Nazis Were Given ‘Safe Haven’ in U.S., Report Says [Archive]

PanzerJaeger

11-15-2010, 09:08

The long-delayed report is finally out (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/14/us/14nazis.html).

A secret history of the United States government’s Nazi-hunting operation concludes that American intelligence officials created a “safe haven” in the United States for Nazis and their collaborators after World War II, and it details decades of clashes, often hidden, with other nations over war criminals here and abroad.

The 600-page report, which the Justice Department has tried to keep secret for four years, provides new evidence about more than two dozen of the most notorious Nazi cases of the last three decades.

It describes the government’s posthumous pursuit of Dr. Josef Mengele, the so-called Angel of Death at Auschwitz, part of whose scalp was kept in a Justice Department official’s drawer; the vigilante killing of a former Waffen SS soldier in New Jersey; and the government’s mistaken identification of the Treblinka concentration camp guard known as Ivan the Terrible.

The report catalogs both the successes and failures of the band of lawyers, historians and investigators at the Justice Department’s Office of Special Investigations, which was created in 1979 to deport Nazis.

Perhaps the report’s most damning disclosures come in assessing the Central Intelligence Agency’s involvement with Nazi émigrés. Scholars and previous government reports had acknowledged the C.I.A.’s use of Nazis for postwar intelligence purposes. But this report goes further in documenting the level of American complicity and deception in such operations.

The Justice Department report, describing what it calls “the government’s collaboration with persecutors,” says that O.S.I investigators learned that some of the Nazis “were indeed knowingly granted entry” to the United States, even though government officials were aware of their pasts. “America, which prided itself on being a safe haven for the persecuted, became — in some small measure — a safe haven for persecutors as well,” it said.

And here are some of the more noteworthy filled-in redactions (http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/11/14/us/14documents.html).

While the American support for ex-Nazis is well documented, what strikes me the most is what a waste of taxpayer dollars the O.S.I. was. The organization led what was little more than a monumental witch hunt, hunting down old men with often only the most tangential of evidence, some of whom had helped America in various respects during the Cold War and others who were completely misidentified. Vengeance, grandstanding, and politics apparently replaced justice at the Justice Department. Who would have thought that could happen?

Fragony

11-15-2010, 10:48

Thought this was common knowledge

rory_20_uk

11-15-2010, 10:57

As did I. All the major powers were at it, probably with 80% of resources getting the important players out as the other 20% bumbled around trying the less strategically important ones.

I imagine the USA has the most difficulty in squaring this circle - oh so holier than thou whilst holding it's nose in dealing with the real world.

~:smoking:

al Roumi

11-15-2010, 11:12

I imagine the USA has the most difficulty in squaring this circle - oh so holier than thou whilst holding it's nose in dealing with the real world.

I'm not sure the UK escapes that.

rory_20_uk

11-15-2010, 11:26

Not escapes, but the UK has been doing bad things for a lot longer, and so views itself less in such black and white terms that America tends to.

Churchill went into an alliance with the USSR eyes open (a marriage of convenience, nothing more), whereas Roosevelt was far more naive.

~:smoking:

al Roumi

11-15-2010, 11:41

Not escapes, but the UK has been doing bad things for a lot longer, and so views itself less in such black and white terms that America tends to.

But, becuase of the trauma and guilt, the UK tends to try to play nicely now. Not only can it not bully people anymore but it also tries to make a virtue of it.

The Stranger

11-15-2010, 12:58

old... news...

better news!

llamas gave home to donkeys!

Philippus Flavius Homovallumus

11-15-2010, 13:04

But, becuase of the trauma and guilt, the UK tends to try to play nicely now. Not only can it not bully people anymore but it also tries to make a virtue of it.

I dissagree, we slap people around plenty (in theory) but we have dropped to a Second-Tear Power now (We might be able to struggle back up to Great Power status again in another 20 years), our interests currently chime with letting others (the Americans) do the nasty work for us, mostly, we just go along for the ride to provide "credability" and then bemone American incompetance.

I agree with Panzar's point about the OSI, it often turned to awitchhunt and millions of dollars have been expended in the pointless chasing of 90-year old camp guards with grandchildren.

I mean, come one, has anyone ever prosecuted the French, Dutch, or Greeks who brutalised the young women (and their small children) for having relationships with German soldiers?

Louis VI the Fat

11-15-2010, 13:19

camp guard

I mean, come one

French, Dutch, or Greeks who brutalised the young women for having relationships with German soldiers?Whatever else one may think of people who harassed women for horizontal collaboration*, I must protest equalling this with concentration camp guards.

What is it with the extreme cultural relativism about WWII nowadays? The nazi crybabies have always refused to accept any responsibility for their own conduct, or denied anything happened outright, yet won't shut up about any tiny injustice which may have befallen them. The internets seem to agree too. Soon, the neo-nazi project will be complete, and the allies will apologise to nazis for having mistreated them so badly all along.

*I, for one, do not think it is a given that these women must be off the hook as a matter of course.

gaelic cowboy

11-15-2010, 13:40

What is it with the extreme cultural relativism about WWII nowadays? The nazi crybabies have always refused to accept any responsibility for their own conduct, or denied anything happened outright, yet won't shut up about any tiny injustice which may have befallen them. The internets seem to agree too. Soon, the neo-nazi project will be complete, and the allies will apologise to nazis for having mistreated them so badly all along.

Your surprised the Anglo-Saxon's finds it easy to engage in relativism over there Germanic cousin.

Andres

11-15-2010, 13:44

I agree with Panzar's point about the OSI, it often turned to awitchhunt and millions of dollars have been expended in the pointless chasing of 90-year old camp guards with grandchildren.

So, whatever crime one has committed, one should get a free pass once the age of 90 has been reached?

At what age exactly do you think a person should no longer be prosecuted for his crimes? Can I do whatever I want at the age of 80? Or 85? Is having or not having grandchildren also a criterium?

Fritzl was 73 when he was arrested? Isn't he too old to do jail time? Or is 73 doable? Are we going to take into account certain illnesses? A mass murderer with cancer should be left alone?

Or should the criterium for not prosecuting people be the amount of money it takes to find them? If it costs more than x €, we shouldn't bother trying to find criminal Y? What kind of justice system do you have in mind?

~:confused:

Philippus Flavius Homovallumus

11-15-2010, 13:47

Whatever else one may think of people who harassed women for horizontal collaboration*, I must protest equalling this with concentration camp guards.

Weren't some of those women lynched? In any case, it was done out of vengence - which reflects evily on the vengeful.

This is the same, and it is litterally that some people (and particularly Jews, and particularly Israel) want revenge.

It's been sixty years and more now, there is no real point to this anymore, it's time for forgiveness for these old men.

Which brings me neatly to the Pope and his sense of Christian forgiveness - which is why he "shelters Nazis" as the accusation goes.

What is it with the extreme cultural relativism about WWII nowadays? The nazi crybabies have always refused to accept any responsibility for their own conduct, or denied anything happened outright, yet won't shut up about any tiny injustice which may have befallen them. The internets seem to agree too. Soon, the neo-nazi project will be complete, and the allies will apologise to nazis for having mistreated them so badly all along.

*I, for one, do not think it is a given that these women must be off the hook as a matter of course.

Oh, not at all - World War II was terrible, Hitler was responsible for it and it had to be forght to stop him. However,it was forght with blood and fury and a htred of the enemy which for some people continues to this day - that needs to end now; not least because it is places a weight of guilt upon another generation of Germans that deserves to be free of it.

gaelic cowboy

11-15-2010, 13:50

Even if your an 80yr old cancer patient the facility to at least have a judgement on paper against you is a right and proper action even if you never serve a day behind bars.

Philippus Flavius Homovallumus

11-15-2010, 13:52

So, whatever crime one has committed, one should get a free pass once the age of 90 has been reached?

At what age exactly do you think a person should no longer be prosecuted for his crimes? Can I do whatever I want at the age of 80? Or 85? Is having or not having grandchildren also a criterium?

Fritzl was 73 when he was arrested? Isn't he too old to do jail time? Or is 73 doable? Are we going to take into account certain illnesses? A mass murderer with cancer should be left alone?

~:confused:

Ha!

A man of 90 who hasn't hurt a fly in over sixty years being prosecuted and sentenced to life inprisonment for something he did in his 20's under a totalitarian regime where dissobedience could result in your own entire family being sent to concentration/death camps is fair? Is he really the same as a man who, at 73, is still abusing his daughter who has been imprisoned by him for years and on whom he has fathered numerous children?

Now who's engaging in fuzzy relativism?

The two have nothing in common, in their circumstances, their form of life, or their crimes.

Andres

11-15-2010, 13:54

Oh, not at all - World War II was terrible, Hitler was responsible for it and it had to be forght to stop him. However,it was forght with blood and fury and a htred of the enemy which for some people continues to this day - that needs to end now; not least because it is places a weight of guilt upon another generation of Germans that deserves to be free of it.

I can condemn the nazis for being the scum they were and enjoy a few pints with Husar and Ser Clegane.

It's called making abstraction. Condemning the nazis is not the same as condeming modern day Germans :shrug:

I find the acts of Belgians in the Congo despicable and a tragedy, but I don't feel guilty about it, as I wasn't even born back then.

Andres

11-15-2010, 13:56

A man of 90 who hasn't hurt a fly in over sixty years being prosecuted and sentenced to life inprisonment for something he did in his 20's under a totalitarian regime where dissobedience could result in your own entire family being sent to concentration/death camps is fair? Is he really the same as a man who, at 73, is still abusing his daughter who has been imprisoned by him for years and on whom he has fathered numerous children?

In a fair trail, the 90 year old camp guard, surely can use those arguments in his defense... The court of law will certainly take it into account.

rory_20_uk

11-15-2010, 13:58

...or the Americans and their funding of the IRA.

Nothing is nice and clear cut in real life. The lead up to WWI was a disaster caused by all sides. This led to the surrender that even at the time was thought to be excessive and no way to secure a lasting peace. The fall out of this helped the Commies and the Fascists gain the vote and the Fascists won under the Nazis. The world did nothing whilst this was going on.

The vast majority in Germany didn't know what was going to happen. Nor did the vast majority elsewhere - and if they did, why was nothing done? Well, some things were done. IBM sold the sorting machines used to quickly sort those for work camps and those for death camps, and the Swedes sold them enigma machines. Britain even sold them high grade steel from the scuttled German ships at the end of WWI, with narry a thought as to why Germany needed it all.

So, another world war where atrocities were committed mainly by the Germans, Japanese and Russians with the Allies merely starving Japanese troops do death on abandoned islands, bombing the odd civilian city with incendiaries, and interning those that were ethnically similar to the protagonists.

Yes, this doesn't read like a comic. There are no superheroes, nor blameless victims. Even lumping the losers into one amorphous "villain" category should be seen as ridiculous.

Perhaps there are those here who would have preferred persecution to joining the Nazi party. Perhaps they would have refused a desk job at the first concentration (not extermination) camp. Perhaps they would have refused inmates to be sent elsewhere to Dachau et al, and accepted the firing squad for insubordination. Good on you! I've worked in several hospitals where I have seen cover ups of patients that died. Most of the time I was a junior and in all but one case not even part of the team, but I - along with everyone else - didn't speak up. So I can be pretty certain I'd not have gone to the firing squad for my principles. Perhaps that makes me as bad as under the same pressures I would probably have not the moral strength to die for my beliefs.

~:smoking:

Philippus Flavius Homovallumus

11-15-2010, 13:59

Louis VI the Fat

11-15-2010, 14:03

Your surprised the Anglo-Saxon's finds it easy to engage in relativism over there Germanic cousin.That. And 'fascination' for Nazi Germany. And British self-loathing.

These three. How I'd hate to be a former RAF pilot who has lived to witness the spectacle evolving on the intertubes nowadays. Once, the RAF pilot was a revered man in Britian, a hero who risked everything to save Britain. A country's finest.

Nowadays, he is a criminal. A mass murderer. A despicable man somewhere slightly above a child rapist but well below a Nazi camp guard. The public image of WWII on the intertubes is 'Germany, so cool, so awesome! So hard done by. Evil British, bombing innocent civilians'.
When will Britain apologise for having fought Nazi Germany?

HoreTore

11-15-2010, 14:03

Few endeavours have been more worthy than "hunting down 90-year olds with grandchildren".

There can be never be any mercy for the thugs who joined the SS.

Fragony

11-15-2010, 14:15

I dissagree, we slap people around plenty (in theory) but we have dropped to a Second-Tear Power now (We might be able to struggle back up to Great Power status again in another 20 years), our interests currently chime with letting others (the Americans) do the nasty work for us, mostly, we just go along for the ride to provide "credability" and then bemone American incompetance.

I agree with Panzar's point about the OSI, it often turned to awitchhunt and millions of dollars have been expended in the pointless chasing of 90-year old camp guards with grandchildren.

I mean, come one, has anyone ever prosecuted the French, Dutch, or Greeks who brutalised the young women (and their small children) for having relationships with German soldiers?

Ah the famous post-war resistance, lions since may 1945. Don't know about brutalising they were shaved, but it wouldn't surprise me. There a thousands of these kids (and they all work at T-mobile)

Louis VI the Fat

11-15-2010, 14:19

I can condemn the nazis for being the scum they were and enjoy a few pints with Husar and Ser Clegane.

It's called making abstraction. Condemning the nazis is not the same as condeming modern day Germans :shrug:

I find the acts of Belgians in the Congo despicable and a tragedy, but I don't feel guilty about it, as I wasn't even born back then.WWII was two hundred years ago. Who cares about that ancient history.

The thing is, it is easy to mistake taking a moderate, reasonable, rational view of the conflict with 'the truth is somewhere in between', 'two sides to every story'. In between, that is, a democratic-humanitarian narrative and the Nazi narrative.
People think that in order to do Germany justice, the Nazis have to be done justice, their story incorporated into the grand narrative.

But the story of Germany is not nazism. Auschwitz was not the logical conclusion of German history. History could've worked out differently.

One does not do the criminal nor the victim justice to incorporate the perpetrators story: 'yes, but she did look funny at him, and she was wearing a very short skirt, and what was she doing outside all alone anyway'.
Neither Germany nor history is done a service by mistaking fairness to Germany with fairness to Nazism. That is a revisionist trap.

Furunculus

11-15-2010, 14:25

we were at it too:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-Force

http://www.amazon.co.uk/T-Force-Forgotten-Heroes-1945-Secrets/dp/1849012970

gaelic cowboy

11-15-2010, 14:25

...or the Americans and their funding of the IRA.

I have to nip this myth in the bud even if it is not strictly related to the thread.

The majority of IRA funding came from armed robbery and the taxing of major criminal gangs in the Republic Ireland. The movie's "The General" with Brendan Gleeson and "Ordinary Decent Criminal" with Kevin Spassy all loosely deal with the life and death of crime lord Martin Cahill aka the General at the hands of the IRA. The smuggling of cigarettes, importing angel dust a growth hormone for beef cattle making counterfeit diesel for cars and the threatening of ordinary business for protection money are just some of the ways they funded themselves.

NORAID which people in UK point to was in the grand scheme mere window dressing and far more likely to have been used to wash the money raised by criminality. In the early 1960s there were maybe 3 or 4 murders in the republic this situation quickly changed by late sixties as the newer Republican groups started to break away from whats know as the Official IRA. We went from a situation of no bank robberies to a situation where they seemed to be happening every week the actual security of the state was endangered by these groups and they became the sole preoccupation of the various Irish governments after the 1960's.

Fragony

11-15-2010, 14:26

Few endeavours have been more worthy than "hunting down 90-year olds with grandchildren".

There can be never be any mercy for the thugs who joined the SS.

If that includes our royal family I'm all for it. But for many it was some super-boyscout club.

rory_20_uk

11-15-2010, 14:26

That. And 'fascination' for Nazi Germany. And British self-loathing.

These three. How I'd hate to be a former RAF pilot who has lived to witness the spectacle evolving on the intertubes nowadays. Once, the RAF pilot was a revered man in Britian, a hero who risked everything to save Britain. A country's finest.

Nowadays, he is a criminal. A mass murderer. A despicable man somewhere slightly above a child rapist but well below a Nazi camp guard. The public image of WWII on the intertubes is 'Germany, so cool, so awesome! So hard done by. Evil British, bombing innocent civilians'.
When will Britain apologise for having fought Nazi Germany?

May be I'm out of touch, but I think that in the UK there is a very anti-war, but pro-troops attitude at the moment. Parades for returning regiments and for every coffin returned. The RAF isn't thought of as much as frankly it doesn't have the tools to do much at the moment.

In WWII the Germans did have some of the most spectacular weaponry whereas the Allies in the main had numbers; the USSR probably equalled them, but since they were the new enemy they wree airbrushed out of history. The Nazis lost, so we can still look at their gear.

Were all SS volounteers aware of what the SS were doing? Was this in the brochure? "Join up to kill women and children?" Or was it an ideological fight against Communism? Was murder the only motivation, or was there also a desire to defeat the Russians who had invaded the Baltic states?
I'm not denying or defending what they did, but again to paint the whole lot of them as sociopaths from the get go one wonders what quirk of fate made all of them to be born at just the right point to join the SS, yet dissappear without trace post-war.

~:smoking:

Andres

11-15-2010, 14:31

Yes, this doesn't read like a comic. There are no superheroes, nor blameless victims. Even lumping the losers into one amorphous "villain" category should be seen as ridiculous.

It is perfectly possible to admit that the Allies killed numerous innocent people and still hold the view that fighting the Nazis was the right thing to do :shrug:

Perhaps there are those here who would have preferred persecution to joining the Nazi party. Perhaps they would have refused a desk job at the first concentration (not extermination) camp. Perhaps they would have refused inmates to be sent elsewhere to Dachau et al, and accepted the firing squad for insubordination. Good on you! I've worked in several hospitals where I have seen cover ups of patients that died. Most of the time I was a junior and in all but one case not even part of the team, but I - along with everyone else - didn't speak up. So I can be pretty certain I'd not have gone to the firing squad for my principles. Perhaps that makes me as bad as under the same pressures I would probably have not the moral strength to die for my beliefs.

That's a fair point and I think it is safe to say that most people who put themselves on the moral high ground nowadays, sitting in a comfortable chair behind their pc, after a good meal, would have followed orders if they would have been in the place of young Fritz who had the choice of gassing Jews or being shot.

There are distinctions to be made, there is need for nuance and abstraction, but I understand Louis' anger and frustration. All too much, under the guise of exactly that (nuance, distinction, abstraction), are people re-writing history in an attempt to make Nazism look like just another ideology or "not worse than the Allies". Certain things are not to be relativized (sp?); Nazism and death camps are among those.

HoreTore

11-15-2010, 14:34

But for many it was some super-boyscout club.

No excuse.

That some of the people responsible for the extermination of millions died in peace is a black mark on history.

Fragony

11-15-2010, 14:42

No excuse.

That some of the people responsible for the extermination of millions died in peace is a black mark on history.

And how were they supposed to know that, SS was the elite devision of the best army in the world, that has appeal. When immigrants get no assylum in Norway and are flown out, do you ever wonder where they end up? Maybe they go directly in the shredder, would you buy that.

Louis VI the Fat

11-15-2010, 15:06

When immigrants get no assylum in Norway and are flown out, do you ever wonder where they end up? Maybe they go directly in the shredder, would you buy that.Oh Frags, you're part maniac, part fantastic poet. 'Directly into the shredder' - that's both ridiculous and brilliant. :laugh4:

[/Off topic. Carry on with thread]

Philippus Flavius Homovallumus

11-15-2010, 15:11

That's a fair point and I think it is safe to say that most people who put themselves on the moral high ground nowadays, sitting in a comfortable chair behind their pc, after a good meal, would have followed orders if they would have been in the place of young Fritz who had the choice of gassing Jews or being shot.

There are distinctions to be made, there is need for nuance and abstraction, but I understand Louis' anger and frustration. All too much, under the guise of exactly that (nuance, distinction, abstraction), are people re-writing history in an attempt to make Nazism look like just another ideology or "not worse than the Allies". Certain things are not to be relativized (sp?); Nazism and death camps are among those.

The thing though is that most of these people were not "Nazis" in the sense of being Jew-hating socoiopaths, many of them were members of the Nazi party (as the Waffen SS was a Nazi paramilitary organisation I'm assuming you had to be one to join) but that doesn't make them evil by default.

Loius points up the difference between the way RAF pilots wer seen and are now seen, but neglects to distinguish between Fighter Command and Bomber Command, one defended Britain from German bombers, the other conducted a systematic campaign designed to destroy not only the German infastructure but the will to fight - Dresden being the classic example, only fully repaired and rebuilt quite recently.

The point is, the men of Bomber Command were doubtless brave, but in the course of "doing their duty" they slaughter thousands of civilians and destroyed masses of civilian goods and property - I'm sure on some level they knew they were doing this, but they kept on "doing their duty". Of course, the Germans did this as well, and they also slaughter six million defenceless people in gas chambers, so what ther Germans did was more but the individuals involved have, perhaps, a similar level of culpability for their personnal sins.

The important thing to remember is that the Third Reich set out to impose it's political will over at least all of Europe by force, and they subscribed to an ideaology which effectively removed large numbers of people from the human race. THAT is what Nazism had to be stopped, and it was.

Persecuting old men for sins they committed in their Youth is pointless, and if you had all the evidence you'd probably end up prosecuting everyone in the German army up to 1945 for something they had done.

rory_20_uk

11-15-2010, 15:16

It is perfectly possible to admit that the Allies killed numerous innocent people and still hold the view that fighting the Nazis was the right thing to do :shrug:

That's a fair point and I think it is safe to say that most people who put themselves on the moral high ground nowadays, sitting in a comfortable chair behind their pc, after a good meal, would have followed orders if they would have been in the place of young Fritz who had the choice of gassing Jews or being shot.

There are distinctions to be made, there is need for nuance and abstraction, but I understand Louis' anger and frustration. All too much, under the guise of exactly that (nuance, distinction, abstraction), are people re-writing history in an attempt to make Nazism look like just another ideology or "not worse than the Allies". Certain things are not to be relativized (sp?); Nazism and death camps are among those.

Oh, to clarify, I think morally the fight against the Nazis was clear. It should have started at the Sudatenland Crisis and it'd have been nice if America put its fists where its morals were, as opposed to using WW2 to cement its position in the world by gaining massive wealth in an export-led economy... But no one else is allowed to do this OK (China)?

I'm uneasy that history needs to be re-written to ensure the Correct Lessons Are Learnt. No one appears to be inclined to wonder why the Communists aren't being tarred for their actions which led to millions of civilians and conscripts.

But since things are based upon after the war started I think that much of what should be learnt is lost, and to waste airtime on a 90 year old former SS somethingorother further reduces the "why".

~:smoking:

rory_20_uk

11-15-2010, 15:26

I thought that for almost any decent job one had to be a card carrying Nazi, and that it was common to bestow honorary ranks to others for all sorts of divisive reasons (mainly related to control). If the SS offers you a honorary post, a brave man would refuse.

Oh Frags, you're part maniac, part fantastic poet. 'Directly into the shredder' - that's both ridiculous and brilliant. :laugh4:

[/Off topic. Carry on with thread]

The UK deports people back to Zimbabwe. Not quite the shredder I agree, but come election time there are still gangs who will cut off extremities. I'm sure "embarrassing" the country abroad isn't going help matters either. Leaving aside 80% unemployment, no health system, etc.

Bomber command required fighter screens to bomb targets. Going up alone would be tantamount to suicide. Those dashing young chaps in fighters needed to ensure the plucky Lancasters could drop their incendiaries.

I imagine that in most wars a high percentage of all front line troops committed war crimes. The rules were generally written by lawyers who barely know one end of the gun from the other in peacetime.

~:smoking:

Louis VI the Fat

11-15-2010, 15:32

To return to the opening post. Two seperate debates:

1) The hunt for Nazi top men after the war to bring them to the US.
After WWI Germany was left nearly fully intact, from the legal order to territorial and economical integrity. This Germany abused to render the peace nothing more than a German breathing space.
A hard lesson thus learned, directly after WWII the victors sought to render Germany incapacitated for the foreseeable future. Entire factories were shipped abroad, patents were confiscated, ordinary Germans had to perform forced labour, and top scientists were taken abroad.

2) The hunt for these German / Nazi émigrés in later decades, to bring them to justice.
One can question the wisdom of smuggling in a German / Nazi scientist directly after WWII, only to hunt down this same Nazi two, three, four decades later.

The main wrong to me is not that they were rendered incapacitated for Germany after the war - it was a fluid situation, there was a German threat which needed to be incapacitated, there were always the Russians too, other third countries.
The wrong to me is neither that these men were hunted down later. A war criminal is a war criminal, regardless of whether he was a useful rocket scientist.

The wrong then, to me, is that these men were not prosecuted after the war, but were instead offered a safe haven and new identity.

Having said that, I am not opposed to a sense of 'realism' in politics. The Soviet Union posed a real threat. Why let a former Nazi intelligence officer or rocket scientist go to waste by imprisoning him? Better to have him share his information with you, and then prosecute him after he has shared it, a few decades later.

Louis VI the Fat

11-15-2010, 15:32

Soobzokov. In May 1977, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York opened a criminal investigation to determine whether Soobzokov had lied to INS in his sworn intervie\v, \vhether he was in fact involved in a bribery scheme with Social Security, and whether INS or the Social Security Administration had improperly th\varted an investigation.

http://documents.nytimes.com/confidential-report-provides-new-evidence-of-notorious-nazi-cases#text/p356
Soobzokov. A Nazi who had fled to America. He lied to the immigration services. Lied and covered up his identity after the war. He managed to get a job at the CIA, where he sat about for decades destroying documents that incriminated himself and his Nazi friends.

He was found out eventually, and prosecuted.

Far from merely prosecuting poor senior citizens, this too, lest we forget it, was a facet of the wish to prosecute former Nazis. America is neither as stupid or as mean spirited as it is made out to be.

Beskar

11-15-2010, 15:47

America is neither as stupid or as mean spirited as it is made out to be.

It is actually far worse?

rory_20_uk

11-15-2010, 15:50

Post WWI Germany was bankrupt and given a government that the people despised. Their colonies were all taken and divvied up to the victors. To put the boot in they were made to pay a vast sum of money and even invaded by the French. Yeah, a great way of making friends. Germany could have been kept in line post WWI if the Allies have kept them to their tiny army, navy and no airforce. When a government linked entity has over 3 million male members again this should be something that raises alarm bells - but didn't.

Having said that, I am not opposed to a sense of 'realism' in politics. The Soviet Union posed a real threat. Why let a former Nazi intelligence officer or rocket scientist go to waste by imprisoning him? Better to have him share his information with you, and then prosecute him after he has shared it, a few decades later.

How is a rocket scientist breaking a law? We have loads of clever chaps beavering away right now on things that aren't indirectly weapons like rockets, but are. In WWI all sides made loads of exciting chemical weapons to lob at each other, and no one was prosecuted for this.

Intelligence officers too are not guilty for holding a job. Just leave the SOE to trash whatever they can get their hands on? Leave the Partisans to sabotage in the East? The British were running possibly the biggest guerilla warfare operation, barring the Soviets. It rather smacks of punishing everyone on the "loosing" side. Why not the intelligence officials in the UK who offered German spies the option of being turned or being shot, for example?

~:smoking:

HoreTore

11-15-2010, 16:05

And how were they supposed to know that, SS was the elite devision of the best army in the world, that has appeal. When immigrants get no assylum in Norway and are flown out, do you ever wonder where they end up? Maybe they go directly in the shredder, would you buy that.

When Hitler screams for the death of every jew, how can anyone think that he wasn't going to kill any jews....?

And yes, I am fully aware that immigrants we ship back are treated horribly in some countries - which is why I don't want to ship them back.

Rhyfelwyr

11-15-2010, 16:08

But the story of Germany is not nazism. Auschwitz was not the logical conclusion of German history. History could've worked out differently.

Indeed it could have, if a certain neighbour to the west hadn't done its utmost to completely cripple and discredit the democratic Weimar Republic.

gaelic cowboy

11-15-2010, 16:22

Indeed it could have, if a certain neighbour to the west hadn't done its utmost to completely cripple and discredit the democratic Weimar Republic.

That strikes me as a bit simple the 1920's was a time of enormous change in the maps of Europe but it has almost disappeared from the international historical memory due to the two world wars. Russian expansion and an actual war with Poland plus disorder in Germany prob mean that 1920/30 foreign policy England was about ensuring a strong but not too strong hand arose in Germany.

Fragony

11-15-2010, 16:32

When Hitler screams for the death of every jew, how can anyone think that he wasn't going to kill any jews....?

And yes, I am fully aware that immigrants we ship back are treated horribly in some countries - which is why I don't want to ship them back.

But you aren't sabotaging railroads either, but that's not the point and you probably know that. Hitler never talked about extermination as far as I know anyway, as Magneto said, they just do it. You should buy Triumph des Willens if you see it laying around, nazi-propaganda movie , it's perfectly orchestrated mass hysteria

HoreTore

11-15-2010, 16:38

Hitler never talked about extermination as far as I know anyway

I suggest you find yourself some nazi propaganda and read it.

Rhyfelwyr

11-15-2010, 16:43

Fragony

11-15-2010, 16:46

I suggest you find yourself some nazi propaganda and read it.

You do understand that I have counter of doom here.

HoreTore

11-15-2010, 16:55

You do understand that I have counter of doom here.

No idea what you're talking about here.

But to continue on my previous post: in all the nazi propaganda, the jews are referred to as parasites, a disease and the cause for all the suffering of the German people. How on earth is it even possible to think that Hitler wouldn't have them killed when he could...?

And if people didn't think they were going to be killed; why did so many risk their lives to save the jews from the nazis?

Sasaki Kojiro

11-15-2010, 16:58

Indeed it could have, if a certain neighbour to the west hadn't done its utmost to completely cripple and discredit the democratic Weimar Republic.

Oh gosh :mellow:

rory_20_uk

11-15-2010, 17:00

But to continue on my previous post: in all the nazi propaganda, the jews are referred to as parasites, a disease and the cause for all the suffering of the German people. How on earth is it even possible to think that Hitler wouldn't have them killed when he could...?

And if people didn't think they were going to be killed; why did so many risk their lives to save the jews from the nazis?

I thought that in the 1930's there was a push to deport them all to the Palestine region (and America too?), but the British didn't fancy the numbers as it would cause instability in the area...

If the Germans thought the Jews were going to be killed why did so FEW prevent the Nazis coming in to power in the first place? Perhaps policies changes over the years as power was consolidated and other options were cut off?

Unless you're suggesting that the Nazis were the first democratically elected party to tell the truth in all the elections they stood in? :inquisitive:

~:smoking:

HoreTore

11-15-2010, 17:24

I thought that in the 1930's there was a push to deport them all to the Palestine region (and America too?), but the British didn't fancy the numbers as it would cause instability in the area...

If the Germans thought the Jews were going to be killed why did so FEW prevent the Nazis coming in to power in the first place? Perhaps policies changes over the years as power was consolidated and other options were cut off?

Unless you're suggesting that the Nazis were the first democratically elected party to tell the truth in all the elections they stood in? :inquisitive:

~:smoking:

We're talking about what happened from 1939 to 1945, not what happened during Hitlers rise to power.

Different debate mate.

Strike For The South

11-15-2010, 17:29

A staute of limitations of genocide? I like it.

Nazi revisonism is to Europe what Southern revisionism is to America

Utter and complete nonsense

What's that old saying? You can put lipstick on a pig but at the end of the day is still the industrialzed wanton murder of 6 million innocents

rory_20_uk

11-15-2010, 17:38

But the difficulty is that once powers are in place they're difficult to shift. UK protests against the Iraq war were widespread and were stomped out very quickly with several checks and balances in place.

By 1939 Germany, you've got the old chestnut of complaints = unpatriotic and the SA/SS/SD/Gestapo plus probably a number of others I've missed off to control information flow and polish off any real dissenters. Even by then the mass murder hasn't started. Some might be feeling uneasy, but with the euphoria of easy wins and a reputation returned who'se going to worry too much? Perhaps the Jews did stop Germany ascent as there is a correlation between success and discrimination. And how many years of brainwashing have people had by 1939?

1941 - bigger fish to fry in Russia! Massive attacks against the Slav. The Brits haven't folded yet. Jewish rights? There's a Goddamn war on!

And so on. No nice "one day Hitler whilst kissing children and rebuilding Germany announced he'd off 6 million people, and called a referendum with international oversight."

You can try and charge people with Genocide but how would you do that when there is precious little if any admissible evidence and probably no witnesses any more. Or are we going to throw away Habeus Corpus to ensure some convictions? Better yet, let's torture them into confessing. That'll let them see how focused we are against atrocities.

~:smoking:

Strike For The South

11-15-2010, 17:44

You can try and charge people with Genocide but how would you do that when there is precious little if any admissible evidence and probably no witnesses any more. Or are we going to throw away Habeus Corpus to ensure some convictions? Better yet, let's torture them into confessing. That'll let them see how focused we are against atrocities.

~:smoking:

I was using a bit of hyperbole as hope were the people who were claiming "Oh he likes like paw paw! He probably has some dulces! We can't charge him with anything"

Just because you've managed to skirt the law for 50 years does not man you can not answer for your sins. I have no problem with your average Fritz who went home to dussledorff and worked in a schnitzel shop as he is just one in the long line of exploited common folk. However, there are people who knew damn well what they were doing and what they were doing was wrong.

To not bring them to justice because a few suns has set is asinine and makes a mockery of any humanist

Seamus Fermanagh

11-15-2010, 17:49

Hitler made few specific assertions regarding any sort of pogrom aimed at Jews prior to the outbreak of the war. However, it would be very hard to suggest that his general attitude was unknown given his frequent references to the uses of violence, "the struggle," and his oft-expressed attitudes that the Jews were the source of Germany's problems. You could argue that many Germans figured/hoped that this would be accomplished by some kind of forced expulsion, but it would be hard to argue that the common German was blissfully unaware of the Nazi regimes anti-Jewish intent. This did not bother enough of them to prevent a Nazi plurality in the Reichstag. I guess many people just simply and naively believed that it would be "hot air."

Beskar:

I would not, were I you, be so cynical regarding the USA's "angels of its better nature." Are we hypocrites, mouthing platitudes while playing the realpolitik game for our own betterment? Yes, on any number of occasions. But do you really WANT a USA that doesn't seek to reach for those platitudes at all and simply becomes another cynical player of the Great Game without anything but self-interest in mind? If we ever ended up developing any real skill for "putting the boot on someone's neck," I shudder to think of the world it would beget, however powerful it would make my nation.

Fragony

11-15-2010, 17:52

A staute of limitations of genocide? I like it.

Nazi revisonism is to Europe what Southern revisionism is to America

Utter and complete bull shit

What's that old saying? You can put lipstick on a pig but at the end of the day is still the industrialzed wanton murder of 6 million innocents

One example would be lovely, which revisionism

drone

11-15-2010, 17:59

One example would be lovely, which revisionism
It's not called "the War of Northern Aggression" for nothing. ~D

gaelic cowboy

11-15-2010, 20:25

gaelic cowboy

11-15-2010, 20:38

Beskar:

I would not, were I you, be so cynical regarding the USA's "angels of its better nature." Are we hypocrites, mouthing platitudes while playing the realpolitik game for our own betterment? Yes, on any number of occasions. But do you really WANT a USA that doesn't seek to reach for those platitudes at all and simply becomes another cynical player of the Great Game without anything but self-interest in mind? If we ever ended up developing any real skill for "putting the boot on someone's neck," I shudder to think of the world it would beget, however powerful it would make my nation.

I for one would welcome an attempt by USA of actual hegemony of Western Europe sure the USA is basically Hiberno/Anglo-Saxon and even when (not if) the USA turns Hispanic sure were still quids in with them too.

PanzerJaeger

11-15-2010, 22:11

Soobzokov. A Nazi who had fled to America. He lied to the immigration services. Lied and covered up his identity after the war. He managed to get a job at the CIA, where he sat about for decades destroying documents that incriminated himself and his Nazi friends.

He was found out eventually, and prosecuted.

Soobzokov is a perfect example of OSI overreach. He did not lie to cover up his identity except when ordered to by the CIA and there is no evidence that he destroyed documents that incriminated himself. He did, however, help the West in the CIA in Jordan during the height of the Cold War and was later hunted down and harassed for the favor.

From the report:

"OS1 also contacted the CIA and learned that Soobzokov had told the agency about his SS service at some point after he emigrated and before he became a citizen. 23 Although the statements by Soviet witnesses tied Soobzokov to possible persecutory actions, OSI personnel had not met the declarants. Moreover, "most of the better circumstantial witnesses" were dead. Without testing the testimony of the remaining witnesses "according to U.S. standards of due process and admissibility," OS1 was unwilling to base its case on their cIaims. 24 However, the ne\vly-established office wanted to file some cases quickly.25 The Soobzokov case was particularly pressing since he was the only subject in Blum's best-selling book against whom charges had not yet been filed. 26 Rather than charging him with involvement in persecution, the government focused on his failure to disclose his full military and criminal history to the State Department at the time of his visa application, and to the INS when he sought citizenship. OS1 filed charges in December 1979, alleging illegal procurement of citizenship (in that he had never been "'la\vfully admitted" because he had concealed pertinent information which \vould likely have barred his entry) and misrepresentations in his citizenship appl ication. The complaint also charged that Soobzokov lacked the good moral character necessary for citizenship; the lack of good moral character \vas based on his nlisrepresentations. The media, in reporting on the case, stated that Soobokov had "worked as a U.S. intelligence agent in Jordan in the 1950s, and may have been granted asylum secretly.,·27

Since the new information indicated that Soobzokov had told the State Department about his past \vhen he applied for a visa, the Department of Justice determined that it could not, in good faith, pursue the SS misrepresentation charges, \vhich were the crux of the complaint. And without misrepresentation, there was no longer a basis for the lack of mo~al character charge. The only charges left \vere those involving the unreported criminal record. Although the Soviets claimed Soobzokov had spent five years in custody, the statutes violated involved hooliganism and arbitrariness, both crimes used by the Soviets to pursue those who opposed the Communist state. 31 The Soviet Union was unwilling to give details about the alleged criminal activity. Without additional information, the Department was not willing to pursue this charge either. Accordingly, in July 1980, the government moved to dismiss the complaint. The motion detailed the efforts OSI had made to verify its facts both before and after the case was filed.

Two other points:

Thousands of honorable soldiers fought in the Waffen SS, without any connection to war crimes. Thousands more served in the overarching SS and various administrative branches without incident. SS membership does not automatically make one guilty of war crimes, just as RAF or US Marines membership does not.

Also, while it was clear that he hated the Jews, Hitler was a bombastic politician and Europeans were used to aggrandized, dramatic political speech. Hitler also railed against communists, capitalists, the French and many other groups as enemies that had to be wiped out. Much of his language was cryptic and he never discussed specifics. However, it should be noted that the actual extermination was a highly secretive affair. The extermination camps were located mostly outside of Germany and in remote areas. Very few Germans actually served at the camps, which made use of Russians and Jews to fill the ranks, and those that did were barred from discussing what they had seen with others. There was a propaganda campaign (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theresienstadt_(film)) launched to deliberately mislead Germans into believing that the camps were happy, healthy communities, as well. Finally, when the camps were deemed to have completed their task, they were razed to the ground and meticulous efforts were taken to destroy any evidence of what transpired.

Louis VI the Fat

11-16-2010, 01:07

Post WWI Germany was bankruptBollox. :laugh4::laugh4::laugh4:

Germany faced neither war damage, nor inter-allied war debt, nor large reparations. As a consequence, Germany was much better off than the European allies, who faced huge debts (UK), or huge debts combined with crippling reparations payments (France).
The economic peace reversed the military verdict.

and given a government that the people despised. Bollox. :laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4:

The Prussian military had assumed control over the German state. Upon defeat, the Prussian junkers did what they traditionally do: be docile and cowardly in defeat. That is, beg for peace, then lie that they didn't start the war, that most of it hadn't happened, and that they hadn't lost. To this end, the mind-boggingly dishonourable Prussian military which had taken control of Germany then lost the war for Germany, quickly put civilians in power after the defeat, then shouted that it was the civilian government which had lost the war.

As a result, the government was left vulnerable to nationalist agitation. Sadly and strangely, people still fall for this stab in the back nonsense.

The democratic government was wished for, but not imposed by, the allies. The allies left the German legal order intact - for such was the lofty idealism of the peacemakers.

To put the boot in they were made to pay a vast sum of moneyBollox. :laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4:

The Fourteen points, the pre-armistice agreements, and the armistice itself spoke of full reparations for all civil damages in France. To this the dishonourable German military caste eagerly agreed, while never intending to keep their word.

In the peace treaty, the demand was lowered: Germany would now only be required to pay insofar as it could pay, France magnanimously would pay all of the remainder. Unlike Germany, France would pay regardless of whether she could do so.

Still this was not enough for the duplicitous Germans. Even as the German troops were driven out and the German military command was pleading for peace, promising to pay full reparations for all damages, the German army was under orders to steal what it could carry, and destroy all else.

The German army saw fit to flood and destroy France's largest coal mine right before signing its defeat. As compensation, France required coal shipments until such time as the reparations to the destroyed French coal industry was completed. When Germany failed to deliver coal for the 34th time in 36 instalments, France occupied the Ruhr to ensure shipment herself.

This much to the delight of the German government, which had sought to provoke France into this. Germany now cried murder. It was a fantastic diplomatic succes for Germany, for its effort to undermine the peace. The German public was rallied. The British were disgusted and embarked on their project to bolster Germany and weaken France, to preserve a military balance on the continent. (Boy were they misinformed...)
France was defeated, the country which had won the war had now lost the peace. France was now isolated, was left the only country defending the order on the continent, but was relegated to sit powerless while the inevitable unfolded. The world slept and refused to listen to the desperate pleas and warnings of France about the coming German-Russian attempt to overthrow European peace.

and even invaded by the French. Bollox. :laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4:

Britain and the US ought to have done what they agreed to in 1919: preserve the peace in Europe with a democratic front. To abandon France and leave her the sole defender of democracy and the peace in Europe, in the face of a revanchist Germany and Russia was a mistake. The Rurh crisis was a German provocation to test the resolve of the allies.

It was a resounding succes for Germany. Germany had learned: there is no resolve to prevent a German attempt to overthrow the peace. Britain appeases, America remains absent. The real marvel is that it still took Germany another decade to install a man they entrusted with overthrowing the peace. The real battle was an internal German affair. Sadly, not just the national-conservative side won, but the man they thought their puppet.

The world failed itself, the world also failed Germany. It could all so easily have been prevented with a bit more wisdom, a bit more resolve.

Louis VI the Fat

11-16-2010, 01:07

Indeed it could have, if a certain neighbour to the west hadn't done its utmost to completely cripple and discredit the democratic Weimar Republic.:laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4:

That bollox is German nationalist-conservative / Nazi propaganda. German democracy was discredited by this very propaganda of internal nationalist and fascist agitators.

There is, however, no excuse for a serious historian to still be a useful idiot to nationalist-conservative / Nazi agitation. The ancient Manichean 'Harsh France, idealistic US, realistic UK' has not stood up to modern historical scrutiny. For decades now, serious scholarship has considered the French peace delegation the most moderate of all.

The harshest? Why, that would be the UK. Try for example Marc Trachtenberg, who way back in 1979 took the trouble to add up all demands:

http://www.jstor.org/stable/1877867?seq=1&Search=yes&term=trachtenberg&list=hide&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3Ffilter%3D%26Query%3Dtrachtenberg%26wc%3Don%26acc%3Don&item=11&ttl=3605&returnArticleService=showFullText&resultsServiceName=null

Surprising too is the work of Georges-Henri Soutou. He explored French offers of post-war economic cooperation with Germany. None were ever taken up by Germany. The plans were remarkably similar to post-1945 Franco-German economic coopration, showing the roots of France's foreign policy impulses run deeper than was previously remembered. This is more interesting history than the endlessly repeated 'France wished to cripple Germany'. That is German nationalist propaganda (in its modern Anglo form). It wasn't even believed by many Germans in the 1920s. That it still passes for meaningful history beggars believe.

One can wonder - if the allies really sought to completely cripple and subdue Germany, then they made a pretty poor job of it, eh? The slightest glance at the world in 1925 ought to reveal that Germany was left the most powerful state in Europe by far.

Louis VI the Fat

11-16-2010, 01:09

Thousands of honorable soldiers fought and died in the Waffen SS, without any connection to war crimes. Thousands more served in the overarching SS and various administrative branches without incident. SS membership does not automatically make one guilty of war crimes, just as RAF or US Marines membership does not. What utter bollox :laugh4: :laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4:

Now then, Panzer, let's say that one man figures out when a girl is driven to ballet by her dad. Another man shoots the girl's father. A third abducts the girl and sells her to a paedophile ring. A paedophile abuses then murders her.

Is only man four responsible for the murder of the girl? Or are all four part of a criminal organisation intent on committing a crime all knew to be wrong?

Industrial murder knows many murderers. The desk clerk murderer is not absolved of blame. Neither is the Waffen SS member who did not personally kill any unarmed civilian.
The RAF or US Marine, disregarding blatant acts of war crimes, operated within a

Louis VI the Fat

11-16-2010, 01:13

The events elsewhere with Poland etc weren't related, at the end of the day it was pure French self-interest that crippled the Weimar Republic. Britain certainly didn't have any idealistic principles in mind in supporting Weimar Germany, just doing the old trick with balancing the powers on the continent. But France had a lot to gain from a weak and divided Germany, and lucky for them the major industrial western regions were on their doorstep.

Does this in any way excuse Nazim? No. But there is not some particular inherent evil in Germans that means there are no other reasons for why it came about...It is this, exactly this, that I've rallied against in several threads. In effect, what you are doing is blaming France for WWII.

It all goes something like this:

1) Germany the world's most advanced country,
2) ???
3) Auschwitz.

Now, '???' is not 'evil fascist orcs'.
So the answer must be something else that drove Germany from 1 to 3. For an explanation, ancient nationalist / Nazi propaganda provides a very tempting story. Tempting, because it is of exactly the right difficulty level. It is intermediate enough that it takes some effort to understand it. It is also simple enough that any amateur with an internets can grasp it within an afternoon. Versailles mythology is the carrying-card of the amateur historian. The shortcut into statecraft for the semi-intelligent. It has become so ubiquitous that it is repeated simply as a matter of fact.

At some point, any adult understands that Germans are not racist orcs, that this is not the explanation. Sadly, the answer to what did happen, is all too often sought in a rehash of fascist propaganda about an onerous peace and a crippled Germany:
'Germany did not / not really lose the war. Yet it faced a duplicitous peace treaty. It was subjected to crippling economic measures. This was the fault of France which sought to weaken Germany. As a result, resentment led to the rise of Hitler'. I think that's about the simplest form, although an entitre library has been based on it to satisfy a lifelong study for those with a fascination for Nazism.

The problem is, it is all false. Not false in the sense that it is a simplistic version of events that lacks nuance. But false in the sense that is entirely untrue, based on fundamentally erroneous assumptions.

It is an extreme version of Versailles mythology. A rehash of old German nationalist-conservative propganda. With, in the Anglo world, the Liberal Democracy and Jews left out, and a blame placed solely on France. Especially since 2003. Sadly, at the beginning of this century two things further conspired against France: the rise of the internet since early this decade, and the final triumph of English as lingua franca. The end result is one of the gravest damages done to French pr after 2003: France is now in amateur history and in the public image the most directly responsible for WWII.
Sad, incorrect, reprehensible, Very damaging. I mean, not to be a crybaby and all that. France is not an 'innocent' country. Stupidty, arrogance and short sightedness were not absent. But even so...

Try this for a link.
That ancient Léon Degrelle again, now a hero in anti-zinistic Islamofascist movement. 'Hitler born at Versailles': http://abbc.net/degrelle/hitler-born-at-versailles.htm

It is there, at Stormfront and at their suprising ally of Islamofascism, that the nonsense belongs about stabs-in-the-back, Jewish conspiracies, avaricious French, a crippled Germany kept down by evil outsiders and their wicked schemes.

Sadly, I am slowly beginning to understand the full extent of the slow spread of this fascist narrative, which by now is tragically taught in many schools as a workable abridged version of events in the 1920s/30s.

gaelic cowboy

11-16-2010, 01:22

Sadly, two things further conspire against France: the rise of the internet since early this decade, and the final triumph of English as lingua franca. The end result is one of the gravest damages done to French pr after 2003: France is now in amateur history and in the public image the most directly responsible for WWII.
Sad, incorrect, reprehensible, Very damaging.

The most destructive piece of technology since the invention of fire and thats a fact, were going to have to figure out how to live in a world where masses of information does not mean we have the correct information. blah blah long winded rant etc etc

PanzerJaeger

11-16-2010, 01:32

What utter bollox :laugh4: :laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4:

Now then, Panzer, let's say that one man figures out when a girl is driven to ballet by her dad. Another man shoots the girl's father. A third abducts the girl and sells her to a paedophile ring. A paedophile abuses then murders her.

Is only man four responsible for the murder of the girl? Or are all four part of a criminal organisation intent on committing a crime all knew to be wrong?

Industrial murder knows many murderers. The desk clerk murderer is not absolved of blame. Neither is the Waffen SS member who did not personally kill any unarmed civilian.
The RAF or US Marine, disregarding blatant acts of war crimes, operated within a

Well done, sir. That brings back memories of a much different Backroom. :applause:

Sadly, at the beginning of this century two things further conspired against France: the rise of the internet since early this decade, and the final triumph of English as lingua franca. The end result is one of the gravest damages done to French pr after 2003: France is now in amateur history and in the public image the most directly responsible for WWII.

Yes, the interwebz is conspiring against France. It is not at all that the internet has actually allowed certain French apologists to easily link to obscure and biased French historians to create a narrative that paints France as the only friend Germany had in Europe during Versailles and the interwar period.

Rhyfelwyr

11-16-2010, 02:05

Heh, I always like your psychological insights with the calling people amateur historians thing Louis, reminds me of your broad generalisations with looking into national psycies to explain a lot of things that have come up in the Backroom. Strange for a man that goes on to criticise the simplistic view of "Harsh france, idealistic US, realistic UK"!

Anyway, instead of getting swept up in the historical narrative over the years and the supposed Nazi revisionist conspiracy, why not just take things back and look at the issue itself.

Now, did France seek to aid the development of a successful, democratic German state? The anwer is quite clearly no. To get a bit philosophical with Kant and what not, one of the main ideas behind the 'liberal peace' is that states respect each others borders, as opposed to cutting off sections to make satellite states to supply important resources, or send in a foreign military to occupy other regions. Or violate a state's sovereignty by refusing to allow it to have any military to speak of. Or to transfer large sections of its historic territory to new nations that would lead to the explusion of hundreds of thousands of ethnic Germans.

Did this cause Hitler's rise to power? No it did not. Fascism was obviously not unique to Germany. Indeed, off the top of my head, fascism seemed to do best in states that had to take tougher measures to preserve a sense of national identity/unity. If you think about it, Italy, Germany, and Spain are all countries that had particularly strong regional identities/separatist movements, and with Germany and Italy being the latest to achieve unification, it is not surprising they should be the most fascist countries. So if you start cutting off bits of territory like the Saarland or the Polish Corridor, then that is a big threat to such nationalist sentiments.

Plus there were things outside of anyone's control, like the depression and what not. National socialism offered a third way at a time when the capitalist world seemed to be collapsing, and the only alternative was communism (I believe communists performed similarly well to the Nazi's as Germany was polarised under the extreme conditions). And that is why Versailles was so significant in crippling Weimar Germany. Of themselves, the terms of the treaty weren't particularly remarkable, but at a time when Germany was so fragile, they tipped it over the edge. For example, hyperinflation in Germany was caused by the strikes of German workmen in the Ruhr after the French occupation.

Obviously there was far deeper roots and wider causes between the rise of Nazism. Nobody ever claimed it was a case of:

1) Germany the world's most advanced country,
2) French stupidty
3) Auschwitz.

As Louis is saying I said it was.

Heck even instinctively suggesting that Auschwitz and the Holocaust was the only notable thing about Nazism shows it's not me that is being too narrow in my focus. The Holocaust was a side show based on some relatively local issues in central/eastern Europe, the meat of Nazism is in its social and economic outlook, and their historic context. Because let's face it, genocide isn't exactly rare. The only reason Germany had an industrialised slaughter of the Jews is because western Europe beat them to it, whether in 1290 for England, 1492 for Spain (IIRC, it was the same time as the Moors).

And google-fu reveals France was at it from 1182!

Beskar

11-16-2010, 03:38

Beskar:

I would not, were I you, be so cynical regarding the USA's "angels of its better nature." Are we hypocrites, mouthing platitudes while playing the realpolitik game for our own betterment? Yes, on any number of occasions. But do you really WANT a USA that doesn't seek to reach for those platitudes at all and simply becomes another cynical player of the Great Game without anything but self-interest in mind? If we ever ended up developing any real skill for "putting the boot on someone's neck," I shudder to think of the world it would beget, however powerful it would make my nation.

(I actually forgot I responded to this thread)

But I will only say something, that is while I am critical of many things, it is mainly the self-perpetual fantasy within America which rubs me the wrong way the most. With the light of many other criticisms I have of other powers, on the grand-scale, that could be classified as a compliment. Hopefully that is a satisfactory answer.

Husar

11-16-2010, 07:41

Having said that, I am not opposed to a sense of 'realism' in politics. The Soviet Union posed a real threat. Why let a former Nazi intelligence officer or rocket scientist go to waste by imprisoning him? Better to have him share his information with you, and then prosecute him after he has shared it, a few decades later.
So you deceive them, take everything they possess, then kill them?

America is neither as stupid or as mean spirited as it is made out to be.
And then you claim it's not mean spirited? So maybe deceiving the jews, taking their possessions and killing them was not mean spirited either and just 'realism'(if you believed that the jews were behind communism) in politics to beat the soviets?
The difference being that the jews weren't war criminals of course but the method is roughly the same anyway, as was the goal.

Andres

11-16-2010, 10:31

The end result is one of the gravest damages done to French pr after 2003: France is now in amateur history and in the public image the most directly responsible for WWII.

Is that really so? Or is your chauvinistic French self being oversensitive for everything that resembles something that looks like saying something bad about your country?

The "amateur historian" saying "Versailles was very likely one of the causes of WWII" is not saying "France started WWII!" or "Germany is not to blame!". Saying that the Allies committed attrocities is not the same as saying "teh Allies were teh bad guys and teh Nazis teh good guys; you're all brainwashed!1!!1!."

Aren't you being a bit paranoid? My history teacher in secondary school told us about how the treaty of Versailles was perceived as a "Diktat" by many Germans. We learned about the A-bombs and the discussion if it was really necessary to drop them or not. We learned about Dresden. And we also visited Breendonk, learned that the nazis were evil scum and at the end of the year, malgré the bad things the Allies had done and that we had learned about, we were convinced that fighting the nazis was the right thing to do and that we were lucky that they had been defeated. That was in 1996, not 2003. Did I live in a cave these past 15 years or are you a bit exaggerating to get your point accross?

Also, accusing people who disagree with you of being brainwashed by 70 year old nazi propaganda won't help your cause and will have the opposite effect of what you're trying to achieve.

Husar

11-16-2010, 13:28

Did I live in a cave these past 15 years or are you a bit exaggerating to get your point accross?

Also, accusing people who disagree with you of being brainwashed by 70 year old nazi propaganda won't help your cause and will have the opposite effect of what you're trying to achieve.

I'm afraid Louis is actually trying to spread his own revisionist history instead of actually trying to find a balance, one day he suddenly started with this french propaganda campaign, making France look like the most noble and forgiving nation in Europe. I've got nothing against France but i think he is completely overdoing it and it makes it very hard to believe him anything he has to say about the topic. Of course according to him that means I'm a victim of the internet nazi propaganda. :dizzy2:

Fragony

11-16-2010, 13:28

(I actually forgot I responded to this thread)

But I will only say something, that is while I am critical of many things, it is mainly the self-perpetual fantasy within America which rubs me the wrong way the most. With the light of many other criticisms I have of other powers, on the grand-scale, that could be classified as a compliment. Hopefully that is a satisfactory answer.

If you take things at face value, how can you really call it a perception. Europe isn't a total mess because them. They will have to work very hard to inflict as much hardship as much as we did. Belgians killed maybe 50 million in Congo, French and Dutch killed hundreds of thousands in Algeria and Indonesia after WW2, we have a sick history and terrible memory

InsaneApache

11-16-2010, 14:00

Talking of how great France is, I watched Hotel Rwanda last night. Good movie.

Fragony

11-16-2010, 14:16

Talking of how great France is, I watched Hotel Rwanda last night. Good movie.

Nah crap movie, watch 'Shooting Dogs' instead, no room for feelgood every inch of sickness in your face. Yeah the French are bastards alright, just like everybody else. At least the Belgium soldiers get a fair treatment for a change it must have been very frustrating.

Louis VI the Fat

11-16-2010, 14:45

HoreTore

11-16-2010, 15:00

one day he suddenly started with this french propaganda campaign, making France look like the most noble and forgiving nation in Europe.

A frenchman being [I]arrogant[/I....?

I do believe you're out of your mind, old chap :toff:

Fragony

11-16-2010, 15:01

Well being French kinda makes you a bastard, can't fight it. But if you want a 1 men's insights on Rwanda and the UN read 'Shake hands with the Devil' amazing stuff.

Andres

11-16-2010, 15:15

Rwanda?

Isn't Belgium to blame? After all, it was our government that ordered Belgian troops to retreat, leaving 2000 to be slaughtered in the Don Bosco incident (Belgian's Srebrenica; but we keep it silent and hidden, as per usual when we do something nasty). Wasn't it the Belgian Secretary General of the Nato, Willy Claes, who used all his diplomatic influence to convince other countries to retreat their troops as well, in an attempt to make Belgium look less bad (it looks better if all troop retreat, not just the Belgians)?

To top it off, the idiot Verhofstadt apologised to Kagame, who was one of those responsible for the genocide.

Philippus Flavius Homovallumus

11-16-2010, 15:20

Spouting bollox, the lot of you. :laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4::laugh4:

The modern standard work about the Peace and subsequent development is MacMillan's 'Peacemakers'. It is readily available. It will make you wash your mouth with soap out of shame for having called any of my posts propaganda.

Neither a word nor a minute of the reader's time is wasted in the book on popular notions of some onerous treaty.
As is both customary and befitting for a serious study of the period, I should add. Call me an elitist swine. :book:

Foch dissagreed with you, didn't he?

The Treaty was unjustly punitive to a major power, and unacceptably lenient to what we would not call a "Rogue Nation".

The blame for WWI does not rest with Germany any more than with France or Britain, the latter's insistance on bringing in it's whole Empire extended the war for years and resulted in the stalemate far more than any other factor - it also dragged in the US.

Clearly the Peace was flawed, and the League of Nations was toothless - neither of which has anything to do with German machinations, so I fear France and the other "Powers" need to take alarge collective share of the blame without complaint.

Fragony

11-16-2010, 15:57

HoreTore

11-16-2010, 16:24

Well being French kinda makes you a bastard, can't fight it. But if you want a 1 men's insights on Rwanda and the UN read 'Shake hands with the Devil' amazing stuff.

If I was to be born again and could choose freely what country to be born in, there's no doubt in my mind:

I'd be French.

Louis VI the Fat

11-16-2010, 17:13

If I was to be born again and could choose freely what country to be born in, there's no doubt in my mind:

I'd be French.Excellent choice. For one, being French means you can brag about having been the most moderate, most rational, most realistic great power of the first half of the 20th century.

I keep linking to long studies of wide scope. Nobody is going to read that I suppose. Below then a brief thirty page article that gives a brilliant recapitulation of the findings of serious modern scholarship. The foreign policy of France, America, Britain and Germany after 1918 compared. It is an excellent shortcut to modern academic findings:

(And yes, serious scholarship leaves no escaping the conclusion that old popular concepts were completely amiss. On the contrary, France had by far the most moderate, realist policy goals. Had the world listened to France just a little bit more, WWII would not have happened. France is always right about these things. :yes:)

A few years ago, a number of historians felt that it was
important to take a fresh look at this whole complex of issues: a
good deal of archivally-based work had been done on Versailles
over the past twenty or thirty years, and the time had come to
stand back and figure out what all this new work had amounted to.

A conference was held in Berkeley in 1994; the present volume
contains the papers presented at that conference. These papers
present the views of some of the best scholars working in this
area--indeed, of some of the best historians in the business,
including people who have been studying Versailles and related
subjects intensively for over thirty years.

What is to be taken away from this collection of articles?
How has our understanding of the peace conference period changed
in recent decades? What, in particular, should we make of the
different policies pursued by the three main western governments
in 1919, and by the German government as well?

II
One can begin with French policy in 1919. For years, the
consensus judgment was quite negative. The French were commonly
portrayed as harsh and vindictive; they wre blamed, in large
measure, for the supposedly "Carthaginian" peace terms imposed on
their neighbor across the Rhine.

Judging from the contributions in this volume, little of
that traditional view remains intact among serious scholars,
although there are still a few echoes of it here and there. In
fact, a number of the contributors--Elisabeth Glaser, for
example, and William Keylor and Sally Marks--explicitly reject
the idea that Versailles was a "Carthaginian" peace.

French policy itself is also now viewed in a relatively
charitable light.

III

The political issues were perhaps even more important.
Neither Wilson nor Lloyd George was primarily concerned with the
question of what it would take to establish a stable structure of
power. The whole idea that there had to be an effective
counterweight to German power in western Europe, that France
alone could not provide it, that Britain and America had to come
in and redress the balance--that indeed this was the only
alternative, short of accepting Germany as the dominant force in
Europe, to a system of constraints on German power that the
Germans were sure to resent and to resist--never lay at the heart
of either American or British thinking.

IV
At least Wilson was trying to do what he felt was the right
thing, but the same cannot be said of Lloyd George. Like Wilson,
he did not face up to the most important issues. He did not
think seriously about the problem of enforcement, nor did he
think deeply about the central political problems, especially the
core problem of what relations between France and Germany should
be like.
But in his case, this had to do more with a moral than
an intellectual failing. The British prime minister reached
constantly for immediate advantage, especially domestic political
advantage; his tactical virtuosity operated at a relatively
superficial level; under Lloyd George, Britain achieved most of
her goals, but the gains he won would now strike us as trivial.

V
Finally, what about the Germans? How is their policy to be
assessed? Klaus Schwabe says in his contribution to the book
that "judged by its own standards"--that is, assuming that the
overriding goal was to maintain "Germany's status as a great
power"--the strategy Germany pursued at the peace conference was
"successful in the long run."

Well, perhaps, if the long run stops in 1929, or even 1939, but not if it goes past 1945. And
whatever foreign policy benefits Germany drew from a policy of
resistance, that policy, as Niall Ferguson argues in his
contribution, led to economic and political disaster at home.

http://www.upf.edu/materials/fhuma/hcu/docs/t2/art19.pdfRead it. Louis is not the one talking bollox here.

Husar

11-16-2010, 17:15

Call me an elitist swine.

Did your forefathers in 1789 die in vain when they fought to end elitism in France? ~;)

Louis VI the Fat

11-16-2010, 17:32

Did your forefathers in 1789 die in vain when they fought to end elitism in France? ~;)My forefathers fought to bring French rationalism to Germany. It was much welcomed by liberal democratic Germans in the west, who sadly lost out to the Prussian military caste and their Asian hordes.

Germany always is best off when it accepts French guidance, as it did during the enlightenment and after 1945. When Germany refuses to listen to France, as in the period 1870-1945, there is German disaster. :book:

Sasaki Kojiro

11-16-2010, 18:46

biased French historians

Is "Marc Trachtenberg" a biased French historian?

I read the paper and he does support Louis's claim. Although he focuses solely on an examination of the causes and not on considering blame, which I was interested in. And sometimes he says bizarre stuff like:

Did this mean that he was so hemmed in by domestic political
considerations that he could not have taken a moderate stance on
this issue at the peace conference even if he had wanted to?

:dizzy2:

As if he "could not have" carried out a better peace treaty if it meant he would lose an election.

HoreTore

11-16-2010, 19:04

Excellent choice. For one, being French means you can brag about having been the most moderate, most rational, most realistic great power of the first half of the 20th century.

Not really why I want to be French.... I'm focusing more on all the hot women, constantly intoxicated by red wine, with a thing for blonde vikings....

Also, it will be legal for me to be as arrogant as I please.

Louis VI the Fat

11-16-2010, 21:16

Marc Trachtenberg focuses solely on an examination of the causes and not on considering blame, which I was interested in. And sometimes he says bizarre stuff like:

Did this mean that he was so hemmed in by domestic political
considerations that he could not have taken a moderate stance on
this issue at the peace conference even if he had wanted to? :dizzy2:

As if he "could not have" carried out a better peace treaty if it meant he would lose an election.Why is that so bizarre? These statesmen really did were hemmed in by their domestic (electoral) demands.

Are you perhaps reading history backwards a bit here? The peacemakers had no knowledge of the subsequent maniacal attack on the peace treaty and every little clause in it. Never mind realised that the peace would become an icon of malcontent for those who could not accept Germany's defeat. The peacemakers had other things in mind. Amongst which political realities at home, which to a large extent set the political bandwith in the peace negotiations.

In the case of Lloyd George, he had made himself the champion of the part of the British electorate that wished to see as large an indemnity for Britain as possible. He was committed to, but not bound by, a policy that sought to extract as large an indemnity from Germany as possible. Consequently Lloyd George was still in a domestic position to accept the moderate French and American proposals. It was his own character and outright dishonesty that prevented Britain from accepting the modest proposals of the other allies.

It was France which helped George out. In breach of the armistice, the British sought payments for war pensions. To this the Germans had not agreed in their defeat. Clemenceau, in contrast to the 'Lies 'n deceit r us' Germans and the dishonest Lloyd George a man of his word, naturally refused. The French delegation however eventually proposed that France would pay Britain...out of her own pocket. This to prevent Germany from having to pay for more than it had agreed to in the armistice - something which France would not allow. So instead, France passed on reparations meant for French and Belgian* damages to Britain. To this rather bizarre and very costly arrangement France agreed for the same reason France agreed to all the other arrangements in the peace, most of which were so very detrimental to French interests: to secure the postwar Anglo-French alliance.

*Nobody asked the Belgians anything. Also, over the course of the 1920s, France and Britain took care of their own payments first and foremost, disregarding Belgian interests.

~~o~~o~~<<oOo>>~~o~~o~~

What blame considerations are you are interested in? The blame for how and why the peace failed, who and what led to WWII?
There are many answers to that. In the field of International Law, the Treaty of Versailles is the gold standard of an idealistic peace. A marvellous work. A most noble peace. Many of our most cherished ideals were introduced into international law in the post-WWI treaties.

Versailles sought to promote peace through law. This, sadly, failed. Why? To me, because the peace was too noble to defend itself. The 1920s and 1930s pitted the most lofty ideals ever against the most depraved violent ideologies ever. The hard lessons were that an idealistc reliance on law and collective security will not suffice:

Pursuit of the idealistic goal of world peace through international
law diverted focus from more realistic measures that could have prevented
the return of war in Europe 'Peace through Law - the failure of a noble experiment': http://works.bepress.com/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1028&context=johnyoo

Sasaki Kojiro

11-16-2010, 21:46

Why is that so bizarre? These statesmen really did were hemmed in by their domestic (electoral) demands.

Hemmed in, sure, but I object to it being said that a politician "can't" do something because he will lose an election if he does. I don't really object so much to him saying that about george (he even goes on to say that he wasn't hemmed in that much) but it's a prime example of his whole tone, which is a bit like...

Are you perhaps reading history backwards a bit here? The peacemakers had no knowledge of the subsequent maniacal attack on the peace treaty and every little clause in it.

Reading history backwards is sort of the impression I got. When I said he didn't talk about blame I meant that he seemed to talk about "this (1) was done, which ended up leading to this (2), and they should have foreseen that" without spending time on how (1) was just and (2) was unjust.

But yeah, he definitely has France as the country with the foresight to see beyond any kind of passion for retribution.

rory_20_uk

11-16-2010, 21:52

What I didn't really understand is that the French were not desiring a vast amount of reparations - which were the doing of the British.

Then why go into the Ruhr when the reparations were not paid if they didn't want the money?

~:smoking:

Rhyfelwyr

11-17-2010, 00:08

Germany always is best off when it accepts French guidance, as it did during the enlightenment and after 1945. When Germany refuses to listen to France, as in the period 1870-1945, there is German disaster. :book:

Is this on merit of the fact that they were enlightened and liberal principles, or that they were French? France wasn't the only country to have an enlightenment you know.

IMO this conflation of liberalism/Frenchness is a big problem in French history. They seem to have been unable to separate the two, and hence their violent idea of "spreading the revolution" that would make Bolsheviks blush.

Just because France was the first country to have a successful 'liberal' revolution (liberal in a very loose sense, as in opposing the old order) doesn't mean it is the only country where such a process would have happened naturally. You make it sound like the Germans still be in the 19th century if the French hadn't come in to chop up their country, prop up satellite regimes, and steal all their coal. Freedom indeed!

EDIT: Also what is the fascination with the Prussian junkers, their heyday was long gone. I don't see how the existence of a strong aristocracy on the eastern fringe of Germany proves all Germans were under a sort of feudal yoke or something. Germany was actually much more industrialised than the backwards French, it is one of the reasons why a purely liberal revolution couldn't succeed in 1848.

Louis VI the Fat

11-17-2010, 02:32

Just because France was the first country to have a successful 'liberal' revolution (liberal in a very loose sense, as in opposing the old order) doesn't mean it is the only country where such a process would have happened naturally. Well that post, about Germany needing French guidance, was mildly hyperbolic. A wee little provocation of dear Husar.

The Stranger

11-17-2010, 03:21

i blame france.

The Stranger

11-17-2010, 03:22

and coca cola

Rhyfelwyr

11-17-2010, 11:27

And the Jews.

PanzerJaeger

11-17-2010, 11:47

Is "Marc Trachtenberg" a biased French historian?

I read the paper and he does support Louis's claim. Although he focuses solely on an examination of the causes and not on considering blame, which I was interested in.

No. He does have a reputation for looking at history from different perspectives than the norm, but that is certainly not a bad thing. I was referring to some of the jstor articles he has posted in other threads on the subject.

Just to clarify, I don't necessarily disagree with many of Louis' points. My only problem with his posts on the subject is that he is blending legitimate historical analysis with supposition and nationalistic hyperbole to present a very partisan position.

For example, it is very true (and not particularly groundbreaking to people that study the period) that Keynes' dire predictions after Versailles did not come to fruition. (Not, by the way, because of French compassion at Versailles, but because the Germans undercut the treaty and later Allied governments forgave much of the debt, as it could not be paid.) Obviously the reparations did not cripple Germany, as it was able to rebound and crush France less than ten years after Hitler ceased making the payments.

However, what most historians understand and what Louis fails to address is that the role Versailles played in leading up to the Second World War was far more emotional; it transcended X million pounds of coal and Y shipments of lumber. The German people, rightly, believed that they did not cause the war. That fundamental truth made any perceived punishment highly exasperating. The 'War Guilt' clause was far more damaging to the success of the treaty than the reparations, as was subsequent French (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupation_of_the_Ruhr) antagonism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhenish_Republic). The sight of French soldiers marching into a chaotic, economically destitute Germany to collect payment gave validity to the far Right and was a large part of their rise to power.

Revanchism, no matter which country it emanates from, is a highly personal affair. It permeates a society on a far deeper level than the specific issues and insults that cause it. The movement in France after '71 was not about Alsace-Lorrain, it was about French national pride.

As Hitler well understood, in politics, perception equals reality. He did not stand in front of thousands of people at his rallies arguing nuanced points about specific reparation sums, he argued that the French (among others) were pillaging innocent German citizens and businesses as the German government did nothing, rendered helpless by Versailles. Many Germans looked to the Ruhr and could not help but agree.

Louis VI the Fat

11-17-2010, 14:18

As Hitler well understood, in politics, perception equals reality. He did not stand in front of thousands of people at his rallies arguing nuanced points about specific reparation sums, he argued that the French (among others) were pillaging innocent German citizens and businesses as the German government did nothing, rendered helpless by Versailles. Many Germans looked to the Ruhr and could not help but agree.Indeed. It is all about perception and reality indeed. It is not something I fail to understand. It is rather my main point.

Trachtenberg's 1999 article gave a summation of the body of work a numerous historians, a series of key articles of which have been collected in a single volume in 1998, to which Trachtenberg refers to in his article I quoted above:

Manfred F. Boemeke, Gerald D. Feldman, and Elisabeth Glaser, Eds., The Treaty of Versailles: A Reassessment after 75 Years. Cambridge, New York, Melbourne: Cambridge University Press and The German Historical Institute, 1998.

Years ago in a Holocaust course I co-taught, I had portrayed the Versailles Treaty as neither harsh nor conciliatory. Lucjan Dobroszycski, a survivor of Auschwitz, a great historian of Jewish history, thought the Treaty dealt harshly with Germany. I indicated the conflict between our interpretations. With a characteristic twinkle in his eyes he asked, "Might we agree that Germans perceived the Versailles Treaty to be harsh, and perceptions play crucial roles in history."
For good reason, I quoted the above as the beggining of that Versailles reassessed-thread I started a few months ago. Perception is everything.

As the French troops marched into the Ruhr, Hitler at the same time held his alcohol-infused speech in a beerhall about eternal enslavement of Germany.

Germany was under a relentless campaign to convince the people they were enslaved by Jews, western democracies, social democrats etc. Many Germans came to perceive this was so. Most serious scholarship agrees Germany was not, However, the perception in the period itself remains a reality.

The question is how we should understand the history of the period. Should we go over all of the propaganda issues of the age, out of a mistaken sense of historical empathy and fairness? Should we, that is, look at German-national conservative agenda from its internal perspective, or should we look at it from an external perspective?

'The Germans perceived the Jews as parasites'. Ought history to be about carefully exploring in great detail every Germany anti-Jewish claim, from an internal ational-conservative perspective? '...And in 1938 a Jew murdered the German ambassador in Paris...Jewish businesses bankrupted German workers etc.?'
Or should history be about examining the workings of German propaganda? About why Germany could be led to believe it was enslaved by Jewish parasites?

'Germany perceived the peace as enslavement'. Ought history to be about carefully examining every German grievance? '....Polish independence from Germany was implemented by the treaty.....Germany had to return the books and art it looted from Belgium....etc.?
Or should history be about examining the origins and causes of the attack against the peace by German national-conservative groups? About stab in the back legendry? About the propaganda campaigns to rally the population for another war?

Now if it is all about perception, we can agree that not the German grievances themselves ought to set the narrative - these are based on mistaken perceptions. The narrative must be set by reality.
The story of how Germany moved from defeat in 1918 to renewed attempt twenty years later then must not be told as: Germany was done injustice, Germany suffered a harsh treaty, France (/Jews/democracy/social-democrats) undermined German stability and sought to keep it down.
No, the more relevant story is: Germany could not accept defeat. German nationalist agitation destabilised Germany. Relentless propaganda undermined democracy. When the depression of 1929 struck, nationalist agitators saw an opportunity to install a clown they mistook for an easy puppet. Enter Disaster.

Sasaki Kojiro

11-17-2010, 16:34

However, what most historians understand and what Louis fails to address is that the role Versailles played in leading up to the Second World War was far more emotional; it transcended X million pounds of coal and Y shipments of lumber. The German people, rightly, believed that they did not cause the war. That fundamental truth made any perceived punishment highly exasperating.

Oh, but this is exactly what I found problematic with trachtenberg. The focus on "cause". Imagine I'm working for your insurance company and you suspect one of your policy holders of arson. So you send me to investigate, and I tell you that the cause of the fire was "the proper amount of oxygen combined with heat and a flammable substance". Or lets say that an oil spill made the stock for a certain company plummet, and the policy shareholder lost a bundle of money on the deal, and I tell you that the cause of the fire was an oil spill.

Could Germany have chosen to not invade france? That is the question we should really look at, in the same way that we look at the question "did the policy holder deliberately start the fire". I think you and trachtenberg argue from cause instead of blame too much, e.g.:

The 'War Guilt' clause was far more damaging to the success of the treaty than the reparations, as was subsequent French (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupation_of_the_Ruhr) antagonism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhenish_Republic). The sight of French soldiers marching into a chaotic, economically destitute Germany to collect payment gave validity to the far Right and was a large part of their rise to power.

If the French do something, and it is used as propaganda, the people who used it as propaganda are to blame. Sometimes you can argue negligence on the part of the first party, but it's a separate issue.

As Hitler well understood, in politics, perception equals reality. He did not stand in front of thousands of people at his rallies arguing nuanced points about specific reparation sums, he argued that the French (among others) were pillaging innocent German citizens and businesses as the German government did nothing, rendered helpless by Versailles. Many Germans looked to the Ruhr and could not help but agree.

So Hitler spouted propaganda and the Germans bought it, so blame the French? :juggle2:

I have a hard time seeing any excuses for going on the offensive in these wars.

Rhyfelwyr

11-17-2010, 17:56

I have a hard time seeing any excuses for going on the offensive in these wars.

The thing is it's not as simple as the way I was taught it in school. Neither the Austrian Anscluss nor incorporation of the Sudetenland into Nazi Germany were simple acts of aggression. The US itself once advocated the right of the Sudeten Germans to self-determination. The idea of unification was so popular in Austria that Dollfuss had to have a fake referendum just to try and put the matter to rest.

And yes the Nazis invaded Poland, but so did the USSR, why side with them?

Sasaki Kojiro

11-17-2010, 18:10

The thing is it's not as simple as the way I was taught it in school. Neither the Austrian Anscluss nor incorporation of the Sudetenland into Nazi Germany were simple acts of aggression. The US itself once advocated the right of the Sudeten Germans to self-determination. The idea of unification was so popular in Austria that Dollfuss had to have a fake referendum just to try and put the matter to rest.

I don't doubt that I have a simplified impression of the events. But what would justification for starting a world war look like?

And yes the Nazis invaded Poland, but so did the USSR, why side with them?

One at a time :mellow:

al Roumi

11-17-2010, 18:12

I don't doubt that I have a simplified impression of the events. But what would justification for starting a world war look like?

A big lie? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Lie)

Rhyfelwyr

11-17-2010, 19:22

I don't doubt that I have a simplified impression of the events. But what would justification for starting a world war look like?

I don't know but it seems to me the whole thing about appeasement I was taught at school was a fuss about nothing, the actions in Austria or the Sudetenland were not any sort of justification for declaring war. Well technically they were since the violated the Treaty of Versailles, but I've already said what I thought of that document.

Certainly, the invasion of Poland provided a clear justification, since there were no Polish desires to be incoporated into Germany.

Sasaki Kojiro

11-17-2010, 19:28

A big lie? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Lie)

Yeah, but that clearly isn't justification.

I don't know but it seems to me the whole thing about appeasement I was taught at school was a fuss about nothing, the actions in Austria or the Sudetenland were not any sort of justification for declaring war. Well technically they were since the violated the Treaty of Versailles, but I've already said what I thought of that document.

Certainly, the invasion of Poland provided a clear justification, since there were no Polish desires to be incoporated into Germany.

I remember the thing about appeasement being more that it resulted in Hitler thinking people were just going to roll over.

gaelic cowboy

11-17-2010, 19:54

I don't know but it seems to me the whole thing about appeasement I was taught at school was a fuss about nothing, the actions in Austria or the Sudetenland were not any sort of justification for declaring war. Well technically they were since the violated the Treaty of Versailles, but I've already said what I thought of that document.

Certainly, the invasion of Poland provided a clear justification, since there were no Polish desires to be incoporated into Germany.

The appeasement was wrong in the long run but right at the time our hindsight dams Chamberlain and it's a bit unfair really. UK was not capable of fighting Germany at that stage and it probably seemed perfectly reasonable to reunite Germans in Germany proper.

Interesting thing I read recently was Poland got a nice lock of territory themselves out of that aggreement too but that does not fit the narrative so it's forgot.

Rhyfelwyr

11-17-2010, 21:34

Aye that's the thing Austria/Sudetenland was really just fulfilling those peoples right to national self-determination. Nothing too malicious, probably just made the rest uneasy to see Germany getting stronger.

I think the Poles got a tiny block off the edge of Czechoslovakia, not sure what the deal with it was though, only seen it on a map.

gaelic cowboy

11-17-2010, 21:50

drone

11-17-2010, 22:03

I think the Poles got a tiny block off the edge of Czechoslovakia, not sure what the deal with it was though, only seen it on a map.
Zaolzie. The Poles used the same justification as Germany did with the Sudeten Germans, and the Germans were more than willing to spread the love for political gain.

Edit-> beaten by the Irishman...

rory_20_uk

11-17-2010, 23:08

Imagine for a second that Germany had been faced down in 1938 the Sudetenland would just have been annexed anyway and Poland would have still grabbed the bit they did too. Now Britain and France are at war with Germany and Poland the Western Front still collapses and instead of noble Dunkirk the soldiers possibly go home in boxes due to not having more time to get ready.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teschen

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaolzie

The Poles gained virtually nothing. Would they have wanted to enter a war for this small scrap of land? Probably not. Russia behind who is no friend and the only allies in the arena are France and England.

The Sudaten front was heavily fortified and they had 35 divisions. Probably would have not have fallen as easily as the Poles did. The Germans had less time to develop and army, and in 1939 they were using all of the weaponry they captured whereas now they're fighting against it.

Dunkirk was mainly the "heroic success" it was as Hitler didn't put the boot in when he could have. I don't think that this would differ merely that it's a year earlier.

~:smoking:

gaelic cowboy

11-17-2010, 23:21

The Poles gained virtually nothing. Would they have wanted to enter a war for this small scrap of land? Probably not. Russia behind who is no friend and the only allies in the arena are France and England.

The Sudaten front was heavily fortified and they had 35 divisions. Probably would have not have fallen as easily as the Poles did. The Germans had less time to develop and army, and in 1939 they were using all of the weaponry they captured whereas now they're fighting against it.

Dunkirk was mainly the "heroic success" it was as Hitler didn't put the boot in when he could have. I don't think that this would differ merely that it's a year earlier.

~:smoking:

Hmm no Churchill no side tracked German Army occupying Poland, Norway and various other places the UK unable to help Sudeten cos there back in Blighty and the exact same fortifications in Belgium and Holland were overcome in a few days.

The Soviets are happy at that time to let Europe descend into what they think will be trench warfare and a destruction of the Western powers, Stalin pretty much signed the pact confident he could pick up the German/French leftovers after the war. The situation basically ends the same way with Britain alone no matter what way you take it.

Shaka_Khan

11-18-2010, 09:19

I'm well aware of German rocket scientists in the US. They're just scientists anyway.

But I remember a movie about a real holocaust survivor who met a war criminal doctor in a NYC market whom she originally met in a concentration camp. She was too shocked to say anything. I don't remember the title of the movie. The article in this thread confirms what the movie showed.

Shaka_Khan

11-18-2010, 10:41

Taking pieces of German land was an old trend started by Napoleon to weaken the Germans. Napoleon did more and divided the German lands up. He was worried that the Germans would become too powerful and he predicted it correctly like what he predicted on China. When Prussia under Bismarck was unifying Germany, Bismarck was seeking to gain colonies outside of Europe (which was a superpower trend back then) and got into competition with other superpowers that already had much of the world. Not only were the Germans trying to gain more colonies, they were also expanding in Europe, which was a big no-no to the other Western European countries. What the Allies did to Germany after WWI was quite minimal when compared to the other times that the Germans lost. After experiencing the horrors of WWII, France, UK, and the USSR vowed to divide up Germany. The US under Truman being far away from Germany was more concerned about the spread of communism. So the US, UK, and French sectors of Germany combined together into West Germany in competition against the USSR. The Marshall Plan was done to make the West Germans wealthy and in hopes that it would prevent communism to spread. Afterwards, the world including the Germans themselves were used to having Germany as a pacifist nation. Gorbachev brought down the Wall.

Anyway, Germany's loss of land and the restriction on what weapons the country could manufacture pales in comparison to what the Nazis did. I like the ordinary Germans. One of my friends is from Germany, and one of the most attractive friends I had was a college student in Arizona who was descended from German immigrants. But I can't side with Germany of the 30s and 40s in any way because of what the German government stood for at that time.

Husar

11-18-2010, 16:56

When Prussia under Bismarck was unifying Germany, Bismarck was seeking to gain colonies outside of Europe (which was a superpower trend back then) and got into competition with other superpowers that already had much of the world.

That's somewhat wrong, Bismarck was against colonies, it were mostly industrials at the time who wanted colonies to make more profit and only when Wilhelm II. took over did they get a lot of government support as in Germany also deserves a "place under the sun". Bismarck's main objective was to unite Germany (not including Austria, which was the second option proposed by others) and then stabilize Europe, that's why he worked towards several defense treaties excluding France (they were kinda angry) and some other treaties that Germany wasn't directly involved in. But I'm not aware of any time he was really in favour of colonies (possible that he had to give in to the pressure of the industry at some point but I don't remember the details).