Title: Ken Burns ("The War") on Bill Maher 9/28/07 Source:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dfWTtYzyPQ&eurl=http%3A%2F%2 URL Source:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dfWTtYzyPQ&eurl=http%3A%2F%2F Published:Sep 29, 2007 Author:Burns/Maher Post Date:2007-09-29 13:59:40 by robin Keywords:None Views:323 Comments:20
Interesting interview - aside from his patently transparent glorification of war film, Ken Burns stumbles in some parts in delivering a coherent message to the sheeple...notable example...
Burns said as a paraphrased response to Maher's suggestion that our troops can't find anything important point to fighting in the Iraq War except to continue do so for their brothers, l'esprit de corps:
"Yes, it is amazing to see the flag flying at half-mast at all times at West Point - it goes to show that our troops are willing to fight and sacrifice for necessary as well as unnecessary wars."
But, his documentary shows how astonishingly different this preemptive war business is from WWII.
Not only from what kind of war, what kind of people we were then, but also the incredible amount of manufacturing that took place - jobs for all. What a contrast with today! We couldn't go to war today with China, they make everything we need for war!
It is still a very worthwhile series, the personal storytelling by those who were there, is well done.
It is still a very worthwhile series, the personal storytelling by those who were there, is well done.
My nephew benefits more from having his grand father stay tight lipped about what he did in WWIII except to advise him thusly: "War is government sanctioned murder. War is ugly."
His grand father should know - because unlike Ken Burns, he was a navigator in WWII on bombing missions and he has had to live all these years with a very bad conscience about the people - many civilians - he helped snuff in WWII. The solidarity of Americans post conscription was a good by product I guess but the onus borne by individuals who actually fought this war mano-a- mano was not always happy.
I have not seen The War series, but I suspect that LKen Burns did not bring up the rather uncomfortable aspects of fighting WWII.
First off, American soldiers were fighting and killing family tree related brothers. Americans of German and Italian descent were in high numbers at the time of WWII.
Secondly, though WWII was partly about liberating the Jews and Polish Christians from the NAZII's concentration camps, let's keep in mind that it was the NAZIIS not regular German soldiers who ran these monstrous camps. The German soldiers were fighting for their nation and for the lies their Nazii leaders told them at the time.
Thirdly, when the American troops found Russian POW's they had to release them to Uncle Joe's military. These Russian POW soldiers were shot on the spot - my father's older brother said he was present when this happened and he had to live with that ugly realization - that the Russian communists, our WWII allies, were BARBARIANS. We threw our lot in with arguably a bigger monster than the monster we were fighting in WWII.
Fourthly the primary goal of entering WWII - at least for the Brits - was to "liberate" Poland. What a colossal failure if that was a primary goal of WWII. We only changed the servitude of Poland's peoples from one monster to another.
I have not seen The War series, but I suspect that LKen Burns did not bring up the rather uncomfortable aspects of fighting WWII.
First off, American soldiers were fighting and killing family tree related brothers. Americans of German and Italian descent were in high numbers at the time of WWII.
Secondly, though WWII was partly about liberating the Jews and Polish Christians from the NAZII's concentration camps, let's keep in mind that it was the NAZIIS not regular German soldiers who ran these monstrous camps. The German soldiers were fighting for their nation and for the lies their Nazii leaders told them at the time.
He made many of these points. Or rather, the people who fought the war or lived through it made these points. It's a pretty remarkable series. The second part begins Sunday evening.
He made many of these points. Or rather, the people who fought the war or lived through it made these points. It's a pretty remarkable series. The second part begins Sunday evening.
Okay you and robin have convinced me. I'll watch part 2 on Sunday. Perhaps I got a bad impression of Ken Burns from Maher's interview with him and associated that with the content of the series. If the series presented war as having complex uncomfortable aspects, then that's good.
Too often the mainstream media's and Hollywood's presentations of WWII has been nothing more than Greatest Generation pro-war aren't we wonderful schtick. For example, I have not seen documentaries about the very real and ugly consequences of allying ourselves with Stalin. I have not seen documentaries regarding the Dresdan bombings or about the wholesale slaughter of Germans by communists after the war was won or about the German scientists we gave a free pass to for their war crimes for immigration to the USA. Those topics need to be shown to Americans - to teach people that we made a bargain with a monster - that we beat the Germans but at great cost to the Eastern Europeans. Does anyone realize that the allies broke the Germans' code due to the efforts of a Polish cryptographer, who escaped from his native Poland? What thanks did we give him re: his family members who were left behind and handed over to Uncle Joe? War is not to be entered into lightly because winning does not mean the winner is perfect and 100% right and unblemished - often winners, as in WWII, have had to make horrible compromises/make deals with the Devil along the way in order to win. That's what our young should learn about the responsibilities and the trade offs and the loss of humanity that comes with going to war.