What perspectives do Michael Bess and Richard Overy bring to studying World War II?
In Choices Under Fire Michael Bess explores the dimensions and perspective of morality in the time of war. Bess delves into moral choices made by soldiers, civilians, and all levels of government officials from the Allies to the Axis powers. We will see the stark reality of how war can change a person and expose parts of ourselves that we never thought possible. He also wants the reader to better understand and contemplate how these moral decisions impacted the course of the war and postwar era. He asks the difficult moral questions that challenge the moral clarity and high ground that we tend to view the World War II with. Richard Overy begins Why the Allies
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He uses people’s personal stories and moral choices as a lens to tell the story of World War II. From these stories, he draws common themes and traces their impact on the war, and the impact on society postwar. On page 13 he talks about using two different hats in which to use in our historical observance while reading his book. The first is, “the stance of celebration: the imperative one feels to recapture vividly the drama, sacrifice, and extraordinary achievement that culminated in allied victory.” This stance is how we tend to usually view the war. (Bess 13) The second hat is called, “the stance of scrutiny: the imperative one feels to reconstruct the full story of what happened as accurately as possible.” (Bess …show more content…
In the East, Germany pulverized the Soviet Union’s four-million-man army in a matter of months, and by October, as Soviet documents now show, Stalin was contemplating capitulation. In Asia, Japan seized the oil fields of Borneo with ease, clobbered the British at Singapore, and was poised to sweep American forces out of the Pacific.”
Are their works complementary or at odds?
I found the two books to complement one another. They both desire to challenge the illusion of World War II but in different ways, Bess does it through a moral lens while Overy seeks to convey through facts, how close the allies came to not winning the war. Each book forces the reader to ask difficult questions of themselves and their beliefs of the war prior to beginning the book. I found that so far the books support one another in terms of overall themes. I have not found anything that puts them at odds.
Is one perspective more valid than the other?
I do not think that one perspective is more valid than the other. I believe that they are both equally important in having a healthy nonbiased view of the events of the war. A blend of both perspectives will give an individual the most educated and dogmatic take away of the war that shaped our modern world. There is a saying that
Still today, the allies decision to not bomb the Nazi death camp Auschwitz is discussed and questioned. One side claims that it was a huge failure, as well as a show of how much the allies actually cared for the jews, while the other argues that it was a much more complex decision; and that ultimately, the war effort had to be diverted elsewhere in order to defeat the nazis. The many different arguments and pieces of evidence on both sides make one wonder exactly how such a difficult decision should be made, especially under such pressure, and what should be prioritised in war. In this circumstance, the allies chose to put their efforts elsewhere; which one side claims ended the war quicker, rather than committing the symbolic act of attacking
“Between 70 and 85 percent, depending on the State, People willingly put their lives at risk to save the life of someone unknown to them.” Congressional Record, V. 148, PT. 13. Within The Greatest Generation, Tom Brokaw talks about the “sacrifices” made by the men and women of the “World War II generation”. Although some people, like Brokaw, find these actions as born into and the praised sacrifices unique to this generation of Americans today.
Unmaking War, Remaking Men by Kathleen Barry Submitted by: ARPIT SAGAR (OT Code-B51) Kathleen Barry is a feminist activist and a sociologist. Her first book launched an international movement against human trafficking. In this book namely Unmaking War Remaking Men; she has examined the experiences of the soldiers during their training and combat as well as that of their victims using the concept of empathy. She explains how the lives of these men are made expendable for combat.
A MESSAGE TO GARCIA This book exemplifies what a Marine or any service member can truly be capable of with a great set of ethics. It shown service members that even in the face of fear anything can be accomplished; as well as, explained to civilians that these qualities can be used in an everyday basis. "A Message to Garcia" by Elbert Hubbard is based on an actual event in the Spanish-American War. The book is primarily about Lieutenant Andrew Rowan and his perseverance and obedience to all orders given even in the face of fear and other obstacles in his path.
They might die the next day, or a second later, this fear crushed them down and made them tremble and burst into tears. Fathers, boyfriends, and brothers left their lovings behind and headed to the bloody zone with firm and cold face. They attached their nation’s flags on their hearts and confronted the enemies with murderous weapons, not knowing that their enemy might also be one of the people who were forced to leave their families. Men had to kill the other men unwillingly. August 15, the seventieth anniversary of the World War 2, is coming up and it reminds people the history of this war.
In the book Fallen Angels Walter Dean Myers tells the story of soldiers who struggles with a problem involving what is right and wrong in war. Fallen Angels set in Vietnam during the Vietnam war, the story introduces the main character Perry, who faces obstacles, including death and killing. The author’s use of literary devices, specifically imagery, irony, and metaphors convey the theme warfare often forces soldiers to reconsider their traditional notions of right and wrong. The author employs imagery to express the theme that warfare often forces soldiers to reconsider their traditional notions of right and wrong.
Things I Carry The things I carry to school are to ease my job everyday. I carry my backpack so it could hold all my other materials which I need to carry. I carry extra pencils in case of loss of my actual pencil. One day in January, my mechanical pencil ran out of lead during a math test, and I had to waste five minutes to get another pencil.
The book The Best War Ever, by Michael C. C. Adams, is about World War II, the events that led up to the war, and the years following the war. Adams starts the book off explaining some myths that people have about the war. The biggest myth associated with the war is that it was the best war ever. Adams then spends the rest of the book talking about why this may or may not be true. In the following chapters, Adams explains the events that led to the war and the events that accorded during World War II.
Throughout the ages, wars have wreaked havoc and caused great destruction that lead to the loss of millions of lives. However, wars also have an immensely destructive effect on the individual soldier. In the novel All Quiet on the Western Front written by Erich Maria Remarque, one is able to see exactly to what extent soldiers suffered during World War 1 as well as the effect that war had on them. In this essay I will explain the effect that war has on young soldiers by referring to the loss of innocence of young soldiers, the disillusionment of the soldiers and the debasement of soldiers to animalistic men. Many soldiers entered World War 1 as innocent young boys, but as they experienced the full effect of the war they consequently lost their innocence.
The obligation a citizen feels to serve their country is a common sentiment. Despite this presumed duty resulting in countless deaths of men and women, many still make the brave decision to enlist themselves during a war. This can be attributed to how those who serve their country’s military are touted as courageous, selfless and heroic. Timothy Findley’s “War” follows the tragic story of a young boy named Neil growing up during World War II. Neil finds himself in a difficult situation upon learning that his father has enlisted himself in the army.
War is the graveyard of innocence for boys who become men through the loss of humanity. The book “Fallen Angels,” by Walter Dean Myers, is a story about Richard Perry, a young man who mistakenly joins the Vietnam War to avoid the shame of not going to college. As the book goes on Perry discovers his mistake and in the process, not only loses his innocence, but also his humanity. Wars will always be the dark parts of our history and no war is devoid of horrors that can strip anyone of everything they are, and in war soldiers must use coping mechanisms to deal with these very apparent horrors.
In his book, A Higher Call, Adam Makos provides the readers with information on how even though their were many conflicts and hardships between the enemies during World War II, there was a chance that there were good men on both sides of the war. Adam Makos is a journalist, historian, and editor of Valor, a military magazine. Throughout his whole life he has been attached to what went on during World War II. When he was younger, him and his friends wanted to be journalists one summer and started up a magazine that eventually took off. The main purpose of the magazine was very similar to this book and its meaning.
In my essay I will be talking about how war re-defined morality, the conversation between good and evil, his coward-ness, his relationship with the soldiers, and finally his understanding of why the war started. War changes the definition morality. The soldiers used to
In the short story, “On the Rainy River” by Tim O’Brien, the author develops the idea that when an individual experiences a feeling of shame and humiliation, they often tend to neglect their desires and convictions to impress society. Tim, the narrator, starts off by describing his feeling of embarrassment, “I’ve had to live with it, feeling the shame”, before even elaborating on the cause of the feeling. Near the end of the story, he admits he does not run off and escape to Canada because it had nothing to do with his, “mortality...Embarrassment, that’s all it was”. The narrator experiences this feeling of intense shame and then he decides that he will be “a coward” and go to war. His personal desire is that he wishes to live a normal life and could never imagine himself charging at an enemy position nor ever taking aim at another human being.
I find Ho Chi Minh’s letter far more persuasive than Lyndon B. Johnson’s. Using ethos, pathos, and logos, he forms a solid argument that supports Vietnam’s stance on the war. He appeals to one’s emotions by expressing the injustices faced by his people, writing, “In South Viet-Nam a half-million American soldiers and soldiers from the satellite countries have resorted to the most barbarous methods of warfare, such as napalm, chemicals, and poison gases in order to massacre our fellow countrymen, destroy the crops, and wipe out villages.” Words such as “massacre” and “barbarous” highlight the severity of these crimes, and invoke feelings of guilt and remorse in the reader. Chi Minh uses ethos to support his logos, or logical, views on the