1949] POST SECOND WORLD WAR 21 3 inhabitants (mostly W0111en) living in a state 'of slavish subservience and con­ stant f~ar', 'working dumbly and mechanically as if they were machines' (p. 243), and miserably clad and underfed. In fact, they had been reduced by Soviet planning and policing to a state of complete destitution. In spite of their poverty, the Uzbeks treated the Poles kindly, and relations between them were most friendly until their departure as members of the new Polish Army in March 1942, via Krasnovodsk for Persia. This is a memorable book and not least so for the many gallant and interest­ ing personalities which flit through its pages; the indomitable, quick-witted Halina, the patient, kindly Bogdan, Sczepan, Lopatka, Ivan the Samoyed, Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/ia/article/25/2/213/2693930 by guest on 02 October 2021 Olscewski, singing like a lark as he makes 'coffins for Russians', the 'strong, reliable' surgeon from Moscow, Maria Tarfievna, deported to the Arctic for fifteen years (for what crime we know not), the 'Crazy Karczak' and many more. It is regrettable that this book has so far only appeared in German, which must greatly restrict its circulation, and that it is not provided with an index. C. G. SEVEN ASSIGNMENTS. By Dudley Clarke, with an Introduction by Field-Marshal the Earl Wavell. , Cape, 1948. 262 pp. Maps as endpapers. 8" X si". 12S. 6d. THIS brilliant narrative sheds a welcome light on some of the backstage episodes of the Second World War. We are fortunate to have in Brigadier Dudley Clarke a Regular Officer who can depict so faithfully and enter­ tainingly the thrills and the tragedy of our extemporized incursion into Norway in April 1940; he follows this with an enthralling account of the Dunkirk disaster as recorded at the War Office end of the cross-Channel telephone. Perhaps the most interesting chapter is that which describes the conception and birth of the Commandos, an inspiration which sprang from the author's fertile brain, and was adopted and developed on the highest level. Few officers have had the chance of such interesting assignments as Dudley Clarke, and fewer still possess the ability with which he narrates them. JAMES MARSHALL-CORNWALL

POST SECOND WORLD WAR REPARATIONEN SOZIALPRODUKT LEBENSSTANDARD: Versuch einer Wirtschafts­ bilanz. Preface by G. W. Hannssen. Second edition, 4 parts. Bremen, Friedrich Triijen Verlag, 1948. Part I, 129 pp.; Part 2, 104 pp.; Part 3, 114 pp.; Part 4, 60 pp. II!" X 8i". 36 DM. THIS memorandum with its massive supplements (which first appeared as privately printed in February 1948) is a collective effort by a number of unnamed experts, scientific institutes, and administrative bodies. It acknowledges Ger­ many's moral obligation to pay reparations but, by a strange example of oblique logic, prefaces this acceptance of responsibility with the words: 'Eben weil das deutsche Yolk im Krieg unmenschliche Opfer gebracht hat ...' without even mentioning the sacrifices of any other nation (p. 9). A desperate effort is then made to construe reparations as if they were a claim made by private persons in an action of civil law. The clamour for an 'impartial judge' (Suppl. I, p. 14) and the pretence that without such an independent judgement no legally valid solution can be found is either really naive or an intentional evasion of political realities. For where can an impartial judge be found in a case in which the claims of all the great Powers against Germany are involved? Nor is there the slightest attempt to assess the damage caused to and the spoils taken from Poland, Russia, Norway, Holland, and the other invaded countries; there is only one very discreet reference to the sources of income derived from them: 'Aus­ zerdem wurden die Vorrate und die Erzeugung der besetzten Gebiete zur