When did WWII start?

Merlotgran, that was wonderful to hear her speaking. She sounded just like my Nan who grew up a few streets away from her in Edmonton. Gawd Blimey!

yggdresil I think you are right. It was a war about land grabbing. I was wondering if the West ignored it because of the Chinese being communists? They were super sensitive about anything to do with communism in those days. However 20 million dead and 90 million Chinese impoverished is worth a mention in history I think. You cannot cherry pick like that. It has not affected me, I am only interested because of OH's connection.

I did watch the film when it came out but as usual it is the Hollywood version, not the true version. Very much romanticised. Since I became interested I have been on the internet, which was not around when I was at school of course, and there is a lot more about it on there. The real story is an epic in itself and apart from the brutality the way the Chinese overcame the damage to their country it is amazing. More interesting than the film. The Chinese were fighting Chinese gangsters and communists at the same time as the Japanese. It says in this report that

'the Security Chief Chiang's resistance to the Japanese during the Pacific war 1941-45 forced the West to turn a blind eye to the campaign of terror that went with it.'

So I guess that is the answer to my question. For those interested in the real story:

www.theguardian.com/books/2013/jun/06/china-war-japan-rana-mitter-review

Just googled to see how many wars Britain has been involved in since WWII. Too many! Of course we weren't involved in this war between China and Japan.

www.historyguy.com/british_wars_1945present.htm

www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_xngUfIL6U&t=77s

When I first came across this clip of GA speaking in person I was stunned because she didn't sound a bit like I expected her to. I suppose I was thinking she would sound like Ingrid Bergman but then why on earth would she?

What also surprised me was her delivery - almost Old Time Music Hall.

Fascinating.

Yorky: We talk about WWI, we talk about WWII, this invasion happened in between the two so why weren't we taught about it?

Because it didn't happen in the UK. Very few schools ever taught about history that happened in Europe, let alone the other side of the world.

Annie
She came to our chapel in the late 50s.
I was expecting Ingrid Bergman

Re Gladys Aylward, I remember she was the subject of This Is Your Life with Eamonn Andrews. This must have been late 50s. She sat on one of the chairs and her feet didn't reach the floor, so tiny was she. No doubt this would be before the beeb thought to archive its stock, so lost to posterity.

The Second Sino-Japanese is well-documented, Yorkshiregel, and loads of people have heard of the Rape of Nanking. I don't understand why you think it's being hidden. There isn't room in the curriculum to teach about every aspect of WW2.

If you Google, there were dozens of conflicts between the two WW's, too.

We talk about WWI, we talk about WWII, this invasion happened in between the two so why weren't we taught about it? Any teachers around who know the real answer? Was it deliberate? Was it because it was so violent? Well what the Germans did was violent too.

I recently read an excellent book, Nicholas and Alexander, based on contemporary letters and reports. It illustrates very clearly that these wars were simmering long before the two world wars. Most wars seem to be about land; countries wishing to take over other areas and extend their wealth.

I understand many of you saying that period of history was too recent to have been part of our education in the 50's and 60's, but my experience doesn't bear this out. I studied 20th Century history for my O Level.
I have never forgotten going to school on Monday 26th January 1965 and the class being told to go back to the page in our notebooks where we'd written, as a header, "Sir Winston Churchill, 1874 - " and filling in the gap, '1965'. The mood was so sombre and there was a dawning sense among us all that we were all 'living history'
I don't recall being taught anything about the Sino Japanese war, however - the syllabus, as far as I remember, was confined to British and European history.

Yes, Thomas Glover. Madam Butterfly is supposedly based on his life although there are doubts about that.

Do you mean Glover?

I think most of us are well aware that war is evil and solves nothing.

Going back to Japan, it could be said that their involvement in the Sino-Japanese War began when a certain Brit travelled to Japan and changed the course of their history in the 19Ct. You'll all know the name of one of the lasting results of his work there - Mitsubishi.

internment camps for italian,asian and germans in usa/canada and uk.
There were also internment camps in Australia and I have met some of the children of people who were in these camps.
My DA and DU had a German POW who was sent to work on their farm and he was a good worker and enjoyed working for them. He was treated far better than British POWs in Germany.

It has obviously affected you greatly Yorkshiregel but is reading further about it and viewing harrowing images from long ago doing you any good?

IMO we must all learn that war is EVIL. It solves NOTHING, it creates hatred. The only way to prevent wars is to try and understand other cultures. Not that I could ever understand what the Japanese and Nazi monsters did. I am talking about the future not the past. Some people are in denial, I have heard the phrase 'It never happened' more times than I can remember. Well reports like these show that yes it did happen, and what is worse it could happen again. Not necessarily started by Japan or Germany, but any Nation hell bent on converting others to their way of thinking, or who wish to expand their territory at the expense of others.

Do not think it is all over. This makes interesting reading. The long game:

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1179902/Revealed-The-secret-report-shows-Nazis-planned-Fourth-Reich--EU.html

www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_8vhE-wmTQ&oref=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DN_8vhE-wmTQ&has_verified=1

I warn you there are some shocking images on this and other documentaries on YouTube but the information is there if anyone is interested

you also have to remember that the usa is 40xs bigger than the uk,communication wasn't like it is today.radios and electricity were not a common thing in the farming and less populated states.people would gather at friends houses who were lucky enough to have these conveniences to listen to reports in ww2 like fdr and churchills addresses to the public.
there are still parts of the usa without access to cell phones and elctricity.i used to sell sewing machines with the treadles to woman who had no electric.
so news didn't always get to the average person livng outside the eastern seaboard of the us.
perspective;california is almost 2xs bigger than the uk.
thats one state out of the 48 continental states.
i think all the horrors done to our fellow humans is atrocious.and we can;t seem to learn.
internment camps for italian,asian and germans in usa/canada and uk.some familys who had been here longer than the people locking them away.

yggdrasil yes, you could say that WW1 never really finished.
And, of course, some of the results and the decisions made after WW2 caused repercussions which are still relevant to what is happening up to the present day.

Please,not all americans think that ww2 started in 1941.pearl harbor was 1941 and the active start of americans major involvement.
my grandmother was an american"bomb girl"
her husband went to canada to join the RAF as did many americans long before 1941.
the germans were trying to recruit in the states long before pearl harbor with thier bund camps in the 30s/this was an eyeopener .we were also recovering from the great depression and the "dust storm "problems.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_American_Bund

In one respect you could say WWII started the day WWI ended. The treaties and economic repercussions made it inevitable.

You could also argue that the Spanish civil war was a beginning, certainly Hitler used it for bombing practice-Guernica. But it isn't taught in any history syllabus either. It was too recent for my generation's education. History is still of course taught from a British perspective, but the problem is where do you draw the line? There is so much that could be included.

Politicians and leaders wage war and innocents suffer Yorkshiregel, from time immemorial to the present day.

No-one deserves nuclear bombs being dropped on them. Even the man who was the scientist responsible for developing it said and I quote 'that it brought to mind words from the Bhagavad Gita: 'Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds'.' J R Oppenheimer, a brilliant theoretical physicist and professor of physics, lobbied for international control of nuclear power to avert nuclear proliferation and a nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union. He knew what horror his bomb had inflicted and he regretted it but once the gene was out of the bottle he could not put it back in.