je ne sais pas s'ils verront ça un jour mais bravo aux (sauf erreur) 36 euros qui ont eu leur bac et leur mention euro !!

Today, I chose to introduce a comic about the Secession War in connection with what we are doing at school.

This series of comics tells the adventures of two Yankee soldiers of the cavalry, the Sergeant Chesterfield and the Corporal Blutch.

This volume,the second of this series, called "Du Nord Au Sud", tells us a very violent battle between the Yankees ans the Rebels.

The war is just declared and the two heroes, Chesterfield & Blutch, accompanied of two other soldiers from the cavalry of Fort Bow, have to join general Grant's army who is fighting against Lee's. This volume tells us all the ideas that the soldiers have to kill a lot of ennemies and the soldier's conditions of life during the war. During a battle, Chesterfield is captured and tortured but Bluch delivers him.

At the end of the comic, a lot of soldiers from the two armies have been killed and we understand this war is very bloody and there is no trace of peace.

This story also shows us all the aspects of the Secession War : use of the machine guns and the torture that the prisoners undergo (Chesterfield is captured by the Rebel army and he is fastened on the floor under an extremely hot sun and without water ! )

To conclude, I advise you this series of comics which permites to discover the Secession War and have fun in the same time but in spite of the funny aspect of the adventures, the situations and the characters, I think this series is in fact a violent denonciation of the horrors of this war.

            <st1:place w:st="on">Western Berlin</st1:place> became a symbol for West. The blockade provoked a shortage of food which obliged <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Berlin</st1:place></st1:state> population to cultivate its own fruits and vegetables. There was the come back of ration coupons and black market.

The life was very hard during this period for inhabitants of <st1:place w:st="on">West Berlin</st1:place> and numerous Berliners died of malnutrition or tuberculosis during the blockade.

The blockade end was felt as a big reassurance for <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Berlin</st1:place></st1:state> population on the 12^th of May 1949. But airlift was maintained until the 30^th of September.

In October 1949, the German Democratic Republic (GDR) at the East and Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) at the West were created, which separated even more the two blocs (Western and Eastern).

It was an important defeat for <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">USSR</st1:place></st1:country-region> and GDR.

After that, lives’ conditions were so hard and the unemployment reached a very high rate.

There was the creation of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which gathered the Western Bloc against the Eastern. This part of the History was at the origin of the cold war.

DUCOMET Charlotte 1ere S10

  From the midlle of the 1920s, Europe could assist to the rise of Nazism, which led to old Continent's mutilation during more than two decades, especially marked by one of the most terrific piece of History, the Second World War. That's why we have many testimonies, books... which illustrate Nazism's wheels...

  At first, we can read an extract of a speech pronounced in 1929 by the Propaganda Minister during Hitler's reign ( during the Reich ), Joseph Goebbels. With this speech, he conveys his conception about women, about their role : according to him, women had to be reduced to a state of submission and servitude towards their husband...

  Then, the document two presents itself in the form of a poster done in the middle of the XXth century  within the context of Nazism's  policy of propaganda and indoctrination, as its messages testifies, addressing German maidens : "Every girl belongs to us".

   The source C is another part of speech. Here, it was pronounced by the head of the German Labour Front, Robert Ley, in 1936, in other words, during Nazism's crystallization. This praise about the Führer, shows how Hitler succedeed in being indispensable in Germany.                                                                                                                                                                       

    Lastly, this text, extracted from Hitler and the Germans, by the British historian Ronald Grey, published in 1981, as a commentary of the previous documents, explains how people had to behave towards Hitler, being constrained to salute him as soon as they saw him, or they incured a risk to be banished...and so, by extension, it shows the moral pression done on people, their dependence about Hitler.                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

So, seeing all these documents about Nazism, one of the first European totalitarianisms in the XXth century, we could wonder :

                              How did the Nazi government control the German people, during about twenty years ?                                    

        To begin, Goebbels's speech, among lots of other speeches he used to pronounce every day - dont' forget that he was the Propaganda Minister - , is a proof of the ideological plugging done on the population during Nazism. By radio, the press..., the government incited people to many things : for example, to celebrate Hitler, the party ( since it was the one at the time : it is a feature of a totalitarian state )...Asserting his point of view about the role of women, Goebbels obliged women to respect it ( being submitted to their husband, bringing up their children...) and to become a paragon of the society idealized by Hitler, of the new superior humanity he wanted...

        As an extra piece of information about this control of the German people by the Nazi government, we have this poster, perfect symbol of this policy of propaganda...The indoctrination, the enrolment of youth by a totalitarian government is also one of its characteristics : like in Italy, where fascism founded in 1919 by Mussolini has dominated during more than thirty years, young girls and above all, young boys, belongeg to Hitlerian Youths, which lasted from 1922 to the end of the Second World War, in 1945. Indeed, this paramilitary organization had above all young boys who wered from fourteen to eighteen years, prepared for being strong men, " Aryans"..., thanks to an intensive military and physical training, more important than scientific education...To understand its development, and so, Nazism's success in its policy of control, look at the figures: when it was created, it counted 5000 young people ( in 1923), and ten years later, in 1933, there was 2 250 000 members...

     Robert Ley was the head of the German Labour Front, which replaced the Weimar Republic Trade Unions from the beginning of the 1930s : with this organization of workers, he wanted to "create a true social and productive community". However, it serve to manipulate people, and workers were completely controlled : as this speech demonstrates it, the GLF also belonged to this policy of indoctrination of Nazism, which didn't have any social intention as it was claimed, but which was another instrument of propaganda and of celebration of the Führer ( term invented in 1934...)...

      Lastly, Ronald Grey explains with Hitler and the Germans, and particulary with this extrac, that everybody had to respect a certain ritual : saluting Hitler as soon they saw him, or "there would be serious consequences". In fact, telling bad things about Hitler was punished, a person who showed an opposition to his way of governing was immediately banished, deported or killed. The first concentration camp which was erected was the camp of Dachau, in Germany, in 1933, reserved for the opponents, and not greeting, not celebrating Hitler, was considered as an act of opposition of resistance...

    These four documents illustrate so, the intellectual, moral control done on all the German people, by propaganda..., from the young girls and boys untils the workers, without forgetting women, who had to admire Hitler and to show him : in other words, this group of documents deals with one of the features of the European totalitarianisms : manipulation and indoctrination of the population, like in Italy...