Entertaining if unedifying fireworks in postwar Berlin.
An account of the stormy Allied-Soviet relations in Berlin after Germany’s 1945 surrender.
Most histories of this period emphasize Allied leaders (Truman, Churchill, Stalin) or generals (Eisenhower, Montgomery). In his latest World War II history, however, Milton moves down the hierarchy to focus on Berlin’s four military governors, especially American colonel Frank Howley and his bitter rival, Soviet general Alexander Kotikov. A civil affairs specialist, Howley impressed superiors in governing and feeding Cherbourg and then Paris before he was promoted to command the American sector of Berlin. On June 17, 1945, his unit moved toward Berlin only to be stopped and harassed at the border of Soviet-occupied Germany. It was not until July 1 that he entered a city stripped bare after two months of Soviet looting, with communists in control of the police as well as road and rail traffic. Howley arrived with written orders to cooperate; however, confronted with Soviet policy aimed at expelling the three Western occupiers, he disobeyed. It helped that, unlike his British and French colleagues, he was both pugnacious and enterprising. Milton devotes two-thirds of the book to shouting matches, political skulduggery, and violent confrontation that might be called “comic-opera” if it weren’t for the Soviet willingness to engage in kidnapping, sabotage, and murder. Perhaps the high note was the 1946 Berlin city council election. Free elections were never a Soviet strength, but they deluged the electorate with food, privileges, propaganda, and promises only to be horrified at their landslide defeat with less than 20% of the vote. Finally exasperated, in 1948 they cut off all supplies, resulting in the iconic Berlin airlift. Many popular histories treat that operation as a dazzling triumph, but Milton’s detailed account reveals that Berliners starved and suffered intensely before Stalin called off the Soviet blockade. The author ends in 1949, with Berlin firmly divided, an outcome acceptable to the West but a persistent drain on the Soviet Union that ultimately contributed to its collapse.
Entertaining if unedifying fireworks in postwar Berlin.Pub Date: July 13, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-250-24756-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: April 28, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist (1900–45) collected his work from WWII in two bestselling volumes, this second published in 1944, a year before Pyle was killed by a sniper’s bullet on Okinawa. In his fine introduction to this new edition, G. Kurt Piehler (History/Univ. of Tennessee at Knoxville) celebrates Pyle’s “dense, descriptive style” and his unusual feel for the quotidian GI experience—a personal and human side to war left out of reporting on generals and their strategies. Though Piehler’s reminder about wartime censorship seems beside the point, his biographical context—Pyle was escaping a troubled marriage—is valuable. Kirkus, at the time, noted the hoopla over Pyle (Pulitzer, hugely popular syndicated column, BOMC hype) and decided it was all worth it: “the book doesn’t let the reader down.” Pyle, of course, captures “the human qualities” of men in combat, but he also provides “an extraordinary sense of the scope of the European war fronts, the variety of services involved, the men and their officers.” Despite Piehler’s current argument that Pyle ignored much of the war (particularly the seamier stuff), Kirkus in 1944 marveled at how much he was able to cover. Back then, we thought, “here’s a book that needs no selling.” Nowadays, a firm push might be needed to renew interest in this classic of modern journalism.
Pub Date: April 26, 2001
ISBN: 0-8032-8768-2
Page Count: 513
Publisher: Univ. of Nebraska
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2001
Harari delivers yet another tour de force.
A highly instructive exploration of “current affairs and…the immediate future of human societies.”
Having produced an international bestseller about human origins (Sapiens, 2015, etc.) and avoided the sophomore jinx writing about our destiny (Homo Deus, 2017), Harari (History/Hebrew Univ. of Jerusalem) proves that he has not lost his touch, casting a brilliantly insightful eye on today’s myriad crises, from Trump to terrorism, Brexit to big data. As the author emphasizes, “humans think in stories rather than in facts, numbers, or equations, and the simpler the story, the better. Every person, group, and nation has its own tales and myths.” Three grand stories once predicted the future. World War II eliminated the fascist story but stimulated communism for a few decades until its collapse. The liberal story—think democracy, free markets, and globalism—reigned supreme for a decade until the 20th-century nasties—dictators, populists, and nationalists—came back in style. They promote jingoism over international cooperation, vilify the opposition, demonize immigrants and rival nations, and then win elections. “A bit like the Soviet elites in the 1980s,” writes Harari, “liberals don’t understand how history deviates from its preordained course, and they lack an alternative prism through which to interpret reality.” The author certainly understands, and in 21 painfully astute essays, he delivers his take on where our increasingly “post-truth” world is headed. Human ingenuity, which enables us to control the outside world, may soon re-engineer our insides, extend life, and guide our thoughts. Science-fiction movies get the future wrong, if only because they have happy endings. Most readers will find Harari’s narrative deliciously reasonable, including his explanation of the stories (not actually true but rational) of those who elect dictators, populists, and nationalists. His remedies for wildly disruptive technology (biotech, infotech) and its consequences (climate change, mass unemployment) ring true, provided nations act with more good sense than they have shown throughout history.
Harari delivers yet another tour de force.Pub Date: Sept. 4, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-51217-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Spiegel & Grau
Review Posted Online: June 26, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2018
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