I am a historian born in Amsterdam in 1946 and I think that Americans romanticize their role in the war in Europe too much. My parents and family suffered from a 5-year occupation and killings and deportation. America was not occupied ever and for them it is probably hard to understand what the experience of occupation by a fascist state is. Living in Amsterdam I see a lot of Americans have a huge fascination for Anne Frank and visit her room but that seems the only interest in WWII and they often don't know that 90% jews of Amsterdam were deported and killed. War is not the heroisme of soldiers only. There was the heroisme of common people everyday during the occupation being part of the resistance and often with the danger of getting tortured and killed

I was born in Cologne, Germany 1961 (today living in the US). By the end of WW II my Father was 18, my Mother 21. My Grandfather had survived WW I and WW II. So, the teaching about Nazi Germany and WW II started (and continued) at home. In school, they made as watch documentaries about the Holocaust starting in 5th grade and it was repeated every year up to 9th grade. What we also learned (and what was very important) was what happened in Germany between 1918 and 1932 because the raise of Hitler began after WW I and our Teacher wanted to make sure we understood how Hitler came to power. We learned in detail about the book burning, the night of the long knives (Nacht der langen Messer) and of course Kristallnacht. My Father often told me how he was brainwashed in school and then when he turned 17 he wanted to become a Soldier. He was sent to the east front but shortly after he and some friends deserted and were hiding at a Farm until the war was over. My mother was in Cologne during the war and experienced the extensive bombing of the City special in the last year of the war. American war planes tended to drop incendiary bombs which always caused fear and panic. In our house, were I grew up, we had a marble floor in the hall and there was a big piece missing. My Mother told me the story that a incendiary bombs fell through the roof on the marble floor but didn't explode and that is how the marble floor was broken. The education about WW II is important but it is even more important to teach what happened prior to WW II. It is the only way to truly learn about history and making sure it doesn't happen again.

As a german, I remember our teachers not only telling us about WWII as a sequence of historical events, but as an opportunity to understand the psychological "blind spots" that made this possible. They showed us how this can totally happen again, any time, anywhere, if people are unaware of the mechanisms. One of our school reads was "The Wave" ("Die Welle"), and we discussed the Milgram experiment. I like to think fascists would have a much harder time gaining followers if this was commonplace knowledge taught all over the world.

Your discussion of the events that led to the USA finally entering the war reminded me of Churchhill's famous quote in response: "You can always count on Americans to do the right thing - after they've tried everything else."

Had a great history teacher, who taught me the perhaps most important thing about wars: cause and reason are two different things. Like, World War 1 was triggered (cause) by the murder in Serajevo, but was brought about (reason) by enormous shifts in power or economy in Europe.

I've been to the USA several times and having learned about the country's culture my entire life, I didn't think there was anything that could surprise me anymore. But when you said "WW2 should be seen as one of the darkest times in history" ... I had to sit down. As a European, it has never occurred to me that that was a concept that needed pointing out. Thank you for delivering this cultural difference without judgement, and thank you for yet another incredibly well researched and nuanced video!

Small nitpick: "Im Westen nichts Neues" is set in WWI, not WWII. I am German, my husband is US American. One of the first questions his family asked me was where my grandfathers fought in WWII to figure out whether one of them could have encountered their relatives. For me, that was a weird question. I also encountered the attitude that "something like that" (fascism rising to political power) could never happen in the US which I find ludicrous and frankly, dangerous. Our kids have those divided souls: US pride of winning WWII and German shame. It is an interesting combination, to say the least.

I’m British and 72 years old. My memories of learning about WWII at school are Zero. My adolescence and early adulthood were peppered, as you remarked, with the heroic actions of British and American Soldiers through the cinema of the 50s and 60s. I then, as I grew older, decided to learn for myself about the history of the world including WWII and have been doing so ever since. I find it sad that with the arrival of the Internet the world seems to have polarized itself into two groups that will not listen to each other; those for and those against. There is today so much great and unbiased information about WWII that the youth of today should experience in order to make informed judgements about how they should lead their lives in the future in order to avoid, dare I say it, WWIII. That the modern education system is failing in its duty to “educate” in this respect, leaves me not very optimistic; one can but pray. Really enjoyed your video. Please continue in the same vein. With love and peace.

I'm Finnish, and our WW2 history classes were understandably a bit more focused on the Winter and Continuation wars between Finland and the Soviet Union than on the western front. In fact, in Finland the term "world war 2" is often used for the war in continental Europe specifically, while the part of the war affecting Finland is treated as separate wars altogether. I remember we did talk about the outbreak of WW2, Hitler's motivations and how he came to power, but it wasn't a big focus. In the context of Finland, I often felt like the class wasn't just trying to teach us what happened and why, but also had another motive, to make us proud of our country. I do think the Finnish army pulled off a hell of a feat holding off the Soviet union, don't get me wrong, but this was emphasized a looot. It was also really emphasized that, while Finland and Germany were fighting the same enemy, we weren't allies. And this is something I've realized only later isn't such a black and white issue. It was clear that the Soviet union declared war on us in the Winter War and we had no choice but to defend ourselves. I get that. But the outbreak of the Continuation war, when we joined the German operation Barbarossa and declared war on the Soviet union again, was almost overlooked as far as I can remember. I think we went over the facts and the reasons for the war briefly, but there was no ethical discussion about if we should have done it. It was very recently that I learned and really realized that we actually were the ones to invade Russia the second time, because it looked like Germany would win so we wanted to join their advance. I think that definitely needs to be discussed more critically. Also the fact that we had a sort of concentration camps of our own in the occupied Karelian territories, where we put a lot of Russian civilians, is really barely even mentioned. It may have been mentioned briefly or not at all, but I don't remember anything about it from history class. Hopefully it's my memory giving up on me and not the school system.

“You have to know the past to understand the present.” ― Carl Sagan

As an American who loves reading history, your graphic showing deaths by country was still eye opening! Yes, Hitler was democratically elected and obviously today's Americans have forgotten this. Hence the phrase, "history repeats itself."

*I SENT MY AMERICAN FRIEND* some pictures of the bombed-out houses I played in as a child in the 1970's [Britain] - She asked with American innocence "Why were they not rebuilt?" "Because no one in the family survived the bomb" - It struck me that only someone from a nation that has never experienced civilian bombardment would now know that? If every member if the family is killed, how do you rebuild the house? You cant just go TAKE the house, it does not belong to you and the neighbours would linch you, so they stay there - a ruin for decades.

The meaning of commemoration in the Netherlands has changed about every 10 years, but what remains is the impressive two minutes of silence on May 4. Sometimes silence is the best way to remember that horrific time.

What a great video! My grandpa, before he died, told me a lot about the war. He was forced to fight shortly before the war ended just when he turned 16. I mapped his units path. They walked 20-40km each day until they reached their destination in south-east Germany. Each night the other young German "soldiers" fled into the dark of the night. My grandpa's officers met with an US American troop. The officers sat together, drank wine and had a good night. All of the soldiers ate and drank, the German unit surrendered. My grandpa sad he only survived because he became a US prisoner of war. They fenced them in, kept them together on a potato field. After 3-4 days of no food, the young Germans dug for raw potatoes. My grandpa made friends with a US soldier who guarded them. He therefore was allowed to leave sooner. He tighed the pants at the bottom down with 2 pieces of string and filled his pants with sugar. That was the only thing he would eat for a couple of days. Reaching the trains, the Americans provided passage to a few areas around Germany und US control. They had to pass through French terretory and French soldiers stopped the train. German prionsers were free labor for the French mines. They were used until death. Going into French war prisons was a death sentence. The US soldiers got out of the trains, he vividly remembers that part, the got their automatic guns out and shot above the heads of the French's soldiers until those retreated and the train could carry on and bring the ex prisoners of war back into the homeland. He had a far stretch to walk and he was with someone from a neighboring village. They almost didn't make it. They simply gave up under a tree and decided their fate was death by starvation. An old woman from a house nearby saw them and she asked what they were doing out in the sun at this young age in the middle of nowhere. They couldn't really answer. The woman came back with a loaf of bread. This is the part my grandpa almost couldn't finish telling. Every time he talks about the loaf of bread he cried for minutes straight. They made it back home. Others weren't so lucky. French and Russian war prisons were notorious for cruelty. Basically I'm only here today because my grandpa got surrendered to the US troops. And that's what he said as well until he died as he reached 93 years of age

My dad was born just a few weeks after WW2 ended (and two full months too early). He still remembers vividly how he went to school each day through the ashes and rubble of his home town of Zerbst in what's today Saxony-Anhalt. How they were living with friends of the family since his own house was completely in ruins. About 80% of the town were leveled by US-american artillery and it burned for like half a week nonstop. His dad (my grandpa) actually witnessed the moment his own house was hit, but he never talked about his experiences to us (his grandkids). It was only in the mid-90s, afer all my grandparents were gone, that my parents slowly started to loosen up on this topic and to drop little snippets of information about what happened back then, but still only after quite a bit of soft pressuring from our side. My dad's birthday each year at least for me is a constant little reminder, how long ago all of this was and simultaneously how recent and alive it still is in a lot of minds.

As a german, i learned about the rise and fall of nazi germany not just once, but at least 4-5 times in school. 2 times history class, but also german class, ethics class, religion class and probably more, e.g. english class. Even though, we only shortly talked about WWII and quite long about concentration camps and the persecution of the jews, the idiotic race theory and so on. I am not sure if it's on the teachers or the curriculum. I always had the feeling that the teachers wanted to show us the cruelty of war and what the nazis did and not tell us great war strategies and campaigns. So we( or at least me )had also blind spots in our education. Not sure how good this is in america but the european colonial history was almost only about america, Africa only mentioned in slave trade.

Should have waited for your final question ❤ I’m from Rotterdam, and the Netherlands capitulated immediately after the devastating bombardment of our city. I’m from 1953, so we learned the history not only at school, but also at home (both my parents were from 1919. Miraculously the whole family survived, but my mom just barely made it through the horrendous hunger-winter of 1944-‘45 in the northwestern Netherlands. Rebuilding, redesigning and revitalising the city took over 60 years (the how/why is too complicated to explain here). There had always been a memorial for Rotterdam’ Jews, but only 25 years ago a monument was added for the children: all their names etched at children’s height, to be read. As life and history do not stand still, the national remembrance is slowly but steadily developing into remembering Dutch victims (citizens and military) of wars.

MY MOTHER - Born April 1937, and over 8 yrs by war's end on 5 May '45 in Holland - tought me first-hand memories and stories. Notably, Her Father was in the Dutch underground resistance, got caught by the Nazis, Put on a Cattle-train to an Extermination Camp, but Miraculously succeeded in Jumping Out of the Moving Train, making his way Back thru Germany, to Holland, and Surviving in hidance.

I find it interesting that after the brief flurry of Vietnam movies in the 70s and 80s Hollywood largely reverted back to films about WW2. I think maybe it is easier to paint an uncomplicated story of valor and victory with WW2 - at a time when the US is very much grappling with its cultural identity

As someone from Poland, this is a loaded topic. I can say we learn A LOT what happened to our country particularly. What I mean is the invasion itself (from BOTH Germany and USSR), the Holocaust but also the Underground State and its work, the things I don't think many people outside of here even heard about. We can't escape that information because it "haunts" us at every step while living here. Not far from where I live there was a secret printing house for the Underground and the Nazis found the members and massacred them on the grounds of my primary school. Memorials are everywhere, even in small towns. My middle school had a mandatory visit to Auschwitz since we live quite close. Depending on where you live, your school would visit the closest camp I reckon. My school also visited the Schindler's Factory Museum. During Polish language lessons we would read books relating to WW2. That being said, with years I have realised it's still not enough. I don't remembered learning much of what happened on the fronts beside few famous battles. I didn't know almost anything about the African or Pacific theatres until I read about it myself. I don't want to blame my history teachers, because I had great ones but I think we had so much emphasis on the earlier parts on the history we never really had time to properly go through 20th century in detail. There's also another thing: I started going to school only after 13 years since the collapse of Communism. Since then more and more information came to light about events during WW2 because all the information was CENSORED to public during Communism. I learned a lot more during history lessons than my parents most likely or at least showed in completely new light. That's probably why we had such an emphasis on the occupation itself. Reading comments from others also made me realise that we don't really celebrate any "victory/liberation" day related to WW2. It's because even tho we were technically "allies" and the war started with an attack on our country, we were arguably one of the biggest losers in this war. In many people's eyes here, we were truly free after 1989. We only commemorate 1st of September as the start of WW2 and it became the Day of Polish Air Defense Army and the 1st of August which was the start of Warsaw Uprising in 1944 (although that one is the biggest event in Warsaw itself, some other cities also carry out the minute of silence at 5 pm just on smaller scale). When it comes to memorials, they can be grand and/or thought provoking. The ones of the victims are more solemn but the ones to the resistance fighters show more heroism. Sorry for the lenghty comment.

Thank you for never shying away from sensitive topics.

I deeply respect how Germans teach their children about WWII. They own it, take responsibility, and feel a duty to try and prevent this from happening anywhere else on the world. Meanwhile, here in the United States, many states are making it ILLEGAL to teach about core elements of slavery or the forced discrimination or black people after the Civil War because (I'm not making this up) it hurts the feelings of some students and makes them feel bad.

As a 4th grade public school teacher in America, I would like to add the following: yes, education depends upon the district but also depends upon the teacher and their personal background and understanding of history. It is common in many curricula to integrate picture books about historical perspectives within ELA due to time constraints. We do a project based unit around WWII childhood perspectives. I included the dark history of Japanese Internment Camps but my colleagues did not…because one didn’t know about it and the other didn’t want to overwhelm her students. You’re right on with everything said in this video. There is a push to introduce heavier topics through picture books across America (Fountas and Pinnell), but it depends on what the teachers know and the “feelings “ of the community sadly…

Living in the Netherlands on a 10 km distance from the German border I remember a German TV documentary about the Nazi and WW2 period. It was in in the times of analogue black/white TV with reception through the air. It was a documentary in weekly episodes and it I has been one of the best documentaries, I have ever ever seen. Being 78, born in May 1945, I still remember that brutally honest German documentary from my teenage years. For modern Americans: It was a very woke documentary, hurting the souls of many German kids, but it improved Germany!

Congratulations. A terrific video as usual. Living here in Switzerland since 1977, having emigrated from the US, it pushed all the "right" buttons. What the emphasis in the US is, the differences in presentation of history elsewhere. And while the Spielberg movies are less "romantic" in nature and more realistic, they still reinforce an American perspective of that history. The only possible exception to a certain extent would be Schindler's list, which was more centred on the victims of the Nazis than on the war efforts specifically of either side. What is generally missing in the presentation of history is the eagle-eyed perspective that takes into account, all aspects of the before during and after, as you also stated. Maybe I'm wrong, but I see no possibility of this being presented in US schools in general. It seems to only in the last 10-15 years be coming out, how incredibly unpopular the idea of a WWII before Pearl Harbor was, the US Nazi movement with it's "Night at the Garden", the congress members who actively worked to promote Hitler's Nazi-ism in the US. I can't imagine the proportional sacrifice the UdSSR paid in winning the war - I have however seen it written, that without that eastern War, Hitler would have had all those resources to throw at the troops in the west, that it was the intenseness of the fighting in the east that made an allied "victory" in the west possible. What is pretty much the popular opinion was expressed in the classic US war film "Patton", where Gen. Patton very clearly said, he expected to be fighting the russians in the future so it would be better to do it now, while the US resources were already in Europe. Basically, the US even then only had contempt for the Russians and no understanding for their sacrifices. Not to say, they weren't mountrous themselves, both with the German POWS, the civilians in the lands they captured and with their own civilians. But that so colored the "history" as taught in US schools, with Russia being the big, bad enemy in the east, that it would be counter US interests to even advantagously mention them in US school history books.

In Germany we were taught WWII history in order to prevent anything similar during our lifetime. "Never Again!" was the teacher's slogan. Never again naziism, dictatorship, holocaust or war! Under no circumstances!

I'm a 70 year old American. In history class I would ask questions, but they had no answers, because they put no effort into these classes. Everything Americans know about history is from movies. So I went to the library. I wanted to know why and how wars started, I looked for perspective. Most books start with the war, not how people got dragged into them or what happened to the people before, during and after. It takes a lot of reading. Thank you for this video.

I am 42 and I remember from my history lessons back in school, that we talked a lot about the kingdoms and changes in countries in europe throughout history and the middle ages for many years and also a lot about WW2. We didnt visit a concentration camp, that is not something that is manadatory or anything, like some comments on the internet claim here and there occationally. But we watched movies in class about war and documentaries with pictures of concentration camps and all that. I remember we watched "Platoon" and "All Quiet on the Western Front". So the horrors of war are deeply embedded in our conciousnes from early on and I find that good. We also learned a lot about why and how WW2 came to be. WW2 truly began with the defeat in WW1 and the conditions that were dictated on germany which prepared the ground for a man like Adolf Hitler. The conditions and how people lived at the time that made them listen to guys like hitler which then eventually ended in him even being elected. This shall never repeat. Maybe this is something the US still needs to experience themselves. I see this currently with Trump and the republican party and we can live see democrazy being taken apart. History repeats itself.

Thank you for your interesting vlog. Being Dutch and living in Germany it was an intetesting compairison. One remark though: Im Westen nichts neues/ all quiet on the western front tells about WW1 not WW2 Keep up the good work!

Ashton, thank you so much for your relentless curiosity and for taking that deep dive into German and European culture. As a German myself I have learned a whole lotta stuff from your fabulous stream. As high school kids in Hamburg, we were taught about the Weimarer Republic, the Machtergreifung in '33, and how this deepest scar in German history came about and is still affecting us today. From 7th to 10th grade this was part of our history curriculums including the Shoah and the thousands of barbaric chapters. It wasn't annoying at all to me. Awareness was meant to prevent. Many of the older (WW2)generation were either silent or denied any personal wrongdoing claiming "it was Hitler who seduced us", "there was nothing we could do" or "let's not look back". One day a Jewish concentration camp survivor was invited to our school to speak to us. It was Ester Bejerano who sadly passed away recently. I remember her soft smile and infatuating voice. She was well into her 70s. Her words were earth-shattering to me. "Guys, you don't have any guilt on your shoulders. Live the best life you can but you have a responsibility to be watchful." It was like a silent promise, a silent oath I gave her. It was the day I was born again as a lifelong anti-fascist. My grandparents almost never spoke about it. I think it was too painful for them. In East Germany (the GDR) there was no reprocessing of WW2. Neither in society nor in schools. They defined themselves as new socialists untethered to anything that occurred before 1945. That unawareness of history may be a contributing factor to the rise of xenophobia and right-wing political groups in the former GDR after our reunification. To me, that our former enemies forgave and became partners and friends (well, most of them) with us is a special kind of miracle...

Awesome video! I wish more American’s would look outside their world and view life from the prospective of other countries. I retired from the US Air Force over 20 years ago. My wife and I had the fortunate opportunity to travel the world. We tried to learn about the various cultures in which we lived and respected their points of view. We Americans are very short sighted. We think the world revolves around us. It revolves around our money and resources! At 60, I’m looking to retire again next year and for the last couple of years have been viewing a lot of videos on American’s living abroad…we’re getting “Itchy Boots” (Sorry Noraly for borrowing that!) and want to see more of Europe than we saw while stationed in England..which was beautiful! We aren’t considering moving outside the US, just want to experience even more of the world. Anyway, love your well-thought out videos about Germany and other topics. We visited Germany and loved it! My grandfather immigrated from Vienna so, strangely enough, I felt at home there. To all reading this…get out and see the world…stay active…stay safe!!! Don’t believe the media entirely. The world isn’t that scary!!!

I have been following your channel for quite some time. I am thankful for your explanations and courage to tackle even such subjects as WWII. I was born in Colombia but my father sent us to a German school in Colombia that was financed to a large extent by the German government. Three quarters of the teachers were German civil servants (Beamte) working there for three to a maximum of six years. We had excellent history teachers as well as some rotten old Nazi apples. The curriculum was oriented towards German history but we had a separate class for Colombian history. We had a very good introduction to the development of the idiocincracity of the Germans that led to the war. Up to now my impression of the school system in the states is that it is more oriented to prepare students for technical and practical aspects of life rather than preparing them to be conscious, responsible and knowledgeable. I wonder how you found your way to be a critical, observing and unprejudiced person because the states are not the best place to develop these traits?

WW2 still influences international politics today, no doubt about that. The permanent members of the UN security council are mainly the victors of WW2. This arrangement was a big mistake. If you classify the adversaries of WW2 into the "good guys" and the "bad guys", like so many do, you overlook they're put in a position of having become "the forever good" or "forever bad". And that does not reflect developments of the past 80 years. Societies rise and fall and they can turn from good to bad in one generation or from bad and defeated into fair and just. The design of the post WW2 political landscape created the current situation of rising arrogance, nationalism and tendencies towards autocracy with the WW2 victors and their willingness for self-reflection is very low, because they won "the war", they're the "forever good" nations. And this mindset mirrors of course how the war and the country's role in it is taught to younger generations. There are lessons to learn not only for the defeated, but also for the victors.

Thanks for a great video. Again 😊 What we were taught about WWII did fill a whole history book for almost a year of history class. But what stuck in my brain the most...every year a survivor of the Dachauer Todesmarsch (death march of Dachau...something akin to the US trail of tears) came and she talked about it and how she survived it. That march had passed our village and here she escaped it. It made quite an impression, lets say. The feeling of "never again" was ingrained by her accounts the most I think.

As a Czech, I did not learn almost anything about WW2 in school. Our history teacher was so obsessed with ancient civilizations and medieval era that we had very little time left for learning about modern history. We swiftly completed learning about WW1 and the creation of Czechoslovakia, WW2 and its prelude was basically just homework and the communist regime, the Velvet revolution and the split of Czechoslovakia was entirely skipped. At least my parents are very fond of history so I learned a lot of at home.

The first time I learned to critically re-think the history I learned was when I read this quote: "May I give you a word of advice? Next time you invade Italy, do not start at the bottom." -Wehrmacht General Fridolin von Senger, father of Bundeswehr, 10 years after the war). It had never occurred to me that any major allied plan was anything but the best available option.

WW2 wasn't a standalone topic, we also went into great detail about the years leading up to those events. The power structure before WW1 and how that one was concluded, the treaties after and their significance to societies. And much more than I care to list just now. The war didn't just start one day in a vacuum. So thanks for your effort on shining a light on the different approaches.

I am half American/half German, and even though I don’t feel proud of this darkest part of German history, I am proud of the way WW2 is usually taught in Germany and I am truly glad I was able to receive a German or European influenced education on this subject while attending German Gymnasium. I can full heartedly attest to how Feli from Germany presented the education system provided over here. In my case, history on WW2 encompassed a range of subjects such as French class (studying the resistance movement under Vichy France as a Nazi collaborator through movies such as “Monsieur Batignole” or “Strange Gardens”), religion class (where we studied the churches role in Nazi Germany, the long history of antisemitism in Europe and the origins of eugenics and scientific racism), art class (what Nazis deemed “degenerate art”), German class (reading books such as “Als Hitler das Rosa Kaninchen Stahl” in 6th grade or “Der Untertan” aka “the Loyal subject” by Heinrich Mann about the time leading up to WW1) and of course years repeatedly going over the period leading up to WW2 in history class and how imperialistic, populist and nationalistic movements ultimately led to the rise of fascism in Germany. At times I have to say it did feel like it almost overshadowed other parts of my history learning, as we never had the time to tackle any part of the Cold War for example, so that I was ultimately forced to learn these parts of history on my own. What was interesting at that time, though, was for me to see that one of my mom’s US college textbooks on World history was less detailed than what I was learning at a much earlier age at school. Despite providing less time for other topics, I think studying a part of history in such an in-depth manner teaches us more about the importance of history itself. For instance, not only are you critically analyzing excerpts of a Nazi school textbook, Nazi rhetoric and poster propaganda, but also learning how to recognize similar mechanisms of propaganda in our society today. Once I was older traveling to other countries, every time I became engaged in a conversation about the war, I was asked about specific details of the war and and machinery (“You’re German and don’t know tiger tanks?” ) and realized that specific battles were simply left out for the simple reason that these are not important for understanding the necessary aspects of ww2. In Europe, like you said, the aftermath and long-lasting effects are much more noticeable. My grandfather fought in the war and barely talked about it. He was a POW in France for years and actually ended up forming a long-lasting friendship with the family he was staying with, as they shared a similar background as farmers. This always seemed to underline the sheer pointlessness of the war to me, as these two sides who shared so much to become friends, had fought against each other as enemies. Besides that, I remember East Germany as a child in the late 90s and how buildings were still in ruin. Even in university, while studying medicine, covering Nazi medical experiments on prisoners in its concentration camps was part of the curriculum. Shockingly, for example, some of the data and information we are familiar with today, about the effects of the human body towards freezing, were obtained as a result of inhumane experiments. All in all, an awareness is so ingrained in society that I continue to hope that we will make sure to never repeat this part of history here ever again.

My experience of learning about WWII is vastly different than other Americans. I am a military brat and spent 10 of my first 18 years overseas (Philippines, Germany. And Japan). In 6th grade (while living in Germany) we studied WWII in a similar way to how it is taught in German schools. We spent a full semester and read additional books and travelled to Dachau. My family also spent time in Chiemsee at the General Walker hotel (now demolished) and spent time in the bunker tunnels and at the Eagle’s Nest. These experiences gave a more human perspective on the war that most American students will never have. In 10th grade (we were stationed inJapan) we studied the pacific theater of the including a trip to Hiroshima which was as haunting as Dachau. Because the US is pretty much isolated from actual war (except the revolutionary war and the civil war) there is no real reference to what happens and how people are effected. To many it’s like watching a movie and not real.

Some small corrections needed here about the mentioned movies: "All Quiet on the Western Front" is about WW1, not WW2. I think the book was even banned in Germany during WW2 The english title of "Der Untergang" is "The Downfall" And Indiana Jones stole the Ark of the Covenant in Egypt in the first movie, the Holy Grail was in Alexandretta (actually Petra, Jordan) in the third.

I'm German and 42 years old. From school, I remember that we were the generation that slowly got fed up with the great focus on WWII in history class and the weight of the national guilt imposed on us. I never felt quite that way (I actually had a huge phase of being fascinated with WWII, particularly the perspective of the victims, and read everything the municipal library had to offer on the topic) but I can see where some of my peers were coming from. Overall, I would mostly criticize that we learned way too little about the war outside of Europe, especially in Africa and Asia, beyond Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And even then, we never learned that much about Italy's involvement, either, it was all very focused on Germany itself and the Holocaust. My granddad died when I was still very young, so I only know a little about his experiences - he was a radio operator (he worked for the Deutsche Post as a telecommunication engineer before and after the war), he lost some toes to frostbite in the fight at the East European front and was a Soviet POW for some time, I believe. My grandma was born the same year as Sophie Scholl (1921). For some reason, I never talked to her about the topic, which I greatly regret by now. (I didn't know the family on my dad's side, he doesn't even know who his father was. My dad was born in 11/1945, you do the math what had most likely happened to his father ...)

From what I have seen, Americans care about the war, the battles, that sort of stuff. It's not just a popular wargaming setup, but even American SciFi games tend to quote WW2 generals as if they were comparable to the Laconian "if" or the Spartan "Molōn labé". (If you have no idea what those are, that's part of my point) The only reason I ever had an actual lesson on the war was because we had a substitute one day in history class that opened a map and gave a general overview. That was probably 11th grade, and I think he even mentioned the pacific theater (I think the Rape of Nanjing and John Rabe were mentioned at some point, though?). The only reason I know individual battles besides interaction with people from allied nations is remarks to the side about where my grandfathers were captured. In contrast, we learned all about Weimar, the Third Reich and Holocaust as well as postwar things like rationing, Trümmerfrauen, currency reform... And then a speedrun to 1990 to reach "today" before we graduated. I think the only war they told us about individual battles was WW1 with lessons about how pointless Verdun and the Somme were. For context, I took an advanced class (LK) in history for my 2002 Abitur. In the Ruhr Area. Admittedly, my LK teacher mentioned she would have taught us about the French Revolution for 3 years if onlyshe had been allowed to, but there were still six years of middle school history before her. As an aside, I was already evacuated once and almost evacuated twice (close enogugh toi get a "stay awayfrom windows", too far away to get a "get TF out of there") this year because WW2 bombers couldn't hit and they found a few unexploded bombs from their attempts to hit Krupp on construction sites. Business as usual, but no reason to teach about the *war*. Meanwhile, the US was untouchable until the Kuba crisis and has no living memory of actual war *on US soil*. Obviously actual soldiers have living memory of war, but society at large hasn't experienced that since the US civil war. (Another thing I only know about because US entertainment rubs it into people's faces)

Your essays are always of high standard, but you've really outdone yourself on this one. The difference of living through war rather than sending some people to fight a war elsewhere in particular is something that US Americans often find difficult to understand. I was born 25 years after the war, but my grandmother had lived through 2 world wars and spoke about it often and so it was ever present for me growing up. Her husband did not come back from the war, they had only been married less than a year before he was recruited, she had to give her daughter to stay with relatives who lived in the countryside as she herself lived and worked in Dresden which was bombed regulary. And then she ended up 'behind the iron curtain' when the Russians occupied Eastern Germany and she and her daughter had to flee and leave all their belonging behind.

I'm Polish, so you can imagine our school education about WW2 is quite different. What's interesting for me though is that we learn A LOT about the WW2 *before and outside of* the school lessons, or even books and films. The abandoned stadium near my home stands in the place of the first concentration camp in Poland. My grandma's dad spent 2 years in Dachau. Warsaw's city centre is weirdly modern - and so is Szczecin 's, since bricks from there were used to rebuild the capitol. Every few years we hear about stolen/lost art being found on someone's attic. When I was a scout, I sang a lot of songs about young people dying in forests. In Poland, we don't really celebrate "winning" WW2. We celebrate its ending. Granted, it probably has to do with falling right into other country's pocket. But I do think the US can treat the WW2 as simple and "good", because it has the privilege of not living with the reminders of how truly evil and destructive it was.

I had the great pleasure having a history Teacher who was held captive in Siberia after WWII. It was always somewhat amazing and yet pretty sobering to learn first hand how it was back then. Also we learned a lot deeper, how all this happend (i.e. that Hitler was democraticly elected, or the famous Franz v. Papens words "in 2 weeks we have Hitler in a Corner so far, that he squeeks). And yet, as a German, i see how Americans learn about their past, never really go into to much detail. What scares me the most with the actual political atmosphere over there, is the fact that to much people think it could and will never happen at home. It takes onle ONE Election to be in the middle of a Dictatorship like we had in the 1930's.

Great video! It is of vital importance to teach kids and grown-ups around the world not only what happened but also how it did happen. Greetings from Bochum ✌️

I remember hearing stories about how great grandparents escaped German conscription my inexplicably going for a fishing trip and not returning home for days. Living in the Netherlands at the time was pretty dangerous for them, and a lot of them ended up moving to Canada after the war.

My great uncle was a machinist for the Luftwaffe during the war. Towards the end he was stationed at the airfield at Fassberg. When the british army arrived, they took over the airfield and employed him because of his skillset. In 1949, during the Berlin Airlift, the USAF took over the airfield and extended the runway inorder that Berlin could be supplied via larger transport aircraft. They too employed him machining spare parts for aircraft. He worked for the Luftwaffe, the RAF and the USAF in the same workshop, without moving his tools. Everyone likes someone who can do stuff.

Commendable video! pleasantly surprised that you would take on this subject. Just this week I went to see the film Oppenheimer and had a discussion about this with my husband. We have seen many of the WW2 films and series produced by European countries and of course they are in great contrast to what USA based films and TV series concentrate on, as you pointed out. I must have been extremely lucky to have had several history teachers in a NYC high school who did indeed discuss why WW1 AND WW2 started, also what the allied forces did. My Austrian husband's history education was awkward: his history teacher stopped at WW1. Only in retrospect did he find out why: the reason was probably because his teacher or his family were directly involved. But my husband taught himself in order to fill in the gaps as did many of his classmates, and he heard family stories as to how life was during and immediately after.

My family is Chinese. I grew up in the US, and I distinctly remember having an extensive class debate on the morality of the atomic bombs. A few years later, I found out about the Nanjing Massacre. And a few years after that, I found out about the Unit 731 coverup, Stilwell's propaganda, the barring of China from the Treaty of San Francisco, and how all of this relates to the ongoing issues today between the US and China. It is hard not to think that this was all censored specifically for strategic reasons.

Hi. I'm an American (from Long Island, New York) and I've been living in various European countries (Finland 1 year in High School), Italy (1 year after HS), Ireland (a summer break from college), England (a summer break from grad school), Russia (2 years (during undergrad and then grad school), and now for the past 24 years mostly in Belgium (where I got citizenship) and also France, Holland, Germany and Spain. I've been working for the past 15 years as a tour guide for American tourists mostly in Germany, the low countries, Central Europe and France. I say all this to give you context about my background and to say all the stuff you talk about on your channel and the differences between American and European perceptions are things I deal with everyday in both my personal and professional life... and let me say... You do an excellent job! Keep up the good work!

I don't know about other regions in Germany and Europe but living in the Ruhrgebiet, we get reminded of the war pretty regularly when once again there is an unexploded bomb in the ground at a construction site. This means the people in this area need to be evacuated, train stations and sometimes a near autobahn gets closed and a special team needs to come and defuse the bomb. It's pretty common around here and I'm glad and yet surprised, that there are basically no tragic events in connection to that, as far as I know at least.

So glad other Dutch have already chimmed in and talked about how we view the war as it allows me to go a bit on a tangent.. In your video their were a couple of points you raised which i think where under "appreciated" (for lack of a better word). The first is the USA's history of rewriting history to fit their views (like the southern socialites or most history around the native Americans) so it should not be surprising that American movies/culture reflect this (we see something similar now happening around CRT). Another point you made which i found very interesting was that after Pearl Harbour people wanted revenge not liberation and this somehow made me think of the American justice system which seems to be about revenge/punishment and not reparations/rehabilitation.. Loved the video and how honest you were about your own feelings/background from an education stance. Have a great sunday and see you next weekend!

i am dutch in my 50's and would comment probably what many others will do here. i am happy to see most of our generations after me still know and learn more its hard after such a long time. what happened before but also after ww1 and ww2 is a lesson we will need in the next few years when the current war is over in europe and we need to rebuild a country for the common good of europe like after ww2. Things like the The Marshall Plan should be part of what we teach to lay the groundwork on why it has to be done and why even more bills have to be paid. germany doesn't have a great history of being on the right side but they have earned a lot of respect by how they recovered and paid their due i doubt for example any country would be able to reunify like they did and the continued open views to helping war victims now.

I don't have much memory of talking about WWII in history class in the mid 80ies. I think we got stuck with Bismarck... But we talked a lot about it in German class and social class. Me German teacher had been a Flakhelfer. He had to defend against air raids in Frankfurt at seventeen years old. His class had to leave school altogether. He wrote a booklet about it 'Von der Schulbank ans Geschütz'. He read us many poems of Paul Celan and made us read Alfred Andersch's 'Sansibar oder der letzte Grund'. We visited Dachau and Fuhlsbüttel.

As an American in the Midwest, I remember thinking about how Desert Storm and the aftermath played out. I kept thinking that although it can make sense to have sanctions on a country, it seemed to me that we could see a replaying of Germany between the world wars. In the late 1990s, I expected we would be back in Iraq in a full-blown war within just a few years; I just didn't know what would trigger it. I greatly value two atlases I have. One is a World Atlas from 1920, which includes the text of the Treaty of Versailles in the back. The other is a travel atlas of Germany, 1936. The last entry in the latter book has a chronology, including the rise of Hitler to power, and the last entry was that Germany reenters the Rhineland. One just had to look in the other atlas to see the specific term of the treaty that was violated in that action. I really do wish more was taught about how wars come to be, and ways things are handled well or badly following war. The conditions in Germany made it ripe for a second war. I know in American politics, people often attributed traits of Hitler to a recent President, even though many of those same and worse traits were evident in others who opposed him. I think Holocaust Museums and going to Concentration Camps can provide quite a bit of context. They focus on what led up to what allowed the holocaust to happen, though. They still tend to lack some of the other background that's important to know. Granted, anyone who focuses on the religious timeline would expect WWII. In Fatima, Portugal, in 1917, before the end of The War to End All Wars, we were warned that if certain things were not done, there would be an even worse war. A prediction was made of something that would be seen in the sky beforehand. The message was not heeded, and the sign in the sky occurred and is still not understood as to the true origin of it. WWII broke out right after that, and it was indeed much worse than WWI.

ive long held the belief that when you teach history without focusing on the why and how things happened, what they mean and how those things work in general... you are not teaching history - just a list of dates for someone to memorize and then forget about

My history teachers focused mostly on Canadian mobilization and the major battles Canadian soldiers fought in. As well as a lot of British events. I think we actually skipped a lot of other history just to go in more depth on the world wars. Although Canadian history is probably not that hard to summarize considering how short it is. We even went through early English history just to cover bases. We also had a world history class because our history can't fill two semesters of classes. Learned about the French and soviet revolutions and more about ww1 and ww2. We had a book report that needed to be non Canadian literature. So we got a more rounded view of what different people thought about it.

In high school (Virginia, 1961-'65), we learned a LOT about the Civil War (which, okay, WAS having a centennial then); about WWII there was zilch, as far as I can remember. Thank goodness for Walter Cronkite!! His TV program, "The Twentieth Century" was a wonderful, multi-year history course that gave me the essential background for understanding the world that birthed our own. Thank you, Uncle Walter!

I am a German whose time in school ended 50 years ago and I actually do not remember ever 'learning about WW2' in school, although we probably did - as others mentioned. That being said we knew about that time very well because there were traces all around us. I remember a wall in our house, where a bomb got stuck ('Blindgänger') and I remember playing in holes in the woods that were created by bombs that did detonate. Some of my friends were refugees from the east of former Germany (now Poland), starting all over in a new place, having lost all they had. And there were the stories we heard from our (surviving) grandparents or our parents how they experienced that time, how it felt to be a POW. And for many years we kept seeing bullet holes in facades of pre-war buildings. Growing up in the middle of history does lead to a different view on things if compared with hearing just second hand stories (=movies).

What a pity that this video is only around 20 minutes long and what a shame that I can give only one "thumb up" for this video. I had already watched Feli's excellent video before and I think your work is a great addition to what she did. Having been a student in Germany with History as one of my "Leistungskurse" (=major subject for the "Abitur" exam), my experience was probably rather similar to the one Feli had. I have been to several Concentration camp sites (3 or 4 times to Dachau, once to Auschwitz and once to Hersbruck, a minor site in Bavaria). WW2 and the Third Reich in general had never been a topic reserved to History class but we had come across it in other subjects, too, like German, Arts, etc... Although we at times kinda got annoyed by repeating it over and over again, today I think that this approach is more than adequate as this conflict has affected the lives of people on all kinds of levels. This is also one of the reasons, why the way WW2 is taught is so different in the US from how it is in Germany. Despite all the talk of "the Good War" or "the Best Generation", WW2 was, for the US, just another (though decisive) stepstone to the summit. More Americans lost their lives in the Civil War than in WW2. For Germany, these 12 years basically had changed everything.

From the British perspective, I guess the main thing that we are taught about WW2 is that 'we hung on' against Nazi Germany, to provide a base close to Europe that allowed a safe place for refugees from Europe and soldiers from France/Holland/Belgium etc to come to, while they were trained and re-equipped to fight again. Obviously we provided the space to build up the military forces to land in Normandy in 1944. Other key areas of WW2 was winning the Battle of Britain in the summer of 1940, to allow the UK to continue to fight. Invasion of the UK was a very genuine concern at the time, although actual study of WW2 history and the German preparations to invade the UK meant it would probably have been a failure for Germany. Another major concern was the Battle of the Atlantic and the threat of cutting off supplies from the US. Again reducing the U-boat threat allowed the US production of weapons/supplies to get to Europe which allowed the invasion to take place. The bombing of German cities by both the RAF and USAF remains a controversial issue, but given the weapons technology at the time, was the only way of hindering German weapons production. The RAF lost around 55000 men attacking Germany in this way. My lasting hope and as a former member of the RAF (1980/90s), that the UK as a current NATO member nation we have learned from our history that war solves nothing, but we must be prepared to stand up for our modern (imperfect?) freedom and democratic principles. Sadly the man in the Kremlin hasn't learned this lesson.

A very considerate tribute to history and how it is told and taught. Very much appreciated!

So well put; I hope the people who need to hear this the most will hear it.

I went to the National WWII Museum in New Orleans - I was shocked by how US Centric it was. I get that we're in the USA, but the contributions of the rest of the allies seemed to be largely ignored. Especially the Russians.

History is written by the victors, this saying is as true as it is both a blessing and a curse. It is a blessing because every nation needs it's sucessful historical events to be proud of, it will forever bind it's people together in spirit which we also call Patriotism. However it also makes you gloss over a lot of things. I am German and in school we learn in great detail about why the Weimar republic failed and talk about the World War however only about the attrocities we commited whether it was in the occupation of countries like France and the Netherlands, the horrible killings of Slavs as well as the Holocaust. And rightfully so I believe because this teaches us how to avoid this from ever happening again. The development of the War is never talked about, if at all we will talk about the failure of the battle of Stalingrad, I believe to avoid any romanticising of the german triumphs in the beginning of WWII like the Ardennes offensive. Also german history would never romanticise a figure of war like the US did with their generals such as Robert E. Lee, Ulysses S. Grant and of course the greatest of them all the almighty George B. McClellan (little joke for those US americans who know him). I couldn't imagine a history teacher talking about the story of Helmuth von Moltke (the elder), Heinz Guderian or Erwin Rommel, the outrage would be incredible. Speaking in general the only german success story we ever are taught about would either date back to the days before the holy roman empire or be about the first attempt of unification discussing events like the Hambach Festival. Now here is my controversial point. I believe the US glorifies most of it's history to an unheard of amount. The period of manifestating destiny where multiple indiginous clans were massacred and their offspring discriminated (I think most US citizens would not know that the country was officially at war with the Apaches until the 20th century when the Apaches had to surrender). The US Mexican war. Also the betrayal of the northern people of Mexico (now Texas) in their attempted succession to just integrated them into their country against their will afterwards. And lastly the role of the US in WWII. On the one hand nobody can deny the role the US played in it however most historians will agree that the war against russia played the biggest part in defeating the Axis Powers. When I see movies like Pearl Harbor that dramatize the death of 2403 US citizens and compare them to the battles on the Eastern fron where countless german and russian soldiers lost their lives it is difficult to understand. While these events are glorified the usage of the Atom Bomb is rarely discussed to my knowledge. Now I want to be honest the usage of the first bomb in my opinion was justified given the radicalness of the japanese regime but the 2nd atom bomb is at least worth discussing about given the state Japan was in at the time. If I were to glorify anything about the US regarding WWII it would be the financial help Europe and especially Germany received after the war ended. The Marshall plan really helped my country develop into what it is today, prevented another turmoil and I will forever be greatful for it. I'll be quite honest to a certain amount I envy the US americans a bit because I think that it should be possible to learn about especially Prussian History in school as a german and be proud of my history. I think that certain personalities like Frederick the Great are worth being proud of as one of the first enlightened monarchs in europe and sometimes I'd like to have a bit more patriotism myself. But nowadays I think the disavantages outweigh the benefits because Patriotism blinds the people. Losses especially in WWII allowed for us to learn a lot regarding what kind of society we want to be, how do we want to live with our neighbors, what is more important patriotism or working together with other nations in cooperation? Also how can we rebuild our states to be less likely to fall to radicalism. I believe the Europe we have today has only been possible because of our joint experiences in WWII and I for one am a proud european. When I look at russian society, english society as well as US society, I see soceties and political parties that are stuck in their ways because they have no experiences to learn from. They substitute this with Patriotism but at a certain point in time every country needs to face it's demons. A lack of learning means a lack of societal progress.

Biggest thing I remember from my history teacher on any war was this. ''remember that winners write history"

History was my main subject in my final school years. I'm still grateful to my teacher Friedrich Krüger, for inspiring us, bringing us closer to the events of the 19th and 20th century and taking us to the places where it all happened. RIP.

Thank you for another great video with an exciting topic and clever questions. I would like to tell a story from my family to demonstrate how strange and weird wars are: I found members of my family in the USA as part of my genealogy research 25 years ago. And the Buwen couple from the USA also visited us one day in Germany. My relative, whose first name was Peter, like me, told me that his father - my grand cousin - was an American fighter pilot during World War II and flew missions with a P-51 over Germany. I then told him in return that a mutual relative of both of us at the end of the war as an old man in Frankfurt, sitting in his rocking chair on the terrace of his house, was hit by an American aircraft machine gun and killed. So it wouldn't be unthinkable that the American pilot killed his own cousin. And basically it's always like this: we're actually all just cousins. War is strange.

Thank you so much about this comprehensive view of history-telling in America. The oscar-winning movie "Im Westen nichts Neues" is a great film. But it is about WW1.

I am german and when I had my exchange year in the US I told my foster parents about how my school in Germany is called Geschwister Scholl Schule and they've never heard of them so we watched Die Letzten tage (The last Days) and they really liked it and it opened up a whole new conversation about the teachings in Germany/US.

I was out walking with my American friend here in Norway some years ago. What's that over there, she said. I replied: Oh, just a bomb shelter from the war. We used to play there when we were kids. Imagining all sorts of ghosts of German soldiers getting us. It's closed now, it's not the 70s anymore, it's all about health and safety these days. She went quiet for a bit. "Oh, you guys were actually occupied". Yep. And what happened to us was nothing compared to other nations.

I like your videos much. You put a lot of research in your videos, very fact based and well presented. Educational. Keep on going so.

again a wow video from the TBFF, thank you Ashton for showing another different point of view between our cultures...

I lived a year as an exchange student in South Carolina. It was in the history classes of US High School where I realised how little Finnish schools teach about WW2. Nobody had ever told me about the war in the Pacific

I totally recommend Buchanans book: "The unnecessary war". Why Americans romanticize WW2? The were in a great depression after 1929 and the war in Europe was an good opportunity to get out of it. No bombing of their cities, nearly no deads for such a big country and becoming an world power for nearly no costs. And after WW2 they could everyone force to buy their crappy products and get rich. So it was the Golden era for America.

Danke für den tollen Beitrag! Ich sehe viele Mängel in unserem Bildungssystem in Deutschland. Aber wenn ich das Ergebnis mit Amerika vergleiche, stehen wir sehr gut da. ;-)

Very well done, This probably has cost some time to decide and put forward, but the tone, level of honesty and viewpoint is perfectly chosen. History (I hated it during my entire education) is arguably the most important thing to learn. You can catch up as an adult though. Thanks for this

I'm Canadian. I learned most of what I know about WWII AND WWI from taking History 12. It covered 20 century almost exclusively. It was decades ago but I still remember the graphic video's about the Holocaust and the various issues globally. I am close to 50 now but that class I remember more of than most others. It was a 10 month course that was optional and was 1 hour long. We had to read about 3 or 4 books a week and do essays, presentations about various historical events. It was a difficult and time intensive class. It was lecture style with questions and answers in the last ten minutes of class. World history was covered almost exclusively from a NA point of view. We covered not just facts, but various political POV and the reasons behind them. Various military events, the facts of them, and some of the behaviors of the participants and the reasons for why they did things that way. I have mostly forgotten almost the entire class though. We learned about not just the wars but politics, world events, peoples, and organizations. There were a few weeks where we sometimes had to pick a POV we were against and argue that POV against another group in a debate format. That was pretty easy for me but many other students would just flat out refuse to do that. I have always had very flexible morals and ethics. I tend to go with the flow of what people around me think. I understand the implications of this quiet well and can easily see how things happened in Europe the way they did. I can empathize with any POV which I have found leads people to the wrong conclusion that I agree with or condone the behaviors of others that commit various crimes. I don't agree with most of what people do when they commit crimes but I can see why and how they end up that way. I can imagine how things go without issues. Like mass shooters in the USA. It is absolutely horrible but I can see how they think and even understand how they end up behaving that way. I cannot condone or accept it but many people look at me when I try and explain what motivated actions and they shake their head saying even thinking those ideas was wrong. What makes history complicated to me is what to believe as most English's texts I have seen don't cover the moral and ethical behavior of the enemy. They do cover the behavior but not the reasons behind it. The books and educational material I am referring to are for Highschool or below. I imagine the details at higher education are more comprehensive and go into more details.

The thing I remember most poignantly from one of my history textbooks in high school was the staggering difference in emphasis when describing different genocides that have happened in the 20th century. The Rowandan genocide was given maybe one paragraph of text in a side page description box. With the Armenian genocide given a similarly small denotation in the textbook. Whereas the holocaust was given I think 2 sections of a chapter entirely devoted to it. This, to me, was an incredibly upsetting situation to be presented with. I feel like the emphasis of the lesson was taken from 'how sadly common it is for humanity to divide into groups and attempt to wipe out perceived opposing groups' to 'look how bad the Germans were in world war 2 and how good the Americans (we, as I was born in America) were for fighting and defeating the Germans.'. I think this idea of righteousness in war and inflicting suffering on others is one of the biggest tragedies I have seen in my lifetime. For me, all suffering is a tragedy and no one can ever win a war.

I spent a year as a high school student in Ohio and I was really surprised that the focus in US history classes is the war itself. Be it the Civil War or World War 2, the general framework of the class was going through the battles instead of the reasons, different positions and the effects afterwards. Mind you this was also part of it, but it was a side note to discussing in detail how the battles were fought, who fought, where and what the battle strategies were. It was interesting coming from Germany where individual battles were not topic of history classes. Maybe Stalingrad and otherwise more general concepts like the western or eastern front. Here the focus was on the socio economic situation, how it started, what came after and everything around the actual battles, except for talking in details about battles themselves. Of course this is in part as the US was mostly sending troops and supplies and wasn’t affected themselves from battles at home, but as I mentioned this structure was the same when talking about the American Civil War like the Battle of Gettysburg. Interestingly the assassination of Kennedy was also an extensive topic covering all the theories, who shot, where they shot from, how many bullet casings where found in the library I think it was and generally the theories like the Umbrella man and someone shooting through that wood fence/wall etc. which was also kinda focused on the killing part lol same with the Lincoln assassination in the theater or Roosevelt being saved by his speech notes in the suit pocket i think it was haha

Thanks guys a lot for another great video. Not sure from where to start because we have a big background of learning history about World War 2. I was born in Belarus (SSSR) and my family is Jewish they were living in East Poland on the border of Germany where during 1939-1944 34 members of my family were descended during that time and the rest of the family ran away or fight during that time. In Belarus during World War 2 every 3 person were killed, history starts in a 4 grade and continues all away till the end of your high school if I remember right classes were 3 times a week. Now I am leaving a long time in US and was most shocking for me couple years ago when my 8-grade daughter comes to me and say do you know that in our history classes, they are saying that America wins World War 2, I was like ohhhh really, I was ask her if she can do presentation about her family during World War 2 time and what we know and how her dads family side was doing in that time. After that presentation her classmates stop making fun about that she has Soviet Union parents, and they don't know a lot about that time)

Your videos belong to the best youtube has to offer. You deserve a much greater publicity. Thank you for all this effort !

I'm surprised you didn't mention one thing; but maybe that doesn't happen (that often) where you live: In my part of germany (the ruhr area), it's quite common to hear about a several hundreds of pounds bomb somewhere in the city. The usual reaction? Check to see if it impacts the bus/tram/autobahn you want to use later that day, and check to see wether you / your home are in the evacuation zone.

Here in the UK the legacy of Aerial bombing and navel warfare are a common event as regards unexploded bombs or sea mines washing up on the shores. Sea mines have become rare as time has moved on but buried bombs are still quite common with a few every month still being discovered. It’s the same in France, Poland and much more common in Germany. I guess these are still active reminders of the war and just as deadly. Where as in the US it’s solely just history found in museums, old film footage and ever shrinking numbers of old veterans memory’s.

What a complicated topic you picked, Ashton! Thanks so much for your effort to clarify. It is difficult to describe the relationship Germans have to WWII. I realise that when I hear that foreigners visiting a concentration camp were approached by police for playing ball on the site and they did not understand what the big deal was. To them, it's just "another attraction" to visit and therefore just had a little bit of fun, for us it is a sombre reminder of our recent past, and playing ball on that site is perceived as being a lack of respect. In German highschool, 5 years of my history classes were solely on WWII, so if you count that a year has 40 school weeks approximately (don't shoot me if it is a bit more or less) in my neck of the woods and that I had 1 hour of history every week, we are up to a total of about 200 hours of WWII history, so go figure the details. Also, there are many documentaries in Germany about more of WWII which are constantly on on some TV channel, and naturally, you can also find them on KZfaq and so on. So Germans in general really know a lot about WWII and are very aware about details. What I find a bit scary is how little some Americans really know about history and especially WWII. I find it absolutely shocking to see that there are Nazi groups in America with hispanic people, people of color and so on. It makes me shiver, because due to their lack of knowledge, they aren't aware what would have happened to them in Nazi Germany. And to end it all: I do not understand what good a history class is when you only hear about the core data. Is it to memorise any dates? Because such class definitely doesn't help to learn why things have happened (and will happen) in this world.

I live in Berlin and I am not finished with school (currently 12th grade), so the amount of history lessons that were spent on WWII were probably above average. We started with Germany pre WWI and worked our way through the first WW and how it evolved, focusing on main events as the "Roter Faden" (Sarajevo etc.). After WWI we learned about how the Paris Treaty pushed Germanies newly founded Democracy ("Weimarer Republik") into a corner with Hyperinflation, the occupation of the Ruhr-Gebiet by France, the seperated german military functioning almost as a seperate entity from the state, the spread of misery amongst the population and its overall systemic flaws ("Ersatzkaiser", missing "Sperrklausel" etc.) and how that led to more extreme political positions (KPD (communism), NSDAP (you know), DVP (antisemitism...) and maybe more). And how finally there was literal war on the streets fought by the political parties with their paramilitary organisations (most famously the NSDAP's supression of opposing political parties). And this eventually leading to the democratic election of Adolf Hitler as "Reichskanzler" amongst others through populism (link to todays world AfD, Republicans etc) and use of conspiracy belief ("Dolchstoßlegende"). And finally to the war and its major turnpoints and cruels of the Nazi government (Holocaust, mass-executions), focusing on reports by people of that time that were deported (concentration camps) and the overall effect on society. The amount of literal war that was discussed goes near 5% so incredibly small. This was done to divert an attack on our todays democracy from right wing (left wing too but the amount of which is forgetable) extremism (doesnt really seem to work AfD=~20%) and to prevent another Holocaust by all means. Thanks for the video!

I am from Denmark, and what we were taught was very in-depth about specifically Germany. We started learning about it in middle school. We read books like "The Boy in The Striped Pajamas" and learned about the holocaust. When I moved onto high school, we were taught about the politics of the war and priarily about the german side of the war as well as some general stuff about the american side and what had happened on the paciffic front. We had minimal, or at least very few discussions about the german occuaption of Denmark. During out classes, we not only discussed the factual and statistical side of the war, but also discussed it and focused on tying it to other historical situations, like how the war affected more recent events and mindsets and what lead to it. I am very happy to have gotten such an in depth and nuanced education, and hope that more people get the same experience in the coming years.

From an American point of view, the dead of World War II are heroes, from a German point of view, they are victims. That's a big difference, isn't it.

The bringing of democracy to Europe idea seems a bit of a stretch. You could say they helped return some parts of Europe to Democracy, because otherwise it is suggesting that America invented democracy, introduced the idea to the entirety of Europe and did so on their own.

Very cool new Intro! Keep up the amazing work👍🏼

As usual a very high quality video, well prepared and informative.

A good and nice Video again, greatg job. For me as a German, I learned about WWII at school when I was 12-13, almost before the 1970s. Yes we learned a lot but at that age there are more things in private life that were more important , sorry! My knowledge of WWII started when I became more interested in it in my early 40's. My opinion is that German schools need to be taught more about the Second World War and the Nazi regime in order to understand the current political situation and to suppress certain undemocratic tendencies.

WW2 certainly was a just war from the American perspective. But it was not necessarily fought with just means, thinking of the nukes dropped on Hiroshima and especially Nagasaki or bomb carpets on German cities like Dresden. Glorifying any war is very foreign to Germans as we are taught relentlessly in school that any war is morally wrong and even fighting against an aggressor is only a necessary evil.

I learned a lot from my teachers. We had a few veterans come speak with our classes. Even answering questions through their tears. We had Americans, German and French. A couple of Italian and Polish people. K think we were one of the last classes with all of those wonderful people who poured out those heavy memories and admit that they did terrible things. Even Americans were ashamed of things they saw and did. There were plenty of funny moments shared too. I think those were needed to keep sane. I had family on both the 🇺🇸 and German sides of the war, and though my part of the family had been here for over 80 years before the war, we were interpreters and field specialists. Most saw too much action. My great uncle met Mel Brooke's at the Battle of the Bulge. I lost family in Pearl Harbor also. We didn't have access to the soviet side of things in the mid 90's, but I met a few later on. My sister did a major report on one of George Pattons primary aides during the war. It won some awards here in iowa, and it made our papers. He died shortly after, but I'm certain that the weight off his soul had helped his mind find more peace. We had a German POW camp about 20 miles north of where I grew up. Many of those German soldiers were very fond of what American possibilities were like, so many applied to become citizens and did so. Iowa has a large Germanic population, and I'm proud of the history of the German people. Yes, they stumbled, and the worst stumble was due to an Austrian interloper. War is an easy way to set an economy in motion. It keeps people busy and if it's done right it can make people happy. I have read extensively on both world wars in all theaters. I remember groups of us walking to the front of the class and offering firm handshakes and hugs and thanks gmfor their time reliving so many bad things. I wish we could have kept those people forever as a lesson, but they deserve to rest. Old soldiers are still human. Those 2 teachers deserved much much more recognition than they ever received. I.do miss those classes 25 years later.

Thank you for your video - as always very informed and informative.

To be fair it is sensible that germany as the perpetrator would have more focus on it with such a close relation. In Germany we do not learn about the atrocities from Belgium to the congo (or at least i didn't) and american history or wars like vietnam or irak were kept rather short too. Slavery is probably a really big topic in the US, right? I think that also serves fighting racism from a different perspective that maybe students feel they can relate to more (when it happened right in their country). But first of all calling it the "good war" definitely is disgusting as someone else here said and also i think the whole world should learn from it looking at nationalism rising in many countries.

I am from the Netherlands and learning of ww2 is centered around the beginning of may. In the days ahead of the memorial moment 4th of may and Liberation day. Schools and media pay attention to the war. My personal memory was in primairy school when every one got a Liberation news paper. I rembember the images that most impacted me where the images of piles of sorted personal belongings from the concentration camps especially the glasses. The other was the markings used to distinct the humans in groups. Like the Yellow david star, the pink triangle for gays. The red triangle for left wing Supports. So my in my experience WW2 was less about the battles and more on the systematic elimination of the "unwanted" and political opposition.

As with many other commenters, WWII education started at home. I am Dutch and from 68, both my parents where between 5 to 10 during the war. All my grandparents are WWII survivors.Stories were told from both the child as the adult perspective. In school, it was one of the major themes starting from elementary all the way until my graduation. One of the things that struck me in your video is how little the younger generation Americans know while they at the same time are quick to say "If it wasn't for us you would be speaking German" which is comically wrong in the case of the Netherlands as most of the country got liberated by the Canadians and Polish troops. In fact, after liberating a small part of the Netherlands the Americans stopped advancing, what followed for the rest of the Netherlands, was the most brutal winter famine in centuries.

World War II was taught in a rather fragmentary way in my United States public school education. I read a lot about it on my own initiative so it's hard to separate what I learned in school versus what I learned on my own. My first exposure to the holocaust was my 5th grade reading teacher who was too young to fight in the war but joined the Army as the war ended. He spent some years in Germany as part of the U.S. occupation force and told us the Army had them tour a concentration camp. He spoke in very general terms and the extent of what happened did not penetrate at that time. Most of what I remember learning about the war before high school was the documentary "The World at War" narrated by Lawrence Olivier. The episode about the holocaust marked the first time I understood the extent, the stages leading up to it, and placing it in the larger context of the Nazis and their ideology. The public school did not do that at all. For my classmates in high school years later it was a mini-series aired in the late 70s that gave them their first lesson in the holocaust. Essentially, from what I have observed, Americans learn about history mostly from seeing it acted out in movies and television shows. Our public education system (at least as I experienced it in the 60s and 70s) failed badly and repeatedly and in more respects than just WWII.