An-tee-fa? MY Dad in 1945:

[Dennis Donovan]

Here he is in 1945, Regensburg, Germany (closest to the camera). I'm sure he wasn't PRO-FASCIST then!

Thank you Dad!

[Journeyman]

1. This is a nation, and government, with a history of convicting people of "premature antifascism"...

"Premature Anti-Fascist" — by Bernard Knox

http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/scw/knox.htm

A “Premature Antifascist” — And Proudly So

https://www.thenation.com/article/premature-antifascist-and-proudly-so/

Tender Comrades: The Prehistory of the Blacklist

http://www.youmustrememberthispodcast.com/episodes/2016/1/20/blacklist-prehistory


So the question to ask ourselves, today as we did in the 1930s, is if courage and conviction are more important in the beginning of the conflict or in its aftermath. We can debate tactics but the strategic reality is beyond question.

[struggle4progress]

10. I think "premature antifascist" references the period between mid-1939 and mid-1941,

that is, between the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact (August 1939) and Operation Barbarossa (June 1941). Stalin's objective in the Pact was, at least partly, to buy time to arm the Soviet Union against an armed conflict with the Nazis; and so the Communist Party urged members internationally not to oppose fascism. After the invasion of the USSR, the official party line changed to opposing fascism

Anyone, who had been antifascist since at least the time of the Spanish Civil War (July 1936 - March 1939), and who remained antifascist during this period, would have been in some political disagreement with a Communist Party controlled by Stalinists. The ironies of this were not lost on many leftists, as shown by this song, which appeared in New York socialist circles around 1940

http://www.folkarchive.de/moscow.html

When the party line changed again in mid-1941, these antifascists became "premature antifascists" for Communist Party members, since they had not been willing to adopt the party line during the interim -- and were consequently regarded as unreliable

The officially neutral stance of the US before Pearl Harbor did not prevent the country from quietly preparing for conflict in Europe, including 1939 repeal of provisions in the neutrality law and a military build-up beginning in 1940 -- and after war, no one was going to be criticized in the US simply for opposing fascism before the US went to war

It is, of course, possible that "premature antifascists" later also became a ironic code-phrase for the McCarthyites -- to signify that someone had been antifascist for leftist reasons

[grantcart]

14. "Mow a Nazi is a hotsie totsie" could describe the Trump White House.

[Mc Mike]

20. Dalton Trumbo related an interesting brush with being labelled 'prematurely antifascist'

in the preface to his Viet Era edition of "Johnny Got His Gun".

Before we entered WWII, he was approached by American bund Lindberg types, who wanted to back publication of the anti war novel. He sized them up as pro german nazis, and reported them to the Feds. The feds sent some representatives around, who seemed much more interested in making Trumbo the subject of an investigation, and who questioned him in a hostile and adversarial way. He learned after FOIA ing his FBI file later that his report about the bunders had earned him the designation "prematurely antifascist".

His comment about the situation was 'it served me right, too.' Needless to say, he refused the bunders permission to republish his work; though he was very much anti-war, he was also very much anti-nazi.

[struggle4progress]

21. The term seems to have a persistent connection to the Spanish civil war volunteers:

ALB volunteer Milt Wolff started (but may not have finished) "The Premature Antifascist"

ALB volunteer George Cullinen wrote "Wild Grapes and Rattlesnakes: The Memoirs of a Premature Anti-Fascist"

Several university libraries have in their rare ephemera collections indications of a VALB "40th Anniversary Banquet, Honoring the Premature Anti-Fascist Women" in 1979

The article "Premature Anti-Fascist" by Bernard Knox, another Spanish civil war volunteer, is widely available on the web:

'I first heard the .. phrase .. in 1946 ... The Professor ... was very interested ... I explained that, in July 1944, I had parachuted, in uniform, behind the Allied lines in Brittany to arm and organize French Resistance forces ... I told him that I had fought in 1936 on the northwest sector of the Madrid front in the French Battalion of the XIth International Brigade. "Oh," he said, "You were a premature anti-Fascist"'

Knox asserts:

'"Premature Anti-Fascist" was an FBI code-word for "Communist." It was the label affixed to the dossiers of those Americans who had fought in the Brigades when, after Pearl Harbor (and some of them before) they enlisted in the US Army. It was the signal to assign them to non-combat units or inactive fronts'

But perhaps the professor's comment merely reflects a familiarity with the vagaries of party-line politics rather than actual wide-spread use of such a term in the US. And Knox's interpretation seems inconsistent with his naturalization as a US citizen in 1943, his subsequent military assignment, and his long career in the US afterwards

Manfred Stern, the original commander of the XIth International Brigade, on the other hand, seems meanwhile to have been recalled to Moscow and imprisoned in 1939, dying in a labor camp in Sosnovka a few months before the end of his fifteen year sentence. During the time between the Nazi-Soviet pact and the Nazi invasion of the USSR, Stern would have been nothing but an inconvenience to Stalin and so disappeared permanently

As the Trotskyites of Young People's Socialist League (4th International) sang in their 1940 lampoon: "Oh my darling, oh my darling, oh my darling party line! Oh, I never will desert you cause I love this life of mine." The Stalinists, of course, succeeded in assassinating Trotsky not long afterwards

[Mc Mike]

44. This stuff is very interesting, considering the current Von Ribbentrop Molotov pact we have

between the dRumpfenfuhrer's bircher backers and putin's wiseguy intel people.

I only know a bit about the Spanish Civil war, and don't know a lot of the Abe Lincoln brigade members. I haven't read much Hemingway, the Old Man and the Sea turned me off to him, maybe unfairly. I like the idea of Americans seeing the danger from nazi-ism and getting in early to fight it in "pre-WWII" Spain. Orwell said that Stalin purposefully dropped the ball in Spain, got arms to his loyalists and purged all other anti nazi groups, handed Spain to Hitler on a platter.

Of course, the victorious allies let Franco stay in power until he died when SNL was first starting up, leading to the frequent week-end updates by Chevy that 'Generallisimo Francisco Franco is still dead'. Also leading to the rat-lines for nazi mass murderers, Opus Dei, and successful co-ordination of latin american death squads by international fascista and Dulles' part of the Agency.

So the Spanish civil war went from '36 to '39. A bunch of smart lefties saw where nazism was going and opposed it before the US jumped into the war. Pre-ribbentrop-molotov in '39, stalin had already made convenient political accomodations with hitler by wiping out the rest of the left's opposition to hitler's franco gambit.

Plenty of international anti-nazis left Spain, managed to get out alive, didn't agree with stalin's purges, didn't back him, and were committed to fight nazis before and after Spain and Molotov. Like those people you mentioned in your post. I can't sympathize with any 'leftie' who looked at Stalin's foreign and domestic policy positions then and remained loyal to his communist vision, if I was the US gov, I wouldn't have put any stalinists in any important positions relating to war efforts. (Funny how the current pro-McCarthy right is o.k. with Tillerson being in charge of State, Ross being in charge of Commerce, Flynn being in charge of national security, etc., today, with all the open ties to today's stalin, putin.) And Trumbo wasn't backing the official stalinist left party line, because he promoted anti-war ideas when doctrinaire stalinists were anti-pacifist.

When the US left and center increasingly wanted to fight nazism, the stalinists cut a deal to not fight hitler, though they opposed pacifism. Stalin's new buddy, hitler, has his american buddies approach trumbo to promote an 'anti-war' ideology to sap morale and blunt opposition to nazism. The stalinist left comes off as pro-violent conflict, just not violence against nazis. Trumbo flies in the face of 'necessary violence' and is committed to fighting nazis at the same time, the exact opposite of the fake left stalinists on both counts. Then Hitler sticks it to stalin, and all the 'anti-pacifist' pro-stalin lefties become 'prematurely anti-fascist'.

The 'lefties' who came out of the Spanish civil war maintaining a consistent pro-stalinist ideology, I'd sanction with a 'premature anti fascist' designation, if I was in charge of US policy. That would seem like the only coherent use of that designation, if the aim was to back the US and oppose nazism. But I think the idea that came across was that some people were judged by our right wingers in the power structure as being too smart for their own good, how dare they assess that nazism was dangerous evil while so many corporate powerful interests in this country thought it might be a good idea. The righwing power structure frowning upon 'smart guys' who thought they knew better than the people who decide for the country which way we're going, how dare they guess right first, before the real deciders could think straight and decide to oppose hitler.

I could only find a link for the '59 intro, with the entire book posted, but the one I referenced was published during the Viet war.

http://sgjohnnygothisgun.wikispaces.com/file/view/Johnny_Got_His_Gun.pdf

[struggle4progress]

41. I just re-read his 1959 and 1979 introductions: the FBI story is not in the 1970 introduction but

in the 1959 introduction; and neither seems to contain the phrase 'prematurely antifascist'

The 1959 introduction is interesting, because he says he wrote the book in 1938 and that it began to appear commercially ten days after the Nazi-Soviet pact was signed and two days after WWII started. He also says there here received a number of letters from US servicemen who had read his book in Army libraries and that before the end of WWII he himself encountered a copy in such a library in Okinawa

There is no reason to assume that this account is inaccurate; and if he were writing a pacifist novel in the era before the end of the Spanish civil war, then his views would have been unpopular among the leftists sometimes called 'prematurely antifascist' -- since they were then already taking the view that it was important to resist Franco and his then-allies Hitler and Mussolini

[Mc Mike]

43. I am sorry to not have the edition I referenced, anymore. Gave it to a young relative years ago.

I recall the updated intro specifically adding up the tonnage of bone, tonnage of flesh, etc, from lost limbs in Vietnam, and it ended with 'good night, losers.' (I didn't feel offended that Trumbo was actually calling the reader 'losers', but it was a plain statement of fact.

It's possible that the bunders wanted to get some type of permission from Trumbo or license to mass purchase and distribute the book, with the end being to use US revulsion at the WWI death toll to keep us out of the war, to back the reich. The rest of my memory of the intro is solid, I read that copy at least 5 x. That's the first place I ever saw the phrase 'prematurely antifascist', in my life.

There is some interesting discussion to be had about the flip flopping of pro Stalin 'lefties', about whether Hitler was acceptable or not.

[shenmue]

2. ...

[DFW]

3. My dad was at the other end of Germany

In the Rheinland somewhere--ironically, probably not far from where I live now.

One cool story--after Germany had surrendered, the Allies were desperate to find lodging for their forces, as the logistics to get them all home quickly didn't exist. They pleaded with the people of Allied or neutral countries to open their homes to GIs and take them for a while. My dad's CO came in and asked who in the unit liked to sail. No one spoke up, but my dad had the presence of mind to ask how come the question. The CO said, well there's this rich family with a villa on the shore of Lake Geneva....."I LIKE TO SAIL!!" my dad immediately spoke up. He got a room in this fabulously located villa outside of Geneva Switzerland. He had taken French in college, so he spoke it passably. In the course of his short stay, they got to be good friends with whom he never lost touch. When I was 18, and wanted to take my first "Europe on $5 a day" trip through Europe, they said I was welcome to stay with them for a few days

I got to Geneva, took a bus out to their small town outside the city, and asked where I could find the address. The people of the village looked at this scruffy kid in blue jeans and a beard and asked if I was sure I had the right address. I said yes, and said the family name. That's them, all right. OK, well, you take this road (etc etc etc). I got to a big iron gate and hit the buzzer. A voice came on the intercom, and I said in my rudimentary (at the time) French who I was. I said my name and the gates swung open. Sure enough, they welcomed me as if I had been an old friend all my life. I didn't know who was who in Geneva until I took a day trip into town and saw their name on just about every construction site in Geneva. No wonder the townspeople gave me such strange looks when I said the name of the people I was looking for. It was as if I had just arrived in New York, and said I was looking for the house of a family named Rockefeller because they had invited me to stay with them.

Oh, and they did have a sailboat. They used it to get to their castle and vineyard on the other side of Lake Geneva (!!!!).

[wryter2000]

4. Fabulous story

I wish I'd been with you.

[mountain grammy]

5. Great story!

[ProudLib72]

7. Wonderful story

The best part is that they stayed in touch all that time.

[DFW]

24. Before I went there myself, they were just names on Christmas cards we got ever year

I didn't know the first thing about Switzerland, and had never stayed with anyone of that kind of immense wealth. But they were as natural as could be, welcomed me as if I had seen them every other weekend instead of never at all. In the fifties and sixties, one couldn't just grab the family and hop over to Switzerland for the weekend on a reporter's salary.

[think4yourself]

9. Awesome story!

Your dad really left a great impression on them!

[DFW]

11. He left that impression on a LOT of people

Many people ask me why I didn't go into journalism with all the connections he had.

Easy--All they would have been doing my whole career long would be comparing me to him, and he was minor legend of his time. President of the Gridiron Club, getting cited by Senators and Congressmen for fairness in the Congressional Record, winning the Stokes award, etc etc. I kept some of his connections (Helen Thomas remained a friend to the end, for example), but I never even attempted to fill shoes that were meant to be left unfilled.

[NBachers]

13. I love the way you take us along on your journeys throughout time and places.

[DFW]

26. Just little episodes snatched from the past

Brought back from distant memory by a relevant theme. I'm sure we all have them from time to time.

For that matter, I'm writing this from my room in a hotel in Vienna that used to be the Imperial Riding School. The rooms are nothing to write home about, but the lobby is straight out of the heyday of the Hapsburg Empire, and the Russian Orthodox Church across the street is probably better maintained than most of the ones in Russia--looks like a scene straight out of Dr. Zhivago. Well-timed thread!

[Ligyron]

23. This is why I read DU.

Cool stories like this.

Yeah, I remember over 4 DM to the dollar myself. It wasn't much of a stretch to do Europe on 5 bucks a day.

[DFW]

25. Hard to imagine these days

In Switzerland now, $5 wouldn't even get you a coffee a day at a Swiss Starbucks.

[Dennis Donovan]

29. THAT is a GREAT story!

I never had an opportunity to ask my Dad about the war. He died when I was 2 1/2 in a boating accident. All I have (of his time in postwar Germany) is that photo.

I'd love to know and meet the children standing behind his CO. What was life like for them after the war?

[DFW]

35. I'm sure the stories are as varied as they could possibly be.

Just the stories of my father-in-law and mother-in-law are fascinating to hear.

My father-in-law, as is the case with many that experience the bloodiest combat and were gravely wounded, almost never talked about his war experiences, and only on his deathbed, in his delirium, started calling out to long-dead members of his unit who perished in the artillery barrage that left him without one of his legs. He had been drafted off his farm at age 17, returned a cripple at 19. His fondest wish was that all his grandchildren be girls so none of them would ever be involuntarily conscripted for the military--a wish fate was to grant him. Though from a traditional background, he fully approved of his son's (ultimately successful) attempt to dope himself up so completely that when he turned 18 (this was in 1974) and had to report for his draft physical, he was deemed physically unfit for military service. He said it was better that his son be stigmatized in that manner than return home one day at age 19, traumatized and with a leg blown off.

My mother-in-law was from a rural middle class family who lost 3 out of her five brothers during the war, as well as almost everything they had. She remembers hiding in ditches from strafing runs by fighter-bombers who didn't care what or who they were shooting at. She not only liked her husband-to-be when she met him, one leg and all, but also appreciated that being from a farm family, he could also bring them bread and the occasional couple of eggs.

[madokie]

37. Thanks for sharing that with us

We have so many Good People here at DU its amazing

peace

[Impeach Trump]

6. +100

[DrDan]

8. great picture . . .My Father was in the Pacific at Pearl Harbor during WWII - not pro-Fascist either

[Dennis Donovan]

30. I had a friend who was @ PH on 12/7/41.

He's since passed - Harold Smith. He was on the USS Helena (torpedoed at 1010 dock) and was in his bunk when the torpedo hit. She heeled to starboard but stayed afloat. The ship moored outboard of her, the USS Oglala, rolled over and sank (an old Great Lakes steamer refitted for war).

Helena was sunk almost 2 yrs later - torpedoed again. Harold had transferred to another ship before she was sunk.

As a side note, Harold was also in the only plane accident I ever witnessed. It was 1991 and he was flying in his own Cessna 210. I was fueling my aircraft (rented C-172), up on the ladder when he came in during a viscous crosswind of 15-20 kts 90 degrees across 35 (K3MY in Peoria, IL). It lifted up his port wing and pushed him off the runway into 2 Piper Aztecs - his nose wheel smashed into the windscreen of one and his wing ripped off the tail of the second one. His 210 flopped onto the ramp and his prop, at full power since he was trying to go around, ripped into the ramp and was headed right towards me. I jumped off the ladder as it skidded towards me. It stopped before hitting my C-172 and me. I was the first to his aircraft and helped him out of it after ascertaining he didn't have any broken bones (he was fine except for a bump on his head). No fire risk since he was nearly out of avgas.

Freakiest thing I ever witnessed. He never flew again, though.

[DrDan]

33. my Father got there sometime after 12/7 - not sure exactly when

That accident sounds frightening. I don't blame him for giving up flying. Are you still flying? I have quite a few hours in a 172 as I was in flight school during the Viet Nam years - Reese AFB. We had 3 student accidents while I was there - the most frightening was student who got inverted in a cloud bank - panicked and punched out at about 1,000 ft. The funniest (if there is such a thing with respect to flying accidents) involved a marine - we had about a dozen in our class. He ran off the end of the runway in a 172 - nosed over - uninjured except for his pride. They were an arrogant bunch - I had no sympathy for him.

[Dennis Donovan]

34. I haven't flown since 1998

No accidents in an aircraft. I miss flying but I think getting a medical certificate might be difficult since I had a DWI in 2003. Dumb fricking thing on my part (no one was hurt except for me, a tree and my 928-S4 which was totalled).

[DrDan]

36. that S4 was a great car - I drove a '77 911S for about 15 years - got tired of the high-$ maintenanc

[Dennis Donovan]

38. It was a beast! I took it out on a track before the wreck...

Last edited Mon Sep 18, 2017, 06:53 PM - Edit history (1)

...and got it up to 145 mph.

[DrDan]

39. yow . . . I had my 911 on Daytona a couple of times - but never that fast

I had the engine rebuilt - top and bottom - and it could pop your neck back going into 5th . . . . but I don't think I ever exceeded a 110 or so - but it was only 2.7L

were other cars on the track when you took it that fast? if so - you must have some experience on a track

I have a C6 corvette now - but miss driving a Porsche - nothing quite like it.

[Dennis Donovan]

40. It was a straightaway

I just gunned it.

[paleotn]

12. A whole generation of antifa.

My father enjoyed occupation, but the hard part he said was keeping guys out of trouble. It still beat the hell out of fighting he said. He was lucky enough to have the points to go home. Many of his friends didn't and were sweating the long boat ride to the Pacific. Luckily, that never happened.

[JohnnyRingo]

16. My Uncle Henry Canfield

I never discussed it with him, but as a member of the Ohio Militia I suppose he wasn't too fond of Confederate statues and flags either.

[img][/img]

[Dennis Donovan]

28. Awesome CdV!!!

Here's my great-great-Grandfather in 1862:


He was with the NY 111th Volunteers. Wounded at Gettysburg and seriously wounded during the Battle of the Wilderness (he was sent home).

[oneshooter]

17. My Uncle is currently in France

Been there since 1944.

[DFW]

18. There were many--too many--who made a one way trip that year

My dad was there, too, but was lucky enough to get home to tell the tale.

[Dennis Donovan]

27. Dad missed the landing on D-Day.

He went over late June, 1944 with his unit, the 551st AAA Aw Bn. Was caught up in the Battle of the Bulge though. 2 of my uncles went ashore on 6/6/44. One in infantry and the other drove a Higgins boat ashore. He was shot in the butt. He always considered himself lucky given that so many never made it past the beach.

My condolences to you for your loss. All heroes in the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial

[oneshooter]

42. Uncle Edger was one of 500 killed during the

Invasion of Soeteran of both actions here in Texasuthern France.

Operation Dragoon was to relieve the pressure on the Normandy beach head.

http://www.history.army.mil/brochures/sfrance/sfrance.htm

The "Forgotten Invasion",

We have a veteran of both invasions here in Texas.

https://www.thoughtco.com/uss-texas-bb-35-2361303

[DK504]

19. Since anti-fascism is a bad thing. Wait what?

[Voltaire2]

22. My anti-fa dad was landing troops in Italy to fight the fascists.

Back then we seemed to know that you don't tolerate fascists.

[bdjhawk]

31. My Dad was in Regensburg in 1945, too!

We took a family trip to Europe right after I got out of college. We went to the Normandy beaches, American cemetery and then generally followed the route my Dad's Armored division followed through France and Germany. One memory I will never forget was of my Dad standing on a cobblestone street in Regensburg and looking around and saying "I can still hear how loud the tanks were driving over these streets as we came through " and you could see on his face he was envisioning being there in 1945.

Thanks for your photo Dennis and bringing back that memory.

Thanks also to DFW for sharing the neat story of friendship coming out of war.

Thanks to those who posted photos of hero Union soldiers who fought FOR the United States.

Thanks to oneshooter for the cemetery photo to remind us of brave soldiers/anti-fascists who paid the ultimate price. Unbelievable that we are in a day and age where those who claim to be the "most patriotic" Americans have aligned themselves with those who we fought in WWII!

[Dennis Donovan]

32. What unit was your Dad in?

I'm sure many units passed thru Regensburg, but I have to ask (maybe served w/ my Dad?).