Posted on 05/26/2005 10:30:32 AM PDT by xzins
I agree with everyone that exact figures cannot be arrived at, if only because people will disagree on which types of deaths to include.
For instance, "Does this count the 2 million Soviet POWs the Nazis murdered from 1941-42?"
Depends what you're counting.
BTW, Stalin killed some large but unknown number of Soviet POWs after their repatriation, perhaps close to this number. The official position of the Soviets during and after the war was that every single Soviet POW was actually a deserter and under a sentence of death.
Oddly enough, a great many of them in the early days of the war probably were more or less deserters. After 24 years under socialism they couldn't believe that the Germans could be worse.
Didn't take them long to find out they were indeed worse, for Slavs at least, but by that time many had already been captured.
One problem with DDT (or at least its ban) is that the half life of DDT is much smaller in tropical climates than in temperate or arctic climates. Thus, the environmental hazards are least where DDT is needed most. (Note that Minnesota Mosquitos aren't as efficient killer bearers as those in Africa.)
Perhaps a policy of targeted applications would be more helpful. (Spray the bug, not the tree?) Standing water, areas of mosquito infestation, etc. could be more agressively targeted, especially in the tropics.
People and natural disasters kill people......that's about it...
Depends. I once worked for a Ukrainian fellow (who nevertheless was as Slav as they come) who deserted the Soviet army in '41 and actually fought for the Nazis for 4 years, mostly in anti-partisan units. The war stories he told were some of the most unspeakable things I have ever heard. Forty years later, he had zero ill will toward the Germans, but he still hated Soviet communism like gangrene.
Look at it! You'll see! ;-)
Here's the link:
http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.TAB16A.1.GIF
Hmmm - native res is apparently 2080x3075!
Thanks for the link. Bookmarked
Well, I think it is fairly obvious that a considerable majority of Russians decided sometime during 1942 that the Nazis were even worse (for them) than the Commies.
I've heard this described as "better our beasts than theirs."
In addition, the Commies had the tar scared out of them by their very near extinction during 1941 and lightened up on their people quite a bit. For instance, they loosened up the restrictions on the private plots of the peasants and even allowed conversion of some communes back to co-ops. They allowed the Church a lot more freedom, in the hope it would help rally the people to fight for the state.
It worked.
Of course.
But a lot of them feared the guns to their rear more than those to their front. The kommisar's pistol aimed at the back of your head (or at your loved ones) is a powerful motivator. The Soviet man made the greatest sacrifices of the war, but saw none of the fruit.
Issslam has slaughtered at least 200 million Hindus in a millenium and at least half that number of others.
No, it's not ethnicity -- Isssslam in India was the reason to slaughter infidels (Hindus)
No arguments from me.
I'd like to recommend a book I recently read.
Soviet Tragedy: A History of Socialism in Russia
Perhaps the best outline I've seen of why their system worked out the way it did, despite the noble intentions of many of its founders.
It shows pretty conclusively, IMHO, the Stalin was not an anomaly in the system, he was its logical expression.
If we're going to talk sheer numbers, the Mongols probably killed 100M+ in less than a century, a good deal more than 10% of the world's population at the time, a world record percentage-wise.
And the Mongols weren't Muslim, they were anti-Muslim.
I haven't read that one. I'll check it out.
I find that hard to believe. Ya, they killed any one who resisted, but I doubt it was 100 Million.
And those with good intentions based on bad information and poor fore site.
And with primitive techniques by modern standards.
Sugar, and then salt.
Neither. People murder because they submit to their sin nature.
Some of the numbers I've seen for the Mongol invasions:
Population of China reduced by half in 50 years, from 100M to 50M.
5M killed in Central Asia.
5M killed in Russia and Eastern Europe.
5 to 7M killed in Persia.
A little known fact: The Mongols for a while had a state policy of killing the entire population of China, with the idea that this would give them a lot more ground to pasture their flocks on. Until a Chinese official pointed out that hard-working Chinese peasants are a much more valuable crop per acre than sheep or horses.
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