Hitler

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

So what part of a plan to 'merely' deport people based on their ethnicity or religion isn't evil?

What part of 'merely' overseeing a genocidal extermination rather than actively planning it isn't evil?

Of course, keeping in mind the common definition of evil in this sense, yes, it was evil. However, the article doesn't deny that Hitler was evil, simply that Himmler should get the same amount or more of the bad rap that Hitler does.

[Ramses II CP]

Of course, keeping in mind the common definition of evil in this sense, yes, it was evil. However, the article doesn't deny that Hitler was evil, simply that Himmler should get the same amount or more of the bad rap that Hitler does.

...err, read that first line up there again.

[Geoffrey S]

What do I think? Revisionist, offensive, and inaccurate tripe.

[CountArach]

What do I think? Revisionist, offensive, and inaccurate tripe.

Revisionism for the sake of Revisionism is not a good thing...

[Subedei]

Both were awefully dangerous freaks, not too much need for discussion about that......

The whole 3rd Reich was built on the leadership claim and orders of Adolf Hitler, b/c with every action/crime a Nazi commited he/she could blame the next higher hierarchical level...all the way up to A.H. They did not call him "Führer" for nothing, you know.

[Watchman]

Himmler was pretty much Adolf's right-hand man and general-purpose troubleshooter for a lot of stuff is all. He was way better at organising stuff than his boss and a fervent believer in the Nazi ideology, so...

Mind, Hitler wasn't always unconditionally thrilled by some of Himmler's odder ideas (say, the occultism), and is known to at least once have told Speer he wished the man wouldn't spend so much time digging holes to remind everyone the Germans had still been living in mud huts when the Greeks and Romans built metropoles...
Well, that was before the Ahnenerbe and the other kooks managed to sell him the crackpot German pinko-ultranationalist version of world history. Damn, but some of that stuff was surreal nonsense...


As an aside, when the Nazis talked about "deportation" of the Untermenschen, nevermind now the vile Jews (whom they regarded pretty much as a sort of living plague), what they actually meant was along the lines of "corraling in a suitably unviable hellhole and letting the conditions and 'natural wastage' do the rest", hard forced labour with insufficient rations (as was done with Russian POWs for example), and suchlike. ...and, since ridding the world of the "Jewish contagion" was a sort of major thing in their crazy racial ideology, in the case this wasn't enough they were envisoning more proactive steps from the start.

[Geoffrey S]

Out of curiosity, where did you find the quoted text?

[Fragony]

What do I think? Revisionist, offensive, and inaccurate tripe.

Not so much really, the madagascar thing is real at least.

edit, no not that one. Sebastian Haffner is somewhat of an authority forgot what book though.

[Geoffrey S]

Oh, I don't deny that the Madagascar plan was real at some point - although like other posters in this here topic, I doubt the humane motives somehow implied in the opening quote.

Anyway, my earlier post refers mainly to such comments as 'Adolf Hitler (right) was NOT evil. Heinrich Himmler (left) was the evil one'. Such comments get me riled up without fail, attempting to absolve Hitler of blame for whatever reason. That is why I'm interested in where Jkarinen found it, because a quick search in Google only supplied this topic.

[Fragony]

More responsible would be better, evil is so relative if you do bad things for what you believe to be the greater good it isn't really evil just twisted. But Himmler was the driving force behind the final solution.

[Furious Mental]

That assumes that Hitler conceived of "the greater good" in the same way as the rest of us, which, if I may be so presumptuous, would be the betterment of all mankind by an objective and universal standard. Hitler completely rejected such a concept- humanism and universal values were foreign to him. The only good that mattered was the good of his nation, and by definition this was also the detriment of other nations, because his view of history required his nation to expand continuously and engage in wars for their own sake in order to survive.