2 comments about Shadows of Treblinka.

1. Compared with other books on Treblinka escapees, this one, serially written by Miriam and Saul Kuperhand (hereafter MK and SK), is a disappointment. Written decades after the events (p. vii), it contains obvious misstatements and non-objectivity. Thus, the AK was disbanded in 1945, not 1939 (p. xiii). The Polish Army held out for five weeks in 1939, not two (p. 15). MK frivolously accuses some assailants of belonging to the AK (p. 76). Indeed, editor Alan Adelson admits as much (p. xiii).
   
   The accounts of Treblinka itself contain whoppers. SK describes the deportation of Siemiatycze's Jews (including himself), in November 1942 (pp. 104-105), to Treblinka, where the dead were promptly cremated (p. 105; which SK claims to have seen with his own eyes: p. 137). Pointedly, the cremations at Treblinka (both previously-buried and newly-killed) didn't begin until early 1943, some 2-3 months later! Elsewhere, SK speaks of Treblinka's crematories (p. 109, 140) and crematoria chimneys (p. 110, 137). In actuality, there never were any crematories or chimneys at Treblinka! (Bodies were burned in massive open-air pyres).
   
   Do the foregoing inaccuracies imply the fictionalization of much of this book? Let the reader decide.
   
   MK denies widespread Jewish-Communist collaboration, yet makes the following revealing statement: "I had no compunctions about cooperating with our Russian occupiers." (p. 16), despite the fact that: "I did not understand the precariousness of our situation with the Nazis just a few kilometers away." (p. 16). MK expresses dismay over the Poles' 1941 cheering of the invading Nazis into Soviet-occupied Poland (p. 21), without mentioning that this was their (temporary) deliverance from the Gulags.
   
   It would be a mistake to think that fugitive Jews resorted to thievery and armed robbery of Poles only when they had no other means of getting provisions. Indeed, a band of Treblinka escapees immediately threatened a farmer at gunpoint (p. 130), and waylaid individual farmers who were transporting goods (pp. 132-133). On another occasion, the Jewish band held a farmer hostage (p. 153). Given such events, and as word got around, is it surprising that some Polish peasants came to see fugitive Jews as adversaries rather than victims? And to believe German propaganda that portrayed fugitive Jews as bandits who should be denounced or liquidated?
   
   MK repeats the familiar Polonophobic accusation of Polish Jew-hunters being much more common then Polish benefactors (p. 51). This has been disproved by careful studies (e. g., Paulsson, Chodakiewicz).
   
   The accounts of Poles denouncing and killing fugitive Jews, reported by both Kuperhands (e. g., p. 46, 50-51,156), are unmistakably secondary. Hearsay! Their only eyewitness experience of such a comparable incident was at the hands of common criminals (smugglers) of unidentified nationality (pp. 65-67).
   
   Let's focus on two anti-Polish accounts. SK, who was housed by peasant Anthony Shlewanowsky, reports that Shlewanowsky had warned him about a nearby peasant, Maximiuk, who allegedly took some Jews in, fed them and built a shelter for them, and, that very night, suffocated them in their shelter (pp. 140-141). Did Shlewanowsky know this for a fact? Why go to the trouble of feeding some Jews, and especially constructing a shelter for them, only to turn around and kill them? And is it probable that a near-surface rustic shelter was so airtight that it could be used to asphyxiate its inhabitants? Peasants are good storytellers. What if Maximiuk (who, BTW, sounds Ukrainian), just made up this lurid tale in order to scare Jews away from his property? Ditto for the story, told by one Polish farmer, of another Polish farmer who was said to have turned-in his Jewish-butcher friend (p. 50).
   
   Now consider the tale of a Jewish mother and children in the forest, being denounced by a Pole, begging for life and then pleading to be allowed to cover her children with a blanket before they were all shot by a German (pp. 149-150). One of her sons, a ten year-old, away from the hideout at the time, spotted the Germans and ran away. How could he have seen and heard such details (including the Polish ethnicity of the denouncer) if he was already at a safe distance and running further away? Assuming he simply heard Polish being spoken, how could he know that the denouncer was not a Polish-speaking Ukrainian or German (Volksdeutsche)?



2. This book is a double account of escaping death during the Holocaust in Poland by a couple that is now married. Before these two met, they each had their own horrifying adventures of survival in the Polish countryside as well as in Treblinka. It is well written and a great source of information about what happened in the cities and towns after the Jews were evacuated, how escaped Jews survived in the woods and how the local Poles signed the Jews death warrants by violence and informing. A touching account of desperation and survival during the worst of times. This book leaves you feeling the sting of hunger, hate and abandonment as well as love, redemption and personal triumph.

No comments about Maus: A Survivor's Tale Part II (Maus).

2 comments about Love in the Tempest of History: A French Resistance Story.

1. The author is the daughter of two French resistance figures of World War II. Her father was a French naval captain who divorced at mid age and married a young Polish Jew living in Paris. When the French gave up and signed an armistice, this captain wanted to fight on and joined the Resistance. Rather than escaping to London where he could have served in the Free French Navy as a high officer, he serves as a resistance figure and climbs to the head of a cell. He is then tortured and shot with his wife just before the liberation of much of France. It is a sad tale.
   This is a short book, and as the previous reviewer notes, makes these heroes come to light with all their positive and negative characteristics. I feel I was reading something very personal when I read this book. Since the original book was in French, perhaps the translator did not do a great job in the translation. This is why I rated it only three stars. Also, a more detailed description of the aftermath could have been done describing how the daughter was adopted by her uncle and what happened to the Leitner family children.



2. Let's get a couple of things straight.

   1) Little of the story has to do directly with the French Resistance.

   2) This is still a vital, interesting and perhaps even historically important work.

   Ms. Yung-de-Prevaux, in a notable work of journalistic digging, resurrected her deceased parents in a monument to their heroism during the war.

   Through her work, they live and breathe again as people, not dusty historic figures, but people with desires, wants, frustrations and faults, who, seeing their country overrun by barbarians, chose to fight and die together rather than submit to their conquest.

   Their actions in organizing and operating a major resistance information-gathering cell covering the Mediterranean coast, undoubtedly saved the lives of thousands of troops and helped with the eventual liberation of Europe.

   Tragically, Aude never new her parents except through her research, and equally tragically they were executed mere days from liberation.

   This book is the account of their lives, and, as such, is better documented for the period before the war--but then, so much of what was done by resistance and special forces has never and probably never will come to light, having been taken to the grave by those heroes who performed these actions.

   What we are left with, is a picture of these two very human people, their lives before the war and how these fairly ordinary extraordinary people came to make the choices they did to risk (and lose) everything for the sake of others.

   Like so many heroes, they died mostly unknown by and unappreciated by those for whom they died. Thanks to their daughter, their worth is now more publicly known.

1 comments about The River Of Angry Dogs: A Memoir.

1. As gripping and moving a book as you will ever read.
   A truly extraordinary and emotional work. I had to pinch myself when I finished reading the book to remind myself where I was.

2 comments about Tomorrow Will Be Better: Surviving Nazi Germany.

1. This is an honest, unflinching memoir written by a Christian German who was sent to prison and later two Nazi concentration camps as a teenager for rebellious behavior during World War II. People interested in this subject and time period will appreciate the detail with which Meyer tells his story. He also does an excellent job of capturing the essence of his adolescent personality and outlook during those long-gone days. One editorial review complained that there was not enough explanation of how he felt at times (for example, while leaving his homeland, Germany, after the war), but his emotions at that point are self-explanatory to any reader who has been paying attention. For example, he was tortured and almost killed by the Nazi government of his "homeland", so by the time he left, he was not exactly sentimental about it. It is also fascinating to read about the outlook of his family members and friends; it gives the reader an idea of what Nazi Germany was like from an "Aryan" German perspective. The Other Victims: First-Person Stories of Non-Jews Persecuted by the Nazis (Sandpiper) , Hitler Youth , Swing Kids , Sophie Scholl - The Final Days



2. Walter Meyer's memoir, Tomorrow Will Be Better: Surviving Nazi German, speaks out to inform the world that the horrors of the Holocaust were not an exclusively Jewish experience but that it also included Hitler's own German people as well as other non-Jews. Many scenes that the author details have been chronicled many times in books and documentaries about the Holocaust, but these are familiar to the world as exclusively a Jewish nightmare. Meyer informs the world that this is a misconception. His voice helps to create a more complete picture of atrocities suffered by "millions of humans," not at the hand of the enemy, but by his very own government. Meyer reminds the world that Hitler was brutal in his quest to eliminate "any opponent of the Third Reich, regardless of race, religion, or nationality."

   Meyer was arrested during World War II and, after botched escape attempts, sent to the Ravensbrueck Concentration Camp, where his weight declined to eighty pounds and he contracted tuberculosis. Realizing that if he didn't escape, death was certain, he devised a plan, and survived by sheer determination.

   Meyer has been a resident of Austin, Texas, since 1963. He earned doctorates in History and Philosophy of Education, Psychology and Human Sexuality, was Assistant Director of the University of Texas' Center for International Education, and taught languages as well as philosophy. He has represented a number of Texas Governors as Ambassador of Good Will. He served as an interpreter to President Lyndon Johnson, and painted His Holiness Pope John Paul II on commission.

   This book was a finalist in the Nonfiction Category of the Ninth Annual Austin Writers' League Violet Crown Book Award and honored with a Special Citation for Nonfiction in 1999.

1 comments about Never Despair: Sixty Years in the Service of the Jewish People and of Human Rights.

1. In 194 a counsel in the Geneva office of the World Jewish Congress sent the first notice of the 'Final Solution' affecting Jewish peoples in Europe - it was known as the Riegner Telegram and while it was a pivotal point in his career, it by far wasn't the only memorable point in his life. This biography surveys the life of a middle-class Jewish family in Germany and tells how Riegner fled Hitler's rise and worked for the World Jewish Congress all his life thereafter, sponsoring many key programs. Any interested in Jewish history in general will find NEVER DESPAIR: SIXTY YEARS IN THE SERVICE OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE NAD THE CAUSE OF HUMAN RIGHTS to be essential reading.
   
   Diane C. Donovan
   California Bookwatch

1 comments about Narrow Escapes: A Boy's Holocaust Memories and Their Legacy.

1. if I was to describe "Narrow Escapes". In fact, I believe that the pain and sorrow that Holocaust survivor Dr. Samuel P. Oliner faced as he tried to escape from the horrible claws of Adolph Hitler during the Second World War, could never be described. The horrors that he faced are too great for words. The most piercing fact in this book is that the war stories in it are not the stories of a man but the ones of a SMALL CHILD who was forced to become a man much faster than lighting and in the most afflictive situations.

   This book is a must read because we all must know the truth about the history of the human race. I strongly believe that every one of us is responsible for what happens today and must keep in mind the future of next generations. Dr. Oliner says, "knowledge of the past may somehow avert similar future...those who remember the past will do all they can to prevent its recurrence."

   This book broke my heart way before the Germans came to Zyndranova, the little village near Czecholovakia, when Little Oliner's mother got sick and he was only six-years old. It was at this time that he began to make sense of his world. After his mother's death he exclaims, "My mother is dead. But that is only for a short time, isn't it?" And like if his mother's death was nothing, his father takes him away from his love ones, into another village, in the house of male strangers. It was there, all alone, that he held a job at the age of seven while he went to school. Could you imagine your own child in this situation? Although Oliner doesn't mention in his book, I believe that these agonizing situations were only preparing him for what was to come when the Nazis arrived. These situations were his training ground to face the monster that would take over the land and his people. But the hardships of times and the warmth of his family brought the best out of him. And his fight has not ended yet.

   The rest of the story is for you to read in suspense but mostly in deep grief. As I read the book, I often felt glad that the child who was facing all the hardships of the Holocaust was not my sixteen year old son. In fact, I thought about my son the entire book. But the sad part is that although he was not my son, he was the son of another woman. In a war, my child or the child of another woman or man is the same. It brings pain. Being forty years old I have learn that it is a thousand times better to die in the face of injustice that to live in silence before it.

1 comments about Who Loves You Like This.

1. This is a horrifying personal account of a young girl's experience of the holocaust. She tells her story in direct and unadorned language, simply relating each experience as it occurred. We watch her childhood stripped from her and her belief in humanity almost broken. But Bruck observes her experiences with an acute and truthful eye - she speaks the unspeakable, revealing how under the worst human conditions, kindness and love so rarely shine through. We are faced with unpalatable truths about how close to the surface our savage natures lie. This book should be read for its uncompromising honesty, and the extraordinary story it tells.

No comments about The Burning Generation.

5 comments about The Strange Death of Heinrich Himmler: A Forensic Investigation.

1. This book presents a compelling argument to suggest that Heinrich Himmler did not, in fact, commit suicide in the hands of the allies.
   
   The author, while questioning the official story of Himmler's death, is unable to form any conclusions regarding Himmler's fate because much of the evidence is either under seal until 2045, or 1945. However, the author does more than enough to bring into doubt the old, tired story about Himmler's fate.



2. One thing is for certain, Himmler is a man of multiple contradictions and this is one of the first books to show that. The more that comes out of the archives as time passes shows a man who was not dull or stupid, riding up on Reinhard Heydrich's coattails; but a man who had amazing cunning and a remarkable sense of self preservation. Perhaps he did snap at the end of the war and foolishly walked into British hands and say 'Here I am', but I have always found that rather hard to believe. I found Thomas's arguements and research interesting; I don't know if I believe all of it, but I think it's about time someone questioned what happened at Himmlers suicide.



3. I received the "Himmler conspiracy" book as a gift and struggled through most of it; my only surprise was that it is even worse than I had imagined. The book is poor research, poor forensic science, and not even very good conspiracy pulp.

   There are numerous sources on Himmler's death that the author has failed to mention, obviating the troublesome necessity of refuting them. Even a cursory glance at the debriefings of Himmler's SS assistants who were with him shortly before his arrest, for example, attest to his intent to take his own life if made prisoner. The author similarly ignores myriad statements from British and German individuals, military and civilian, who were present at the various stages of Himmler's arrest, suicide, and eventual internment.

   Beyond the weak "research"-- much of it apparently relying on translations rather than primary source materials since the author does not read German (?)-- is the central question of motivation.

   Why would the British or the Allies acquiesce in such a ruse? To avoid embarassment at having "negotiated" with Himmler during the war's final stages? Rubbish! The Western Allies used plenty of ex-Nazis to counter the Soviet threat, from the technicians of Werner von Braum's shop to intelligence assets like Himmler's erstwhile svengali Walter Schellenberg. Some of these associations were unsavory, but neither London nor Washington has ever been overly reluctant to acknowledge them given the uncertain and dangerous period in which they were forged.

   Himmler had nothing to offer the Allies after the war. He would have been far more useful in the prisoner's dock at Nuremburg than as an intelligence asset. And to suggest that Himmler took up captaincy of an Odessa-like werewolf organization pushes the bounds of credulity to the limit.

   For readers interested in leading Third Reich personalities who did escape justice and went on to lead interesting and unusual lives, try bios of Josef Mengele, Adolf Galland, Otto Skorzeny, or maybe the Flemish Nazi leader, Leon de Grelle. But as for Himmler-- not really the most interesting Nazi in any case-- leave the conspiracy theories well enough alone!




4. At least the first 25 or 30 pages of this book are spent 'examining' the personality of Heinrich Himmler.
   The author offers no new insights into the Reichsfuhrer, he falls back on old suppositions and translations of books. Most notably he relies on the translations of Himmler's diaries. Personally, I have no respect for a 'serious' researcher who likes to state as fact something that he hasn't translated for himself.

   His portrait of Himmler's personality is the same old 'brilliantly scheming monster' that we've all seen before. It is dull and uninteresting, and falls back on old legends and anecdotes about Himmler without really touching on what kind of person he may have been. Granted, this isn't a biography, but still, a more objective presentation might have been a reasonable alternative.

   My biggest problem, though (and this is with just the first 30 pages) is the fact that the author basically shoots himself in the foot right from the start. He runs hot and cold between Himmler being not especially intelligent, then decides that the man WAS intelligent, then goes back and decides that he wasn't, and so forth.

   Clearly Himmler was an organizational genius, but if the author isn't willing to give Himmler credit for being at least semi-bright, how in the world does he expect the reader to believe the level of quick thinking and long-term planning that he goes on to describe?

   Beyond that, for a forensic expert, the author certainly has some antiquated ideas of post-mortem physiological happenings. I was initially very excited to pick up this book, but I lost my appetite before I even hit a double-digit page number, and was ready to throw the book into the street before I hit a three-digit page number.

   Ultimately, the reader will have to decide for his or herself whether or not the book is good, but I wouldn't recommend it unless you're very, very bored and are ready to have to swallow poor writing and research and half-baked theories and evidence.




5. Regardless of speculation based on such circumstantial material as whether hair grows or not after death or what eyeglasses Himmler preferred, Thomas' theory that the No. 2 Nazi survived the war comes down to one question: whose body did British Intelligence conceal in an unmarked grave in May 1945? According to the author, the dental assistant who worked on Himmler until November 1944 did not recognize the teeth shown in the British autopsy report as belonging to the suicide identified as Himmler. The author presents a convincing case that the SS Reichsfuhrer was no suicide. If so, this book --- which shows the Nazis had business dealings with British & American intelligence agencies, US-based multinational corporations and European aristocracy that amounted to treason --- may prove of particular interest to conspiracy "buffs" who see disturbing parallels, if not outright linkage, between the rise of fascism in Germany and America under the "neo-cons."