Historical Bits & Pieces 1930s-1950s

[Art Eatman]

Every now and then I run across some honest soul whose knowledge of history betrays the effects of "modern wisdom".  Not a "fault" issue, of course.  With the anniversary of Hiroshima, some thoughts come to mind about that era.  This ain't gonna be perfect, and some stuff is real rusty after 50 or 60 years...Use Google to check me out on some stuff...

A point to remember from the 1930s is that good and loyal Americans believed that the Great Depression was an indicator that Capitalism had failed.  FDR's Keynesian econmics touting in the media didn't help, what with the call for government intervention in money matters.  Many patriotic people were led to believe that Communism was a viable economic system.  This led to an over-supply of sympathy for Russia, particularly after the Nazi attack.

Research into atomic power was quite busy in the 1930s.  Search on names like Fermi, for instance.  IIRC, the first "chain reaction", or achievement of a critical mass, was at the lab at Soldier's Field in Chicago.  1939?  I'm weak on the specific date.

We, the Germans, and to a lesser extent the Russians were striving for a nuclear device as a weapon of war.  Germany was using Deuterium Oxide (H30?) or "heavy water" in their work; it was produced in Norway, and the destruction of the plant there seriously hindered their efforts.

Stalin's folks had a dual effort going:  Do research on the A-Bomb, and steal all the secrets from us that they could.  The agents played on the sympathies of US folks who didn't understand that Stalin's talk of "World Peace" and "Parity with the West" was BS.    Search on Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, e.g.

At the end of WW II, the Russians stripped Germany of any and all machinery they could haul back to Russia.  Same for any other eastern European countries.  And gold and art treasures.  Roaches with guns.

The Communists moved into control of eastern Europe, creating the "Iron Curtain" as Churchill named it.  Tito had avoided fighting the Germans; that was led by Mikhalovic--who Tito slandered, mock-trialed in kangaroo court, and killed.  That gave control of Yugoslavia to the Communists.  Similar events occurred throughout the region.

Mao Tse Tung had kept his fighting force pretty well out of the warring with Japan, and the late 1940s saw his expansion of power in China.  That culminated in his takeover of the whole country in 1949.  North Korea also was Communist dominated, with the partition line of the 38th parallel set as the boundary with South Korea.

The creation of the Iron Curtain began to make it obvious that the Russian Empire was not just a defense effort on Stalin's part--although Russian paranoia is understandable in light of the number of invasions of that country throughout history.  They are a highly xenophobic people.

Truman and his people then instituted a policy of "containment" of the Empire.  This was seen to be far more desirable than any effort to invade and conquer Russia.  It also allowed a more gradual buildup over time to circumscribe the Empire and allowed efforts to use propaganda, military aid and foreign civilian aid to stave off the spread of Communism.

And this period thus saw the beginnings of what's known as the Cold War.  It came about as a western response to the Communist effort at world domination.  It led to NATO, among other things, as well as the SEATO treaty which got us into Vietnam.

The summer of 1950 saw the North Korean invasion of South Korea.  The US got the UN to be the lead element in the recapture, with US and British forces being the main force.  Nominal units from Communist-hating countries like Turkey also took part.

Going out to supper.  More later, etc.  Think of questions you might have, and I'll try to answer...

Art

[Iain]

Have us young uns been showing off what we have haven't learned yet?

Tell me about the Cuban missile crisis. My parents are in their fifties and obviously are English, their memories are probably a little different to yours. Still, mother remembers thinking that the world was minutes away from ending.

A close friend lost her father last year. He was 89, she is now 20. He knew a few things about a few things that he had to sign some papers to say he wouldn't talk about. Some interesting and pertinent stuff from what I gather.

[Sylvilagus Aquaticus]

Have a look at your local (used) bookstore for Richard Rhodes' The Making of the Atomic Bomb.  It's the best work I've read on the work that culminated in the development of American nuclear armament.

Enrico Fermi was only one of the principles in creating the first artificially sustainable nuclear reaction at Stagg Field on the University of Chicago on December 2nd, 1942. The first pile was built of uranium oxide pellets and graphite blocks with a cadmium salt solution hanging above the pile as a backup safety system to hopefully halt a runaway reaction.


For a brief overview, plus Dr. Fermi's own words on it, have a look here.

http://hep.uchicago.edu/cp1.html

(edited to add) and here as well.

http://www.worldwar2database.com/html/atombomb.htm

Regards,
Rabbit.

[Art Eatman]

"Cuber", as JFK called it.

There's no doubt that (Fulgencio?) Batista was a no-good SOB as dictator of Cuba.  There was little sympathy for him (aside from the Mafia) as Castro's revolution came to power in 1959.  And, at first, it wasn't obvious that Castro was a dictatorial Communist SOB in his own right.  It was not until his inner circle "stole" the revolution and murdered the nationalist revolutionaries that people really understood his evil.

The Communist takeover meant that the Cuban economy went totally to garbage.  By buddying up to Stalin, Castro got some three to four billion dollars per year worth of support.  In return, the USSR got an outpost 90 miles from Key West.  A locale for spies and for radio monitoring, etc.  

During 1961/1962, the Russians moved missiles into Cuba.  They naturally claimed they hadn't.  The construction work of the missile sites was touted as "structures for defensive capabilities".

During 1962, U2 flights photographed the sites in detail.  The photos were shown in the UN and proved to the world that the Russians were lying.  JFK declared an embargo on Cuba.  The US Navy set out to enforce the embargo.  A Russian freighter with missiles on board was pretty much "shouldered" off course and sent away from Cuba.  The Russians caved in, and withdrew their missiles (so far as is known).

Yeah, times were tense for a few months, but it was Kruschev who blinked, not JFK.

Art

[Sylvilagus Aquaticus]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deuterium



Edward Teller came up with the idea of adding tritium to a nuclear explosion to create an more energetic device.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tritium


Regards,
Rabbit.

[Art Eatman]

Thanx.  Like I said, I'm culling a lot of this stuff out of memory.  I knew it was a stadium in Chicago...

The 1930s brain drain of people escaping the Nazis made a helluva difference in a lot of the technology developed during the WW II era.  After the war we then got folks like Werner von Braun.

Art

[Sylvilagus Aquaticus]

You're welcome. Particle physics is an area of interest to me.  Thanks for starting the thread, Art.

We can thank Fascism in the 30's for the likes of Fermi, Szilard, Teller, Bethe, Einstein, and (unfortunately) Fuchs.

[K Frame]

Uhm....

OK.

Point on the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Kennedy himself precipitated the movement of missiles into Cuba by backing (sort of) the invasion at the Bay of Pigs.

It was a fiasco of monumental proportions.

It also pushed Castro firmly into the Soviet camp. He really had no desire to be under the Soviet sphere of influence. He wanted close ties to the United States, but on CUBAN terms, not on the terms dictated by Dole, Bananaco, Hersheys, etc., with a corporate puppet (Batista) in place as the titular head of state.

Tito may have been a Communist, but he was by no means a true friend of the Soviet Union. He continually bucked Stalin's insistence that he toe the Soviet line, and never accepted membership in the Warsaw pact.

Mao kept the Chinese Communists out of the war with Japan because it was part of a brokered peace (largely forced on Chaing Kai Shek by the United States). Chaing's army had already driven the Communists far into the interior, but instead of fighting the Japanese, Chaing was more interested in fighting the Communists. The United States forced the deal by telling Chaing that the only way he'd maintain US supplies to fight anyone was by fighting the Japanese.

[Monkeyleg]

Art, you have a few years on me, but not that many.

I don't go searching for historical reading, but do remember what happened, and read about the media-celebrated anniversaries of those happenings.

JFK was an untested president with regard to world politics, and Khrushchev thought he could outmaneuver him.

From everything I've read, heard and remember about the Cuban Missile Crisis, it all came down to who would blink first. And, at the last moment, I think that both JFK and Khrushchev realized the implications were not exactly what they were hoping for.

The Kennedy administration quietly removed the short-range missles and listening posts that our country had placed in Turkey, all part of the negotiations to end the crisis. I don't remember what Khrushchev gave up publicly, but both sides got to back away saving face.

I just read today an op-ed piece written by the man who almost single-handedly delivered our defeat in VietNam, Walter Cronkite. He cited various converatives from the 1940's who opposed Truman's decision to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Those quotes are beyond dispute, just as are the quotes of many of those same people opposing our entry into a war with Germany or Japan  in the first place.

Here's the problem I have with the anti-nukes crowd, and the Hiroshima apologists: yes, we killed more Japanese civilians with two bombs than we killed during several conventional night-time raids.

The US and Britain burned Dresden to the ground, killing more civilians and leveling more buildings than probably any war had ever witnessed. And the Germans did much the same to London.

So, it took a few nights, versus one night. Isn't that very much like the argument against "assault weapons?" That someone using an Evil Black Rifle with thirty rounds can fire thirty rounds without reloading? Well, what if he can fire ten rounds, reload, fire ten, reload, fire ten, reload, ad nauseum? What's the difference?

The difference, at least with regard to nukes, is the now-famous "shock and awe" phrase. Japan was ready to withstand a traditional assault. They weren't ready for the new firepower the US had created.

Cronkite, and others, have long suggested that the US should have shown the Emporer and his military leaders a demonstration prior to the actual bombings. As if that would have persuaded them to surrender, when just as many lives and just as many buildings were burned during previous conventional carpet-bombings.

My guess is that the Japanese military didn't know if we had just two of these bombs, or two thousand.

But that's beside the point.

Cronkite and his ilk have suggested that the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings were especially noteful because they targetted not just military installations, but indiscriminately targetted civilians as well.

Cronkite has obviously not read his history. The Germans used imprecise air bombing in WWI, resulting in civilian casualties. The US, Britain, and other countries were quick to follow the German tactics.

But what of our own Revolutionary War, where not only were civilian targets indiscriminate, but also often deliberate? Or Sherman's march to the sea, when his soldiers torched the homes of everyone in their path?

Let's set aside the "US is always wrong" arguments, though. What about the Boer wars, the British war in India, and any number of other wars in the last hundred or so years? Were civilians not killed then?

Sadly, I've forgotten the better part of my World History classes. But I cannot remember a war in which civilians were at best collateral damage or, at worst, direct targets. Refresh my memory, please.

On a more comical note (black comedy, really), there was a letter to the editor many months back complaining about our use of "precision-guided weapons" in Iraq. The letter writer thought that it was inhumane to be able to prescisely target and kill enemy combatants with these new weapons.

Honestly, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when I read that letter. All I thought about was how many Americans and Brits and Aussies and Canadians might still be alive had we possessed such weapons in 1944.

But I'd sure like to put that woman in the same room with Walter Cronkite and let them iron out a new war policy.

[Monkeyleg]

Mike, you're somewhat right about the Bay of Pigs. That operation was in the planning stages before JFK took office. However, I have little doubt that JFK didn't know about it in advance. If he didn't, his intelligence staff was incompetent.

During the 1960 presidential election, JFK kept beating the drum about how the Soviets were ahead of us in missile technology, and the number of missiles on hand. Nevermind that what JFK was saying was false.

JFK had exactly the same intel that Nixon had. Nixon couldn't comment on JFK's campaign-stop slams, because it was classified information. JFK should not have made those comments, yet he did.

As for Castro: maybe he was a Commie, or maybe he wasn't. But he sure didn't waste any time seizing private businesses in the name of Cuba. Champion of the People, or El Presidente for Life? You tell me.

[Art Eatman]

No doubt that the Bay of Pigs was a fiasco.  I'm not so sure about Castro's notions, though.  He and his folks killed too many nationalist Cubans in order to have his Communist Party in total control.

Tito's method of gaining power is what has always struck me as representative of Communist methodology.  I grant he was much less of a puppet than others.

Certainly the 1950s were turbulent times.  After my stint of occupation duty in S. Korea, 1954/1955, I wound up at the HQ of the US European Command in Paris.  TS clearnace; documents control clerk.  (Small whee.)  Suez and Hungarian crises.  Multi-star generals sweating ICBMs and suchlike relaxation.

Mao was pretty savvy about "The Art of War".  Chiang's forces initially were stronger, which led to the 10,000 li march, the Long March.  "When the enemy is strong and you are weak, hide.")  We may have pushed Chiang into fighting the Japs instead of Mao, but in 1942/1943 we needed all the help we could get from anyone, anywhere.  "One war at a time, please."

Shifting emphasis to manufacturing capabilities, consider that the U.S. supplied its own forces, allied European forces including Russia, as well as China.  The rate of production of such things as Liberty Ships and airplanes is mind-boggling when one thinks of the lengthy periods required in today's world--at much lesser rates of production...

Another drift:  Consider oil spills and environmental effects.  The east coast of the US was well coated with gasoline, diesel and crude due to Nazi submarine efforts against tankers.  Yet, the fishing continued to be pretty good there...

, Art

[Monkeyleg]

Art: "The east coast of the US was well coated with gasoline, diesel and crude due to Nazi submarine efforts against tankers.  Yet, the fishing continued to be pretty good there..."

If I can make a suggestion: olive oil is better for your heart and cholesterol.

[K Frame]

"He and his folks killed too many nationalist Cubans in order to have his Communist Party in total control."

What, you mean the nationalist Cubans who wanted a return to the policies of the Batista era, when approximately 2 to 4 percent of the population controlled nearly 90% of the arable land in Cuba (often at the behest of the large corporations) and nearly 95% of the wealth?

Those are the kinds of nationalists who needed killing.

The life of the agrarian population in Cuba before the revolution was very reminiscent of that of Russian serfs -- virtual slaves to the land owners.

Castro's revolutionary movement struck a cord with the people for a simple reason -- it sounded one hell of a lot better than the status quo.

That's also one of the major reasons why the supposed populist uprising against Castro that would be triggered by the Bay of Pigs invasion never materialized.

Castro's revolution didn't become a Socialist revolution until it became very clear that the United States was actively seeking Castro's overthrow after the Bay of Pigs invasion, and it wasn't until 1965 that Castro became secretary (leader) of the Cuban Communist Party.

[telewinz]

Had we "attempted" to invade Cuba, it most certainly would have lead to our defeat.  Unknown to us, the Russians also had tactical nuclear missiles in Cuba and the Russian technicians had preauthorization to use them.  Our invasion fleet and troops never would have survived long enough to reach the beaches of Cuba.

[Iain]

Monkey -

Was there not something to be said for some positive personal relations between JFK and Krushchev? Can't remember where I read that, but it was suggested that the two of them got along as well as could be expected given the circumstances.

My twopenneth on the Cold War, or more post-Cold War.

I'm old enough to remember the Wall coming down, I'm old enough to remember Caecaescu being shot. Old enough to remember and old enough to think that these were good things.

My generation is questioning a lot of Cold War actions though. From my perspective some pacts were made with evil to fight evil. How did it look at the time?

[Art Eatman]

Regrets that I didn't make myself more clear, Mike.  By "nationalists" I meant those in the Revolution against Batista who were not Communists.

What Castro did in Cuba was repeated by Ortega in Nicaragua.  That is, join into a popular revolution against a dictator.  Work into a leadership position by virtue of aid from the USSR or its allies.  After the revolution is successful, kill all the non-Communists leaders who fought alongside.  The North Vietnamese did this to some extent to the VC leadership after the fall of Saigon.  The reason is obvious:  Get rid of trained revolutionaries who might disagree with post-victory policies.

The U.S. problem throughout all those years was that we'd jump into bed with any tinpot dictator who claimed to be anti-Communist.  That put us on the wrong side in many an honest revolution--said revolution then leading to a "People's Democratic Republic of BatGuano".

Monkeyleg, I always sorta figure that dead's dead.  How it happened isn't all that important when you're talking about war.  Remember after Desert Storm when there was a brief Leftish gripe about our smothering of Iraqi soldiers in bunkers?  People actually were horrified that enemies were smothered; somehow it might have been better had they been shot or blown up by high explosives.  Duh.

Art

[Iain]

To be honest I agree with Art, dead is dead. The atomic thing is largely about the use of the 'most powerful' or 'deadliest' weapon. I've got here a book which contains some eyewitness accounts of both Hiroshima and Dresden, and there is no great difference in how horribly people died. The estimates are that between Hamburg, Darnstadt and Dresden around 80-90,000 people were killed, some melted into asphalt.

Apparently prior to the big bombings of Germany, Churchill once turned to the Australian Minister and said 'Are we monsters? Are we taking this too far?'

In some ways there are some parallels between this work I have here (Jonathan Glover's 'A moral history of the 20th century') and David Grossman's 'On Killing' in as much as they both talk about distance being an enabling factor in mass killing during war. The pilots of bomber command were bombing Germany, not shooting at children, the Enola Gay pilots were likewise bombing Japan not shooting at children. Perhaps this is partly why suicide bombers shock us so much, they stare into the faces of their innocent victims and do it anyway.

Since WWII, and during the Cold War we accepted the concept of collateral yet further, we knew that if it came to exchanging blows with the USSR then countless numbers would die, and they would not all be military, in fact the proportion of military deaths to civilian deaths would be even 'worse' than it was during WWII. A little too readily? Not that there was ever a 'Golden Age' of military-only conflict with no civilian casualties.

[Art Eatman]

SFAIK, one of the first times (in relatively modern times) of organized military attack on civilian targets was in the US Civil War.  Most notable was Sherman's "March to the sea".

Most civilian problems during times of war prior to that was from armies living off the land as they marched.  This was not an actual military assault, although deaths, rape, looting and starvation commonly ensued.  This was not systematic and ordered by the generals.

[Iain]

How was Paris anyway?

You've already made a comment about tinpot dictators in response to my question about all that. How was all this portrayed by the government, in the media? Was anything really that different than our 'alliances' with the House of Saud and suchlike are today? Or did it make more sense because of a wider ideological conflict?

My friends father who I mentioned earlier was under Philby at Bletchley and knew Burgess well. Those seem like very distant days already.

[Monkeyleg]

Iain, from everything I've read, Khrushchev regarded Kennedy as an inexperienced rich kid. At least he did at the time of the missile crisis. I can't remember exact quotes; I'll have to look them up.

Sometimes it's hard to look at the Cold War and understand why it went on. Looking back, though, it's clear that the Soviets wanted to take us down.

Art: "dead is dead." Very true, although the bleeding hearts always seem to take issue with the method, and not the results. Reminds me of that scene in "All in the Family" when Gloria gets all upset that two-thirds of homicides are committed with guns, and Archie says, "would it make you feel better if they was pushed outta windows, little goil?"

[K Frame]

Monkeyleg,

"As for Castro: maybe he was a Commie, or maybe he wasn't. But he sure didn't waste any time seizing private businesses in the name of Cuba. Champion of the People, or El Presidente for Life? You tell me."

You mean after attempting to broker a deal with the major foreign corporate land holders to compensate them for land that would be returned to Cuban control?

After the corporations refused (backed by the United States government) Castro signed the seizure orders. It's very interesting, though, that Castro's government offered to compensate the foreign companies for the land which had, originally, been seized from Cuban nationals themselves after the American government supposedly "liberated" Cuba from Spanish rule.

I've had this discussion a number of times over the years with people who claim that Castro's nationalization of foreign owned land was anti-capitalist. The only problem is, capitalism didn't exist in Cuba in the years prior to Castro. As I mentioned earlier, it was more akin to pre-revolutionary Russian serfdom.

I think it's very interesting that the recent Supreme Court decision that allows emminent domaine seizure of land in this country is so roundly decried by some of the same people who scream bloody murder about Castro reseizing corporate land to return it to Cuban control.

[Sylvilagus Aquaticus]

(quote from Art) "The U.S. problem throughout all those years was that we'd jump into bed with any tinpot dictator who claimed to be anti-Communist.  That put us on the wrong side in many an honest revolution--said revolution then leading to a "People's Democratic Republic of BatGuano"."

Cordell Hull  brought up the epithet "He may be a sonofabitch, but he's our sonofabitch" referring to Trujillo.


As such, to wit- an example of US foreign policy within the Western Hemisphere, ca. the mid 20th Century.

http://www.jlhs.nhusd.k12.ca.us/Classes/Social_Science/Latin_America/Dominican_Republic.html

Regards,
Rabbit.

[K Frame]

"Regrets that I didn't make myself more clear, Mike.  By "nationalists" I meant those in the Revolution against Batista who were not Communists."

Many of those individuals were against Batista only because they themselves were Batistaites who wanted the kind of power that Batista had enjoyed (read massive corruption) but had been shut out of the process.

They only wanted a change in leaders -- they didn't want a change in government or system, and certainly not reforms of the kind that might permanently shut them out of "Batista Bucks."

"What Castro did in Cuba was repeated by Ortega in Nicaragua.  That is, join into a popular revolution against a dictator.  Work into a leadership position by virtue of aid from the USSR or its allies."

Except that Castro didn't come into power with the backing of the Soviet Union.

Remember, Castro, not long after consolidating power, visited the United States. He met with Richard Nixon (Ike snubbed him). Nixon reported that while Castro was naieve, he was certainly not a Communist, and should be supported by the US. Even the US had gotten to the point where it was very tired of Batista, and didn't at all mind him being removed from power. That's why Batista never received US aid in fighting Castro or the other rebel groups.

It wasn't until after Castro tried to purchase the land from the American companies, and was rebuffed, that he seized foreign assets, at which time the United States withdrew any potential for support, and Castro slowly turned to the Soviet Union as a hedge against a US invasion.

[Guest]

"As for Castro: maybe he was a Commie, or maybe he wasn't. But he sure didn't waste any time seizing private businesses in the name of Cuba. Champion of the People, or El Presidente for Life? You tell me."

During the Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961, Castro finally declared his revolution "Socialist," and in December of that year he declared himself  "a lifelong Marxist-Leninist!" Cuba was now officially Communist.


"You mean after attempting to broker a deal with the major foreign corporate land holders to compensate them for land that would be returned to Cuban control?"

He confiscated all U.S. properties on the Island,  5,911 businesses worth $2 billion worth, along with most property and businesses owned by Cubans.  The Cuban's property was ALREADY under Cuban control - just not HIS control!  Within three months of his entry into Havana, Castro's firing squads had murdered an estimated 600-1,100 men and boys, and Cuba's jails held ten times the number of political prisoners as under Fulgencio Batista, who Castro overthrew with claims to "liberating" Cuba.

[Art Eatman]

Iain, in 1956/1957, Paris was a bunch of fun and good times.  This was before DeGaulle got back into power, and the Senat had (essentially) quit and gone home.

Jean Behra owned the AAT bar not far from the Arc de Triomphe, and I'd have a drink there and be goggle-eyed at folks like Moss and dePortago and others.  I found a cellar club on  the Left Bank with folk music (and was called an "Existensilista" one night) with a resident musician named Frank Schildt.  Frank was from Holland; he now lives in NYC.  A flaming socialist of the Pete Seeger variety.

I told my mother I hung out between two churches; Sacre Couer and Notre Dame.  (Pigalle is in between.)

Back the dollar was king.  Even at the bar at the George V hotel, a scotch and water was only a buck--which was high for the average European billfold.  

I remember that during the filming of "The Young Lions" I was wandering down the Champs Elysee on late Sunday morning and encountered Dean Martin.  He looked like death warmed over; his famous bags-under-the-eyes more resembled steamer trunks.  I guessed he'd had more than enough fun the night before and probably was returning from who knows where.  Needless to say, I spoke not a word.

I and a bunch of guys from Camp des Loges got into a stock car racing deal.  Roundy-round on about a 1/8th-mile dirt track.  Team racing "bumper car" style with tired junk; US vs. French.  The track was located in a predominantly Communist section of Paris.  They'd stand up for the Marseillaise and sit down for the Star Spangled Banner.  No matter the finish order; a Frenchman always won.  However, the second year, folks remained standing throughout both anthems, and we could win if we finished first.  We got lunch, lotsa wine, and $28.50 to do the deal each Sunday.  Even were on French TV!

My crowd mostly motorcycled or had TR-3s and Austin Healeys.  We wandered all over western Europe.  I discovered a hazard of the French Riviera:  A beautifully-filled bikini will create instability in a motorcycle...

It was a great time to be young, alive and ignorant...

, Art