On this day ...

... seventy years ago - April 26, 1937 -, German soldiers of the "Legion Condor" bombed the small Spanish town of Guernica. It was the Nazi Reichsluftwaffe´s first military strike abroad, and the first air raid on an extensive civil area in military history, completely destroying the center of Guernica, plastering the town with a deadly carpet of incendiary bombs, grenades, and shots fired from aircraft weapons upon the fleeing men, women and children.

To this day, it remains unclear how many casualties this air raid caused. At the time of the attack, many refugees from the Spanish Civil War had fled to Guernica. The highest estimate is around 2000 casualties, while according to other sources around 300 people were killed - burnt, torn to pieces, or shot.

The account of an eye witness, whose estimate of casualties ranges closer to 2000, captures the horror which statistics just won´t adequately describe:

I had arrived in Bilbao on April 24 and on the next day had gone to Mass with the Foreign Secretary and his family, spending the rest of the day in his office. The morning of the 26th I spent quietly at the office of Asistencia Social, discussing in outline the plans for evacuation. In the afternoon I made my way down to La Prensa where a group of journalists had invited me for a drink, among them Philip Jordan and George Steer, who during the next few weeks were to prove towers of strength and encouragement to me. A day begun so quietly was to end in indescribable horror and dismay.
"A raid's coming up," said Jordan. "Do you want to go down to the shelter?" I shook my head, so we went outside. Phil's ear had caught the sound of bombers in the air, although there had been no warning. Across the hills to the east the air was alive with Heinkels as wave after wave drove in from the sea. They were followed by Junkers. Horror-striken, the Basques amongst us shouted, "Guernica! they're bombing Guernica!" It seemed incredible that such a monstrous thing could happen to this quiet little market town, renowned from time immemorial as the home of Basque liberation where, before the famous oak tree, rulers of Spain had traditionally sworn to observe Basque local rights. Helpless to do anything we watched from the hills. Until nearly eight in the evening, incendiary bombs and high explosives rained down every twenty minutes. The town was open and defenceless; it was crowded with market day visitors and as people fled from the destruction they were dive-bombed and machine-gunned from the air. The roads out of the town were jammed with dead and injured: 1,654 killed; 889 injured.
(From the autobiography of Leah Manning, A Life For Education)

Here you can find more on the bombing of Guernica. And, of course, on Wikipedia.

Carnations ... And A Song

Carnations and a song are the watermarks of the Portuguese "Carnations Revolution", which on April 25, 1974, ended Europe´s longest standing dictatorship.

On May 28, 1926, a military junta had taken over through a military coup and implemented an authoritarian regime of fascist inspiration. In 1933, Oliveira Salazar came to control the country (he was to stay in power for over half a century, until 1968), and the regime renamed itself Estado Novo ("New State") - a name which remained until the "Carnations Revolution".

The regime of Marcello Caetano, who succeeded Oliveira Salazar in 1968, successfully annihilated all attempts of political reform. Torture, repression and censorship of the press were trademarks of the Estado Novo, and independent trade unions were prohibited. The military secret police persecuted opponents of the regime, and although there were formal elections, both the opposition and foreigh observers accused the government of electoral fraud and Caetano of not being impartial.

In addition, the regime was determined to keeep Portugal´s colonies beyond the 1960s despite growing independence movements, and against the pressure from the United Nations, because the maintenance of a colonial empire was part and parcel of the Estado Novo´s ideologues historical vision.

The necessity to spend huge amounts of money for war in Africa in order to maintain the colonial status against increasing resistance (which cost the Portuguese state almost 40% of its annual budget), as well as the Estado Novo´s economic policy of Corporatism contributed significantly to the impoverishment of the Portuguese economy.

On April 25, 1974, parts of the military uprose against the regime. On April 24, 1974 at 10:50 p.m. local time, the Portuguese radio played the love song "E depois do adeus" ("After the farewell") by Paulo de Carvalho, which was the secret sign for the insurgent troops.

However, the song which really came to be associated with the revolution was "Grândola, Vila Morena" ("Grândola, tanned city"), which had been banned by the regime. On April 25, 1974 at about 0:30 a.m. local time, the radio host of the catholic radio read the first verse of "Grândola". This was followed by the song sung by antifascist songwriter Zeca Afonso. This was a clear sign for the Portugues population - although at that point they had no idea what for.



For the insurgent military units the verses were the sign for the begin of the armed uprising. 18 hours later, the Movimento das Forças Armadas (Movement of the Armed Forces) had overthrown Europe´s oldest dictatorship. The revolution had been almost without bloodshed, save for 13 casualties, caused by troops who remained loyal to the regime and shot upon unarmed demonstrators.

Overjoyed Portugese population adorned the guns of the insurgent troops with carnations, and one of the most famous images from the "Carnation Revolution" was that of a waitress sticking a carnation into a soldier´s gun barrel. That´s how carnations became the symbol and eponym for the Portuguese Revolution.

Happy birthday, Portugal!

An extensive documentation in English is provided by the Universidade de Coimbra´s Centro de Documentação 25 de Abril.

April 19, 1943 - Or: Why It´s Important Not To Forget

(Jewish resistance fighters captured by SS troops during the Warsaw ghetto uprising. Warsaw, Poland)

Today marks the 67th anniversary of the beginning of the final stages of the Uprising of the Warsaw Ghetto, which eventually ended with the liquidation of the ghetto on May 16, 1943, at which point the remaining 56,000 Jews where sent to extermination camps (the remainder, some 300,000+ Jewish inhabitants of the Ghetto, had been sent to extermination camps - which in most cases meant certain death - by the end of 1942). You find a very good, dense summary, plus a link to a more in-depth account, at this blog.

Many, especially young, Germans question the necessity of being constantly reminded of the Nazi past of our history. While I reject the notion that younger generations carry some sort of "guilt" for what our forefathers did (or, in not resisting, did not), I do believe - no: I know that it is important that we are aware of our history and do not act as if it had nothing to do with us, lest we forget.

Case in point: The recent case of historical-political amnesia by conservative Governor of Baden-Wurttemberg, Guenther Oettinger. On April 11, he held a eulogy for the late Hans Filbinger, deceased on April 1, 2007. Filbinger had served as a naval judge from the spring of 1943 to the end of the war. During that time, he was involved in about 230 naval criminal proceedings, in six of which the death sentence was part of the proceedings.

At least in one case, the death sentence proclaimed with Filbinger´s involvement (in that case, he was acting as witness of the prosecution, assembling the death squad, and gave the order to fire) was executed on March 16, 1945 - three weeks before the capitulation - or liberation - of Germany. In this case - as in several others - Filbinger would have had several options open to avoid imposing the death sentence and the execution of 21 year old naval soldier Walter Groeger, who was accused of desertion.

Filbinger had been governor of Baden Wurttemberg from 1966 until he was caught up by his Nazi past and was forced to resign from office in 1978. In his eulogy, Oettinger - perhaps in a false understanding of the concept of "De mortui nil nisi bene" - twisted the historical facts, algidly alleging that Filbinger had been an opponent of the Nazi regime. (Yes, and so was the entire German populace at that time, with the possible exception of Hitler and a few other leading heads themselves ...).

When coming under pressure from various associations (from the most prominent one, the German Central Consistory of Jews, to the association of victims of the Nazi judicial system), Oettinger at first flat out refused to withdraw the claim that Filbinger had been an opponent of the Nazi regime. And he had several supporters amongst the lines of conservatives, among them the head of the JU (the Young Conservatives), Steffen Bilger, who applauded Oettinger for his "liberating" remarks and for "straightening several things out" (I wonder what that was supposed to mean ...).

Oettinger eventually did have to give in and had to withdraw his remarks on Monday, April 16, 2007, after the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, practically forced him to do so, although he probably will not have to resign as a governor. Thankfully, there are some mechanisms and organizations in this country that help to prevent a sugarcoated picture of our history from becoming mainstream, at least for the time being. Which is why it is important for all of us not to forget.

A short account in English on the fallouts of Oettinger´s eulogy by the Washington Post from Saturday, April 14 (i.e., before Oettinger had to distance himself from his remarks) can be found here. A more detailed account and a chronology in German is published there.