Berlin Feels the Pain

The city of Berlin is one of the cultural centers of central Europe, along with Prague and Vienna. Museums, concerts, and architecture make this city a goal for educated people from every nation. Naturally, they know how to have fun, too - there are nightclubs for dancing, and stadiums for soccer matches. But this exciting city has seen its difficult times. Historian William F. Buckley, Jr., writes:

Berliners suffered greatly from the defeat of Germany in World War I, though their city's buildings were not much damaged. And then came Adolf Hitler, and World War II.

When the Nazis took over Germany, they created more misery in twelve years than the nation would normally see in a century. Hitler damaged Germany in many ways:

The British air raids began in 1940; the American, in 1942. Potsdamerplatz was taken out early, reduced to rubble by a bombing raid in the 1941. The Reich buildings and older official buildings nearby, along Unter den Linden, were particular targets. But it was not the Allies who destroyed the original linden trees: that had been done before the war, on Hitler's orders, to facilitate the digging of a new U-Bahn (subway) tunnel. The area around the Kurfürstendamm also was hit hard. Block after block of apartment houses had their habitable areas reduced to basement and sometimes ground floor, which survivors of the air raids shared with rats. In April 1945, one and half million Soviet soldiers marched in from the east, determined to take revenge for the Battle of Stalingrad and the siege of Leningrad. By the time Hitler killed himself in his bunker, some fifty thousand Berliners had died and many times that number had fled; 39 percent of all buildings in the city had been destroyed, including more than a quarter of the housing stock.

As devastating as the destruction was, the rebuilding of the city was also amazing. These landmarks were all restored and rebuilt, and are worth studying as cultural and architectural pieces. Potsdamerplatz is a large square or plaza, surrounded by buildings, and featuring trees, fountains, and sculptures. Unter den Linden is a grand boulevard street through heart of the city lined on both sides with linden trees. The city's U-Bahn (subway) system is linked with elevated railroads, streetcars, and local commuter trains to form a masterful public transportation system. Kurfürstendamm is an elegant street defining an upscale shopping area.

Berlin was a major cultural center in the 1800's, and it is still one today - a fact which is astounding, given the horror inflicted on the city, and the destruction from which it rebuilt itself.

Romania's Path to Freedom

Each of the separate Warsaw Pact countries worked to find a path to liberty between 1988 and 1991. Most succeeded. In each of these different Eastern Bloc nations, the route was slightly different, reflecting the unique circumstances of each. William F. Buckley, Jr., writes about Romania:

Until the mid-Sixties, Romania had been, so to speak, an ordinary, well-behaved Soviet satellite. Under Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej, Romania was totalitarian, but a state in which there was some room to maneuver. When Gheorghiu-Dej died and Nicolae Ceausecscu took over, he set about closing up that room. He strengthened the Securitate, the secret police. They were now the equivalent of the Gestapo, the Stasi, the KGB. He instituted his "systematization" program. Rural villages were destroyed, peasant families forcibly relocated. This anti-kulak-style program was to lead to grand new agricultural collectives, which, however, never materialized. Agricultural production dropped catastrophically. Much of what was produced was sold abroad to acquire the funds necessary to maintain the Securitate.

This application of Marxist principles was perhaps one of the most literal to be found anywhere. The relocation of farmers, collectivization of agriculture, and other steps taken are quite directly from Marx's Communist Manifesto and predictably had disastrous results.

Ceausescu also generated a massive personality cult. His picture was everywhere, printed on posters, woven into tapestries, painted on walls. In Bucharest nine thousand houses and sixteen historic churches were bulldozed in order to create the Boulevard of Socialist Victory - an eight-lane road sweeping up to the Palace of Parliament. Before World War II and the Communist takeover, Bucharest had been the most elegant city in the region. Now, British journalist Anthony Daniels remarked that Ceausescu seemed determined to turn the Paris of the Balkans into the Pyongyang of the Balkans.

Romania's rich cultural heritage was indeed partially destroyed. Architectural masterpieces from the 1600's and 1700's were wiped away to create Stalinist monstrosities in the official style of Socialist Realism. All of which was remembered in the deep collective consciousness of the people of Romania, who were in no position at the time to rebel. But they would watch and wait, and the opportunity would eventually arise.

Ceausescu was not prepared to go quietly ... when opposition started to emerge, Ceausescu moved quickly to cut it down. In March 1989, a group of retired Party and government published an open letter accusing him of human-rights violations and demanding an end to the systematization program. All six signatories were arrested. Efforts to communicate with them were blocked.

Although the communist regime was still in control, and able to quickly silence this dissent, the first cracks in the wall of their monolith had appeared.

Then, in December, protests broke out in Timisoara, a city in the Transylvanian region, near Romania's borders with Hungary and Yugoslavia. The protests were sparked by government harassment of the Reverend Laszlo Tokes, a Protestant minister who had been set upon and stabbed by a band of masked men, almost certainly members of the Securitate. On December 16 the protests evolved into a full-scale demonstration. Ceausescu reacted ... Army and Securitate forces, incuding tank and helicopter units, moved in and started firing. The death toll was estimated at an extraordinary four thousand. The United States, Britain, Poland, and even the Soviet Union issued protests. Ceausescu was not in Bucharest to receive them. He was in Iran, going ahead with a scheduled state visit.

By 1989, there was nothing new about such Stalinist indifference - it had been going on since at least 1924 (Lenin's death and the beginning of Stalin's rise), if not since 1917. But what was new was the cultural climate in which ordinary people began to believe that they did not have to accept such treatment.

On December 20, Ceausescu returned to Bucharest and blasted the "fascists" and "terrorists" who were stirring up dissent. The next day at noon he stood on the balcony of the Palace of Parliament to address his people. Television cameras captured the astonishment on his face when his people began to boo and jeer him. Securitate forces swung into action to disperse the crowd. The first casualties were two young men crushed beneath an armored car. Fighting continued through the night, with an estimated forty dead in Bucharest, and another thirty in Cluj, a small city in Transylvania. But as protests erupted in other parts of the country, reports came in that army units were refusing to help the Securitate forces suppress them.

At this point, things began to change very quickly. With an open split between the army and the state police, everyone but perhaps Ceausescu knew that the end was near.

On the morning of December 22, Radio Bucharest announced that Defense Minister Vasile Milea had committed suicide. Neither foreign diplomats in Bucharest nor the Romanian General Staff believed it: they suspected that Milea had been killed by Securitate officers in retaliation for the army's failure to support them.

As often happens in history, when a totalitarian absolutist regime clamps down with its brutal power in an attempt to quell the unrest, it actually merely makes the unrest worse.

That may have been the decisive event. When one hundred fifty thousand protesters gathered later that day in Bucharest's University Square, the army actively joined them in beating back the Securitate. The insurgents captured the Palace of Parliament, the Central Committee headquarters, and other government buildings. That evening the liberated Radio Bucharest announced the formation of the National Salvation Front, which would include Laszlo Tokes and General Stefan Gusa, chief of the General Staff.

Romania was beginning to breathe the fresh air of freedom. One can try to assign credit for this to Pastor Tokes or to General Gusa, but the majority of the credit must go the people themselves, who had been suffering and who saw a chance to topple the individual and the system which caused their suffering.

Soon after the announcement, Nicolae and Elena Ceausescu, who had fled Bucharest by helicopter that morning, were captured by armed insurgents and handed over to the military. On Christmas Day they were put on trial by a self-described "extraordinary military tribunal" and charged with committing genocide, abusing power, undermining the economy, and stealing government funds. For fear that the Securitate would come in with a last-minute rescue, the army did not disclose the site of the trial, and no outside observers were permitted. However, the proceedings were videotaped, and the entire trial was broadcast on Romanian television the following day. The day after that, we in America could see a short clip on our own television screens - an elderly couple huddled in their overcoats and looking bewildered and almost pitiable. Almost. One of Nicolae Ceausescu's replies to his interrogators reflected his posture: "I am the president of Romania and the commander in chief of the Romanian army. I am the president of this people. I will not speak with you provocateurs any more, and I will not speak with the organizers of the putsch."

Although unpleasant, it was a proper start for the new era in Romania's history to fully videotape and broadcast these proceedings. As painful as it was, this was the new type of openness which Romania needed in order to begin properly a new phase in its national saga.

As for Elena Ceausescu, she was no innocent bystander. She was a Politburo member and first deputy prime minister. A few months earlier, when it appeared that ill health might force her husband to step down, she started jockeying for position to succeed him. Now, at the trial, she occasionally piped up with remarks like "Such impudence! I am a member and the chairwoman of the Academy of Sciences. You cannot talk to me in such a way!"

The couple made it easy for the Romanians. Had they eloquently and humbly defended themselves, they might have gained a modicum of sympathy. They could have never retained any form of power, but they could perhaps have found slightly less harsh treatment. As it was, they only infuriated the people even more.

The trial was not a model of due process (although the Ceausescus were offered a defense counsel, whose services they indignantly refused). But there is no doubt that the couple had done the things they were accused of.

Romania knew it had suffered - and here one is justified in personifying the nation, unlike so many other historical narratives, because the understanding of this misery was ubiquitous in the land - but it could not punish the system. One cannot see to it that a system endures the logical consequences of its actions. One can only ensure that the individuals who operated the system face the consequences of their actions. The system itself cannot be punished, only cast aside. People can be punished.

They were sentenced to death by firing squad. Then there ensued macabre confusion. Accounts differ. Perhaps the officer in charge of the firing squad was apprehensive that the Securitate forces, still active, would storm in before the executioners could do their job. Perhaps he and the squad members were awestruck at having in their power the dictators who had oppressed them for so long. Whatever. The result was disorder. The soldiers didn't wait for the formal order to fire, starting to pull their triggers as soon as the Ceausescus stepped outside the building. No one knows how many bullets were fired, but photographs showed the bloody remains.

As with deaths of any brutal ruler, there is a bittersweet emotion - naturally, one is glad that oppressed nation has been freed, and yet it is sobering to realize that after the deaths of thousand of brave rebels, these two additional deaths were still necessary to bring liberty. Both words in the phrase "necessary evil" make themselves felt.

Warehouses broken open by the insurgents after the execution confirmed the widespread belief that, while most Romanians lived in destitution, Party leaders were copiously supplied with luxuries, including beef, chocolate, coffee, and oranges. As Elena Ceausescu was being led to the firing squad, she cried out, "I was like a mother to you!" Mother ate off gold dishes, the kids starved.

In an instant, all the Marxist sloganeering about a classless society, about a people's revolution, and about equality was shown to be a lie. The communist ideology had never been anything more than a facade to cover the dictator's ability to amass personal wealth at the expense of the people. Romania had suffered bitterly for decades so that the ruler and his wife might enjoy the finest luxuries.

Soon after taking power, Nicolae Ceausescu had outlawed Christmas. Now, against the grisly background of his and Elena's execution, with the fighting still continuing, Romanians celebrated the Feast of the Nativity for the first time in more than twenty years.

The great script of history is written to unfold with precise irony - nobody in Romania planned for the overthrow to coincide precisely with Christmas, and nobody in Romania could have manipulated events so exactly even if they had wanted to. Yet the nation received its freedom as its first Christmas present in more than two decades.

Goths, Not Savages

The Goths, the Germanic tribe which controlled most of Europe from the 300’s A.D. to the 500’s A.D., were not primitive cavemen. Some history books still describe them that way; but why? Because the Romans, desperately needing to blame their own decline on someone else, wrote about any other society in such terms.

In fact, the Goths possessed a literate culture, capable of not only producing major scholarly works, but commentaries upon those works. To this day, we possess Gothic commentaries on Gothic translations of the New Testament, and legal contracts written with the subtle sophistication in which lawyers in all cultures and all times pride themselves.

But the Romans could not admit that they had been outwitted, and would rather say that they have been overcome by primitive savages. Thus began the historically incorrect image of the Goths. Historian William Weir writes:

The Barbarians were literally at the gate. It was 408 A.D., and the Gothic king Alaric had led his army from the eastern Roman Empire to journey westward through Greece, across the Alps, and into the heart of Italy. They now surrounded the world’s capital city, controlling all means of transport in and out.

By this time, however, Rome had long ceased to be the world’s capital. The empire had been divided, east and west, and soon the division would become complete, when the Byzantine Empire was recognized as an independent entity. Europe’s Germanic tribes had shown that Rome no longer reigned supreme north of the Alps, and the Persians were demonstrating this same fact at the eastern end of the Mediterranean.

The citizens of Rome could do nothing except bide their time inside the city walls until the detested barbarians decided what to do next. They had no means of communication with the outside world and, worse, had begun to run out of food. Dead bodies started piling up throughout the city, swelling and rotting in the August sun. Then, stories of cannibalism began to spread. People were killing their own friends, it was reported, and eating them on the spot. And some people even heard tales of mothers eating their babies.

Roman imperial power, which once controlled lands from Scotland to Egypt, was now unable even to keep its own capital city secure. Rome was no longer the capital of the world - if indeed it ever truly had been - and now it was not clear if it was the capital of anything at all.

Another story making the rounds was that Serena - niece of the later emperor Theodosius, widow of the Roman general Stilichio, and surrogate mother to the present child-emperor, Honorius - had secretly conspired with Alaric to let the Goths into the city to kill everyone. The claim was based on one truth - her husband’s father was a barbarian, in this case, a Vandal - and numerous leaps of logic that racists were able to make in such situations. Once a barbarian-lover always a barbarian-lover, the thinking went. The senate hastily voted to have Serena put to death; she was strangled immediately.

Such paranoia is typical of empires in decline. Similar mentalities were noted in the last year of imperial Russia before 1917. The Goths were, in fact, open to diplomatic negotiation and even preferred it to open warfare.

Two Roman delegates bravely ventured out from the city and met with Alaric to negotiate his peaceful departure. Alaric’s demands included gold, silver, and the freedom of every barbarian slave inside Rome. “What will you leave us?” asked the delegates. “Your lives,” Alaric replied. Although they were in no real position to do so, the Romans balked at the deal. So Alaric lowered his demand for riches. But he remained firm on the freedom of all barbarians in Rome.

At this point, the Goths have given up their demands for large amounts of money, and are merely asking for the emancipation of slaves. It is the Romans who appear savage, willing to risk war over the principle of preserving slavery: an interesting foreshadowing of the American Civil War. However, before hostilities could begin, calmer heads inside Rome prevailed: Rome desperately desired to preserve the institution of slavery; the Goths wanted to get rid of it. But simple physical calculations showed that the Goths would win overwhelmingly, and so the Romans had to yield, despite their love for the institution of slavery.

The deal was soon settled, and Rome’s gates were opened to deliver the material and human treasures. A mass of 30,000 barbarian slaves poured out of Rome, many of them for the first time in their lives. Alaric kept his word and immediately lifted the siege, allowing for the passage of goods and food to and from the port.

It becomes clear that the Romans were as “savage” - or more so - than the Goths, given that they were almost willing to destroy themselves to defend the institution of slavery, and given that the Goths were willing to back down from their demands for gold and silver simply to free their fellow Germanic tribesmen. Who were the real barbarians here?

Hernan Cortes, Fleeing for His Life

During the first months of 1520, Hernan Cortes and his soldiers spent a number of days in the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan. The politics of the situation were complex and compounded by difficulties in translating. The Aztecs had made allies of some of the neighboring tribal groups - sometimes willing alliances and sometimes forced alliances. Other tribal groups were at war with the Aztecs. The Spanish likewise had both allies and enemies among the locals.

Within the city of Tenochtitlan itself, it was clear that not all the Aztecs were of one mind: some apparently thought that their emperor, Montezuma, was too friendly with Cortes. The situation deteriorated: the emperor went from being the host of the Spaniards to being their prisoner. Cortes decided to leave after the Aztecs assassinated Montezuma, although some say that Cortes killed Montezuma himself. In either case, Cortes decided that it was time to leave. Historian William Weir writes:

Their horses' hooves muffled, the Spanish troops and their Indian allies filed silently through the darkened streets of Tenochtitlan, the fabled city of the Aztec empire. It was raining lightly, and just past midnight on July 1, 1520. Hostility was on every side, but they were not alarmed. "The Aztecs do not fight at night," they had been assured by their commander, the conquistador Hernan Cortes.

Some historians have portrayed Cortes as a butcher who committed killings on a genocidal scale. But in reality the situation, as we have already seen, was complex, and various groups among the Aztecs and other local tribes were engaging in brutal killing among each other. Cortes, in fact, spent much of his time on the run, rather than engaging in brutal oppression. He and his men fled from the city Tenochtitlan, afraid for their own lives:

Then a lantern suddenly shone brightly in the darkness, and a woman's voice shattered the stillness. Out for water, she heard the hoofbeats of the enemy's horses and spotted the shadowy ranks. "Come quickly! Come quickly!" she shouted. "Our enemies are leaving! They are running away!" From a temple top, a priest called out: "Mexican chiefs, your enemies are leaving! Run for your canoes of war!"

The Spaniards now knew that they were in serious trouble. It would get worse. This event would later be known as La Noche Triste or "The Night of Sorrow" in which between 450 and 1,700 Spaniards would be killed along with several thousand Tlaxcalan. The Tlaxcalan were local tribesmen who'd been friendly to the Spanish.

The huge war drum atop the city's giant pyramid sounded, its notes echoing through the city and arousing the populace. Within minutes, volleys of stones, sticks, timbers, anything that could be dropped or thrown, cascaded from the rooftops, knocking marchers to the ground. A torrent of arrows pelted them. Men and women brandishing clubs, stones, and makeshift weapons attacked the fallen, many of whom were weighed down with gold and other loot and could scarcely struggle to their feet. Others rushed to set up the much rehearsed defense of the island city.

Tenochtitlan was a city built on a island in a lake. The island had been reshaped by the Aztecs, and connected to the mainland by bridges and causeways.

In 1520, Tenochtitlan had a population estimated at 200,000. It had been constructed on a blob of land in a volcanic lake in the Valley of Mexico, where the great metropolis of Mexico City stands now. The arriving Spanish marveled at the city, which rivaled in its urbanity the great cities of Europe. Tenochtitlan was linked to the shore by bridges and causeways, set up to allow sections to be dismantled quickly to forestall any attack. Thus Cortes' men had brought with them a makeshift span to cross any gap in a bridge or causeway.

For all its size, and the sophistication of its civil engineering, Tenochtitlan was different from large European cities in one important respect: its society was structured around human sacrifice. No mere sideshow, the frequent bloodlettings, in which healthy young people were dismembered atop the pyramidal temples, were part of the core values of the Aztecs. It was from this society that Cortes was escaping.

Led by Cortes himself, the Spanish soldiers, plus a few hundred Indian allies, now headed for the critical causeway, which would lead them to friendly territory. At its far end, a road would carry them to the land of the Tlaxcalans, many of whom were fighting alongside them. The Tlaxcalans and Aztecs had long been enemies, and the Tlaxcalans were thirsting for a fight.

As the situation unfolded, we see that Hernan Cortes was trying to make a quick, quiet, and peaceful exit from Tenochtitlan. He had no desire for a fight, because he knew that he would most likely lose, being both outnumbered and less familiar with the locale. But a major battle would take place, mainly between the Tenochtitlans and the Tlaxcalans.

Cortes's Indian allies were responsible for the massacre, which Cortes tried to stop. A severe outbreak of smallpox was a major contributor to the fall of Tenochtitlan.

If history accuses Hernando Cortes of anything, it is cowardice rather than butchery. He was simply trying to escape.

The Day Scotland Won Its Freedom

For a number of decades, starting sometime after the Battle of Hastings in 1066, until the early 1300's, Scotland was essentially under English domination, although it had its own quasi-independent monarch. But it was clear that the English were in control, and this did not sit well with the Scottish. Historian William Weir tells of the battle which was the final major step toward self-sovereignty for the Scots:

Riding into battle that June day in 1314, Robert the Bruce's gilded and jeweled crown gleamed brightly in the Scottish mid-summer sunlight. The burly monarch reached up, adjusted the crown, and thrust it more firmly down over his leathern helmet. Kings did not normally wear their crowns into battle, but the Scottish king was making a statement.

Wearing the crown - the symbol of sovereignty - into battle against the English was indeed a statement. Lasting two days, the Battle of Bannockburn is a high point in Scottish history.

Not one to choose a sturdy warhorse, the king sat astride a diminutive palfrey, a pony-sized steed favored by royalty and high-ranking nobles for its smooth and easy gait. He guided the frisky animal back and forth before the assembled Scottish spearmen, archers, and men-at-arms, exhorting them to battle. He knew his force would be badly outnumbered, but he appealed to their patriotism and bravery.

The enemy, the English soldiers, were led by their king, Edward II. Despite their greater numbers, they would be defeated, and it would be the worst defeat of the English military since 1066.

A fourteenth-century mounted king might ordinarily remain in the rear, guiding the movement of troops. Robert rode ahead of the formation, clearly exposed, as an example. He carried neither sword nor spear, only a battleaxe.

Early in the battle, Robert swung his axe down on the head of an English knight, Henry de Bohun, so hard that it split both helmet and skull evenly in two. Robert's axe-handle broke from the power of the blow. The Scottish troops were cheered, seeing their king fight so successfully.

To the English force massing opposite him, across the sun-hardened marshland of Bannockburn, he was sending a message, too. Friend and foe alike were being notified that after a series of English invasions of the highland nation, and some ignominious defeats, the thirty-nine-year-old Scottish monarch was defiantly drawing a line in the sand. Here the War for Scottish Independence would be fought, and the outcome would rest in his hands. The message was clear: Robert the Bruce was back, both as an inspiration and a target.

We do not have very accurate numbers about the two-day battle. The Scottish arrived with between five and ten thousand troops; estimate of their dead range from 400 to 4,000. The English with between 13,700 and 25,000 men; of them, between 4,700 and 11,700 died. It is clear, however, that by the end of the battle, the Scots had taken a big step toward independence.

War and Plague

In the 1300's, western Europe was hit with two spectacular crises: the Black Death Plague, and the Hundred Years' War. Between 1337 and 1453, there was not continuous battle, so the name of the conflict is misleading; it also did not last precisely one hundred years, as the dates reveal. Central Europe suffered from the Plague as well, but was not involved in the war. The fighting had been going on for about ten years when the disease swept through all of Europe between 1346 and 1351.

There were ceasefires and truces which halted the battles. Fighting also stopped out of necessity because of weather or food shortages. The Plague also produced suspension of hostilities. Historian Barbara Tuchman writes:

In October 1347, two months after the fall of Calais, Genoese trading ships put into the harbor of Messina in Sicily with dead and dying men at the oars. The ships had come from the Black Sea port of Caffa (now Feodosiya) in the Crimea, where the Genoese maintained a trading post. The diseased sailors showed strange black swellings about the size of an egg or an apple in the armpits and groin. The swellings oozed blood and pus and were followed by spreading boils and black blotches on the skin from internal bleeding. The sick suffered severe pain and died quickly within five days of the first symptoms. As the disease spread, other symptoms of continuous fever and spitting of blood appeared instead of the swellings or buboes. These victims coughed and sweated heavily and died even more quickly, within three days or less, sometimes in 24 hours. In both types everything that issued from the body - breath, sweat, blood from the buboes and lungs, bloody urine, and blood-blackened excrement - smelled foul. Depression and despair accompanied the physical symptoms, and before the end "death is seen seated on the face."

The disease would kill millions, in some places entire towns. Forcing an armistice in the war would be the least of its sociological impacts. European society was put to a severe test. Some failed the test, turning to looting and otherwise exploiting the situation. But many rose to the occasion, as they tended the sick at great danger to themselves. There were no proper 'hospitals' then, but makeshift sick wards were staffed by people who volunteered out of sense of humanity.

In sum, the Plague revealed heroism - naturally, monks, nuns, and priests in large numbers devoted themselves to tending the ill, risking infection, and in some cases, practically ensuring it. But more revealing still were the large numbers of ordinary laypeople who organized themselves into ad hoc infirmaries, taking on those same risks, simply living out the sense of 'being there for others' which is so central to the European tradition.

Sadly, the end of the Plague around 1351 also paved the way for the resumption of warfare. It took society a few years to steady itself, but then the conflict between France and England continued. Ironically, the Plague, among the many sufferings it visited upon Europe, had at least one blessing - peace for a time.