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And once again the BBC News Site drives me to an LJ entry
Sunday, January 23rd, 2005 12:05 pmThe article in question this time is about how the allies should have done more to bomb Auschwitz.
Basically the BBC are going over (again) whether the Allies could and should have bombed the death camp at Auschwitz during World War Two. THere is no doubt that the allies knew the purpose of the camp, there are numerous historical documents that testify to that fact. THe bit that annoys me is that it is History. It is in the past and the actions that were taken then could not be changed. Everyone has 20:20 vision in hindsight and it's very easy for a journalist writing now to say "this is what we should have done". Perhaps we should have, but the fact remains that we didn't. I'm also a little concerned that noone raises the possibility could have killed a majority of the prisoners interned there, as (though I am not by any means an expert) I am not aware of there being any sort of Air Raid Shelters for the population of the camp.
This isn't really very focussed. The main gist is (I think ;)) that I am annoyed of actions being taken 50, 100, 200 years in the past being re-examined in light of what we know now and the values we hold dear now. The world of the past was as confused as the present is to us now. Noone can know all of the facts at the time, they can just do the best job possible on the facts they have and it's not fair for them to be condemned in the future when we have all the facts, not only about the circumstances surrounding an event, but also the effects that a particular action had.
Hrm.
Sorry ;) Brain dump :P
Basically the BBC are going over (again) whether the Allies could and should have bombed the death camp at Auschwitz during World War Two. THere is no doubt that the allies knew the purpose of the camp, there are numerous historical documents that testify to that fact. THe bit that annoys me is that it is History. It is in the past and the actions that were taken then could not be changed. Everyone has 20:20 vision in hindsight and it's very easy for a journalist writing now to say "this is what we should have done". Perhaps we should have, but the fact remains that we didn't. I'm also a little concerned that noone raises the possibility could have killed a majority of the prisoners interned there, as (though I am not by any means an expert) I am not aware of there being any sort of Air Raid Shelters for the population of the camp.
This isn't really very focussed. The main gist is (I think ;)) that I am annoyed of actions being taken 50, 100, 200 years in the past being re-examined in light of what we know now and the values we hold dear now. The world of the past was as confused as the present is to us now. Noone can know all of the facts at the time, they can just do the best job possible on the facts they have and it's not fair for them to be condemned in the future when we have all the facts, not only about the circumstances surrounding an event, but also the effects that a particular action had.
Hrm.
Sorry ;) Brain dump :P
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