Book Description
From the author of the widely acclaimed King Leopold's Ghost comes the taut, gripping account of the world's first grass-roots human rights movementthe fight to free the British Empire's slaves. In early 1787, twelve mena printer, a lawyer, a clergyman, and others united by their hatred of slaverycame together in a London printing shop and, combining fiery devotion with cool practicality, began one of the most brilliantly organized campaigns of all time. Masterfully stoking public opinion, the movement's leaders pioneered a variety of techniques used by citizens" movements ever since, from consumer boycotts to posters and lapel buttons to celebrity endorsements. A deft account of the precipitous rise of this popular crusade and its fierce, powerful enemies, Bury the Chains delivers all the drama, sweep, and surprise of Hochschild's previous histories.
Customer Reviews:
change is possible.......2007-06-21
Beginning in 1555 and lasting for 350 years, the British empire bought, sold, and enslaved about 11 million African people. This required some 35,000 voyages along the so-called triangular trade route: buying slaves from African slave traders along the continent's west coast, depositing their human cargo mainly in the Caribbean to work on Britain's sugar plantations but also to ports from Quebec to Chile, and then returning to England with imports for the empire. At the end of the 18th century slavery was hardly unusual; it was the rule for most peoples and places on earth. What was unusual was that in the space of about fifty years Britain outlawed the slave trade, and then a while later slavery itself (abolition was one thing, genuine emancipation another).
How did the unthinkable happen? How did an economic system that was so deeply embedded, so profitable, and so taken for granted as normal by almost everyone, disappear so swiftly? Hochschild describes the abolition movement as "one of the most ambitious and brilliantly organized citizens's movements of all time." Many of the political means that we enjoy today were perfected back then-- investigative journalism into the real conditions of slave life, sugar boycotts, 519 petitions to the British parliament with 390,000 signatures, public debates, media campaigns, and every day activism. Progressive women's groups far ahead of their time, missionaries (despised by the plantation owners), British evangelicals, Methodists, and especially the culturally marginal Quakers all provided principled moral argument. The herculean efforts of Thomas Clarkson, the parliamentary leadership of William Wilberforce, and the legal advocacy of the eccentric Granville Sharp were essential.
But Hochschild is careful to avoid the paternalism of self-congratulatory, aristocratic benevolence. After all, when all was said and done, it was the slave-owning planters who were reimbursed for their "losses" by the British government and not the slaves. Whenever possible he allows the slaves to speak for themselves, like the remarkable Olaudah Equiano, whose 500-page best-selling autobiography Interesting Narrative provided a first person narrative of what is still considered the best account of slave life (and is still available today); and Quobna Ottobah Cugoano's Thoughts and Sentiments on the Evil and Wicked Traffic of the Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species. He describes at great length the numerous slave revolts in which fearless and skilled leaders like Toussaint L'Overture led slaves to free themselves and force the British to face reality, however reluctant they were to do so. In these violent and vicious revolts the most beleaguered people on earth defeated the world's two greatest military powers, France and Britain, in Haiti and Jamaica.
Bury the Chains joins Hochschild's previous book King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa (1999) about Belgium's plunder of the Congo. The stories are depressing but inspiring, for however dark these histories, however deep our national complicity, the narratives remind us that we are nor fated to accept injustice to our fellow human beings. Whether in Iraq or Darfur, whether with malaria or HIV-AIDS, the abolition of slavery reminds us that effective movements of genuine social justice are possible.
How a group of activists changed the world.......2007-05-07
Hochschild tells the story of how a small group of Quakers, Anglicans and Methodists brought about the end of the slave trade. It is a story of enormous moral courage against an accepted, and economically powerful interest, and also the story of great organizational skill. The product boycotts, public opinion campaigns, demonstrations and political pressure that the campaigners invented at the end of the eighteenth century are still the mainstays of civil society. It is a wonderful irony that Napoleon's reintroduction of slavery in the French empire was the final, clinching argument for its abolition in the English one.
Useful but one-sided study of the abolition of slavery.......2007-04-12
The British Empire, so praised by our current rulers, was at root a slave empire, held together by slave-trading between slave colonies. Between 1660 and 1807, British-owned ships carried 3.5 million Africans, 40,000 a year, across the Atlantic, more than any other country carried. British property owners were the world's chief slavers.
The British ruling class, not the nation, owned the slave ships, the slaves and the plantations. British workers did not control their own labour power, never mind own other people. William Cobbett noted that in 1832, "white men are sold, by the week and the month all over England. Do you call such men free, on account of the colour of their skin?" Black chattel slavery and white wage slavery were parts of the same system.
The abolitionists ignored the eighteen-hour-days worked by children in Bradford's mills. They backed the laws that attacked trade unions and suspended Habeas Corpus. They funded their foreign philanthropy by increasing the exploitation of their white slaves at home. The trade unionist Oates said, "The great emancipators of negro slaves were the great drivers of white slaves. The reason was obvious. The labour of the black slaves was the property of others. The labour of the white slaves they considered their own." As the Derbyshire Courier noted, "We make laws to provide protection to the Negro: let us not be less just to the children of England."
Bronterre O'Brien wrote, "What are called the working classes are the slave populations of the civilized countries." From birth, they were mortgaged to the owners of capital and land, only nominally owning their own labour power, forced into wage slavery. Britain's property owners extracted far more profit from their 16 million wage slaves than from their million chattel slaves. O'Brien again, "We pronounce there to be more slavery in England than in the West Indies ... because there is more unrequited labour in England."
The empire was based on exploiting wage slaves and used the free movement of goods, capital and labour to extend its exploitation. The wars of the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries were fought to keep, or add to, Britain's imperial and slave-trading conquests. For example, in the 1790s, British slave owners united with French slave owners to try to eat Haiti's revolution. The government sent more soldiers to the West Indies, and lost more, than it had when trying to crush America's independence. Of the 89,000 sent, 45,000 died, as did 19,000 sailors. France lost 50,000 dead. Haiti's freed slaves defeated the armies of the two greatest slaver powers, but the British forces laid waste to the island, destroying almost all its sugar plantations.
Slavery lost its former importance to the metropolitan economy. The slave colonies took an ever smaller share of Britain's exports. From 1820 the slump in the West Indies grew worse and worse. In 1832, an official wrote that the West Indies system "is becoming so unprofitable when compared with the expense that for this reason only it must at no distant time be nearly abandoned."
The years 1830-32 also saw the Swing Rising in Britain, revolution in France, a major slave revolt in Jamaica and the parliamentary Reform Act. All led to the 1833 Slave Emancipation Act, which freed the 540,000 slaves in the British West Indies. Parliament gave the planters £20 million (a billion pounds in today's money) as compensation for the loss of their slaves. The working class paid the money in tax, though they pointed out that the Church should have paid, as it owned so many slaves itself and as its priests justified the slavery of both black and white, at home and abroad. The Empire then imposed another form of servitude on the `freed' slaves of the West Indies - compulsory six-year `apprenticeships'. Later in the century, it used indentured labour, workers forcibly imported from India.
Slavery had been profitable in the 18th century; abolition was even more profitable in the 19th. The effort `to stop the foreign slave trade' was designed to damage rival empires and to protect the West Indies planters, now denied annual slave imports, from competition by sugar producers Cuba and Brazil, still reliant on buying slaves. The suppression of the slave trade on Africa's West and East coasts necessitated ever closer control of West and East Africa, at first by private companies like the British East Africa Company, later by the Empire itself. Abolition was a weapon to expand the empire.
Throughout the century, the Empire continued to steal people, land and resources from Africa, reinforcing slavery there and killing millions of African people. The Empire continued to contribute to and profit from the slave trade well into the twentieth century. As Marx wrote, we see in slavery "what the bourgeoisie makes of itself and of the labourer, wherever it can, without restraint, model the world after its own image."
Abolitionism was an early form of the fake internationalism we see today - LiveAid, Live Earth, Blairite calls to intervene everywhere, Oxfam's delusions about Britain being `a force for good on the world stage'. We should be satisfied if Britain was a force for good in Britain.
A Familiar Tale Told With Verve.......2007-03-03
"Bury the Chains" has little new data, but it is still a brilliantly written synthesis of a wide range of material on British antislavery. The subject is larger and more diffuse than the author's earlier "King Leopold's Ghost," but the outlook is similar, and appropriately so. Hochschild represents the neo-abolitionist perspective on slavery: it assumes the centrality of moral issues and the necessity for reforms, and reconstructs the world of antislavery advocates and slaves while also trying to understand the institution's supporters. The author balances several factors culminating in the end of the Old Slavery: humanitarian activism, structural economic changes, and not least slave revolts and revolution. Ultimately he gives primacy to the influence of humanitarianism. The book is rather conventional, even old-fashioned in asserting individual agency in history, though there is due attention given to more impersonal economic developments. A strong chapter on British women consumers as abolitionists adds a refreshingly different dimension to the story. Tragically, there is now a burgeoning slavery promoted by globalization. This New Slavery sadly returns abolitionism to the realm of current events, and enables future historians to shed more light on earlier antislavery movements. L. Sanneh, "Abolitionists Abroad" breaks new ground on African antislavery efforts; K. Bales, "Disposable People" is most enlightening on the New Slavery.
Wonderful writing, with some obvious bias.......2007-02-18
Hochschild has written a compelling, provocative book that I heartily enjoyed. In addition to good narratives and compelling anecdotes, he shines as he tries to make the social conventions and economic realities of the time period comprehensible today.
Mr. Hochschild is of the opinion that Wilberforce has received way too much credit for what was in reality a broad-based, complex movement of many decades. I have no problem with this and I respect his research and credentials. But he does seem to have an ax to grind with Christianity. No, I am not someone naive enough to hold that Christians can do/ have not done any wrong. But while Hochschild sometimes go to great lengths to make the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries comprehensible, he does not make this same effort for the Christians of that era.
Most notably, he singles out John Newton, author of Amazing Grace, for withering commentary. While I am not here to defend John Newton or assert he had no blind spots (like so many people of his day), I do think Mr. Hochschild trashes him unfairly. Christianity is not an instantaneous transformation but a lifelong process. The fact that John Newton left the slave trade, became a pastor but did not become a leader in the abolition movement somehow is incomprehensible to the author who infers that Newton's religion was a blind and hypocritical sham. This is most glaring sore point in an otherwise wonderful book that I am very glad to have read.
Average customer rating:
- Calculations are only as good as your numbers
- Pants on fire?
- Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed.
- Very Interesting
- History as Science Fiction
|
History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
Anatoly Fomenko
Manufacturer: Mithec
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ASIN: 2913621058 |
Book Description
Recorded history is a finely-woven magic fabric of intricate lies about events predating the sixteenth century. There is not a single piece of evidence that can be reliably and independently traced back earlier than the eleventh century. This book details events that are substantiated by hard facts and logic, and validated by new astronomical research and statistical analysis of ancient sources.
Customer Reviews:
Calculations are only as good as your numbers.......2007-08-03
Yes, we can all agree that mainstream history is nearly 100% BS due to politics, economics, ego, problems with dating techniques, and various conspiracies. Agreed. But, I've been researching the distinct possibility that human history (in terms of civilizations) are much more ancient than we've been told, so coming across this book was very interesting to me. I wondered how Fomenko could be wrong (if at all) because he is very persuasive in his presentations. Then it dawned on me. If at previous times in prehistory, due to the various catastrophies that are well documented (comets, asteroids, planetary disruptions, plasma discharge, pole reversals, etc) the Earth was in a different position in relation to the sun, different tilt on its axis, different orbit, different rotation (in terms of velocity and DIRECTION), and the continents were in different positions, then would this not cause the ancients to see the sky (constellations) differently? In other words, is Fomenko making erronious assumptions about the physics of the Earth in pre-history, which then corrupt his data with regards to dating the relevant astrology? The last event to seriously disrupt our planet occured roughly 3500 years ago, according to other good researchers, so is it possible Fomenko has been confused by this? The vastly different physics of our planet in the not so distant past may explain this confusion, which is not to say the "mainstream" version of history is correct; on the contrary. I am not an expert in these fields, but wanted to see if this idea could spark discussion.
Pants on fire?.......2007-07-19
Will people ever read before spamming? Yes, Jesuits could not rewrite world history alone, they had help. Anyway, Dr Prof Acad A.Fomenko does not point to jesuits as the driving force of world wide history manipulation in published volumes 1,2,3;, actually he barely mentions the poor devils. Check it with 'Search inside' feature, please. China is rarely mentioned either, in fact, Dr Fomenko is completely eurocentric. Right, his theory contradicts all mainstream schools of history, because in their actual state they are all built on blatantly erroneus chronology. You don't need a mysterious cabal (conspiracy) to falsify history, the falsification is its modus operandi. It is inherent to history(ians) to falsify (distort) events, as it is inherent to humans to boast as it is inherent to power (authority) to legimize itself by referrring to glorious past made to its own order. Dr Prof Fomenko and team have identified scores of instances of such manipulation in Russian, European, etc.. history, and delivered valid statistical proof thereof. His own 'reconstruction' is completely another story. Forget c14 as a valid method of dating. W.Libby has initially discovered a brilliant method of INDEPENDENT dating. Too bad, c14 method has become a joke after a forced marrige with dendrochronology with consensual chronological scale inbuilt. Radiocarbon method can't stand blind tests, but is so very productive as a rubberstamp.
Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed. .......2007-04-09
There is no doubt that history as most know it is a sham, & institution's version of History both University & Church is fradulent & inaccurate. Everything was established with an agenda, The real "Dark Ages" are now when we have access to incredible amounts of information past authorities & more important 'common folk' didn't have but our institutions & educators are slow to evolve because of what has ignorantly & arrogantly been taught for too long. This is on many subjects not just Chronology.
For anyone to question "Why would a Mathematician have anything credible to say of History?" The answer is from Dr. Fomenko's preface in the book: "It would be worthwhile to remind the reader that in the XVI-XVII century Chronology was considered to be a subdivision of Mathematics." These volumes could possibly be some of the most important works to date & should be read by everyone with an interest in History, especially professors & educators who have a duty to the public. I have read both books & must say that 'Chronology 1' has some very eye opening & revolutionary information. Even if these volumes are part true the implications are profound & opens the doors to further investigations & questions which must be done. I speak several different lanquages & must say the logic Dr. Fomenko uses with "inflection" of words & words being read from left to right in one region & right to left in another then written backwards, the removal of vowels & get down to basics of words, or different cities & locations having the same name etc. is correct. Vowel usage has always been optional & varied, actually complicating linquistics & study. The first thing one has to understand is that words never had a fixed spelling in history like we do now, the spelling of words was mutable & regional, as well as names & titles of people were vast, varied & changed, NOTHING WAS FIXED or understood linear. Matters of Life & Death as well as financial profiteering yesterday & today were & are made with ignorant, illogical & conspiratorial views of history & reality, it's time people get closer to the Truth & society collectively grow up.
Very Interesting.......2007-03-07
It is a good proposal and I believe it will mature into something even better in the future. I think it deserves to be read.
History as Science Fiction.......2007-01-10
Anatoly Fomenko has written a very intriguing book, full of pictures, charts, and computer 'proof' of his thesis: backwards of AD900 we don't really know what happened or when. Between AD900 and AD1600 there is more certainty, but there is still a lot of fuzzy ground, and things don't get reliable until we get past the 1600's where the printing press made it very difficult for the perpetrators of this timeline manipulation to change anything that had been committed to print. The Dark Ages did not happen. Books were burned for a reason. One organization has doubled the actual length of its existence by expanding the real chronology. Read why.
I had always wondered why Christ died about AD33 and yet men waited until the 11th century to form the Knights Templar, the Cathars, etc and go after the Holy Land by force. Why the 1000 year gap? Turns out there wasn't more than a 10-12 year gap and he proves it using astronomy. This also implies that the planet is not as old as we have been told, and current Christian and other creationist scientists are already championing that idea without being aware of Fomenko's book. The two groups, creationist scientists and the Russian mathematical analysts corroborate each other. Fascinating.
Of course, all this flies in the face of what we have been told traditionally is the 'proper' chronology of western civilization, and most readers will experience 'cognitive dissonance' in reading this book. It means that our history going backwards from AD1600 becomes progressively more incorrect and unreliable until it cannot be trusted at all... in the space of 700-800 years.
Naturally, the curious, open-minded reader will want to know WHO did this, WHY, and did any of the events we think of as really ancient ever happen?
Dr. Fomenko is a respected scientist/mathematician at Moscow State University who has already answered these questions to the satisfaction of his initially skeptical colleagues. Most of them are now believers, a few still refuse to believe (the usual diehards), and of course the western press has ignored Fomenko's work -- for obvious reasons when you read the book. The ones who perpetrated this chronology ruse have a lot to answer for. They are still with us. That's why this book is a well-kept secret.
I gave the book a 4-star rating because I was unable to check out some of his claims; those I checked were as he said. But if even 1/3 of his claims are true, this punches a big hole in what we think is our history, the meaning of western civilization, our educational process (for repeating the ruse as gospel), and the trustworthiness of the organization that perpetrated this ruse, well-intentioned or not.
This book relates to current research into a Young Earth paradigm, to John Keel's discoveries about our planet, and Fr Malachi Martin's insights (in his now out-of-print books). We are indeed sheep who are manipulated and kept ignorant -- for a reason. While knowing what these men have to say may be the "booby prize" (as in: 'what can you do with this knowledge?'), it will provide interesting reading. Didn't someone say: "...and the Truth will set you free."?? For you to judge if this book contains the truth.
Book Description
Hailed as "the most dramatic and comprehensive account" of the early years of Russian capitalism (New York Times Book Review)
David Hoffman, former Moscow bureau chief for the Washington Post, sheds light onto the hidden lives of Russia's most feared power brokers: the oligarchs. Focusing on six of these cunning and ruthless men--Alexander Smolensky, Yuri Luzhkov, Anatoly Chubais, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Boris Berezovsky, and Vladimir Gusinsky--Hoffman reveals how a few players rose to the pinnacle of Russia's new capitalism.
The oligarchs started small. Before perestroika, they lived the lives of Soviet citizens, stuck in a dead-end system, cramped apartments, and long bread lines. But as Communism loosened, they found gaps in the economy and reaped their first fortunes by getting their hands on fast money. As the government weakened and their businesses flourished, they grew greedier. The state auctioned off its own assets, and they grabbed the biggest oil companies, mines, and factories. They went on wild borrowing sprees, taking billions of dollars from gullible western lenders. When the ruble collapsed, the tycoons saved themselves by hiding their assets and running for cover. This is a saga of brilliant triumphs and magnificent failures, the untold story of how a rapacious, unruly capitalism was born out of the ashes of Soviet communism.
Customer Reviews:
The Oligarchs.......2006-08-04
I'm about a quarter into the book. I am very impressed. It is riveting. I went on a tour of Russia in June and wanted to know more about what is going on. I have talked my husband and sister into reading it. I think Americans get some insight into a country we know little about.
A good thumbnail sketch of the oligarchic interregnum.......2006-06-17
Daniel Hoffman of the Washington Post has written a good introduction to the interregnum between the reign of the Commununist Party of the USSR and the Presidency of Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. When Communism and the Russian legal system collapsed, the boldest and brashest quickly amassed fortunes in rather unusual circumstances.
Hoffmann's account is a good introduction to these times and to the "oligarchs" who shaped these times. His book is by no means a work of investigative reporting, being liberally littered with phrases along the lines of "we'll never know the whole story", "there must have been more going on, but there are no authorative sources," "we can only surmise that much of the episode is opaque." Nor do I understand why Hoffman considers mayor Luzhkov of Moscow, Moscow's answer to Richard Joseph Daley of Chicago, an "oligarch."
All the same, this is a well-written and entertaining book about an extraordinary time.
Provides Great Insight into Russia.......2006-02-12
This book provides a great background to understand Russia and the current situation today. If you want to know about business and the history of Russia from the 80's forward, written in a way that reads like a novel, read this book.
Loving portrait of grand larceny.......2004-11-22
David Hoffman, the author of this fascinating book, intends to give us a portrait of dynamic, progressive entrepreneurs. But he actually gives us a picture of greedy criminals.
Russia's privatisation programme was huge, rapid and unprecedented. By 1996, 18,000 industrial enterprises, 80% of the total, employing 80% of Russia's industrial workers, producing 90% of Russia's industrial output, had been privatised.
Russia's 1992 Privatisation Programme, which the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs fought for, allowed directors and workers to buy 51% of the voting shares in their organisation, at a nominal price, using the enterprise's own funds. All were given vouchers, which could buy shares.
All too often, workers agreed not to interfere with the management, in exchange for promises of job security. Often, managers bought workers' shares before they had any market value, or outbid the workers, in collaboration with banks. In some cases, President Boris Yeltsin issued special decrees, excluding outsiders.
Factory managers used cooperatives, joint ventures and later, shell companies and offshore havens to leach cash and raw materials out of public enterprises. They created banks and trading companies that seized the factory's output and put the profits into their offshore accounts. Law and order were shredded.
These management buyouts led to short termism, parasitic profits (not productive investment, not rebuilding), asset stripping and capital flight (totalling possibly $150 billion between 1991 and 1999). Russia's wealth, produced by its workers, went into thousands of offshore bank accounts, real estate holdings and offshore companies.
For example, in 1993 Boris Berezovsky, Yeltsin's friend, bought 35,000 Ladas at low export prices from the producer Avtovaz, Russia's largest car factory, paying 10% down, the rest to be paid 30 months later in a time of huge inflation, nearly bankrupting the producer. He then sold them to Russians at high market prices, making $3000 a car, in a $105 million deal. Later, Berezovsky bought a third of the company for just $3 million, in a one-bidder auction. Berezovsky loaned the government $100 million for 51% of Sibneft, Russia's sixth biggest oil company, in 1995, and sold it to himself 18 months later for $110 million.
Anatoly Chubais, head of the State Privatization Committee, said of Russia's capitalists, "They steal and steal and steal. They are stealing absolutely everything and it is impossible to stop them." By 2002, five capitalists controlled 95% of Russia's aluminium, 18% of her oil, 40% of her copper, 20% of her steel and 20% of car production. The Mafia ran nearly half the private sector and owned half of Russia's largest banks. Criminal gangs controlled 80% of Avtovaz's output, which did not deter General Motors from starting up a joint venture with the giant car company.
"In sum, neither the workers nor their unions have much power over privatisation", said a US privatisation adviser. By 1999, 38% of Russia's people existed below the poverty line. 90% of the people endured worsening conditions, while the handful of arrogant capitalists made colossal profits by crime and corruption.
Great book to learn the new Russia!.......2004-09-09
Hoffman did a good job. Six main characters, Smolensky the Banker, Luzhkov the Mayor, Chubais the Economist-reformer, Khordorkovsky the oligarch, Berezovsky the Master Mind, and Gusinsky the TV Media King, controlled the Russia Yeltsin-regime economy. Many of them are Jewish, started from humble beginnings and got rich at the right place at the right time. Unfortunately, with 1998 stock crash, ruble devalutaion, Putin as the new president, their wealthy empires quickly fizzled. It is a must read for any one doing business in Russia.
Book Description
"Among the many books written on Germany after the collapse of Hitler's Thousand Year Reich, this book by Milton Mayer is one of the most readable and most enlightening."—Hans Kohn, New York Times Book Review
"It is a fascinating story and a deeply moving one. And it is a story that should make people pause and think—think not only about the Germans, but also about themselves."—Ernest S. Pisko, Christian Science Monitor
"Writing as a liberal American journalist of German descent and Jewish religious persuasion Mr. Mayer aims—and in the opinion of this reviewer largely succeeds—at scrupulous fairness and unsparing honesty. It is this that gives his book its muscular punch."—Walter L. Dorn, Saturday Review
"Once again the German problem is at the center of our politics. No better, or more humane, or more literate discussion of its underlying nature could be had than in this book."—August Heckscher, New York Herald Tribune
Customer Reviews:
Sleeping Societies rarely awake before its too late.......2007-06-07
Mayer, a Jew on Sabbatical in post-WW-II Kronenberg, sets his goal as that of better understanding the life-story of the ordinary German under National Socialism.
As he tells the story, Nazism was not just a political system or just an ideology it was a worldview peculiarly suited for and congruent with the German Post WW-I temperament and mentality. In the aftermath of the much-hated Versailles Treaty, Nazism arrived on the scene just in time to not just conquer the minds of both little and big Germans but to overwhelm them. Mayer's phrase has described it nicely: German enthusiasm for Nazism was clearly a case of "little men-gone wild."
The true value of this book and hence Mayer's most valuable contribution has been to draw a graphic conceptual picture of how the system of Nazism worked as seen at ground level by ten ordinary Germans and from the interior of German society: To a man, they all agreed that it brought them untold economic success, bound them patriotically and politically into a coherent cultural unit, restored the nation's pride and gave all Germans renewed reasons for hope in the future.
Given this rosy and very much interior and insulated backdrop, it is no wonder there was no basis for ordinary Germans to see (or even to be able to perceive) Nazi excesses, or to see Nazism itself, as an inherently evil system until it was too late.
This was true in part because all Germans already had community permission to hate Jews. The excesses, reserved mostly for Jews, thus seemed normal and in any case were always introduced in carefully orchestrated, slowly escalating, but easily digestible bites. This was done specifically to stay below the radar of the everyday German conscience -- so as to never assault German sensibilities too abruptly. Even the most alert of Germans and the least anti-Semitic Germans were lulled to sleep by this strategy.
But more importantly, because all Germans were wedded to the Nazi worldview thorough its benefits, both tangible and intangible, there were few incentives for them to "rock the boat" by pointing to its excesses. Dissension was left for victims and outsiders to engage in. However, being identified as an outsider or as a dissenter, at a minimum, could ensure social exclusion and a slow social death; and if one were very unlucky, it could mean disappearance into a concentration camp, or even a swift bullet to the temple.
Ordinary Germans thus were willing contributors to their own self-imposed trap: They needed the community's approval on its own terms. Sometimes this meant turning a blind eye to community sanctioned criminal activity, such as was the case in the event that set off a cascading sequence of pogroms against Jews, Crystal-nacht. Ordinary Germans did not want to approve of the criminal behavior involved, but was it not the community to which they were bound that decided what was criminal and who should be rewarded and punished for community-defined criminal behavior? It is easy enough for outsiders to exaggerate the actual relationship between man and state under tyranny, but from the inside, it is always made to seem normal and seamless.
Like a thief in the night, tyranny always descends upon sleeping societies in a cloak of patriotic conformity. It attacks when one is unguarded psychologically and least wary of an assault. By the time the citizen is prepared to raise a dissenting voice, in the name of state security, his throat (and presumably his vocal cords) have already been cut and he has been rendered mute. Once the national conscience has been drugged, sedated, or put to sleep, it is difficult to reawaken it.
Since there are no political systems that are entirely insulated against criminal activity, corruption or evil, only healthy, timely, vigorous and authentic dissent can act as an antidote to the evil inherent in tyrannical political systems like Fascism and Nazism.
Without drawing too fine a distinction, it is difficult to miss the many parallels between contemporary American society and 1933-1939 German society.
One of the most important books of our time.......2005-03-24
Among the impossibly vast literature about how the Nazis took and held power, this book is one of a kind. It is an honest look into the minds of "typical" Germans, not as we see them, but as they saw themselves. The author admits his biases and overcomes them to let his subjects speak for themselves. We hear them, in their own words, make their excuses and justifications and evasions, but the same question will not stop coming up in our minds: "What would I have done?" This book is a journey of questions without final answers, and it deserves to be ranked as one of the essential books of our time. The fact that it is so little known, and particularly that it is not required reading in college courses, is a disgrace.
Chilling Look at Nazism from the German Perspective.......2001-09-11
Mayer gives us a chilling look at Nazi Germany through conversations and interviews with ten self described 'little men', who were all members of the party. The men tell of their beliefs and experiences during the years of the Third Reich. In some ways the scariest aspect of the book is how normal the men seem to be. Their Nazi beliefs are somehow more frightning as they do not come from high ranking officials like Himmler and Goebbles, but rather from ordinary civilians.
Mayer lived in Germany for several years after the Second World War and learned quite a bit about Germany. His book gives us a fascinating look at the Germans and why they behave as they do. We learn a great deal about why they supported Hitler, their love for law and order, and their general outlook.
The one weakness here is that his material is out of date. His statements may accurately reflect on the Germany of the 40's and 50's, but most likely do not apply to that country in the Twenty-First Century. The Germany of today is largely free of the hatred and fear that existed in earlier times.
Chilling parallels with today's society.......1999-06-06
Shortly after World War II, Milton Sanford Mayer traveled to Germany to find out the mind set of ordinary Germans who were "little men" in the Nazi Party. They did not know that he was an American Jew, although he did not lie to them. To a man, they declared that their days under Hitler were the best in their lives. I found the parallels with current day America to be much to close for comfort, if you substitute white rural culture for Jews in Germany. This book will open your eyes as to how totalitarianism is welcomed by the mass of people if the media support it, and the economy is good.
Book Description
Europeans and many American pundits believe that while the U.S. economy may create more growth, Europeans have it better when it come to job security and other factors. Olaf Gersemann, a German reporter who came to America, found the reality quite different. He checked facts and found the market freedoms in America create a more flexible, adaptable and prosperous system then the declining welfare states of old Europe.
Customer Reviews:
Good information.......2007-05-27
Most literature showing the greatness of capitalism through statistics is horribly biased, but this book keeps the bias to a moderate level. This means you get a wealth of statistical information that is not overly influenced by ideology, which is a rare find.
A Well-Made Case.......2007-05-01
Like the previous reviewer, I think Olaf Gersemann offers a balanced and well-documented case that France, Germany, and Italy would benefit from some American-style economic liberalization. Advancing an argument with logic and solid empirical evidence is not the same thing as writing propaganda.
Gersemann goes out of his way to point to that it is "foolish" to believe that post-war European economic models are "generally, under all imaginable circumstances, inferior to other economic models." He draws attention to the number of Americans without health insurance, the sorry state of many of our public schools, the alarmingly high rate of poverty among American unwed mothers and their children, and the "ridiculously high" compensation of many corporate managers. This book is not a one-sided apologia.
But it does, as advertised, manage to dispel many myths about American capitalism and the supposedly kinder, more agreeable European version.
As have a number of others before him, Gersemann reveals the hollowness of the claim that the purchasing power of working-class people in the U.S. has been stagnant since the early 1970s. And he does this using household income numbers as his primary statistical evidence, even though he could have shown even more improvement (as he briefly points out) if he had used the *per capita* money income of the average household. (Household income has been depressed because there are now fewer people per house, which is a sign both of more widespread home ownership, and thus more wealth, as well as a sign of higher rates of illegitimacy.) If further adjustments are made to control for immigrants--whose pre-immigration incomes do not, obviously, show up in U.S. statistics--it becomes even more evident that the American economy is much more successful at improving the of lot native-born workers in the bottom quintile than one would gather from watching ABC News or reading *The New York Times*. That our economy also improves the lives of immigrants, and in the process makes the gains of the native-born less statistically obvious, is cause for congratulations, not criticism. The improvement in the lives of particular individuals is what matters, not the fate of a particular quintile, the composition of which is ever-changing.
Gersemann also rebuts much of the nonsense reported about the percentage of Americans who are "trapped" in poverty and about low unemployment merely being the result of mind-numbing service jobs that don't pay a living wage. He demonstrates that those on the left who praise the security offered by the European system too often fail to note that security comes at the price of dynamism, which comes at the price of opportunity, especially for those on the bottom.
Unfortunately, the same neighborhoods in France that suffer most from this lack of opportunity, and from debilitating unemployment, voted overwhelmingly for the Socialist candidate (Ms. Royal) in last week's elections, even though it is not she but the much hated Mr. Sarkozy who stands at least some chance of offering them economic opportunities infinitely more lucrative than burning cars. And of course it was the French left that took to the streets when the government attempted to enact modest reforms to make the labor market more flexible. Marching for "social justice" and against "American conditions" also meant marching for the continued joblessness of North African immigrants. But what of it? It's all too easy to ignore arguments like Gersemann's, congratulate oneself on being morally superior to capitalists, and then take a nice long vacation.
Both Europeans and Americans would benefit from reading this book. It's not a groundbreaking work of research, and in fact most of the information Gersemann presents can be gleaned from the financial press. But the book doesn't pretend to be groundbreaking. What makes it a success is that it so clearly and dispassionately debunks many of the most frequently repeated falsehoods about the American and European economies.
Challenge - not propaganda........2007-04-20
It is surprising that "Cowboy Capitalism", recommended by two nobel laureates (the late Friedman and Buchanan), would be accused of propaganda by a critical voice (Newton Ooi, below) who first proceeded to point out that all the facts it presents are true. "Cowboy Capitlism" has an agenda, of course - an agenda to show through the raw numbers that European (or NYTimes readers') perceptions of the two economic systems of central Europe and the US are skewed... that there is more to the differences and the benefits/detriments that each system offers, than is popularily acknowledged. Fear and suspicions (and lack of knowledge) are the cause of this - rather than facts. This book pokes fun at the former by trying to reveal the latter.
In doing so, CC is actually rather fair. It does not pretend that the European economic system is per se inferior to the US System. In fact, there were times in which it was rather superior. (Times of great economic stability had Germany, for example, grow its economy at a pace well above that of the US. Or healthcare - where Europe admittedly piggy-bag rides on US consumers' expenses, but which Gersemann has no probolem stating is a matter of preference, not "better" or "worse".)
Anyway... to look at the criticism listed below:
Home Ownership: The argument that because of higher population density, home ownership would *naturally* be less ("less land to build on") is completely ludicrous. What would follow that argument would be mass-homelessness, not low ownership rates. People in Europe still live in places... the question is: why don't they own? Apartments count, too, you know! (Density contributes to homes being more affordable - which is one of the reasons. Red tape making ownership more difficult is another. Rent-protection is yet another. (And when looking at entire countries, the numbers *are* meaningful. The author did not compare only New York to rural Europe.)
Education: I'm European, so I don't want to argue the point that by going to high school I am automatically smarter than a US college graduate... even though I had to learn that knowing where Malaysa and Phoenix are (I've 'always' known), somehow don't give me the edge on the job-market that I thought it would. :-( There are Americans who audaciously compete with me, despite flagrant lack of geographical knowledge... And win out! Perhaps other factors matter, too? Drats.
Unemployment rates are not measured by whether one "has to work" or not. Unemployment rates are measured by how many people *want* to work and can't. A busy little Hausfrau who takes care of the kids and whose husband makes enough to support the entire family doesn't show up in the unemployment numbers, because she probably doesn't run out and declare herself unemployed. So the higher numbers of unemployment of women in Europe reflect women who "have to work" -- but won't find a job. And that's the real problem... whether one likes the social ramnification and the dissolution of the family nucleus or not.
Computer use, Internet access et al. in Germany is well behind that of the US. Especially among the crowd that didn't grow up with them.
Computers, even made from recycled materials or made with the use of recycled parts (I've done that, years ago, but I wonder how common that still is) would still show up as a computer sold... They don't sit around trash-heaps and maker their own computers out of trash, after all.
The last point - oil-war-obesety-pharma-industry - is a little too dense fore me to get into. I am baffled.
Cowboy Capitalism does not pretend not to take sides. But it wants to show that it takes the side of greater economic freedom, because there are benefits to more people to be had - at the price of less security for others. (That's obviously a gross oversimplification... but aims in the right direction, I should believe.) The way this book does it is humorous (in a dry way) and merciless... but not with blindfolds or immune to "inconvenient" facts. This is a must-read for when your European friends come over to visit and try to tell you why everything is so much better in the old part of the world. (30% youth unemployment in France, a terribly efficient but very rigid economy, are just one of many points to consider...)
P.S. The Thinktank CATO is a libertarian institution, not a conservative one. The two overlap on many issues, but are not the same. (Legalization of drugs, Gay marriage et al. are points libertarians support; conservatives by-and-large don't.)
Lying with numbers........2007-03-04
The title of this book, Cowboy Capitalism, is a term many Europeans use to describe the American business climate. More precisely, the American style of economics involves a lot of uncertainty and risk, with high chances of success (Microsoft and Google) and failure (Enron and GM) and the ensuing results of low job security, high income fluctuations, and high rates of bankruptcies for businesses and individuals. This book argues that this has produced an overall better standard of living in the US than in the countries of Germany, France and Italy. This book is published by the Cato Institute, a conservative US organization that lobbies for deregulation of public enterprises, free market reforms and low taxes. The book argues its points by presenting a lot of statistical data comparing the employment rates, home ownership rates, educational levels, disposable income levels, and other macro and micro economic indicators of the US, France, Italy and Germany. I do not doubt the validity of the numbers presented, but they only show part of the story. Lets go over them one by one.
First, this book gives numbers showing that home ownership is higher in the US than in France, Italy and Germany. This is absolutely true. The author attributes this difference to the fact that since America is more free-market, incomes are generally higher in America, and hence more people can afford to own homes. The author totally misses the affect of population density. The population density of the three European countries listed are substantially higher than in the US, meaning there is less land per person. This means there is less land to build homes on, so of course fewer people can own homes. If one looks back over the past 30 years; the primary engine for economic growth in the US is new home construction. Besides, the use of home ownership as a measure of prosperity is totally bogus. New Yorkers have lower home ownership rates than residents of most southern cities, yet New Yorkers in general are wealthier than people living in the deep South.
Second, the book states that a higher percentage of people in America go to college than in France, Germany and Italy. Again, absolutely true. What the author misses is the amount of knowledge learned K-12. Specifically, many European high school graduates are better educated than many American college graduates. For instance, just about every European has taken a year of calculus before leaving high school. There are many American college graduates who have never taken a semester of calculus! If you don't believe me, ask yourself why College Algebra classes are so common on college campuses. Here is another example. After I received my bachelor's degree, I backpacked through Europe and stayed at youth hostels. Every local I met knew where Malaysia (my birth country) and Phoenix, Arizona (my hometown) was on the globe. Coming back home, most of my American friends could not locate the places I visited such as Berlin, Rome, London, Munich, etc... Another example, every French, German and Italian I met in Europe could speak English to some degree. How many native-born Americans can speak a second language? Getting an education is about acquiring a bank of knowledge and set of skills. I dare say most citizens of Italy, France and Germany acquire more knowledge and skills K-12 than most native-born Americans acquire K-college. Given this statement, the higher rates of college participation in the US do not amount to much.
Third, the book states that employment rates are higher in the US than in France, Germany and Italy; especially among women. This is true. What the author does not mention is that many Americans, especially women, work because they have to. Specifically, a larger percentage of American adults are single or divorced than in Europe. And the percentage of single American women raising children is higher than in Europe. Growing up in America, half my friends had working mothers. The most common reasons why was that either their fathers walked out on them, or their parents were divorced. So of course their mothers had to work; they could not rely on the fathers to bring home the bacon. This brings up another unspoken truth. A divorced couple requires twice as many places to live as a married couple; i.e. two houses versus one house. This means that two divorced parents will have to spend more money than two married parents. The more money that is spent means the faster the economy moves, so of course the US economy will grow faster than the European economy.
Fourth, the author states that the use of high-tech products in France, Italy and Germany is lower than in America. He argues this point by stating that the number of units of high-tech items sold in the US is higher per capita than in the 3 European countries, and that these industries employ more people in the US than in the 3 European countries. True again. Again the author leaves out many qualifying factors. For example, Germany has strict recycling and reuse laws for computers. Specifically, when a German throws away her old computer, it does not end up in a landfill occupying space and leaking various chemicals into the environment. Instead, it is taken apart piece by piece. Those parts that can be re-used, like the fans, housing and cables, are packaged with new computers, while those that cannot are recycled. In this way, less is wasted. A side effect is that since more stuff gets reused, there is less need to produce, hence a smaller industry geared around the production of computers in Germany. Does that mean Germans are less computer literate than Americans? I doubt it. I do not remember seeing in this book a chart comparing computer literacy in Germany versus the US.
Fifth, this book compares the state of the pharmaceutical industry in the US versus his three target European countries. The book shows that this industry is more profitable, generates more new drugs, employs more people, and pays better in the US than in Europe. This is all true. But what the author forgets is that demand for pharmaceutical drugs is less in Europe than in the US. As any person who has lived in both Europe and America can tell you, Americans are more obese and out of shape than Europeans. Higher obesity rates leads to higher rates of cancer, heart disease, stroke, diabetes and a whole host of other chronic diseases. This in turn leads to a higher demand for pharmaceutical drugs to treat them, which in turn leads to a bigger and more profitable pharmaceutical industry in the US than in Europe. Why are Americans more obese than in Europe? That leads to my last point, so keep reading.
Last, this book totally misses a point that is very telling in comparing the economies of the US, Germany, France and Italy, and that is energy consumption. Per person, Americans consume more BTUs of energy from fossil fuels such as oil, gas and coal than Europeans. Energy is the blood of economic growth. Since the end of WWII, America has pursued a policy of acquiring and using fossil fuels in increasing amounts with time. On the other hand, Europe has pursued a dual policy of reduced energy use and increased energy independence. The former includes cities built to encourage walking and biking, and high taxes on fossil fuels such as car gasoline. The latter includes nuclear reactors in France, and a high reliance on solar and wind power in Germany. These policies are primarily due to WWII. First, the effects of the war left these countries in no shape to pursue aggressive foreign policies of defending oil wells. Second, many Europeans are aware that the causes of WWII included competition for fossil fuels. On the other hand, America was not devastated by WWII, but strengthened. Hence, America's economic growth has mirrored a growth in its fossil fuel industries. Is this a good thing? Once you consider global warming, pollution, destruction of land due to mineral extraction, and other factors, I think the grade goes to Europe for being more energy efficient; even if it means a slower economy and lower employment rates. As a side effect, Europeans drive less than Americans, but walk and bike more, and hence are generally healthier.
In conclusion, the facts stated by this book are all true, but the conclusions they point to are not. Many of the points must be placed in context with other qualifying factors. Overall, this is an OK book that must be read for what it is, propaganda, and not an economic treatise or case study.
Don't Cut the Pie, Bake Another One.......2007-02-15
This book explains that the European model of allocation assumes that the economy is static and employment can increase only by sharing existing jobs with regulation of hours and guaranteed employment. The US model is dynamic and companies that don't perform are replaced through the process of creative destruction by companies that do. Excess resources get reallocated to new enterprises to the benefit of everyone.
Book Description
Today many view Sigmund Freud as an elitist whose psychoanalytic treatment was reserved for the intellectually and financially advantaged. However, in this new work Elizabeth Ann Danto presents a strikingly different picture of Freud and the early psychoanalytic movement. Danto recovers the neglected history of Freud and other analysts' intense social activism and their commitment to treating the poor and working classes.
Danto's narrative begins in the years following the end of World War I and the fall of the Habsburg Empire. Joining with the social democratic and artistic movements that were sweeping across Central and Western Europe, analysts such as Freud, Wilhelm Reich, Erik Erikson, Karen Horney, Erich Fromm, and Helene Deutsch envisioned a new role for psychoanalysis. These psychoanalysts saw themselves as brokers of social change and viewed psychoanalysis as a challenge to conventional political and social traditions. Between 1920 and 1938 and in ten different cities, they created outpatient centers that provided free mental health care. They believed that psychoanalysis would share in the transformation of civil society and that these new outpatient centers would help restore people to their inherently good and productive selves.
Drawing on oral histories and new archival material, Danto offers vivid portraits of the movement's central figures and their beliefs. She explores the successes, failures, and challenges faced by free institutes such as the Berlin Poliklinik, the Vienna Ambulatorium, and Alfred Adler's child-guidance clinics. She also describes the efforts of Wilhelm Reich's Sex-Pol, a fusion of psychoanalysis and left-wing politics, which provided free counseling and sex education and aimed to end public repression of private sexuality.
In addition to situating the efforts of psychoanalysts in the political and cultural contexts of Weimar Germany and Red Vienna, Danto also discusses the important treatments and methods developed during this period, including child analysis, short-term therapy, crisis intervention, task-centered treatment, active therapy, and clinical case presentations. Her work illuminates the importance of the social environment and the idea of community to the theory and practice of psychoanalysis.
Customer Reviews:
An important contribution to the history of psychoanalysi.......2005-08-14
In Freud's Free Clinics: Psychoanalysis and Social Justice, 1918-1938, Professor Elizabeth Danto looks at a familiar subject and, by dint of serious scholarship and critical intelligence, manages to tell us fresh and important things about it. Much of the cultural and social impact of psychoanalysis developed in the political-economic climate of Austria and Germany during the two tormented decades between the world wars. Danto demonstrates a sensitive understanding of that scene and its powerful influence on what became the ideology and practice of psychoanalysis. This well-written book is essential reading for
students of the history of psychoanalysis and psychiatry -- indeed for anyone interested in twentienth-century cultural history. I recommend it highly.
Thomas Szasz
Manlius, NY 13104
Book Description
On Human Conduct is composed of three connected essays. Each has its own concern: the first with theoretical understanding, and with human conduct in general; the second with an ideal mode of human relationship which the author has called civil association; and the third with that ambiguous, historic association commonly called a modern European state. Running through the work is Professor Oakshott's belief in philosophical reflection as an adventure: the adventure of one who seeks to understand in other terms what he already understands, and where the understanding is sought is a disclosure of the conditions of the understanding enjoyed and not a substitute for it. Its most appropriate expression is an essay, which, he writes, 'does not dissemble the conditionality of the conclusions it throws up and although it may enlighten it does not instruct.'
Book Description
Treasury of immediately usable motifs featuring the sinuous interlacements, stylized mythical creatures, abstracts, geometrics, and other elements that give Celtic art its characteristic distinctive look. Ideal for a host of art and craft projects.
Customer Reviews:
96 designs.......2007-03-15
This was not exactly what I had in mind when I ordered this book.However on recipt I found it to be very useful for what my origional needs were.
The service and delivery were excellent in all respects so that this was again a great Amazon experience.
Ready-to-Use Celtic Designs.......2006-11-10
Service from the seller was good, but I don't know why the book is titled "ready to use". It was listed as designs ready to use as stencils for etching, but it was a lot more work to use it than I anticipated.
Book Description
The transition from socialism to capitalism in former socialist economies is one of the main economic events of the twentieth century. Not only does it affect the lives of approximately 1.65 billion people, but it is contributing to a shift in emphasis in economics from standard price and monetary theory to contracting and its institutional environment. Economic research in transition shows not only that institutions matter but also how their evolution toward higher efficiency depends on initial conditions and on sustained political support.
Unlike early policy literature on transition economics, which focused on the so-called Washington consensus, this book provides an overview of current research, analyzing issues raised by transition for which economic theorists and policy makers had no ready answers. It shows how research on transition contributes to our understanding of capitalism as an economic system and of the dynamics of large-scale institutional change.
The book is divided into three parts. The first part looks at how large-scale reforms are decided dynamically through the political process. The second part looks at the general equilibrium and macroeconomic effects of liberalization in economies without preexisting markets. The third part looks at the economic behavior of firms in the transition from state to private ownership and compares the effects of privatization, restructuring, and financial reform. Although focused on transition economics, the discussions are relevant to topics in political economics, development, public economics, corporate finance, and micro- and macroeconomics.
Customer Reviews:
Transition as It Is.......2000-11-07
I would recommend this book for everybody who wants to know what and why the great new Transition Revolution has happened in USSR and East Europe.I use this book for teaching in the Moscow State University as the main textbook ,and students like it for its explanations of a lot complicated problems of Transition economical systems and policy making.
Book Description
This book is a rare and important gift. One of the few memoirs of combat in World War II by a distinguished African-American flier, it is also perhaps the only account of the African-American experience in a German prison camp.Alexander Jefferson was one of 32 Tuskegee Airmen from the 332nd Fighter Group to be shot down defending a country that considered them to be second-class citizens. A Detroit native, Jefferson enlisted in 1942, trained at Tuskegee Institute, Alabama, became a second lieutenant in 1943, and joined one of the mostdecorated fighting units in the War, flying P51s with their legendary—and feared —“red tails.”Based in Italy, Jefferson flew bomber escort missions over southern Europe before being shot down in France in 1944. Captured, he spent the balance of the war in Luftwaffe prison camps in Sagan and Moosberg, Germany.In this vividly detailed, deeply personal book, Jefferson writes as a genuine American hero and patriot. ItÂ's an unvarnished look at life behind barbed wire— and what it meant to be an African-American pilot in enemy hands. ItÂ's also a look at race and democracy in America through the eyes of a patriot who fought toprotect the promise of freedom.The book features the sketches, drawings, and other illustrations Jefferson created during his nine months as a “kriegie” (POW) and Lewis CarlsonÂ's authoritative background to the man, his unit, and the fight Alexander Jefferson fought so well.
Customer Reviews:
Thank You Alexander Jefferson.......2005-10-29
Among the many groups to whom we owe more than we can ever repay there is the Tuskegee Airmen. Determined to become Army Air Crop pilots and to fight for America, these men enlisted in the army. In spite of the determination of some to make them fail, they didn't. In spite of a 'quota' as to how many would be allowed to graduate (not discovered until many years later) some 900 made it through the system. Most became fighter pilots, after all if they flew bombers they might have had white crewmen under them and in those days that just wouldn't do.
Lt. Jefferson made it through. And eventually he flew with the famous 332nd, the Red Tails. Most of the missions of the 332nd were to escort bombers. NO Bombers were ever lost to Enemy Aircraft while being escorted by the 332nd.
On his 19th mission Lt. Jefferson was shot down by anti-aircraft fire. He spent the next nine months in a German POW camp. When finally returned to the United States after being liberated he walked off the ship to be told, "Whites to the right, niggers to the left."
Thank you Alexander Jefferson for all that you did, including writing this book.
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- Fodor's See It Barcelona, 2nd Edition (Fodor's See It)
- Frommer's Walt Disney World & Orlando 2007 (Frommer's Complete)
- Frommer's Yellowstone & Grand Teton National Parks (Park Guides)
- Ghosts of Spain: Travels Through Spain and Its Secret Past
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