VE Day Piccadilly Circus 1945
As our politicians mark the anniversary of VE Day they simultaneously promote defence spending at the expense of the post-war welfare state, oppose peace in Ukraine, demonise refugees and support the greatest crime against humanity of our time. It therefore is reasonable to ask: are they acting in the spirit of those who fought and died in their millions over 80 years ago?
May 8th is the 80th anniversary of VE Day, when the Second World War came to an end. After six years of war, a poor, hungry, damaged and battered Europe saw Hitler dead, the allies victorious and the beginning of a new era.
As the news media has repeatedly shown us, people in Britain celebrated by taking to the streets and holding impromptu parties. The streets were thronged throughout the centre of the capital and the pubs ran out of beer. My mum was part of those crowds, given two days off work and determined to celebrate the end of fascism in Europe and what they hoped would be the end of suffering.
And people had suffered. The last year of the war in London saw the onslaught from the skies returning, with the V1 and even more dreaded V2 rockets, which caused thousands of deaths. The last V2 explosion was only in March 1945, less than two months from the war’s end. Most people had lost friends and family, in my mum’s case her first boyfriend, a rear gunner in a Lancaster bomber shot down over Berlin in November 1943, aged 19.
The celebrations were tinged with sadness and a certain sort of aimlessness as people wandered the streets of central London on May 8th.
Many people in Europe had suffered much worse. The Jews of Europe were fascism’s most obvious victims, killed in their millions alongside gypsies, gays, the disabled and others targeted by the Nazis. Most countries of mainland Europe were occupied and resistance movements were born which fought with immense courage and bravery against the Nazis and home grown collaborators. Yugoslavia was scene of a bloody civil war, where the left partisans fought against monarchists and fascists. Greece was also victim of civil war, with the British aiding and abetting the right against the Communists. Britain’s bombing of Germany, the city of Dresden in particular, was bloody and deliberately targeted civilians.
Russia was particularly hard hit, losing around 27 million people in the war including at the terrible siege and battle of Stalingrad, where the Germans’ eventual defeat marked a turning point in the war.
You will hear little about most of this in the next few days. Europe’s post-war history saw the defeat of the left in countries such as Italy and France. The labour government in Britain brought in real reforms, many of which have been dismantled or under threat today.
In August 1945, the US dropped the atomic bomb on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, causing death and injury on a previously unimagined scale, following on a deadly conventional bombing of Tokyo. The war ended with the US the declared victors, and very soon afterwards a ‘Cold War’ began. Europe was divided along its centre, and Germany divided as a country.
The demand by the people of Europe for peace in 1945 is now ignored by the governments and military. Today, there are dangers of a new world war starting up again, and few if any lessons are being learned from all the commemorations and fly-pasts.
We are told Putin is the new Hitler. The anti-war movement is accused of appeasement for calling for peace in Ukraine, and history pushed to one side as Russia’s commemoration of VE day on 9 May is boycotted by the EU. The UK and US do nothing to end the horrors in Gaza, rather they actively support Israel, selling it weapons and providing political cover. The war in Palestine has every chance of spreading, with attacks already carried out on Lebanon, Syria and Yemen, while Iran remains a target for many in President Trump’s administration. And then there’s the chance that the current trade war on China will become a hot war.
There are many very good reasons for remembering the end of the second world war and the sacrifices of my parents’ generation. There is no good reason to support genocide or war in Ukraine aimed at fostering conflict and possibly future wars.