I have always been interested in stories about the resistance in World War II. During a trip to the Netherlands quite some time ago, I really enjoyed visiting famous sights where acts of immense bravery and kindness, such as where Anne Frank and her family hid, took place. We also walked past Corrie ten Boom’s house, now a museum, but were unable to visit because it was closed when we were there. We also visited the Dutch Resistance Museum, which was fascinating and which provided a more in-depth view of the resistance and how it functioned and how so many people were able to participate in the Dutch attempt to withstand the evils of Nazism. There are similar stories from all the countries invaded by Nazi Germany. Like the Dutch stories that have proven a source of lifelong inspiration, these other stories, usually not quite as famous, cover a wide range of people doing what was right and are able to inspire us to do what is right, even in the face of great danger.
The Zookeeper’s Wife: A War Story by Diane Ackerman (ISBN: 978-0-393-33306-0) is one such story. The story’s heroine is Antonina Żabińska, who was a Polish writer and the wife of the head of the Warsaw Zoo, Jan Żabiński. Both were members of the underground resistance that fought the Nazi occupiers of their homeland. They, like most members of the resistance, used what they had on hand to do this. In their case, the story is rather remarkable because what they had on hand was a zoo. This gave them cover for Jan to be out and about more than the average Varsovian and provided some unusual hiding spots for fellow resistance members and Jews alike. Jan also used his position working for the municipality to help Jews escape from the ghetto, and they were often housed at the zoo, both in spaces formerly inhabited by animals and in the family’s house (which was always home to an extensive menagerie of unusual pets). As with any underground operation, there were risks and close calls. Hitler’s henchmen were interested in purebred animals as well as purebred people, so the zoo was of interest to some high-ranking Nazis, some of whom visited the zoo. Regular soldiers used it as barracks and shot some of the animals for food. The whole situation was always dangerous because one could never be sure just what those walking past the house would notice about the extra bodies in the house. Jan, Antonina, their son, and some of their animals made it out of the war alive, having done the right thing by all those whom they helped and having risked it all.
I kind of expected I would like the book, and I wasn’t disappointed. The story was very interesting and well written. The reader is presented with a rather detailed (arguably too detailed in places) picture of the Żabiński family, the zoo, and the work Jan and Antonina did to save people from the Nazis. Throughout the book, I was reminded of the risks they took and thought of how important a characteristic that is to have. I believe they were always calculated risks, and they didn’t push the envelope when they didn’t have to, but to be able to do the right thing in a world, like the one created by the Nazis, where wrong is right and right is wrong, one has to be able to put aside risk aversion to a certain extent. It was only by being willing to take certain risks that the story’s heroes could help as many people as they did. Like all such stories, it helps us to never forget, but hopefully it does more than that and inspires us to not just never forget, but to undertake proactive measures to help the world avoid repeating the same mistakes again.
The Zookeeper’s Wife: A War Story by Diane Ackerman (ISBN: 978-0-393-33306-0) is one such story. The story’s heroine is Antonina Żabińska, who was a Polish writer and the wife of the head of the Warsaw Zoo, Jan Żabiński. Both were members of the underground resistance that fought the Nazi occupiers of their homeland. They, like most members of the resistance, used what they had on hand to do this. In their case, the story is rather remarkable because what they had on hand was a zoo. This gave them cover for Jan to be out and about more than the average Varsovian and provided some unusual hiding spots for fellow resistance members and Jews alike. Jan also used his position working for the municipality to help Jews escape from the ghetto, and they were often housed at the zoo, both in spaces formerly inhabited by animals and in the family’s house (which was always home to an extensive menagerie of unusual pets). As with any underground operation, there were risks and close calls. Hitler’s henchmen were interested in purebred animals as well as purebred people, so the zoo was of interest to some high-ranking Nazis, some of whom visited the zoo. Regular soldiers used it as barracks and shot some of the animals for food. The whole situation was always dangerous because one could never be sure just what those walking past the house would notice about the extra bodies in the house. Jan, Antonina, their son, and some of their animals made it out of the war alive, having done the right thing by all those whom they helped and having risked it all.I kind of expected I would like the book, and I wasn’t disappointed. The story was very interesting and well written. The reader is presented with a rather detailed (arguably too detailed in places) picture of the Żabiński family, the zoo, and the work Jan and Antonina did to save people from the Nazis. Throughout the book, I was reminded of the risks they took and thought of how important a characteristic that is to have. I believe they were always calculated risks, and they didn’t push the envelope when they didn’t have to, but to be able to do the right thing in a world, like the one created by the Nazis, where wrong is right and right is wrong, one has to be able to put aside risk aversion to a certain extent. It was only by being willing to take certain risks that the story’s heroes could help as many people as they did. Like all such stories, it helps us to never forget, but hopefully it does more than that and inspires us to not just never forget, but to undertake proactive measures to help the world avoid repeating the same mistakes again.
 | This work, including all text, photographs, and other original work, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives 3.0 License and is copyrighted © MMXIV John Pruess. |
Star Wars: A New Dawn by John Jackson Miller (ISBN: 978-0-553-39286-9) talks about how two of the main Rebels characters met and teamed up to fight the Empire. A guy named Kanan is living out his life in anonymity, usually jumping from one job to another to stay ahead of anyone really getting to know him, mostly because he’s a little afraid of the Empire and because he’s really never known anything different. His public image is that of a rough-and-tumble cowboy, piloting ships carrying explosives and fighting anyone who so much as looks at him crookedly. However, he often finds himself helping people out of sticky situations, usually seemingly without thinking as it just seems to be a part of who he is. Opposite him is Hera, a Twi’lek, a humanoid alien (basically a human with so-called head-tails), who is an excellent pilot and has already dedicated her life to fighting against the Empire, although she is not part of any truly organized effort. Their worlds collide on a planet where the moon is the real draw because it can be mined. Kanan saves a few people, having used the Force to keep a cave from collapsing on them, and so is looking for a way away from the planet to avoid detection as a former Jedi. Hera comes to get some information from a guy who works for a Star Wars version of a signals intelligence agency. They meet in a dark alley, fighting off the local gang bangers and protecting people in the process. Eventually, rather begrudgingly (especially for Kanan), they’re drawn into a mission that involves smuggling things on board an Imperial ship, fighting a cyborg, and a few shoot-outs. There’s lots of action, some Star Wars-style romance, and the necessary positive ending after all the damage is done along the way. The result is that the groundwork is laid for Hera and Canan, no longer completely running from his Jedi past, leading a small team of rebels all over the galaxy, resisting the Empire whenever they get the chance.
The Winter Fortress: The Epic Mission to Sabotage Hitler’s Atomic Bomb by Neal Bascomb (ISBN: 978-0-544-36806-4) is a story that tells just such a story (incidentally, also in Norway). The book tells part of the story of Nazi Germany’s efforts to acquire an atomic bomb. Those efforts were tightly tied to Norway’s hydroelectric capabilities and a substance known as heavy water, or water with extra deuterium in it. Early experiments by Allied and Axis scientists alike indicated that heavy water could be used in making an atomic bomb. Germany pursued this theory rather aggressively. After occupying Norway, the Germans used Norway’s production of heavy water to accelerate their nuclear experiments. The Allies knew this and wanted to come up with a plan to prevent the German scientists from getting what they needed. Norwegians in the resistance did a lot in their day-to-day efforts to sabotage the heavy water without doing too much damage to the plants where it was produced since that would lead to German reprisals and put many Norwegians out of work. It was something the Norwegians had to carefully balance. As things got down to the wire, though, even the Norwegians could see that their efforts would have to increase in scale. With help from the UK, various plans were set in motion, including one that led to some disastrous deaths in the Norwegian outback as saboteurs rode gliders into Norway only to crash land with horrible results. Later attempts were more successful with Norwegian commandos, already in Norway, conducting two successful raids against heavy water, one damaging the plant and one preventing a large delivery of the water from being completed. After the first raid on the plant, the production capabilities were eventually brought back on line, but when they were, the U.S. bombed the plant, putting down for the count until the end of the war. The book chronicles these operations, all that led up the them, and many of the brave people it took to make them successful.
In The Vory: Russia's Super Mafia (ISBN: 978-0-300-18682-6) by Mark Galeotti, one gets a much more in-depth look at Russia’s criminals. The book looks at the heavy hitters, not the petty thieves, starting way back in tsarist times and finishing with events of the last couple years. The history of Russia’s criminals is interesting in that it is rather tightly woven together with the history of Russia itself. The Russian Empire, the Bolsheviks, Stalin, Gorbachev, and then Yeltsin and now Putin have all left a mark on Russian organized crime. The central figures, the so-called thieves in law (“in law” because they lived according to the thieves’ code) have proven themselves resourceful and adaptable, changing their methods and worldview to fit whatever comes their way. Originally unwilling to be part of mainstream society, Stalinist repression and policy caused a demographic shift in the underworld that resulted in the top criminals finding a partner, not an enemy, in the state, and that relationship has continued to morph up through today, where crime, business, and politics is often a blurry and hard-to-define conglomeration. Russian organized crime was a hot topic in the 1990s, when it and the oligarchs settled their scores openly and violently on the streets of Moscow and St. Petersburg, and security services around the world warned of the Russian mafia and its potential influence in Europe and even farther abroad. Galeotti discusses that, too, including organized crime in America that is tied to the Russians. He notes, though, that most of the Western fears never materialized, and the Russian criminals were never able to (or never even tried to) overtake the criminals who were already in place. Now, with their shady ties to legitimacy, they ply their trades on the margins, providing services such as hacking or providing frontline fighters in Crimea. There are a few significant words on the costs of crime, both in terms of people and economics. The author’s main thesis is that the Russian thieves, the vory, now a solid part of mainstream society, a complete 180° turn from their pre-Revolution days, have adapted before and will continue to adapt to whatever situation comes their way.
Already eight years ago, Why Kosovo Still Matters by Denis MacShane (ISBN: 978-1-907822-39-1) was printed. At that time, Kosovo had only been independent for three short years, with many in the West wondering why this little country was such a focus for so many in government. The book gives a short history of Kosovo, but spends the bulk of its relatively few pages discussing the more modern history of the country from the fall of Yugoslavia to its troubled beginnings as an independent state. Kosovo faces a number of difficulties. Most are local, many having to do with the hostility of its neighbor and former overlord, Serbia. These are unlikely to subsist soon because of the large Serbian minority in Kosovo. Other problems exist because of the lack of support from the international community. In essence, Europe and the U.S. created the country, but the West has since then done what some perceive as a poor job at integrating the country into the West, which has left Serbia pretty free to meddle in the country it wishes had never been created. Serbia has a few allies in its efforts to keep Kosovo in a constant state of change. Some are more active than others in these efforts, but overall, only a little over half of UN members have recognized Kosovo’s independence. This situation makes it hard for the country to develop and for the people there to experience the benefits that independence and democracy are supposed to bring. The end of the book discusses a few ideas on how to move forward. Although it’s a little dated, some of the ideas being floated as ways to solve Kosovo’s troubles then are still being talked about, such as letting Serbia have the regions populated by a majority Serb population, but that is dismissed out of hand. The problems are best dealt with, according to MacShane, by accepting that both Kosovo and Serbia are going to be around and then moving forward with an eye to improving the lots of the people on both sides of the ethnic divide.
George Washington's Secret Six: The Spy Ring That Saved the American Revolution by Brian Kilmeade and Don Yaeger (ISBN: 978-1-59523-103-1) tells a very interesting story and gives some important insights into just how Washington and the other rebels upset one of the greatest empires in the world. Washington was not opposed at all to spying, and the methods he was willing to employ were rather cutting edge for his time. Importantly, the American forces were first to plunge into the spy game, so the British, who eventually put off the old ways of thinking about spying and the old ways of spying itself, had to play catch up. Since New York was of such great importance to the warring armies, getting solid intelligence out of the Tory-held area was critical to the American cause. Washington’s chief of intelligence, Benjamin Tallmadge, was able to recruit six agents in New York, known as the Culper Ring, after the pseudonyms of the main agents, who then provided the Continental Army with key information throughout the war. They were able to help thwart a British attack on French forces friendly to the American rebels, they helped capture traitor extraordinaire Benedict Arnold, they helped Washington avoid defeat by warning him not to chase after what was a British diversion, and they helped the Continental government fight against British attempts to infuse America with counterfeit money. Kilmeade and Yaeger provide a number of details about those involved in the spy ring, the officers on both sides, and the various events they were involved in from the ring’s inception to the end of the war.