ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book provides veterans within wide historical processes that took place in the world after 1945. It explains a sense of racial cohesion developed among white soldiers during the war; this development made an important contribution to the imposition of apartheid as a consequence of the South African 1946 elections. The book shows, it embraced racist and conformist notions of veteranhood that systematically marginalized black veterans. It suggests that the relevance of veteran politics did not end with the attainment of independence and the consolidation of relatively stable post-revolutionary state structures. The book argues that a complex relationship between memory and oblivion characterized the transformation of veteran’s war memory in the decades after the Second World War. It also shows that British veteran’s trips to South Korea in the 1980s were a turning point in their memories and interpretation of the Korean War.
