how is WW2 taught in Europe

The Japanese were remarkable fighters that fought till the last breath hell they would even commit suicide to prevent capture.The German got sloppy after invading Russia which was a bad move.The only people that invaded Russia and held their ground the longest were the mongols.

 

Don't forget that World War 2 occurred at a time when the US and other countries had greatly reduced their military and reduced the size of their milary and equipment, in agreement with many other nations. After this happened, the great depression occurred where much of 'the west' had stagnated in terms of spending and development, at a time when Germany was greatly building their military force. Japan was already at War many years before Germany with China, the German high command knew it was only time before they would cause grief for the US etc, which meant their forces had to be divided. If the military reduction and great depression hadn't occurred, Germany would have been no where near as successful as they were.

 

What else do you expect?

 

in spain we study that franco didnt want to go in because we just had a civil war (and srsly, we had no weapons), we dont study that GB paid lots of money everyone in spanish goverment, because spain in with hitler = gibraltar goes to germany = mediterranean sea closed = GB without oil = GB dead = war over.
Nor that hitler never wanted war with GB -_-.

Aka in spain we dont study WWII (apart from their impacts in our civil war), our big-subject its spanish-history, not world's history, and others are basic education which no1 remembers, i know everything because i like to read, we study a little about how it went and what it caused...

We study a lot of more about moors invasion, spanish empire and napoleon failed invasion, i like those times better +_+

PD: thatguy, germany also was in that make-less-troops agreement... they armed faster than every1 else.

 

I agree with what he/she said. I was born in Belgium and studied a lot of history & WWII and when I came to Spain it really surprised me that no-one knew anything about the war in Europe... but things are changing now.

Anyway, I think people shouldn't rely on the Holywoodmovie-culture and get some serious information about the war.

 

We're taught that Belgians have always been comparing themselves to hippies because throughout our entire history we've never once started a war but the peoples that did start wars nearly always decided to fight them right here on our turf rather than someplace else so we're quite familiar with the atrocities of war and sort of had enough of that crap by now TBH.

We also know how Americans usually love to interfere with the rest of the world and, with them being economically strong and Belgium as a whole country being even smaller than New York City and everything, we're also taught how not to piss them off by rubbing under their noses the fact they didn't want to get involved with WW II, leaving us in our charred ruins and our dirty ripped up clothes with nothing but disease and famine to help cheer us up after the Germans started treating us like enslaved cattle, all until shortly after they themselves finally got their asses kicked at Pearl Harbor in such way they had to insist on calling it "cowardly"... For some strange reason, even today they often still don't like to be remembered of what truly happened to their men at Bastogne either. As far as Hollywood goes, just watch the Band Of Brothers series on Blu Ray and learn about the real magnitude of the horror those men went through at Bastogne.

 

That's very interesting and surprising to me.

And guys I'm not asking to argue the points of the war and who did what and blah blah blah.

I'm asking how its taught on a moral aspect. I don't need a b!tch war going on about WW2. I know a ton about it and don't want to see you guys arguing over who did more and who won the war.


I'm looking for stuff that was said by people like aless83, Black_ice_Spain, yngwiemalmsteen,

 

There's nothing moral about war. I honest to gawd hope our teachers haven't forgotten that since I've left school, yet I think most of them haven't.

 

WW2 is no where near as simple matter as some think. Especially when it comes to axis vs. allies. The fact that Soviet belong to allies and that they attacked us gives another twist. My grand father was in German submarines and he had no idea at all what Nazis where doing. It was really depressing to find out. Also, one should not forget about Stalin's clean ups...

 

What gets omitted in most classes is the American pre-Pearl-Harbor blockading of Japan, creating fuel shortages and economic problems. Pretty much sticking a finger in their eye and daring them to go to war with the U.S. - so as to break the public's isolationist sentiment that was keeping the U.S. government's hands tied, unable to engage in WW2.

-scheherazade

 

This is going to be a long post, settle in.

Japan had every reason to expect a complete victory over the U.S. with Pearl Harbor. Without a Pacific Fleet, the U.S. would be completely helpless to resist any of the Japanese advancements for several years. Japan's fatal error was to attack while the carriers were not in port, if they were I think we would have seen WW2 go rather differently.

OK Svein, I'm going to have to bold my replies and amend parts:

 

I've known about that from school. Japan didn't just decide to bomb us for fun. We pissed them off real bad.

Hell for a long time we were supplying Germany with certain supplies. We were making money from everyone.

 

Not blockade, embargo.

 

Do you have any idea why Finland was considered as Axis nation?

 

This sums it up pretty nicely:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_history_of_Finland_during_World_War_II

 

USSR was not part of the allies when they invaded Finland.

Later when Finland and USSR singed a peace treaty, Finland found itself between Germany occupied neighbors to the left and USSR to the right and chose to join Germany's invasion of the USSR.

To elaborate more: After the Russian 1917 revolutin Finland as well as other states managed to break off in the midst of the chaos.

Come 1939 Germany is approaching Russian borders, Petersbourgh is to close to Finish border. Germany would either crash Finland or most likely Finland would join Germany as they had been on good terms.

So Finland was a critical strategic point, USSR asked Finland to allow soviets to establish defense on it's land, looking at Finland as breakaway nation, pretty much thinking of it as part of the USSR. Finland refused thus soviets had to attack. After peace treaty soviets did get some Finnish ground to establish defense for the coming Germans.

So from USSR prospective and the impediment invasion of USSR by Germany and refusal of Finland to co-operate and realizing that Finland would join Germany anyway, USSR had no choice but to invade.

 

Both the USA and Great Britain urged Finland to distance itself from ***** Germany in 1944. This was well after the Soviet Union was considered an ally by the western powers. They had a choice to negotiate peace with the Red Army and the west.

Cooperating with Germany in the end hurt Finland. Many thousands of people lost their homes as they were burnt to the ground by the Nazis. It is completely evident that Germany only desired Finland for her natural resources and intended to exploit her people just the same as the rest of Europe... Germany's rape of europa

 

That's what I was tought in middle and high school — I'm French.