Hecate wrote:
On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 10:55:09 +0100, "Branko Vukelic" wrote:
Just one more for comparison.
Disclaimer:
Y’all, who find this topic offensive, please keep your views to yourselves. Don’t even read the texts.
http://www.angelfire.com/oz/1spy/Sorge.html
So now you know how I got involved with photography. 🙂
my "hobbies" is military history covering the Ancient World, the Napoleonic era, and especially WWII. I had read about Sorge and knew of him, and what he’d done. As I asked above, Sorge was your Grandfather?
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Hecate
veni, vidi, reliqui
My granpa is Branko Vukelic (after whom I was named). Thanks to some of the authorities (my father, Branko’s son remembers general Willoughby of the USAF, who forgot to mention much about Branko) who were repeatedly quoted around the World, people came to believe that Branko was an amateur who did photograpy work for Sorge at best. However, Branko was remembered by his associates as being proud and fierce, a dedicated and passionate fighter in the ranks of the Sorge ring. After all, Branko was the only one not to crack under interrogation by the Japanese police (although Sorge and Max were actually trained to be "cooperative" under such circumstances).
Max remembered (on 2nd of April, 1965): "The last we met was at the Tokio trial, facing the imperial court of Japan. Although he had been tortured
[by the Japanese police] and was seriously ill, he stood up proudly, with a
flame in his eyes."
Branko was an skillful photographer (he even built his own b/w enlarger) and also good with people. His coleagues remember him as a journalist working for Belgrade’s "Politika" and French "Havas", a dedicated communist, witty and with a keen sense of World politics. I’ve seen a cartoon that he drew sometime before the WWII, on which Stalin is depicted as a tortoise, and Hitler as a hare — the prediction that came so very true, soon after the termination of Sorge’s mission in Japan.
Branko gathered valuable intelligence not only for Sorge, but also for his coleagues in France and the States. On piece of information that was passed on to an American journalist by Branko was the exact date of the planned attack on Pearl Harbour. The article was published immediately, but was completely ignored by the US officials and the military, leading to the catastrophy we all know of. (It is now even argued that the catastrophy was actually allowed to take place in order to boost the popular support for American participation in the War.)
Sorge’s participation in espionage missions was never acknowledged before Stalin’s death, as you may recall. The same goes for Max, Anna, Branko, Ozaki, and Miagi. It was only after the death of Stalin that all of them received official acknowledgement and medals of honour. Only Max and Anna were awarded the medals during their lifetime. My dad and my grandma were summoned to Moscow in order to receive it.
Although, you migh expect that the figure of such importance to the moder history of Mankind such is Branko would become a legend at least in his own fatherland (i.e, Yugoslavia), there was no mention of him until the very end of the 20th century. In a small article, in "Politika", he was mentioned as the Sorge’s associate, and the "top Politika’s journalist" of all times. However, in Japan, there was a TV show about Sorge in, which an entire episode was dedicated to Branko. (Also, in near future, I’m planning to release a web site and a multimedia presentation on my granpy.)
I have, at my grandma’s house in Japan, a huge collection of negatives and photos that police returned to her after the war. Of course, there are no confidential documents there, but there’s a significant amount of life photos of WWII Japan — it’s people, its cityscapes and landscapes. Releasing all of the materials is my dream, and I hope it comes true…
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Branko Vukelic ()