“The Good War”: An Oral History of World War II

A Jewish professor of history, Arno had in the military served as an aide for high-ranking German prisoners of war. He also worked on getting German scientists to relocate to the United States and work for the US government. Finally, Arno discusses his views of the Cold War, namely the Cold War actually began after World War I with the Allied forces intervening in Russia.

Erhard Dabringhaus was an intelligence officer who interrogated German POWs in Britain. He remarks that there was resistance to the idea that Russia, the United States’s greatest ally against Germany, was suddenly America’s enemy in the Cold War.

Milton Wolff fought against the fascists in the Spanish Civil War and became involved in World War II. However, Milton says that he “always had more respect for the conscientious objectors,” and he should only be recognized for fighting in “good wars” (486) against fascists.

A social worker at the time of the Spanish Civil War, Eileen Barth and her husband were investigated by the FBI for their leftist sympathies, specifically their support of the anti-fascists during the Spanish Civil War. At the war’s end, Eileen felt optimistic both because society was experiencing more material comfort but also because of the spread of democracy and social progress. However, her optimism has since been dashed.

An Italian American, Anthony Scariano recollects fighting alongside the Partisans of Italy against the Nazi occupation of Italy in the final months of the war. Although he and the other Americans in his battalion were “not very political” (499), they still hoped that the war would improve the United States and the world.

Another veteran of the Spanish Civil War, Irving Goff went on to serve in World War II and earned a Legion of Merit award. His leftist leanings got him investigated by the FBI after the war.

Hans Massaquoi was a mixed-race child whose mother was German and father was Liberian. While growing up in Germany with the rise of Hitler, he had to take an apprenticeship as a mechanist despite being a good student and fell in with other youths who hated the Nazi regime. Hans survived to the end of the war and was disappointed by how readily Americans fraternized with Germans. He also remarks upon how the Nazis “disappeared” (503) after the war, since everyone denied ever being one.