The History Buff's Guide to World War II (53 page)

7.
VOLGOGRAD (STALINGRAD)

Mamayev Hill was vital high ground during the battle of Stalingrad. A perpetual target of artillery, air strikes, tanks, and close-quarter fighting, its soil was often reddened with blood and forever inundated with shrapnel.

Today nearly a square mile of the rise is home to Mamayev Memorial, commemorating the tremendous losses and immeasurable gains of the Soviet victory at Stalingrad. Opened in 1967, the memorial is an elaborate progression of monuments lining the famous hillside. Winding upward on granite walks (signifying permanence), through rows of poplar trees (the stalwart defenders), past flower beds and pools of water (eternal life), stand a series of statues and sculptures, each dedicated to a particular facet of the fight. Among other effectively titled places for reflection are the Square of Those Who Fought to the Death, the Square of Heroes, and the Square of Sorrow. Past the last station, a gravesite holding tens of thousands killed in the battle, stands one of the most striking sculptures ever constructed. Towering from the top of Mamayev Hill is Motherland, a saintly female figure brandishing an enormous saber. Colossal, idyllic, and awe-inspiring, it is the most visited memorial in Russia.

Also in Volgograd is Russia’s second most complete World War II museum (behind the sprawling Great Patriotic War Museum in Moscow). Refurbished and recommissioned on the fortieth anniversary of V-E Day (simply known as V-Day in Russia) in 1985, the seventy-year-old Volgograd State Panoramic Museum houses four thousand displays set in eight galleries, most of which exclusively feature the battle of Stalingrad. The museum also has a lifelike panoramic painting two stories tall and the length of a football field entitled the “Defeat of Fascist Armies at Stalingrad.”

From the United States, it costs twice as much and takes three times as long to fly to Volgograd as it takes to reach Paris. Getting around the Russian city is not the easiest endeavor for English-only tourists, though a few tours are available. Yet the effort is rewarded in full, if only to see where history profoundly and unquestionably changed course against the “Thousand-Year Reich” of Nazi Germany.

At more than three hundred feet in total height, Volgograd’s Motherland is the tallest freestanding statue on earth.

8.
ARNHEM

In the September 1944 O
PERATION
M
ARKET
-G
ARDEN
, the British First Airborne plus elements of the First Polish Airborne along with Dutch Resistance planned to take the town of Arnhem by air drop and then secure its priceless bridge across the Rhine until help arrived. Unfortunately, the plan went “a bridge too far.” Today the key stop on this tour is the Airborne Museum, housed in the hotel that served as battle headquarters for the British First Airborne. It boasts an excellent collection of uniforms, relics from the battles, dioramas, video presentations, and a comprehensive 3-D map.

In Arnhem proper, Museum 40–45 depicts the desperate four years of occupied Holland and the fight for the city during Market-Garden. Also significant is the bridge itself. Destroyed after the battle and rebuilt to the same blueprints in 1950, it is now known as the Col. John Frost Bridge, named after the brigade commander who led the doomed attempt to take the span.

The Airborne Museum and other organizations offer walking and coach tours. In September paratroopers reenact an airdrop. To truly appreciate the difficulty facing the British Armored Thirty Corps, it may be enlightening to drive the seventy miles to Arnhem from the Belgian border (Highway N69 to N271) over its single narrow road crossing nine bridges.

In September of each year, the children of Arnhem gather at the Airborne Cemetery just west of town and adorn the British and Polish gravestones with flowers in honor of their sacrifice.

9.
CASSINO

One look at Italy begs the question why the Allies considered this the “soft underbelly” of Europe. A spine of mountains down its length, a choice few roadway arteries up its coasts, and a thick skull of frigid Alps, the country was born for defense.

Deep in the shin of the Italian boot, between Naples and the capital, stands Cassino, where the Allied march on Rome came to a bloody halt. To wrest this high ground from the Germans, the Allies launched attack after attack—Americans in January 1944, New Zealanders in February, Indians in March. Finally, Poles and French in May.

The city today should be called New Cassino. The original town rested higher up the hill and was erased during the battle. Crowning the hill is Montecassino, the sixth-century monastery that was controversially and—as it turned out—pointlessly destroyed by Allied bombers in February 1944; rubble from the raids made for better defenses. Fortunately, the sprawling, looming abbey has been nearly restored and can be visited today, provided the tourist arrives properly attired (no shorts or short-sleeved shirts). Some of the original religious trappings survived the battle and are on site.

Surrounding the abbey are grave reminders of the international struggle that took place. Nearby is a Polish cemetery, accessed by stairs, holding more than one thousand troops. Just outside of town is a Commonwealth cemetery with more than four thousand resting places, plus four thousand names of the missing. Farther north is a German cemetery with twenty thousand bodies.

The site is an hour south of Rome. Hotels are plentiful, but the land is rugged and steep. If walking is undesirable, renting a car may be the best option, although Italian motorways are not for the timid.

Ten miles southeast of Cassino is the village of San Pietro Infine. Though tourists visit, it has no inhabitants. All its residents were killed or driven off during a fierce battle there, and the ruins of the town remain as they were in 1943.

10.
HIROSHIMA

On any given day, the atmosphere at Hiroshima's Peace Park is strangely relaxed, surrounded as it is by a bustling metropolis of one million people. Straddling the river Motoyasu, about five hundred yards square, the park is a collection of memorials, a burial mound, temples, and other shrines of solemnity. Most of them impart the “Spirit of Hiroshima,” an internal and international appeal for everlasting peace. Across the river in the park's northeast corner stands the decaying cadaver of the “The A-Bomb Dome,” once known as Hiroshima Prefecture Industrial Promotion Hall, above which occurred the air burst. Just north is the T-shaped Aioi Bridge, used as the aiming point for the Enola Gay.

Central to the complex is the three-story Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. Engrossing may be the operative word here. Text is in English and Japanese. There are charred and melted relics of the blast, before and after pictures of human bodies, films of the damage, and video testimonials from survivors. Present is a rare acknowledgment of the Japanese army’s 1937 Rape of Nanking. Of the Hiroshima bomb itself, the museum implies that its use was racially motivated. A heavy emphasis is placed on the ensuing nuclear arms race.

Hiroshima is on the largest Japanese island of Honshu. Direct flights to the city are expensive. The better route is by way of bullet train from Tokyo, then by streetcar to the park. Though everything can be covered in a day, the city is home to a bustling nightlife and a major baseball team. Many signs are in English, and hotels are abundant.

In 1946, several prominent Japanese from the Hiroshima area gathered to discuss plans for reconstructing the city. One person suggested preserving the vast wasteland as it was to serve “as a memorial graveyard for the sake of everlasting world peace.”
⁵³

WAYS TO GET INVOLVED

Americans treated the Civil War and World War II almost exactly the same. When the conflicts ended, so ended much of the attention they commanded. Citizens generally bade each calamity a hasty good riddance and moved on. Not until decades had gone by and the war generation began to pass away did the country as a whole turn to see each event for its great magnitude.

For Americans in the early twenty-first century, there are abundant prospects to connect with the Second World War. Established organizations, extensive documentation, and global communications provide far-reaching networks of opportunity. Following are ten among many activities available for newcomers and diehards, students and educators, anyone interested in experiencing history beyond the confines of the bookstore and cable television. Ranking is according to the minimum investment in time and funds required for participation, from least to most.

1.
INTERVIEW A VETERAN

Sixteen million men and women served in the U.S. armed forces during World War II. Just over a third were still alive at the start of the twenty-first century. These individuals are dying at a rate of twelve hundred per day. As is too often the case, many depart and take their memories with them, having never recorded their unique and irreplaceable stories for generations present or to come.