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Why do people think that the US won WW2 in Europe?

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Re: Why do people think that the US won WW2 in Europe?

#81
post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arguably, the USSR also got lots of the spoils and emerged a super power.

And 100 years from now, China will have won WW2 with their subtle but very important sideline involvments

Seeing that the Chinese War Against Japan lasted over eight years the Chinese very likely have a good claim to that title.

(That's eight years at least. Some people count that war as between 1931 and 1945, so some 14 years.)

Re: Why do people think that the US won WW2 in Europe?

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US people don't discuss that. The idea is that if nobody remembers, they won't know that the war was lost.

My experience has been different. It was a wildly unpopular war with poor people being sent into a meat grinder. And its the one with the pervasive urban legend about returning soldiers being spat on. Vietnam is still a single-party state run by a self titled Communist Party that follows Marxist teachings while adopting the more modern state-capitalist approach. This is the opposite of American values and the exact o…

You're right that people remember the opposition to the war. But that's exactly why they don't accept that the war is lost.

In American's minds, the war was opposed, and they think that was the reason why it ended. When in fact it was just the opposite. Vietnam won that war of invasion fair and square, with the sacrifice of millions of Vietnamese for their country. Because of that, the American people was unwilling to send more of their children to be killed in Vietnam.

The result of the protests is that the government created the illusion that they were retreating because people didn't want to continue the war, not because they lost.

Re: Why do people think that the US won WW2 in Europe?

#85
post #78
post #47

The issue is that Russia's liberation of Eastern Europe was incredibly traumatizing to the domestic populations. You had systematic mass rapes on a bewildering scale. As in, every single female from city X was raped. See this article: "They raped very german woman from age 8 to 80" ( https://www.theguardian.com/books/2002/may/01/news.features1... ). And it was not just German women. Similar things happened in Poland,…

This is exact story of my grandmother and her sister when Soviets were going trough my home city in northern Poland. They were not as afraid of Germans as they were of Soviets. Soviets were animals raping, stealing and beating everything they encountered.

My grandmother also. It's amazing how many in the US not only don't know about this, but become angry when you tell them.

Yet for the generation that lived through WW2, you can talk to anyone who was on the wrong side of the iron curtain and they will tell you what it was like.

The BBC documentary World At War (1973) covers this in episode 21. https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3oeao1

This is also covered on Wikipedia now https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_during_the_occupation_of_...

"Female deaths in connection with the rapes in Germany, overall, are estimated at 240,000.[2][17] Antony Beevor describes it as the "greatest phenomenon of mass rape in history", and has concluded that at least 1.4 million women were raped in East Prussia, Pomerania and Silesia alone.[18]"

In Hungary: "According to Skrabski, it’s possible that as many as 800,000 Hungarian women were raped, and the violence included gang rape and sexual torture. Pregnancy resulting from rape was so widespread that the government suspended its ban on abortions for several months during 1945, offering abortion and STD treatment services free of charge." https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2013/...

There are many well documented stories of these atrocities in all the areas occupied by the Red Army, most too gruesome to include here. Anyone can do their own research, the information is out there, even if many don't want to hear it. When you want to understand why Eastern Europe is falling over itself (foolishly, IMO) to join NATO and integrate into the West, these types of things need to be understood as being in the background.

Re: Why do people think that the US won WW2 in Europe?

#86
post #78
post #47

The issue is that Russia's liberation of Eastern Europe was incredibly traumatizing to the domestic populations. You had systematic mass rapes on a bewildering scale. As in, every single female from city X was raped. See this article: "They raped very german woman from age 8 to 80" ( https://www.theguardian.com/books/2002/may/01/news.features1... ). And it was not just German women. Similar things happened in Poland,…

This is exact story of my grandmother and her sister when Soviets were going trough my home city in northern Poland. They were not as afraid of Germans as they were of Soviets. Soviets were animals raping, stealing and beating everything they encountered.

The Germans killed 5,000,000 people in Poland, but you are saying now the people at the time were not as afraid of them as the Soviets. Makes sense.

Re: Why do people think that the US won WW2 in Europe?

#87

That reminds me of this video[1], where Americans are asked questions you'd think they'd easily be able to answer. Such as... Q: Who won the Vietnam war? A: We did. Wait, were we even in the Vietnam war? Q: How many sides does a triangle have? A: Damn. Four. A: There's no sides... One? Q: How many World Wars have there been? A: Three. Q: What are Hiroshima and Nagasaki known for? A: Judo-wrestling? [1] - https://www.…

well, this makes me think hmm, I know all the answers to those questions, but I've never been asked in one of those surveys of people walking on the street when living in the U.S - but if I had been.... would I have been put on this funny TV segment?

> but if I had been.... would I have been put on this funny TV segment?

Well, if you wanted to be—and plenty of people do—then there’s an easy way. All you have to do is give a really bad answer to an easy question.

Re: Why do people think that the US won WW2 in Europe?

#88

> Why do americans think that the US won WW2 in Europe? If you were British you would know the real truth from the 24/7 repeats of WW2 documentaries that Churchill won WW2

And if you were Russian you would know that it was the Soviets that defeated the Nazis and won the war. And if you were Polish you would know that the Soviets were bad for invading originally, and the English were also pretty bad through their initial inactivity. In fact if you look at the death toll by nation, one could argue that the UK barely went to war at all. The UK lost what, 400,000 people? Compared with Pola…

And they'd all be wrong. The Allies won the war. None of them did it on their own. Nor could they had they tried. The UK was going to fall. The USSR was going to fall. It took all of us to destroy the Axis.

Re: Why do people think that the US won WW2 in Europe?

#90
post #14

Because they were on the winning side? War is a team sport.

This is like saying Troy Daniels won NBA Championship last year. He was on Lakers roster and has the ring but you know… :)

Did he made the winning shot in game 7?

Specially in basketball, do you credit the first 10 baskets made or the three pointer at the buzzer?

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