We hope the vast majority of our American readers are enjoying the Memorial Day holiday outdoors, and thus won’t be reading these words ’til much later. Microkhan, alas, won’t be barbecuing with y’all—this is just another work day ’round here, as the screenplay deadline looms. We’re gonna devote the bulk of today’s energies to that […]
Tags:Hawaii·Herman Perry·India·Now the Hell Will Start·NtHWS Extras Month·Washington Post·World War II
One of the greatest research challenges we faced while writing Now the Hell Will Start was the paucity of primary source material describing day-to-day life for African-American GIs. Enlisted men were discouraged from keeping diaries, literacy rates were low, and post-war archivists too often ignored black contributions to the Great Cause—an unholy trifecta for historians […]
Tags:Now the Hell Will Start·NtHWS Extras Month·World War II
Okay, we’ve got a spare second while Microkhan Jr. roams about the Sandman’s domain, so it’s time to dash off today’s installment of NtHWS Extras. Our focus today is on the cartoon art of World War II—not the stuff from the homefront op-ed pages, but rather the quasi-humorous strips meant to bolster troop morale. The […]
Tags:Bill Mauldin·cartoons·Cpl. Gee Eye·Now the Hell Will Start·NtHWS Extras Month·World War II
We’re swamped with Wired reporting duties for the remainder of the day, so today’s NtHWS Extras installment must once again be a visual quickie. The photo above depicts several African-American GIs enjoying rickshaw rides in Calcutta, the only Indian city with a nearby rest camp willing to accept black soldiers. White American officers, by contrast, […]
Tags:Calcutta·India·Now the Hell Will Start·NtHWS Extras Month·World War II
We have to jet downtown for an evening of semi-responsible alcohol consumption, so today’s edition of NtHWS Extras will be exceedingly brief. It consists, in fact, of little more than the cartoon at right, which Microkhan discovered in the archives of the United States Army Military History Institute. It comes from a scrapbook donated by […]
Tags:covert operations·Kachin Rangers·Now the Hell Will Start·NtHWS Extras Month·OSS Detachment 101·World War II
Today’s edition of NtHWS Extras brings us the amazing tale of Dr. Gordon S. Seagrave, arguably one of the most selfless and impressive American expatriates of the 20th century. There is nary a peep about Seagrave in Now the Hell Will Start, primarily because he’s not the sort of bloke you can just casually mention […]
Tags:Burma·Gordon Seagrave·medicine·Now the Hell Will Start·NtHWS Extras Month·World War II
En route to the Indo-Burmese jungle, the main character in Now the Hell Will Start spent several weeks at a British rest camp called Deolali, about 125 miles from Bombay. Prior to World War II, the camp had been used as a holding area for British soldiers who’d completed their service in Asia, and were […]
Tags:chemical weapons·Deolali·India·mustard gas·Now the Hell Will Start·NtHWS Extras Month·World War II
In the course of researching the Now the Hell Will Start chapter that deals with wartime prostitution, we stumbled upon a great little artifact called Morale-Building Activities in Foreign Armies. It’s an illustrated 1943 pamphlet that delves into the various methods used by both Axis and Allies to pep up their troops’ spirits. And it […]
Tags:Britain·Germany·Italy·Now the Hell Will Start·NtHWS Extras Month·World War II
For today’s edition of NtHWS Extras, we’ll be covering a topic that’s been much in the news as of late: Cannabis laws. Ganja use plays a significant role in Now the Hell Will Start, as it did in the lives of thousands of American GIs during World War II. The book’s main character became a […]
Tags:Assam·British Empire·drugs·India·Indian Hemp Drugs Commission·marijuana·Now the Hell Will Start·NtHWS Extras Month·World War II
The best novel we’ve read so far this year is Ian Buruma’s The China Lover, a criminally underrated fusion of first-rate historical reportage and thoughtful meditation on the nature of art. The book’s backbone is the true-life tale of a Japanese actress-turned-politician, whose career is recounted through the eyes of three lonely, movie-obsessed observers. The […]
Tags:Ian Buruma·Japan·Manchukuo·propaganda·The China Lover·Tokyo Rose·World War II
In today’s edition of Now the Hell Will Start Extras Month, we’re going to delve into one of the book‘s main themes: Military segregation during World War II. Time and again in the course of my research, I was struck by the virulence of Jim Crow attitudes within our nation’s armed forces. Despite the desperate […]
Tags:Now the Hell Will Start·NtHWS Extras Month·politics·pseudoscience·World War II
It’s a bright, gorgeous morning here at Harlem headquarters, which obviously means it’s the perfect time to revisit one of Microkhan’s favorite topics: suicide. The graph above shows the suicide rate in the United States between 1950 and 2005. As you can see, the rate has been remarkably stable over the years, despite growing awareness […]
