Revisionist History

I always thought that the idea of looking at counterfactual history was a fascinating concept, how would the second world war have unraveled if Hitler had been killed in the wolfs lair in 1944?? What would have happened if The D-day landings had failed?? You could go on, however what's taken hold in the last 20-30 years is revisionist history. It started on College and University campuses in the USA and has spread through further education in the Anglos-sphere. This horizontal spread through education also moved into the political realm heavily promoted by the media, but there has also been a vertical spread down to high schools and upwards to human rescores departments in the workplace.

The first time I came across this was on a US history course focusing on the end of the US civil war. The contention was that it was not a war motivated by the immorality of slavery in the newly declared confederate states, but only a desire to keep the southern states within the Union. The defeated south had to deal with changes that were difficult for them to swallow and there were also compromises given by the victors. Reconstruction of the South had to be done with sensitivity rather than the desire to bring the hammer down. For example, many of the top confederate military personnel were still recognized as honorable brave soldiers and southern culture was still promoted. This is not understood today and is condemned by the moral standards of the early 21st C. Even though slavery was abolished after the surrender the modern political class are happy apologizing for the past because then Washington was more concerned about winning the peace with the defeated south than embarking on a civil rights program. There is an undercurrent that people should feel shame and guilt about governing in the past. (Yet they don't feel any guilt towards the dead and wounded from the Union army).

Another, moral judgement of revisionist history is the use of the atomic bombs on Japan in WW2. Revisionism in history has an advantage that they know how things unraveled, leaders and the top military at the time didn't know for sure how the war was going to end. The fact that Japan did surrender shortly after the second bomb was dropped on the city of Nagasaki is of no consequence. They still make the case that the decision to drop the bomb was done out of spite and probably was motivated by racial hatred towards the Japanese. From a military point of view, they claim that it was also unnecessary as Japan was going to surrender, just using such a weapon was immoral and is a stain on the USA's history. To make these proclamations from a either a cozy university faculty or in secure legislative chamber years later is incredibly insensitive to the suffering and the horrendous ordeal of the people still held in Japanese occupied territory back then. That is a nice and convenient luxury belief because they know that their claims cannot be proven or disproven. It also doesn't take into account that any invasion of Japan would have been a massive undertaking which could potentially dragged on for months and the casualties both in military and civilian would have run into hundreds of thousands. The dropping of the atomic bomb was the last act of the most violent conflict in the history of humanity.

The motivation and morality of the leaders of the western allies in WW2 is also being revised. Winston Churchill is now in the firing line as it is alleged that he was motivated to drag out the war because of his desire to hold on to the British empire. Again the complete defeat of Germany is an inconvenience to critics of Churchill because they believe that WW2 could have been over much earlier. At the end of the war Britain was in a terrible financial condition and Churchills conservative party were replaced by the Labor party with a new PM. If Churchill wanted to keep the empire it might have been better to have taken the peace terms offered by Hitler which would allow keep their overseas possessions for British neutrality. It was quite obvious after the Atlantic Charter proclamation in August of 1941 that the USA wasn't interested in protecting or preserving the British empire, Churchill knew this and also knew that for the Germany and Japan to be beaten the USA needed to enter the war. Churchill is also being blamed for the famine in Bengal where anything from 300,000 to 3 million perished. This is quite a wide over and under , however, what ever the true total, Great Britain had a lot on it's plate and as usual it doesn't even consider that corruption and incompetence of local indigenous officials could bare most of the responsibility. Winston Churchill was certainly a product of late 19thC British politics and made many bad decisions throughout his career, although standing firm against Hitler in 1940 isn't one of them. In addition when he was younger escaped a prisoner of war camp in the Boar war and volunteered for duty on the western front in WW1 after being dismissed from the cabinet by then PM Lloyd George. (You certainly can't imagine Boris Johnson or Tony Blair doing anything like that) . Churchill is an easy target to go after for revisionist historians whose motivation is not to set the record straight but simply a determination to besmirch his reputation as with any historical figures who were courageous and don't measure up to the lofty moral standards of today.