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SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2009
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NEWS ABOUT: World War II

World War II stories: 102 news summaries

1 - 20 of 102 Stories | 1 2 3 4 5 6 Next >>

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 Hitler's Last Aide Dies 

Fritz Darges still thought Fuhrer 'greatest man who ever lived'

Oct 30, 09 6:46 AM CDT
(Newser) - The last surviving member of Adolf Hitler's inner circle died this week, at 96, and historians hope his soon-to-be released memoirs will silence once and for all claims from revisionists that Hitler wasn't aware of the Holocaust. Fritz Darges was present at most of Hitler's conferences until 1944, when he... More »

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Holocaust • Adolf Hitler • Nazi • World War II • memoir • Nazi Germany

 Nazi Hitman Goes on Trial 

88-year-old who killed Dutch civilians faces German court

Oct 28, 09 2:59 AM CDT
(Newser) - A Dutch Nazi collaborator who killed his countrymen in reprisals for anti-German actions has gone on trial in Germany. Heinrich Boere, 88, has admitted gunning down three civilians as part of a Waffen SS death squad. He fled to Germany after the war and dodged extradition attempts for years. Prosecutors... More »

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Iraq • Germany • war crimes • Netherlands • Nazi • World War II • Nazi collaborators

 WWII GI Returns 
 Looted 16th Century 
 German Books 

Vet took 400-year-old legal volumes home as souvenirs

Oct 8, 09 3:19 AM CDT
(Newser) - Retired optometrist Robert Thomas handed a pair of books he filched as an 18-year-old GI 64 years ago to the German ambassador in a ceremony at the National Archives this week. Thomas, 83, found the 400-year-old legal volumes stashed among millions of others in a salt mine while inspecting recently... More »

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veterans • Germany • World War II • book • National Archives

WATCH IT

 Only Footage 
 of Anne Frank 
 Hits YouTube 

Film of neighbor's wedding in 1941 was given to Holocaust victim's family in the 50s

Oct 2, 09 10:55 AM CDT
(Newser) - The Anne Frank House has posted the only surviving video of the young diarist and Holocaust victim on YouTube. “The footage is very moving and very unique because these are the only moving images of Anne Frank,” a museum representative tells the Guardian. The film, of an... More »

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YouTube • Holocaust • museum • Netherlands • Amsterdam • World War II • Holland • Anne Frank • diary • footage • Otto Frank

 Skull Not 
 Hitler's; 
 Suicide 
 in Doubt 

Bullet-pierced skull fragment belongs to woman under 40, say scientists

Sep 28, 09 2:23 AM CDT
(Newser) - A portion of bullet-pierced skull believed to be Adolf Hitler's is actually from the head of a woman under 40, throwing into question how the Nazi dictator died, American scientists have revealed. The skull portion, seized by Russians after soldiers stormed Hitler's bunker, has the DNA, bone thickness and fusion... More »

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suicide • Adolf Hitler • skull • World War II • bunker buster • Eva Braun

Adidas, Puma End 60-Year Feud—With a Soccer Game

Founding brothers had falling out in 1948

Sep 18, 09 9:18 AM CDT
(Newser) - The family feud is over. Adidas and Puma are putting aside their differences, 60 years after the brothers who founded the German sportswear giants had a falling-out. Adi and Rudolf Dassler divided the town when each started his own company in Herzogenaurach, Germany, after a disagreement during World War II.... More »

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Germany • World War II • Adidas • sportswear • Puma • Adi Dassler • Rudolf Dassler • Herzogenaurach, Germany

 Rings Writer 
 Tolkien Trained 
 as WWII Spy 

Hobbit creator turned down chance to join codebreaking team

Sep 17, 09 4:09 AM CDT
(Newser) - Lord of the Rings author JRR Tolkien secretly trained as a British spy in early 1939, the Daily Telegraph reports. Newly released records show that Tolkien—one of his generation's foremost linguists—was given spy training along with 50 other intellectuals and had been picked to join the team trying... More »

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espionage • World War II • Lord of the Rings • J. R. R. Tolkien

DVD REVIEW

The Human Condition Is
9.5 Hours, in Japanese...

...and 'the greatest
film ever made'

Sep 16, 09 5:13 PM CDT
(Newser) - The Criterion Collection re-release of Masaki Kobayashi’s The Human Condition does high-definition justice to the WWII film critic David Shipman has called “unequivocally the greatest film ever made,” according to Very Short List. The movie follows a good—and handsome—man through the “innumerable trials... More »

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film • Japan • World War II • movies • film criticism • The Human Condition • Masaki Kobayashi • Criterion Collection

OPINION

 Brooks: Humility Is Dead 

Kanye, Joe Wilson lead age of attention-seeking

Sep 15, 09 10:45 AM CDT
(Newser) - What happened to humility in America? In the past few days, we’ve seen Joe Wilson interrupt a presidential speech, Kanye West steal Taylor Swift’s microphone to voice his opinion, and Michael Jordan offer up an “egomaniacal” Hall of Fame speech, writes David Brooks in the New York ... More »

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Michael Jordan • Kanye West • World War II • David Brooks • VJ Day • Taylor Swift • Joe Wilson

 Jewish Engineer Designed 
 Beetle: Historian 

Hitler ordered Porsche to replicated Josef Ganz's prototype

Sep 14, 09 5:48 PM CDT
(Newser) - Adolf Hitler took the original design for the Volkswagen Beetle from the brainchild of a Jewish engineer, the Jerusalem Post reports. Historian Paul Schilperoord claims in his forthcoming book The True History of the Beetle that a prototype Josef Ganz designed in the late '20s had many of the Beetle’... More »

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Germany • Jews • Switzerland • Adolf Hitler • Nazi • World War II • Volkswagen • beetle • Josef Ganz • Ferdinand Porsche

British PM Apologizes
to Gay WWII Codebreaker

Gordon Brown slams 'horrifying' treatment of late mathematician Alan Turing

Sep 11, 09 3:20 AM CDT
(Newser) - Gordon Brown has issued a posthumous apology to WWII codebreaking genius Alan Turing, the Guardian reports. Turing's work cracking German codes helped the Allies win the war, but he was later prosecuted for having a gay relationship. He was chemically castrated after being forced to choose between that or prison,... More »

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Gordon Brown • homosexuality • World War II • homosexual • mathematicians • Alan Turing

OBITUARY

 Showbiz Scribe 
 Army Archerd 
 Dead at 87 

Column appeared in Variety for 52 years

Sep 8, 09 9:34 PM CDT
(Newser) - Army Archerd, who chronicled Hollywood for 52 years as a columnist for Variety, died today of mesothelioma, the showbiz publication reports. He was 87; the cancer was thought to be related to exposure to asbestos during World War II. He was known for injecting a social consciousness into his reporting,... More »

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entertainment • Hollywood • AIDS • asbestos • World War II • Variety • mesothelioma • Army Archerd • showbiz • gossip columnist • Rock Hudson • celebrities

Pope Recalls Holocaust Horrors, Forgets Jews

Benedict XVI has testy relationship with Jewish community

Sep 6, 09 5:12 PM CDT
(Newser) - Pope Benedict XVI recognized the 70th anniversary of the start of World War II today by paying tribute to Poles and the “tragedy of the Holocaust,” but did not mention its Jewish victims, the New York Times reports. The omission may further strain relations between Jewish leaders and... More »

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Pope Benedict XVI • Poland • Holocaust • Hitler youth • Jews • World War II

Pentagon
Steps Up Hunt
for Missing
WWII Soldiers

Search intensifies as aging witnesses die

Sep 6, 09 6:26 AM CDT
(Newser) - After years of searching for missing US soldiers in the jungles of Southeast Asia, the military's POW/MIA Accounting Command has intensified the hunt for the 74,000 WWII troops still unaccounted for, reports the New York Times. Searching for the nearly-65-year-old remains is a race against time, however, as historians... More »

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POW • World War II • MIA • POW/MIA

Fury Mounts Over Treatment of Gay WWII Codebreaker

Petition seeks posthumous apology for computing genius Alan Turing

Sep 2, 09 6:54 AM CDT
(Newser) - A campaign to win a pardon and apology for gay World War II codebreaking genius Alan Turing is gathering steam, CNN reports. Turing—considered by many to be the father of modern computing—made a vital contribution to the Allied effort with his invention of a machine to crack German... More »

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homosexuality • World War II • homosexual • computer science • Alan Turing

 Poland Marks 
 70th Anniversary 
 of WWII's Start 

Leaders gather at Polish fort where Nazis launched blitzkreig

Sep 1, 09 6:58 AM CDT
(Newser) - Polish leaders gathered at dawn today at the fort the Nazis attacked to begin World War II exactly 70 years ago, the BBC reports. A German battleship attacked Westerplatte on September 1, 1939, as German troops launched a blitzkreig attack on three fronts. The invasion triggered declarations of war from... More »

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Germany • Poland • Nazi • World War II • invasion

Basterds Should Be Last WWII Movie Ever: Pitt

...and calls Tom Cruise's Valkyrie 'ridiculous'

Aug 21, 09 1:54 PM CDT
(Newser) - Brad Pitt thinks Inglourious Basterds is so good that no one should ever bother making a World War II movie again, People reports. “I believe that Quentin put a cover on that pot. With Basterds, everything than can be said to this genre has been said,... More »

MORE ABOUT:
Brad Pitt • Tom Cruise • Valkyrie • World War II • movies • Inglourious Basterds

Movie Review

 Critics Find Basterds Glorious 


Aug 21, 09 10:34 AM CDT
(Newser) - Not every critic loves Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds, but many do, and they really love it. Here’s what they’re saying.
  • It’s not just Tarantino’s best movie, “It's the first movie of his artistic maturity,” writes Mick LaSalle of the
... More »

MORE ABOUT:
Quentin Tarantino • movie review • World War II • Inglourious Basterds

(Newser) - A former commander in Adolf  Hitler's army has been sentenced to life imprisonment for a massacre in Italy he ordered 65 years ago, the BBC reports. In what is expected to be one of the very last Nazi trials, a Munich court found Joseph Scheungraber guilty of murder in the... More »

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Germany • war crimes • massacre • Nazi • World War II • murder trial • imprisonment

 Andy Rooney at Cronkite  
 Funeral: 'I Can't Get Over It'

Memorial service honors legendary TV news anchor

Jul 23, 09 5:47 PM CDT
(Newser) - Family and friends of Walter Cronkite remembered the venerable television news anchor today at a memorial at St. Bartholomew’s Church in Manhattan, CBS News reports. Speakers at the service remembered Cronkite’s sense of humor, his love of sailing, and the strong emotions that lay beneath his calm, collected... More »

MORE ABOUT:
World War II • funeral • memorial service • anchor • Walter Cronkite • television news

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