Crimes and Mercies: The Fate of German Civilians Under Allied Occupation, 1944-1950 Paperback – September 15, 2007

Crimes and Mercies is a very difficult book to read as well as review. Bacque is an excellent writer. If you believe what Bacque has written, you get the feeling that everything you thought you knew about the Allied occupation of Germany has been turned on its head. Bacque's basic premise is that casualty figures reported by the allies in post-war Germany are greatly under-reported, that the Allied occupation was brutal, and that these facts are still being covered up by the government, historians and the media. This may sound like conspiracy theory to some people, but is it? Bacque cites published British statistics showing the death rate in their zone of occupation during the Allied-imposed famine of 1947 was the same as the German death rate in 1939. The British figures are of course, completely ridiculous. Bacque also details American records that are missing, destroyed, or still classified. The American authorities should make these documents accessible (as did the Russians) to clear up any doubts about Bacque's claims. Bacque contrasts Soviet occupation policy to that in the western zones. Bacque verifies what Victor Gollancz wrote, that the Soviets in spite of their brutality (including mass rape and imprisonments),in some ways got life in the DDR back to normal a whole lot quicker than the Americans, Brits & French did. The Soviets put Germans back to work, fed them etc. This was true at least until 1948-1949 when Truman fired Morgenthau. However, in the Soviet-occupied territories east of the Oder-Neisse life was pure hell, the German population murdered, imprisoned, enslaved, tortured, and the survivors finally ethnically cleansed.For those who question of the western allies plundering Germany, they may want to do some research into the Qudelinburg Art Treasures. I personally remember being in Heidelberg castle in 1970, and viewing the empty display cases in the museum - which had a note that the contents were stolen by British soldiers.For the most part, Crimes and Mercies is very depressing, but there are elements of humor. On page 164, Bacque describes George Marshall going ballistic on Molotov in 1947 because Molotov had insisted that the Americans were taking reparations without reporting them. Who would have thought that the Americans were as good at stealing as the Soviets, also that we were double-crossing the Russians, and getting indignant with them when they asked us to adhere to agreements? I'm certain this would have upset FDR greatly, being the faithful friend and ally to Stalin that he was. Also humorous was the French occupation authorities sending Edith Piaf and lecturers to Germany to entertain the populace, and being surprised that very few people turned out to see them. This occurred at a time where the Germans were on starvation rations and thus more interested in attending to their own survival rather than drinking in the joys of French "culture".As other reviewers have mentioned, there are flaws in this book. Bacque appears a bit paranoid at times. I don't believe Bacque is a communist, yet, sometimes he paints too rosy a picture of the Soviet prison camps. For example, Bacque writes that when German prisoners received care packages from home, they often shared the contents with their Soviet guards. I would find it more believable that the Soviet guards confiscated their packages and if they felt like it, gave the prisoners some of the remains. However, I may be wrong about this, but I can't say I've ever come across claims such as these made by Bacque. Anyone I've ever heard of who returned from a Soviet prison camp returned in pretty rough shape.Several passages in Crimes and Mercies stand out in particular. From page 27 "The Morgenthau Plan has three remarkable aspects: that it was devised, that it was implemented after it had been cancelled, and that it has since been covered up so well. Now it has shrunk from sight in the West. The basic idea of the plan was to wreck or confiscate all important German industry, converting the country into a huge farm, while at the same time destroying the fertilizer plants on which German agriculture depended. It would also cut Germany into pieces, and allot a huge piece of territory to the Poles and Soviets. On Page 44, there was something I wish I hadn't read: "The most gruesome killing was witnessed by the prisoner Hanns Scharf, formerly of California, who was watching as a German woman with her two children came towards an American guard in the camp at Bad Kreuznach, carrying a wine bottle. She asked the guard to give the bottle to her husband who was just inside the wire. The guard opended the bottle into his own mouth, and when it was empty, threw it on the ground and killed the prisoner with five shots. " Bacque goes on to state " In months of work in the Washington archives of the army, no court martial of this or similar incidents has ever turned up,."The heroes and villains of this book are apparent. Herbert Hoover was a genuine humanitarian, and I credit his religion (Quakers) as being one Christian sect that actually stands up for what is right and just. Crimes and Mercies gave me renewed admiration for Harry Truman, although I wish he would have been faster and gone farther in reversing the insane policies of FDR. Of the villains, it is difficult to find anything to admire about Morgenthau. He was a vile apparachik whose intent was to starve millions to death. Eisenhower also does not come off well in this book, not at all. Crimes and Mercies is inconvenient history, and is not perfect, but it is an important book that should be read.

The book is divided between a strong presentation of facts and the author's personal feelings about the United States, religion, and the Soviet people. This becomes a tug of war for the reader which, depending upon your perspective, can be uncomfortable.The author's presentation of the facts for those readers who have only known of WWII from public school books or Hollywood will come as a surprise. For others with either a broader understanding of history, or in the least, a realistic view of what takes place when savagery is unleashed, it will still bring a certain sadness knowing how brutal man is to fellow man, not only during war, but after.Another great book in this vein is "After The Reich" (here at amazon). We have learned of the killing of 6,000,000 Jews, but we learn so little about the German civilian population that was decimated throughout Germany, and the areas formerly known as Prussia, or the annexed lands bordering Poland.Most of us have likely wondered what became of the surviving Jews who did not emigrate to Israel, and most have thought of retribution taken by Jews, but little is written today.Little is written of American war crimes, Soviet slave labor, Western slave labor, and Jewish retribution at the old death camps; but these are stories that need to be told.The author's attempts at masquerading his disdain for America is thin, but the information presented needs examination and careful thought."After the Reich" was a book I wished I had not read. It turned my stomach to read of the Soviet soldiers' savagery upon the women of the lands they conquered; animalism that defies description; but it prepared me for this work, especially since it was well known how FDR had wanted to "punish" Germany; even to the point of turning his back upon them (and the Poles) while Joseph Stalin's evil intentions became known.Who was responsible for more deaths, Adolph Hitler or Joseph Stalin? I don't know the answer.One area in which the author's prejudice becomes unglued is his descriptions involving Winston Churchill. Nothing "tongue in cheek" is explained, and he contradicts Churchill's own descriptions of meetings and plans (reading Churchill's WWII history is a MUST for all students of WWII); as well as Churchill's shining wisdom in seeing through Stalin's malignant views. Roosevelt, often considered a champion today who "saved" America from depression (something that has no truth to it at all; WWII production saved America from FDR's wild spending sprees, much like we are seeing today) looked into Stalin's eyes and saw "goodness". Churchill saw the Iron curtain to fall upon 50 million people that would suffer for a half a century under Soviet brutality. Let us hope that somehow we will learn from history. When Nazi propaganda shut down foreign radio from being listened to in Germany, mind control began. Recently, our American president threatened not to work with politicians who listen to a certain radio program. From the wild government spending programs of the 1930's and the "social engineering" that took place, we are left with many lessons; and, sadly, some echoes that are still being heard today. The government wanted to make sure every citizen had "social" security, and did not trust its people to invest their own money; and have their own ideas. This next step led to McCarthyism. Where are we today? The author does present the reader with the burden to THINK about the lessons of the past. There can be NO large scale war to get the economy out of the dumps due to the power of the atom. The author causes you to think: how close are we to the 1930's? Depression? Government growing with more control over the people?? He makes us think, which is always good.On a personal note: in the past 20 years, I have met people who came to America from Germany. Without a single exception, each one, early on in our social meeting, brought up Nazi idealogy and was in "apologetic mode" in an attempt to distance themselves and their families from all things Nazi.The author is dead on correct about this: there is STILL, after more than 60 years, this German Guilt--even in young Germans, that ought not be. This goes a long way for propaganda's impact. So much so, that when an American president compares a world leader to Hitler, bombs are sure to be following. The evil of Hitler and of his idealogy belonged to Hitler and those who believed in the cause of nationalistic socialism; not to all Germans.The book is a good read with the caveat of the author's own prejudices; but its content should not be dismissed.

We all know about the 6 million. We all just KNOW what happened in Europe in the 1940s – the ethnic cleansing of Germany. We all just KNOW about the pogroms, the people herded onto cattle cars, the mass annihilation of human life by starvation, typhus and bullet. We think we know who the victims were because history tells us over and over again – Gypsies, Jews, Homosexuals et al… But the events we speak of here happened in peacetime, after the war had ended. These are the unworthy victims that history has forgotten. In Bacque’s earlier book “Other Losses” the author appraised the evidence for a far higher death toll, in Allied Prisoner of War camps in Europe after World War Two ended, than we had previously thought. His evidence was compelling, surprising, shocking and controversial. This, his follow-up, covers the fates of the civilians in Germany between 1945 and 1950. Traditional historiography gives us a simple timeline for the War: Hitler starts it, the Holocaust, war ends, Marshall Plan & everyone lives happily ever after - content in the results of our “good war”. But that wasn’t how it was.At Potsdam the Allies promised Stalin that he could keep the parts of Poland that he had invaded and occupied (in agreement with Hitler!). In return Poland would take over parts of Germany adjacent to it. The agreement included the ethnic cleansing of all the German civilians from that zone. At the same time secret Allied policy enforced the starvation of Germany. These are our “crimes”. The “mercies” Bacque writes of are the efforts of so many good people in America, Britain, Canada & further afield to feed the world after WWII had ended. Popular myth still holds that we fed the people of Germany when the opposite was true. Elegantly constructed propaganda told of worldwide food shortages and lack of transport. Neither bear scrutiny. Above all the role of Herbert Hoover is singled out for praise in his repeated attempts to get food into Germany.Whilst the message contained in this book is important it is not well delivered. The author befuddles his audience with a dizzying array of statistics that seemingly reach no conclusion. Large parts of the book are dominated by the “mercies” so much so that it sometimes looks as if Bacque is telling you about the feeding of Germany. The reader is left wondering whether we were starving them or feeding them. Then there is the moralising and padding. This edition is 271 pages long in paperback. Yet the core of the book is all over by page 171. The rest is waffle – the author musing (very badly) about the morality of it all (or lack of) of what the Allies did, then he launches into endless Appendices covering more statistics, then there is an entire section about his paranoia (apparently the State is spying on him), then Notes, then the Index. This rather distracts from the main message: we forget history at our peril. Take an example: Germar Rudolf is a German revisionist historian who was born of people ethnically cleansed from what is now Poland. He grew up burning with injustice and now spends his time writing books about how the gassing of the Jews really didn’t happen. This is the legacy of our lies. We just plant the seeds for it to happen all over again. Everyone should understand our own crimes before we judge others. Yet it is the hardest thing to do.

Other Losses was a very good piece of work. My honest opinion is that this, the follow up, rides on its coat tails and isn't up to the same standard.

As someone whose father nearly died thanks to deliberate starvation and mistreatment at the hands of the 'good guys', this book will make you think twice about what you have been taught and read. Many references cited to shore up the information in this disturbing, yet captivating book that reads more like a horror story than what it actually is - a factual account of the other side of the story behind WWII.

libro perfetto , frutto di documenti accertati sui crimini degli americani ed inglesi ,frances,i belgi ,svedesi, russi ,'etc perpetrati contro la pacifica popolazione tedescha dopo la resa della germania

More excellent work by Mr. Bacque. His honesty is infectious, and it also has many of the upper military brass concerned about how to frustrate any further attempts of bringing these Allied War Crimes to the public's eye. Unfortunately for them, the cat is out of the bag, and it has no intention of going back in.