p. 965-974

On the book's perspective in general: I was struck anew by how much World War II was (and is) seen as a battle between good and evil. The Allies are good: they hold out against the forces of darkness, their will cannot be broken. The inspiring picture on p.950 (also here) seems to me to show a bias towards the British people, illustrating their resilient spirit and refusal to give in. The Allies always fight courageously against the advancing Nazis and towns are "liberated." I wonder how much this portrait is over-simplistic. We want to believe that the British are only honorable fighters, to have heroes in this devastating war. The Nazis were monsters and killed millions more than the Allied powers, but we forget too easily the atrocities committed by the other side: the Dresden bombing, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Both events were because of similar reasons to those used by the Axis powers, namely, terror. The killing of civilians cannot be justified on either side, and I think perhaps this war should be less the war that America loves to remember and more the war where we feel shame for our part in jump-starting nuclear warfare.