the second world war [Theme] Page 1

The peoples were regaining a free face; and in mid-January a new map of Europe was drawn in Yalta. If the troops were still in the war, then their leaders were already working for tomorrow.

Alberto Moravia is a classic of world literature, the greatest Italian writer of the 20th century. His novels "Chochara", "The Roman Woman", "Contempt" and many others entered the golden fund of European prose and were repeatedly filmed by the most famous directors. Moravia is cruel and derisive, he never sympathizes with his heroes, but his brilliant knowledge of psychology gives his works a special depth.

I met him in the Louvre, at the Impressionist paintings, where I spent whole evenings. It was comforting. When I stood in front of the quiet, sun-filled landscapes, I could not believe that the two-legged creature who created all this could at the same time prepare a robbery war. I couldn't believe it. And these illusions for an hour, or two, lowered the mad blood pressure.

To your last Stalingrad.

And at night - the Nuremberg prison.

Tips shouted that government can control any cook, with Stalin chopped off the heads of anyone who dared even breathe on it again and forged iron. Hitler screamed - one people, one leader, and a blanket of power went hand so that crackling was on the whole Reich. However, only Hitler and Stalin were the titans, all the other politicians rode them in the legs a bunch of pygmies, not yet decided, whether to stay in one pygmy flock, whether to choose titanium.
Only the titans have fallen, gentlemen.
Fate of the titans - rise and fall.
Survive the pygmies.

I morally get sick if I don't fight. I can tell a lot about current events. But to say only as a soldier, not as a tourist. <...> I do not like war, but can't stay in the rear and not take on their share of risk. <...> It is necessary to fight. But I have no right to talk about it, yet in complete safety walking in the sky over Toulouse. It would be obscene. Give me back my right to be tested. The great spiritual abomination to claim that those who is a some value, it is necessary to keep safe!



Explanation of the quote:

Letter H. (Toulouse, 26 October 1939). Translated from the French by L. M. Ziviani.
[The next day after the announcement by France of war against Germany on 4 September 1939, the captain of the air force reserve Antoine de Saint-Exupery came to your mobilization point. Friends tried to persuade him not to take the risk, assuring that it will bring more use of France as a writer. But he wasn't going to refuse the decision. In a private letter, dated October 1939, before the German invasion of France, he argued his position.]

Few people know that throughout the war Japan was producing oil concession to Soviet (North) Sakhalin. Throughout the war, while American soldiers were dying in the Pacific ocean. Until August 1945, before the Soviet entry into the war. Oil was not very much, but for Japan, any number was important.