Astrology of Now: A Lesson From History
During the Liverpool Blitz 1-8 May, 1941. This is the Victoria Memorial.
In May 1941, Germany and Japan were winning the war. Britain and her fraying empire were alone. More than half the population of Europe was under Nazi control. The Luftwaffe was decimating British cities. Rommel, the “Desert Fox”, and his seemingly unbeatable Panzers were storming across North Africa. In Paris, nearly 4000 Jewish people were rounded up that month, the first such round-up in the French capital. The strategically critical island of Crete fell to the Nazis in May too. Stalin hosted Germany’s top brass at that year’s May Day parade. Meanwhile in the East, the Japanese army advanced inexorably across Asia, pushing south through Indochina. It looked as if the Axis powers would soon hold sway over most of the world’s population.
But in fact, Hitler and his counterparts in Japan were planning two surprise attacks that would change the direction of World War 2.
On midsummer night in 1941, the Germans launched the biggest land invasion in human history, Operation Barbarossa, opening up the Eastern Front like a massive slash across Europe. Millions were to lose their lives across what are now Ukraine, Belorussia and eastern Russia. But Operation Barbarossa forced Russia into the Allied camp, tipping the scales away from Germany’s favour.
Meanwhile on the other side of the world, Japan was already meticulously planning its own over-reach. On 7 December, their airforce bombed the US Naval base in Pearl Harbour. The United States declared war the following day.
With Russia and the United States decisively now with Britain, very, very slowly, the war began to turn a long corner. Many millions would die before the peace, and more territory would fall to the Axis powers, but 1941 was the year that those two crucial tactical errors were made, creating an alliance that could win.
On 8 May 1941, Uranus, the planet of surprise and switch, and Jupiter the planet of extension and just plain largeness met in the sign of Taurus, the Bull, Europa. Hitler, himself a Taurus Sun, had the full weight of that conjunction directly on his Black Moon Lilith — unleashing the forces of darkness across Europe, not just in the shape of the German army, but specifically as the mobile killing units knows as Einsatzgruppen, that spread out across the newly conquered territories to the East. This was stage one of the Final Solution, a plan to murder all the Jews in Europe that would be formally agreed in January 1942 at Wannsee.
That spring, there had been the final eclipse in a series across the polarity of peace and war, Aries and Libra. That final eclipse saw Venus, the planet of peace, in Aries, the sign of war, flushed away through the South Node. This would be total war.
Exactly four years to the day later, on 8 May 1945, the Allies won the war in Europe.
A Conjunction of Big Surprises
Jupiter and Uranus combine to create boundlessness, which can be reckless or even berserk — as we see in the cases of Japan and Germany — or can lead to scientific breakthroughs. Together, they can symbolise groups of people working together to create genius also. Two such co-ordinated efforts began within weeks of the conjunction in 1941. In May, the US Office of Scientific Research and Development was mooted and launched a few weeks later. This branch of government was given almost unlimited funds to develop weapons, including, fatefully, the atom bomb. In June, a branch of British military intelligence dedicated to code-breaking, named Ultra, was launched. This would lead eventually to the deciphering of Germany’s Enigma Code, and according to some historians, as a result, a shortening of the war by several years.
If that cosmic combination sounds familiar, it’s because we are having similar astrological weather right now — a conjunction of Jupiter and Uranus in Taurus, and an eclipse in Aries, both coming up in April.
Our current global situation harks back to 1941. Once again the berserkers are in charge. You can see the parallels.
This coming eclipse does not have Venus at its centre, but the centaur Chiron. Although the eclipse is again in Aries, this time it is a North Node eclipse, and Venus is applying. So let us hope that peace is not flushed away this time, but embraced. Unfortunately, Chiron’s presence suggests that the wounds are so profound.
I’ll leave you to draw your own parallels. Here are some of the important themes: surprise, genius, breakthrough, over-reach, excess, war, peace, weaponry, berserkers, big mistakes, alliances broken and remade, breaking rules and boundaries. Remember that history does not repeat, but it really does rhyme and in this example, the results were unclear for many years. In fact, for a while, an Allied victory seemed inconceivable.
I will be talking to Anne Whitaker at this month’s Salon about the Jupiter-Uranus conjunction. All members of The Oxford Astrologer are welcome. Know that I will be recording this one and making it available to members if you can’t make it. Anne wrote a study of Jupiter-Uranus, looking at the last 2,500 years of conjunctions. She is really fascinating on the subject. The link for the Zoom meeting will be on the members’ page soon and also in the newsletter. If you’re not already a member, have a look here.
Brilliant article ! Thank you very much for publishing it.
Thank you!
Yes, indeed.
Chiron as mentor/teacher being thrown away seems horribly apt in the face of the current wars. The North Node (as the caput draconis & our ideal goal) being eclipsed is grim. Also, Chiron makes me wonder about the outlook for disabled people.
All very creepy, really. I’d love to be wrong.
Also… looks like Jupiter was about trine its 1941 position in 1945. Mulling…