National Geographic USA 06.2020

Vera NIKITINA
Leningrad blockade survivor

‘I don’t want to remember any of it,
even to speak of it. It’s all so
hard. I don’t want that anyone
would ever have to suffer such a
thing again. When I talk of my child-
hood, I get upset. I start to cry.
I don’t want to cry anymore; I want
to live the rest of my life in
peace and see only the good in life.
I don’t want to see anything
terrible anymore. I’m sorry.’

Nikitina, 87, was a child besieged city. Nearly
when the 900-day Nazi all of her relatives who
blockade of Leningrad
began. Having already couldn’t escape the
Nazi stranglehold died
lost her mother, and
with her father off at from the hunger,
war, she was quickly cold, and bombings

evacuated from the that claimed some
800,000 civilian lives.

T H E L A S T V O I C E S O F W O R L D WA R I I 57

S E V E N T Y- F I V E Y E A R S AG O,

the most far-flung, destructive,

and lethal war in history

S approached its end. World War
II lived up to its name: It was a
true global conflict that pitted
the Allied powers—the United
States, the Soviet Union, Brit-
ain, China, and their smaller

allies—against Germany,

Japan, Italy, and a few other

Axis nations. Some 70 million

men and women served in the

armed forces, taking part in

the greatest military mobilization in history. Civilians, however, did

most of the suffering and dying. Of the estimated 66 million people

who perished, nearly 70 percent—some 46 million—were civil-

ians, including six million Jews murdered during the Holocaust.

Tens of millions more were uprooted from their homes and coun-

tries, many of them living in displaced persons camps for years

to come. ¶ The war’s aftereffects were as staggering as its scale.

It laid the groundwork for the world we’ve known for more than

seven decades, from the dawn of the nuclear age to the creation of

Israel to the emergence of the United States and Soviet Union as

the world’s dueling superpowers. It also sparked the formation of

international alliances such as the United Nations and NATO, all

designed to prevent such a cataclysm from happening again. ¶ Yet,

with the passage of time, public awareness of the war and its almost

unfathomable consequences has faded, becoming as dim as the

sepia tones of an old photograph. At the same time, firsthand wit-

nesses are dwindling in number. According to U.S. government

statistics, fewer than 400,000 of the 16 million Americans who

served in the war—2.5 percent—were still alive in 2019. ¶ But thanks

to the willingness of some of the last survivors to share their stories,

we’ve been given a valuable gift: a chance to bring the war into sharp

58 N AT I O N A L G E O G R A P H I C

focus again by viewing it through their eyes. With An American
no access to the internet or other forms of today’s soldier comes ashore
instant communications, most of these men and on Omaha Beach during
women knew little of the world beyond their com-
munities before the war. By wrenching them out the Allied invasion
of their familiar settings, it exposed them to an of German-occupied
overwhelming array of new experiences and
tested them in previously unimaginable ways. France on D-Day,
Many found the challenges exhilarating. June 6, 1944. With some

That was true for 18-year-old Betty Webb (page 7,000 ships carrying
60), who was recruited to join Britain’s top secret nearly 160,000 troops,
code-breaking operation at Bletchley Park. Webb
was one of countless women whose work was the largest seaborne
crucial to their countries’ war efforts and who, invasion in history
in the process, found a sense of self-worth and
independence they’d never known before. set the stage for the
liberation of Europe.
Harry T. Stewart, Jr. (page 66), the 20-year-
old grandson of a man born into slavery, proved ROBERT CAPA, INTERNATIONAL
himself as well. A New Yorker who had never CENTER OF PHOTOGRAPHY/
driven a car before the war, Stewart became a MAGNUM PHOTOS
fighter pilot in the famed all-black unit known as
the Tuskegee Airmen, flying 43 combat missions More at Nat Geo online
and winning a Distinguished Flying Cross. Veterans and survivors from around
the world share first-person accounts
These triumphs are inspiring and should be of the war at natgeo.com/ww2.
celebrated. Yet what dominates the survivors’ How this story came to be
stories are the tragedies experienced by so many Special thanks to photographer Robert
of them, Allied and Axis alike. Their accounts Clark and his father, U.S. Navy veteran
are testament to the sheer hell of World War II— R.R. “Russell” Clark (pages 42 and 64),
the brutality, suffering, and terror experienced, who inspired this story, and to the many
and inflicted, by both sides. Particularly haunt- individuals who welcomed Robert
ing is the testimony of Victor Gregg (page 64), and our writers into their homes and
a British soldier captured by the Germans. His shared their memories.
prison was destroyed in the Allied fire bomb-
ing of Dresden in February 1945. Gregg, who T H E L A S T V O I C E S O F W O R L D WA R I I 59
witnessed the fiery deaths of German civilians
there—some 25,000 perished—was left with
an abiding sense of guilt and shame. “These
were women and children,” he said. “I couldn’t
believe it. We were supposed to be the good
guys.” His story, like the others, should remain
indelibly imprinted on our minds.

Lynne Olson is the author of Last Hope Island:
Britain, Occupied Europe, and the Brotherhood
That Helped Turn the Tide of War. This is her
first story for National Geographic.

‘I wanted to do something

more for the war effort

than bake sausage rolls.’

I t was in that room there that I signed the “The fact that we’d broken German and Japa-
Official Secrets Act.” Betty Webb, 97, points nese military codes was a closely guarded secret,
with her walking stick to a ground floor known only to a very few people.”
room in the baronial mansion at Bletch-
ley Park, Britain’s legendary top secret Webb enjoyed the work. “I liked the devious-
code-breaking facility during World War II. ness of it,” she says with a smile. She also worked
Through the bay window, a massive desk on intercepted Japanese messages and was so
is visible. “There was a senior intelligence good at paraphrasing their contents that in June
officer seated behind that desk,” she says, 1945, after the war in Europe ended, she was sent
“and I remember he had a handgun lying casu- to Washington to help the American war effort
ally beside him, right where that coffee cup is in the Pacific. “I flew over in a flying boat,” she
now. I was told to sign and made to understand recalls. “It was the first time I’d ever been up in
in no uncertain terms that I could never discuss a plane. I sent my parents a postcard from Wash-
anything about my work here with anyone. I ington. I’m sure they must have wondered what
signed. It was a sobering moment. I was 18 years I was doing, but of course they never asked, and
old at the time.” anyway I could never tell them.”
That was in 1941. Britain was at war. German
troops had already overrun much of Europe. Decades would pass before any of the people
Webb had been taking a home economics at Bletchley were allowed to speak of their work
course but joined the Auxiliary Territorial Ser- during the war. “Both of my parents had died
vice—the women’s army—because, as she put by then, so they never knew,” she says. “All the
it, “I wanted to do something more for the war secrecy made it tough to get a job after the war,
effort than bake sausage rolls.” Webb was bilin- especially for the men,
gual—she’d grown up with a German au pair and since you couldn’t tell
had been an exchange student in Germany—so employers anything
she was ordered to report to Bletchley, an hour about your war years
or so north of London. “It was so secret I had no other than that you’d
idea what it was—nobody did!—let alone what worked at some place
I was getting into.” called Bletchley Park.”
Initially Webb was put to work cataloging the
thousands of encrypted German radio messages Webb eventually
that British listening posts were intercepting found work at a school
each day. But as the war progressed, she moved whose headmaster
to a more creative role: paraphrasing priceless had been at Bletchley.
nuggets of intelligence gleaned by the code “I never knew him at
breakers so no one would suspect it had been the time,” she says,
obtained by broken codes. “but when he saw on
“We had to make it sound as though it was my application that
information we’d picked up from spies or stolen I’d been at Bletchley
documents or aerial reconnaissance,” she said. too, no words needed
to be said, no awkward
questions asked. I got
the job.” —Roff Smith

60 N AT I O N A L G E O G R A P H I C

BETTY
WEBB

British intelligence

Webb, 97, was 18
when she started
work at Bletchley Park,
Britain’s top secret
code-breaking cen-
ter. German leaders
believed messages
encrypted by their
Enigma machines—this
model (below) could
generate 103 sextillion
combinations—were
all but unbreakable.
Bletchley personnel
proved them wrong.

Decades would pass before those who
worked at Bletchley Park were allowed to
speak about what they did during the war.

ENIGMA PHOTOGRAPHED AT BLETCHLEY PARK TRUST

YEVSEI T he fighting ended 75 years ago, but
RUDINSKY Maria Rokhlina, now 95, still feels
the war in her hands, in every fin-
Soviet navigator ger. Born in Ukraine, she dreamed of
becoming a pilot. But by 1941, when
THE WAR CAME for Yevsei she was 16, the Nazis were advancing
Rudinsky, a student and gymnast, deep into her homeland. “I stepped
when he was sent to a recruitment from my school desk into the war,”
station and was told the country she says. She became a combat medic
needed 100,000 pilots. “I didn’t and served with the Soviet forces for four years.
dream of aviation, but I really liked
to study,” says Rudinsky, 98. Drawn One day, as she was helping ferry a wounded
to charts and astronomy, he trained soldier across the roiling Dnieper River, her oar
to become a navigator in Russia’s far broke, so she paddled through the bone-chilling
north, where polar pilots taught their water with her bare hands. The pain in her fin-
inexperienced charges to orient in gers is still so severe that she takes injections in
treacherous weather without reliable each joint for relief.
maps. His baptism into combat came
in the skies above Kursk, scene of In 1942 Rokhlina became trapped in the
the war’s biggest tank battle. “I flew besieged city of Stalingrad. The battle raged for
a dive bomber, Petlyakov PE-2. We more than six months, reducing the city to ruins
lovingly called it Peshka,” meaning a and decimating its population. Winter tempera-
chess pawn. He recalls fear only after tures regularly plunged below zero degrees
landing. “When you see how many Fahrenheit. Rokhlina holed up with Soviet
holes you have in your plane, or how troops in a tractor factory, but there wasn’t
the Messerschmitts attacked you, a scrap of paper or wood to burn. “We had to
then you start to feel.” He adds: “If warm each other with our bodies,” she says. “We
you feel nothing, you’re not human. took an oath there—never to forget Stalingrad,
And in the end we’re all human.” never to forget those who stood hugging each
other” in what she calls “warming circles.”
—Eve Conant
Then there are the memories Rokhlina has
62 N AT I O N A L G E O G R A P H I C tried to forget but can’t: the heat of a dying sol-
dier’s intestines as she tried to push them back
into his abdomen. Or a fellow medic who was
raped and killed by the Germans, her breasts
sliced off. “I cannot forgive them for what they
did and what I saw.”

But like the heating circles, the horrors forged
bonds. A Soviet soldier, on first sight of her,
promised to propose if they survived the war.
They were married for 48 years.

—Eve Conant

‘We did not bury dead bodies in the winter
in Stalingrad. Corpses were piled up.

There was no place to bury them.’

MARIA
ROKHLINA

Soviet combat medic

VICTOR
GREGG

British rifleman

AN OFFER OF A BUN and factory, causing it to burn to
a cup of hot tea sounded awfully
good to Victor Gregg on that the ground—an act for which
raw London day in October
1937—enticing enough to follow they were sentenced to death.
a recruiter back to his office
and sign up for the British Army. “They transferred us to a prison
“It was my 18th birthday,” recalls
Gregg, now 100. “And you know, in Dresden and told us we were
as far as I recall, I never did get
that cup of tea.” to be shot the next morning,” R . R . ‘ R U S S E L L’
CLARK
Instead he got a harrowing Gregg says.
front-row seat to World War II,
from start to finish. After qual- Fate intervened. That night
ifying as a marksman, Gregg
was posted briefly to India and British and American planes U.S. sailor
was serving in Palestine when
the war broke out in September began raining firebombs on
1939. He spent the next three
years in the North African des- Dresden. The prison took a WHEN A FOOTBALL injury
ert, on covert missions behind
enemy lines. Later he became a direct hit, and Gregg escaped left Russell Clark with a hernia,
paratrooper and took part in the
invasion of Italy. In September through a broken wall. He says he knew he’d be disqualified for
1944 he was dropped into the
Battle of Arnhem—a failed Allied the horrors he saw over the next military service. But 18-year-old
attempt to secure a bridge over
the Rhine River. few days would haunt him for Clark, born and raised on a

“They told us it would be a the rest of his life and fill him Kansas farm, was determined to
walkover,” he recalls. “Instead
we ran into some Panzer divi- with guilt and shame. “Until then join his two brothers at war. He
sions nobody seemed to have
reckoned on.” The fighting my war had been soldiers fight- paid for the operation to correct
was brutal, hand to hand, and
the British paratroopers were ing other soldiers, but these his condition, then enlisted.
overrun. Gregg was captured
and sent to a labor camp near were women and children, civil- By early 1945 Clark was some-
Dresden, Germany.
ians,” he says. “I couldn’t believe where in the North Atlantic,
That winter he made two
unsuccessful escape attempts it. We were supposed to be the working in the engine room of
and as punishment was sent to
work in a soap factory. He and good guys.” the destroyer escort U.S.S.
another POW sabotaged the
Gregg escaped from Dresden Farquhar. “It was hot and steamy

in the aftermath of the bombing down there—100 degrees,”

and made his way east to join recalls Clark, 95.

the advancing Soviet forces. He Despite the long, hot hours

was with them in Leipzig the day belowdecks, Clark considered

Germany surrendered. himself lucky. “The poor guys

After six years of living on the who had to be up on the deck

edge, he found it impossible in the North Atlantic, they were

to settle into postwar civilian life. mighty cold,” he says. His one

He says he sought out risk and brush with the enemy came the

danger, whether it was riding morning after Germany’s surren-

motorcycles, doing clandestine der. A Nazi sub that apparently

work for the British intelligence hadn’t gotten the memo bore

agency MI6, or involving down on the Farquhar.

himself with underground pro- “We had no choice,” he says.

democracy movements behind “We made a torpedo run on

the Iron Curtain. them.”

Memories of Dresden proved An oil slick was all that

to be a particularly heavy remained. —Bill Newcott

burden. But recently Gregg

was invited there to give

a talk about his experiences.

In the audience was a woman

in her early 80s who, as a young

girl, had survived the Dresden

bombing but lost a leg. As they

spoke after his lecture, Gregg

says, he found the inner peace

he’d been seeking for decades.

“Somehow, at last, I felt for-

given.” —Roff Smith

64 N AT I O N A L G E O G R A P H I C

WILHELM
SIMONSOHN

German pilot SHIZUYO BORIS
SMIRNOV
GUIDING TANKS and TA K E U C H I
artillery to their targets from Soviet medic
a spotter plane, Wilhelm Japanese survivor
Simonsohn saw the German “WE WERE FULL of Soviet
invasion of Poland in 1939 from THERE’S NO escaping her
high above the fighting. From memories of February 25, 1945— patriotism,” says Boris Smirnov,
his perch, the first days of the the day American B-29s fire-
war seemed like a great adven- bombed Tokyo. Then 13, Shizuyo 93, who saw many of his com-
ture. All that changed when Takeuchi returned to find cin-
Simonsohn entered Warsaw. ders where her home had been. rades die during the conflict
The Polish capital was in ruins, Only an iron rice pot survived.
shattered by German bombs. The forbidden English dictio- the Soviets named the Great
Thousands of people, mostly nary, a gift from her father,
civilians, were killed in the was ash. She held a single page, Patriotic War. On one occasion,
attack. Simonsohn, now 100, which the wind soon swept
says he still remembers the away. A second firebombing on Smirnov’s platoon was building
smell of rotting bodies trapped March 10 left her with images of
under the rubble. “It made running through a maelstrom of a bridge over the Neman River
such an impression on me that debris and smoke, and passing
I said to myself, ‘I’ll never drop charred bodies—one, a mother when their commander was
a bomb on a human being.’ ” who had tried to shield her
infant beneath her. struck by a bullet, possibly from
Instead he trained as a fighter
pilot and flew dozens of night “I felt scared because I lost an enemy sniper.
missions, scrambling to intercept my emotions for a time,” Takeu-
British bombers. “I flew with the chi recalls. Now 89, married, and
idea that I’d prevent the English with a son and daughter, she
from setting our cities on fire,” works as a storyteller at a center
he says. “I was 22, and naive.” dedicated to bearing witness to
By the spring of 1944, having the horrors of war. —Ted Gup
watched German cities go up
in flames, Simonsohn knew the “As I tried to help him, there
war was lost. “I realized I just
needed to survive,” he says. was another soldier next to me,”
News of Germany’s surrender
came as a tremendous relief. Smirnov recalls. “He said, ‘Hey
“May 8, 1945, was a second
birthday for me. It meant an doctor, you help him, and I’ll
end to all the killing, all the fear,”
he says. “All those burning cover you.’ ” As the medic ban-
cities made me a pacifist. And
I’ve only become more of daged the fallen officer, a shot
one as the years have gone by.”
rang out from the opposite
—Andrew Curry
bank, instantly killing the soldier

standing watch over him. “He

fell quietly,” says Smirnov, still

grieved by his protector’s death.

More traumatic was the day

in October 1944 when Smirnov’s

platoon was surrounded and

callously gunned down. “I saw

the laughing German soldiers

who were sitting some 50 to

60 meters from us,” Smirnov

says. “We were rushing at

them, screaming; they were

laughing and waving their hats.

My friends were falling down

all around me.”

There is a document from

Russian archives that Smirnov

holds dear. It’s a list of his fallen

comrades. —Eve Conant

HARRY T.
STEWART, JR.

U.S. airman

A handcrafted model
of a P-51 Mustang holds
powerful memories
for Stewart, who flew
43 combat missions
in just such an airplane.
The grandson of a man
born into slavery in
Alabama, Stewart
(below, at left) shot
down three enemy
aircraft while escorting
American bombers and
was awarded the Dis-
tinguished Flying Cross.

By 1945 more than 1.2 million African Americans
were serving in uniform in Europe, the Pacific,
and on the home front.

‘I just want them to be remembered as good citizens’

who helped protect their country

‘even in the face of discrimination.’

N early a thousand African-American he won the inaugural “top gun” competition
pilots who served in World War II with two fellow Tuskegee pilots in 1949. A year
learned to fly at Tuskegee, Alabama, later, postwar budget cuts forced thousands of
the only U.S. military airfield that officers, including Stewart, out of the Air Force.
trained black cadets. Just 10 of the He earned his commercial pilot’s license on the
famed Tuskegee Airmen remain GI Bill and applied to fly for Pan American and
today, and retired Lt. Col. Harry T. Trans World Airlines. They rejected him. They
Stewart, Jr., who turned 95 last Inde- didn’t hire black pilots then.
pendence Day, is one of them.
Growing up in Queens, New York, Stewart The loss of his wings and dignity seeped in.
would wander over to a nearby airfield to admire But Stewart had a history of overcoming obsta-
the mammoth aluminum birds and fantasize cles. He applied to New York University and
about flying. He would finally realize his dream earned a degree in mechanical engineering. He
in 1944, when he began escorting American found employment and success as an engineer,
bombers to their targets across Europe. traveling around North America, the Far East,
During one such mission on Easter Sunday and Europe. His last job took him to Michigan,
1945, Stewart and six squadron mates were flying where he rose through the ranks at one of the
5,000 feet above Nazi-occupied Austria when nation’s largest natural gas pipeline companies
suddenly they found themselves outnumbered and retired as a vice president.
by Luftwaffe planes. Deadly dogfights ensued,
Stewart squeezing off burst after burst from his In 2018 Stewart traveled to Austria for the first
P-51 Mustang’s six .50-caliber machine guns. time since the war, this time as a guest of the
Landing back at his base in Italy, he was greeted Austrian government. Researchers investigating
with fanfare and credited with the fate of downed Allied pilots had determined
downing three enemy aircraft—a that Stewart’s squadron mate Walter Manning,
feat for which he was awarded the the one who had bailed out during the bloody
Distinguished Flying Cross. Easter mission, had been captured alive.
But the rookie fighter pilot was
thinking of three fellow aviators While awaiting transfer to a prisoner of war
shot down in the battle. One died camp, the 24-year-old had been lynched by a
instantly, one managed to crash- mob incited by racist Nazi propaganda. Exactly
land in Yugoslavia, and one bailed 73 years later, Stewart and his daughter looked
out, his body reportedly discov- on as Austrian dignitaries apologized for the
ered in Austria after the country atrocity and dedicated a memorial.
was liberated from the Nazis two
weeks later. Stewart says he never expected to see the Tus-
After the war Stewart stayed in kegee Airmen acknowledged in museums and
the Air Force—President Harry memorials, and written into history books and
Truman mandated racial integra- Hollywood films. His hope for their legacy? “I
tion of the military in 1948—and just want them to be remembered as good citi-
zens—good Americans who felt duty-bound to
join in protecting their country during times of
need, even in the face of discrimination.”

—Katie Sanders

T H E L A S T V O I C E S O F W O R L D W A R I I 67

FINLAND EASTERN KARELIA

Co-belligerent with Axis, (FINLAND)

BREAKING THE AXIS fought only Soviet Union
Siege of Leningrad
January 1942: Europe is in Hitler’s grasp, Leningrad SEPT. 8, 1941–JAN. 27, 1944
but the Allies are striking back. They’re NORWAY (St. Petersburg)
pushing Axis forces out of North Africa Oslo
while Soviet armies are fighting fierce Helsinki
battles of attrition in the east. The
largest amphibious invasion in history, Stockholm Reval
on the shores of Normandy in 1944, (Tallinn) SEPT. 22, 1944
opens a new western front. ESTONIA

SWEDEN OCT. 13, 1944

Riga LATVIA

North

Sea Siege of Königsberg SEPT. 25, 1943
JAN. 25–APR. 9, 1945 Smolensk
UNITED DENMARK

KINGDOM Copenhagen LITHUANIA SOV
Kaunas
IRELAND
Dublin AUG. 1, 1944

Battle of the Atlantic OPERATION Danzig E. PRUSSIA Minsk
MARKET GARDEN (Gdańsk) (GER.)
SEPT. 3, 1939–MAY 8, 1945 JULY 3, 1944
SEPT. 17–25, 1944 Hamburg MAR. 30, 1945
.....-.---OPERATION BAGRATION Ku
MAY 3, 1945 Fall of Berlin
JUN. 19–AUG. 19, 1944 JULY 5–23,
NETH. APR. 16–MAY 2, 1945
Battle of Britain JAN. 17, 1945 Kha
--Axis dominance, January 1942
Axis country or JULY 10–OCT. 31, 1940
occupied territory
Axis ally or dependency London Amsterdam Warsaw Pinsk OCT. 20–2
Allied country London Blitz MAY 12–2
Allied-held area Elbe Berlin JULY 14, 1944 FEB. 19–MAR. 1
Neutral country .-----P O L A N D
SEPT. 7, 1940–MAY 11, 1941 Rhine Torgau Kiev Dnieper
ine
OPERATION English Channel BELGIUM APR. 25, 1945–U.S. NOV. 6, 1943 AUG. 26–DEC. 2
Brussels AND SOVIET FORCES MEET
Dresden

OVERLORD SEPT. 3, 1944 GERMANY SLOVAKIA Lvov JULY 27, 1944 Dnipro
JUNE 6–AUG. 30, 1944
Se The Bulge Prague OC

NORMANDY DEC. 16, 1944–JAN. 25, 1945

LUX. CARPATHO-
RUTHENIA
Extermination camp Paris

Allied war efforts FRANCE Munich DanubBeratislava Budapest FEB. 13, 1945 APR. 10, 19
Major battle Loire Vienna HUNGARY
APR. 30, 1945 APR. 13, 1945 Odessa
•• Allied naval victory Vichy ROMANIA Se
Allied offensive advance Bern LIECH.
•Istanbu
SWITZ. P S

Bordeaux Lyon L APR. 29, 1945 Trieste OCT. 20, Bucharest
1944
SEPT. 3, 1944 ATurin Milan MAY 3, 1945 AUG. 31, 1944
Po Belgrade
VICHY FRANCE Danube
SERBIA
CROATIA (GER.) BULGARIA
Sofia
Toulouse SAN YUGOSLAVIA

ANDORRA •AUG. 28, 1944 MONACO MARINO DALMATIA MONTENEGRO
Marseille (ITALY) (ITALY)
ATLANTIC
OCEAN I TA LY

PORTUGAL OPERATION Corsica Monte Cassino
DRAGOON (VICHY FR.)
*Lisbon JAN. 24–MAY 18, 1944
AUG. 15–SEPT. 14, 1944
Rome
Madrid OCT. 4, 1943 JUNE 4, 1944

* Anzio ALBANIA ..Salonika
JAN. 22–JUNE 5, 1944 Naples
S PA I N (ITALY) (Thessaloníki)

Sardinia ITALIAN GREECE 4
CAMPAIGN
SEPT. 18, 1943 (GER., IT., BULG.)

JULY 9, 1943–MAY 7, 1945 Taranto ...- -l

Mediterranean OPERATION Messina NOV. 11, 1940 . ..Athens

from (Tanger) Tangier GIBRALTAR (U.K.) Sea HUSKY Palermo •Cape Matapan .,
U.S. (International Zone) SPANISH MOROCCO MAR. 27–29, 1941
JULY 9–AUG. 17, 1943 I

Ops. Vulcan and Strike Sicily

~· Tetuán (SPAIN) Algiers APR. 22–MAY 12, 1943 DODECAN
(Tétouan) (ITALY)
from •Constantine MAY 7, 1943 Crete ~
U.K.
Oran Tunis MAY 20–JUN. 1, 1941

Port Lyautey (Kenitra) TUNISIA MALTA
(U.K.)
Rabat (VICHY FR.) Crete M e d i

Casablanca OPERATION ALGERIA Kasserine Pass Siege of Malta

NOV. 11, 1942 TORCH (VICHY FR.) FEB. 19–25, 1943 JUNE 11, 1940–NOV. 20, 1942

Safi NOV. 8–16, 1942 El Guettar Mareth Line WESTERN DESERT
CAMPAIGN
FRENCH MOROCCO MAR. 23–APR. 3, 1943 MAR. 16–31, 1943 Gazala First El A
JUNE 11, 1940–FEB. 4, 1943
(VICHY FR.) A F R ICA MAY 26–JUNE 21, 1942 JULY
NOV. 20, 1942
250 mi Medenine Tripoli Second El A
Benghazi
250 km TUNISIAN MAR. 6, 1943 JAN. 23, OCT. 23–NO
CAMPAIGN 1943
Boundaries shown as
of September 1939 NOV. 17, 1942–MAY 13, 1943

Front line CYRENAICA Fron
JAN. 1, 1942 NOV. 1
LIBYA

(ITALY)

MATTHEW W. CHWASTYK, NGM STAFF
SOURCES: CRAIG L. SYMONDS, U.S. NAVAL WAR COLLEGE;
NICK REYNOLDS, ARMY HISTORICAL FOUNDATION

Allies’ relentless bombing DEATHS IN THE EUROPEAN THEATER ••• Civilians
Axis military
Britain’s Royal Air Force strikes Europe lost an estimated 43 Allied military
German cities by night, while million people. Countries that
the U.S. Army Air Force attacks suffered more than 50,000
industrial targets by day. The deaths are shown below.
firebombing of Dresden kills 6.03 M
some 25,000 civilians. 123 k

Moscow Hitler’s hate-fueled tactics POLAND 6.15 M

Eastern Front Hitler conducts Operation
JAN. 1, 1942 Barbarossa—the invasion of the
Soviet Union—with utmost bru-
tality. Over half the 5.7 million 8.66 M 294 k
Soviet POWs die in captivity.
VIET UNION 280 k 67k HUNGARY 430 k
Stalingrad ITALY 440 k
ursk Voronezh (Volgograd) INDIA 42 k

, 1943 Don Stalingrad FINLAND 84 k

arkov AUG. 23 1942–FEB. 2 1943 UNITED KINGDOM 490 k
a k
24, 1941 Volga U.S.
28, 1942 170 309 k
17, 1943 k

350

ROMANIA
820 k
397 k
16.9 M
23, 1943 Caspian
Rostov Se SOVIET UNION 25.56 M 305 k
opetrovsk 29420k0 k
Eastern Front after 325 k 200k NETHERLANDS
CT. 25, 1943 German offensive 208 k
toward Caucasus
Sea of GREECE 342 k
Azov NOV. 24, 1942

944 Caucasus Mountains

a
Crimea

vastopol YUGOSLAVIA CZECHOSLOVAKIA 540 k
Siege of Sevastopol 1.50 M BRITISH
COMMONWEALTH 55 k
OCT. 30, 1941–JULY 4, 1942
BELGIUM 85 k
Black Sea

IRAN 3.5 M

(Occupied by 3502k50 k FRANCE 603 k

U.K. and Soviet

Union)

ul Ankara

* A S I A GERMANY 5.10 M 1.6 M

TURKEY

SYRIA IRAQ THE TOLL

(Free France) (Occupied by More than 66 million civilians and fighters died

LEBANON U.K.)
(Free France)
NESE CYPRUS
(U.K.)

terranean SAUDI
ARABIA
Sea PALESTINE TRANSJORDAN
(U.K. mandate) (U.K. mandate)

Alamein •Alexandria Battle for Africa

Y 1–27, 1942 Along the North African
coasts, Axis and Allied forces
Alamein fight highly mobile battles
from September 1940 until
OV. 11, 1942 May 1943. The Allies’ depend-
able supply chain helps
Cairo secure their victory.
Alam el Halfa
nt line
0, 1942 AUG. 30–SEPT. 5, 1942

EGYPT
(U.K. protectorate)

ROOTS OF VIOLENCE WAR OF CONQUEST DESPOT OR TYRANT RELIGIOUS CONFLICT COLLAPSED STATE COLONIAL EXPLOITATION

Brutal events often have The primary objective of a country A corrupt ruler uses absolute Religious motivations are often a Disputes and mass disorder lead to Lives are lost as a region has its
myriad, overlapping causes. or nation is to gain control of other power to advance personal aims key driver, one that typically results government collapse; regions are resources, and often its people,
Here, up to three drivers of countries for territorial expansion. through oppressive means. in larger acts of violence. divided among warlords. extracted by an external entity.
violence (organized by color)
have been selected for each
incident depicted below.

MEDIEVAL AGE 476–1450

Guns, gunpowder, and artillery transformed warfare by the 1300s.

The “gunpowder age” began in East Asia and spread to Europe,

drastically changing military technology and political structures.

72 48
67

13. An Lushan Rebellion 13 M 59 62 49
(755-763) 37

55 30. 29. 17. Fall of the Yuan 98 26.
Crusades 3 M Hundred Years’ Dynasty 7.5 M 82 Napoleonic
8. Mideast Slave Trade 18.5 M (1340-1370) Wars 4 M
(7th-19th centuries) (1095-1291) War 3.5 M (1792-1815)
Demand for labor escalated (1337-1453) 9. Timur 17 M
the slave trade along Africa’s (1370-1405)
14. Xin Dynasty 10 M east coast and in the Sahara. 5. Fall of the Ming Dynasty 25 M
(9-24) The last of the Mongol (1635-1662)
conquerors violently
swept through Central
Asia, killing millions.

25. Three 2. Genghis Khan 40 M A cultural peak of Chinese
(1206-1227) civilization, this dynasty was also
19. Decline Kingdoms beset by corruption and lawlessness,
The charismatic leader united opening China to conquest by
and Fall of the of China 4.1 M Mongol tribes of nomadic neighboring Manchu.
horsemen and brutally
Western Roman (189-280) conquered nations all across
Central Asia, founding the
Empire 7 M 71 46 28. Mongol Empire in 1206.
(395-476) It’s estimated that over
Gladiatorial 10 percent of the world’s
population was annihilated.
40 83 47 Games 3.5 M
(264 B.C.-
84
58 94 A.D. 435) 61 10. Atlantic Slave Trade 16 M
96 (1452-1807)
97 11. Conquest of
Deaths occurred in Africa, at the Americas 15 M
(beginning 1492)

ANCIENT WORLD 500 B.C.–A.D. 476 sea, and during the slaves’ 45
first year in the Americas.

Wealth was agricultural or took the form of tangible goods, making 18. Thirty Years’ War 7.5 M 22. The Time 54
war an efficient way to acquire resources. War could drain agrarian (1618-1648) of Troubles 5 M 73
workforces and hamper cultivation, causing massive death tolls. (1598-1613)

31.
French Wars
of Religion 3 M
(1562-1598)

INDEX OF THE ATROCITIES (with deaths under 2.5 million) RENAISSANCE AND EXPLORATION 1450–1650
Incidents with the same estimated death toll are listed in order by date of occurrence.
Advanced shipbuilding techniques and the creation of large
36. Expulsion of Germans from Eastern 53. Rwandan Genocide 0.94 M (1994) standing armies contributed to western Europe’s rise as a
Europe 2.1 M (1945-1947) 54. Burma-Siam Wars 0.9 M (1550-1605) world power as it sought fortune in the New World.
37. Fang La Rebellion 2 M (1120-1122) 55. Hulagu Khan's campaign 0.8 M (1255-1260)
38. Mengistu Haile 2 M (1974-1991) 56. Mozambican Civil War 0.8 M (1975-1992) 71. Alexander the Great 0.5 M (336 B.C.-325 B.C.) 81. War of the Triple Alliance 0.48 M (1864-1870) 91. Great Northern War 0.37 M (1700-1721)
39. Democratic Kampuchea 1.67 M (1975-1979) 57. French conquest of Algeria 0.78 M (1830-1847) 72. Bahmani-Vijayanagara War 0.5 M (1366) 82. Franco-Prussian War 0.43 M (1870-1871) 92. Cuban Revolution 0.36 M (1895-1898)
40. Age of Warring States 1.5 M (475 B.C.-221 B.C.) 58. Second Punic War 0.77 M (218 B.C.-202 B.C.) 73. Russo-Tatar War 0.5 M (1570-1572) 83. First Punic War 0.4 M (264 B.C.-241 B.C.) 93. Spanish Civil War 0.36 M (1936-1939)
41. Seven Years War 1.5 M (1756-1763) 59. Justinian’s Western Wars 0.75 M (527-565) 74. War of the Austrian Succession 0.5 M (1740-1748) 84. Third Mithridatic War 0.4 M (73 B.C.-63 B.C.) 94. Roman-Jewish Wars 0.35 M (66-74, 132-135)
42. Shaka 1.5 M (1816-1828) 60. Italo-Ethiopian War 0.75 M (1935-1941) 75. Russo-Turkish War 0.5 M (1877-1878) 85. Cromwell's invasion of lreland 0.4 M (1649-1652) 95. Sanctions against Iraq 0.35 M (1990-2003)
43. Bangladesh Genocide 1.5 M (1971) 61. Gallic War 0.7 M (58 B.C.-51 B.C.) 76. Partition of lndia 0.5 M (1947) 86. Haitian Slave Revolt 0.4 M (1791-1803) 96. Second Persian War 0.3 M (480 B.C.-479 B.C.)
44. Soviet-Afghan War 1.5 M (1979-1992) 62. Chinese conquest of Vietnam 0.7 M (1407-1428) 77. Indonesian Purge 0.5 M** (1965-1966) 87. Mexican War of Independence 0.4 M (1810-1821) 97. War of the Allies 0.3 M (91 B.C.-88 B.C.)
45. Aztec human sacrifice 1.2 M (1440-1521) 63. War of the Spanish Succession 0.7 M (1701-1713) 78. Angolan Civil War 0.5 M (1975-1994) 88. Greco-Turkish War 0.4 M (1919-1922) 98. Crimean War 0.3 M (1854-1856)
46. Qin Shi Huang Di 1 M (221 B.C.-210 B.C.) 64. Iran-Iraq War 0.7 M (1980-1988) 79. Ugandan Bush War 0.5 M (1979-1986) 89. French Indochina War 0.39 M (1945-1954) 99. Idi Amin 0.3 M (1971-1979)
47. Roman slave wars 1 M (134 B.C.-71 B.C.) 65. American Civil War 0.69 M (1861-1865) 80. Somalian chaos 0.5 M (1991-today) 90. Great Turkish War 0.38 M (1682-1699) 100. Saddam Hussein 0.3 M (1979-2003)
48. Maya Collapse 1 M (790-909) 66. Hui Rebellion 0.64 M (1862-1873)
49. Albigensian Crusade 1 M (1208-1229) 67. Goguryeo-Sui Wars 0.6 M (598, 612)
50. Panthay Rebellion 1 M (1855-1873) 68. Sino-Dzungar War 0.6 M (1755-1757)
51. Mexican Revolution 1 M (1910-1920) 69. Algerian War 0.52 M (1954-1962)
52. Biafran War 1 M (1966-1970) 70. Syrian Civil War 0.51 M* (2011-today)

-COLONIAL REVOLT HUMAN SACRIFICE -DYNASTIC DISPUTE -WAR OF DOMINATION -ETHNIC CLEANSING -INTERNAL CLASH

Civil insurrections and rebellions Ritualized killing is performed as Two or more individuals vie over Fights for dominance among nations A dominant group executes Fighting inside a country ignites,
are undertaken to overthrow an offering for the maintenance of their right to become the successor transform the power structure of an varying forms of violence or forced often over ethnic, religious,
colonial control. societal and spiritual order. to the throne in a monarchy. international system. removal on other ethnic groups. linguistic, or political differences.

RISE OF NATION-STATES AND COLONIALISM 1650–1914 PEAKS OF Diamond
BRUTALITY size shows
In an era of industrial development and the rise of nation-states, it scale of deaths
was Europeans, predominantly the British with their strong army and
navy, who were able to expand their political control across the globe. 1. World War II 66 M
(1939-1945)

68 81 42 91 32. Peter Rank out Date Estimated
66 the Great 3 M of 100 in deaths in
65 86 87 57 75 (1682-1725) death tolls millions

6. Taiping 85 90 41 21. Mahdi Revolt 5.5 M This rendering of history’s most lethal periods highlights the
63 92 (1881-1898) 100 deadliest events of the past 2,500 years, based on work by
50 researcher and author Matthew White. In 1945 WWII became
the bloodiest war in recorded history. Death tolls, especially those
74 23. Aurangzeb 4.6 M further back in time, are best estimates. Statistics can’t fully reflect
(1658-1707) the devastation and suffering of war. But they illustrate how
humankind has been prone to surges of violence throughout
Rebellion 20 M the ages, motivated by many of the same timeless drivers.

(1850-1864) 1. World War II 66 M

15. Congo Free State 10 M (1939-1945)

(1885-1908) Main drivers of violence—the

conquest of Europe, the tyranny of

Adolf Hitler, and ethnic cleansing

4. Famines in British India 27 M horrors of the Holocaust— MEDIEVAL RISE OF NATION-
(1769-1770, 1876-1879, 1896-1900) combined in deadly unison to AGE STATES AND
result in the most destructive war COLONIALISM
476–1450
1650–1914
Repeated droughts and famines in recorded human history. Nearly

were intensified by laissez-faire 70 percent of those killed were

economics and colonial exploitation civilians; in World War I, military ANCIENT RENAISSANCE MODERN
WORLD AND AGE OF AGE
by the British government. deaths far outnumbered those of EXPLORATION
500 B.C.–A.D. 476 1914–today
noncombatants. 1450–1650

3. Mao Zedong 40 M The Holocaust 7. Joseph Stalin 20 M ALBERTO LUCAS LÓPEZ AND
(1949-1976) killed six million (1928-1953) KAYA LEE BERNE, NGM STAFF
The Communist regime Jews and several
tried to remake the oldest Punitive famine SOURCES: MATTHEW WHITE,
and largest society on million other accounted for at least THE GREAT BIG BOOK OF
Earth. Millions died in minorities. six million deaths. HORRIBLE THINGS; BEN
political purges, and tens Over four million died KIERNAN, YALE UNIVERSITY;
of millions died in famines in forced labor camps. PETER BRECKE, GEORGIA
caused by mismanaged INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
agricultural reforms. 16. Russian Civil War 9 M 12. World War I 15 M
24. Vietnam 88 (1918-1920) 36 (1914-1918)
39 War 4.2 M 51
(1959-1975) 89 76 About a million
60 53 79 Armenian Christians
27. 35. Sudan 33. North
Second Congo War 2.6 M 80 Korea 3 M were killed by the
(since 1955) (since 1948) Young Turk regime.
War 3.8 M
(1998-2002) 52 38

56 99 20. Chinese Civil War 7 M
(1927-1937, 1945-1949)
100 64 77 34. Korean
69 78 War 3 M
(1950-1953) 43

MODERN AGE 1914–today 44 93
95 70
After some of the largest battles of all time, a rise in smaller
*NOT INCLUDED IN ORIGINAL conflicts played out by paramilitary groups using guerrilla and
SOURCE DATA counterinsurgency tactics ensues. Information becomes a weapon.
**DEATH TOLL UPDATED WITH
MOST RECENT ESTIMATE

SI

DEATHS IN THE PACIFIC THEATER SOVI

1,000 (1 k) dead The Pacific region lost an esti- TANNU
10,000 (10 k) mated 23 million people. Coun- TUVA
100,000 (100 k) tries that suffered more than
1,000,000 (1 M) 50,000 deaths are shown below. Soviets defeat the
Japanese, ending efforts
SOURCE: MATTHEW WHITE,
NECROMETRICS PROJECT to capture SIberia.

OUTER Khalkhin-G
MONGOLIA
MAY 11–SEPT. 16, 1

China ravaged

Chiang Kai-shek’s nationalist Beijing
forces extend a truce with Mao
JULY 11–AUG. 8, 1937

Zedong’s Communist troops to Hostilities commence Peking
between China (Beijing
combat Japanese invaders. The and Japan.
brutal fighting kills as many as

18 million Chinese civilians.

DUTCH EAST INDIES 4 M Tai’erzhuang

TIBET MAR. 23–APR. 7, 1938

2.57 M 1.76 M CHINA
240 k
NEPA L BHUTAN (Nanjing) Nanking Sh
(U.K.)
Over 200,000 AU
Chungking Civilians massacred
8M (Chongqing)
DEC. 1937–JAN. 1938
Changsha
JAPAN 3.24 M INDIA Kohima
SEPT. 14–OCT. 13, 1939
(U.K.) APR. 4–JUNE 22, 1944 SEPT. 29–OCT. 6, 1941
DEC. 31, 1941–JAN. 4, 1942
UNITED STATES 96 k Imphal Occupied after
JUNE 5–18, 1944 August 1942
PHILIPPINES 127 k MAR. 8–JULY 3, 1944
KOREA APR. 1–J
400 k
CHINA 10 M Mandalay
FRENCH INDOCHINA
2M JAN. 14–MAR. 28, 1945 Hanoi Hong Kong Formo
(Taiwan
BURMA DEC. 8–25, 1941
(JAPAN
(U.K.)

Rangoon Luzon L
(Yangon) Hainan JAN. 9–AUG. 15, 1945

UNITED KINGDOM 6 k SIAM FRENCH Sea O
INDOCHINA Bataan
SOVIET UNION 8 k (THAILAND) C PHILIP
(FR.) hinaDEC. 1941–MAY 1942
BRITISH 51 k Bangkok (U.S.)
COMMONWEALTH Vichy France Manila
INDIA 3.07 M 3M granted Japan Leyte Gulf
access in 1940. (Sibuyan Sea)

Andaman

Sea OCT. 24, 1944 Leyte

u OCT. 17–DEC. 26, 1944
th
U.S. 9 k Malay
(Merchant Marine,
Peninsula o Minda
globally)
S Sandakan
BRUNEI
MALAY Destruction of (U.K.) N. BORNEO (U.K.)
British Force Z Celebes
STATES Sea
(U.K.) DEC. 10, 1941

Kuala Lumpur SARAWAK

•Sumatra Singapore (U.K.)

FEB. 8–15, 1942 Kuching

Borneo

OF WAR GREATER SUNDA ISLANDS

in recorded history’s bloodiest conflict. DUTCH EAST IN

BY ALBERTO LUCAS LÓPEZ, MATTHEW W. CHWASTYK, A N D KAYA LEE BERNE Java Sea (NETHERLANDS)

l..... _
LI ....MSunda Strait FEB. 27, 1942
IT
OF FEB. 28, 1942 Batavia Java ..f
JAAuPgA. 6N,E19S4E2OC(JCakUaPrtAa)T ION

INDIAN OCEAN

MATTHEW W. CHWASTYK, NGM STAFF
SOURCES: CRAIG L. SYMONDS, U.S. NAVAL WAR COLLEGE;
NICK REYNOLDS, ARMY HISTORICAL FOUNDATION

BERIA ALASKA
(U.S.)
ET UNION
Bering Sea UNITED
The Soviet Union declares war on
August 8, 1945, and launches a Sea of Komandorski rI s l a n d s DEFEATING JAPAN STATES
massive invasion of Manchuria. Okhotsk
'• •MAR. 26, 1943 August 1942: Japanese forces dominate
Sakhalin Attu Aleutian land and sea, from eastern China to the
MAY 11–30, 1943 Kiska Solomon Islands. But Allied forces led
by the U.S. are about to mount a two-
Gol Changkufeng Hokkaido Route of • pronged strategy to dislodge them. Naval,
Incident land, and air forces under Gen. Douglas
1939 .. Pearl Harbor .. MacArthur and Adm. William Halsey
JULY 29–AUG. 11, 1938 attack fleet concentrate on the eastern and South
MANCHUKUO Pacific, while Adm. Chester Nimitz retakes
(MANCHURIA) Vladivostok islands in the central Pacific. The British

(JAPAN) ..fight back the Japanese in Burma.

Hsinking
(Changchun)

g) Sea of Japan

Yellow CHOSEN (East Sea)
Sea (KOREA)

(JAPAN) JAPAN

Keijo Honshu
(Seoul)

Tokyo Atomic inferno Japan loses four
Hiroshima aircraft carriers,
On August 6, 1945, the U.S.
hanghai Nagasaki Doolittle Raid drops an atomic bomb on changing the
Kyushu Hiroshima, then one on course of the war.
UG. 13–NOV. 26, 1937 APR. 18, 1942 Nagasaki three days later.
Nearly 200,000 people are •Midway
East Carrier-launched B-25 killed, up to 80,000 of them
bombers attack Tokyo instantly. Japan surrenders JUNE 3–6, 1942
China yukyu Is. on August 15, 1945.
and other cities. • Midway Is.
(U.S.)
Sea . ...O C E A N
Okinawa R Iwo Jima PA C I F I C Honolulu

. . . .JUNE 22, 1945 FEB. 19–MAR. 26, 1945 NORTH TROPIC OF CANCER

sa - . I•Kazan Retto • Marcus I.
n) (JAPAN)
(Volcano Is.)
N)

Leyte Gulf (Cape Engaño) Mariana Wake I. LIMIT OF JAPANESE Pearl Harbor HAWAII
OCCUPATION
OCT. 25, 1944 Islands (U.S.) DEC. 7, 1941 (U.S.)

Philippine Sea (JAPAN) Island assaults Aug. 6, 1942 Day of Infamy

PPINES Saipan U.S. strategy is to attack Japa- The Japanese surprise attack
Philippine Sea on December 7, 1941, at Pearl
JUNE 15–JULY 9, 1944 nese island garrisons, landing Harbor kills 2,403 Americans,
•JUNE 19–20, 1944 damages or sinks 21 warships,
Guam troops backed by heavy air and and destroys 169 aircraft. The
United States declares war
JULY 21–AUG. 10, 1944 naval support. Bypassed island the next day.

Leyte Gulf (Off Samar) Tinian bases are isolated to “wither on Japanese dominance, August 1942
Japanese territory,
OCT. 25, 1944 JULY 24–AUG. 1, 1944 - ~Eniwetok the vine,” according to General
MacArthur’s strategy. • ally, or puppet country
Leyte Gulf Japanese-occupied territory
(Surigao Strait) JAPANESE SOUTH ·~·----- - •Kwajalein
• Allied country
nao OCT. 24–25, 1944 SEAS ISLANDS JAN. 31–FEB. 4, 1944 • Allied-held territory
• Neutral country
•Peleliu Palau Is. (JAPAN) Marshall
Allied war efforts
SEPT. 15– L Truk (Chuuk) - - - - Islands Major land battle

Operation Hailstone (JAPAN) • Allied naval victory
• Japanese naval victory
NOV. 27, 1944 C a r o l i n e I s.
-• Allied offensive advance
FEB. 17–18, 1944
500 mi
Morotai Makin 500 km

NDIES Biak Cape St. George •Tarawa Gilbert EQUATOR Boundaries shown as of September 1939
Islands
Díli MAY 27–AUG. 17, 1944 NOV. 25, 1943 NOV. 20–28, 1943
PORTUGUESE TIMOR (U.K.)
Bismarck Sea Empress Augusta Bay

MAR. 2–4, 1943 NOV. 1–2, 1943

Aitape Vella Lavella
JULY 11–AUG. 10, 1944 N.E.
New Guinea NEW GUINEA OCT. 6–7, 1943

(AUS.) Kula Gulf; Kolombangara
PA P U A
JULY 5–6, 1943; JULY 12–13, 1943
(AUS.)
SOLOMON ISLANDS
Buna-Gona
(U.K.) Sea battles near Guadalcanal
NOV. 16, 1942–JAN. 22, 1943 Savo Island AUG. 8–9, 1942
Guadalcanal
Port Moresby AUG. 7, 1942–FEB. 9, 1943 •Eastern Solomons AUG. 23, 1942
•Cape Esperance OCT. 11–12, 1942
Darwin • ·~>VellaGulf Santa Cruz Is. •Guadalcanal NOV. 12–15, 1942
AUG. 6–7, 1943 ••Tassafaronga NOV. 30–DEC. 1, 1942
Coral Sea OCT. 26–27, 1942

MAY 4–8, 1942 ....NEW HEBRIDES

, ..•(U.K.&FR.) SOUTH ,.P A C I F I C OCEAN

Cairns Coral Vila • FIJI
Sea (U.K.)
AUSTRALIA •

‘You were an old man if you were still there at 23.

If we let it bother us,

it would destroy us. You just had to go on.’

G rammy-winning producer, play- sent the night’s load parachuting out. Back in
wright, and actor Eugene Polinsky England, officers waited and hoped the num-
flew clandestine missions over Nazi- ber of crews that took off the previous night
occupied Belgium, France, and would match the number that landed before
Norway during the war. Instead of the sun rose. But 42 Carpetbagger planes never
unleashing bombs, his eight-man returned, and 21 more were mangled beyond
American crew dropped Allied repair. More than 200 of Polinsky’s fellow air-
agents, weapons, motorbikes, cash, men ended up missing, imprisoned, or killed
and other vital supplies to resistance in combat. “You saw the 18- and 19-year-olds
fighters as part of a mission called Operation come in as replacements,” Polinsky recalls. “You
Carpetbagger. “I didn’t know what I was doing were an old man if you were still there at 23. If
then,” says Polinsky, now 99. “I didn’t know what we let it bother us, it would destroy us. You had
I was carrying. I would have been terrified!” to just go on.”
The Carpetbaggers were the air arm of the
Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the U.S. intel- In August 1944, after a successful drop over
ligence agency that ran espionage and sabotage Belgium, Polinsky’s crew returned from their
operations. Between 1944 and 1945 the Carpet- 35th mission—the magic number for a ticket
baggers dropped more than 500 agents and home. Their final orders were to “forget every-
some 5,000 tons of supplies into hostile territory. thing.” And so he did for many years.
They flew late and low, so low that the planes’
bellies snagged tree branches. “They told us, ‘If Then, in 2001, Polinsky received a mysterious
you’re shot down, if they capture you, you’ll be invitation to a reception in Belgium celebrating
shot as a spy,’” Polinsky says. “‘So don’t get shot a new book about an elaborate Allied operation
down.’ Great advice.” to liberate the Port of Antwerp in 1944. Polinsky
Born in Manhattan on September 11, 1920, never knew he had played
Polinsky was the son of Russian Jewish immi- an important part in the
grants. When he arrived in England for duty with mission until his host,
the Eighth Air Force, his crew was assigned to the former head of the
stripped-down B-24 Liberators, painted black Belgian resistance, told
to blend into the night. Hours before a mission, him the story. “We were
the ground crew loaded supply containers into friends all these years,”
the plane’s bomb bay. Just before takeoff, agents he said. “Only you were
known to the airmen only as “Joes” and “Jose- up in the air, and I was
phines” sometimes slipped aboard. down on the ground.”
As navigator, Polinsky squatted on a gun case
toward the nose of the cramped, freezing Lib- “You want your whole
erator, directing the pilot to the target. When life to do something,” the
they neared the drop zone, the pilot dipped veteran says. “To find out
down as low as 300 feet, and upon spotting that you did it when you
signal lights from Allies below, the dispatcher were just a kid and you
didn’t know it, well—
that’s a strange feeling.”

—Katie Sanders

78 N AT I O N A L G E O G R A P H I C COURTESY EUGENE POLINSKY (DIGITIZED BY PAST PRESENT PIX)

EUGENE
POLINSKY

U.S. navigator

“Most of our opera-
tion was not to get
noticed,” says deco-
rated airman Eugene
Polinsky, who deliv-
ered spies and supplies
behind enemy lines for
the OSS, forerunner of
the CIA. Polinsky (top
row, second from left in
wartime photo below)
was navigator aboard a
B-24 Liberator. He’s now

the last surviving
member of his crew.

Between 1944 and 1945 the Carpetbaggers
dropped more than 500 agents and some 5,000

tons of supplies into hostile territory.

ARTHUR
MADDOCKS

British code breaker

IGOR MORSHTEIN ”I SUPPOSE THEY figured VA L E N T I N
if I could understand economic
A N D VA L E N T I N A theory, I could crack code,” says SHORIN
Arthur Maddocks, 98, who was a
L U K YA N OVA top student at Oxford Univer- Leningrad survivor
sity when he was recruited by
Soviet veterans British intelligence. Like Betty HE WAS JUST FIVE when
Webb (page 60), Maddocks was the Nazis began their nearly
THEIR LIVES were inter- posted to Bletchley Park. He was 900-day campaign to starve and
twined by war, the siege of Len- put to work cracking the Lorenz shell Leningrad into submission.
ingrad, and 40 years as friends cipher, the encrypted messag- At first Valentin Shorin’s mother
working in the same factory. But ing system used only by Hitler kept working, and took him to
romance blossomed only after and his most senior generals. kindergarten by trolley each
both were widowed. Valentina Lorenz had two layers of encryp- day. Then the bombing started.
was raised in orphanages; Igor’s tion and millions of possibili- Loudspeakers in the streets
mother died trying to evacuate ties to unravel. But by the time broadcast the air-raid alert, fol-
their famine-ravaged city. One the war was drawing to a close, lowed by a whistling sound and
day Igor and some boys heard a Maddocks and his colleagues— the thunder of collapsing build-
child crying. “We went to look,” assisted by Colossus, the world’s ings. Mother and son were con-
he recalls. “We found a one- first large-scale digital com- stantly hungry, “but I figured it
year-old baby trying to nurse puter—were reading communi- out later—she was giving me her
from his mother lying dead next cations between Nazi leaders rations as well,” Shorin, now 83,
to him.” That, he says, “was the so far in advance that Germa- says. Finally his mother grew too
beginning of our missions. We’d ny’s surrender in May 1945 was weak to walk. He remembers his
go door-to-door to look for something of an anticlimax, aunt pulling her in a rag-filled
orphaned children.” Maddocks says. “We already wooden sled with one hand, and
knew it was over.” —Roff Smith pulling him with the other. They
A drop-off place was orga- reached his kindergarten. “I
nized, and babies were given looked at my mom—it still hurts
the last names of the children to this day. She had these big
who found them. “We didn’t tears running down her face like
think to look for identification streams, and I felt in my soul this
papers,” Igor, 92, says. “We were was the last time I’d see her.” He
boys, 12 to 14. We were not seri- bit his aunt to break away, but
ous, but we felt the need that his mother called out, “Valya,
was there.” By the time they go, go. I’ll get better and come
were old enough to fight, “we pick you up.” Instead, he says,
were malnourished, we didn’t “my kindergarten became my
have the strength to pick up our first orphanage.”
weapons.” The army fed him,
and he eventually helped lib- —Eve Conant
erate Leningrad from the Nazi
stranglehold. Four years ago, he
got a call from a veterans com-
mittee. A woman was looking for
him. “It turns out I had found her
as a baby during the siege and
took her to the baby drop-off.”
She was named after him.

—Eve Conant

80 N AT I O N A L G E O G R A P H I C

HANS-ERDMANN During cold nights the young MALLIE
SCHÖNBECK officer listened to his men curse
Hitler for abandoning them. MELLON
German officer Months earlier, saying such
things would have meant exe- U.S. warplane builder
Hans-Erdmann Schönbeck cution. Now he found himself
survived one of the biggest, silently agreeing. BORN IN A Kentucky farm-
bloodiest battles in history. house, Mallie Osborne Mellon,
He looked Adolf Hitler in the On January 19, 1943, Schön- along with her husband and
eye. He slept a few feet from beck was wounded by an artil- their young son, boarded a bus
the bomb that nearly took the lery blast that punctured his to Detroit in 1943, responding
führer’s life—and escaped the lungs and shattered his shoul- to a radio ad for civilian war
bloody purge that followed. der. A sergeant shoved the jobs. By then more than 300,000
young officer onto a German American women were involved
Now 97, Schönbeck has only bomber. It took off minutes in aircraft production, many by
one explanation: “I have had, later, and Schönbeck became shooting rivets into warplanes
in my life, whole squadrons of one of the few German soldiers in Motor City factories. Mellon
guardian angels looking after to survive Stalingrad. The battle, worked at Briggs Manufacturing,
me. There’s no other way.” one of the largest in history, was burnishing parts for bombers
the start of the Wehrmacht’s col- rolling off the assembly line at
Assigned to a German tank lapse on the Eastern Front, and Henry Ford’s mammoth Willow
regiment in the summer of 1940, of the end for Nazi Germany. Run plant nearby.
Schönbeck says he felt a part of
the world’s best army. For a year Ten months after his unlikely Mellon, now 100, hadn’t heard
his unit rampaged across the escape, the young officer briefly of Rosie the Riveter—the term
Soviet Union. Eight tanks were was assigned to guide Hit- used to describe women who
shot out from under him, and ler’s entourage through the worked in defense plants—until
he was given one field promo- streets of Breslau (now Wrocław, five years ago, when she learned
tion after another. By the time Poland). Schönbeck recalls rush- that she was one. Now she
his tank crested a hill overlook- ing to open the führer’s car attends monthly American Rosie
ing Stalingrad in August 1942, door, snapping to attention, and the Riveter Association gather-
he led an entire tank company. saluting as Hitler emerged. ings. She still has her southern
He wasn’t quite 20 years old. drawl, but Michigan is home,
As he followed Hitler into and the Rosies are family.
The next five months were a a meeting hall, Schönbeck’s
thoughts darkened, thinking of —Katie Sanders
turning point, for Germany and the lives lost in Stalingrad. He
Schönbeck. Hundreds of thou- fingered the pistol at his belt,
sands of German soldiers were then remembered Stalingrad
cut off from their supply lines. again. “I thought, ‘You’ve been
The situation grew desperate in given another chance at life. Do
winter, when night temperatures this and you’ll surely die—and
plunged to lethal lows. they’ll kill your whole family.’ ”

Schönbeck and his men tore He was assigned to an intel-
down houses to burn for heat, ligence unit at a secret base
turning their Russian inhabitants where Hitler had a headquar-
out into the snow. His tanks ters. As Schönbeck was deliver-
out of fuel, his men starving, ing a briefing, his commander
Schönbeck shrank from a strap- asked a strange question. “He
ping young man to a 99-pound said, ‘If something big happens,
shadow. He was overcome by an we can count on you, right?’ ”
unfamiliar emotion: doubt. Schönbeck recalls. He learned
later that his fellow officers were
plotting to assassinate Hitler
and that his bunkmate had hid-
den explosives in their room. But
the Stalingrad survivor kept to
himself. “That’s the thing about
living in a dictatorship,” he says.
“You never knew who to trust.”

When the plot failed, a
bloody purge began. “My room-
mate was one of the first ones
hanged,” Schönbeck says.

After the war, he moved to
Munich and got a job in Ger-
many’s booming postwar auto
industry. He rose through the
ranks, and in the 1980s he was
head of the German Automotive
Industry Association. “I lived, I
made it,” he says. “I wasn’t going
to waste that.” —Andrew Curry

‘We were in striped pajamas, lice infested.
But we were polite, spoke the truth, and
discussed what the world should be like.’

FRED
TERNA

Holocaust survivor
Czechoslovakia

S oon after Fred Terna arrived at JEANNINE
Terezín, a Nazi concentration camp, BURK
in 1943, he began sketching. He drew
triple-level bunk beds, lines of peo- Holocaust survivor
ple awaiting meager food rations, and
the railroad tracks that transported WHEN JEANNINE BURK was
prisoners to Auschwitz. He signed
some sketches with a symbol so they three years old, her father took her
couldn’t be traced back to him. Draw-
ing, he found, was a reminder of his humanity. on a streetcar across Brussels. He
Terna was 16 years old when German troops
marched into Prague, his hometown, in 1939. rang a stranger’s doorbell, kissed his
When American soldiers liberated him six years
later, he says, he was “one of those shuffling daughter goodbye, and left her with
skeletons.” He had been held in four concen-
tration camps and had starved, escaped, been the woman who answered. He would
caught, and frozen nearly to death. He returned
to Prague and learned that no one else in his be arrested by the Gestapo in a
immediate family had survived the war.
Terna married a fellow camp survivor and roundup of Jewish citizens, and later
eventually ended up in New York, where he
became a full-time artist. Now, at 96, he still died in a gas chamber at Auschwitz.
paints and lectures. In the top-floor studio of
his Brooklyn home, he custom blends his own From 1942 to 1944, Burk remained
acrylic paint. “It’s my stab at immortality,” he
says of the medium. Terna’s canvases, thick hidden in the home of the Christian
with texture and fiery scenes, line the hallways.
“We have left a record. My record is visual.” woman. She had food and shelter
Nearly 40 years after the war, Terna discov-
ered someone had saved his drawings from but little else. When Nazis paraded
Terezín and taken them to Israel. “We didn’t
know then that I was actually making histori- nearby, her helper ordered her to
cal documents.” Like the number tattooed on
his arm—114974—they were evidence of what the outhouse. Burk would peek out
happened to him and to the six million Jews
who perished in the Holocaust. “Yes, our fam- through a gap between the boards,
ilies are gone, but their memory is kept alive,”
he says. “It’s my obligation—and, in a way, it’s then retreat into the darkest corner.
now yours—to remind the world.”
—Nina Strochlic In 1944 British soldiers arrived.

Soon after, her mother, back from

hiding in the countryside, came for

her. Burk never saw her helper again.

“I am 80 years old, and I still cry,” says

Burk. “I never had a chance to say

thank you.” —Katie Sanders

T H E L A S T V O I C E S O F W O R L D WA R I I 83

WA LT R AU D
PLESS

Child survivor
Germany

In the lean postwar years, millions of
refugees displaced by the conflict were resented
because they were extra mouths to feed.

‘They discriminated against us, cursed at us,

just because we were refugees …

I was nine—the war wasn’t my fault.’

E ven as a child, Waltraud Pless couldn’t to the mainland, and there was nothing to eat.
help but see the way many Germans Without electricity or radios, Pless and her
benefited from the Nazi regime. She
didn’t have to look far: Her parents were family were unaware of Germany’s surrender
broke when Hitler rose to power in 1933. until they heard celebratory gunfire from Soviet
Six years later her father was an officer units garrisoned in nearby houses. Constantly
in the Waffen-SS, the Nazi Party’s elite hungry, Pless spent that spring searching for
military division. By the time he went food. One day, she says, she followed a farmer’s
off to fight in the invasion of France, the cart as it bounced along a cobbled road, gath-
family had two cars, a nice house, and a ware- ering spilled potatoes into her skirt. Before she
house full of valuable “secondhand” furniture. knew it, she was alone in a field far from town.
“Where did all his money come from?” Pless “That’s when a Russian soldier grabbed me and
asks. “It’s clear to me now: It could only have raped me,” she says. She was nine years old.
come from Jewish households. No one can tell Pless says she ran home to tell her mother, but
me he didn’t know Jews were persecuted.” her screams were met with silence.
Her father once plopped her in the car for
an errand to the Sachsenhausen concentration That fall the family got word that Pless’s father
camp on the edge of Berlin. “I saw the people had survived the fall of Berlin and was interned
there, how they were living,” she says. Was she by the British in northern Germany. But there
shocked? The impeccably dressed 84-year-old would be no going home: Their village was now
shakes her head and shrugs. “Things like that Polish territory.
were just a given.”
Then, suddenly, they weren’t. In the fall of For the next decade the reunited family strug-
1944, Pless saw the roads around their family’s gled, living first in pig stalls and barns, later
home, more than a hundred miles east of Berlin, crowding into small apartments with other
filling with families fleeing the Soviet army. For families. In the lean postwar years, many Ger-
weeks she slept in her clothes, ready to join the mans resented Pless and the millions of others
river of refugees at any moment. Finally, on a displaced by the conflict as extra mouths to feed.
freezing night in February 1945, the evacuation “They discriminated against us, cursed at us,”
order came. she says, “just because we were refugees.”
“I thought it was temporary,” she recalls. “As
soon as the Russians were defeated, we’d be Seventy-five years later, Pless feels neither
back home. That’s how powerful the [Nazi] pro- anger nor guilt. “There are truly tragic stories
paganda was at the time.” out there. Mine, by comparison, is almost triv-
After weeks on the move, sleeping in strang- ial,” she says. “I was nine—the war wasn’t my
ers’ apartments and railway stations, she and fault. But I’m not a victim either.”
her mother, brother, and sister were shipped to
a peninsula on Germany’s Baltic coast, where Today Pless visits schools in the Hamburg
a tourist destination had plenty of beds. But in area to talk about her wartime experiences,
April the rapidly advancing Soviets cut off access motivated, she says, by concern.

“Look at the world now: People haven’t
learned. It’s horrifying that neo-Nazis are back,
and not just in Germany, in the U.S., in Scandi-
navia. People are still so easily manipulated.”

—Andrew Curry

T H E L A S T V O I C E S O F W O R L D WA R I I 85

WHEN THE
BOMB FELL

More than seven decades after its devastation,
Hiroshima has moved on. But for the
remaining survivors, the horrors of a nuclear attack—
and the lessons of war—remain vivid.

86

By

ted gup

N I N E DAY S A F T E R T H E ATO M I C B O M B was dropped
on Hiroshima, after his parents and year-old brother died and his
home was incinerated, seven-year-old Masaaki Tanabe watched
his father slip away. His last words: “I see no future as an army offi-
cer.” An implacable enemy of America, Tanabe’s father died with
his sword at his side. Tanabe’s grandfather wanted to keep his son’s
sword, but the occupation forces came and wrested it from him.
“Barbarians,” young Tanabe thought. He was determined to take
revenge against America, he says. ¶ Understandable. He had noth-
ing and almost no one left. His home had been next to Hiroshima
Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall, the now iconic building with
the skeletal dome, preserved as an appeal for nuclear forbearance.

Now in his early 80s, Tanabe is a handsome In it she told her grandfather she was sorry if
man, square jawed and silver browed. He is tra- she had disappointed him. As the years passed,
dition personified in his gray jinbei robe with Tanabe, like much of his generation, reconciled
wide sleeves. He’s also resourceful and adaptive. himself to a changed world.
He became a filmmaker and studied computer
graphics so he could construct a cyber version Seventy-five years after the war’s end,
of the city that the bomb had erased. The result: Tanabe’s story is the story of Hiroshima, and of
Message From Hiroshima, a film that includes Japan itself: a mix of tradition and modernity, of
interviews with survivors of the August 6, 1945, a determination never to forget but also a com-
bombing that—along with the atomic bombing mitment not to be defined solely by the past.
of Nagasaki three days later—would kill up to And as with Tanabe, events personal and public
200,000 people, force Japan’s surrender in World have yoked the two former enemies, Japan and
War II, and render unnecessary an Allied inva- America, to a shared future.
sion of Japan that could have killed millions.
Each August 6, the city pays homage to its
Tanabe couldn’t have predicted the wrench- 135,000-plus A-bomb victims, adding more
ing changes that awaited him and Japan. His names to a cenotaph. All other days of the year,
daughter married an American and settled in its focus is decidedly forward. Today Hiroshima
the United States. Tanabe long wrestled with the has a near-messianic zeal as the world’s cham-
idea that she had embraced the enemy. Two or pion of denuclearization, but it’s also a vibrant
three years after the wedding, Tanabe discov- hub for recreation, research, and commerce.
ered a letter his daughter had left at the base of
a stone Buddha in Yamaguchi Prefecture, where A F T E R T H E B O M B F E L L , Hiroshima was full of
her grandfather—Tanabe’s father—had died. miraculous accounts of services restored—
water, electricity, streetcars—and of unheralded

heroes from near and far who helped bring the of urgency about preserving the memories of
city back to life in the years afterward. the survivors—the hibakusha. There are about
47,000 of them in Hiroshima; their average age
Nanao Kamada grew up in the countryside is 82. The city has dispatched hibakusha around
nearly 400 miles from Hiroshima. Until 1955, the world, in person and via the internet, to tell
when he was applying to medical school in the their stories. The Hiroshima Peace Memorial
city, he hadn’t thought much about the atomic Museum has a video library of more than 1,500
bomb. But in Hiroshima he saw people wear- survivors’ tales, some 400 viewable online. Some
ing caps and long sleeves in searing heat, to survivors are even available for video conferenc-
conceal their burns. He would become an ing. Many say that sharing their stories gives
authority on treating A-bomb survivors and more meaning to what they endured.
on radiation research.
F O R S O M E S U RV I VO R S , the unfounded fears of
Today Hiroshima’s problems are those of many other Japanese citizens became more of a bur-
Japanese cities—a declining birth rate, an aging den than the aftereffects of radiation.
population, inadequate hotel capacity for its
more than two million yearly visitors, and aging Shoso Kawamoto was 11 when the bomb fell.
buildings and infrastructure. But there’s a sense He lost his mother, two sisters, and a brother.
His surviving sister died of leukemia at 17.
This panoramic view On the last page is Though orphaned, he was fortunate: Rikiso
of Hiroshima, from U.S. the domed frame of Kawanaka, the owner of a soy sauce business
Army images taken Industrial Promotion in Tomo, a village some seven miles from Hiro-
several weeks after the Hall. It stands today as shima, took him in.
bombing, shows the a symbol of the atomic
scope of the damage. bomb’s devastation. Kawanaka fed and clothed Kawamoto. He also

PHOTO: COURTESY HIROSHIMA PEACE MEMORIAL MUSEUM (10-FRAME
PANORAMA DIGITALLY STITCHED BY ARI BESER)

W H E N T H E B O M B F E L L 89

made him an unusual offer: If the boy agreed and left his village. He never saw Motoko again
to work for 12 years without a salary, Kawanaka and never again allowed himself to love, fear-
would give him a house. Years passed. Kawa- ing more heartache. His life spiraled downward.
moto rose at two in the morning and worked He says he gambled and fell in with gangsters—
until four in the afternoon—all without pay. yakuza. He considered suicide.

When Kawamoto turned 20, he met a woman Eventually he found work in a noodle shop,
named Motoko. She was pretty and easy to talk his opportunities limited by his sixth-grade
to. She was learning to make dresses and kimo- education and his status as a hibakusha, a
nos. They fell in love. modern-day leper to some. At 70, he returned to
Hiroshima and there, finally, found some peace.
When Kawamoto turned 23, Kawanaka made Now 86, he’s a grandfatherly figure in a straw hat
good on his pledge: He gave Kawamoto the and cotton vest, seen reaching into a shopping
promised house. With his own home, Kawa- bag and pulling out origami planes and cranes.
moto felt ready to ask Motoko’s father for per- He gives them to children who visit the Hiro-
mission to marry his daughter. But the father shima Peace Memorial Museum. Pull the tail, he
knew Kawamoto was from Hiroshima. He told says, beaming, and see the wings flap. Printed on
him that any children the marriage might pro- the planes’ wings are the words “Hope for Peace.”
duce could be deformed from radiation (actually,
no health effects have been found in children THERE IS NO UNDOING the discrimination
of Hiroshima survivors). He forbade the union. Kawamoto and other survivors suffered. But
at Hiroshima University’s Research Institute
Kawamoto was shattered. Two days later, with for Radiation Biology and Medicine, director
marriage denied him—as it has been for many Satoshi Tashiro is determined to try to avoid
hibakusha—he quit his job, walked away from
the house for which he had sacrificed so much,

90 N AT I O N A L G E O G R A P H I C

such future discrimination. The institute aims nursing home and funeral expenses.
to improve communication between the media Even now, telling Hiroshima’s story can be
and scientists, so that the public is not swayed
by unwarranted fears. What happened to the contentious. A new exhibit at the peace memo-
hibakusha, he says, also happens to those who rial museum took 16 years to complete, partly
lived near Russia’s Chernobyl nuclear plant and because of disputes among the exhibition com-
Japan’s failed Fukushima reactor. mittee, says Shuichi Kato, the museum’s deputy
director. Some members wanted stark pictures
The Funairi Mutsumien Nursing Home houses of the horrors of nuclear war; others argued for
some hundred bomb survivors. The youngest, more restraint, afraid of traumatizing visitors.
now 74, was in utero at the time of the blast. The (During a recent visit I saw two people collapse.)
oldest is Tsurue Amenomori; she’s 103. When
the bomb went off, she was less than a mile from One debate was over what photo should greet
ground zero, giving her bedridden parents med- visitors to the museum. It was resolved after
icine. She suffered burns on her face, hand, and Tetsunobu Fujii, the son of a survivor, saw a web-
leg. Today she is cheerful and prides herself on site photo of a young girl, her hand bandaged, her
bounding up the nursing home’s stairs. She’s a face bloodied and bruised. He believed it was his
favorite of the staff. mother, Yukiko Fujii. The museum confirmed it
was her, at age 10. The committee unanimously
These survivors’ care falls to the Atomic Bomb chose the photo for the exhibit’s entrance. Her
Survivors Support Division, which has a staff of photo at age 20 is at the exit. (She would die at
32 led by Takeshi Yahata, a son of hibakusha. His 42.) They are iconic images, impossible to forget.
grandfather disposed of corpses after the bomb-
ing; now Yahata’s division helps living survivors— F O R M A N Y who survived the blast, survivor’s
with health care, social services, counseling, and guilt and psychological scars endured. Emiko

Okada, 82, wears a crane medallion around her was cremated, she adds, pieces of glass that had
neck, symbolizing hope and peace. She was eight flown like projectiles that August day reappeared
when the bomb fell. That morning her 12-year- among her ashes and bone fragments.
old sister, Mieko Nakasako, announced she was
going out. She was headed to within half a mile For Okada and others, the horrors replay
of ground zero. I ask Okada whether her sister themselves even today. Okada hates evening
died in the blast. glows, “like the sunset when the sky is orange or
when the sky is really red, because that reminds
“My elder sister is missing,” she says. me of the night of August 6.”
“Missing?” I repeat, wondering what that
means after 75 years. In Hiroshima the young come to terms with
“She has not returned home yet.” There is the city’s past in their own ways. Kanade Naka-
something eerie about the word “yet,” as if Okada hara, 18, studied the bombing in school and in
half-expects Nakasako to suddenly appear at the March 2019 went to Pearl Harbor on a field trip.
door. That lack of resolution haunts Okada. She is determined to work for peace.
Okada was not orphaned, but she may as well
have been. Her parents desperately searched for Others can’t relate to that distant period. Near
their oldest daughter, abandoning Okada, who the Bank of Japan, which survived the blast but
found herself living on the streets, sleeping in was where 42 people were killed, I find 17-year-
an air-raid shelter, eating what she could find old Kenta, an avid computer gamer. He regards
or steal—a discarded tomato, a fallen fig. Only that day as “ancient history” and isn’t sure what
later did her grandmother take her in. year the bomb fell. He guesses 1964.
“My parents lost their minds after the loss of
their daughter,” Okada says. When her mother On the other hand, Haruna Kikuno, 18, shud-
ders at the sound of passing planes—the result,
she says, of reading books about the bomb as
a child.

ON THE FLIGHT from Hiroshima to Tokyo, I intro- of the B-29 Superfortress bombers. It was B-29s
duce myself to the Hiyama family. Theirs too that rained tens of thousands of tons of explo-
is the story of Hiroshima and its implausible sives down on Japan, as well as incendiary
history. The father, 44-year-old Akihiro Hiya- bombs, and ultimately, the atomic bomb that
ma—“Aki”—grew up in Hiroshima, in a family decimated Hiroshima.
of prominent political figures. His grandfather
Sodeshirou Hiyama is honored with a statue for Between flights, Hiyama, Shimer, and I speak
his contributions to Hiroshima’s rebirth. of those war years. Kai listens, trying to make
sense of it all. “Mama,” he asks, “what’s a mush-
Hiyama’s maternal grandmother, Keiko Ochia, room clown?” It falls to Shimer to answer. “Dust
told him that a friend of hers had planned to and debris went up into the sky when the bomb
travel the day Hiroshima was bombed, but went off,” she tells him. “It was something really
fell ill. Rather than see her train ticket go to sad. A lot of people died.”
waste, she gave it to Ochia. Soon after the train
departed, Ochia looked out the window and saw “They are sweet, innocent ears,” she says later.
the mushroom cloud. Her friend did not survive. “I am glad I can be the one to introduce some of
this to him.” But Kai has one more question: “Are
Today Ochia is 91. She married and had a America and Japan still enemies?”
daughter and grandchildren. Grandson Hiyama
now lives in the U.S.—in Norfolk, Virginia. There, “No,” his mother says, “they are friends.” And
in 2005, he met Leah Shimer. They married and with that, the family heads for its gate and the
have two children: son Kai, seven, and daughter long flight home. j
Emi, five, who hugs her stuffed unicorn.
Ted Gup is a former reporter for the
During the war, Shimer’s grandfather Ster- Washington Post and Time. He first wrote
ling Arthur Shimer helped design the engines about Hiroshima’s recovery in the August
1995 issue of National Geographic.

W H E N T H E B O M B F E L L 93

I F WA R M I N G C O N T I N U E S
TO M E LT T H E I C E S H E LV E S

T H AT A R E C RU C I A L TO T H E I R S U RV I VA L ,
EMPEROR PENGUINS WILL BE ...

-

MARCHING TOWARD

J BY HELEN SCALES
PHOTOGRAPHS BY
STEFAN CHRISTMANN

•

J

-

'

EXTINCTION

95

Male emperor penguins
at the Atka Bay colony,
each with an egg balanced
on his feet, huddle to
endure the two-month
polar night. Females, after
mating and laying the
eggs, have returned to
the sea to feed. Huddling
is so tight that the birds
can steam when they
break apart, as if they’d
stepped out of a sauna.

PREVIOUS PHOTO

In the autumn the pen-
guins begin their roughly
six-mile journey from
the ocean to their Atka
Bay breeding grounds.
But the warming climate
is defrosting the sea ice
they need to find mates,
breed, and raise chicks.



Before departing for
the sea, a female assists
her partner in transfer-
ring her egg onto his
feet. The delicate rou-
tine must be quick or
the egg might freeze.
Though she’ll be gone
for about two months,
the couple’s bonds stay
strong, and they will
reunite in August.



FIRST, A BLACK DOT In late July, tiny claws,
APPEARS IN THE an eye, and a clump
DISTANCE. MORE of damp feathers
become visible as a
DOTS JOIN, FORMING chick begins to break
MEANDERING LINES through its shell, a
ACROSS THE NEWLY process that can take
WHITE ICESCAPE. hours. All the while,
the father repeatedly
“Then all of a sudden, you hear the first calls,” peeks under his feath-
photographer Stefan Christmann says. That’s ered brood pouch to
when it really hits him: “Wow. The birds are monitor progress.
coming back.”

It’s late March in Atka Bay, in Antarctica’s
Queen Maud Land, nearly 2,700 miles south-
west of the southern tip of Africa. Christmann
has been waiting more than two months for the
emperor penguins—the biggest of all penguins,
standing about four feet tall and weighing up to
nearly 90 pounds—to return from foraging at sea.

His plan is to stay with the Atka Bay colony’s
roughly 10,000 penguins through the winter,
for the second time. He spent the winter here
five years ago and has come back to complete his
chronicling of the emperor’s breeding cycle—
something few, if any, wildlife photographers
have done. With temperatures falling to at least
50 degrees below zero Fahrenheit (45 degrees
below zero Celsius) and shrieking blizzards that
cut visibility to a few feet, the Antarctic winter
is not for the faint of heart—especially during
July and August, its coldest months.

“To be quite honest, you get used to it after

100 N AT I O N A L G E O G R A P H I C

a while,” Christmann tells me matter-of-factly. urgent action is taken against climate change.
What the emperor penguins won’t easily get “Under a business-as-usual scenario, emperor

used to is diminishing—and possibly disappear- penguins are marching towards extinction,”
ing—sea ice, which provides a stable breeding says Stéphanie Jenouvrier, a seabird biologist
platform and base from which they can hunt at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in
for food in surrounding waters. Despite being Massachusetts. Her team’s research indicates
superb swimmers, adult emperors in the 54 col- that if carbon emissions remain unchecked,
onies around Antarctica—some 256,500 breeding 80 percent of the emperor colonies could be
pairs—must nurture their chicks out of water on gone by 2100, leaving little hope for the species’
the sea ice before spring comes and the ice melts. survival. Average global temperature is on track
Antarctic sea ice is highly variable, but five years to increase by three to five degrees Celsius (5.4 to
ago it suddenly declined, with record shrinkage nine degrees Fahrenheit) by then, but if the rise
in 2017, according to a study published last year can be kept below 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees
in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Fahrenheit), Jenouvrier says, perhaps nearly
Sciences of the United States. Sea ice may now be 20 percent of colonies would be lost, while the
recovering, but it still remains below the long- Ross Sea and Weddell Sea populations, potential
term average, and climate models predict con- emperor penguin refuges because of more favor-
tinued significant losses by century’s end unless able sea ice conditions, would increase slightly.

M A R C H I N G T O WA R D E X T I N C T I O N 101

Chicks tussle while
keeping warm on their
parents’ feet. After
the mothers return to
the breeding grounds,
they share babysitting
duties with their part-
ner so the birds can
take turns feeding on
fish. Parents that stay
behind often stand
together, allowing
chicks to interact.



A spring blizzard
sweeps in as the chicks
begin exploring the
ice with newfound
independence. In two
months the fledglings
will grow waterproof
feathers and swim off.
Five years later they’ll
return to rear their
offspring—if the waters
of Atka Bay continue
to freeze in winter.



W I T H T H E S E A I C E P L AT F O R M in place and the over feeding duties. For months, parents form a
Atka Bay penguins settled in, Christmann sets tag team, taking turns to fetch food for the grow-
about capturing the scene as they begin a brand- ing chicks. Around September, both parents
new turn of their life cycle. An elegant courtship must go fishing together to satisfy ever hungrier
unfolds as penguins pick that year’s partner. A mouths, leaving the chicks to hang out in crèches.
brief and awkward copulation follows, as the
males do their best not to fall off. The youngsters learn to huddle, not always
neatly. A few nestle together, then others race
Afterward, the penguin partners stick together, up and slam into the pile. As the huddle grows,
mirroring each other’s movements. Their close latecomers try pushing in—“right in the warm
bonds will help ensure their chick’s survival—it’s portion of the huddle,” Christmann says.
the only one they’ll have that season. One day
Christmann notices a pair peering at a snow- Sometimes lone parents stay behind and
ball carefully balanced on the female’s feet. He watch over the crèches. Christmann sees an adult
guesses they’re a first-time couple practicing with two chicks. Although only one belongs to
their egg-balancing skills. the caretaker, the bird reaches down and feeds
them both. An accident? Maybe not. Adult
By the end of May, the first eggs appear, one emperors frequently perform a ritual of lifting
per female. Laying has come at a physical cost, their brood pouch, a feathery flap of skin, to show
so the hungry female carefully passes her egg others their newborn. It’s unproven, but Christ-
to her mate and gets ready to leave. The part- mann thinks it’s possible that the parents do this
ners will test the strength of their bonds as the to form close bonds, becoming guardians to each
females return to sea to feed. other’s chicks and helping out with childcare.

For the males left behind, winter closes in. In Toward year’s end, the chicks are nearly as tall
100-mile-an-hour winds and plummeting tem- as their parents, but they aren’t out of danger.
peratures, the birds huddle to share body heat. Before the sea ice melts, the chicks must swap
Such cooperation keeps the dads and their pre- their gray down for waterproof, adult feathers;
cious eggs alive, as do the males’ body reserves— otherwise, they’ll drown. This happened in 2016
there’s nothing to eat, and they’ll lose almost half at the Halley colony, when a storm broke up the
their weight before the females return. On the ice before October and the chicks were still in
coldest days the penguins fall silent, saving as their crèche period. Since then the ice hasn’t
much energy as possible. All Christmann hears is been stable enough to support adults, leading to
the eerie sound of their feet scraping over the ice. almost complete breeding failure, with no chicks
successfully reared. That colony—previously
Through the six-month-long winter, Christ- Antarctica’s second largest—is now mostly aban-
mann and 11 others are the only humans in this doned. The storm coincided with the strongest
part of Antarctica, huddling themselves in a El Niño event in 60 years, the kind of extreme
small German research station perched on the weather pattern that’s expected to become more
ice shelf above Atka Bay. In all but the worst frequent. Counts of penguins in satellite images
of storms, when the humans stay inside, it’s a are under way to gauge how much the birds have
snowmobile ride down the steep escarpment been affected by the recent changes in sea ice
and onto the sea ice to be with the penguins. losses around Antarctica. The results likely will
be a warning sign for the future of the species.
In late July the polar night ends, and soon the
rising sun greets new voices in the colony. If their BAC K I N AT K A BAY, the sea ice begins melting
mothers don’t get back in time with food for their at the end of December, earlier than expected,
young, the chicks get their first meal from their and Christmann sees molting adults and chicks
father—gooey milk from his esophagus. But after clambering to safety atop the higher ice shelf—
enduring the winter, not all the males have been an extension of the much thicker terrestrial ice—
successful. Christmann sees one picking up a using a pile of drifted snow as a ramp.
dead, frozen chick and balancing it on his feet.
“He took the chick and walked towards the col- A month later, he watches the last full-grown
ony, acting as if everything was normal.” It was chicks leap from the shelf some 15 to 30 feet into
“heartbreaking,” Christmann says. the sea. “It looks spectacular,” he says.

Females return just when their starving part- Elsewhere in Antarctica, emperor penguin
ners need them most. Pairs reinforce their bonds. colonies won’t have this option to survive the
Mothers see their chicks for the first time and take

106 N AT I O N A L G E O G R A P H I C

COLONIES IN CRISIS •Penguin colony status in 2100 25,000
Likely extinct under most
If carbon emissions go unchecked, the optimistic emissions scenario 10,000
average global temperature could rise nine 1,000
degrees Fahrenheit by 2100. That could • Likely extinct if no change 500
doom more than three-quarters of Antarc- to current emissions
tica’s emperor penguin colonies, which Endangered
hold nearly 600,000 birds today.
• or vulnerable
Not vulnerable

, 100

Atka Bay colony Neumayer Station III, Estimated number of
Germany breeding pairs of penguins
0 ••••
Queen Maud • Insufficient data
. ..···-;--.-
Halley colony held
We d d e l l 22,500 pairs in Land Amundsen Bay
Sea 2009, but has since colony has
collapsed due to fewer than
Ronne climate change. 100 pairs.
Ice
A ntarctic Peni
nsula Shelf

Polar East
Plateau Antarctica

West South
Antarctica Pole

Ross Ice Emperor penguin
Shelf (Aptenodytes
forsteri)

3.8 ft

April 2019 Ross
sea ice extent Sea

Sea ice is crucial for Projected
successful breeding in April 2100
April. The ice is close
to food sources in the sea ice
water, yet stable enough extent
to support colonies.
Coulman Island
colony holds around

25,000 pairs.

CHRISTINE FELLENZ, TAYLOR MAGGIACOMO, AND TED SICKLEY, NGM STAFF. SOURCES: Egg Chick Adult
PHILIP N. TRATHAN AND PETER T. FRETWELL, BRITISH ANTARCTIC SURVEY; MARIKA HOLLAND, 62-75 days 0-5 months 20 years
NATIONAL CENTER FOR ATMOSPHERIC RESEARCH; STÉPHANIE JENOUVRIER, WOODS HOLE 0.5-44 lbs.
OCEANOGRAPHIC INSTITUTION; PABLO GARCIA BORBOROGLU, GLOBAL PENGUIN SOCIETY 12-18 oz. 88 lbs.

early disintegration of their sea ice haven. Many kept him going. “There’s this bird that cannot fly,
ice shelves are simply too high for waddling pen- that walks funny, that always looks grumpy, and
guins to climb. Even if they make it up, the ice this bird shows you how it’s done,” he says. “They
is scarred with deadly crevasses, and there’s no are able to live through the harshest of condi-
shelter from the punishing winds. “I’m worried tions, and it would be us who send them over the
about them becoming the new polar bears,” edge. I would feel very, very sad about that.” j
Christmann says, referencing those famous
denizens of fast-shrinking Arctic sea ice. Helen Scales divides her time between Cambridge,
England, and the French coast. She’s written five
It was never going to be easy for Christmann, books about the oceans. Stefan Christmann won
spending a year on the frozen continent, leaving the 2019 Wildlife Photographer Portfolio of the
his loved ones behind, but the emperor penguins Year Award for his work on emperor penguins.

M A R C H I N G T O W A R D E X T I N C T I O N 107

WOMEN IN BOLIVIA,
NEW ZEALAND, IRAQ,
AND AFGHANISTAN
HAVE MADE HUGE

GAINS I N AC H I E V I N G
POLITICAL
POWER. B U T
M A N Y S T I L L FAC E
C ULTU R AL
R E SI STANC E —

AND EVEN

VIOLENCE—A S

THEIR INFLUENCE
INCREASES.

TAKING THE

BY RANIA ABOUZEID | PHOTOGRAPHS BY ANDREA BRUCE

108

LEAD

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