I have watched the entire Tom Hanks-narrated series on the second World War. You can find it on Apple TV or I believe the History channel. Unfortunately it doesn’t appear to be getting high viewership. It would be useful for everyone to watch it, to understand these seminal events around much of the world. There is a lot of footage that I had not seen before. History is important to understand and form a view of because it allows an understanding of what causes human societal conflict, human societal success and human societal decline. What the history of World War II should teach us is that societies are prone to being taken over by authoritarian demogogues who prey on our worst instincts; that we are at root still deeply tribal; that our judgment about likely outcomes in conflicts is not great; that societies that respect individual freedom and rely on free market economics are not likely to start conflicts, but are likely to win them; that humans can be enormously courageous and self-sacrificing; that humans can be incredibly brutal to other humans and commit the most barbaric acts imaginable.
The number of people simply murdered by the Germans, the Russians, the Japanese during the war was astounding. And the worst lesson of all that should have been learned is that there is no peace without attempting to ensure that surviving societies are democratic, freedom respecting and have free market economies. Leaving eastern European countries at the mercy of Russia was a horrible mistake, that cost trillions of dollars and left hundreds of millions of people subject to the whims of dictators in the Kremlin with no freedom and a declining standard of living. That could have been avoided, but war fatigue existed in the US.
The lessons for today should be obvious. You must always have the strongest military. Barbarians like Putin and the mullahs in Iran cannot be appeased in any way. They must be met with overwhelming force; that is all they will understand. But we don’t seem to have learned that lesson. Successive presidents have in fact attempted to appease Putin. Successive presidents ignored what was going on in Iran. We are already too late with North Korea, which sooner or later will commit some barbaric act. Does China really respect our willingness to defend free countries?
If you didn’t watch the documentary, I encourage you to do so; you will find it compelling.
three excellent books on the geopolitical issues of WW2
Stalin’s War: A New History of World War II
Book by Sean McMeekin
The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won
Book by Victor Davis Hanson
A third book has a good history of hitlers rise to power that remains relevant
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
Book by William L. Shirer
Most WW2 books deal with the actions on the battlefield. The first two deal with the broader geopolitical events and effects.
Kevin writes “The lessons for today should be obvious.”
Most every one on the left praises the JCPOA and condemns Trumps withdrawal from the JCPOA during his first term. Yet the ones on the left who praise the JCPOA forget the lessons of the Munich “peace in our time”.
The parallels should be obvious.