Henri Cartier-Bresson is one of the greatest photographers of our time. He himself was a German prisoner-of-war and successfully escaped to France on his third attempt. His photograph from inside Dessau exposed the society’s collective anguish in the aftermath of a war. It was a deeply personal photograph for him, and he ensured that it is a personal photograph for every viewer.

In a camp of displaced persons waiting for repatriation, a Gestapo informer who had pretended to be a refugee is discovered and exposed by a camp inmate. The faces are the most striking part of this photo. On them are the judge’s aplomb, the denouncer’s rage, the Gestapo informer’s resignation, and faces of apathy and anger that frame the picture. The picture draws the audience into that anguished circle of the wronged. Had Cartier-Bresson been a painter, these would have been the allegories of Rage and Shame standing before Justice with a Greek chorus in the background. And we are that Greek Chorus. The intimate circle ensured that we share not only Agony, but also Shame and Responsibilities in the Aftermath of a War.

gatheringbones:

wrathofprawn:

lostsplendor:

stalins-princess:

Nightwitches

Die NachtHexen

Ночные ведьмы

for those not in the know, night witches were russian lady bombers who bombed the shit out of german lines in WW2. Thing is though, they had the oldest, noisiest, crappest planes in the entire world. The engines used to conk out halfway through their missions, so they had to climb out on the wings mid flight to restart the props. to stop germans from hearing them coming and starting up their anti aircraft guns, they’d climb up to a certain height, coast down to german positions, drop their bombs, restart their engines in midair, and get the fuck out of dodge.

their leader flew over 200 missions and was never captured.

(Source: sovietico)

thedailywhat:

Kids Letters To War of the Day: US soldier stationed in Afghanistan holds up an actual letter he received from a kid.

I believe the children are our future — and that scares that crap out of me.

[22words.]

A white rose was placed on barbed wire at the museum of the former Nazi concentration camp of Auschwitz Birkenau on Friday, marking the 67th anniversary of the liberation of the camp by Soviet troops.

nickturse:

Khmer Rouge survivor’s tale helps Cambodia confront its brutal past

Film documenting mother’s ordeal under communist regime aims to educate sceptical new generation 

Kate Hodal of The Guardian writes:

“Lost Loves focuses on Sotheary’s mother, who lost seven members of her family – including her father, husband and four children – during the hardline communist regime of 1975-79, which killed about 2 million people. With its all-Cambodian cast and crew, including Sotheary as the protagonist, the film premiered in 2010 at the Cambodian international film festival to a riveted audience, and last week finally appeared in city cinemas. Critics have called it ‘groundbreaking’ and ‘beautiful’.”

life:

The image is chilling, bordering on surreal: On December 18, 1941, as World War II rages and countless innocents endure the horrors of the Third Reich’s “final solution” — killing operations at the Chełmno death camp, for instance, began less than two weeks before — Adolf Hitler presides over a Christmas party in Munich.

Stark, jarring swastika armbands offset the glint of ornaments and tinsel dangling from a giant Tannenbaum; festive candles illuminate the scene. Confronted with the image, the question naturally arises: How could Nazi leaders reconcile an ideology of hatred and conquest with the peaceful, joyous spirit of the Christian holiday — much less its celebration of the Jewish-born Christ?

Here, LIFE.com presents astonishing photos from this unsettling affair, and the equally remarkable story behind them.

thedailywhat:

End Of An Era of the Day: Early this morning, the last US troop crossed the Iraqi border into Kuwait, closing the door behind him.

Literally: “The gate to #iraq is closed,” tweeted NBC News’ Richard Engel. “Soldier just told me, ‘that’s it, the war is over.’”

Approximately 100 MRAP armored vehicles with some 500 American soldiers on board made up the very last column to leave the country. The trek from their base to the border lasted five hours.

“I just can’t wait to call my wife and kids and let them know I am safe,” said Sgt. First Class Rodolfo Ruiz when the company was in sight of the border. “Hey guys, you made it,” he later announced to his soldiers, with Iraq, and the war, to their backs. 

Below: A U.S. Air Force MQ-1 Predator drone watches overhead as the last troops leave Iraq. 

[msnbc / wired / photo: getty via nyt.]

Lloyds of London staff held their annual Remembrance Day service in London Friday. The U.S. observed Veterans Day, which is often referred to as Remembrance Day in Britain and Armistice Day elsewhere in Europe, to mark the end of World War I.

bitchitoldyouigottaste:

Some photos of WWI veterans with their tin masks, some surviving pieces, and a couple WWI plastic surgery photographs. Sorry if this offends you somehow; I find it fascinating.

Because of advances made in medicine, in WWI far more soldiers were surviving disfiguring facial injuries than ever before; this led to the rise in cosmetic surgery and prosthetics- the masks, though more aesthetically appealing than the early plastic surgery, were unsettling because they obviously didn’t move with the wearer’s face, creating a dead-eyed, doll like look. They fell out of favor by WWII, but many men who had received tin masks kept and used them for life.

A man laid flowers Tuesday during a ceremony to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the departure of the first convoys carrying Jewish people to concentration camps from the Gruenewald railway station in Berlin.

In 2008, 270 photos Andre Zucca took during the Nazi Occupation of Paris was shown collectively to the public for the first time. They were deliberately pedestrian: velo-taxis waiting for customers, bicyclists, well-dressed citizens strolling along the boulevards and in the parks, commuters in the Metro, crowed cafes, nightclubs and swimming pools full of young fashionable people. But all these photos challenged the collective memory reinforced by movies and books: the Paris under the Nazi Occupation was a dreary place, black-and-white hell of hunger, of Nazi round-ups, of torture, humiliation and resistance. Zucca, on the other hand, showed a Paris that got on with life and without great hardship.

But that Paris was a myth. Andre Zucca — respected prewar photographer for Paris-Soir and Paris-Match — was working for the German propagandists under the Occupation. Zucca himself was not a Nazi, but he felt no hostility towards the Germans either. But his previous employers shut down, Zucca took a job with the German propaganda magazine Signal, which provided him extremely rare and valuable rolls of Agfacolor film. His assignments were narrowly-defined and difficult but Zucca didn’t stage any of his photos — his casual, carefree, and nonchalant Paris existed:Joseph Goebbels wanted Paris to be “animated and gay” to show off the “new Europe”. Coco Chanel entertained the Nazis; Serge Lifar, Edith Piaf and Herbert von Karajan performed. Theatres, opera houses, nightclubs, cinemas and brothels were kept busy. (Orgy-like parties flourished, right next to the Louvre, and included champagne baths in an era where the most of the world was on food rations).

Yet, in Zucca’s photos, the absent traffic, swastikas, Nazi uniforms and yellow Stars of David — the insignia that Jews were forced to wear — subtlety suggest everything was not well in the Occupied Europe. The film itself — uniquely in color in a time when no one but the Nazis could get color film — tells another tale: the photos were sunny and cheerful because every films required bright sunlight. No matter what inferences you draw from these photos, this much is certain: while they may not lie, photographs never tell the whole story.

Zucca was arrested after the 1944 liberation but never prosecuted. He worked until his death in 1973 under an assumed name as a wedding photographer in a small town of Paris.

(Source: iconicphotos.wordpress.com)