Voices of World War II

lorentzen-nicklaus lorentzen-nicklaus at t-online.de
Wed Jan 8 03:47:55 CST 2003


in chapter 33 of "minima moralia", written in los angeles in late 1944, adorno 
has an aphorism about the V-weapons, machines which he sees as paradigmatic for 
the fascist spirit of the time because in their subjectless accuracy of aim they 
combine superficial technical perfection with absolute blindness, deadly terror 
with total futility: "hätte hegels geschichtsphilosophie diese zeit 
eingeschlossen, so hätten hitlers robotbomben, neben dem frühen tod alexanders 
und ähnlichen bildern, ihre stelle gefunden unter den ausgewählten empirischen 
tatsachen, in denen der stand des weltgeistes unmittelbar sich ausdrückt. wie 
der faschismus selber sind die robots lanciert zugleich und subjektlos. wie 
jener vereinen sie die äußerste technische perfektion mit vollkommener 
blindheit. wie jener erregen sie das tödliche entsetzen und sind ganz 
vergeblich. --- 'ich habe den weltgeist gesehen', nicht zu pferde, aber auf 
flügeln und ohne kopf, und das widerlegt zugleich hegels geschichtsphilosophie." 

"'i have seen the world-spirit', not on a horse [like napoleon to whom the quote 
refers, kfl], yet on wings and without head, and this, at the same time, 
disproves hegel's philosophy of history." as some of you know, hegel defined 
history as "progress in the consciousness of freedom". oh well.... 

                                                                 KFL     


Dave Monroe schrieb:

> "As the Allies stepped up their air assaults following
> the Normandy landings, Germany countered with their
> intensified use of 'pilotless secret weapon planes,'
> as the Nazi Vergeltungswaffen-1 'buzz bombs' were
> called in this June 16, 1944, report. 

> Between June 13,
> 1944, and March 29, 1945, about 8,000 V-1s were
> launched against England, with nearly 2,500 hitting
> their targets."

  interestingly enough, lothar gruchmann (Totaler Krieg - vom blitzkrieg zur 
  bedingungslosen kapitulation, münchen 1991: dtv, here p. 163) says that the 
  V1s were only launched till early september because then the air-base at the 
  canal-coast was lost: from september 8 on, gruchmann says, it was exclusively 
  the new V2 that got launched against england (later also against brüssel, 
  antwerpen and lüttich). anyone for clarification? 

>
> http://www.umkc.edu/lib/spec-col/ww2/Dday/interrupt.htm#interrupt
>
> http://www.umkc.edu/lib/spec-col/ww2/main.htm
>




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