Astronaut Chimps – and the US Space Program in the Cold War

The space race was one of the key battlegrounds during the Cold War. And as the space race became ever more important during the 1950s and 1960s, chimps became a key part of the US space program. Andrew Walls explains.

Ham the chimp, prior to his test flight in January 1961.

The era of the spacefaring chimp

The era of the rocket monkeys was a confusing one. Both for the chimps themselves and for those working towards the eventual moon landing. The Cold War was in full swing and the American and Soviet space programs were battling for ideological supremacy. The Soviets had just sent two dogs, Belka and Strelka, up into the Earth’s orbit and had touched them down safely.

The American public wanted a similar milestone for the American space program. So when Ham touched down in the Mercury capsule the public treated him not like a research animal and more like a “short, hairy astronaut”. Gifts and flowers began arriving for Ham. People wanted his autograph. He was one of those golden age American heroes that made people weep with pride.

This didn’t thrill Alan Shepard, who was to go up following Ham’s safe return to prove its safety for humans. Neither really piloted the craft. They both just sat there and let the guys on the ground prove the flights were safe. Alan Shepard in short wasn’t thrilled with this monkey stealing his thunder and reasonably chose not to attend the furry American hero’s funeral some years later.

Space Chimps Made In America

Albert was the first chimponaut to be launched into space. The term launched is right because they strapped him to a V-2 rocket and let him suffocate during the flight. Albert ll, his successor, was killed when the V-2 rocket he was strapped to had a parachute failure. During this suicidal flight Albert ll became the first monkey in space after passing the Karman line of 100km above sea level. In fact the first Albert to survive the landing was Albert Vl, who along with his 11 mouse crewmates touched down safely. However, once they touched down, the monkeys weren’t finished yet.

Next came the battery of medical tests which ascertained what impacts, if any, weightlessness and other phenomena of space travel had on them. They wisely stopped numbering the chimps and just started giving them nicknames. So “Baker” was the first chimp to survive both the flight and the post flight operations. At the age of 27, Baker was buried on the grounds of the United States Space & Rocket Center. Ham, our American hero and Enos, his successor, were the two most well-known astrochimps but there were many others who lived and died with little fanfare.

Ham the chimp is welcomed back with a 'handshake' after his January 1961 flight on the Mercury Redstone rocket.

Furious George

Beyond the States, Russia, France, Argentina and Iran have all launched their own chimps - most of whom also perished during their flights. Astronauts dying mid-flight has always been horrendous for space programs. The Columbia and Challenger disasters crippled the American space program. So for riskier flights, especially during the initial testing phases, it made sense to send a chimp who will garner far less media attention in the event of a malfunction. Chimps are very similar to humans biologically and it is reasonable to assume that any effects they experience from space flight could also be experienced by a human.

What most people don’t realize is scientists of the time had no idea of what to expect from people in space. No person had ever been that far from the ground before. It just hadn’t been possible. We know now that people are fine in space with the appropriate precautions being taken. At the time, however, they were just guessing. Would lessened gravity distort people’s eyeballs and blind them? Maybe the change in weight of body parts would restrict movement, leaving the pilot unable to control the ship at altitude. Would the space radiation kill people before they could safely land? NASA, the Soviet space program and the rest of the world had absolutely no clue. So they sent up chimps and hoped for the best.

Monkey Business

The use of chimps in aerospace was an unfortunate necessity of the time. A space program that had as many astronauts die as chimps did would have been cancelled and condemned very quickly. Chimps were a necessary sacrifice in the vital quest for information. But I want to finish this story with a happy ending. One about what happened to the chimps after the space programs no longer needed them. This story reinforces where using chimps or any surrogates as research tools can go wrong when the agency using them doesn’t respect them as intelligent organisms.

In the 1970s the Air Force decided it no longer needed its chimp colony. The space race was finished; they had all the information launching chimps could give them. So they began leasing them to medical facilities in New York and New Mexico State. That lasted for a while.

Gorilla Warfare

Then in 1997 they decided to officially “retire” them forever. Luckily that didn’t mean putting them to sleep. The Air Force would instead sell the chimps on the open market. In a mock “bidding” process, they only considered one bid, which came from The Coulston Foundation. This foundation had a horrendous track record of animal cruelty and had once had 300 chimps seized because of negligent care. Important people asked that instead these chimps go to a sanctuary.

They still had memories of Ham and other chimp sacrifices in the Space Race and wanted these chimps to be treated with some respect and dignity. Here’s where Dr. Carole Noon comes in. With the backing of Dr. Jane Goodall and Dr. Roger Fouts, Noon fought hard for the chimps to be moved to a sanctuary. The Air Force, in what they must have thought was a “show of good faith”, awarded 30 chimps to Dr. Noon and the rest to The Coulston Foundation. Dr. Noon was less than pleased. She raised the funds herself and built a sanctuary in Florida. After a year-long court battle she finally won custody of the remaining 21 chimps and moved them to her sanctuary. Today she operates the Save the Chimp foundation which is where these chimps are living out their days peacefully and without testing.

Chimpy Meadows

A life of rest and peace is a fitting end for the descendants of the monkeys who helped us reach space. But the fact that the Air Force was going to condemn them to an abusive testing facility reaffirms the lack of respect they have for these animals’ intelligence and their contribution to the space program. Moving forward it would serve any agency using animals for testing to consider the following: Will this test give us information that could not be obtained otherwise? Can we use people instead without putting those people through some significant risk? And in the event they do decide animals are necessary: Are we treating these animals with respect and dignity both during the testing process and afterwards?

Thank you astro-chimps the world over for your sacrifices. You may not realize it, but you’ve helped to start something which could change humanity’s destiny forever.

For more of Andrew Walls’ writing visit his space and entrepreneurship blog: Landing Attempts.

Out of respect for the chimps discussed in this article, Landing Attempts has made a donation to the Save The Chimps Foundation founded by Dr. Noon. Save the Chimps works to reclaim and house chimps affected by biomedical testing facilities. They deserve our support and respect.

Sources

Roach, Mary. Packing for Mars. http://www.maryroach.net/packing-for-mars.html

Cassidy, David and Davy Kristin. Space Chimps. http://www.spacechimps.com/theirstory.html

Wall, Mike. Scientific American. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/monkeys-in-space-a-brief-spaceflight-history/

The Truth about Vladimir Lenin – The Father of Post-Truth Politics?

Just who was Vladimir Lenin? While we know that he came to power after the Russian Revolution, much of his life is shrouded in myths and lies. Author Tanel Vahisalu explains all.

PS - you can find out about Tanel’s latest project on Russian history here.

A painting of Lenin by Isaak Brodsky - Lenin in front of Smolny.

Ninety-three years after his death, Vladimir Lenin continues to make headlines. During 2017’s commemoration of the Russian Revolution, a poll conducted by the independent Levada Center demonstrated that 56 per cent of Russians believe Lenin played a positive role in history. What’s more, many of the remaining 44 per cent of Russians fail to see that Lenin was actually a supreme master of using fake news and mass manipulation.

The question becomes: How much do we actually know about Vladimir Lenin?

Despite a massive collection of history books, we still know surprisingly little about the man lining the pages. Perhaps that is because each of the 653 million volumes of Lenin’s published works – dated through to 1990 – contain fake biographies.

According to Russian historian, Dmitry Volkogonov, during Soviet times, there were at least 3,725 documents that were carefully collected and sealed within the cellars of Party archives that nobody was permitted to see. Many of these documents were said to be classified because they reveal the actual cause of Lenin’s death. Furthermore, many of the documents contain information about the true Ulyanov family tree, which was kept secret within the Soviet Union.

Bearing that in mind, let’s now turn to the most prevalent “alternative facts” of Vladimir Lenin.

Contrary to his official biography, Lenin was neither a Russian by ethnicity nor was he a peasant by descent.

Lenin’s mother, Maria Alexandrovna, had Jewish-Swedish roots. His great-grandfather, Moshe Blank, was known as a “mad Jewish merchant,” who had once set fire to 23 houses in his home village. Lenin’s grandfather, Alexander Blank, was a highly respected doctor and wealthy landowner, who bought an entire village near Simbirsk (today’s Ulyanovsk, Russia), along with 39 peasants and their farms.

The Ulyanov family was relatively affluent in local Simbirsk. Lenin’s father, Ilya was a high state official in the field of education. When he unexpectedly died, while Vladimir was 16, the family had sufficient income to easily support themselves. In fact, they even had servants.

Lenin was neither a kind-hearted, modest child nor was he a devoted revolutionary from a young age.

Already as a baby, Volodya – as he was called – stood out from his siblings. He began speaking at three and had trouble standing up on his weak feet. His head was larger than normal and he used to bang it against the floor in fits of rage. Lenin’s mother was sincerely worried about his cognitive development.

Lenin’s sister recalled - when their parents gave him a toy horse for his birthday – that he creeped away to a solitary space to tear its legs off, one by one. Volodya was a troublesome child, always fighting with his little brother, Dmitry, and purposely frightening his sister, Maria. It was documented that his parents found his behavior very disturbing.

Although Volodya grew up to be an extremely bright child, and was awarded a gold medal upon graduation, there is no evidence that he took any particular interest in revolutionary ideas prior to moving to Saint Petersburg in 1893.

In 1887, Lenin was neither expelled from university, nor was he detained in a Siberian prison camp.

A good example of “alternative facts” in Lenin’s official biography is the story about how the young revolutionary was expelled from Kazan University to a remote village of Kokushkino because of his revolutionary activity.

Truth be told, Volodya had only taken part in a peaceful student meeting and, when confronted about this, he wrote a voluntary resignation letter to the university. It is also worth mentioning that the village of Kokushkino was the same village that Lenin’s grandfather had bought. The Ulyanov family used it as their summer estate. So technically, he was “deported” to a nice vacation at his grandfather’s place.

While in Switzerland, Lenin was neither struggling to make ends meet nor did he have a happy marriage.

Lenin and his wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya lived as refugees in Western Europe for seventeen years, though neither of them had to work. They had several bank accounts in Zürich, and Lenin’s family regularly sent them money and packages of goods.

“In Zürich I messed around quite a bit an ended up in a … Swiss health resort”, Lenin joked in a letter he had written.

History has also revealed that Lenin had many relationships prior to Krupskaya, and he continued to have them during their marriage. The most famous of which was his affair with Inessa Armand, a political activist and family friend.

The cause of Lenin’s death was not cerebral atherosclerosis.

During his final years, Lenin suffered from loss of consciousness, paralysis, hallucinations, and epileptic seizures. His official death certificate stated his cause of death was cerebral atherosclerosis, yet two of his closest personal doctors refused to sign it.

No doubt that is because he likely died of syphilis, contracted at an early age and left untreated. In 1922, a number of doctors prescribed him salvarsan, which is a medication used only for treating syphilis. Additionally, a German physician who specialized in syphilis was summoned and commented: “Everyone knows for which brain disorder I am called”.

Taken together, if we look at Lenin’s life story, there is not too much that can be viewed as factual. Many of these “alternative facts” were perpetuated by Lenin during his lifetime, and were bolstered, posthumously, by Joseph Stalin and his successors to create a god-like cult figure for the Soviet Union.

Quite simply, Vladimir Lenin is the sad embodiment of the very problems that we face today – “post-truth politics” and manipulation based on “alternative facts”.

Learning from history, we would do well to question what we are told, and hold our political leaders accountable by calling truth to power.

Find out more about Tanel’s book, History of Russia in 100 Minutes, here: Amazon US | Amazon UK

References

Volkogonov, Dmitry. Lenin: A New Biography. The Free Press, 1994.

Service, Robert. Lenin: A Biography. Harvard University Press, 2002.

Kolata, Gina. Lenin’s Stroke: Doctor Has a Theory (and a Suspect). The New York Times, 2012.

Roig-Franzia, Manuel. Medical Sleuths Discuss the Forensics of Death. The Washington Post, 2012.

Finding a way out of the Great Depression? Roosevelt’s Brain Trust

The Brain Trust was a small group who came together in 1932 to help Franklin D Roosevelt find ways out of the Great Depression. The group’s legacy was significant as they were closely involved with the New Deal as well as a very famous speech. Ted Harvey explains all.

Unemployed men outside a Chicago Depression-era soup kitchen.

They were mocked by some in the media, but the three men who were known as the “Brain Trust” were influential in helping Franklin Delano Roosevelt craft the policies that would become the New Deal. Technically it was a short-lived group, existing primarily during FDR’s run for the White House in 1932. While other advisors became lumped in with the “Brain Trust”, there were originally three who made up the group: Raymond Moley, Rexford Tugwell, and Adolf Berle. All were professors at Columbia University, Moley and Berle in law and Tugwell in economics.

The idea for the Trust was suggested by Samuel Rosenman, speechwriter and legal counsel of Roosevelt, whom he knew through his time on the New York State Assembly and as a Justice on the New York Supreme Court. Rosenman thought it would be beneficial for the candidate to have an academic team of advisers. The idea was supposedly based on the Woodrow Wilson’s “The Inquiry”, a large group of academics who advised President Wilson on peace negotiations following World War I. “The Inquiry” would eventually become the Council on Foreign Relations.

The Forgotten Man

The “Brain Trust” came together in 1932 led by Raymond Moley, a strong supporter and close ally of then Governor Roosevelt. The country remained trapped in the Great Depression with no obvious end in sight. Moley brought the Brain Trust together to help Roosevelt craft his message, focusing on how his administration would pull the country out of the worst economic depression the country had or would ever face. In some sense the “Brain Trust” was for show, allowing voters to see Roosevelt had a plan to get out of the Depression, and that he wouldn’t stand idly by to let the country work itself out of the depression.

The group’s influence was evident in Roosevelt’s first major campaign speech, now generally known as the “Forgotten Man” speech. In it Roosevelt laid out his plans for his initial 100 days and how he meant to address the continued Depression. The speech focused on the poor, the “forgotten men” who were not receiving the help they needed. It was Raymond Moley who helped write this speech and include the now-famous “forgotten man.” Moley also wrote much of Roosevelt’s first inaugural address. It is also thought that Moley came up with the term “New Deal,” which remains influential to this day. Adolf Berle was also heavily involved with Roosevelt’s speechwriting, helping to write the Commonwealth Club speech, focusing on the importance of government involvement in the economy.

Following the election, the original “Brain Trust” gave way to a more permanent group of advisors. These new Brain-Trusters, people like Frances Perkins, Harry Hopkins, and Harold Ickes, as advisors and Cabinet Secretaries, continued to push New Deal policies forward. As far as the original three, they each pursued a different path. Adolf Berle left the administration soon after Roosevelt’s inauguration, although he continued to be an informal advisor of the President. Later, from 1938 to 1944 Berle returned to work for the White House as Assistant Secretary of State for Latin American Affairs. Raymond Moley became disenchanted with the New Deal policies and with President Roosevelt. He continued writing speeches for the president until 1936, after which he left the White House becoming an ardent critic of the New Deal and liberalism, at least the kind promoted by FDR. Nothing exemplifies Moley’s shift in position than his awarding of the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1970 by President Richard Nixon.

Of the three, only Tugwell transitioned directly from the “Brain Trust” to a role in the administration, becoming Undersecretary of the Department of Agriculture. Tugwell would have continued influence as Roosevelt implemented the programs of the New Deal, including the Agricultural Adjustment Agency, the Soil Conservation Service, the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, and the Resettlement Administration. He left the administration in 1936 and became vice president of the American Molasses Company. Later he became the first Director of the New York City Planning Commission, where he frequently ran up against the (in)famous Robert Moses. He returned to the Roosevelt administration in 1941 as the last appointed Governor of Puerto Rico.

In perspective

Although the “Brain Trust” was a short-lived loose affiliation, the influence the small group had on Roosevelt and New Deal policies was enormous. While the members of the “Brain Trust” were dismissed by many as advocates of big government and elites, they approached the economic problems of their day through the lens of Progressivism. For example, their goal was not to rely solely on the government or to break-up the large corporations when it came to economic policy, but to have the government regulate businesses. These ideas, supported by President Roosevelt and his Brain Trust, became the backbone of the New Deal economic policies and in many regards remain in place today.

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References

http://www.epluribusmedia.org/features/2006/200609_FDR_pt3.html

https://www2.gwu.edu/~erpapers/teachinger/glossary/brains-trust.cfm

https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/research/economic-thought/economics/roosevelts-brains-trust/

Kennedy, David. Freedom From Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929-1945. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Brands, H.W. Traitor to His Class: The Privileged Life and Radical Presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt . New York: Anchor Books, 2008.

Was Spain Neutral or a Nazi Ally in World War Two?

Of the many officially neutral countries in World War Two, Spain was perhaps the country closest to Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. Here, Laura Kerr follows up on her article on Switzerland in World War Two, by considering whether General Franco’s Nationalist Spain was a friend of Hitler, or actually neutral between the Allies and Axis Powers.

Francisco Franco is the figure second from the right. Nazis Karl Wolff and Heinrich Himmler, and Spanish minister Ramon Serrano Suner also feature.

Non-belligerent - A nation or person that is not engaged in a war or conflict.

Neutral - An impartial or unbiased state or person.

Spain’s official stance of non-belligerence during World War Two is best taken with a pinch of salt. While its reasons to stay uninvolved appear legitimate, in reality Spain was arguably the most involved out of all “neutral countries”.

“Non-belligerent” normally refers to a state or country that does not get involved in a war, normally resulting in their neutrality. Spain’s reason for not officially getting involved was, of course, the Spanish Civil War.

This was a bloody civil war fought from 1936-1939 between the Republicans and the Nationalists. From an ideological perspective, the Spanish Civil War could be considered a precursor to World War Two and almost foreshadowed the end to the fragile equilibrium established in Europe.

On one side you had the Republic government. They were largely liberals and fought against the conservative Nationalist rebels. The Soviet Union provided the Republicans with significant military assistance, although France and Britain were more wary about supporting them. The Republic also received volunteer International Brigades from Western Europe and the U.S. More broadly, many in Europe saw the Spanish conflict as a threat to the peace that had settled in Europe and wanted to prevent the spread of the Nationalists’ fascist-linked ideology.

The Nationalists’ rebellion started off as a failed military coup but resulted in their leader, General Francisco Franco, becoming dictator of Spain. Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany both provided military aid, not only to support the Nationalists but also as a military testing ground for new weapons they hoped to later use.

The rebels won in 1939 and General Franco was made Head of State. While General Franco leaned heavily ideologically to Nazi Germany and the Axis countries, he was careful to appease the Western allies for trading reasons.

Volunteers

The main way in which Spain entered World War Two was through volunteers. The side with which each man volunteered largely paralleled the side on which they had fought during the Spanish Civil War. Over 18,000 nationalist men volunteered to fight for the Axis Powers, on the condition they would be fighting on the Eastern Front against the Soviet Union rather than against the Western Allies. By doing this, General Franco assisted and repaid Hitler while maintaining peace with Western Europe and the U.S.

Conversely, as a result of losing the civil war, many of the Republicans went into exile and fled to refugee camps in southern France. At the outbreak of the Second World War, they joined French forces to fight against the Axis Powers. It is estimated that over 60,000 Spaniards joined the French resistance alone. Just over 1,000 Spaniards (largely the communist leaders) fled to the Soviet Union and fought alongside the Red Army after the invasion in 1941.

Non-belligerence

Diplomacy is where the term ‘non-belligerency’ is distinguished from absolute neutrality. While volunteers technically assisted both the Allies and Axis during World War Two militaristically, General Franco also provided the Axis Powers with both economic assistance and useful intelligence. In 1940, Franco signed the Protocol of Hendaya, which provided for close cooperation among the governments of Spain, Italy and Germany.

Furthermore General Franco and Hitler engaged in numerous talks discussing the possibility of active involvement in the war and the issue of Gibraltar. This was an area of Spain in British control that Hitler was keen to seize. However General Franco repeatedly refused entry to German soldiers, arguing that the United Kingdom and its colonies still posed a major threat to Spain. In these discussions, General Franco often demanded too much in return for active entry into the war. Whether this was simply desperation considering Spain’s war-torn state, or a way of delaying irreversible actions, it resulted in a lack of official action. Among his other demands, General Franco asked for a large supply of grain to feed its population, which Germany could not provide. Pressure to invade Gibraltar was only relieved in 1941 when Hitler focused his attention on the Eastern front by invading the Soviet Union.  After a meeting on October 23, 1940 to discuss details about the alliance between Spain and Germany, Hitler was famously quoted telling Mussolini: "I prefer to have three or four of my own teeth pulled out than to speak to that man again!” This suggests that despite ideological similarities, the two leaders had a hard time making definite agreements.

Allied Trade Pressure

Like most countries during World War Two, Spain was struggling economically. People were starving and it relied heavily on trade and imports to support itself. The Allies worked hard to ensure Spain could not afford to actively enter the war and used trading blockades and economic incentives to enforce that.

Portugal and Spain had long had an alliance, therefore Portugal provided Spain with the much needed grain to ease its food shortages. However, to put pressure on Spain, America and Britain reduced Spain’s access to oil. All told, considering its economic and social depression after the Civil War, entering World War Two would have led to economic pressure which could have effectively brought the country to a halt.

Great Britain also followed a policy of "building a network of mutual interests and creating the conditions, thanks to which any breakup between the two countries would mean a key loss for Spanish trade and industry.” This largely dictated Spanish movements towards the Western Allies during the war.

As a result of tactical trade blockades and other agreements, over the war Spain was inescapably dependent on the United States and Great Britain.

A cowardly ending

Despite its seemingly favorable views towards the Axis Powers in the early years of the war, General Franco changed his tune as Hitler’s indestructible façade began to slip and victory for the Allies seemed inevitable. It was only when this happened that Spain reverted back from ‘non-belligerence’ to true neutrality and began to act that way.

However, this quick change of tact didn’t mean they could escape the consequences of favoring the Axis. As a result of their cooperation with Nazi Germany, not only militaristically but also economically, Spain was isolated by the major powers in the immediate aftermath of World War Two. Although Roosevelt had promised Spain would not suffer sanctions from the United Nations as a result of their alliance, the U.S. president died in April 1945, leaving Truman to take power, who was less forgiving of General Franco. That being said, with the onset of the Cold War in the late 1940s, the US later saw conservative Spain as more of an ally against the rise of communism, rather than a threat.

In conclusion, while it is clear that Franco’s Spain did favor the Axis Powers of the war, it did not technically become involved in the war. Its conduct during World War Two combined flexibility on who her allies were with a desperation to survive. After such a damaging Civil War, Spain was not in the position to wholly side with either the Allies or Axis Powers. It begs the question, therefore, that if they had been a fit state, who would they have chosen? And does that make them any better?

Did you find this article interesting? If so, you can read about the Spanish Civil War in our book – find out more here.

The Language of the Unheard - Martin Luther King and the Impact of Star Trek

Star Trek was one of the most important television programs of the 1960s. Here Christopher Benedict explores why through the many fascinating characters and plots. It was also a show that Martin Luther King, Junior enjoyed – and one that broke boundaries on race in one very important way.

Leonard Nimoy and William Shatner as Mr. Spock and Captain Kirk on Star Trek. Source: here.

Strange New Worlds

Martin Luther King, Junior was, still is, and always shall be remembered and revered for the myriad roles and responsibilities he assumed during a life which was as astonishing for its historical and cultural impact as it was appalling for the barbaric manner in which it was often disturbed and ultimately terminated.

Among his assumed or accepted capacities were preacher, teacher and practitioner of nonviolent resistance, writer, agitator, community organizer, civil rights leader, Nobel Peace Prize winner. And Trekkie?

Even Nichelle Nichols, who played the groundbreaking part of Lieutenant Uhura - Communications Officer aboard the USS Enterprise on the short-lived but beloved original series of Star Trek - could hardly believe it. She would learn of Dr. King’s affinity for Gene Roddenberry’s visionary science fiction program when she found herself at a professional and existential crossroads, acting eventually upon-and revitalized by-personal counsel originating from a most unexpected source. Her peace-keeping mission was no longer relegated simply to the distant and abstract galaxies of Uhura’s 23rd century “where no man has gone before”, but in the very real here and now of the turbulent 1960s where Ms. Nichols could and would have a more direct, forceful, and noble influence.

To Boldly Go

Star Trek was not an easy sell. Having signed a development deal with Desilu Productions (started by, and named for, Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball) Gene Roddenberry submitted a proposal to executives at CBS for an episodic drama modeled after the popular western Wagon Train, transporting the consequent adventures from the American heartland to outer space. Though they were not necessarily contemptuous of science fiction as a genre with prime-time viewership potential, CBS did dismiss Star Trek as “too cerebral” in favor of the more sanitized and banal Lost in Space, a sort of interstellar Leave it to Beaver.

Roddenberry then pitched his concept to NBC which agreed to move forward after overhauling the show’s cast (Spock being the only character retained) due to the dismal reception of the pilot episode called The Cage. Unlike the creators of Lost in Space, Rodenberry was uninterested in formulaic, obtuse entertainment depicting a gentrified cast acting out pointless hijinks for the dubious benefit of injudicious audiences. Indeed, he was hell-bent on crafting an audaciously philosophical and tirelessly optimistic vision of the future which would be both brain-teasing and gut-checking, defiantly challenging racial prejudices, social constructs, and political xenophobia of the day.

“Gene was a man of ideas and ideals,” explains original cast member turned social media sensation George Takei. “Our human past may not have been all good, and neither had the history of his creation, Star Trek. But he had the boldness of spirit to go into a medium-television-famous for mediocrity and uplift it and succeed, against all odds, with idealism.”

To scratch the surface of what Takei describes as Roddenberry’s “world of infinite diversity in infinite combinations”, you need only examine a snapshot of the team gathered aboard the bridge of the Enterprise.

A Constellation of Rising Stars: Leonard Nimoy as Spock

Second in command and dogmatically contrary to the swashbuckling James Tiberius Kirk, whose heroics were almost always reactionary and emotion-driven, was Leonard Nimoy’s Mr. Spock, the ship’s Science Officer. His mother an Earth woman and his father Sarek a green-blooded Vulcan, Spock is denigrated as a “half-breed” by an android version of Kirk in the episode What Are Little Girls Made Of? Spock inherited not only Sarek’s pointed ears and perennially arched eyebrows but the predominant Vulcan trait of thinking and acting strictly within the logical boundaries of mathematics and science.

The wrestling match between sensible reason and deliberate speculation which the partly-human Spock must occasionally participate in is reminiscent (as is his physical appearance in a vague fashion) of Abraham Lincoln who grappled with similar ideological conflicts in his speechwriting, policy making, and personal thinking. What later turns out to be a carbon-based copy of Lincoln beams aboard the Enterprise in the Savage Curtain episode (third to last of the original series) and encounters Lt. Uhura to whom he refers as “an enchanting Negress”. Uhura takes no offense, assuring a properly chagrined ‘Lincoln’ that “in our century, we’ve learned not to fear words.” The replicated Emancipator replies, “The foolishness of my century had me apologizing where no offense was given.”

Nichelle Nichols as Uhura

The visually striking and multi-talented Nichelle Nichols had modeled, danced in Hugh Heffner’s Playboy Club, traveled extensively as a singer in the ensembles of Duke Ellington and Lionel Hampton, and appeared variously onstage and onscreen. She was featured in Gene Roddenberry’s first series titled, appropriately for the soon-to-be Communications Officer of the Enterprise, The Lieutenant. Interestingly, because Uhura’s makeup swept her hair atop her head and accentuated Nichols’ naturally almond-shaped eyes, she was often mistaken for Asian by people viewing the program on black and white television sets.

George Takei as Sulu

The role of Helmsman Hikaru Sulu was filled by George Takei, who was very involved in several early plot lines alongside the show’s central triumvirate of Kirk, Spock and Leonard ‘Bones’ McCoy (“Dammit, Jim, I’m a doctor…”) played memorably by DeForest Kelley. Born Hosato Takei in Los Angeles to Japanese parents, he (at the age of four) and his family were rounded up along with more than 120,000 other Japanese Americans in the wake of the Pearl Harbor attack and interred for five years in a perpetual state of “chaos and confusion” among “rows upon rows of black tar paper-covered Army barracks aligned in military parade precision”, first in Alabama’s Rohwer Relocation Center then Camp Tule Lake back in California.

Prior to navigating the Enterprise out of a succession of hazardous situations among the stars, one of Takei’s first film appearances was an uncredited role as the Japanese steerer who pulverizes Lt. John F. Kennedy’s torpedo boat in PT-109.

Walter Koenig as Chekov

Takei’s prolonged absence while filming The Green Berets opposite John Wayne was responsible for the increased screen time given to Walter Koenig, introduced as Ensign Pavel Chekov in Star Trek’s second season. His parents, Isadore and Sarah Koningsberg, were Russian Jews who fled Lithuania for Chicago and ultimately New York where Isadore, a former Communist, found himself subject to scrutiny beneath the red-tinted lens of Joseph McCarthy’s un-American activities microscope. Koenig compared the McCarthy witch-hunts of the 1940s and 50s to “our version of the Spanish Inquisition or Robespierre’s Committee on Public Safety or the shadow councils of South American dictatorships.”

Roddenberry’s addition of a Russian to the cast was a further controversial brushstroke of brilliant multiplicity just as the successful missions of Sputnik and Vostok had given the Soviets the lead in the jingoistic space race, throwing further fuel onto the fire of the still-simmering Cold War. Beyond giving the prematurely balding actor a mop-topped toupee, drawing favorable comparisons among female Trekkers with Davey Jones of the Monkees, and requesting that Koenig over-enunciate an already cartoonish Russian accent (such as swapping W’s for V’s), Roddenberry’s public relations department concocted another puzzling fabrication.

The character of Chekov, according to a press release which was every bit a work of fiction as Star Trek itself, was created to satisfy the call for a Russian cast member proposed by the Soviet newspaper Pravda, a publication which pre-dated the October Revolution but had enjoyed its most immense readership under Lenin’s rule along with the Bolsheviks’ other propaganda sheet of choice Izvestia.       

James Doohan as Scotty

James Doohan confessed that he was Canadian with “some Scottish blood in me, but that’s three hundred years ago.” He recalled being asked by Gene Roddenberry during his audition to judge for himself“which of the eight different accents I’ve just done for him would best fit the role of the Chief Engineer. It had better be a Scotsman,” Doohan decided. “They’ve built all the great ships around the world. The Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth, the Titanic…”

That last example notwithstanding, the Enterprise’s Transporter Engineer adopted the guise of Montgomery Scott, still associated today with the catchphrase “Beam me up, Scotty”. Like “Play it again, Sam”, it is one of those peculiar anomalies of the pop-culture lexicon for having never actually been spoken as quoted. Much to Doohan’s regret, the aforementioned Lincoln-related episode Savage Curtain would be the only opportunity for Scotty to don the traditional Scottish kilt.

MLK Rescues Uhura    

Star Trek did not become the mainstream cultural phenomenon that it remains today until after its 1969 cancelation and subsequent network syndication in the 70s. The series suffered, during its inaugural season, from lukewarm critical reaction and poor viewership ratings. It was also nearly altered drastically and for the worse by the potential departure of one of its major cast members.

Nichelle Nichols was routinely given a difficult time by certain security guards on the Paramount lot who pretended not to recognize the unmistakable actress with the intention of denying her access to the show’s soundstage. One afternoon, she was approached covertly by two mailroom employees who apologized for withholding the bulk of her voluminous fan correspondence - which rivaled that of either Leonard Nimoy or William Shatner - at the request of their supervisor who himself was acting on orders handed down from above.

Worse still, she was verbally accosted by a Desilu executive who told her in no uncertain terms following a first-season cast reduction that “If anyone was let go, it should have been you, not Grace Lee,” referring to Grace Lee Whitney who had played Captain Kirk’s personal assistant and hopeful love interest Yeoman Janice Rand until her role was deemed redundant. “Ten of you could never equal one blue-eyed blonde,” was his bigoted analysis.

These events proved the breaking point of the frustration already weighing heavily upon her at being little more than a prop on the ship’s bridge (with the notable exception of getting to sing in two early episodes), exhibiting her shapely legs in a red mini-dress and interminably intoning the line, “Hailing frequencies open, sir.” The last episode of the season having wrapped, Nichelle went to Gene Roddenberry’s office and tendered her resignation, effective immediately.

She attended an NAACP fundraiser the following evening where a fellow guest asked if she could take some time to meet with a big fan. Anticipating a short cordial chat followed by an autograph request or photo opportunity, Nichols was astounded to turn and stand face to face with Martin Luther King, Junior. “Yes, I am that fan,” King beamed, “and I wanted to tell you how important your role is.” He revealed to her that Star Trek was the only television show that he and Coretta allowed the children to stay up late and watch as a family and was completely taken aback by Nichele’s revelation that she was departing the program.

“You cannot and must not,” demanded King. “You have opened a door which must not be allowed to close. You have created a character of dignity and grace and beauty and intelligence. For the first time, people see us as we should be seen, as equals, as intelligent people, as we should be. Remember, you are not important there in spite of your color. You are important there because of your color. This is what Gene Roddenberry has given us.”

Nichols returned to Roddenberry on Monday morning to relay Dr. King’s message and retract her resignation. “God bless that man,” Gene said while fighting back tears. “At least someone sees what I’m trying to achieve.”

The Kiss

Before the series wound down to its fateful and unfortunate third season conclusion, it would shock the world with a provocative episode titled Plato’s Stepchildren. It begins in a manner not dissimilar from The Squire of Gothos (wherein Uhura is identified by the French-obsessed alien presence Trelane as “a Nubian prize”) as a landing party consisting of the crew’s principal players is manipulated for the amusement of their nefarious hosts. Here, a Utopian society has been founded on the planet Platonia by its leader Parmen based on the teachings of the ancient Greeks, namely Plato and Socrates.

Lt. Uhura and Nurse Chapel (Roddenberry’s wife Majel) are involuntarily beamed down to Platonia for inclusion in a stage play-equal parts dramatic, romantic, and sadistic-along with Kirk and Spock, all in Greek costume and under the influence of Parmen’s psycho-kinetic control. After Spock and Nurse Chapel have already done so, Kirk and Uhura have no choice but to comply with Parmen’s wish to see them kiss. This is commonly and mistakenly referred to as television’s first inter-racial kiss but the truth of the matter is that the British soap opera Emergency Ward 10 beat Star Trek to the lip-smacking punch four years earlier.

Furthermore, the sequence, as aired, features the second alternate take shot at the insistence of Paramount executives where Shatner pulls a struggling Nichols toward him and their lips do not make direct contact. This measure was taken to placate southern network affiliates who threatened to black out the entire hour based solely on the presentation of ‘the kiss’.

“And even when we shot this compromised version of the scene, I can clearly recall the network suits standing on the set watching us intently,” remembers William Shatner, “making sure that before the two of us performed our simulated kiss, we fought against it intently, making it absolutely clear that in the case of Kirk and Uhura, this was an ‘against their will’ coupling. Completely devoid of any passion, romance, or sexuality.” Nichelle Nichols raged that “It was bullshit! Bullshit! It was simply and clearly racism standing in the door…in suits. Strange how a twenty-third century space opera could be so mired in antiquated hang-ups.”

Regardless, it was a mountain-moving moment in American television and one can only imagine that writer Meyer Dolinsky anticipated the furor this scene would arouse when he scripted the lines of dialogue beginning with Uhura saying, “I’m so frightened, Captain. I’m so very frightened.”

“That’s the way they want you to feel,” Kirk reassures her. “It makes them think that they’re alive.” Uhura then declares affirmatively and defiantly that “I’m thinking of all the times on the Enterprise when I was scared to death…and now they’re making me tremble. But I’m not afraid. I am not afraid.”

Down to Earth and Back to Space  

Many cast members happily accepted the challenge to “seek out new life and new civilizations” after they had shed their Starfleet insignia, tri-corders, communicators, and phasers (set to stun, of course).

Nichelle Nichols would use her sci-fi credibility to recruit engineers and astronauts for NASA, specifically appealing to females and minorities. Augmenting the encouragement she had received from Martin Luther King back in 1966, she would be further touched by the words of Whoopi Goldberg who would appear as Guinan on the last four seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Whoopi excitedly conveyed the story to Nichelle of how she had turned on the television as a child and seen Uhura featured prominently on the bridge of the Enterprise, screaming to her mother, “Come quick! Come quick! There’s a black lady on tv and she ain’t no maid.”  

Leonard Nimoy campaigned for the dovish Eugene McCarthy and worked on behalf of the ACLU, Cesar Chavez’s United Farm Workers, and Martin Luther King’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference. One of the songs that appeared on Nimoy’s 1974 double-LP Outer Space/Inner Mind was a track entitled Abraham, Martin, and John, a musical tribute to Lincoln, King, John and Bobby Kennedy.

George Takei, an openly gay man with a decidedly wicked sense of humor, proudly uses his frequent appearances on the Howard Stern Show as well as his various social media platforms to advocate for LGBT rights and same-sex marriage legislation along with his husband Brad. The hit musical Allegiance, starring Takei and based on his experiences in the Japanese internment camps, opened at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego and has played to great acclaim in several major cities with a recent run at Broadway’s Longacre Theatre.

Suffering terribly from a hellish combination of Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, and pulmonary disease, James Doohan was honored shortly before his 2005 death with a convention called Beam Me Up One Last Time, Scotty. The keynote speaker was Neil Armstrong who made a rare public appearance to express his gratitude for the inspiration that Star Trek had given him in his quest toward the moon. “I want a Chief Engineer like Montgomery Scott,” Armstrong mused on a hypothetical return to the stars, “because I know Scotty will get the job done and do it right. Even if I often hear him say, ‘But, Captain, I dinna have enough time!’ So, from one old engineer to another, thanks Scotty.” Doohan was cremated after passing away, his ashes successfully beamed up into near-earth orbit in 2012-after two previously failed attempts-aboard the Falcon 9 rocket.

Live Long and Prosper!

Did you find the article interesting? Let us know why below…

Sources

Beyond Uhura: Star Trek and Other Memories by Nichelle Nichols (1994, Putnam)

To the Stars: Star Trek’s Mr. Sulu by George Takei (1994, Simon & Schuster)

Warped Factors: A Neurotic’s Guide to the Universe by Walter Koenig (1997, Taylor Publishing)

Beam Me Up, Scotty by James Doohan with Peter David (1996, Pocket Books)

Star Trek Memories by William Shatner with Chris Kreski (1993, Harper Collins) 

I Am Not Spock by Leonard Nimoy (1975, Celestial Arts)

The Trial of the Twentieth Century – And its relevance for tensions in modern America

The Scopes Trial was very possibly the most important of the twentieth century in the US – and has many considerations for today. Here, Edward J. Vinski returns and shares his reflections on Black Lives Matter and Blue Lives Matter in present-day America in the context of the Scopes Trial. You can find out more on the Scopes Trial in Edward’s previous articles over three parts here, here and here.

The Anti-Evolution League at the Scopes Trial. Source: Mike Licht, available here.

I write this on July 10, 2016, ninety-one years to the day since the so-called Scopes Monkey Trial began. This court case has fascinated me for well over a decade.  I read every book and article I can find about it. I have seen several documentaries. I have watched the dramatization "Inherit the Wind" so often I can almost recite it verbatim. I have thought about it and written about it. I follow new attempts at removing the theory of evolution from the public school classrooms with great interest. Nevertheless, it is only today that I came to a momentous conclusion: We, all of us in the United States of America, may have been wrong about William Jennings Bryan.

Not from a scientific perspective, mind you, because Bryan was no scientist and he often showed his ignorance. He valued scientific achievement for its benefits to humankind, but he had very little understanding of scientific principles. In some instances, his ignorance was nothing short of laughable as in this section from his famous "Prince of Peace" address:

I was eating a piece of watermelon some months ago and was struck with its beauty. I took some of the seeds and dried them and weighed them, and found that it would require some five thousand seeds to weigh a pound; and then I applied mathematics to that forty-pound melon. One of these seeds, put into the ground, when warmed by the sun and moistened by the rain, takes off its coat and goes to work; it gathers from somewhere two hundred thousand times its own weight, and forcing this raw material through a tiny stem, constructs a watermelon...[u]ntil you can explain a watermelon, do not be too sure that you can set limits to the power of the Almighty and say just what He would do or how He would do it. I cannot explain the watermelon, but I eat it and enjoy it (Bryan, 1909).

The argument appears to be, in essence, that science is faulty and God exists because William Jennings Bryan did not know where watermelons come from.

Bryan’s ignorance

Nowhere was his ignorance more evident than in the Scopes Trial itself. In an astonishing development, defense attorney, Clarence Darrow, called Bryan to the witness stand to answer questions about the Bible. Darrow, however, chose his questions carefully from biblical events that pressed up against the boundaries of science. Thus, Bryan stumbled badly when asked questions about such things as the age of the earth, the length of the days in the Genesis account of creation and how these stories contradicted accepted scientific facts. At best, he did nothing to help his cause. At worst, he played directly into the defense's hands.

Bryan was clearly wrong about evolutionary theory. How, then, have we misunderstood him?

Present events

You see, I am also writing this in the wake of a tense week for America. The shooting deaths of black men by police officers in Louisiana and Minnesota were followed a few days later by the shooting deaths of five police officers in Texas. Social media is currently undulating between prayers for the victims, sadness, outrage and anger. In addition, the all too familiar battle lines are once again drawn between Black Lives Matter and Blue Lives Matter.

The names of these movements, however, give a hint of something that Bryan foresaw over nine decades ago: Dehumanization. When we see only the dark skin and the blue uniform, we cannot help but lose sight of what inhabits both - an individual human being. One of Bryan’s greatest arguments for the banning of evolution had nothing to do with science per se. Rather, it was that while science clearly had produced the mechanical marvels of the twentieth century, it had produced no code of morality to keep these marvels in check. Bryan feared that the "survival of the fittest" interpretation of Darwin would lead to eugenics, sterilization, euthanasia and wars of aggression.

For evidence of this, we need look no farther than the textbook under scrutiny at the Scopes Trial, George William Hunter's "A Civic Biology". In a lengthy passage, Hunter describes precisely what Bryan feared most:

Hundreds of families [...] exist to-day, spreading disease, immorality, and crime to all parts of this country. The cost to society of such families is very severe. Just as certain animals or plants become parasitic on other plants or animals, these families have become parasitic on society. They not only do harm to others by corrupting, stealing, or spreading disease, but they are actually protected and cared for by the state out of public money. Largely for them the poorhouse and the asylum exist. They take from society, but they give nothing in return. They are true parasites.

If such people were lower animals, we would probably kill them off to prevent them from spreading. Humanity will not allow this, but we do have the remedy of separating the sexes in asylums or other places and in various ways preventing intermarriage and the possibilities of perpetuating such a low and degenerate race. Remedies of this sort have been tried successfully in Europe and are now meeting with success in this country (Hunter, 1914).

It is noteworthy that Hunter's book was published in 1914, the very year in which a Great War broke out that would eventually see some smaller, weaker nations swallowed up by larger, stronger ones.

War without a moral code?

Bryan worried that the proliferation of evolutionary theory without a proper moral balance would lead humanity to make judgments about those who are fit for life and procreation and those who are not. Those in positions of power could use evolutionary theory as a justification to eliminate those deemed parasitic, troublemakers, or just unpleasant. Had not such philosophies already affected the way we conduct our wars?  Science, Bryan wrote:

Has made war more terrible than it ever was before. Man used to be content to slaughter his fellowmen on a single plan-the earth's surface. Science has taught him to go down into the water and shoot up from below and to go up into the clouds and shoot down from above (Scopes Trial Transcript).

No less an authority than the secular evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould seemed to think that Bryan was on to something, writing, "when [Bryan] said that Darwinism had been widely portrayed as a defense of war, domination, and domestic exploitation, he was right" (p. 163). Within a few years of the Trial, Adolf Hitler would show, just how right Bryan was.

Understanding others

We see this same Dehumanization in our day when we look at the tragedies of Louisiana, Minnesota and Dallas. Depending on which side we find ourselves supporting, we see either black skin or a blue uniform, but not the person inhabiting them. Even the reasonable-sounding All Lives Matter perspective, while certainly true in the broadest sense, dehumanizes as it removes all traces of personal identity from the equation and ignores the reality faced by individuals of color and of law enforcement on any given day. For all of our advancements as a society, we have never been able to understand the world clearly from the perspective of another. There are those who cannot see how the actions of a white police officer against a black person could possibly be viewed as racist. There are those, on the other hand, who cannot see how such actions could be anything but. I may be able to sympathize with someone else, celebrate with them in triumph and commiserate with them in sorrow, but I can never truly see how they operate in the world and how the world reacts to them. If I cannot do this among my most intimate of friends, how then, can I ever hope to do so with those I know only through the broadest of generalities, which, by their very definition, dehumanize even further? The "you" and "me" of intimacy become the "them" and "us" of separation. Rodney King, the subject of another period of racial tension a generation ago once asked, "can we all get along?" Until we are able to view the world from the perspective of others, to understand them as individual human beings bound up in a history that is both of their own making and also beyond their control, the answer to that question is likely to remain a sad and resounding "no".

William Jennings Bryan did not understand evolutionary theory. His grasp on the scientific method was sketchy at best. He understood people, however. This skill enabled him to become a three-time candidate for President of the United States and one of the most popular public speakers of the twentieth century. His performance at the Trial led to his being labeled a villain, a bully, a buffoon. Maybe his insight went further than we thought, however. Maybe he knew what we would do to each other given only the slightest provocation and with only the slightest scientific justification. Maybe, just maybe, he was more right than we knew.

What do you think of the article? Tell us below…

References

• Bryan, W.J. (1909). The Prince of Peace. New York: Fleming H. Revel Company.
• Gould, S.J. (1999). Rocks of Ages: Science and Religion in the Fullness of Life. New York: Ballantine Books.
• Hunter, G. W. (1914). A Civic Biology Presented in Problems. New York: American Book Company.
•  Scopes Trial Transcript, 1925

Cold War History - The Complete History – From World War 2 to the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the Vietnam War to Reagan and Gorbachev – 1945-1991 (Required History)

Do you know why the world nearly destroyed itself in a catastrophic nuclear war?

Two words – ‘Cold War’.

Get the book on Amazon

The Cold War was international affairs for the second half of the 20th century. Nuclear weapons testing, civil wars in all corners of the globe and the race for economic dominance were all key spheres of the Cold War, although they were just a few elements of an intriguing global puzzle. More so than the great battles between Carthage and Rome in Ancient times or the Napoleonic Wars, the Cold War defined our world. But, there was one key difference between the Cold War and earlier major wars. Due to advances in technology and communications, the Cold War touched most countries on earth.

This introduction to the Cold War tells the story of the great clash between the communist Soviet Union and the capitalist USA. It covers the period from 1945 to 1991 in one combined edition, neatly breaking the Cold War up into three parts.

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The book starts by describing how two super-powers emerged out of the rubble of World War Two and includes the following:

·      How the Soviet Union and the USA quickly went from war-time allies to enemies

·      Events in East Asia - the Chinese Civil War and the Korean War

·      The most dangerous event of the early Cold War years, the Cuban Missile Crisis

·      The Vietnam War and its impact on the Cold War

·      The shocking power of nuclear weapons – and attempts to control them

·      Uprisings on the eastern side of the Iron Curtain

·      The super-powers as friends? Détente, Richard Nixon, and Leonid Brezhnev

·      The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan

·      The rise of Ronald Reagan and his aggression in the early 1980s

·      How Mikhail Gorbachev became Soviet leader

·      Glasnost, Perestroika, and how the Cold War ended

The approximately 250-page book is the perfect complement to the Cold War History audio series that is available as part of the ‘History in 28-minutes’ podcasts.

So come and join the past – get the book now!

Required History

The aim of the 'Required History' book series is to create approachable, succinct written introductions to some of the most interesting topics in history. They are designed for those:

·      That want to quickly learn about some of the world’s major historical events

·      Studying history. The books act as a perfect complement and overview to those undertaking high school and introductory college courses in history

·      Who enjoyed the audio podcasts and want to reinforce and further their knowledge

·      Learning English. The language and level of detail in the books are perfect for those in advanced English classes

All of the Required History books are designed to build on the audio podcasts available on the publisher’s website. They provide an extra layer of detail to the major historical events that the audio podcasts cover.

The End of Empire – Just how did Indonesia gain its independence from the Dutch?

Independence movements come in different shapes and sizes in different parts of the world. And while many of us are familiar with Vietnam’s anti-colonial history, that is less true of other countries in South-East Asia. Here, Miguel Miranda explains the anti-colonial movement and quest for independence in post-World War Two Indonesia.

Revolutionaries who wanted Indonesian independence. 1946. Source: Tropenmuseum, part of the National Museum of World Cultures. Available here.

Southeast Asia used to be a chaotic map of internecine conflict. This was indeed the prevailing state of affairs when the Portuguese and Dutch arrived in the early 16th century. As the scholarly adventurer Antonio Galvao wrote of the Moluccas’ martial culture, “they are always waging war, they enjoy it. They live and support themselves by it.”

Maritime forays into the Orient, an uncharted expanse whose nations were completely unknown to Europeans, were inspired not by Marco Polo’s tall tales but the raw desire for commodities. Spices, cloves and nutmeg, in particular, were the prizes. The problem was exactly where the precious cloves were to be found—the Moluccas Islands in the Banda Sea.

Owing to competition from Portugal, the Dutch East India Company or the VOC established a firm toehold in Java instead. The sumptuous domain was where petty Sultans and pirates held sway. European arms and technology weren’t as superior as presumed in this setting because local armies had greater numbers and formidable warships. After all, the Portuguese adventurer Fernao Magalhaes and his men were slaughtered in the shores of Mactan. The VOC employed the alternative to force of arms, focusing their energies on cultivating alliances, patronizing local rulers, and building outposts for absorbing exports.

The Dutch influence

This changed when the Netherlands consolidated the Dutch East Indies after the brutal Java War ended in 1830. Appointed governors, tasked with running an export-driven economic policy, assumed control of Java, Sumatra, Sulawesi, Papua and Borneo. The Dutch were stern and ruthless masters and every revolt, such as in Aceh, was dealt with by force.

The very idea of Indonesian nationalism took hold in the early 20th century. It even followed a pattern many anti-colonial movements went through, where a so-called intelligentsia educated in Europe began to aspire for political freedom. This ferment produced two seminal figures who would usher Indonesia’s birth: the coldly intellectual Mohammad Hatta, who was more Dutch in his outlook and conduct than Javanese, and Achmed Sukarno, whose own background as an engineer hardly prepared him for a career as professional rebel. Together they formed an interesting partnership, the ideologue and the man of action, and commanded a powerful vehicle for their ideas: the PNI, or Partai Nasional Indonesia.

Japan’s lightning assault on Southeast Asia in 1941 deposed the Dutch colonial government in Batavia, which is present day Jakarta. This brief interlude, complete with the harsh wages of occupation, did galvanize Java’s nationalists. Sukarno himself, long familiar with imprisonment meted by Dutch colonial authorities, was freed by the Japanese. In turn Sukarno didn’t hesitate to solicit aid from his country’s occupiers. His dalliance with Japan extended to the personal realm. A compulsive womanizer, Sukarno’s better half was a Japanese entertainer.

Independence?

Towards the end of 1945, with the Imperial Japanese Army having surrendered and ready for demobilization, the nationalists and their allies—hardened by years of guerilla warfare—were poised to reclaim Java. The PNI rallied and with Tokyo’s blessing Sukarno declared a republic on 17 August 1945.

But what followed instead was swift retribution from the Dutch. Cobbling a military from young recruits equipped with Allied Lend Lease and surplus, some 120,000 soldiers were shipped to the Indies to smother the new country. Their activities, which would include prison camps and wholesale slaughter, were officially labeled as “Police Actions.”

The historical record of Indonesia’s “national revolution” remains murky. The available facts form a bare outline lacking in color and drama. Its most critical battle, for example, is a farcical episode in the city of Surabaya where the British—not the Dutch—had to rout the local guerillas who had seized the metropolis to restore order.

Owing to the young republic’s tenacity, a typical stalemate soon prevailed between conventional European armies (the Dutch and the British) garrisoned in the large cities while the local rebels had free reign in the countryside. The fate of Madiun, in East Java, was interesting as it fell to hardcore communists who were then crushed not by the Dutch but the nascent republic’s own troops. In West Java a separate rising under the guise of Darul Islam sought to wage jihad and establish a grand theocracy lasted two decades.

Even the Japanese had a role in the conflict. With a substantial garrison stuck in Java, IJA officers willingly lent arms and equipment to the Indonesian resistance before departing for their homeland. This was done just as the British were relying on Japanese troops to help police the restive colony.

The rise of a new leader

Sukarno’s revolution wasn’t an exceptional one. Other eruptions were tearing apart Europe’s aging dominion on foreign territories. The British in Palestine. The French in Vietnam and Algeria. The Belgians in their precious Congo. World War Two may have saved Western civilization, but it ignited small fires among the people suffering under colonialism’s yoke.

Indonesia’s war for independence never had its own Dien Bien Phu where local grit and daring prevailed over European hubris. This didn’t make it any less bloody. It killed more than 100,000 Indonesians and cost the Netherlands several thousand troops along with at least a thousand dead British and Indian soldiers. Rather than Sukarno and the PNI victorious beyond doubt, it was the United Nations who eventually recognized and then restored Indonesia’s independence on 27 December 1949. The Dutch acquiesced owing to their battered economy and withdrew their forces. Rather than usher peace, however, Indonesia’s emergence allowed a dictator in the making to craft grand schemes.

Despite an early fixation on parliamentary democracy in the 1950s, Sukarno eventually steered the PNI toward “guided democracy,” which was really just shorthand for lifelong dictatorship. With a powerful army at his disposal a headlong push to annex Borneo ignited a confrontation with the British in what became the Konfrontasi. Provocations aimed at Singapore and separate invasions of Sulawesi and West Papua enhanced Jakarta’s reputation as a contentious neighbor.

As he leaned closer to Peking and Moscow, Sukarno dreamed of establishing a super state across Southeast Asia. This compelled Washington, DC’s long campaign to unseat him, beginning with a botched covert invasion in 1958 and a full-blown coup d’etat in 1965 that ushered the Suharto era and the horrific purge of Indonesia’s communists.

The only recourse that checked Indonesia’s belligerence was when five ministers, from Jakarta, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Manila, and Bangkok, convened in the Thai capital on 8 August 1967 and agreed—on paper—to establish an informal union. The idea came from Indonesia’s Adam Malik, who would go on to serve a brilliant diplomatic career. 50 years later and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations or ASEAN is thriving, albeit still uncomfortable with the challenges posed by what the First World considers “development.”

Indonesia paid dearly for its independence and suffered under two corrupt dictators. Having achieved true democracy it’s exciting to think about whether Indonesia is destined to emerge a peerless regional giant. Could Sukarno’s fever dream become real?

Did you find this article of interest? If so, tell the world. Tweet about it, like it, or share it by clicking on one of the buttons below.

References

http://www.christopherhalemedia.org/2013/05/the-battle-of-surabaya/

http://countrystudies.us/indonesia/16.htm

https://www.culturalsurvival.org/ourpublications/csq/article/west-papua-forgotten-war-unwanted-people

http://dannyreviews.com/h/Indonesian_Revolution.html

http://www.iisg.nl/collections/hatta/intro.php

http://indonesia-dutchcolonialheritage.nl/

http://www.indonesia-investments.com/culture/politics/soekarno-old-order/item179

https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/explore-the-collection/timeline-dutch-history/1820-1950-indonesia-and-decolonisation

http://thecreatorsproject.vice.com/blog/unreleased-indonesian-national-revolution-pics

http://www.lowensteyn.com/indonesia/

http://www.nusantara.com/heritage/surabaya.html

http://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/Indo58.html

http://www.san.beck.org/20-11-Indonesia1800-1950.html

http://users.skynet.be/network.indonesia/ni4001c10.htm

Cold War History - Brave New World – Reagan, Gorbachev and the end of the Cold War – Part 3: 1979-1991 (Required History)

Just how did the Cold War end?

We reveal all in the fascinating conclusion to the Cold War series.

The Cold War was international affairs for the second half of the 20th century. Nuclear weapons testing, civil wars in all corners of the globe and the race for economic dominance were all key spheres of the Cold War, although they were just a few elements of a very complex global puzzle. More so than the great battles between Carthage and Rome in Ancient times or the Napoleonic Wars, the Cold War defined our world. But, there was one key difference between the Cold War and earlier major wars. Due to advances in technology and communications, the Cold War touched most countries on earth.

Get the book on Amazon

This introduction to the end of the Cold War tells the story of the great clash between the communist Soviet Union and the capitalist USA. It considers events at a time of ever-faster change. Following the relative calm of the Détente years, the world became much more dangerous. After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan a new and very assertive US president arrived who would seek to radically alter the international order. And soon enough a new Soviet leader would arrive and lead a great change in the international system. The biggest change since World War Two…

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The topics in the book include:

·      The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan

·      The rise of US President Ronald Reagan and his aggression in the early 1980s

·      How Mikhail Gorbachev became Soviet leader

·      The most important nuclear treaties made during the Cold War

·      The surprising friendship between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev

·      Great internal changes in the Soviet Union and wider Eastern Bloc

·      How the Cold War ended

The approximately 90-page book is the perfect complement to the Cold War History audio series that is available as part of the ‘History in 28-minutes’ podcasts.

So come and join the past – get the book now!

Required History

The aim of the 'Required History' book series is to create approachable, succinct written introductions to some of the most interesting topics in history. They are designed for those:

·      That want to quickly learn about some of the world’s major historical events

·      Studying history. The books act as a perfect complement and overview to those undertaking high school and introductory college courses in history

·      Who enjoyed the audio podcasts and want to reinforce and further their knowledge

·      Learning English. The language and level of detail in the books are perfect for those in advanced English classes

All of the Required History books are designed to build on the audio podcasts available on the publisher’s website. They provide an extra layer of detail to the major historical events that the audio podcasts cover.

The fascinating tale of the European King who never visited his Long Island mansion

Rich and powerful people are prone to buying properties in the world’s most attractive places, whether that be the south of France, London or the Hamptons. Here, Christopher Benedict looks at one such property hot spot. He tells the fascinating story of King Zog I of Albania and how he purchased a mansion that he never visited in Long Island.

King Zog I of Albania.

The Gold Coast

The handful of hamlets and villages which comprise the Hamptons are collectively associated with Long Island’s go-to getaway spot, second home, or den of iniquity for contemporary celebrities. An all-inclusive VIP playground with a guest list reading like a who’s who of the well to do and the ne’er do wells. Faces familiar from movie screens and television sets, concert stages and the rear flaps of dustjackets. Personalities whose images with accompanying tales of achievement and debauchery alike are routinely spread throughout the pages of Vogue and Variety, Rolling Stone and Sports Illustrated, Fortune and Time.

The Hamptons are a relatively recent phenomenon and not at all relevant to the not too distant past when Long Island’s North Shore was the place to be and be seen (or not be seen, depending upon one’s desire for privacy and seclusion) for those who could afford such ostentatious status symbols as the mansions and sprawling estates built on what came to be known as the Gold Coast between just before the birth of the 20th century with its financial windfall created by the Industrial Revolution and the sobering death knell for the inebriated obliviousness of the Jazz Age (which turned blissfully blind eyes away from the horrific aftershocks of the First World War and flaunted their ill-gotten alcoholic party favors in the absurd face of the Volstead Act) sounded by Black Tuesday and the Great Depression.

Among the original occupants of these opulent, custom-built dwellings were luminous names such as William Vanderbilt, Alfred DuPont, J.P. Morgan, the Guggenheims, Lewis Tiffany, Frank Woolworth, William Robertson Coe, Otto Hermann Kahn, Henry Clay Frick, and John S. Phillips. Sagamore Hill in Oyster Bay served as Theodore Roosevelt’s permanent domicile and ‘Summer White House’ while president. Oscar Hammerstein, W.C. Fields, Ring Lardner, Eugene O’Neill, Groucho and Chico Marx, not to mention their father and mother Sam and Minnie, all maintained addresses up and down the Long Island Sound for varying lengths of time and frequent visitors like Charlie Chaplin, Ethel Barrymore, Dorothy Parker, Herbert Bayard Swope, and Winston Churchill, to name but a few, came and went as they pleased. 

The Gold Coast is most famous for its fictional depiction in The Great Gatsby, authored of course by short-term Great Neck denizen F. Scott Fitzgerald, who lived with Zelda on Long Island from October 1922 through April 1924 and based the novel’s East Egg and West Egg on Port Washington’s Sands Point and Kings Point of the Great Neck peninsula respectively. Lands’ End, the manor many consider to have been Fitzgerald’s inspiration behind Daisy Buchanan’s home in Gatsby, was demolished in 2011, the property sold off for a five-unit sub-division. In fact, it is estimated that fewer than 400 of the approximately 1,200 mansions constructed from the 1890s to the 1930s remain standing, with some functioning today as national landmarks, historic sites, state parks, public gardens, and museums.

It is the dilapidated ruins of a massive structure once known as Knollwood in the Incorporated Village of Muttontown, however, and one of its intended residents in particular that concern us now.

Bloody Inauguration

Ahmet Zogu was born to a family of feudal landowners in their Burjaget Castle on October 8, 1859 in the Muslim province of Mati which had established an independence of sorts from its Christian neighbors eight years prior. Albania remained, at the time, under the thumb of the Ottoman Empire and young Ahmet was sent off to begin his studies in Constantinople, an academic endeavor which lasted for all of three years. Indeed, Zogu would live out his entire existence as a functional illiterate. His friend and future foreign diplomat Chartin Sarachi alleged in his unpublished memoirs that “Zog never learned Albanian grammar and…is unable to write a line in the Albanian language. He can write in the old Turkish alphabet, but indeed that very poorly.” Sarachi contends that Zogu had only ever read two or three books, and each of them biographies of Napoleon. Which itself speaks volumes.  

Unlettered though he was, Ahmet would not allow this minor nuisance to thwart his ambition and patriotic fanaticism. At the age of sixteen, Zogu succeeded his deceased father as the Mati Governor and would add his signature to the Albanian Declaration of Independence in 1912. After having volunteered for service in the Great War on the side of Austria-Hungary, Ahmet would return home to a country fallen to disorder amidst a revolving parliamentary door of provisional figureheads, all of which Zogu served in some capacity or other.

From out of this chaos Ahmet ultimately emerged as Prime Minister and initiated several progressive if controversial measures such as converting expansive graveyards into public parks, liberating Muslim women from religious and social restrictions, outlawing polygamy, and drawing a firm line between religion and state. Shortly after being shot at by a student representing a radical group of young Albanian intellectuals who plainly saw tyranny dressed as democracy (one of a supposed 55 assassination attempts, as Albanian legend tells it), Zogu was forced into Yugoslavian exile in early 1924. Backed by a group of paid mercenaries 5,000 strong, he fought his way back across the Albanian border and reached the capital of Tirana on December 24 following two weeks of intense battle and much spilled blood. Ahmet almost immediately proclaimed himself President and made his designation official by virtue of a perfunctory election thrown together the following January. Thus did Zogu become not only Albania’s inaugural President but also the first Muslim sovereign of a European nation.

Chartin Sarachi remarked in his unfinished autobiography that Zogu “liked flattery and expected godlike veneration.” Those who failed to comply with these lofty wishes or in any way opposed his autonomy met with lengthy prison sentences or more decidedly grisly fates, prompting the European press to refer to Zog as “Ivan the Terrible of the Balkans.”

The Bizarre King

In the wake of his expulsion for criticizing “the fanatical, cross-bred, cringing, corrupt, face-grinding Beys and Moslems”, Albanian newspaper correspondent J. Swire wrote of Zogu in 1933 that “the alarming thing is that this very able man, the ruler of a very able people, is still so insecurely seated on a rickety throne.” Swire went on to suggest, “His death alone would be enough to provoke the break-up of the army, an explosion among the clans, intervention by land and sea and, possibly, a major war.” The root cause of this diagnosis lay in the fact that the country’s financial situation was not only devoid of equity but wildly lacking in accountability.

Zogu treated the extremely finite resources within Albania’s Treasury Department as a bottomless cookie jar from which he helped himself annually to more than twice his self-allotted £35,000 salary. He cut quite the ostentatious figure in an all-white ensemble of military tunic, feathered Cossack cap, gloves, pants, and patent leather shoes and his paramour Francy, a Viennese cabaret dancer with whom Ahmet became acquainted in Belgrade during his pre-presidential banishment, wore gowns produced by the finest Parisian dressmakers complimented by scores of jewels which, as Chartin Sarachi surmised, would have won the envy of Cleopatra.  

When this malfeasance threatened to unravel into a national economic crisis, Zogu first sought relief from Russia’s ambassador in Vienna who refused to take the matter to Moscow much less any further than the consulate itself. With no Communist assistance forthcoming from the Soviet front, Ahmet turned his attention to Fascist Rome which proved much more receptive to Zogu’s entreaties. Having knowingly bought into the lie with ulterior motives already in mind, Benito Mussolini personally approved a £200,000 loan to help stave off what he was informed to be an imminent revolution. There was more than a scarce element of truth behind Zogu’s ruse, surrounded as he was not only by a discontented general population but by sycophants, illiterates, and traitors which Ahmet proudly yet contemptuously referred to as “my circus.”

The creation of an Albanian National Bank, established and kept solvent by international handouts and headquartered in Rome, was a laughable attempt at legitimacy and necessitated the signing of a formal alliance with Italy in 1927. What followed was the coronation of Zog I, King of the Albanians, in what could only have been an eerie procession. The monarch rode in an open-top automobile flanked by armed cavalry, traveling into Tirana past houses all adorned with Italian-made Albanian flags, inside of which the occupants were ordered to remain. The purpose of this was to keep the streets clear, eliminating any risk of assassination.

The Puppet Defies Its Master

If Zog was initially thought of as an easy mark who would exist contentedly and be manipulated effortlessly beneath the boot of Italy, Il Duce had another guess coming, particularly when the Balkan King brazenly rejected four of the seven demands included in a 1933 ultimatum drafted by Mussolini. The disputed points of contention called for “the dismissal of all Albanian high officials not of Italian origin, the removal of English officers commanding the police and their replacement by Italians, the reopening of Catholic schools recently closed by the government, and the replacement of the French school at Kortcha by an Italian school.”     

Zog ran further afoul of Mussolini by subsequently entering into a commercial agreement with Yugoslavia as well as initiating diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union. However, growing financial instability and a resulting small-scale rebellion in the city of Fier in 1935 would force Zog to relent to Mussolini’s ultimatum in order to guarantee the continual flow of money into Albania from Rome. Zog additionally sought to curry favor with his benefactor by publicly protesting the sanctions imposed upon Italy by the League of Nations as a penalty for its annexation of Ethiopia.  

Ironically, it would be another annexation order issued by Mussolini - in 1939 against Albania - which would finally cause the two vainglorious dictators to come to loggerheads. Zog’s denial of Italy as Albania’s military protectorate would be his final act of defiance. Mussolini’s vengeful response arrived in the form of a naval bombardment from the Adriatic Sea which cleared the way for a boots-on-the-ground invasion over the Easter weekend. While the Albanian crown transferred to the head of Italy’s Vittorio Emanuel III, Zog escaped to Greece with his beautiful Hungarian bride Geraldine Apponyi and their infant son, Crown Prince Leka. From there, they re-routed to London where the royal family took sanctuary within the luxurious confines of the Ritz Hotel.

Knollwood

The famed Manhattan architectural firm of Hiss and Weeks drafted plans for the immense 60-room stone mansion which was constructed sometime between 1906 and 1920 as the centerpiece of Westbrook Farms, a 260-acre estate in Nassau County on Long Island intended for Charles Hudson who amassed his fortune through dealings on Wall Street as well as in the burgeoning steel industry.   

With the purpose of utilizing Knollwood as a by-proxy Albanian kingdom, the exiled Zog purchased the estate in 1951 for a reported amount of $102,800, which today would equate to slightly less than a million dollars. Pillagers and vandals, fueled by speculation that Zog had completed the transaction by means of rubies and diamonds and already had hidden for him within the mansion by low-level Albanian functionaries his money and multitudinous treasures, looted and destroyed beyond repair the vacant premises.

Never having laid eyes or set foot upon the property, Zog sold it four years later and the Town of Oyster Bay declared the unsafe structure condemned and had it all but leveled to the ground in 1959. Accessible - albeit difficult to find - from hiking trails winding through the present-day Muttontown Preserve, the ruins of Knollwood are still today a popular destination for scavengers and curiosity-seekers who may not even necessarily be privy to the story of the obscure Albanian king who very nearly lived there.

And, so, what of Zog? Rather than Long Island, he and his family relocated to Paris where he died in 1961 and was buried in the Thiais Cemetery. In 2012, the Albanian government - including Zog’s grandson Leka, a political advisor to President Bujar Nashani - commemorated the centennial of the nation’s independence from the Ottoman Empire by having Ahmet Zogu exhumed and repatriated to Tirana.

Committed to a specially built mausoleum, Zog’s remains have fortunately received far more reverential treatment than those of the Gold Coast’s ransacked and bulldozed mansion. 

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Sources

King Zog of the Albanians: The Inside Story by Chartin Sarachi (Unfinished and Unpublished Manuscript, 1940)

King Zog’s Albania by J. Swire (Liveright, 1937)

Eastern Europe in the Twentieth Century and After by R.J. Crampton (Routledge, 1997)

In Albania, Mussolini’s Interference (Sunday Times of Perth, Australia-August 27, 1933)

Invasion of Albania by C. Peter Chen (World War II Database)

King Zog I of Albania by Richard Cavendish (History Today, 2014)

Bizarre King Zog’s Remains Repatriated to Albania by Robert Myles (Digital Journal-November 12, 2012)

Stumbling on the Abandoned Ruins of King Zog’s Long Island Estate by Nick Carr (Scouting New York-March 4, 2013)