Guenter Lewy

Guenter Lewy (born August 22, 1923) is an American author and political scientist who is a professor emeritus at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. His works span several topics, but he is most often associated with his 1978 book on the Vietnam War, America in Vietnam, and several controversial works that deal with the applicability of the term genocide to various historical events.

In 1939 he immigrated to Palestine, and after the war to the United States to reunite with his parents. Lewy earned a BA at City College in New York City and a MA and PhD at Columbia University. He has been on the faculties of Columbia University, Smith College, and the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He currently lives in Washington, D.C. and is a frequent contributor to Commentary.

Early life

Lewy was born in Breslau, Germany (now Wrocław, Poland) in 1923. At the age of nine he joined a German-Jewish scouts organization called Die Greifen (lit. "the griffins"), which he has suggested was important in shaping his desire for an academic career. Described by Lewy as a "quasi-Romantic" group, Die Greifen emphasized music, literature, and song, particularly Landsknechtlieder, encouraging the youths to avoid becoming "Spiessbürger" ("philistines"). By 1938, as persecution of Jews in Germany increased, Lewy began to lobby his family to leave Germany behind. After Kristallnacht, in November 1938, when his father was interned in Buchenwald for four months and he was beaten, his parents sent him to Palestine. Later in the war, when Lewy was of fighting age, he voluntarily took up arms against Germany, serving in the Jewish Brigade.