No better than them

[PBI]

I am increasingly of the opinion that this sort if thing, rather than being exceptional, is more or less inevitable once somebody has been stupid enough to start a war.

Was it right to forcibly cleanse these regions of ethnic Germans? No. Does this make the Allies as bad as the Nazis? No. It was the Nazis' waging of aggressive war that led ultimately to these events, and thus they are ultimately to blame.

Yet another thing to add to the list of Adolf Hitler's crimes against the world. Not the most original scapegoat, but the correct one.

[Brenus]

“Remember those who were persecuted - all of them.”: Victims and offenders are equal? Without Nazi Germany’s aggression, who can say that the German of the Volga would have to go? Why the “Germans” had to go from Yugoslavia?

“Stalin killed people in gulags, butchered his own officer corps, starved millions during the forced collectivization of agriculture, and even sent someone to axe Trotsky a question -- in short, he butchered millions (some sources suggest he and Beria killed substantially more people than did the Nazi regime) and was willing to kill anybody who might vaguely, possibly, conceivably, become a threat to Papa Joe sometime in the next half century. He just didn't go after Jews with any particular hatred. He was a very ecumenical monster.”
Uncle Joe.
I agree. Stalin was not nor race, skin colour or gender hatred orientated. He slaughtered without discrimination all potential danger to his power, from the earlier Bolsheviks to the Red Army officers, scientists, intellectuals etc. He was a perfectly democratic butcher.

“They did nothing to stop it”: Some did. The Concentration camps were built for the Socialist and Communist Germans.

“Some seventeen million (according to some brief research) were killed by the Nazi regime, whereas Stalin's era was responsible for the deaths of between twenty and forty-three million. Just some statistics” Ah, statistic!!! What period of time? Er, 3 years for Hitler, some 30 years for Stalin. That doesn’t make it right but it puts it in perspective….

“Germany has no more to be ashamed of than any other nation of power.” Well, except Einsatzgruppen and the very specific EXTERMINATON camps, and all the Nazi System, in fact. I can’t see same in France, UK, Holland and others, even Italy. The Nazi Germany was specific and this past is shameful.

[Fragony]

I don't hold it against the germans. We did a really poor job at preventing it.

[naut]

I don't hold it against the germans. We did a really poor job at preventing it.

Exactly. A lot of the issues could have been resolved if the victors of WWI had handled the peace process more effectively. And if the issues had actually been met in their infancy rather on the edge of the precipice in 1939.

[Rhyfelwyr]

Exactly. A lot of the issues could have been resolved if the victors of WWI had handled the peace process more effectively. And if the issues had actually been met in their infancy rather on the edge of the precipice in 1939.

I think fascism was always going to have its little go at glory at some point, the Nazi's just combined rampant racism in theirs.

[Fragony]

Exactly. A lot of the issues could have been resolved if the victors of WWI had handled the peace process more effectively. And if the issues had actually been met in their infancy rather on the edge of the precipice in 1939.

That as well but what I mean is that it's unfair to lay blame on just Germany for the holocuast. National socialism was an european movement at the time. Something crazy happened, in Germany.

[Koga No Goshi]

That as well but what I mean is that it's unfair to lay blame on just Germany for the holocuast. National socialism was an european movement at the time. Something crazy happened, in Germany.

And the Eugenics movement originated in the United States with things like cranial capacity studies and comparing Europeans to Native Americans and blacks and such.

It's interesting historical backstory, and yes, someone would be wrong to pretend that the U.S. or Europe in general weren't part of the "system" (anti-semitism, biological racism, etc.) which helped make the Holocaust happen. But I am not sure how any of that stands in as a justification of Germany in WWII, at all. That strikes me a lot like saying well mistreatment of Native Americans actually started with the Spanish, so what the English and colonials/later Americans did wasn't really their fault.

[Strike For The South]

Im just glad our side won. Wether we were "good" or "bad"

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

Ah, statistic!!! What period of time? Er, 3 years for Hitler, some 30 years for Stalin. That doesn’t make it right but it puts it in perspective….
.

That would be the entire Nazi regime, so from 1933-1945.

[King Henry V]

“Remember those who were persecuted - all of them.”: Victims and offenders are equal? Without Nazi Germany’s aggression, who can say that the German of the Volga would have to go? Why the “Germans” had to go from Yugoslavia?

Did the Volga Germans ask Hitler to invade Russia, or have any influence at all on the war? Most of them were hundreds of miles behind the front line even at the furthest penetration of the German army, and afforded no assistance to the Germans. Perhaps they would have done, if they had not been deported. Nevertheless, they were deported not because they had done anything, but simply because of the fact that they were Germans. Do you think this is a justifiable? If it was right to transport them to prison camps just in case they revolted against the Soviets, does that not also justify German pre-emptive action against possible "enemies" (viz the Reichenau Order)?

Samartian I refer to the process of deporting and settling in the Reichs newfound territory people who were German , might be partially German , might be sorta Germanish or might be able to become German with a thorough Nazi re-education policy .
After all many poles fitted into 4 varying categories of germanism and became "germans" , were they kicked out too when the poles took over the territory again , what about the all Baltic germans that Hilter swapped with Stalin , did they get kicked back to the Baltics or to German territory ?
Since all those people recieved the land and property of other people who were deported or murdered they must be removed from any fair complaint about the numbers of Germans kicked out of territory after the war .

To focus on the relatively small number of Ethnic Germans who had bee subject to the various population swaps between Germany and the USSR and Italy belittles the fact that vast majority of German expellees had lived in places which their ancestors had inhabited as far back as the Middle Ages, and who had come not as pillaging warriors but as settlers and craftsmen, often at the invitation of local rulers.



As for the opinion that "many of them volunteered for Nazi German", I can only ask what you would have done. As the grandson of Sudeten Germans who were expelled after the war, I know that life for German minorities in Eastern Europe between the wars was no picnic.
In the case of the Sudetenland, their wishes were completely ignored by the peace settlement in 1919 (making a mockery of Wilson's principle of self-determination) and their attempts to break away and remain within German Austria were brutally repressed. Following centuries of Austrian rule, the Czechs wanted to exact their revenge on these minorities. The German language was attacked and the German regions were denied any autonomy.
To add to this, the Depression, of course no fault of the Eastern European governments, hit the German regions extremely badly, with huge unemployment. After twenty years of political repression and economic penury, what would you do if suddenly people seeming to be your saviour swept in, allowing you to practice your own language without hindrance, and promising a new future? Do you say "No thank you, your boots are too black and shiny for me, and I don't think you will deliver the same standard of democracy to which we have been used over the past two decades (ha-ha)."? My grandfather was a farm labourer in 1938, earning 80 Pfennig a week, and he was one of the lucky ones. After the annexation, he, like many, volunteered for the army, which offered four times as much pay, plus food, lodging and clothes. Was he wrong?

I must agree that the expulsion of the Germans from Eastern Europe after the second world war ranks among some of the worst events in the history of the 20th century in Europe. Even at the lowest estimate half a million people were killed, and the rest lost everything that they ever had. I know that female members of my family had their gold earrings torn from their earlobes by their former neighbours, and they were lucky considering they were not raped, as were millions of other German women. There can be no moral justification for such an action.

Nevertheless, as bad as the expulsion was, I will say that it can never even begin to compare with the unspeakably evil event that was the Holocaust. However, I believe that because it was such an unimaginably abhorrent action which had no precedent in history, the vast majority of the German population had no idea that such a mass programme of extermination was being done, especially information for most of them was limited to what the Propaganda Minsitry told them. True, they could see that the Jews were being persecuted, but I don't think that if I had been in their place I could even have begun to conceive that industrial scale murder was being done. What they were therefore faced with was a totalitarian government which might have murdered the odd "undesirable" in front of their eyes, and which would have wiped out their entire family if they had even begun to talk about resistance, a situation which many people have since experienced all over the world but which few have done much about. As Edmund Burke said, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing". I for one do not think that such inaction should be punished on the scale of the German expulsion, which was nothing more than opportunism on the part of those who profited from it.




*****

Phew, that's both the longest and the first large backroom venture of mine for years, but this is an issue which has affected both my family and me personally, and I just wished to add something to the discussion. I have not meant to offend anyone, and I apologise in advance if I have.

[Brenus]

“That would be the entire Nazi regime, so from 1933-1945.” So that would be a manipulation of statistic. That is why we have statistic mind you.
The extermination was started in 1941, with the Final Solution in one hand, and the 1941 directed against USSR on the other.

“Do you think this is a justifiable? If it was right to transport them to prison camps just in case they revolted against the Soviets, does that not also justify German pre-emptive action against possible "enemies" (viz the Reichenau Order)?”
Justifiable? Yes. For good reasons: No. But would Stalin have done it without Hitler war of aggression?
Deportation is not mass killing. Ethnic cleansing is not genocide.
The nowadays Croatian Serbs expelled by Gal Gotovina and Tudjman are better off in Voivodina than their ancestors in Glina or the one sent to Jasenovac.

The difference between the Allies and the Nazi is the Allies REACTED and didn’t INITIATED. Yes, some of them were too happy to take the opportunity to deal with political internal situation.
I think of Tito, using Serbs against Croats, sending the Serbian from the Bourgeoisie) Youth against very well trained SS and the remaining Ustasa and Cetniks, and by the way mixing-up the two like they were similar…

[King Henry V]

“Do you think this is a justifiable? If it was right to transport them to prison camps just in case they revolted against the Soviets, does that not also justify German pre-emptive action against possible "enemies" (viz the Reichenau Order)?”
Justifiable? Yes. For good reasons: No. But would Stalin have done it without Hitler war of aggression?
Deportation is not mass killing. Ethnic cleansing is not genocide.
The nowadays Croatian Serbs expelled by Gal Gotovina and Tudjman are better off in Voivodina than their ancestors in Glina or the one sent to Jasenovac.

The difference between the Allies and the Nazi is the Allies REACTED and didn’t INITIATED. Yes, some of them were too happy to take the opportunity to deal with political internal situation.
I think of Tito, using Serbs against Croats, sending the Serbian from the Bourgeoisie) Youth against very well trained SS and the remaining Ustasa and Cetniks, and by the way mixing-up the two like they were similar…

Deportation approaches mass killing when a third of those deported die, don't you think? Besides, seeing the other numerous ethnic groups that Stalin had deported, I'm sure he would have done it sooner or later. It was not a necessary move, seeing as the Volga Germans had been hitherto loyal Soviet citizens and probably felt little sympathy for their ethnic cousins seeing as they had been seperated by thousands of miles, but merely opportunism.
As to the Soviets not initiating it, I am of the opinion that both sides knew that the non-aggression pact couldn't last for very long and that war was inevitable and that the only reason why Russia didn't invade first was because Stalin was a megalomaniacal nutter too busy killing his own officers.

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

That isn't a statistic thats a very vague guess .

That's the sane minimum and the sane maxiumum. Draw your own conclusions, but it's still within that range.

Protested it, didn't vote for Bush.

Well, a lot of Germans didn't vote for Hitler, and a lot of Germans didn't have the freedom to protest without repercussions like you have in America. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm fairly sure that in America a tool known as secret police isn't commonly used.

Basically, it comes down to this. Presume that the average German knew exactly what was going on, in all details, everything. I am not saying that is true or not, just presuming. Now, what are you going to do? Protect your house and family, or protest and be beheaded. Maybe even some guilt by association for your family.

Stalin and Hitler aren't comparable.

Two mass murdering megalomaniacs. Pretty comparable to me.

Russian declassified archives show that the number is much lower but still enough to make any sane and civilized person's head spin.

Apparently there were files missing or destroyed when the archives were opened. I'll try to find a source, because I know you'll ask for one.

And considering legacy, Stalin found Russia with wooden ploughs, centuries behind the west and left it as a nuclear armed, space faring superpower. Hitler found Germany in crisis and left it in ruins.

No argument with that. A superpower full of Gulags, some starvation, and mass murder, but a superpower, yes.

Anyway, since when is one dictator excuse for another?

Never. I don't think even Panzer is arguing in any way that the crimes of the Allies in any way vindicates the Axis of the terrible atrocities it committed - I don't think anyone here believes that. Heck, the point that one crime doesn't excuse another is EXACTLY - I repeat, EXACTLY - the point I'm trying to make.

I'm glad the Allies won. It was good for humanity, it was good for democracy, it was good for the world. But being what most people, including myself, believe was the better side doesn't mean you're automatically angelic. If anyone believes the Second World War was completely black and white, I have a bridge to sell them.

EDIT: And Panzer is right - the mocking is getting really juvenile. He's not "detracting" from the severity of the crimes the Axis committed by pointing out that they weren't the only ones. He's not a "Nazi" or a "supremacist" for believing that some innocent people may (*gasp*) have been killed by the "good guys."