Why isn’t the 75th anniversary of World War II a bigger deal?

Strangely quiet on the anniversary front.  World War II is seventy-five years old today.  Perhaps a cake would be inappropriate, but a bit more recognition would have been nice.

Seventy-five years ago today, Hitler’s regime faked some Polish border incursions and invaded in force by way of spurious retaliation.   It’s sometimes argued that Munich gave the allies the time they needed to prepare for war and be ready for September 1939.  These people tend to ignore that the extra year gave the Germans the extra time also.  The Germans, unlike the western allies, were always planning to break the agreement and therefore Munich did not materially disrupt any timetable.   And, of course, in between autumn of 1938 and summer of 1939, the (temporary) Ribbontrop/Molotov pact was secured, which secured Germany’s eastern frontiers and ensured that it would be a while before Germany had to fight a two front war.

Seventy-five years on from the most destructive war in the world ever, I can only assume that the lack of commemoration may be the product of an unwillingness to subject the public to more than one war at a time.  For sure a seventy-fiver is not a big as a centenary, but it’s still a biggie.

Commemoration fatigue is going to be a problem over the next four years because we’re going to have key anniversaries from both wars operating simultaneously.  Now this wouldn’t be an issue if people were given the smallest amount of credit for the ability to keep more than one date in their head at a time.

The presumption of commemoration fatigue has a negative effect upon historical sequencing.   In terms of any sort of intelligent response to the so-called “lessons of history”, it is necessary not only to remember an individual event, but also the order in which such events happened and the extent to which certain events may have impacted upon other events.  Without this inability, history becomes a collection of isolated nuggets, to be dragged out into the light in no particular order.  Indeed, without the ability to compare different historical events at the same time, we are no longer part of history at all – history becomes part of a vast amorphous “then” with no connection to an eternal contrasting “now”.

If we can commemorate key events of the Second World War alongside the First, we can not only demonstrate an ability to juggle more stuff than the media assume we can – we might also, heaven help us – learn something.