Oliver O’Donovan, on the challenges of actually reckoning with the end of World War II and its complicated legacy:
To remember the end of World War II with historical perspective is to remember the serious initiatives of international law it gave rise to, and to face the painful questions of what has become of them, and what is to become of them. Staged exercises in “remembering” beloved of the ceremonial classes – the journalists, the statesmen and the clergy – may serve only to help us forget the real point. I fear we shall hear a great deal of triumphant reflection on the decisions of 1939 when Britain and France declared war on Germany and (further West) 1941 when the U.S. entered the conflict, while that of August 6th 1945, with all the solemn control that it continues to exercise over our lives, may slip past unnoticed.