War? What War?
A British government agency in charge of deciding what's to be taught in the UK's public schools has come out with a new syllabus on German history (for students aged 11 to 14) that doesn't mention World War II or Adolf Hitler (see http://education.independent.co.uk/news/article335231.ece).
The new syllabus concentrates on German history of the Cold War era, leading up to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Germany. Critics of the old syllabus--including the German ambassador--said the UK was obsessing about Hitler, causing schoolchildren to have a mental picture "of today's Germany as being full of goose-stepping Nazis."
Well, what the heck, let bygones be bygones. It's all water under the bridge. Ancient history. They're not socking London with V-2s anymore, are they? We're all in the EU together, one big happy family. Besides, we can always teach 'em about Hitler later.
"Those who don't learn from history are condemned to repeat it" is a cliche, but it's also true. Sweeping Nazi Germany under the rug is a Very Bad Idea. Especially so because, to this day, there remains considerable confusion as to how the Third Reich could have come into being, how it was able to do what it did, why the German people embraced it, and why nobody else in Europe tried to stop it until it was too strong to be stopped without a cataclysmic war.
But hey, if it makes the German ambassador happy...
The new syllabus concentrates on German history of the Cold War era, leading up to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Germany. Critics of the old syllabus--including the German ambassador--said the UK was obsessing about Hitler, causing schoolchildren to have a mental picture "of today's Germany as being full of goose-stepping Nazis."
Well, what the heck, let bygones be bygones. It's all water under the bridge. Ancient history. They're not socking London with V-2s anymore, are they? We're all in the EU together, one big happy family. Besides, we can always teach 'em about Hitler later.
"Those who don't learn from history are condemned to repeat it" is a cliche, but it's also true. Sweeping Nazi Germany under the rug is a Very Bad Idea. Especially so because, to this day, there remains considerable confusion as to how the Third Reich could have come into being, how it was able to do what it did, why the German people embraced it, and why nobody else in Europe tried to stop it until it was too strong to be stopped without a cataclysmic war.
But hey, if it makes the German ambassador happy...
