Journal articles on the topic 'World War, 1939-1945 – Germany – Reparations'

No other country in the world suffered a greater measurable and verifiable loss of human and material resources than Poland during World War II in 1939-1945. According to the first approximation, the value of human and material losses inflicted to Poland by Nazi Germany amounts to 6.495 trillion US dollars of 2018.However, Poland never received war reparations from Germany. The article is a preliminary survey of the complex issue – conducted in an interdisciplinary way combining elements of legal, economic, and political analysis, because the topic belongs to the wide and multidisciplinary field of national and international security. Refuted in the article is an internationally popular myth that communist Poland unilaterally renounced German war reparations in 1953. Then the article discusses the global background of the topic in the 20th and 21st centuries – in particular, the case of Greece whose reparations claims Germany rejects like the Polish claims, and major cases of reparations actually paid: by Germany for World War I, by Germany to Israel and Jewish organizations for the Holocaust, by Japan for World War II – at 966 billion US dollars of 2018, the largest reparations ever – and by and Iraq for the Gulf War. The article concludes with a discussion of necessary further research with advanced methodology of several sciences, and of a possible litigation before the International Court of Justice – or a diplomatic solution to the problem of war reparations.

This article presents the issue of war reparations from Germany in political and legal terms. The settlement of property claims resulting from war between states is a problem in which political factors always play the most important role in addition to legal issues. The article discusses the conceptual difference between indemnisation of war and war reparations, the legal basis of the war reparations demanded by Poland from Germany for the consequences of World War II in a broad political context, including the development of Polish-German relations after 1945. Great emphasis is placed on the arrangements of the Potsdam Conference and the legal analysis of the question of the legality of the Polish People's Republic's renunciation of war reparations from Germany in 1953. Finally, the article briefly presents the contemporary efforts of the Polish authorities to obtain war reparations from Germany.

Established in 1930 in Basel, Switzerland, to expedite and supervise the payment of reparations by Germany to the victors of World War I, the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) quickly evolved into a banking establishment for various national central banks to negotiate and work out mutually-beneficial monetary policies and financial arrangements outside of the usual political and national channels. During World War II the BIS stayed open as a neutral central bank for central banks and provided significant back-channel communications between the Allied and Axis powers that could not have occurred any other way. As an example, discussions for the reconstruction of post-WWII Germany were underway between German and Allied representatives to the BIS at least two years prior to Germany’s surrender in May 1945. The post-WWII BIS then went on to become a global central bank for the world’s national central banks. In spite of the BIS holding so much effective financial power on an international scale and, hence, affecting nearly everyone in the world, few have ever heard of the BIS. This includes many economists and financial-economists. Why? Although technically not a secret organization, the BIS has always maintained an intentionally low profile. The BIS has never advertised its existence. It operates through many other organizations it has either directly created or where it holds major influence. This paper discusses the BIS, its history, and its impact and influence on world events. Questions concerning the role the BIS should possibly play in world events and central banking are raised for discussion near the end of this paper. This paper is focused primarily towards both upper-level undergraduate and graduate finance and economics courses, particularly in the areas of money, banking and financial institutions, financial markets, and monetary policy. However, other courses, to include those outside of the financial-economic arena, can find great use for this subject matter as well. Such outside arenas could include political science and history courses.

Arthur Turner, The Cost of War: British Policy on French War Debts, 1918–1932 (Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 1998), 272pp., £45.00 (hb), ISBN 1-898723-37-0.Patricia Clavin, The Great Depression in Europe, 1929–1939 (Basingstoke: Macmillan/Palgrave 2000) 244pp., £13.99 (pb), ISBN 0-333-60681-7.Karl Mayer, Zwischen Krise und Krieg. Frankreich in der Außenpolitik der United States zwischen Wirtschaftskrise und Zweitem Weltkrieg (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1999), 275pp., DM 84.00, ISBN 3-515-07373-6.Christoph Buchheim and Redvers Garside, eds., After the Slump. Industry and Politics in 1930s Britain and Germany (New York and Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2000), 235pp., DM 69.00. ISBN 3-631-34912-2.Philipp Heyde, Das Ende der Reparationen. Deutschland, Frankreich und der Youngplan 1929–1932. Paderborn: Schöningh, 1998), 506 pp., DM 134.00 ISBN 3-506-77507-3.Monika Rosengarten, Die Internationale Handelskammer. Wirtschaftspolitische Empfehlungen in der Zeit der Weltwirtschaftskrise 1929–1939 (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 2001), 360 pp., DM 148.00, ISBN 3-428-10411-0.

55 years after the end of World War II and after long and difficult negotiations with victims' organizations, the German Parliament passed the ‘Act Establishing the Foundation “Remembrance, Responsibility and Future”’ on 2 August 2000 which provides compensation payments for persons who were subjected to forced labour in the German war economy between 1939 and 1945. With this new legislation, a long debate that began at the end of World War II, is finally coming to an end. This article outlines the different steps in the compensation debate and analyzes the new German compensation legislation of 2 August 2000.

AbstractMany of the forms and practices of interwar internationalism were recreated under the auspices of the Nazi ‘New Europe’. This article will examine these forms of ‘Axis internationalism’ by looking at Spanish health experts' involvement with Nazi Germany during the Second World War. Despite the ambiguous relationship between the Franco regime and the Axis powers, a wide range of Spanish health experts formed close ties with colleagues from Nazi Germany and across Axis and occupied Europe. Many of those involved were relatively conservative figures who also worked with liberal international health organisations in the pre- and post-war eras. Despite their political differences, their opposing attitudes towards eugenics and the tensions caused by German hegemony, Spanish experts were able to rationalise their involvement with Nazi Germany as a mutually-beneficial continuation of pre-war international health cooperation amongst countries united by a shared commitment to modern, ‘totalitarian’ forms of public health. Despite the hostility of Nazi Germany and its European collaborators to both liberal and left-wing forms of internationalism, this phenomenon suggests that the ‘New Europe’ deserves to be studied as part of the wider history of internationalism in general and of international health in particular.

In the years 1989–1944 two different wars against the Soviet Union were imposed upon Finland. During the Winter War of 1989–1940 Germany remained strictly neutral on the basis of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact&&Great Britain and France planned intervention in favour of Finland. When the second, so-called Continuation War broke out in the summer of 1041, Finland was co-belligerent of Germany, and Great Britain declared war on Finland in December 1941. De jure, however, Finland was never an ally of Germany, and at the end of the war, in the winter 1944–1945, the Finnish armed forces expelled the German troops from Lapland, which was devastated by the Germans during their retreat to Norway. Military service was compulsory for each male citizen of Finland. In 1939 the Jewish population of Finland numbered 1 700. Of these, 260 men were called up and approximately 200 were sent to serve at the front during the Winter War.

The actions, attitudes and experiences of German society between 1939 and 1945 played a crucial role in ensuring that the Second World War was not only ‘the most immense and costly ever fought’ but also a conflict which uniquely resembled the ideal type of a ‘total war’. The Nazi regime mobilised German society on an unprecedented scale: over 18 million men served in the Wehrmacht and Waffen SS, and compulsoryVolkssturmduty, initiated as Allied forces approached Germany's borders in September 1944, embraced further millions of the young and middle-aged. The German war effort, above all in occupied Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, claimed the lives of millions of Jewish and gentile civilians and served explicitly genocidal ends. In this most ‘total’ of conflicts, the sheer scale of the Third Reich's ultimate defeat stands out, even in comparison with that of Imperial Japan, which surrendered to the Allies prior to an invasion of its Home Islands. When the war in Europe ended on 8 May 1945 Allied forces had occupied almost all of Germany, with its state and economic structures lying in ruins. Some 4.8 million German soldiers and 300,000 Waffen SS troops lost their lives during the Second World War, including 40 per cent of German men born in 1920. According to recent estimates Allied bombing claimed approximately 350,000 to 380,000 victims and inflicted untold damage on the urban fabric of towns and cities across the Reich. As Nicholas Stargardt notes, this was truly ‘a German war like no other’.

Public opinion polls taken between 1939 and 1945 questioned Americans’ attitudes toward Japan and Germany and toward the people of Japan and Japanese Americans. The polls’ quantified responses provide previously overlooked data that should be taken into account by scholars of Japanese American and World War II history.

Far too often studies in contemporary history have concentrated on national stories. By contrast, this article analyses wartime discourses about and practices against fascism in France, Germany and Italy in a comparative and – as far as possible – transnational perspective. By looking at individual biographies some general aspects of socialist anti-fascism, as well as similarities and differences within anti-fascism, shall be identified and start to fill the gap which Jacques Droz left in 1985 when he ended hisHistoire de l'antifascisme en Europewith the outbreak of the Second World War. To visualise the transnational dimension of socialist anti-fascism both in discourse and practice different categories shall be considered. These include historical analyses and projects for the post-war order in letters, newspapers, periodicals, pamphlets and books, acts of solidarity like mutual aid networks set up by groups and institutions and forms of collaboration in resistance movements.

This article examines German Catholics’ sense of community and identity during the Second World War. It analyses how far they were able to reconcile their religious faith with support for Nazism and the German war effort and questions the extent to which Catholicism in the Rhineland and Westphalia represented either a sealed confessional subculture or a homogenising Nazified ‘national community’ (Volksgemeinschaft). The article argues that, in their pure forms, neither of these analytical paradigms accounts for the complexities of German Catholics’ attitudes during this period, which were far more contested and diverse than outlined by much existing historiography. Religious socialisation, Nazi propaganda and older nationalist traditions shaped Catholics’ mentalities during the Third Reich, creating a spectrum of opinion concerning the appropriate relationship between these influences and loyalties. At the level of lived experience, Catholics’ memberships of religious and national communities revealed themselves to be highly compatible, a tendency which in turn exerted a restraining influence on church–state conflict in wartime Germany.

Vocational schools in Częstochowa in the years from 1939 to 1945 The disorganisation of Polish national life which was brought about by the outbreak of the World War II, commenced by the invasion of Poland by Hitler’s Germany, afflicted the spheres of education and science just as severely as all the others. The occupying forces set out to destroy all that bore the hallmarks of being Polish, evicting teaching staff and students from the school buildings, confiscating school equipment and subjecting teachers as well as students to forced labour, death, starvation, and torture in the name of achieving occupier’s political goals. However, the Polish school community did not remain indifferent to the actions of the enemy. Quite the opposite, in fact: it took up the fight by means of organizing clandestine tuition and also engaging in conspiratorial activities, which cost the lives of numerous teachers and students of the vocational schools of Częstochowa.

This article describes the history of the judicial system of the Uzbek SSR in 1939-1945 on the basis of a comparative analysis of a large number of historical sources and legal documents. According to the Stalinist Constitution and the law on the judicial system adopted in 1938, changes in the judicial system of the Uzbek SSR, the national composition of judges, staff turnover and the factors that led to this were discussed. The article also describes the mobilization of judges from Uzbekistan to the front after the invasion of the Soviet Union by fascist Germany, increasing the competence of military tribunals, types of criminal and civil cases considered by courts of general jurisdiction, activities carried out in the field of training lawyers

The wars of 1914–1918 and 1939–1945 are without parallel in the expansive stretch of decades of the pan-European conquest and occupation of Africa in creating such profound opportunity to study the very entrenched desire by the European conqueror-states in Africa to perpetuate their control on the continent and its peoples indefinitely. The two principal protagonists in each conflict, Britain and Germany, were the lead powers of these conqueror-states that had formally occupied Africa since 1885. Against this cataclysmic background of history, Africans found themselves conscripted by both sides of the confrontation line in 1914–1918 to at once fight wars for and against their aggressors during which 1 million Africans were killed. Clearly, this was a case of double-jeopardy of conquered and occupied peoples fighting for their enemy-occupiers. In the follow-up 1939–1945 war, when Germany indeed no longer occupied any African land (having been defeated in the 1914–1918 encounter), Britain and allies France and Belgium (all continuing occupying powers in Africa) conscripted Africans, yet again, to fight for these powers in their new confrontation against Germany, and Japan, a country that was in no way an aggressor force in Africa. Hundreds of thousands of Africans were killed in this second war. In neither of these conflicts, as this study demonstrates, do the leaders of these warring countries who occupied (or hitherto occupied) Africa ever view their enforced presence in Africa as precisely the scenario or outcome they wished their own homeland was not subjected to by their enemies. On the contrary, just as it was their position in the aftermath of the 1914–1918 war, Britain, France, Belgium, Spain and Portugal in 1945 each envisaged the continuing occupation of the states and peoples of Africa they had seized by force prior to these conflicts. Winston Churchill, the British prime minster at the time, was adamant: ‘I had not become the king’s first minister in order to preside over the liquidation of the British Empire’. Charles de Gaulle, leader of the anti-German ‘free French forces’, was no less categorical on this score: ‘Self-government [in French-occupied Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, South America, the Pacific and elsewhere in the world] must be rejected – even in the more distant future’.

The article is devoted to the analysis of different views in Romanian historiography on the participation of I. Antonescu, along with Germany, Italy, Hungary, Slovakia and Finland, in the war against the USSR, starting from June 22, 1941. It is known that the decision to join the anti-Soviet war was taken by I. Antonescu alone, without any consultation with any political group, or even with the king Mihai, who has learned from the BBC radio that Romania had entered the war with the USSR. First, the war was proclaimed as a “sacred war” against Bolshevism for the return of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina, received full support from the king and from the leaders of the “historical parties”, as well as from a wide range of the population. However, in August 1941, at the request of Hitler, having already military rank of Marshal, Ion Antonescu decided to continue the war in the East, which has been completely unfounded (the territory to the East of the Dniester never belonged to Romania). The modern Romanian historiographers emphasize that the continuation of the anti-Soviet war on the other side of the Dniester, which led to large (and useless) human losses, has become one of Antonescu’s greatest mistakes. The article also raises the issue of the Holocaust in Romania during the Second World War (suppressed during the communist years), the decline in the scale of the tragedy in that period. It is noted that the arrest of I. Antonescu on August 23, 1944 was the merit of the young king, Mihai I, and his entourage, and not the Communist Party of Romania represented by Lucreţiu Pătrăşcanu.

Introduction.The article deals with the problem of forced labor in Nazi Germany during the Second World War. Despite the existence of profound scientific publications devoted to this problem in Russia and abroad, it still needs to be developed. The article emphasizes the urgency of its research in historical, anthropological and humanities perspective, because personal experience of those who survived after forced labor in Nazi Germany, must be stored in collective memory and comprehended by subsequent generations. Methods and materials. Digital Humanities based on the method of oral history allows to solve this problem. The article presents two options of practical implementation of the issue: the online archive of the interview Forced Labor in 1939-1945. Memories and history and related online platform Learning based on interviews. Forced labor in 1939-1945. The archive includes about 600 narrative biographical interviews with victims of Nazi forced labor in 26 countries. The site accompanying the archive is now available in English, German, Russian and Czech. The second project is based on six specially selected interviews from the archive. Broad source base and nationally-oriented concept of forced labor in Nazi Germany, presented on the platform, create the historical context necessary for using this resource primarily in the secondary educational system of the Russian Federation. Analysis and results. The article shows the possibility of using archive-interviews in science and education, and emphasizes that traditional and new methods of historical research can complement each other. The article emphasizes that biographical films created on the basis of interviews can make the memory of forced labor in Nazi Germany, first of all, of “eastern workers” and Soviet prisoners of war more visible in Russian cultural memory. Contribution of authors to writing an article. Characteristics of peculiarity of oral historical sources, online collections of interviews, compensation payments are given by D. Thousendfreund. Analytics of the project “Forced Labor 1939-1945. Memoirs and History “and online platform” Learning based on interviews. Forced labor 1939-1945”, as well as conclusions are prepared by N.P. Timofeev. Introduction, problem historiography and general editing of the article belong to T.V. Evdokimova.

On May 4, 2006, French and German cultural ministers announced the publication of Histoire/Geschichte, the world's first secondary school history textbook produced jointly by two countries. Authored by a team of French and German historians and published simultaneously in both languages, the book's release drew considerable public attention. French and German heads-of-state readily pointed to the joint history textbook as a shining example of the close and positive relations between their two countries, while their governments heralded the book for “symbolically sealing Franco-German reconciliation.” Beyond European shores, East Asian commentators in particular have taken note of Franco-German textbook collaboration, citing it as a possible model for how to work through their own region's often antagonistic past. Diplomatic praise is not mere hyperbole. From the Franco-Prussian War (1870) through World War I (1914–1918) and World War II (1939–1945), France and Germany were widely perceived to be “hereditary enemies.” The publication of Histoire/Geschichte embodies one of the most crucial developments in modern international relations: the emergence of France and Germany as the “linchpin” of the New Europe.

This study demonstrates the Germany's policy towards Iraq after the arrival of the Nazis to power in 1933 till the end of World War II. Because of the geopolitical importance of Iraq, and specifically after its independence and its entry into the League of Nations in 1932, the international parties became in a struggle to dominate Iraq in particular, and the Middle East in general. The study aimed to shed light on Hitler's policy of dominating the Western influence in Iraq, occupying new areas in order to penetrate his power and control, and in his desire to acquire Europe, he was striking the influence of his enemies, especially Britain. The study identified a problem that was based on Germany's betting on time as a significant factor, and how it could be used to serve its strategic plan, taking into account Britain's pressure and its interests in Iraq. The study came out with many conclusions, the most important of which is Germany's growing role to find a foothold in the Middle East, as well as the poor strategic planning of Germany since it did not have any clear goals in that region. In addition, its policy was a reflection of the plans of its allies. The structure of the study was divided into an introduction, and three axes: first, German-Iraqi relations 1919-1939; second, World War II and the Iraqi stance of it it; third, May’s movement 1941 and the German attitude of it, finally, the Conclusion which included the most important findings and recommendations, namely: 1- The growing role of Germany to find a foothold In the Middle East after it achieving its national unity in 1870. However, the German penetration in Iraq was not easy as it was interrupted by many challenges caused by the major countries, particularly Britain. 2- the Germanic strategic planning in the Middle East was poor because it did not have clear goals in the region. Its movements there came as if they were only a reaction to the Allied plans and the depletion of Britain's power. 3- Germany's defeat in the First World War made it interested in restoring its position in Europe and improving its internal conditions, which led to the decline of its international relations with other countries, including Iraq. 4- The developments in Iraq in 1941 provided a valuable opportunity for Germany, but its military failure in its war operations affected its political activities in Iraq to the extent that it ended the German role in Iraq. 5- Germany’s failures began in the last years of the war that reached its climax in 1943, signaling the end of Germany’s aspirations in the East in general and Iraq in particular. Hence, an important stage of the German activities had ended in which Iraq was an arena for conflict between Britain and Germany.

Contrary to the previous political regime of the Slovak state (1939–1945), official policy had significantly changed in the renewed Czechoslovakia after the end of World War II, but anti-Jewish sentiments and even their brachial demonstrations somewhat framed the everyday reality of Jewish survivors who were returning to their homes from liberated concentration camps or hiding places. Their attempts to reintegrate into the society where they had used to live regularly came across intolerance, hatred and social exclusion, further strengthened by classical anti-Semitic stereotypes and prejudices. Desired capitulation of Nazi Germany and its satellites resulted also in the end of systematic Jewish extermination, but it did not automatically lead to a peaceful everyday life. This paper focuses on the social dynamics between Slovak majority society and the decimated Jewish minority in the first post-World War II years and analyses some crucial factors, particular motivations and circumstances of the selected acts of collective anti-Jewish violence in Slovakia. Moreover, the typological diversity of the specific collective atrocities will be discussed.

In World War II the Allies and Axis deployed propaganda in myriad forms, among which cinema was especially important in arousing patriotism and boosting morale. Britain and Germany made propaganda films from Hitler’s rise to power in 1933 to the war’s end in 1945, most commonly documentaries, historical films, and after 1939, fictional films about the ongoing conflict. Curiously, the historical films included several about fifteenth and sixteenth century England. In The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933), director Alexander Korda—an admirer of Winston Churchill and opponent of appeasement—emphasizes the need for a strong navy to defend Tudor England against the ‘German’ Charles V. The same theme appears with Philip II of Spain as an analog for Hitler in Arthur B. Wood’s Drake of England (1935), William Howard’s Fire Over England (1937), parts of which reappear in the propaganda film The Lion Has Wings (1939), and the pro-British American film The Sea Hawk (1940). Meanwhile, two German films little known to present-day English language viewers turned the tables with English villains. In Gustav Ucicky’s Das Mädchen Johanna (Joan of Arc, 1935), Joan is the female embodiment of Hitler and wages heroic warfare against the English. In Carl Froelich’s Das Herz der Königin (The Heart of a Queen, 1940), Elizabeth I is an analog for an imperialistic Churchill and Mary, Queen of Scots an avatar of German virtues. Finally, to boost British morale on D-Day at Churchill’s behest, Laurence Olivier directed a masterly film version of William Shakespeare’s Henry V (1944), edited to emphasize the king’s virtues and courage, as in the St. Crispin’s Day speech with its “We few, we proud, we band of brothers”. This essay examines the aesthetic appeal, the historical accuracy, and the presentist propaganda in such films.

Abstract The Secord World War was a conflict which many British people feared might happen, but they strongly supported the efforts of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain to seek a peaceful resolution of tensions with Germany over disputes in Continental Europe. Baptists in Scotland shared these concerns of their fellow citizens, but equally supported the declaration of war in 1939 after the German invasion of Poland. They saw the conflict as a struggle for spiritual values and were as concerned about winning the peace that followed as well as the war. During the years 1939 to 1945 they recommitted themselves to sharing the Christian message with their fellow citizens and engaged in varied forms of evangelism and extended times of prayer for the nation. The success of their Armed Forces Chaplains in World War One ensured that Scottish Baptist padres had greater opportunities for service a generation later. Scottish Baptists had seen closer ties established with other churches in their country under the auspices of the Scottish Churches Council. This co-operation in the context of planning for helping refugees and engaging in reconstruction at the conclusion of the war led to proposals for a World Council of Churches. Scottish Baptists were more cautious about this extension of ecumenical relationships. In line with other Scottish Churches they recognised a weakening of Christian commitment in the wider nation, but were committed to the challenge of proclaiming their faith at this time. They had both high hopes and expectations for the post-war years in Scotland.

The paper addresses the Slovak drama of the 21st century dedicated to the Second World War, the Holocaust, and the Slovak National Uprising. After the “velvet revolution” of 1989, interest in the military and insurgent theme in Slovak art as a whole declined sharply, but as early as in the 21st century playwrights and theaters of Slovakia are increasingly beginning to return to these topics. Many of these plays created in the last twenty years were written in order to actualize public discussions about the period of the Slovak Republic (1939–1945), around the mass deportation of Jews from its territory, around the arization, etc. The main task of these plays` authors is to put serious moral questions before the viewer. For this purpose, the paper focuses on social and historical context in which National Socialism spread in Slovakia. Such are, for example, the works of R. Ballek “Tiso”, P. Rankov “It Happened on the First of September (or Some Other Time)”, A. Gruskova “The Woman Rabbi”, V. Klimachek “The Holocaust”, Y. Yuraneva “The Silent Whip”. One of the most important questions that Slovak writers and society have been asking in recent decades is the question of how and why Slovaks actually joined Nazi Germany during the Second World War, what prompted them to do this.

ABSTRACTIn September 1939, Portugal made a realist strategic choice to preserve the Portuguese Empire maintaining by its neutrality and also remaining an ally of Great Britain. While the Portuguese could rely largely on their colonies for raw materials to sustain the mainland, the country had long depended on British transportation for these goods and the Portuguese military. With the British priority now given to war transportation, Portugal's economy and Empire were particularly vulnerable. The Portuguese dictator Antonio Salazar sought to mitigate this damage by maintaining particularly friendly financial relations with the British government, including increased exports of Portuguese merchandise and services and permission to accumulate credits in Sterling to cover deficits in the balance of payments. This paper gives an improved set of comprehensive statistics for the Anglo-Portuguese and German–Portuguese relationships, reported in Pounds and according to international standards. The reported statistics include the trade in merchandise, services, capital flows, loans and third-party transfers of funds in favour of the British account. When compared with the German statistics, the Anglo-Portuguese figures show the Portuguese government favoured the British in financial relations, an active choice by Salazar to maintain the Portuguese Empire.

Recenzowana monografia omawia dzieje Archiwum Państwowego w Szcze­cinie (Staatsarchiv Stettin) w okresie od wybuchu pierwszej wojny świato­wej do zakończenia drugiej wojny światowej. W tych latach dyrektorami archiwum byli kolejno: Hermann Hoogeweg (1913–1923), Otto Grotefend (1923–1930), Erich Randt (1930–1935) i Adolf Diestelkamp (1935–1945). W okresie II wojny światowej, w związku ze służbą wojskową Adolfa Die­stelkampa, funkcje kierownika archiwum pełnili Fritz Morré (1939–1941) i Hermann Gollub (1941–1945). Działalność archiwum została ukazana w monografii przez pryzmat funkcji, jakie pełnią instytucje tego typu (gro­madzenie, przechowywanie, opracowywanie i udostępnianie zasobu), na tle przemian politycznych i społecznych zachodzących w Niemczech. Dużo miejsca autor poświęcił pracownikom merytorycznym archiwum i prowa­dzonym przez nich badaniom naukowym. W tym kontekście ukazał kształ­towanie się nowego typu archiwisty zaangażowanego politycznie, włącza­jącego się w niemieckie badania wschodnie (deutsche Ostforschung). From Hermann Hoogeweg to Hermann Gollub: history of the State Archives in Szczecin (Staatsarchiv Stettin). Review of the monograph by Maciej Szukła, Archiwum Państwowe w Szczecinie w latach 1919–1945. Ludzie i działalność, Archiwum Państwowe w Szczecinie, Naczelna Dyrekcja Archiwów Państwowych w Warszawie , Szczecin–Warsaw 2019, pp. 269 The reviewed monograph gives a description of the history of the State Archives in Szczecin (Staatsarchiv Stettin) from the beginning of the First World War to the end of the Second Word War. Within that period the Archives had following directors: Hermann Hoogeweg (1913–1923), Otto Grotefend (1923–1930), Erich Randt (1930–1935) and Adolf Diestelkamp (1935–1945). During the Second World War Fritz Morré (1939–1941) and then Hermann Gollub (1941–1945) deputized for Adolf Diestelkamp when he did military service. The monograph take a look at how the Archives performed its typical functions (collecting, preserving, processing and providing access to archival materials) in the context of the political and social transformation in Germany. The author puts a lot of emphasis on professional working in the Archives and their academic research to show the emergence of a new type of politically engaged archivist who joined the studies on Eastern Europe (deutsche Ostforschung).

The Slovak branch of the international Bata Corporation gradually came into existence in the 1930s, with the process culminating during the existence of the Slovak Republic between 1939 and 1945. In January 1939, the branch also started a magazine, named Budovateľ and targeted at the Slovak factories of the corporation. The magazine, whose content would be created by its editors, provided information about life in the factories, but also presented the official attitude of the Slovak branch’s top management towards the government and the political system of Slovakia at that time. The study maps and evaluates the attitudes (or certain aspects thereof) expressed in Budovateľ in the period 1939 to 1941, when the government of the independent Slovak Republic was on the rise and could boast some economic and social achievements and when the idea of national unity resonated in the broader populace. The study analyses these attitudes up to June 1941, specifically until the attack on the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany. In the months and years that followed, the views of the management and rank-and-file employees at Bata’s plants in Slovakia gradually began to change under the influence of domestic and international developments in the context of the world war.

The article describes the legal status of Poles residing within the territories occupied by Nazi Germany or areas incorporated into the Third Reich during the Second World War. The author points to the examples of the limitations placed on Poles in access to goods and services, including transport, healthcare, and cultural institutions. Furthermore, he reminds us of the orders and prohibitions derived from civil, administrative, and labour laws which were imposed on Poles. The author emphasises some significant differences between the Nazi occupation in Poland and in other European countries. As a result, he advocates the conduct of new research on the issue of the real situation of Poles in various occupied regions administered by the authorities of the Third Reich.

With the passing into law of the War Crimes Act of 1991, the United Kingdom joined common law states such as Canada and Australia in conferring upon its domestic courts jurisdiction to try individuals suspected of having committed war crimes in Europe during the Second World War. Under the 1991 Act, proceedings for murder, manslaughter or culpable homicide may be brought, with the consent of the Attorney-General, against any person who, on 8 March 1990 or later, became a British citizen or resident in the United Kingdom, providing that the offence charged is alleged to have been committed between 1 September 1939 and 4 June 1945 in a place which was, at the material time, part of Germany or under German occupation. The Act further provides that the offence charged must have constituted a violation of the laws and customs of war under international law at the time it was committed. In addition, the Act stipulates that the nationality of the alleged offender at the time the alleged offence was committed is immaterial.

The article offers an overview of modern historical data on the origins, causes of World War II, the decisive role of the USSR in its victorious end, and also records the main results and lessons of World War II.Hitler's Germany was the main cause of World War II. Nazism, racial theory, mixed with far-reaching geopolitical designs, became the combustible mixture that ignited the fire of glob­al conflict. The war with the Soviet Union was planned to be waged with particular cruelty.The preconditions for the outbreak of World War II were the humiliating provisions of the Versailles Peace Treaty for the German people, as well as the attitude of the "Western de­mocracies" to Russia after 1917 and the Soviet Union as an outcast of world development. Great Britain, France, the United States chose for themselves a policy of ignoring Moscow's interests, they were more likely to cooperate with Hitler's Germany than with Soviet Russia. It was the "Munich Agreement" that became the point of no return to the beginning of the Second World War. Under these conditions, for the USSR, its own security and the conclusion of a non-aggression pact with Germany began to come to the fore, defining the "spheres of interests" of the parties in order to limit the advance of German troops towards the Soviet borders in the event of German aggression against Poland. The non-aggression pact gave the USSR just under two years to rebuild the army and consolidate its defensive potential and pushed the Soviet borders hundreds of kilometers westward. The signing of the Pact was preceded by the failure in August 1939 of the negotiations between the military mis­sions of Britain, France and the USSR, although Moscow took the Anglo-French-Soviet nego­tiations with all seriousness.The huge losses of the USSR in the summer of 1941 are explained by the following circum­stances: before the war, a large-scale modernization of the Red Army was launched, a gradu­ate of a military school did not have sufficient experience in managing an entrusted unit by June 22, 1941; the Red Army was going to bleed the enemy in border battles, stop it with short counterattacks by covering units, carry out defensive operations, and then strike a de­cisive blow into the depths of the enemy's territory, so the importance of a multi-echeloned long-term defense in 1941 was underestimated by the command of the Red Army and it was not ready for it; significant groupings of the Western Special Military District were drawn into potential salients, which was used by the Germans at the initial stage of the war; Stalin's fear of provoking Hitler to start a war led to slowness in making the most urgent and necessary decisions to bring troops to combat readiness.The Allies delayed the opening of the second front for an unreasonably long time. They, of course, achieved outstanding success in the landing operation in France, however, the en­emy's losses in only one Soviet strategic operation in the summer of 1944 ("Bagration") are not inferior, and even exceed, the enemy’s losses on the second front. One of the goals of "Bagration" was to help the Allies.Soviet soldiers liberated Europe at the cost of their lives. At the same time, Moscow could not afford to re-establish a cordon sanitaire around its borders after the war, so that anti- Soviet forces would come to power in the border states. The United States and Great Britain took all measures available to them to quickly remove from the governments of Italy, France and other Western states all the left-wing forces that in 1944-1945 had a serious impact on the politics of their countries.

The purpose of the article is to study the Slovak question in the foreign policy of the Soviet Union during the Second World War. The methodological basis of the proposed article is the principles of historicism and objectivity, the application of which involves an unbiased depiction of past events in their historical context. To carry out a comprehensive scientifi c analysis of the article, the author has used the unique historical research methods – problematic, comparative-historical, retrospective, and diachronic. The scientifi c novelty lies in the systematic analysis of the place and the role of the Slovak question in the foreign policy of the Soviet Union in 1939–1945. Conclusion. The USSR considered the independent Slovak Republic an artifi cialentity, a product of German expansion. The establishment and development of Soviet-Slovak interstate relations in September 1939 – June 1941 were primarily dictated by the conjuncture of the short-lived German-Soviet partnership. After the Nazi Germany attacked on the USSR and the severance of Soviet-Slovak interstate relations, offi cial Moscow supported the idea of the continuity of the Czechoslovak Republic and the annulment of the Munich Agreements. In prac-tice, this meant that the USSR advocated the return of Slovakia to the Czechoslovak Republic, which was to become an infl uential leader of Soviet infl uence in Central and South-Eastern Europe. The Soviet Union considered the future state and legal system of the republic to be an internal aff air of Czechoslovakia and did not interfere in settlement of Czech-Slovak relations. On the positive side, the Soviet leadership recognized Slovaks as a separate people. This forced the Czechoslovak government and E. Beneš personally to partially reconsider their views on the issue and agree to the revival of the Czechoslovak Republic as a common state of equal Czech and Slovak nations but without a clear defi nition of the state and legal status of Slovakia.

During the Second World War, Germans fought a “two-front war.” A “community of fate” bound together Germans at home and Germans in uniform who carried the war beyond Germany's borders. “Between 1939 and 1945, there was no doubt that civilians were no longer excluded from the fighting; they found themselves right in the middle of it—as actors, as observers, and as those who bore the suffering” (part 1, p. 2) of the war. The Nazi leadership knew this from the start, and only days after the Nazi invasion of Poland, Hermann Göring was exhorting a factory workforce to remember: “We are now all fighters at the front!”(part 1, p. 8). Jörg Echternkamp reminds us of this in his introduction to this massive two-part volume, the latest installment in the history of Germany in the Second World War that has occupied historians of the Military History Research Office (Militärgeschichtliches Forschungsamt, or MGFA) for the last twenty-five years. Echternkamp is the editor, and he deserves enormous credit for pulling together a collection of twenty essays—some of which could easily stand on their own as monographs, all of which are grounded in staggering amounts of original research—that not only summarize what we know about the impact of the war on the homefront in Germany, but also add considerably to that knowledge. Previous volumes in the MGFA series (seven of which are available from Oxford University Press in English translation) have focused primarily on the military planning, the war at the front, and the organization of the war economy at home. In the more than 2,000 pages of this two-part volume, contributors turn their attention to the impact of the war on German society. The results are extremely impressive, and what Echternkamp has brought together will be the starting point for anyone who wants to understand the war at home in Germany.

The Holy See In Polish Foreign Policy of the Government on exile (September 1939 — June 1940) The article is devoted to the reexamining of the policy of Polish Government on exile toward the Holy See after Poland’s defeat in September 1939 and the reestablishment of the legal authorities of Poland in France, under President Raczkiewicz and General Sikorski as Prime Minister. Terminus ad quem of the narration is the collapse of France and transfer of the Government of Poland to London in June 1940. Problems of Vatican’s perception of Polish Question is discussed on the basis of Polish archival documents, especially those of Polish Embassy to the Holy See. Vatican-Polish relations at the beginning of the World War II require special attention because the last treatment of this highly debatable problem was made in historiography by Zofia Waszkiewicz more than thirty five years ago in her monograph Polityka Watykanu wobec Polski 1939–1945 [Policy of the Vatican toward Poland 1939—1945] (Warsaw 1980). How much Polish diplomacy achieved fighting for the Holy See’s support against Nazi Germany? Two things must be said. Firstly, the Holy See recognized the legal continuity of Polish State after the German-Soviet occupation of Poland’s territory in September 1939, but did not sent the papal nuncio to Angers, when Polish Government resided. Secondly, Polish thesis on the special significance of Polish Question as the test-case of international justice received the positive response of the Pope Pius XII in his encyclical Summi Pontificatus published on October 20 1939, but the guidelines of Vatican’s policy were based on the doctrine of strict neutrality of the Papacy in the international relations. It did not permit for Papal condemnation ex officio of the Nazi crimes and criminal policy of extermination in Poland.

Basing on the study of the Internet publications of archival documents, the article considers the issues of publishing digitized copies of archival documents in the electronic environment on the website of the Federal Archive Agency and the “Archives of Russia” portal. The publications were prepared within the framework of the state programs “Patriotic education of the citizens of the Russian Federation” in 2006–2020, approved by the government of the Russian Federation. The present research is the analysis of the virtual exhibition “Stalin-Churchill-Roosevelt. A joint fight against Nazism”; the publications “How and for what we are fighting with the Poles. The anti-Polish program of the OUN in archival documents”; “Ukrainian nationalist organizations during World War II”; “How the Polish underground ‘helped’ the Red Army to defeat Nazi Germany. 1944–1945. Marking the 70th anniversary of the Warsaw uprising of 1944”; “General Vlasov. The story of betrayal”; “Victory. 1941–1945”; “Stalingrad. Commemorating the 75th anniversary of the defeat by the Soviet troops of the German-fascist troops in the battle of Stalingrad”; “Before and after Munich. Archival documents tell the story. Marking the 80th anniversary of the ‘Munich agreement’ ”; “1939: from ‘appeasement’ to war”; “Nuremberg trial documents from Russian archives”; “Documents of the Soviet era”; “Tempered in the Great Patriotic War...”; “Voices of the outstanding Soviet commanders of the Great Patriotic War”; “Officers of the First World War – generals of the Great Patriotic War”. The main attention is paid to the investigation of the composition and the content of publications, their reference-search engine and finding aids, the advantages and disadvantages of that method of publication. The scientific novelty of the article consists in the study of the Internet publications about the Great Patriotic War, in the development of a new research direction – Archeography in the electronic environment (Digital Archeography).

Fathers, families, and the state in France, 1914–1945. By Kristen Stromberg Childers. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2003. Pp. 261. ISBN 0-8014-4122-6. £23.95.Origins of the French welfare state: the struggle for social reform in France, 1914–1947. By Paul V. Dutton. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Pp. 251. ISBN 0-521-81334-4. £49.99.Britain, France, and the financing of the First World War. By Martin Horn. Montreal and Kingston: McGill – Queen's University Press, 2002. Pp. 249. ISBN 0-7735-2293-X. £65.00.The gold standard illusion: France, the Bank of France and the International Gold Standard, 1914–1939. By Kenneth Mouré. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. Pp. 297. ISBN 0-19-924904-0. £40.00.Workers' participation in post-Liberation France. By Adam Steinhouse. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2001. Pp. 245. ISBN 0-7391-0282-6. $70.00 (hb). ISBN 0-7391-0283-4. $24.95 (pbk).In the traditional historiography of twentieth-century France the period after the Second World War is usually contrasted favourably with that after 1918. After 1945, new men with new ideas, born out of the shock of defeat in 1940 and resistance to Nazi occupation, laid the basis for an economic and social democracy. The welfare state was created, women were given full voting rights, and French security, in both economic and territorial respects, was partially guaranteed by integrating West Germany into a new supranational institutional structure in Western Europe. 1945 was to mark the beginning of the ‘30 glorious years’ of peace and prosperity enjoyed by an expanding population in France. In sharp contrast, the years after 1918 are characterized as a period dominated by France's failed attempts to restore its status as a great power. Policies based on making the German taxpayer finance France's restoration are blamed for contributing to the great depression after 1929 and the rise of Hitler. However, as more research is carried out into the social and economic reconstruction of France after both world wars, it is becoming clear that the basis of what was to become the welfare state after 1945 was laid in the aftermath of the First World War. On the other hand, new reforms adopted in 1945 which did not build on interwar policies, such as those designed to give workers a voice in decision-making at the workplace, proved to be short-lived.

One of the negative phenomena of the modern world are attempts to falsify history and the results of the Second World War, 1939-1945., is an important component of the ideological confrontation in the information space of neoliberal forces of Russian society with patriotic and non-violent, is a tool for achieving geopolitical goals of a number of states. United States, European Union and Ukraine tend to distort the results of the Second World War to remove the history of the Great Patriotic War, the feat of the Soviet people, who saved the world from fascism, and the Soviet Union (Russian Federation), together with Nazi Germany put in the dock of history, accusing all the troubles of the XX century. At the same time attempts to rehabilitate fascism and substitution postwar realities lead to the destruction of the entire system of contemporary international relations and, as a consequence, to the intensification of the struggle for the redivision of the world, including military measures. China is actively implementing the historiography of the statement that World War II began June 7, 1937 and is linked to an open aggression of Japan against China. Given these circumstances, the Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation noted that the trend of displacement of military dangers and military threats in the information space and the inner sphere of the Russian Federation. The main internal risks attributable activity information impact on the population, especially young citizens of the country, which has the aim of undermining the historical, spiritual and patriotic traditions in the field of defense of the Fatherland.

The article analyzes the specificity of the Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King’s attitude to the Soviet Union during the Second World War. The study analyzes the frequency of the Prime Minister referencing the USSR in his diary from September 1, 1939 to September 2, 1945, as well as his reaction to a number of the most significant events of the Second World War associated with the Soviet Union: the German attack on the USSR, the establishment of diplomatic relations between the USSR and Canada, the battles of Stalingrad and Kursk, the victory over Germany. In the course of work, both general scientific methods (analysis, synthesis, inductive method, comparative method) and special methods (historical-chronological and content analysis) have been used to study the materials of the diary. The use of the historical-chronological method is due to the need to correlate information from the diary with the overall historical picture of the studied period, and the use of content analysis helps to create a more reliable picture of Canadian Prime Minister’s perception of the Soviet participation in World War II. The article has made allowances for the fact that Mackenzie King sought to create his own positive image in his diaries, planning their posthumous publication. But, since the USSR was not a key topic for the Prime Minister (as evidenced by keywords statistics), it can be stated that the leader of the Canadian liberals was quite frank, at least as frank as a person who, in his lifetime, was known as an extremely cautious politician could be. It is clear, that King was well aware of the significance of the events on the Eastern Front. But throughout the war he retained both a negatively neutral attitude towards the USSR (due to its communist nature) and his perception of the Soviet Union as part of Asia and thus a step below the Anglo-Saxon world, which had a higher level of culture and moral principles. The objective reality, i.e. absence of hostilities in Canada, its maneuvering between Great Britain and the United States, and priority of economic and domestic policy for King, explains that a lesser part of his attention was paid to the events in the USSR in comparison with processes associated with England and the United States.

The article is a cultural-historical study and a part of the project Uniting History, which aims to discover the multicultural aspect of performing art in pre-war Liepaja and summarize key facts about the history of the Liepāja Symphony Orchestra. The study also seeks to identify the performing artists whose life was associated with Liepāja and who were repressed between 1941 and 1945, because of aggression by both the Soviet Union and National Socialist Germany. Until now, the cultural life of this period in Liepāja has been studied in a fragmentary way, and materials are scattered in various archives. There are inaccurate and even contradictory testimonies of events of that time. The study marks both the cultural and historical situation of the 1920s and the 1930s in Liepāja and tracks the fates of several artists in the period between 1939 and 1945. On the eve of World War II, Liepāja has an active cultural life, especially in theatre and music. Liepāja City Drama and Opera is in operation staging both dramatic performances, operas, and ballet, employing an orchestra. The symphony orchestra also operated at the Liepāja Philharmonic, where musicians were recruited every season according to the principles of contemporary festival orchestras. Liepāja Folk Conservatory (music school) had also formed an orchestra of students and teachers. Guest concerts were held regularly. A characteristic feature of performing arts in Liepaja was its multicultural character – musicians of different nationalities with experience from different schools of the world were encountered there. World War II not only disrupted the balance in society, but it also had a very concrete and tragic impact on the fates of the people, including the performing artists. Many were killed, many repressed and placed in prisons and camps, and many went to exile to the West. Others were forced to either co-operate with the occupation forces or give up their identity and, consequently, their career as an artist. Nevertheless, some artists risked their lives to save others.

This article aims to analyse the role of the Alsatian football club Racing Club de Strasbourg throughout the re-establishment process of the French-German football relations after the Second World War. Because of its geographical location between France and Germany and due to the double annexation of the Alsace by the German Reich the club held a special position in the French football landscape. To examine the difficulties and conflicts that came along with the attempt to restore international sport relations between West Germany and France, the paper focuses on three aspects: German prisoners of war in France, efforts to organise football games between French and German top-level-clubs, and the re-establishment of international matches between the two countries. As a result, Racing’s attitude can be situated in a field of tension between hurtful wartime experiences on the one hand and sporting as well as financial benefits on the other hand. While the former was an argument held against an over-hasty spirit of understanding between the French and the German teams especially by the Alsatian Football Association, the latter were a reason for Racing to intensify its pragmatical efforts to re-establish sport relations with West German clubs. This ambivalence is further exemplified by the dualism between Aimé Gissy, secretary general of the Alsatian Football Association (1935-1939, 1945-1974), and Willy Scheuer, president of Racing Club de Strasbourg (1952-1960).

: This article analyzes the thought legacy of Samuel Štefan Osuský (1888–1975), a famous Slovak philosopher and theologian, pertaining to his fight against totalitarianism and war. Having lived during arguably the most difficult period of (Czecho-)Slovak history, which included the two world wars, the emergence of independent Czechoslovakia in 1918, its fateful, forceful split by Nazi Germany in 1939, followed by its reestablishment after WWII in 1945, only to be afflicted again by a new kind of totalitarianism on the left, it is no surprise that Osuský aimed his philosophical and theological criticism especially at the two great human ideologies of the 20th century – Fascism (including its German, racial version, Nazism, which he preferred to call ›Hitlerism‹), and Communism (above all in its historical shape of Stalinist Bolshevism). After exploring the human predicament in ›boundary situations,‹ i.e. situations of ultimate anxiety, despair but also hope and trust, religious motives seemed to gain the upper hand, according to Osuský. As a ›rational theist,‹ he attempted to draw from theology, philosophy and science as complementary sources of wisdom combining them in his struggle to find satisfying insights for larger questions of meaning. Osusky’s ideas in his book War and Religion (1916) and article The Philosophy of Bolshevism, Fascism, and Hitlerism (1937) manifest the much-needed prophetic insight that has the potential to enlighten our own struggle against the creeping forces of totalitarianism, right and left that seek to engulf our societies today.

Comparison of the peculiarities of the service of the representatives of the countries of the world in different branches of the military has not found a comprehensive coverage in both domestic and foreign historiography. In the available comparisons, their authors rather briefly dwell on the general features of the policy of states with different regimes of government on the organization of women’s service in 1939-1945. However, they do not study in more detail the common and different in experiences of representatives of different states in the service of one or another branch of the military. The article examines the peculiarities of the service and life of Soviet and British women who served in signal corps during World War II. The countries were chosen not by chance, because they represent democracy and totalitarianism, respectively, and studying the experiences of women serving in their armies can deepen our knowledge of these regimes. The author concludes that the women of the USSR and Great Britain in the signal corps during World War II held positions with the same or similar responsibilities, but the everyday life of Soviet women at the front was mostly much stricter, due to the high intensity fighting. At the same time, it should not be forgotten that, despite the fact that the enemy was never able to invade Great Britain by land, its territories were subjected to massive air attacks, which posed a constant danger to the country’s inhabitants, both civilian and military. Therefore, the service of British women in the signal corps in the homeland was also associated with significant risk. Among other things, British female signals officers took part in the top-secret and extremely important for Allied troops operation “Enigma”, which resulted in the decryption of the code of the famous cipher machine of Nazi Germany. According to various estimates, the success of the operation significantly precipitated the end of World War II.

World War II is considered to be the largest and longest bloody conflict in recent history. It began with the German attack on Poland on September 1, 1939. The war lasted six years and ended with the capitulation of Japan on September 2, 1945. The consequences of the war are still present in many countries today. "German, Italian and Japanese fascists waged a war of conquest with the aim of dividing the world and creating a New Order in which it would have economic, political and military domination, establish a rule of terror and violence and destroy all forms of human freedom, dignity and humanism. Only a few thousand Roma in Germany survived the Holocaust and Nazi concentration camps. Trying to rebuild their lives, after losing so many family members and relatives, and after their property was destroyed or confiscated, they faced enormous difficulties. The health of many was destroyed. Although they have been trying to get compensation for that for years, such requests have been constantly denied Based on established facts, eyewitnesses, witnesses, historical and legal documents, during the Second World War, the crime of genocide against Orthodox Serbs, Jews and Roma of all faiths except Islam was committed. The attempt to exterminate the Roma during the Second World War must not be forgotten. There was no justice for the survivors of the post-Hitler era. It is important to note that the trial in Nuremberg did not mention the genocide of the Roma at all. The Nuremberg trial is basically the punishment of the losers by the winners. This is visible even today because these forces rule the world. Innocent victims, primarily Roma, have not received justice, satisfaction or recognition from the world community. The Roma were further humiliated because they were not given a chance to speak about the few surviving witnesses about the victims and the horrors they survived. The Roma for the Nuremberg International Military Court and the Nuremberg judges simply did not exist, which called into question the legal aspect of the process, which has not been corrected to date. The Roma national community is committed to revising history, to reviewing the work of the Nuremberg tribunal.

This article is devoted to the coverage of a number of major historical and educational projects implemented in recent years by the Russian archivists in the context of the 80th anniversary of the beginning of the Second World War of 1939-1945. Having analyzed the activities of the leading national archives in this area, including their use of modern information technologies and Internet resources, the authors link these projects with discourse of world politics and historiography on the most important factors and causes that resulted in the outbreak of World War II. In connection with heated discussions and disputes on the prerequisites and causes of the Second World War that are escalating among politicians and historians of various countries on the eve of its 80th anniversary, the Russian historians and archivists have done a tremendous job in preparing thematic historical and documentary exhibitions devoted to the most significant (from historical point of view) events that directly affected international relations in the pre-war months. Complex of audiovisual sources, which has been reviewed in this article as a part of historical and documentary exhibitions complex, confirms that it was a complex of factors and events associated with the collapse of the Versailles-Washington system of international relations that led to the outbreak of World War II; but, most of all, the policy of pandering to the aggressive revanchist aspirations of Nazi Germany by the major European powers and concern of the European allies of the USSR for strengthening of its position in international affairs. Introduction of new sources and expansion of documentary base available to general public by means of exhibitions and permanent Internet projects plays a huge role in historical and educational work in general, and in counteraction of falsification of history and of dividing the historical memory of the peoples of the former USSR and the allies of World War II in particular. Finally, it contributes to the consolidation of efforts of the national professional community of historians and archivists and to propagation of dialogue of Russian historians and archivists with their colleagues from near and far abroad.

This story is about a kind of pilgrimage, which is connected to the course of events which occurred in Częstochowa on 22 September 1942. In the morning, the German Captain Degenhardt lined up around 8,000 Jews and commanded them to step either to the left or to the right. This efficient judge from the police force in Leipzig was rapid in his decisions and he thus settled the destinies of thousands of people. After the Polish Defensive War of 1939, the town (renamed Tschenstochau) had been occupied by Nazi Germany, and incorporated into the General Government. The Nazis marched into Częstochowa on Sunday, 3 September 1939, two days after they invaded Poland. The next day, which became known as Bloody Monday, approximately 150 Jews were shot deadby the Germans. On 9 April 1941, a ghetto for Jews was created. During World War II about 45,000 of the Częstochowa Jews were killed by the Germans; almost the entire Jewish community living there.The late Swedish Professor of Oncology, Jerzy Einhorn (1925–2000), lived in the borderhouse Aleja 14, and heard of the terrible horrors; a ghastliness that was elucidated and concretized by all the stories told around him. Jerzy Einhorn survived the ghetto, but was detained at the Hasag-Palcery concentration camp between June 1943 and January 1945. In June 2009, his son Stefan made a bus tour between former camps, together with Jewish men and women, who were on this pilgrimage for a variety of reasons. The trip took place on 22–28 June 2009 and was named ‘A journey in the tracks of the Holocaust’. Those on the Holocaust tour represented different ‘pilgrim-modes’. The focus in this article is on two distinct differences when it comes to creed, or conceptions of the world: ‘this-worldliness’ and ‘other- worldliness’. And for the pilgrims maybe such distinctions are over-schematic, though, since ‘sacral fulfilment’ can be seen ‘at work in all modern constructions of travel, including anthropology and tourism’.

The article deals with the literature textbook published in Augsburg, Germany, in 1946 and entitled “Synopsis of the Lithuanian Literature”. It was edited by a Lithuanian writer and teacher Petronėlė Orintaitė-Janutienė, and its sources included a textbook “The Lithuanian Literature: Part 1”, published in the interwar Lithuania (in 1939) and edited by Motiejus Miškinis. However, Orintaitė-Janutienė emphasized having used the publication by Miškinis only “a little”, while writing all the rest “from the memory”. Therefore, the article aims to elucidate what image of the Lithuanian world this memory-based textbook rendition impressed upon the young person studying at a war refugees’ camp, what support it proposed, and what kind of experience it prepared the young one for. The more detailed analysis focuses on the part from the textbook that briefly outlined the concept of folklore. This choice is grounded in the idea nationalism theory that oral culture bears special significance to the formation of the nationality and development of the national consciousness. The analysis also includes some folklore texts from the literary supplement (also edited by Orintaitė-Janutienė) to the Lithuanian weakly Žiburiai (‘Lights’), published in Augsburg in 1945–1949. The author notes that the outline of the Lithuanian folklore in the textbook and the selection of the folklore samples stemmed from the interwar Lithuanian schooling tradition, but they also reflected reaction to the complicated historical situation, in view of which the national community had to rally and act together, discovering new alternatives for survival. The analyzed material allows the author to conclude that the national consciousness of the Lithuanian student at the DP camp was strengthened by presenting certain past experiences inherited from the ancestors, by fostering the idea of historical continuity, by reviving and cherishing the topographic memory, emphasizing the most important existential attitudes, and listing the culture texts testifying to the Lithuanian national distinction.

Danish archaeology in the shadow of the swastika, 1933-1945 With Hitler’s takeover in 1933 and the emergence of the National Socialist regime, Prehistoric archaeology in Germany was strengthened, both on the economical and the scholarly level. Prehistoric archaeologists entered into a Faustian bargain with the new government, and arguing the presence of Germanic peoples outside the borders of the Third Reich, they legitimated the Nazi “Drang nach Osten”. With the Fuhrer’s lack of interest in German prehistory, the fight for control of this field became a matter between two organisations, the Ahnenerbe, which was attached to Heinrich Himmler’s SS, and the competing Reichsbund für Deutsche Vorgeschichte under NSDAP’s chief ideologist, Alfred Rosenberg’s “Amt Rosenberg” (Figs. 1-2). When the Second World War broke out in 1939, Ahnenerbe appeared as winner of the fight over the German prehistory. However, the archaeological power struggles continued in the conquered territories until the end of the war.Immediately after the Nazi takeover in 1933, leading staff members of the Danish National Museum in Copenhagen, such as Mouritz Mackeprang, Poul Nørlund, and Johannes Brøndsted (Figs. 3-4) dissociated themselves from the political development south of the border. However, in the course of time, and in conformity with the official Danish accommodation policy towards Germany in the 1930s, the opposition changed their attitude into a more neutral policy of cultural adjustment towards Nazified German colleagues.The Danish government’s surrender on the 9th of April 1940 meant a continuing German recognition of Denmark as a sovereign state. From the German side, the communication with the Danish government was handled by the German ministry of foreign affairs in Berlin, and by the German legation in Copenhagen. Denmark was the sole occupied country under the domain of the ministry of foreign affairs, and from the beginning of the occupation it became a regular element in the policy of the ministry to prevent other political organs within the Nazi polycracy to gain influence in Denmark. Not until the appointment of SS-Gruppenfuhrer Werner Best (Fig. 5) as the German Reich Plenipotentiary in Denmark in November 1942, the SS and the Ahnenerbe got an opportunity to secure their influence in Denmark. However, due to the chilly attitude in the Danish population towards the German culture propaganda, practiced mainly through the German Scientific Institute in Copenhagen, and the gradual worsening of the political conditions following the resignation of the Danish government on the 29th of August 1943, the Ahnenerbe, led by Wolfram Sievers (Fig. 6), was never firmly established in Denmark. The one result of Ahnenerbe’s influence in Denmark worth mentioning was the effort by the Kiel Archaeologist Karl Kersten (Fig. 7) to prevent German destruction of prehistoric Danish (Germanic) relics. Kersten began his work in 1940 and was met from the start with aversion from the National Museum in Copenhagen, which regarded the activities of the Ahnenerbe-archaeologist as German interference with Danish conditions. Yet, in time the work of the Kiel archaeologist was accepted and recognised by the muse- um, and he was officially recognized by the Danish state when in 1957, Kersten was made Knight of Dannebrog.Less successful than the Ahnenerbe rival was the prominent Nazi archaeologist Hans Reinerth (Fig. 8) and the efforts by Reichsbund für Deutsche Vorgeschichte to gain influence on the Danish scene of culture politics. One of Reinerth’s few successes in occupied Denmark was a short contact with two Danish archaeologists, Gudmund Hatt and Mogens B. Mackeprang (Figs. 9-10). However, the connections with the RfDV-leader do not seem to have been maintained, once the Danish government had ceased to function from the 29th of August 1943.During the occupation, around 300 listed burial mounds and an unknown number of prehistoric relics below ground level were destroyed or damaged due to construction projects carried out by the German occupants (Figs. 11-12). The complaints about the damage put forward by the National Museum were generally met by understanding in the German administration and in the Bauleitung (construction department), whereas the Wehrmacht had a more indifferent approach to the complaints. As opposed to this, the Danish museums managed to get through the war with no damage or German confiscations worth mentioning, thus avoiding the fate of museums, collections, and libraries in countries such as France, Poland, and the Soviet Union.Lars Schreiber PedersenÅrhusTranslated by Annette Lerche Trolle

Alexander Bakulev was born in the village Nebankovskaya Vyatka province. He studied first at the parish school, and then at the Vyatka theological Seminary. In 1911 he entered the medical faculty of Saratov University. In 1918, he passed the exams for a doctor's degree ahead of schedule and remained in the hospital surgery clinic of the University. In 1926 A. N. Bakulev entered the residency at the Department of surgery of the 2nd Moscow medical Institute. In 1928 he successfully defended his thesis and was sent for a one-year internship in Germany. For the first time in the domestic practice, he proposed the introduction of radiopaque substances in the brain tissue, a method of ureteral transplantation, improved methods of x-ray examination of vessels, kidneys and ureters, developed methods of plastic esophagus (1935), surgery on the biliary tract, methods of surgical treatment of peptic ulcer, for the first time in the world surgically eliminated the fixation of the heart muscle to the heart bag with pericarditis, developed new methods of treatment of brain abscesses. A. N. Bakulev is considered a pioneer of intubation anesthesia in the USSR, the founder of thoracic and radical pulmonary surgery. He performed a successful lobectomy for chronic abscess (1938) and lung actinomycosis (1939). In 1943 A. N. Bakulev became head of the Department. During the great Patriotic war A. N. Bakulev - front, and then chief surgeon of the evacuation hospitals of Moscow, head of the surgical Department of the hospital medical and sanitary Department of the Kremlin. He successfully removed a lung from a patient with chronic suppurative process (1945), for the first time carried out a successful operation in nezaradene known to inhibit the Bayou (1948), have developed a method comissurotomy. In 1949, A. N. Bakulev was awarded the Stalin prize (1949). He was the first to impose an anastomosis between the superior Vena cava and pulmonary artery, performed surgery for aneurysm of the thoracic aorta, created a technology of heart operations in hypothermia, for the first time in the world he began to operate on children suffering from congenital heart defects. In 1955 on the initiative of A. N. Bakuleva was established Institute of thoracic surgery (now the Institute of cardiovascular surgery. A. N. Bakuleva), the first Director of which he became. Among his developments can be noted the method of electrocardio-stimulation, intended for the treatment of heart rhythm disorders, a method of plasty of coronary vessels in acute myocardial infarction. In the mid-fifties A. N. Bakulev lays the foundations of shunting operations on the vessels of the heart. In 1957 he was awarded the Lenin prize. In 1959 A. N. Bakulev performed a successful operation for valvular stenosis of the pulmonary artery. In 1958, the scientist was elected a full member of the USSR Academy of Sciences. From 1953 to 1960 President of the USSR Academy of Sciences. A. N. Bakulev was awarded three orders of Lenin, the order of the red banner of Labor and the red Star, was awarded the highest international award of surgeons the award "Golden scalpel". On March 31, 1967, Alexander Bakulev died suddenly from cardiac arrest and was buried at Novodevichy cemetery. In memory of Alexander Nikolaevich in 2005, a documentary film "the Key to the heart" was shot in front of the Institute of cardiovascular surgery named after A. N. Bakulev monument to the scientist, and the building a plaque.

Canon and oblivion. The memorials of archaeologyThe article takes its point of departure in the sun chariot; the find itself and its find site at Trundholm bog where it was discovered in 1902. The famous sun chariot, now at the National Museum in Copenhagen, is a national treasure included in the Danish “Cultural Canon” and “History Canon”.The find site itself has alternated bet­ween experiencing intense attention and oblivion. A monument was erected in 1925; a new monument was then created in 1962 and later moved in 2002. The event of 1962 was followed by ceremonies, speeches and songs, and anniversary celebrations were held in 2002, during which a copy of the sun chariot was sacrificed.The memorial at Trundholm bog is only one of several memorials at archaeological find sites in Denmark. Which finds have been commemorated and marked by memorials? When did this happen? Who took the initiative? How were they executed? Why are these finds remembered? What picture of the past do we meet in this canon in stone?Find sites and archaeological memorials have been neglected in archaeology and by recent trends in the study of the history of archaeology. Considering the impressive research on monuments and monumentality in archaeology, this is astonishing. However, memorials in general receive attention in an active research field on the use of history and heritage studies, where historians and ethnologists dominate. The main focus here is, however, on war memorials. An important source of inspiration has been provided by a project led by the French historian Pierre Nora who claims that memorial sites are established when the living memory is threatened (a thesis refuted by the many Danish “Reunion” monuments erected even before the day of reunification in 1920).Translated into Danish conditions, studies of the culture of remembrance and memorials have focused on the wars of 1848-50 and 1864, the Reunion in 1920, the Occupation in 1940-45 and, more generally, on conflicts in the borderland bet­ween Denmark and Germany.In relation to the total number of memorials and public meeting places in Denmark, archaeological memorials of archaeology are few in number, around 1 % of the total. However, they prompt crucial questions concerning the use of the past, on canon and oblivion.“Canon” means rule, and canonical texts are the supposed genuine texts in the Bible. The concept of canon became a topic in the 1990s when Harold Bloom, in “The Western Canon”, identified a number of books as being canonical. In Denmark, canon has been a great issue in recent years with the appearance of the “Danish Literary Canon” in 2004, and the “Cultural Canon” and the “History Canon”, both in 2006. The latter includes the Ertebølle culture, the sun chariot and the Jelling stone. The political context for the creation of canon lists is the so-called “cultural conflict” and the debate concerning immigration and “foreigners”.Canon and canonization means a struggle against relativism and oblivion. Canon means that something ought to be remembered while something else is allowed to be forgotten. Canon lists are constructed when works and values are perceived as being threatened by oblivion. Without ephemerality and oblivion there is no need for canon lists. Canon and oblivion are linked.Memorials mean canonization of certain individuals, collectives, events and places, while others are allowed to be forgotten. Consequently, archaeological memorials constitute part of the canonization of a few finds and find sites. According to Pierre Nora’s thesis, memorials are established when the places are in danger of being forgotten.Whether one likes canon lists or not, they are a fact. There has always been a process of prioritisation, leading to some finds being preserved and others discarded, some being exhibited and others ending up in the stores.Canonization is expressed in the classical “Seven Wonders of the World”, the “Seven New Wonders of the World” and the World Heritage list. A find may be declared as treasure trove, as being of “unique national significance” or be honoured by the publication of a monograph or by being given its own museum.In practice, the same few finds occur in different contexts. There seems to be a consensus within the subject of canonization of valuing what is well preserved, unique, made of precious metals, bears images and is monumental. A top-ten canon list of prehistoric finds from Denmark according to this consensus would probably include the following finds: The sun chariot from Trundholm, the girl from Egtved, the Dejbjerg carts, the Gundestrup cauldron, Tollund man, the golden horns from Gallehus, the Mammen or Bjerringhøj grave, the Ladby ship and the Skuldelev ships.Just as the past may be used in many different ways, there are many forms of memorial related to monuments from the past or to archaeological excavations. Memorials were constructed in the 18th and 19th centuries at locations where members of the royal family had conducted archaeology. As with most other memorials from that time, the prince is at the centre, while antiquity and archaeology create a brilliant background, for example at Jægerpris (fig. 2). Memorials celebrating King Frederik VII were created at the Dæmpegård dolmen and at the ruin of Asserbo castle. A memorial celebrating Count Frederik Sehested was erected at Møllegårdsmarken (fig. 3). Later there were also memorials celebrating the architect C.M. Smith at the ruin of Kalø Castle and Svend Dyhre Rasmussen and Axel Steensberg, respectively the finder and the excavator of the medieval village at Borup Ris.Several memorials were erected in the decades around 1900 to commemorate important events or persons in Danish history, for example by Thor Lange. The memorials were often located at sites and monuments that had recently been excavated, for example at Fjenneslev (fig. 4).A large number of memorials commemorate abandoned churches, monasteries, castles or barrows that have now disappeared, for example at the monument (fig. 5) near Bjerringhøj.Memorials were erected in the first half of the 20th century near large prehistoric monuments which also functioned as public meeting places, for example at Glavendrup, Gudbjerglund and Hohøj. Prehistoric monuments, especially dolmens, were also used as models when new memorials were created during the 19th and 20th centuries.Finally, sculptures were produced at the end of the 19th century sculptures where the motif was a famous archaeological find – the golden horns, the girl from Egtved, the sun chariot and the woman from Skrydstrup.In the following, this article will focus on a category of memorials raised to commemorate an archaeological find. In Denmark, 24 archaeological find sites have been marked by a total of 26 monuments (fig. 6). This survey is based on excursions, scanning the literature, googling on the web and contact with colleagues. The monuments are presented chronological, i.e. by date of erection. 1-2) The golden horns from Gallehus: Found in 1639 and 1734; two monu­ments in 1907. 3) The Snoldelev runic stone: Found in c. 1780; monument in 1915. 4) The sun chariot from Trundholm bog: Found in 1902; monument in 1925; renewed in 1962 and moved in 2002. 5) The grave mound from Egtved: Found in 1921; monument in 1930. 6) The Dejbjerg carts. Found in 1881-83; monument in 1933. 7) The Gundestrup cauldron: Found in 1891; wooden stake in 1934; replaced with a monument in 1935. 8) The Bregnebjerg burial ground: Found in 1932; miniature dolmen in 1934. 9) The Brangstrup gold hoard. Found in 1865; monument in 1935.10-11) Maglemose settlements in Mulle­rup bog: Found in 1900-02; two monuments in 1935 and 1936. 12) The Skarpsalling vessel from Oudrup Heath: Found in 1891; monument in 1936. 13) The Juellinge burial ground: Found in 1909; monument in 1937. 14) The Ladby ship: Found in 1935; monument probably in 1937. 15) The Hoby grave: Found in 1920; monument in 1939. 16) The Maltbæk lurs: Found in 1861 and 1863; monument in 1942. 17) Ginnerup settlement: First excavation in 1922; monument in 1945. 18) The golden boats from Nors: Found in 1885; monument in 1945. 19) The Sædinge runic stone: Found in 1854; monument in 1945. 20) The Nydam boat: Found in 1863; monument in 1947. 21) The aurochs from Vig: Found in 1904; monument in 1957. 22) Tollund Man: Found in 1950; wooden stake in 1968; renewed inscription in 2000. 23) The Veksø helmets: Found in 1942; monument in 1992. 24) The Bjæverskov coin hoard. Found in 1999; monument in 1999. 25) The Frydenhøj sword from Hvidovre: Found in 1929; monument in 2001; renewed in 2005. 26) The Bellinge key: Found in 1880; monument in 2003.Two monuments (fig. 7) raised in 1997 at Gallehus, where the golden horns were found, marked a new trend. From then onwards the find itself and its popular finders came into focus. At the same time the classical or old Norse style of the memorials was replaced by simple menhirs or boulders with an inscription and sometimes also an image of the find. One memorial was constructed as a miniature dolmen and a few took the form of a wooden stake.The finds marked by memorials represent a broader spectrum than the top-ten list. They represent all periods from the Stone Age to the Middle Ages over most of Denmark. Memorials were created throughout the 20th century; in greatest numbers in the 1930s and 1940s, but with none between 1968 and 1992.The inscriptions mention what was found and, in most cases, also when it happened. Sometimes the finder is named and, in a few instances, also the person on whose initiative the memorial was erected. The latter was usually a representative part of the political agency of the time. In the 18th and 19th centuries it was the royal family and the aristocracy. In the 20th century it was workers, teachers, doctors, priests, farmers and, in many cases, local historical societies who were responsible, as seen on the islands of Lolland and Falster, where ten memorials were erected between 1936 and 1951 to commemorate historical events, individuals, monuments or finds.The memorial from 2001 at the find site of the Frydenhøj sword in Hvidovre represents an innovation in the tradition of marking history in the landscape. The memorial is a monumental hybrid between signposting and public art (fig. 8). It formed part of a communication project called “History in the Street”, which involved telling the history of a Copenhagen suburb right there where it actually happened.The memorials marking archaeological finds relate to the nation and to nationalism in several ways. The monuments at Gallehus should, therefore, be seen in the context of a struggle concerning both the historical allegiance and future destiny of Schleswig or Southern Jutland. More generally, the national perspective occurs in inscriptions using concepts such as “the people”, “Denmark” and “the Danes”, even if these were irrelevant in prehistory, e.g. when the monument from 1930 at Egtved mentions “A young Danish girl” (fig. 9). This use of the past to legitimise the nation, belongs to the epoch of World War I, World War II and the 1930s. The influence of nationalism was often reflected in the ceremonies when the memorials were unveiled, with speeches, flags and songs.According to Marie Louise Stig Sørensen and Inge Adriansen, prehistoric objects that are applicable as national symbols, should satisfy three criteria. The should: 1) be unusual and remarkable by their technical and artistic quality; 2) have been produced locally, i.e. be Danish; 3) have been used in religious ceremonies or processions. The 26 archaeological finds marked with memorials only partly fit these criteria. The finds also include more ordinary finds: a burial ground, settlements, runic stones, a coin hoard, a sword and a key. Several of the finds were produced abroad: the Gundestrup cauldron, the Brangstrup jewellery and coins and the Hoby silver cups.It is tempting to interpret the Danish cultural canon as a new expression of a national use of the past in the present. Nostalgia, the use of the past and the creation of memorials are often explained as an expression of crisis in society. This seems reasonable for the many memorials from 1915-45 with inscriptions mentioning hope, consolation and darkness. However, why are there no memorials from the economic crisis years of the 1970s and 1980s? It seems as if the past is recalled, when the nation is under threat – in the 1930s and 40s from expansive Germany – and since the 1990s by increased immigration and globalisation.The memorials have in common local loss and local initiative. A treasure was found and a treasure was lost, often to the National Museum in Copenhagen. A treasure was won that contributed to the great narrative of the history of Denmark, but that treasure has also left its original context. The memorials commemorate the finds that have contributed to the narrative of the greatness, age and area of Denmark. The memorials connect the nation and the native place, the capital and the village in a community, where the past is a central concept. The find may also become a symbol of a region or community, for example the sun chariot for Trundholm community and the Gundestrup cauldron for Himmerland.It is almost always people who live near the find site who want to remember what has been found and where. The finds were commemorated by a memorial on average 60 years after their discovery. A longer period elapsed for the golden horns from Gallehus; shortest was at Bjæverskov where the coin hoard was found in March 1999 and a monument was erected in November of the same year.Memorials might seem an old-fashioned way of marking localities in a national topography, but new memorials are created in the same period as many new museums are established.A unique find has no prominent role in archaeological education, research or other work. However, in public opinion treasures and exotic finds are central. Folklore tells of people searching for treasures but always failing. Treasure hunting is restricted by taboos. In the world of archaeological finds there are no taboos. The treasure is found by accident and in spite of various hindrances the find is taken to a museum. The finder is often a worthy person – a child, a labourer or peasant. He or she is an innocent and ordinary person. A national symbol requires a worthy finder. And the find occurs as a miracle. At the find site a romantic relationship is established between the ancestors and their heirs who, by way of a miracle, find fragments of the glorious past of the nation. A paradigmatic example is the finding of the golden horns from Gallehus. Other examples extend from the discovery of the sun chariot in Trundholm bog to the Stone Age settlement at Mullerup bog.The article ends with a catalogue presenting the 24 archaeological find sites that have been marked with monuments in present-day Denmark.Jes WienbergHistorisk arkeologiInstitutionen för Arkeologi och ­Antikens historiaLunds Universitet

This article scrutinizes the assumption that friends support each other in times of war. Picking up the notion that solidarity, or ‘other-help’, is a key feature of friendship between states, the article explores how states behave when a friend is attacked by an overwhelming enemy. It directs attention to the trade-off between solidarity and self-help that governments face in such a situation and makes the novel argument that the decision about whether and how to support the friend is significantly influenced by assessments of the distribution of material capabilities and the relationship the state has with the aggressor. This proposition is supported empirically in an examination of Sweden’s response to its Nordic friends’ need for help during the Second World War – to Finland during the 1939–1940 ‘Winter War’ with the Soviet Union, and to Norway following the invasion of Germany from 1940 to 1945.