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For someone so interested in the European theatre of war, genocide and war crimes, and all things Germanic, it may at first seem strange to review a movie concerning the city of Nanking, the former capital of the Republic of China during the Second Sino-Japanese War: It’s hardly the centre of my historical interest but there is a point to be made here and it is a point that goes much further than what has become known as the “Rape of Nanking”: it is a point that travels from China to Europe and divulges the stereotypical and sometimes erroneous misconceptions of 20^th century propaganda; it is a point which challenges the theory that de-nazification must occur in order to become compassionate, democratic and a member of a civilized society.

But what is this point, what is it that encompasses the Second Sino-Japanese War with World War II and the socio-cultural destruction of the German people. It is John Rabe, the Nazi leader in the city of Nanking during the 1930’s. To those who are happy to accuse and stereotype what better place for a Nazi – mass murder, destruction, rape, pillage, but this is not the case: John Rabe acted in a manner deserving of the title hero, he acted in a manner that surpasses every expectation of not a Nazi but of a compassionate, and brave, individual who had no greater love than this, that he laid down his life for his friends.

City of Life and Death, from the outset is a cinematic masterpiece as it tells not only the story of John Rabe, who is accredited with saving the lives of some 300,000 Chinese from slaughter, but of the “Rape of Nanking” itself. The filming is grippingly presented to such a point that one can’t help but shed a tear as the attention to detail drives the horrors home. Images of civilians

“Tied, bound and bleeding, locked in a building and burnt, murdered in a field with automatic gunfire or buried alive”

This is murder in its most horrific state

“I didn’t mean to”

Stated one soldier but this makes me wonder how he didn’t mean to put his finger on the trigger and physically pull it. It is perhaps no surprise to suggest that war crimes trials seem to have evaded the majority of those involved as the Rape of Nanking has become a political pawn which, in certain cases, just did not happen.

Some may say that it is easy to write about because all it is about is killing each other but there is far more to death than death alone as this film with its incredible attention to detail demonstrates. This film is told through the eyes of several figures including a conscience stricken Japanese soldier, John Rabe who was a Nazi businessman who would ultimately save several thousand of Chinese lives – thousands of the enemy’s lives, and a child whose eye sees the events so innocently yet full of brutality beyond a child’s comprehension.

The sick and wounded in hospital murdered in cold blood but Rabe used his influence to protect as many as possible. A City of Life and Death portrays the Protection zone as a brilliant attempt at humanity by one man, but humanity had its price. Women had to be hande over to entertain Japanese troops: In exchange food and clothes were given to ensure the women and children made it through the harsh winter.

Rabe had saved hundreds of thousands of lives by shoving the Swastika under the noses of the Japanese soldiers: indeed he had a Swastika hanging from his house, seen as the safest place in Nanking.

The UK version of A City of Life and Death was subtitled but this didn’t distract from the emotion of the film. It is quite easy to understand the emotion and fear as he was ordered to return to Germany, his activities seen as damaging the relationship between Germany and Japan – not everybody approved of his use of the swastika to save lives which were most notably enemy lives.

Herr John Rabe, the Nazi businessman and living Buddha of Nanking knelt and bowed his head in sorrow before he left – he knew he was leaving a great number of Chinese civilians to their death.

A City of Life and Death is the story of the “Rape of Nanking” it is a story of a great war crime somewhat unknown in the West – it is a film that bleeds emotion, that bleeds as do the victims of the Rape of Nanking: Its almost as though the viewer is there on the streets of Nanking.

Are you brave enough to be on the streets of A City of Life and Death, are you prepared to applaud the Good Nazi and learn the lessons he has left us in his legacy?

“I remember Mami, I remember”

These values help keep the reader’s attention focused upon every word as she remembers her early childhood years in a conflict-strewn Europe. Demonstrating an early recognition of her own and her family’s faith she doesn’t try and portray herself as the perfect child – indeed she tells of the naughtiness and adventure within as much as the faith and love of her family.

With only mild description of the events surrounding her life in wartime Germany she does little more than set the scene so that the reader is as comfortable in her surroundings as she is. Comfortably returning to her Oma & Opa’s farm, the farm she so fondly memorialised at the beginning of her story: To some extent in these few pages she has gone full circle travelling through seventy years of history, prior to sprouting into the conflict-ridden 1940’s where she begins her timely journey to freedom.

Her early religious faith taught her amongst other things, honesty about one’s self: She never portrays herself as the perfect child;

“Hiltrud, what is the matter with you? Can’t I leave you alone for five minutes?” (p. 11)

“I will take care of Hubert anytime, but Hiltrud I can’t handle” (p. 13)

She describes her childhood in a simplistic manner without excuse or justification. Yet it was her first winter of learning at Kindergarten which marked one of the most bitter and heart breaking milestones in her life – the death of her beloved Papi.

“Papi, Papi, we miss you so much”

Her journey of discovery had begun in 1970’s Germany where her mother, stricken with cancer, reminisces about happier times – of Hitrud’s recollections of East Prussia, her place of birth and childhood. It is a long time, if at all, that I have opened a book and read such a beginning which, whist delving into the authors memories, remains simple and easy to grasp whilst retaining the reader’s attention.

There is a certain sense of warmth in the way Webber connects the Prologue to the first chapter despite the obvious upset of her mother’s cancer.

“I remember Mami, I remember”

She recalls as her transports her story of sadness, bravery and isolation through time to the death of her Papi. It is all too easy to feel a teardrop running down your cheek as Webber explains how his death remained with her throughout her life: This long-term heartache bleeds through in to the pages of “A Child of East Prussia” as she creates an analogy of death between some foresters hacking a highly venomous Kreuzotter snake to pieces, and the Russian sharp-shooter who had shot her Papi through the heart causing instant death on the night of October 15, 1943: She was five years old yet it was a night that was to never leave her consciousness – the clouds of war were to cloud her mind for the rest of her life.

Written with an attention to detain that is understandable to both young and old readers alike she recalls her Papi’s preparation for his family after his death. He couldn’t have possibly known that the Russian snake was to take him from his family on that night, yet gifts were arranged for the festive season. Hiltrud Webber, his daughter and author of “A Child of East Prussia” spoke highly of him;

“He was a man who loved others, a man who adored his family….Even after his death we felt his love."   (p. 21)

Webber speaks fondly of other members of her family who were all surviving under the terror of conflict and perhaps more importantly the ever-nearing Russian Front. During the summer vacation of 1944 they visited her grandparents in Tollack. Her Oma and Opa (grandmother and father) gave n to the children’s pleas and said they could have anything they wanted but Mami objected, instead saying that it could be played with the next time they saw Oma & Opa.

They were to never see Oma & Opa again. Despite the German soldiers who were retreating through Domnau reminding the young Hiltrud of her Papi, the Red Army was close by and decisions had to be made concerning what to take, what to leave if they had to flee. Webber resists the temptation to dramatize the situation of January 24, 1945 when the immediate evacuation of the civilian population was ordered.

Pushing her memories deep into her coat pocket, along with the rest of the village, they fled to the outskirts of the village and into the countryside beyond. The fires of hell turned once prosperous towns and villages into “giant funeral pyres” as the advancing Russian font chased them from town to town.

She speaks of the constant search for food and the fight for survival and tells of the horror and pain involved in going against the odds and fighting for survival. A Child in East Prussia isn’t a story to hide behind and dispute guilt: The facts are on these pages as she tells of her fight against the cold as they headed for a ship in Pillau. They arrived in heiligenbeil during the coldest January on record. Over and over again they recited the Lord’s Prayer as they crossed the lagoon whilst Russian planes strafed the German civilians. Many at the time would have said that he failed to answer their prayers: They survived, they got across the lagoon and he answered their prayers

“Thank you, Lord! Thank you for sending your guardian angel”

Wherever they went the fog of fear wasn’t that far behind them. Many were to help Hiltrud and her family and she mentions these people without glamour and remorse; there was no glamour in wartime and many who helped them to escape were to die. This was the cold hard fact of conflict which Webber tries to recapture whilst retaining some form of normalcy.They tried to join the Karolina which was docked in Goltenhafen on the Baltic Sea and sailed on the Deutschland on the evening of 17^th February 1945 to Rugen where they went on to Ascheberg and received refugee identification cards.

They were now identified as refugees and many stories which relate to the Expulsion of the East & Central European Germans and the fleeing of those in the way of the rapidly advancing Red Army stall here, having the opinion that their post-war lives as refugees would not be of interest.

They could not be any further wrong and Hiltrud Webber, author of “A Child of East Prussia” takes this concept by the horn and explains their lives in a post-conflict Germany. They found a roof over their head but were not happy with the violence that surrounded their hosts and asked to be moved on. This was merely out of the frying pan and into the fire as they were soon to find pout upon meeting Her Predel who had a very negative attitude towards the refugees. “The devil himself couldn’t be meaner,” thought the young Hiltrud.

Hiltrud speaks proudly of her Mami as she stands tall and fights of the sexist and violent advances of their host – it was only when Mami and Hubert were in hospital was she to find herself alone for the first time, her hosts previous violence penetrating her memory. Food was a little more plentiful, community and church groups were now springing up to support the vanquished which Hiltrud and Hubert took full advantage of, trips were organised whilst aid began to arrive in the beleaguered country whom both domestic and foreign governments would have preferred to have seen remain under the physical and metaphorical restriction of extra-governance.

Smoothly written from the experience of obvious conflict to the years of alleged peace Webber unites her writing through the years with a strong family bond – the sort of bond a child would need under such extreme circumstances: Not only did she survive the war years as a child but in the post-war years she was to grow – she was to blossom into a queen.

The nearest thing resembling normalcy was returning to the German lands, cultures and traditions which had been sanction by the Army of Occupation/Allied Governments began to unite communities once again. On May 1, 1953 Hiltrud Webber was chosen as May-Day Queen and in November that year a 2^nd floor apartment became available. Things were looking up for the Webber family and she writes without hatred, without bitterness and without vengeance for the life they had been forced to endure. Despite the church-sponsored outings and medical vacations life began anew and early relationships began to blossom.

Webber writes in a warm and sensitive manner of her early relationships and those who had fallen for the queen or those whom had written to her from the states: May, 1955 saw the 50^th anniversary of the Annette von Droste-Hulshoff School and Hiltrud remembers the speaker who spoke about her life in ‘America’

“It sounded like paradise”

Hiltrud remembers the friendship that grew with a boy of the same age from St. Paul, Minnesota but she writes of the friendships that grew at home. Her graduation from school over, a new life began but she remembers the stolid attraction of America. Hiltrud recalls how once she had taken her business exams she needed a sponsor to go to the states: This came in the form of her pen pals parents. By November 22, 1958 she had boarded the Statendam of the Holland-America line at Rotterdam and was heading for the states. She cherished the cross that Mami had given her: It was the same cross she had carried all the way from East Prussia.

“Take it my daughter: It will protect you.”

Writing briefly of her marriage to her pen pal which was to fall apart in time and of her brother Hubert dying aged 50 of a heart attack after having joined the German Catholic Peace Corps she concludes with brief reference to the man she was to marry in 1976 – the man who encouraged her to put her memories to paper and write “A Child o East Prussia.” Her Mami, the woman who had protected her in their journey from fear to freedom died on October 13, 1978 after a long and painful cancer.

Pictures speak a thousand words and alongside a brief epilogue of her life in America in the latter years of the 20^th century she presents what can be best described as a personal photo album of Domnau and its surrounding area and their journey to salvation.

But one thing remains – she will never forget the life she once had; She will never forget the life that was once called home: She will never forget Domnau

“As long as I live, my heart belongs to Domnau, my birthplace in East Prussia. Until the day I die I will remember my childhood there and in Tollack on my grandparents’ farm,”

“It does not matter if Russia and Poland have stolen my homeland”

“They cannot steal my memories – I remember Mami, I remember”

'Shattered Lives, Shattered Dreams' tells the story of America's alleged enemy aliens and their incarceration without trial or legal representation during and after World War II. It is a little known fact that "between 1941 and 1948" three years after the end of WWII" more than 11,000 people of German ancestry were arrested and interned in sixty camps across the United States and Hawaii" (p. 1):

Russell W. Estlack claims that many know of the internment of the ethnic-Japanese internees, most probably due to the huge amount of work they have put into getting recognition from the United States Government: However, few know about the etnc-Germans who were incarcerated alongside the Japanese, for no other reason than for who they were:

It is an even lesser known fact that the United States Government, even to this day in 2009, over 64 years since the end of World War II, refuse to acknowledge their incarceration despite offering that very acknowledgement to the Japanese internees, many of whom were held in the same internment camps.

Perhaps this has something to do with post-war American policy and the Allied wish to dominate Germany in the poisoned years of so-called Peace

It was over 6 years after the end of World War II that the state of war that had existed between Germany and the United States of America was officially declared to have ended. So in all its reality, during the period 1945 - 19th October 1951 the United States was still at war with Germany.

This gave the American government the political and subsequently legal basis to continue to intern civilians as dangerous enemy aliens:

The legal precedent had been set some years before during World War I and now the American government was acting upon it with all means available, despite the West German government requests for an end to the state of war during negotiations preceding the Petersburg Agreement of 22nd November 1949.

Examples such as Mr Fuhr's demonstrate not the cracks in the author's true accounts but moreover the fissure in the war-time policies of the United States Government; policies which were the result of government sponsored hysteria, miss-information and fear-based propaganda.

Estlack's account of the moral panic that swept the nation is revealing to to say the very least as hysteria saw friends become enemies, fear-based propaganda saw enemies become hypocrites and miss-information saw the hypocritesbecome freebies for the state as spying on neighbours and spreading false accusations became a national past-time.

Estlack successfully widens the scope of his book 'Shattered Lives, Shattered Dreams, The Untold True Story of America's Enemy Aliens in WWII' by including the stories of those from Hawaii and South America, where soon-to-be captives were illegally gathered as bargaining chips for the U.S. Government to exchange prisoners with.....one has to wonder why prisoners of war where not used given that according to international treaty's, they would be going back to Germany anyway? Or was there a more sinister motive employed by the U.S. Government?

Russell Estlack doesn't shy away from the somewhat delicate subject of German-Jews either: A subject that is avoided by many mainstream historians in that there still seems to be a division between German-Germans and German-Jews: Both groups suffered, both saw death, destruction and internment, yet only one seems to hold the monopoly on death and persecution.

The Great Hall, Ellis Island Immigration Museum The majority of those who migrated to the USA had to pass through Ellis Island where the Statue of Liberty stands with her back to the island.

German-Jews were deported to Germany just as German-Americans were: Some of these German-Jews were interned alongside hardened Nazi's and so a failure to protect the internees comes to mind. The Plight of the German-Jews was scandalous no less than that of the German-American internees yet it was no more outrageous just because of whom they were. Thousands, hundreds of thousands, even millions of innocent individuals were persecuted for one reason or another during World War II, yet it is those very same divisions that still haunt society in the 21st century.

Former internee, Mr Eberhard Fuhr sums up the culture of oppression in some, maybe even most, departments of the United States Government, when he states that "a sovereign nation has a right and duty to protect itself [.....] In America civil liberties should not be cast aside so freely, even in time of war".

Perhaps this lesson from the pages of history should be a lesson for the present day given the restrictions placed upon American citizens by the 2001 Patriot Act which authorizes the indefinite detention of immigrants, searches without the owners consent and the viewing and search of personal communications and financial records.

Wasn't this the case in 1939 when "President Roosevelt signed a directive authorizing the head of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover, to create a secret intelligence service to identify U.S. citizens and legal residents who might pose a possible security risk to the United States" (p. 2)? Doesn't society ever learn or is it resigned to having no future because it has ignored its own past?

U.S Congress passed the Alien Registration Act, also known as the Smith Act, in 1940 which made it illegal for anyone in the United States to advocate, abet, advise, or teach” the violent overthrow of the government or to publish or distribute printed matter that advocates the violent overthrow, to organizes any society with such a purpose or to knowingly join such a society or conspires to do any of the above. To my knowledge none of the 12,000 or so German-American internees were ever convicted of a crime, and restricted in its scope to those in the United States it sadly wasn't.

Crystal City Detention Centre

British war-time Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, said after the Battle of Britain that £never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few." Much indeed is owed to the 'few' writers who strive to produce books and other publications which aim to tell the true story of the innocent victims, all of them, of World War II:

The internees of whom Russell W. Estlack considers, were indeed victims of their own government's racial prejudice and a casualty of poor, nah extremely poor, Presidential leadership and Congressional resolve.....apparent even to this very day.

'Shattered Lives, Shattered Dreams, The Untold True Story of America's Enemy Aliens in World War II', written and published by Russell W. Estlack is in fact one of those books that has been designed, written and published to be read by a wide audience: Indeed it should be on every school's reading list, on every library's to-buy list and on the bookshelf of everyone who values equal rights and treatment under the law......my bookshelf is no exception.

The German internees still seek justice, they still seek recognition of their plight in a war they had no bearing on: In the words of Mr Fuhr; "Are we [they] not all equal under the law?" (p. 87).

"The Germans were extremely patriotic, cheering when the Americans were victorious in battle and mourning when they lost"

"Even though their civil liberties were taken away from them, they were first, last and always, Americans"

Shattered Lives, Shattered Dreams: The Untold True Story of America's Enemy Aliens in World War II, Written & Published by Russell W. Estlack 2009. A Book Review by Douglas Brough © 2009 Douglas Brough: All Rights Reserved