One death, a tragedy....800,000 deaths a statistic?
591338
...You won't think so after reading this challenging and tragic story told by the man who tried to stop it...and couldn't
A devastating story well written.  However be prepared to be very, very angry.
Thank you Lt. Gen. Delaire.
1070348
When people think of the Holocaust, many picture the extermination of the Jewish people, but they were only one of the Nazi extermination  groups. Between 5,000 and 25,000 children with disabilities were killed by the Nazi regime. Nearly half a million Germans with disabilities were forcibly sterilized through the Law for the Prevention of Offspring with Hereditary Diseases (Evans 18); furthermore, more than "275,000 German adults with disabilities were brutally and systematically killed" (Evans 42). The gruesomeness and extent of the Nazi crimes is unfathomable. In addition, thousands of people were subject to painful and invasive procedures while conscious and/or not anesthetized. Suzanne Evan describes the horror of the actions of the Nazi regime accurately and provides a great deal of evidence, but no one can truly represent the terrible nature and extent of the crimes. Evan gives many statistics and facts accumulating to the horror of the holocaust. Her use of survivor's stories adds to the realism of the night-marish time. She describes in depth the T4 project and its victims and results. She even covers the end of the holocaust and what happened to the devilish doctors and nurses. Though very disturbing, "Forgotten Crimes" is a very good reference book about the holocaust and the disabled target group.
270733
It tells one story out of millions and does  not claim to encompass the entire atrocity of that time.  No single movie or book would ever been able to do that. That would take 6 million books and movies to do so.
644729
I guess I really didn't know that my period of time in Nam was the bloodiest until I read this book and all of the statistics, etc. However, I can tell you from an artilleryman's perspective in I Corps that 68 was a year that still makes me wake with the sweats every few nights. I was near My Lai in June (at LZ Dottie about 3 mos after the massacre) and the area was still bad news. My unit was also near the DMZ near Phu Bai a couple of months later - same story -at Fat City - same story and the same story for the remainder of the year. Please note that I didn't come into country until June which was about 4 1/2 months after Tet when so many of the VC were killed. I believe that the Tet Offensive was a political not a military victory because of need for the press to get stories. Yes, the VC proved that no part of Nam really was safe. But, who really felt safe in a combat area? Because of this need for press coverage I believe that the NVA and the remainder of the VC were embolden in 68 until they were nearly militarily destroyed. And at the same time how many young American men had to die or become maimed because of the press' need for blood. Don't forget the roles that McNamara and Jane Fonda (both war criminals in my perspective) had in the creation of Tet offensive. My time in 69 was not so night sweat inducing, since most of the VC and many of the NVA realized that they too were "cannon fodder" because so many of their numbers were killed or seriously wounded in 68. If you want to read a good book regarding this time period, this is one good book. It can be considered a little dry with its statistics, but what true history book doesn't give statistics. This book belongs on every Viet Nam vet's bookcase.
306563
Author needs to check stats. Number of police increased on average by year. Number of police decreases on average by year.

War On Police?
54250
A must read to see how lies are marketed. The 10% of women killed by coat hanger abortions was the big lie that went unchallenged, the truth way less than 1%. I ask how many children is it ok to kill 10, a million, 50 million. This isa 2 million dollar a day industry killing children at $500.00 per kill average price!
2947261
Hard to describe the pain and anger felt just reading about the atrocities and crimes against humanity-- against children, of all people-- documented here. Evil is the only word for it. Unlike the children, where illegal actions are understandable given that they ARE children (brain development not complete until the 20's) and the backgrounds of abuse and neglect they come from, the discrimination they face, the actions of those responsible defy any hope for reform or excuse except a basic lack of humanity. Yet, the ones responsible are generally rewarded and praised, a blind eye turned to the torture of the most vulnerable members of our society.

This is something that I believe future generations will look back on in the way we look on the worst incidents of human history, asking each other how this could have been allowed to have happened, why decent people didn't storm the gates and bring down the walls themselves. The statistics and types of incidents the author cites are very well documented. The "Oh, this couldn't have happened..." and "Oh, she couldn't have been put there for THAT..." type of comments I've seen online are quite disturbing in themselves, that people would rather just stick their heads in the sand.
3300059
I  just heard dr Makary  talk at my  hospital in st louis , so i bought this book  its a great read ,i was surprised  that there were over 200,000 deaths caused  due to variations in tx . in us hospitals ,
763017
Not every written account has to be so literary! Enough with the one-star reviews! The fact that a written account has been published of this tragedy has it's own significance, therapeutic value, and warnings for our society. It never needed to be Hemmingway!
297170
The reports of violence against Christians is in the news almost daily, but it should be something which dominates our headlines. Less than five pages into The Global War On Christians by John Allen, Jr. I was smacked between the eyes with this statistic: One hundred million Christians worldwide presently face interrogation, arrest, torture, or even death because of their religious convictions. Talk about a wake-up call!

Allen does sound the wake-up call quite clearly. The first section of the book reads a little like Foxs Book Of Martyrs from the 16th century, except these dispatches are happening right now! Allen takes us around the globe in this section with general statistics for each region, and stories of individuals that put a face on the already-sickening statistics. After reading this section, you may wonder, as I did, why these reports aren't the lead news story every single day.

In the second section Allen debunks the five most common myths used to keep people comfortably numb to the atrocities happening to our Christians brothers and sisters around the globe. This is an excellent refutation to those who may say, Its not our problem or How could I do anything about this anyhow.

In the final section of the book, Allen brings all of the stories and statistics right onto your front doorstep. He vividly and, I believe, accurately describes what will happen if we continue to allow this persecution to take place unchallenged and unreported. Truly this book is a wake-up call, and should be read by every liberty-loving, religion-cherishing, thoughtful person in America.
1971624
This is a real incident which happened at Batang Kali, a sleepy town several miles north of Kuala Lumpur, the Federal capital of then British Malaya in the year 1948, and during the national EMERGENCY...! This is a tragedy and it must be told... The British Scots Guard were patrolling the very isolated rubber estate in Batang Kali and they came upon 24 unarmed villagers who made a living by tapping rubber latex. Without proof whatsoever, those villagers  were "suspected" for either aiding the Communist guerillas hiding around the area or they became the target of those  zealous (trigger-happy) young British soldiers.
The villagers, according to one surving eye-witness' report, Madam Tham Yong, were herded into a smoke house as night came on swiftly in these parts. In the next morning, the frightened villagers who spoke no English, were taken out. Since they were so afraid of the intimidation of the Scots Guards who shouted and pushed them...they suddenly tried to run away. At this point, the Socts Guards opened fired and shot the fleeing villagers to death. Only one living witness, Madam Tham Yong, aged 78, who died recently, told the British investigators and the Malaysian public  years later that those villagers were no terrorists, save that they were afraid of the armed soldiers and couldn't understand their language - English! After a filmsy investigation, the British authorities attempted  to cover up this murder by saying that there wasn't sufficent evidence of the appalling actions of the  Scots Guards.
However, several years ago in Britain, a few aging Scots Guards, to clear their consience, said that they shot those villagers just because they tried to flee. Nevertheless, this admission didn't warrant the present British Government to launch another official investigation. This is clearly a case of deliberate shooting of innocent people and should be challenged  in either a British Court of Law or in the international justice court system  and soon...! This incident will tarnish the image of the British authorities and appears to be like another My Lai Massacre in South Vietnam during the American war there. I buy this book in order to know the indepth truth of this massacre in which some 24 unarmed and innocent villagers, through no fault of them, were deliberately shot to death by the Scots Guards. Justice must not only be done but must be seen and heard to be done NOW...!!! Don't deny justice so  the restless  souls of these departed Malaysian  villagers  could rest in Eternal Peace...Amen!
3907482
This book offers nothing, because he obviously is not the deadliest soldier.

I am not even sure what the debate is about here.  I mean, do I love hearing about how many people a single individual may or may not have killed?  Of course, but I want impressive numbers.  Am a excited that this man individually claims to have killed almost as many people as all 19 terrorists on the four planes from September 11?  Obviously, because he is killing with a righteous cause, fighting those Muslims who God hates, and who are evil, while the terrorists were misguided into murdering innocent people due to a misguided belief in a fraudulent deity, which is wrong and extreme.

But mostly the reason I am not impressed is because, when it comes down to it, this pales in comparison.  If "DEADLIEST SOLDIER" is decided by total kills by an individual, through their actions and ability to use equipment, then one must recognize the true hero to be celebrated,  Paul Tibbets.  He killed what is estimated to be 100x more than Johnson, in one single act, with 70,000+ dying that day, almost double in the next 5 years.  I am sorry, but by comparison, Johnson is no hero, but merely a disappointment to the military, and not even close to the deadliest soldier.

Fix this book, and let us only celebrate those who truly can kill entire populations.
4760661
Interesting but too overloaded with details. Description of a few accidents is made as a huge novel; but the significance of it lies in the the danger of something like that to happen again, and a concise (and based on many more diverse cases) analysis will do. The authors I guess was  making decision to either have a "journalist-novel" kind of thing or a broadly analytic one. He has chosen the former, and the reader interested in military, social, political, world-spanning etc. aspects of the situation may easily get  lost.  It is difficult not to compare it with the classic "Brighter than the thousand suns" by Jungk -- 60 year old book!  -- which is much shorter but spans over so many people, events, and documents, and BTW, is so "hot" to read even in spite of its a bit awkward translation...
4274884
Vietnam, a beautiful country where we introduced industrial-scale slaughter. We justified the use of Agent Orange, cluster-bombs, massive bombings of civilian targets, napalm and of course those wonderful large body counts of NVA and Viet Cong on the news every week.

Some key facts have been left out of the book - During Johnsons Presidency, 16,000 U.S. Servicemen were killed in Viet Nam. During Nixons Presidency, 34,000 U.S. Servicemen were killed. An estimated two million Vietnamese civilians were killed, another 5.3 million injured and about 11 million, by US government figures, became refugees in their own country. The amount of ammunition fired per soldier was 26 times greater in Vietnam than during World War II. By the end of the conflict, America had unleashed the equivalent of 640 Hiroshima-sized atomic bombs on Vietnam. There were many who protested the war because the "secrets" that McMaster is telling isn't anything new - All you had to do was listen to  the troops coming back from their tour.

At that time the US military had at its disposal more killing power, destructive force, and advanced technology than any military in the history of the world. We were fighting people in sandals made of old tires. They won. So like Iraq and the Middle-East we continue this same deadly cycle which provides wealth and jobs for the techno-military-industrial complex by creating our own enemies.
3565258
How would you react if you were taken away from everyone and everything you knew and placed in a 'level of hell' that you didn't know could exist?  How would you live day-to-day in a section of Dante's Inferno?  That is what Fred Wander did for six years (1939 through 1945) while being moved from camp to camp (twenty in all) and finally being 'death marched' to Buchenwald where he was liberated by the American forces.

What would be your explanation, not of why so many died, but of how you managed to survive? What would you remember? What would you take from the experience?  Wander has given us the stories of individuals (all who later died) an how their lives gave his meaning.  Stalin said, "the death of one man is a tragedy, the death of a million is a statistic".  The number is too large to get into any kind of perspective.  It's only when you look at the actual people, that you can put it into any meaningful place.

One of the most striking symbols of the stories is that only the inmates have names and identities, the guards and workers are referred to only as 'jackboots'.  They are uninteresting and interchangeable, they are just murderers and sadists, without any humanity.  They are to be endured and fooled, and in some cases made the butt of jokes.  But they are at all times, un-human.
2552638
Is it possible that so many people have so many misfortunes hit them over and over again. This story shows the Indian subcontinent as a region governed by bribary, corruption on so many levels and that it is impossible to live a life without these. Every time i turned the page there was a new tragedy to befall the main characters. This is not a book to "enjoy". The human tragedy and constant violations of human rights is prolific on every page.
1490007
Henning Mankell totaled his car in a crash in late 2013, and while he walked away seemingly unharmed, he later suffered persistent pain.  A slipped disc or whiplash?  But a scan revealed lung cancer and metastasis in his neck.  While Mankell vividly recalls a subsequent nightmare of frighteningly perishing in quicksand, which became the title of this book, he writes less of his health than of autobiographical reminiscences (in Europe and Africa), his views on humanity and how he philosophically evolved.  This is not a book on dying, as Paul Kalanithi so beautifully authored.  Indeed, five months after his diagnosis, at the books end, Mankell receives breathing space as his cancer (temporarily, as we unfortunately know in retrospect) responds to chemo.

Quicksand is a seemingly haphazard collection of 67 short essays/chapters, from which various themes subtly emerge.  One overarching theme, not unexpected when faced with a potentially terminal diagnosis, is time.  Mankell talks of nuclear waste being buried in very deep caves in Finland that will remain lethally dangerous for at the very least 100,000 years.  Will humans, at such a distant future date, know of the danger beneath them?  As a realistic illustration of times passage, he contrastingly writes of ancient cave drawings made by pre-historic artists that date back only 40,000 years.  And even then, hes not done.  A universally understood symbol today is an index finger over your mouth, denoting quiet.  What comprehensible symbol or warning can we possibly leave to warn humans thousands of generations from now about our buried radioactive waste?

He often sidetracks into philosophical observations.  Mankell: everyone carves their name on a tree or similarly marks their presence, but how many of the 107 billion people who have lived do we remember?  And he somewhat cynically discusses life after this one.  Our existence is essentially a tragedy. Throughout life we strive to increase our knowledge, abilities, experiences. But the bottom line is that all will be lost to oblivion.

There are also achingly personal interludes.  In a world where fathers more typically desert their families, his mother did.  He didn't get to know her until he was 15, and her absence was a personal and social tragedy in his little Swedish town. When at last he met her, she heartlessly warned, Dont come close. I have a cold.  No touch or warmth. He sadly writes, I shall never forget that.  Every time I write, I try to create something more dramatic, but I wonder if I shall ever manage to do so.

Those familiar with Mankell know of his passion for justice and humanity.  He states the question that has come to dominate my life is what type of society do we want to create?  And Quicksand is very much an eloquent last plea for us to do our very best for our fellow living humans and future descendants.

Wallander fans know that Mankell is a very good writer, indeed.  If every chapter doesnt resonate, his overall reflections and language make this a memorable last book and parting gift to his many fans worldwide.  A final note  the book is wonderfully translated by the great Laurie Thompson.