggle for power, in order to express its satanic will to persecute and destroy this new concept of a state as such and its young state. It regarded them as the first dawn of a general realization of its destructive work against the nations and as an eminent danger. Perhaps times have changed, but the essence of the fight forced on us has remained the same. What has remained is, first, our own objective: the preservation of our Volk and the securing of its future by all means; and, second, the objective of our enemies: the annihilation of our Volk, its extermination, and the ending of its existence.

That this was not nor is it now a slogan of National Socialist propaganda was proved by the fact of Germany’s decline at home and, today, is proved by the proclamations of our enemies. No National Socialist propaganda minister could put the objectives of our enemies more plainly than the Jewish press has done for decades and does so in particular today. Beyond this, the enemy statesmen above all do this publicly through their ministers. The objective of our enemies has likewise remained the same. Promoted by the democracies, Bolshevism at one time tried to destroy our movement by terror at home.

Supported by the democracies, the Soviet Union strives to destroy the Reich and exterminate our Volk. That the bourgeois world, which at the time consciously or unconsciously acted as the accomplice of Bolshevism at home, was struck with blindness by God and headed for its own downfall does not change its behavior. The fact that today’s democracies would be dead with the victory of Bolshevism, which would smash the democratic states with all their ideas against a wall, does not change the reality of their present procedure. You can explain the incomprehensible absurdity of their actions at the moment you realize that the Jew is always behind the stupidity and weakness of man, his lack of character on the one hand, and his deficiencies on the other. The Jew is the wire-puller in the democracies, as well as the creator and driving force of the Bolshevik international beast of the world (Weltbestie).

Even before National Socialism, many at home already had an idea of this danger. However, an effective fight against it only began after this anemic insight became a confession of flesh and blood, which found an organization of combat strength in the National Socialist Party. An understanding of the necessity of rescuing Europe from the Bolshevik monster today also exists on the part of numerous foreign statesmen, parliamentarians, party politicians, and economists. This understanding will only lead to a practical result if a strong European power manages [to succeed], beyond these theoretical hopes, in successfully organizing and fighting through this common struggle of life and death of all. Only the National Socialist German Reich can and will do this.

Almost always, Europe consisted of a multitude of competing nations and states. In spite of this, Europe most of the time meant just one state or a community of related nations. There was certainly a great advantage in the eternal conflict among the European nations. Like any competition, it challenged the fitness and striking power of the individual nations. However, in times of fateful struggle of life and death for all, there was the great danger of a dissipation of the forces of this continent confronted with the impending attack of the Central Asian east, this eternally latent danger to Europe. In long periods of European history, the thesis of the European balance of power was all too often regarded by the obtuse west as a licence for allying itself with the impending danger, contrary to the commandment of European solidarity, in order more easily to strangle one unpleasant competitor or another. For centuries, the old Reich was forced to wage its fight against Mongols and Turks alone, or with a few allies, in order to spare Europe a fate whose consequences would have been as unthinkable as realizing a Bolshevization would be today.

Even though this struggle in the past centuries was accompanied by many setbacks and demanded the greatest sacrifices of our Volk, it led to success in the end. It alone made possible the development and existence, as well as the prosperity, of the European family of nations. Besides, in confrontations of world-historical impact, it is not likely that the outcome of the fight should be decided in months or years, but rather over long periods, with perseverance. In these periods, divine Providence has men line up to try them for what they are worth. It thereby decides whether they deserve life or death. That our National Socialist state will today pass this historic trial is already guaranteed by the stand of our movement up to now. Which bourgeois party would have been able to survive the collapse of November 9, 1923? Which party would have been capable, following such a complete collapse, of reaching a total victory by an unprecedentedly hard fight? Even though this fight may today appear to the superficial observer to have been minimal compared with the present events, this only reveals his failure to understand decisive values. After all, the struggle for the movement at the time was just as much a fight for Germany as the fight of the present Reich is today. It was a fight for our Volk and its future, which had first to be decided at home before it could face our foreign enemies’ will to exterminate us. How hopeless the fight of the party appeared to our adversaries was revealed by their statements that, following November 9, 1923, National Socialism could be regarded as dead and, herewith, the danger for the enemies of our Volk as eliminated. In spite of this, only a few years later, this party, which was thought to have been eliminated at the time, stood in the midst of the decisive struggle for power. For nearly a decade, it waged this fight by the reckless deployment of numerous men and women, suffered only passing setbacks, and brought it to a victorious conclusion in the end. During this time, the movement developed its mental attitude. It has proved that it is today capable of leading the nation and having the Reich lead Europe. And just as we witnessed at the time that the whole world of the bourgeois democratic party, corrupted by its compromises and cowardly renunciations, slowly began to fall apart on its own, and then finally to die, we today observe the same drama on a large scale.

Nations and, above all, their statesmen, generals, and soldiers always find it easy to tolerate days of happiness and visible successes. What is remarkable about the great men of world history, as well as nations destined for great things, is their steadfastness in days of trouble, their confidence at times when their situation appears hopeless, their defiance and courage when they suffer setbacks. As National Socialists, we were always happy about the short or long periods of prosecution in our fight, because they rid the party of all that light ballast: fellow travelers who surely would have boasted the loudest on the day of victory. Likewise, in this mightiest struggle of nations of all time, we see those elements desert us that are cowardly and unfit for life. That monarchs lose their courage, in complete ignorance of their position, which today can only be regarded as prehistoric, and that they thereby become traitors is the result of their mental and moral incapacity produced by centuries of inbreeding. At such times, nations need leaders different from these dynasties that have become ill and morbid. That even so-called statesmen and generals are deluded by the view that such a confrontation of life and death, and its impact on world history, can be decided in their favor by cowardly capitulation likewise only proves the experience of the ages that not too many great men live at the same time. Wherever such a capitulation took place, or was considered, or may be considered today, the result will not be a cheap slipping away from this crisis with its impact on world history, but the inevitable and certain extermination of the nations in question and the annihilation of its leading men.

After all, a first consequence of this will be Bolshevik chaos and civil war in the interior of these states. Second, there will be an extradition of the so-called war criminals, in other words, first the most valuable men, then endless columns of men who will set out for the Siberian tundra to fade away, all a result of the weakness of the leaders of their states. Even though from the beginning the consequences of these betrayals have, from a military point of view, been very grave for Germany as the bearer of the main burden in this war, they have not succeeded, neither in unbending the structure of the Reich nor in eliminating its spirit of resistance. On the contrary, the nation hardened in its willingness to fight and became all the more fanatical.

We are happy that in a number of the nations which have shown signs of decay a number of elements of resistance could be found: in Italy, they gather around the creator of the new state, the Duce Benito Mussolini; in Hungary, around Szalasi; in Slovakia, around the leadership of state president Tiso; in Croatia, around the Poglavnik Ante Pavelich. All these men are the leaders of young nations.

We know that committees and governments were likewise formed by other nations that have decided not to recognize the capitulation and not to accept the extermination of nations simply because a few spineless weaklings failed their honor and sense of duty, or because some blockheads allowed themselves to be deluded by opportunities in which they themselves no longer believe today. From the first day, our greatest ally, Japan, recognized this fight for what it is: a decisive confrontation of life and death. From this day on, it waged it with the bravery of a true nation of heroes.

My party comrades! Volksgenossen! Since the breakthrough of the Russians at the Romanian Don front in November 1942, since the ensuing complete disintegration of the Italian and Hungarian units with all its terrible consequences for our waging of the war, betrayal after betrayal hit our Volk hard. In spite of this, the hopes of our enemies were not realized. Again and again, we managed to cushion our fronts and halt the enemies. Only one hope remained for them: the stab in the back. As always when they are otherwise unable to succeed against Germany, they try to bring about a decision by stabbing us in the back from the inside. Spineless creatures, a mixture of feudal arrogance, bourgeois deficiency, and former parliamentary corruption came together-in the hope that they would immediately receive a reward for this act of perjury (Meineidstat)-in order to cut the German resistance off at its root.

They were right in one respect: as long as I live, Germany will not submit to the fate of the European states swept away by Bolshevism; as long as I have not breathed my last breath, my body and soul will serve only one goal: to make my Volk strong in the defense, for the attack on the deadly danger threatening it.

While wars used to be fought out of dynastic or economic interests, the war we are fighting today is a fight for the preservation of our Volk itself.

Therefore, all the sacrifices in this war will lead, as a logical consequence, to the strengthening of the German Volksstaat. If some outdated individuals are offended by this, I cannot help them. The Volksstaat will pass over them and resume its agenda. If individual subjects of outdated parties, classes, or other splinters in our Volk think that the time has come for their resurrection, they will face their total extermination at exactly this moment. The day after the seizure of power, National Socialism, which was the victim of bloody persecution before, treated its political opponents not only in a conciliatory manner, but generously. Countless men who once persecuted me received pensions from me in this state, or were appointed to new and higher offices: the justice minister of a land where I spent thirteen months locked up in a fortress was nonetheless appointed German Reich minister of justice by me. Prussian ministers and Reich ministers who earlier were our cruelest persecutors received from me high pensions of charity although I was not obliged to do so.

I felt that it was beneath me to subject Social Democrats to hardship, just because they had opposed me as ministers. Judges who had sentenced us were not hindered in their careers because of this and often were even promoted.

Only those who threw down the gauntlet to the new state in word and deed were treated by it according to the law. Through the manner in which I took over power, I have moreover made it easy for every German, especially every state official and officer, to do his duty without throwing them into an inner conflict. For over a year and a half, the departed Reich president was my superior and was accordingly treated by me with admiration and great respect.

Whoever now believes that he can throw others into inner conflicts, without ever having been forced into one by me, should know that this means his end is dead certain. As long as these people only persecuted me, I was able to magnanimously ignore and forget about this persecution. Today, however, whoever raises the sword or bomb against Germany will be ruthlessly and mercilessly annihilated. A few hours sufficed in order to suffocate the attempted putsch of July 20. It took only a few months to round up and completely eliminate this coterie of dishonorable Catilinarian characters.

Just as I took the occasion to cleanse the movement in the year 1934, after the revolt of a small group within, this new revolt likewise started a thorough overhaul of the entire state apparatus. The time for compromises and reservations is over for good. These days the Reich war flag becomes the regimental flag of the German Wehrmacht, as a symbol of the National Socialist idea of revolution and state. The German salute is now in use in the Wehrmacht. The Volk grenadier division and the German youth will help the National Socialist world of thought achieve a completely victorious breakthrough. What most profoundly moved and rejoiced me after the events of July 20 was the realization that the army, the navy, and the Luftwaffe as a whole-the Waffen SS need not be considered here-had already adopted the National Socialist spirit, even though this was regrettably not outwardly visible before, so that hardly anything remained to be done other than to expel the unworthy from party, state, and Wehrmacht in order to bring about a complete agreement of opinions and will in party, Volk, state, and Wehrmacht.

In spite of this, the consequences of this day were bitter. In a fit of hope, our enemies gathered their entire strength, filled with the belief that shortly they would be able to overrun Germany. That they have not succeeded in this, I owe to the brave behavior of the Wehrmacht and, above all, the brave behavior of the German homeland, which is most worthy of praise. The response to the appeal for the expansion of the Reich’s defense and the Volkssturm was only a symbol of the increasingly evidenced German Volksgemeinschaft in this fateful struggle for the future of the nation. Thus, next to the old grenadiers of the army, the soldiers of the navy and Luftwaffe, the soldiers of the homeland step up in complete equality of rank; not only its men, old men, and boys, but also its women and girls. As I consider the total sum of all the unspeakable sacrifices that our Volk makes today, all the suffering that the millions in our cities must bear, the sweat of our men and women laborers, and our people in the countryside, I would like to ask the criminals of July 20 only one question: with what right can you demand these sacrifices if you do not have the sacred resolve, before your conscience, to strengthen the Volksstaat at the end of this fight, develop it ever the more, so that this greatest epoch of our Volk culminates in the birth of a Reich that not only encompasses all Germans at the outside but also makes them happy at home? By fighting for the National Socialist German Volksstaat, I give the only possible moral and ethical meaning to this greatest struggle in our history.

Whoever thinks of the interests only of his class at such an hour, acts not only as a criminal but also as an insane egotist. He must be insane because it takes incredible narrow-mindedness to imagine that you can rally a nation for a fight of life and death for over half a decade on behalf of a medieval feudal state.

My party comrades! As the year 1923 ended I wrote Mein Kampf in prison.

I incessantly had in mind the realization of the National Socialist Volksstaat.

For years after the seizure of power, we fought for this idea and worked for it.

Rage and envy filled our enemies in view of the accomplishments in all areas of our economic and social life, the increasing culture and satisfaction of our classes. If so-called social plans for the future are today published in other countries, then this is only a pale imitation of what National Socialist Germany has already achieved. So today I can only again pledge the continuation of this work. As an old National Socialist, I will not waver in this fight for one second in the fulfillment of the duties incumbent upon me. I did not choose this duty.

Providence imposes it on every German: to do everything and not to neglect anything that can secure the future of our Volk and make its existence possible.

We will respond to the most severe blows of fortune with a defiant fury, incessantly filled with the conviction that Providence often loves only those whom it chastises; and that it tries human beings and must try them in order to arrive at a just appraisal of their value. I have the unshakable will to set posterity a no less praiseworthy example in this fight than the great Germans did ages ago.

My own life does not play a role in this, which means that I will not spare my health or my life in any manner in the fulfillment of this duty conferred to me as the first German. If, at this time, I speak little and not very often to you, my party comrades and the German Volk, then I do this because I work; I work to fulfill the tasks with which time has burdened me and which must be fulfilled in order to bring about a turn of events. After all, since I have this will and see the loyal following of the German Volk, I do not doubt for a minute that, in the end, we will successfully survive this time of trial and that the hour will come when the Almighty again grants us His blessings as before. At the time, we gained the greatest victories in world history but did not become arrogant. At a time of setbacks, we will never bend and will thereby reaffirm in a positive sense the portrayal of the character of the present German Volk for posterity. I therefore believe with imperturbable confidence that, through our work and sacrifice, the moment will one day come when our efforts will finally be crowned by success. The goal of our struggle is no different from what we fought for in the year 1923, and for which the first sixteen martyrs of our movement died: our Volk’s rescue from misery and danger, the securing of life for our children, grandchildren, and distant generations! In the shadow of our nation, a Europe marches which feels that not only Germany’s fate is being decided today but also the future of all nations that count themselves part of Europe and are consciously disgusted by Bolshevik barbarism. So I greet you from afar, my old party comrades, through the person who will speak this confession of my faith, in dogged determination, with my old unbending fighting morale and my unshakable confidence. On this occasion, I again thank the fighters of twenty-five years ago, who also have set us an example for the future of our Volk and the Greater German Reich!

It would be his last such address.  He'd be dead by the next anniversary.

U.S. infantry in France.

Last edition

Saturday, November 11, 1944. Ghastly Japanese losses at Ormoc Bay.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Battle of Ormoc Bay, boats and ships, Clothing, Croatia, German Army, Greece, Imperial Japanese Navy, Iwo Jima, Labor unrest, Music, Red Army, U.S. Navy, Unions, Yugoslav Partisans, Yugoslavia

Thursday, November 9, 1944. Sorge meets his end.

The Japanese hanged Soviet master spy Richard Sorge, one of the most effective, if perhaps ignored, spies of all time.

Sorge's passport in Japan, noting his cover as a journalist.

The 3d Army crossed the Moselle near Metz.

The 8th Army captured Forli.

The Japanese landed 2,000 reinforcements on Leyte.

Last edition:

Wednesday, November 8, 1944. Mystery of explosions resolved. Canadians prevail on the Scheldt.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Army, Battle of Metz, Battle of the Scheldt, boats and ships, Canadian Army, Imperial Japanese Navy, Operation Infatuate, Rocketry, Tracked vehicles, U.S. Navy, Weapons, World War Two

Friday, November 7, 1924. A balanced budget.

The Weimar Republic announced the first balanced German budget since the end of World War One.

The Soviet Union produced its first domestically manufactured motor vehicle, the AMO-15 truck.

The Alvarado Hot Springs was created when a natural gas exploratory well taped into a geothermal pool in Los Angeles County.  It was operated commercially as a hot springs facility until at least 1961, following which it seem to have disappeared from history.

2BE began operating commercially, broadcasting twice a week, in Sydney. Australia's first commercial radio station would close in 1929.

Last edition:

Thursday, November 6, 1924. The 100th Anniversary of Christopher Robin and Winey the Pooh.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, 1924 Election, Calvin Coolidge, Girl Scouts, Norman Rockwell, Teenagers, The written word, Women

The Aerodrome: Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21. National Museum of Military Vehicles Dubois Wyoming.

The Aerodrome: Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21. National Museum of Milita...:   

Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21. National Museum of Military Vehicles Dubois Wyoming.

 

A Mig-21 at the National Museum of Military Vehicles in Dubois, Wyoming.

The Mig 21 was one of the greatest of the Cold War fighters.

Last edition:

World War Two U.S. Airborne Displays, National Museum of Military Vehicles Dubois Wyoming.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Airborne, Artillery, Clothing, National Museum of Military Vehicles, Operation Overlord, Weapons, World War Two, Wyoming (Dubois)

Today in World War II History—October 22, 1939 & 1944

Today in World War II History—October 22, 1939 & 1944: 80 Years Ago—Oct. 22, 1944: Capt. Alexander Patch III, son of the commanding general of the US Seventh Army, is killed in action in France.

Tuesday, October 14, 1924. The 1924 Wyoming Special Election takes sides.

The sides for the 1924 Wyoming special election, necessitated by the death of Governor Ross, had been chosen.

The Tajik Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, now Tajikistan was created as a partially self-governing entity with the new Uzbek SSR in the USSR.

Last edition:

Monday, October 13, 1924. Mecca captured.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, Kingdom of Hejaz, Mecca, Saudi Arabia, Second Saudi-Hashemite War, Sultanate of Nejd

Wednesday, October 11, 1944. To Have and Have Not.

A Hungarian delegation signed a ceasefire agreement in Moscow agreeing to abandon territory gained since 1937 and to declare war on Germany.  Hungary was enduring turmoil in its government over this general topic.

The obscure Tuvan People's Republic was absorbed by the Soviet Union.

The U.S. Army Air Force bombed Okinawa.

To Have and Have Not premiered.  It was Lauren Bacall's premier film.

Last edition:

Tuesday, October 10, 1944. The murder of the Romani children.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Auschwitz, Austria (Vienna), Gypsies, Imperial Japanese Navy, Italian partisans, Italian Social Republic, Nazi Germany, Okinawa, The Holocaust, U.S. Navy

Tuesday, October 7, 1924. US and Irish Free State establish relations.

The US established diplomatic relations with the Irish Free State.

The British Labour Party overwhelmingly and definitely ruled out affiliation with the Communist Party.

The Soviet Union declared an amnesty for participants in the Georgian August Uprising on the condition that participants surrender their arms.

"Babe Ruth, Bill Edwards, and mascot" October 7, 1924.

The Washington Nationals beat the New York Giants 7 to 4 in Game 4 of the 1924 World Series.  The series was now tied two to two.

Last edition:

Monday, October 6, 1924. Ali of Hejaz becomes king.

Labels: 1910s, 1924, 1930s, 1935, Arab Revolt, Iraq, Italy, Kingdom of Hejaz, Monarchy, Radio, Saudi Arabia, Second Saudi-Hashemite War, Sultanate of Nejd