Latest news with #Luftwaffe
Mint
3 days ago
- Mint
Did Hitler order the murder of Einstein's relative in Italy?
The Einstein Vendetta: Hitler, Mussolini and a Murder That Haunts History. By Thomas Harding. Michael Joseph; 384 pages; £22 By the summer of 1944, Rome had fallen and the Allies were pushing up through Italy. While withdrawing northwards, the Germans massacred civilians, partly out of a sense of betrayal by former friends—Italy had ended its alliance with Germany less than a year before—and partly as reprisals for attacks by partisans. Robert Einstein, a Jew and a cousin of Albert, the Nobel-prizewinning physicist, knew his life was in danger. In late July a unit of the Hermann Goering Division, one of the most powerful in the Luftwaffe, had come looking for him at his Tuscan estate, but he was out working in the fields. Robert decided that he should separate from his wife, Nina, and their two adult daughters, Luce and Cici. As Protestant Christians, they thought they would be safe if the Germans returned. They were wrong. On August 3rd several heavily armed Germans smashed into the house. Their captain said he had orders for Robert's arrest. Fourteen hours later, Robert, who was hiding in the woods 300 metres away, heard gunfire. Robert was overcome with grief and blamed himself for the deaths of his loved ones. Almost a year later he killed himself, but not before he had been interviewed by an American army major assisting in an investigation into war crimes committed by the retreating Germans. Major Milton Wexler may have assumed that he had been sent to look into the Einstein murders because of the name. Thomas Harding's book points to Italians' suffering in this period—'The Einstein murders were listed as number 2,550 of 5,884 in the 'Atlas of Nazi and Fascist Massacres in Italy'," the author observes—but its focus is specific. Mr Harding hopes to find the perpetrators of the triple murder and describes the efforts of both Italian and German prosecutors to do so. Doggedly pursuing his own investigation, Mr Harding interviews surviving witnesses and Einstein family members. Most of all, he seeks to find out whether the killings were the result of a vendetta. As a world-famous Jew, revered physicist and vocal critic of Nazism, Albert had long been an assassination target, but he had moved to America in 1933 and was out of reach. In 1939 Albert had warned President Franklin Roosevelt of the possibility that the Nazis could develop an atomic bomb, which led to the Manhattan Project. Though Hitler could not kill Albert, whom he loathed, he could kill Robert. Did the Führer personally order the hit? Mr Harding cannot prove it, but some of his sources have no doubt. The murders were not random acts of cruelty, they argue, but deliberate acts of vengeance. For more on the latest books, films, TV shows, albums and controversies, sign up to Plot Twist, our weekly subscriber-only newsletter
Middle East Eye
24-06-2025
- Politics
- Middle East Eye
Israel's failure to subdue Iran shows it can no longer dictate the regional order
The Luftwaffe regarded the blitz on Coventry on 14 November 1940 as an astonishing technological achievement. German propaganda broadcasts hailed the raid as 'the most severe in the whole history of the war'. The chief Nazi propagandist, Joseph Goebbels, was so delighted with the raid, that he coined a new term in its honour: 'to Coventrate'. It was not long, however, before the taste of total victory turned sour. The production of aero engines and aircraft parts was quickly shifted to shadow factories. Capacity had only been dented, not destroyed; within months, factories were back to full production. We also know now that the Germans were worried by the effect the image of the ruined Coventry Cathedral would have on the Americans who were yet to join the war. Indeed, the Germans underestimated the resilience of the British, who forged instead a resolve to hit back as never before. The Royal Air Force began a forceful bombing campaign of Germany shortly afterwards. It has taken Israel's high command just 12 days to see the total victory they claimed to have achieved in the first hours of their blitz on Iran turn into something that looks more like a strategic defeat. Hence Israel's massive reluctance to stick to a ceasefire, after promising US President Donald Trump it would abide by it. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters None of Israel's three war aims have been met. There is no evidence yet that Iran's nuclear enrichment programme has been 'completely and fully obliterated' as Trump claimed. Iran had time to move at least some of its centrifuges out of harm's way, and it's not clear where the existing stockpile of more than 400 kilogrammes of highly enriched uranium is being stored. Meanwhile, the scores of generals and scientists killed in the first hours of the attack were swiftly replaced. Weathering the storm If Coventry is anything to go by, uranium enrichment and missile-launcher production will be up and running within months, not years, as the Americans claim. The technology, the know-how, and above all the Iranian national will to restore and rebuild key national assets have all weathered the storm. Evidently, from the damage Iranian missiles inflicted within hours of Trump's announcement of a ceasefire, its ballistic missile force, the second Israeli war aim, remains a palpable and continuing threat to Israel. Israel sustained more damage from Iran's missiles in 12 days than it did from two years of Hamas's homegrown rockets, or indeed from months of war with Hezbollah. In 12 days, Israeli crews have come to grips with the sort of damage to apartment blocks that before only Israeli planes had inflicted on Gaza and Lebanon - and it's been something of a shock. Strategic targets have been hit, including an oil refinery and a power station. Iran has also reported strikes on Israeli military facilities, although Israel's strict censorship regime makes these assertions difficult to verify. Far from turbocharging Netanyahu's ambitions to grind Iran into a Gaza-grade dust, Trump called time on a war that had only just started And finally, the Iranian regime is still standing. If anything, the regime has rallied the nation rather than dividing it, if only out of nationalist fury about Israel's unprovoked attack. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's other great 'achievement' - dragging the US into its war - now looks like a poisoned chalice. For how much longer will that banner - 'Thank you, Mr President' - be up on a central highway in Tel Aviv, after Trump applied a massive and premature handbrake on Netanyahu's war machine? Twelve days ago, Trump started by refuting the notion of any US involvement in Israel's surprise attack on Iran. When he saw it was succeeding, Trump attempted to muscle his way in on the project, saying it could only have been achieved with US technology. As the attack wore on, Trump suggested that he, too, would not be opposed to regime change. But in the final 24 hours, Trump lurched from demanding Iran's unconditional surrender, to thanking Iran for warning the US of its intention to strike al-Udeid air base in Qatar, and declaring peace in our time. Turning the tables Far from turbocharging Netanyahu's ambitions to grind Iran into a Gaza-grade dust, Trump called time on a war that had only just started. And unlike in Gaza, Netanyahu is in no position to defy the will of the US president. Trump had serious problems of his own in pursuing a venture that half of his party was vociferously against. For Netanyahu, these past 12 days have been a steep learning curve. If day one proved that Israeli intelligence could achieve the same success in Iran as it did against Hezbollah in Lebanon, by eliminating the first echelon of its military and scientific command - and that Israel could do all of that on its own, without direct US help - by day 10, it was becoming apparent that Israel could achieve none of its war aims without the US joining in. But before the ink had dried on all the praise Netanyahu garnered in Israel by getting Washington involved in what had been an Israel-only project, Trump turned the tables on his closest ally once again. He proved to be a one-hit wonder. Without even pausing to assess whether the nuclear enrichment site buried deep underground at Fordo had indeed been disabled, Trump declared mission accomplished. Israel-US attack on Iran: The price of Netanyahu's forever wars Read More » He did it with a speed that was suspicious, as indeed, from Israel's view, was his haste in congratulating Iran for not killing any of his troops. It was very much like the way he came to a deal with the Houthis in Yemen before flying to Riyadh to cash in on the proceeds. Iran, on the other hand, is emerging from this conflict with strategic gains - although the immediate battering it has sustained, and the hundreds of casualties it has suffered, should not be ignored. Its air defences failed to bring down a single Israeli warplane, although they appeared to have downed drones. Israeli warplanes were free to roam the skies of Iran, and Israeli intelligence once again showed that it had penetrated deep into the Revolutionary Guard Corps and Iranian scientific community. These were all clear failings. But none proved decisive. In the end, all Iran had to do was, in the words of 1940s-era Britain, 'keep calm and carry on'. That meant sending a steady stream of missiles towards Israel, knowing that even if all were knocked out of the sky, the entire population was penned up in shelters, and Israel's precious and expensive supply of Arrow missiles was being consumed. What Iran thus established was exactly what the Israeli economy could not handle after 20 months of war: a war of attrition on a second front. Netanyahu needed a quick knockout blow, and despite the first day of success, it never came. Even so, Israel could not stop itself from bombing, after being told not to by Trump. So another not-so-subtle message had to be delivered over the megaphone: 'Israel. Do not drop those bombs. If you do it it is a major violation,' Trump boomed in capital letters. War of narratives For in the end, this conflict was never about ending a nuclear-bomb programme that never existed (if it had, Iran would have long ago been able to build a bomb). This conflict was essentially a war between two narratives. The first is well known. It goes like this. The Hamas attack on 7 October 2023 was a strategic mistake. No force that Arabs or Iranians can muster can ever match the power of Israel and the US combined, or even Israel armed with the latest generation of weapons. Israel will always defeat its enemies on the battlefield, as it did in 1948, 1967, 1973, 1978 and 1982. The only option for Arabs is to recognise Israel on its terms, which means to trade with it, and leave Palestinian statehood for another day. This view is held with variations, and unofficially, by all Arab leaders and their military and security chiefs. The alternative narrative is that while the state of Israel exists in its current form, there can be no peace. This is the source of the conflict, as opposed to the presence of Jews in Palestine. Resistance to occupation will always exist, no matter who takes up or puts down the cudgel, as long as that occupation continues. Iran's existence as a regime that defies the Israeli will to dominate and conquer is more important than its strategic rocket force. Its ability to stand up to Israel and the US, and to keep fighting, shows the same spirit that Palestinians in Gaza have shown in refusing to be starved into surrender. If the ceasefire holds, Iran has a number of options. It should be in no rush to return to a negotiating table abandoned twice by Trump himself - once when he withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal in May 2018, and again this month, when his envoy Steve Witkoff was engaged in direct talks. Trump boasted that he had deceived the Iranians by engaging them in talks and allowing Israel to prepare its strikes at the same time. Well, he won't be able to pull that trick again. Tehran's options To return to talks, Iran would need guarantees that Israel will not attack again - guarantees that Israel itself will never give. As I and others have argued, being part of the Non-Proliferation Treaty has served Iran's interests poorly. It could walk away from the treaty, having every incentive now to develop a nuclear bomb to stop Israel from ever doing this again. In reality, Iran does not have to do anything. It has weathered maximum-pressure sanctions and a 12-day armageddon with the latest American weaponry in use. It does not need an agreement. It can rebuild and repair the damage it has sustained in these attacks, and if past experience is anything to go by, it will emerge stronger than before. The Iranian people will never forgive or forget US-Israeli attacks Read More » Netanyahu and Trump have some accounting to do to an increasingly hostile and sceptical domestic audience. Israel's former defence minister, Avigdor Lieberman, is worth quoting in this regard. He noted after the ceasefire announcement: 'Despite Israel's military and intelligence successes, the ending is bitter. Instead of unconditional surrender, we're entering tough talks with a regime that won't stop enriching uranium, building missiles, or funding terror. 'From the start, I warned: there's nothing more dangerous than a wounded lion. A ceasefire without a clear deal will only bring another war in 2-3 years - under worse conditions.' Israel has swapped Gaza's homemade rockets for Iran's ballistic missiles. It has swapped an indirect enemy and sponsor of proxy militias, for a direct enemy - one that has no hesitation in sending the entire population of Israel into bunkers. That is some achievement, but not the one Netanyahu was thinking 12 days ago. The major European states - all signatories to the Iran nuclear deal - have absolutely nothing to say to Iran. They have abdicated all ability to mediate in their spinelessness and acquiescence to an attack on Iran that had absolutely no legality in international law. Once again, they have undermined the international order they claim to be upholding. The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.
IOL News
17-06-2025
- Entertainment
- IOL News
On this day: A love story for the ages, Running Up That Hill, the last Apartheid laws abolished and slaughter at Boipatong
A sad end for the emperor who built the white-marble Taj Mahal for his wife. On this day: June 17 1631 Mumtaz Mahal dies during childbirth. Her husband, Mughal emperor Shah Jahan I, goes on to spend more than 20 years building her tomb – a symbol of great love – the Taj Mahal. 1837 Chemist and inventor Charles Goodyear obtains his first rubber patent. 1855 A heavy French/British bombardment of Sevastopol, in Crimea, kills more than 2 000. 1877 The Nez Perce Indians defeat the US Cavalry at White Bird Canyon in Idaho. 1885 The Statue of Liberty – gift from the people of France – arrives in New York City. 1928 Aviator Amelia Earhart leaves Newfoundland to become the first woman to cross the Atlantic (as a passenger). 1938 Japan finally declares war on China, a year after having invaded the country. 1939 The last public guillotining – that of a murderer – takes place in France. 1940 The liner RMS Lancastria is sunk by the Luftwaffe near Saint-Nazaire, France. 1954 Rocky 'Raging Bull' Marciano beats heavyweight boxing champion Ezzard Charles over 15 rounds. Marciano is the only person to hold the heavyweight title undefeated, with a boxing record of 49 fights, 49 wins and 43 KOs. He dies at 45 in a 1969 plane crash. 1958 Things Fall Apart by Nigerian Chinua Achebe, the most widely read book in African literature, is published. 1982 President Galtieri resigns after leading Argentina to defeat in the Falkland Islands. 1991 The last apartheid laws are abolished. 1992 The slaughter by Inkatha followers at Boipatong leaves 42 people dead. 2019 Former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi dies after collapsing in a court. 2021 China launches its Shenzhou-12 spacecraft, with three astronauts arriving at its space station, Tiangong, 6.5 hours later. 2022 Running Up That Hill single by Kate Bush goes to #1 on the UK chart; originally released in 1985, the song was featured in sci-fi TV show Stranger Things, its record 44-year climb to the top also makes Bush, 63) the oldest female artist to score a No 1. 2024 The Philippines accuses the Chinese coastguard of 'a brazen act of aggression' after a confrontation in the contested Spratly Islands escalating the tension in the area. DAILY NEWS
Time of India
11-06-2025
- Business
- Time of India
R&D? Rarely
Dependence in critical areas makes the nation vulnerable. Strategic interest must prevail over economic sense Germany's crude reserves are so small, they won't last three months in an emergency. So how did Hitler wage war for five years? By turning coal into petrol. Over 92% of the Luftwaffe's aviation fuel was synthetic. As the world grapples with China's rare earth curbs, there's a useful lesson here. While the rare earths crisis that started with China's export curbs on April 4 may be blowing over – Trump announced on Truth Social yesterday, 'Full magnets, and any necessary rare earths, will be supplied, up front, by China' – it will have a once-bitten-twice-shy effect. Over the past few weeks, Western carmakers have considered producing cars minus some components that use rare earths. At home, Maruti's had to scale back production plans for its first EV due to a global shortage of rare earth magnets. As our second Op-Ed explains, these magnets contain about 25% of a rare earth element called neodymium. It's one of the so-called 'light' rare earths that are available in India, but we don't produce enough of it because cheap Chinese supplies made investment in this area unattractive. While you can make motors without rare earths, other devices like TV screens, computers and MRI machines can't do without them. That's why India needs to build a large rare earths industry. And with the world's fifth largest rare earth reserves, it's well-placed to do so. Likewise, it needs to end its dependence on China for 70% of active pharmaceutical ingredients or APIs, because while buying from the cheapest supplier makes economic sense, it's a strategic risk. The aim must be to reduce dependence because dependence, especially in critical products, is vulnerability. About 90% of our crude is imported. An electric future will take care of that, but not if it means 100% dependence on China for lithium batteries. To find alternatives – like Germany's WW-II 'synfuels' – we need big investments in R&D, which is not our strong suit. As a nation, we invest only 0.6% of our $4tn GDP in research. China invests 2.4% of $18tn, US 3.5% of $29tn. And our private sector is even stingier, accounting for only a third of the national R&D spend, as against 70% in US and S Korea. The rare earth crisis is a brief distraction, the real issue is India's rare investment problem, and it needs national attention now. Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email This piece appeared as an editorial opinion in the print edition of The Times of India.
Spectator
11-06-2025
- Politics
- Spectator
My plan for Prevent
In the autumn of 1940, British cities were being bombed every night by large aeroplanes whose provenance was apparently of some considerable doubt. While the public almost unanimously believed the conflagrations to have been caused by the Luftwaffe, the authorities – right up to the government – refused to speculate. Indeed, when certain members of the public raised their voices and said 'This is all down to Hitler and Goering and the bloody Germans!', they received visits from the police who either prosecuted them for disturbing the peace or put their names on a list of possible extremists. The nights grew darker. The number of towns and cities subjected to these nightly bombardments widened. Very soon everybody in the country knew somebody whose home had been destroyed or who had themselves been killed. The government was forced to take action, and so in November 1940 it came up with what it called its 'Prevent' strategy, which aimed to protect British cities from further destruction. In the introduction to this new policy, civil servants listed possible vectors for these bombing raids and top of the list, by some margin, were the Slovaks. A senior intelligence officer told the public: 'The greatest threat to our nation today is from the Slovaks. We must train our people in how to spot Slovaks and report them to the police whenever they can.' The Germans were also mentioned, further down the list of possible perps, but the wording here was heavily caveated. Yes, some Germans may have been involved, but over all the German population was utterly devoted to peace and regretted the nightly infernos every bit as much as did the people who suffered under them. Our own air force was directed to drop its bombs on Bratislava, Kosice, Poprad and (the consequence of an understandable confusion over the names of the two countries) Maribor. And yet for some mystifying reason, the raids on Britain did not lessen. This seems to me exactly the response of our government(s) and most importantly of Prevent to the threat from Islamic terrorism. Let me be clear: I am not remotely comparing Muslims with Germans or Islam with National Socialism – I am simply saying that, in effect, this is what our government would have done in 1940 if it had been gripped by the same cringing witlessness and outright lying that possesses seemingly all of our authorities today when it comes to terrorist attacks upon the British people. You may be aware of the manifestly stupid quote from the Prevent halfwits that people who believe that 'western culture is under threat from mass migration and a lack of integration by certain ethnic and cultural groups' are cultural nationalists at risk of becoming the kind of extremists who end up murdering people. People who believe the above probably consist of 70 per cent of the British population and, if his latest speeches are anything to go by, include the Prime Minister. And yet this stuff pervades everything Prevent puts out, while at the same time exonerating Islam and in some cases even those Muslims who do become terrorists (because they have suffered, you see). If people who support Brexit or worry about immigration are extremists, you're going to get pretty high figures So, for example, Bolton council's useful 'Prevent' handbook singles out 'right-wing extremists' as being at the forefront of terror attacks in the UK, and these extremists include people who are cultural nationalists: 'Cultural nationalism is ideology characterised by anti-immigration, anti-Islam, anti-Muslim, anti-establishment narratives, often emphasising British/English 'victimhood' and identity under attack from a perceived 'other'.' Islamic terrorism is also mentioned – but, again, heavily caveated. Then there's Prevent's own list of people who were picked up under its guidelines: 45 per cent were related to extreme right-wing radicalisation (230); 23 per cent were linked to Islamist radicalisation (118); the rest were related to other radicalisation concerns, including incels and those at risk of carrying out school shootings. But then I suppose if people who proclaim their support for Brexit or worry a bit about immigration are extremists, you are going to get pretty high arrest figures. If you add into the mix the fact that simply to associate Islam with terrorism you are guilty of Islamophobia, then you can see why we're in the state we're in. Incidentally, when she was Prime Minister, Theresa May, to her credit, drafted a new introduction to the Prevent guidelines which made it clear that the biggest threat to British security was al Qaeda, not Tommy Robinson et al. But that message does not seem to have sunk in with those in Prevent. It seems almost pointless to run through the facts. The truth is that almost every fatal terrorist attack in Britain since 2001 has been perpetrated by Islamists. All bar three. Have these people got a twisted or perverted understanding of Islam, as Prevent insists? I haven't a clue. I am no Quranic expert. I'm just, y'know, taking their word for it. Further, 80 per cent of the Counter Terrorism Policing network's investigations are related to Islamism (2023). Some 75 per cent of MI5's surveillance cases are Islamists. There are around 40,000 potential jihadis being monitored by our security services. There is not the remotest doubt as to the provenance of the gravest terror threats to our country. It's not the shaven-headed nutters with swastika armbands. It is Islamists. Nigel Farage's answer is to sack everyone working in Prevent. That seems a perfectly reasonable suggestion. But I may have a better one. Scrap Prevent entirely and initiate a new network of monitoring and reporting which focuses solely on Islamic terrorism. Junk the sixth-form philosophising over what is meant by the term 'extremist' and locate the problem precisely where it is: somewhere within our Muslim communities, even if we accept that our Muslim communities may not want them there. In short, get real and tell the truth. This kind of approach worked pretty well 85 years ago.
