R. M. Douglas (1) (1963–)

This is one of the few books that attempts to detail the forcible expulsion of the ethnic Germans at the end of WWII from their homelands. Homelands in which many of them (and their ancestors) had lived for many, many generations. The author decided to not use the compiled first-person accounts of the expellees themselves, but instead chose to use the accounts of others who witnessed what was going on. This is disappointment in some respects, but good in others. At least the descriptions of what was happening to the ethnic Germans was verified by what others saw taking place. The author goes into some really great details on how the "deportations" took place in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Hungary, Romania etc. The fact that this was anything buy "orderly and humane" was heartbreaking to read. I did disagree with a lot of what the author contends, but my review would be as long as a book if I wrote about everything I disagreed with. I will say his last chapter (The conclusion) is by far his best chapter. That chapter alone makes this book with reading. Recommended for the subject, but one should also read other books on the subject to get a bird's eye view, from the German perspective, of what was happening during the expulsions.… (more)

Masterful History

I try to avoid writing reviews when I don't have a lot of specific things to say, but I'll make an exception for this one because the current average rating for this book is absurdly low, and I need to do my small part to raise it. There are evidently some people who, in light of the atrocities committed by the Nazis, feel that nothing is too bad for those of German heritage. It's similar to the commonly expressed wish that perpetrators of heinous crimes will be raped in prison, except in the case of the Germans the _targets only need to share a genealogy with the criminals, not be criminals themselves.

Douglas has really done a masterful job with this book. He's a great writer, thoughtful in his analysis, and wise in his conclusions. (I now want to read his other books even though they're not on topics of particular interest to me.) He doesn't neglect the context in which the expulsion of the Germans took place, but he also doesn't think that that context means this episode should be whitewashed.

The expulsion of the Germans might not have been orderly and humane, but this book certainly is. Thanks, Dr. Douglas.… (more)

This is the best single book I have seen that describes and details the ethnic cleansing of the Germans from eastern Europe including provinces that had been legally German for centuries such a Silesia and East Prussia. Far too much of what little there is in English is tainted by either Cold War diatribes against the Red hordes or post-WW2 Germanophobia. In fact purely nationalist Czechs and Poles were no different in their treatment of Germans than Soviets [sometimes they were worse]. In fact clear anti-Nazi Germans [and even German speaking Jewish survivors of the Holocaust] were in the main treated no differently than local Nazis. In fact the line between 'German' and 'Slav' was in reality far fuzzier than nationalists on both sides would retroactively make it. The book generally describes what happened throughout the region but the main focus is what is now the Czech Republic [Czechoslovakia then but the Slovak region gets relatively little attention] and Poland. He does an excellent job of setting the feel of successive regime changes from 1919-1950. He does an equally good job of focusing on the vast gap between what was ordered or agreed to at the top and the violent chaos of what happened on the individual and neighborhood level. He makes a good case that the expulsions were a disaster for everyone, even the expelling regimes, who economically devastated the regions in question in an orgy of chaotic looting where the central governments repeatedly lost control of their on the spot minions and new ethnically approved resettlers. He clearly misses how much of this was inevitable. He seems to have a poor grasp of just how chaotic post-war central Europe was. Six years of war had left ten of millions of people displaced, not just the expelled Germans. Add in demobilizing armies and the beginnings of the Cold War and the words 'orderly and humane' can be seen for the cant they were. The author instead takes them as a reasonable standard of judgment. He also takes the Nuremberg charges against the senior Germans as a reasonable standard to judge behavior instead of the mix of victor's justice and pious sentiment they were. This is a very early 21st century point of view. This presentism [judging the past by standards no one at the time would understand or accepted] taints the entire work from top to bottom. European thought and sensibilities have evolved in the near seventy years since the end of WW2 and these memes have gained a good measure of international acceptance [or at least formal acknowledge as nominal standards]. This is a major advance in the laws of international and internal human rights but as the wars of Yugoslav devolution should have shown in the 1990's even Europeans have a problem living up to these standards. To expect the chaotic Czechoslovak and Polish states of 1945-1950 to be held to these standards is absurd.… (more)