WWIIIHD - Update

I mentioned below that I had tapped into the History Channel's "World War II in HD" series and found it interesting because of the new, color footage available.

Well, I watched it again this evening. Granted, the film itself is still interesting, but I've gone right off the series.

You see, the History Channel has chosen to present its take on WWII in what's known as a bottom-up historical analysis. You know, "world events as seen from the eyes of the Little Guy."

Now that's all well and good up to a point. But without some kind of larger view? Not just worthless, but dangerous.

To wit.

One of the stories featured this evening had to do with one of the famed "Tuskegee Airmen", the segregated fighter squadrons that served in the European theatre. There was the usual emphasis on the whole racial divide which, I suppose, was inevitable, and perhaps was even justified.

But what got my goat was the story of this particular fighter pilot. He was hit by enemy fire while escorting a bomber raid deep into Germany and had to crash land behind enemy lines somewhere in the Balkans. Fortunately for him, he was picked up by a group of Tito's partisans and eventually delivered back to his own unit.

That's all well and good. And seen from this fellah's eyes, perhaps there's nothing much more to tell. But what irked me was the softball treatment of the partisans by the program. Those people, to put it kindly, were utter Communist rat-bastards, who didn't give a pair of fetid dingoe's kidneys about anything but their own cause. They delivered this fellah back to his friends not because they were noble and believed in doing the Right Thing, but because they knew they had to make nice with the Allies in order to keep receiving necessary supplies long enough to crush all opposition (domestic as well as foreign). Under any other circumstances, given both the rampant racism of Eastern Europe and the partisans' own explicit political ideology, they'd no doubt have slitted his throat on the spot.

Goddam partisans.

Goddam Tito.

Goddam Communists.

Anyhoo, the History Channel sails right over all of this, even though it has extensive time on its hands to pooh-pooh Japanese detainment camps on the American west coast and the aforementioned segregation of black soldiers.