Microkhan by Brendan I. Koerner

Entries Tagged as 'World War II'

To My Former Captor

November 8th, 2012 · 3 Comments

As I learned so long ago in the mind-blowing Summer of My German Soldier, thousands of Axis prisoners-or-war were housed in Arkansas during World War II. Upon their release at conflict’s end, many of the former captives kept in touch with their American bosses—the men they were forced to pick cotton for, in exchange for […]

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The Art of Getting By

September 21st, 2012 · Comments Off on The Art of Getting By

A while back, I explored the athletic means by which American prisoners-of-war coped with confinement in North Korea. That story popped to mind when I recently came across Bill Manbo’s color photographs of life in Japanese-American internment camps, which depict the unfortunate inmates’ efforts to inject some sense of normalcy into their daily lives. Sports […]

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A Different Approach

March 2nd, 2012 · 2 Comments

I’m a point in my book where I need to describe a cultural misunderstanding, one that has dire consequences for all parties involved. It’s a tricky thing to describe, since my worldview naturally aligns with the American characters—in trying to write the scene, I keep on expressing too much sympathy for their predicament. To wriggle […]

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Kafka in Seattle

January 4th, 2012 · 4 Comments

Amid all the wearying hullabaloo over the Iowa caucus, the passing of a major figure in American history seemed to have slipped off the radar. Gordon Hirabayashi, who died at 93 on Monday, was one of a small handful of Japanese-Americans to legally contest the Roosevelt Administration’s internment policy—a policy that, in this project’s humble […]

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The Christmas Fake-Out

December 23rd, 2011 · 4 Comments

Put yourself in the shoes of a G.I. slogging his way across Italy or New Guinea in December 1943. You’ve been subsisting on tinned ham and cold coffee for days; your feet are bleeding; your best friend took a bullet to the skull on Thanksgiving. The last thing in the world you want to think […]

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Local Knowledge

November 11th, 2011 · Comments Off on Local Knowledge

A brief Veterans Day special today, as I try and dedicate a strong eight hours to the book. I was planning on directing your attention to this excellent site, which honors the men and women of the 335th Station Hospital in Tagap Ga—the Burmese hamlet where so much Now the Hell Will Start action goes […]

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The Roots of the Infographic

October 13th, 2011 · Comments Off on The Roots of the Infographic

I’m almost ashamed to admit how much time I’ve wasted over the past few days sifting through this nifty archive of World War II “newsmaps,” which were essentially weekly progress updates published by the Army’s Special Service Division. Though tinged with the air of propaganda—it’s not like they ever reported on setbacks, and the enemy […]

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Combat in Charcoal

August 11th, 2011 · 5 Comments

Along with the transmission methods for mass psychological illness, one of the main themes I’ll be exploring in my next book is how traumatized Vietnam veterans coped with their homecomings. As such, I’ve been digging into the history of post-traumatic stress disorder, particularly the ways in which the condition was glossed over by the medical […]

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The Grim Handiwork of Man

February 1st, 2011 · 2 Comments

In researching my Teddy Weatherford yarn for The Atavist, I was compelled to revisit a tragic event that I described in Now the Hell Will Start: the Bengal famine of 1943, which ultimately claimed the lives of 3 million Indians. In the book, I detail how a bare modicum of foresight could have prevented the […]

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How to Wreck a Nice Atoll

January 14th, 2011 · 3 Comments

Followers of Microkhan’s microblog may have noted that I’ve developed a recent fascination with World War II-era combat art, which was created as part of an official War Department program to depict the conflict in oils, inks, and water colors. Once the the war was over, the painting continued as the U.S. speedily developed its […]

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Should You Find Yourself Plummeting

August 30th, 2010 · 5 Comments

Whenever a plane I’m on is close enough to its destination that houses and cars appear, I can’t help thinking to myself: “If I fell from here, could I survive?” There is something about having a visual sense of the ground that makes a parachute-less airplane jump seem survivable. If those motor vehicles can zip […]

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Fleet Street’s Dubious Science

August 27th, 2010 · Comments Off on Fleet Street’s Dubious Science

Apologies for the late start to the day, but Microkhan Jr. decided to rob the clan of some much-needed sleep in the wee hours. Unable to get back to the Sandman’s realm once the kid had been pacified, I passed the time by catching up on The World at War. Lots of good stuff there, […]

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If You’re Feeling Sinister

August 5th, 2010 · 10 Comments

Last night, I finally started working my way through The World at War, which I’ve long heard is the be-all and end-all of World War II documentaries. With only a single episode under my belt, I’m not yet equipped to verify the veracity of that statement. But there’s no disputing the filmmakers’ skills at digging […]

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The Father of Boom

July 27th, 2010 · 2 Comments

During my guest stint over at Ta-Nehisi’s place last week, a commenter reminded me of my all-time favorite Otto von Bismarck quote: “Politics is the art of the possible.” The unsmiling German statesman may have meant that all successful negotiations must end in compromise, but I’d like to think he also had faith in politics’ […]

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The Weapon That Almost Wasn’t?

May 17th, 2010 · 1 Comment

It is with great sadness that we note the passing of Edward G. Uhl, renowned as one of the co-fathers of the bazooka. It is safe to say that World War II would have been a much tougher slog for the Allies without the tubular weapon, which Dwight D. Eisenhower hailed as one of our […]

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This Is How We Lost to the Robots

April 6th, 2010 · 4 Comments

The nexus between technology and music is obviously a topic of great interest ’round Microkhan headquarters, so we couldn’t have been any more delighted to receive a gratis copy of Dave Tompkins’ How to Wreck a Nice Beach: The Vocoder from World War II to Hip-Hop a few weeks back. The book is everything a […]

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Mines Never Sleep

March 4th, 2010 · 2 Comments

From the frigid waters of the Baltic Sea, a depressing reminder about the extremely long-term dangers posed by mines: Dozens of Second World War mines that litter the floor of the Baltic Sea will be detonated by a British company this spring in the biggest commercial mine-clearance programme in history. Sebastian Sass, head of EU […]

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Psyops on Thin Dead Trees

December 8th, 2009 · 7 Comments

The advent of electronic media has apparently done little to diminish the use of propaganda leaflets during wartime. Over the first six weeks of the Iraq War, for example, the United States Air Force dropped 31.8 million leaflets, primarily geared toward encouraging conscripts to surrender and oil workers to resist scorched-earth orders. This June 2003 […]

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The Benefits of Complexity

December 7th, 2009 · 9 Comments

We recently stumbled across the tale of the Choctaw code talkers, who were briefly employed by the American Expeditionary Force during World War I. Upon learning of their role in the conflict, we immediately wondered why the United States military opted to use Navajos rather than Choctaws during the wider war that followed a quarter-century […]

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Surrounded by Seeds

November 25th, 2009 · 1 Comment

As you tuck into your fourth helping of stuffing tomorrow evening, spare a few seconds to think about some of our less fortunate brothers from history—specifically the valiant disciples of Nikolai Vavilov, who deserves a place alongside Norman Borlaug in the pantheon of agricultural saints. Vavilov spent much of his career traveling the world in […]

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Still Waiting for Our Mini-Chopper

November 13th, 2009 · 3 Comments

It just seemed cruel to cap the week with Ms. O’Donnell’s execrable work, so we’re gonna give you a retro-futuristic treat: a World War II-era view of the rise of personal aircraft. The pamphlet’s title really says it all: Will There Be a Plane in Every Garage? The answer, as you might surmise, is a […]

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Grease for Strength

October 22nd, 2009 · Comments Off on Grease for Strength

Yesterday morning, while tearing through the Stanford Faculty Club’s equivalent of a Denny’s Grand Slam (sans flapjacks, alas), we recalled how Americans were asked to collect their bacon drippings during World War II. We always assumed that this grease was then converted into fuel. But, boy, were we wrong—as the friendly Disney characters explain in […]

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Beyond Burma Shave

September 15th, 2009 · Comments Off on Beyond Burma Shave

A valued Friend of Microkhan informs us that GMC is running a new crop of ads that refer to the Burma Road, where the company’s trucks did fine work plowing through the monsoon muck. This campaign obviously harkens back to one from the thick of World War II, when GMC touted its vehicles’ performance in […]

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Master at Work

August 3rd, 2009 · Comments Off on Master at Work

So we’re back to working hard on the screenplay, trying to bang out a second draft by (gulp) August 28th. To get in the right frame of mind, then, we’ve started watching a bunch of cinematic classics that have resided too long on our “must see” list. Chief among these was Akira Kurosawa’s Stray Dog, […]

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Mailroom Intelligence

July 13th, 2009 · Comments Off on Mailroom Intelligence

We first fell in love with the oral-history format eons ago, when a copy of Studs Terkel’s The Good War found its way into our grubby hands. Ever since, we’ve rarely passed up the opportunity to comb through typed-up question-and-answer sessions with the sorts of characters who otherwise would be excluded from the history books. […]

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“Kobe 55.7 Percent”

July 6th, 2009 · 3 Comments

We touched down on Spaceship Earth after the Vietnam War’s conclusion, so we can’t say that the late Robert McNamara ever loomed particularly large in our imagination. But we do recall being gobsmacked by The Fog of War, perhaps the most thought-provoking documentary we’ve encountered. As a small memorial to McNamara, the most memorable (and […]

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The Mob Psychology of Desperate Men

July 2nd, 2009 · 2 Comments

It took us well over a week, but we finally got around to finishing Harp of Burma last night, while sitting on the 2 train back from Brooklyn. Yes, a week-plus is an awful long time to tackle a so-called children’s book, one which clocks in at a measly 132 pages. But such is life […]

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“He Plunges at Me, Guttering…”

June 8th, 2009 · 2 Comments

We’ve previously written about Allied mustard-gas experimentation during World War II, involving live human subjects who were occasionally given no protection whatsoever. But it wasn’t until we read about the Bari disaster that we realized hundreds of Allied troops perished from mustard-gas exposure. This wasn’t due to deliberate release, mind you, but rather a horrific […]

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“Survivor Dosimetry”

June 4th, 2009 · 2 Comments

We could easily spend the rest of the year—and probably a fair chunk of 2010—blogging exclusively about Cold War nuclear testing. But since doing so would certainly lead to a mass exodus of readers, we’ll spare you the endless geek out. For now, content yourself with this short-yet-fascinating report (PDF) on the Nevada Test Site‘s […]

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Now the Paperback Will Start

May 26th, 2009 · 10 Comments

So at long last, we’ve come to the appointed hour: The Now the Hell Will Start paperback hits stores today, and can currently be had via Amazon for as little as a tenner. Not a bad deal in our humble (albeit biased) opinion, considering the nearly five years’ worth of mental toil contained within those […]

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