PJB: How the West Lost the World

buchanan.org ^ | 2008.05.27 | Patrick J. Buchanan

[Pelham]

To quibble with your most excellent post, I don’t think he is arguing that the British could have predicted the Japanese payback. He’s simply listing a series of blunders that led to the second war. His point is that the road to WWII is a good deal longer than the always-faithful Munich example.

“These kinds of ludicrous assertions which actually are wholly counter to historical reality betray a shallowness or more likely a need to create controversy in order to sell books.”

Isn’t his theme here just war doctrine? Jettisoning that isn’t exactly a mark of improvement for the West. Arguing that war justifies barbarism is often a line offered by Sherman’s enthusiasts who approve of targeting civilians. It’s effective and they don’t shoot back.

[nathanbedford]

It seems to me that Buchanan is listing a series of actions, implying that they are causes leading to effects,that is, "blunders" leading to, for example, Pearl Harbor. He does not describe the actions as mere waypoints in the course of history, he describes them as "blunders."

If one wants to ascribe a moral quality of blameworthiness to actions of a historical figure, such as Churchill or other British diplomats, that must imply a degree of foreseeability. How can an action be called a "blunder" if the actor could have had no idea of the sequelae? That takes me back to my original premise, historical figures should be judged on what they knew or should have known, not what decades of hindsight reveals.

But I did take your point to this degree, if a historic figure violates an undeniable principle, such as a British leader denuding his country of seapower, the consequences of which, while not specifically foreseeable were nevertheless to be expected to be negative, like the loss of war and invasion of Great Britain-such departure from principle might well be described as a "blunder."

If Buchanan's theme was in fact to advance the just war doctrine, it is literally impossible for him to have picked a more contrary example than the Nazi Holocaust to prove his point.

[patriciaruth]

Thought it only right that I should credit my source, which I forgot to do after I dusted it off and found the information about the ships that were hit by mines in the Dardanelles.

The Last Lion: Visions of Glory 1874-1932 by William Manchester.

A great book and surprisingly easy read for all its detail is couched in an exciting literary style.

[Pelham]

“If Buchanan’s theme was in fact to advance the just war doctrine, it is literally impossible for him to have picked a more contrary example than the Nazi Holocaust to prove his point.”

Nice try, but you’re evading his point which was whether making war on civilians was just. It said nothing regarding the holocaust. Once again a resort to argumentum ad hitlerum indicates either laziness or the lack of a suitable argument.

[nathanbedford]

Thanks for your posts but I must tell you that the last one has sent me scurrying up and down ladders looking for my old copy of Manchester's book which I finally found. You are right it is a great book but now I am troubled because I cannot find the sequel covering the between war years when he was alone.

Speaking of Churchill I would like to acknowledge that I have criss- crossed the admonitions which he draws as lessons in his history of World War II in my original post, but no one has yet corrected me.

You might be interested that here in Germany where I live most of the year I often play a bit of a parlor game with my German friends to get a sense of their worldview. I simply ask them to identify the greatest man of the 20th century. They usually name Adenauer and sometimes even Stalin or Mao, but never Churchill. Questioning reveals that it is not animus because of the war, it simply does not occur to them.

[nathanbedford]

Let's bring the conversation up to date from the beginning. Originally, Pat Buchanan wrote these words which I subsequently objected to:

He led the West down a moral incline to its own barbarism by imposing a starvation blockade on Germany in 1914 and launching air terror against open cities in 1940.

My objections were framed as follows:

Has Buchanan not heard of unrestricted submarine warfare? Is he unaware of German surface Raiders attempts to starve Britain at the beginning of the war? Does he not know that the ultimate near starvation of the German homefront by 1918 was a principal reason for the disintegration of Germany, causing Hindenburg and Ludendorff to tell the Kaiser there was no option but surrender?

With respect to the, "air terror against open cities in 1940," one can only respond: is Buchanan ignorant of Rotterdam? Of Coventry? Of the decision by the Luftwaffe in mid-September 1940 to divert its attacks from English airdromes to English cities thus commencing "the blitz?"

These kinds of ludicrous assertions which actually are wholly counter to historical reality betray a shallowness or more likely a need to create controversy in order to sell books.

Quoting my last paragraph, you offered the following observation:

Isn’t his theme here just war doctrine? Jettisoning that isn’t exactly a mark of improvement for the West. Arguing that war justifies barbarism is often a line offered by Sherman’s enthusiasts who approve of targeting civilians. It’s effective and they don’t shoot back.

To your observation I replied:

If Buchanan's theme was in fact to advance the just war doctrine, it is literally impossible for him to have picked a more contrary example than the Nazi Holocaust to prove his point.

In rejoinder, you offered this:

Nice try, but you’re evading his point which was whether making war on civilians was just. It said nothing regarding the holocaust. Once again a resort to argumentum ad hitlerum indicates either laziness or the lack of a suitable argument.

It was you who introduced the theme of, "just war doctrine" into the discussion. I understood the doctrine to come from Catholic theology and to have mostly to do with whether the undertaking of the war was morally defensible. In that context, clearly undertaking a war against Hitlerism is hardly constitutes resort to an ad hominem and is clearly unworthy of criticism.

But let me assume that by "just war doctrine", which you do not define, you meant not just the undertaking of war but also the means by which the war was waged. Buchanan asserts that Churchill: "launch [ed] air terror against open cities in 1940." First, use of the word "launch" implies that Buchanan meant that Churchill initiated air bombing. If he did not mean that, his choice of language was careless or misleading because, as I pointed out in my objection, we had already had Rotterdam and Coventry and the blitz.

Second, Buchanan said the bombing was "air terror." Prior to the firebombing raids especially against Dresden which came very late in the war, the Allied air war was directed at defensible strategic objectives. Long before the firebombing, Goebbels had made his famous speech declaring total war. To stand history on its head and imply that Churchill waged air terror, ( no "launched" air terror) is under these historic circumstances the worst kind of disregard of moral truth. Why is it "unjust" to bomb guilty civilians who support a regime which is literally murdering other civilians by the millions when one has reasonable cause to believe that such bombing will hasten the end of the war and save innocent civilian as well as military lives?

Third, Buchanan asserts that Churchill "launched" "air terror" against "open cities." An open city in warfare is one which has been declared to be abandoned and one which will not be defended. No German city was ever declared such. No "open city" was ever bombed. Again, Buchanan is playing fast and loose with his vocabulary. If he is so high-minded as you imply when you introduce the just war doctrine-even though he himself never refers to the doctrine-he does his cause no service with this deception or carelessness.

Fourth, you state that civilians do not shoot back, well, someone was certainly shooting back at the eighth Air Force whose losses were staggering and someone was certainly shooting back at the British who had to suspend daylight bombing because of their losses. Civilians organize a nation state and support its armed forces, including its air defense, in that sense civilians were indisputably shooting back.

Finally, I think the foregoing demonstrates that what I have written is more than a,"nice try." I do not know what prompted you to descend to such condescension. I say again, undertaking a war against Hitler, and waging air strikes against cities which contain civilians, as well as strategic targets, in a war in which the civilians themselves have become a strategic target, is "just" by any rational standard. So, when I asserted, "If Buchanan's theme was in fact to advance the just war doctrine, it is literally impossible for him to have picked a more contrary example than the Nazi Holocaust to prove his point." I can confidently, even complacently, say that history and this very thread support me in every respect and there is utterly no warrant to be found anywhere in history or in this thread to justify this remark:

Once again a resort to argumentum ad hitlerum indicates either laziness or the lack of a suitable argument.

[patriciaruth]

This discussion has likewise made me interested in reading the Alone sequel of The Last Lion, and I found it offered at Amazon and have bought it. Will probably dive in when it arrives later this coming week. Hope you find your copy.

Churchill’s monumental WWII series drew me back to reread the last three volumes last year.

I recognized his aphorisms about honorable conduct of the various stages of war; but as I had pondered them once, I skipped your repetition so I didn’t notice any anomalies. Now I have forgotten where exactly I saw them before.

My copy of The Last Lion: Visions of Glory is now in a care package going to Baghdad.

They say a prophet or genius is often not recognized in his own country, so I would assume it is less so in one he brought to its knees. But a recent survey showed only 67% of the people in England knew the Earth goes around the sun. More Germans than Brits knew but Americans got the best score, around 80%.

One thing that I remember from the book that impressed me was that T.E. Lawrence became such a friend and admirer of Churchill. I made a small attempt to get a copy of Lawrence’s writings on strategy for counterinsurgency and fighting guerrila warfare a copy years ago, but they were very expensive then.

Now I see they have an anthology of military writing by him called Lawrence in War and Peace, and I wonder if that would be satisfactory for now.

I’m not sure what candidates there are for the greatest man of the 20th century. Whose life made the most difference? The Wright Brothers, Thomas Edison, Bill Gates, Ronald Reagan, Churchill? Or who affected the most people? Mao and Stalin and Lenin and Hitler and the Kaiser all have left their mark on events. I don’t think I can begin to get a handle on that one.

Have you got some names for a candidates? Did Einstein really change much in the last 100 years or is his effect yet to come. The rocket scientists? Or are we overlooking Noam Choamsky’s perverse influence?

Going to bed, but I will ponder this again later.

Cheers!

[Pelham]

“I understood the doctrine to come from Catholic theology and to have mostly to do with whether the undertaking of the war was morally defensible. In that context, clearly undertaking a war against Hitlerism is hardly constitutes resort to an ad hominem and is clearly unworthy of criticism.”

Just War theory is concerned with how war is fought, not just whether the enemy is morally deserving of being attacked.

In WWII the Pope condemned the bombing of civilians, in Germany as well as Japan. That doesn’t mean he condemned our fighting Germany and Japan, simply that some of our methods were evil in his eyes. Buchanan is an observant Catholic who gives weight to this sort of critique. He isn’t inventing the critique on his own, which is what I gather you think he is doing.

“But let me assume that by “just war doctrine”, which you do not define, you meant not just the undertaking of war but also the means by which the war was waged.”

I didn’t know I had to define it, seeing as there has been a body of literature on the subject in the Christian west for centuries. I assumed that since you were criticizing Buchanan’s writings which addressed the topic that you knew the topic yourself. Evidently I was mistaken.

“First, use of the word “launch” implies that Buchanan meant that Churchill initiated air bombing. If he did not mean that, his choice of language was careless or misleading because, as I pointed out in my objection, we had already had Rotterdam and Coventry and the blitz.”

No, it simply means you conflated “launched” with “first to initiate”.

“Second, Buchanan said the bombing was “air terror.” Prior to the firebombing raids especially against Dresden which came very late in the war, the Allied air war was directed at defensible strategic objectives.”

In 1942 Churchill’s Cabinet decided on a policy of area bombing of German cities in contrast to strategic precision bombing. The campaign explicitly targeted homes and houses, as described by Professor Lindemann who designed the policy. The massive firestorm of Dresden is only the most famous of the raids conducted by Bomber Harris.

“Third, Buchanan asserts that Churchill “launched” “air terror” against “open cities.” An open city in warfare is one which has been declared to be abandoned and one which will not be defended.”

No, it doesn’t mean “abandoned”, it does mean it isn’t being occupied by a defending army.

“Again, Buchanan is playing fast and loose with his vocabulary. If he is so high-minded as you imply when you introduce the just war doctrine-even though he himself never refers to the doctrine-he does his cause no service with this deception or carelessness.”

Once again Buchanan is taking the line of his church. You really ought to read more of his writing, then perhaps your criticisms would at least be informed. You seem to be a stellar example of a little knowledge being a dangerous thing. In this instance to your target as opposed to yourself.

“Fourth, you state that civilians do not shoot back, well, someone was certainly shooting back at the eighth Air Force whose losses were staggering and someone was certainly shooting back at the British who had to suspend daylight bombing because of their losses.”

The AAF attacked military targets which naturally shoot back. The RAF was engaged in the city bombing designed by Churchill’s professor, and that is what is being debated.

“Finally, I think the foregoing demonstrates that what I have written is more than a,”nice try.” “

Hardly. You set yourself as a critic of a writer who has been writing on the theme of the just use of force for over a decade now, who often cites the source for his reasoning, and it is obvious that you haven’t a clue about the background of his writing. If you did you wouldn’t be suggesting that I have introduced the theme of just war doctrine, you would know that this is a major theme in Buchanan’s historical musings.

[KC_Conspirator]

Token “con” is right, but not conservative. Pat should have just subtitled the book “In defense of Mein Fuehrer” and posed in his Hitlerjugend SS uniform hidden in the false panel in the back of his wardrobe. This all goes down to his reflexive and ugly hatred of Jews, couched in what he believes is intellectual thought.

[patriciaruth]

He [Churchill] was behind the greatest British military blunders in two wars: the Dardanelles disaster of 1915 and the Norwegian fiasco of 1940 that brought down Chamberlain and vaulted Churchill to power.

I've already discussed that Churchill was exonerated in the Dardanelles affair in WWI.

This week I've been reading William Manchester's The Last Lion, Alone 1932-1940, and I find out that Buchanan doesn't know what he's talking about when he refers to "the Norwegian fiasco".

Chamberlain, taking Halifax's advice about the Norwegian excursion instead of Churchill's advice, was who was behind making the Norwegian campaign a fiasco, which is why he and not Churchill was the one turned out of office.

Churchill was Hitler's bete noire, and evidently he is the bete noire of Nazi-lovers.

It's pretty sad when a little old lady with Amazon Prime can easily learn historical facts than PBJ seems to have no knowledge of. I have to assume than PBJ has drunk the Nazi Kool-Aid, and should be believed as much as I believe the Marxist Kool Aid drinkers who think that President Bush blew up the World Trade Center.

[nathanbedford]

You quite rightly point out the pitfalls of analyzing history through the prism of an ideology. We have seen it with Marxist view of history. We saw how the Nazis racist view of history led them into all manner of misjudgments in the war. (America, mongrelised with Jews and Negroes could not wage war effectively) Equally, if one views Buchanan from the perspective of a Nazi supporter, one is inevitably lead into historical error, as Buchanan's historical errors clearly demonstrate.

If you see history through the prism of a theological point of view, such as Pelham in this thread has with his just war theory, one is forced to defend bizarre historical errors committed by Buchanan such as Pelham has in his post number 48 with half-truths, and personal attacks.

I would offer one word in defense of those who support Buchanan, including Pelham: their support does not necessarily come out of a fascist predilection, as so often alleged on these threads, but rather often is prompted by a libertarian worldview which simply sees the futility of war as an effective tool of national policy. Others, like Pelham, evidently approach these issues from a Catholic perspective. As I said above, the danger is we see the facts through the prism of our worldview, rather than employing a more scientific method, which is to let the facts generate the theory.

[patriciaruth]

Just now starting T.E. Lawrence, In War and Peace, an anthology of his military writings.

Your view of letting the facts generate the theory is excellent, but even better may be Lawrence’s idea of letting an unbiased analysis of experience allow you to appreciate actually what are the facts before you can begin to comprehend a theory.

I am edified by you both.

[Revolting cat!]

All right, people, start...

[Pelham]

A persistent addict of the reductio ad hitlerem argument whining that he’s being personally attacked. That’s rich.

But just to clear up one more item of misinformation emanating from your keyboard, I’m not Catholic.

[nathanbedford]

I read The Seven Pillars of Wisdom as a young teenager and confess that I did not see below the surface layers of romantic desert warfare. I have not heard of the volume to which you now refer. While I'm on the endlessly fascinating subject of myself, I would like to recount a meeting I had with an elderly Armenian, a refugee from the Turkish Holocaust which the United States Senate, to its eternal discredit has failed to recognize, who showed me a photograph, beaten and weathered with age, of himself as a youth posed next to T. E. Lawrence of Arabia in full regalia. He was one of the few lucky Armenians who managed to evade the Turks and get into safety.

I hope you favor me with a review of the TE Lawrence book.

[dfwgator]

Pat’s pal Hitler bears a lot of responsibility for the West’s decline.

How much blood and treasure did the west lose to rid the world of Hitler? And because of Hitler, Western culture got a huge black eye in the eyes of the rest of the world.

[patriciaruth]

Sorry it took a while to get back to you. I’ve been busy.

Review of T.E. Lawrence, In War and Peace, an anthology of his military writings, edited by Malcolm Brown

The book is divided into two parts. The first is a selection of the secret dispatches that Lawrence sent from Arabia concerning his activities, his observations, and his conclusions during his attachment to the Arab Revolt in WWI. Many of the observations are exact descriptions of the routes he took, and their suitability for military vehicles, and the location and quality of wells and crops. One dispatch consists of his 27 conclusions (or Commandments) of do’s and don’t’s in advising Arabs in a way that will get results, and are considered excellent advice for any military person advising a leader of a different culture.

Lawrence used the secret dispatches (kept unavailable to the general public for 50 years) as a diary source to write his Seven Pillars of Wisdom. I also read the book as a teenager (with a dictionary at my side) and again after the movie Lawrence of Arabia came out. I intend to reread it later this year, as I think age and current affairs will make it more meaningful.

The second part of the T.E. Lawrence in War and Peace book consists of letters and essays he wrote after WWI. One is a synopsis of his conclusions about insurgency/guerrilla warfare tactics. One is an essay on the changing political and social climate of the Middle and Far East which seems prophetic and applicable even today. One is a detailed treatise of his experiences concerning the best ways to blow up railroads. Some are anonymous letters to the editor of the Times summarizing the events in the Arab Revolt, and his observations and experiences during the Arab Revolt.

For any student of military history, this is a worthwhile read. The average reader may find the more detailed dispatches in the first part tedious, and the essays and letters in the second part repetitive.

[VOA]

“
Churchill was Hitler’s bete noire, and evidently he is the bete noire
of Nazi-lovers.

It’s pretty sad when a little old lady with Amazon Prime can easily
learn historical facts than PBJ seems to have no knowledge of.
“

Heck, it seems Churchill is also the bete noire of
a gang of degreed “historians”.

Churchill dropped from England’s history syllabus
(”pandering to a P.C. agenda”)
ABC News (Australia), The Sun (U.K.) ^ | July 13, 2007
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1865231/posts

[patriciaruth]

Arguing that war justifies barbarism is often a line offered by Sherman’s enthusiasts who approve of targeting civilians.

I recently read some interesting history that was correlated to our recent history. Lincoln was opposed for reelection in 1864 by McClellan (the North's favorite decorative General). Lincoln felt there was a great likelihood that he would lose, and that McClellan would sign a peace treaty with the South. He thought that he only had a short time left to win the war, and that (to my thinking) may be why he unleashed Sherman to wage total war in the South, to bring it to its knees as quickly as possible, so the preservation of the Union would be a fait accompli if McClellan won as expected.

The correlation was to President Bush, musing on what he would do in the last year of his presidency to assure victory in Iraq, and (to my thinking) possibly to assure the destruction of bin Laden and Zawahiri, and possibly to set back the Iranian nuclear program, all things that President Obama would then be unable to undo.

P.S. I have a letter that my great grandfather wrote in 1864. He was a sergeant in the volunteer sharpshooters from Ohio and was camped outside Atlanta when he wrote the letter to his brother-in-law who had been wounded and evacuated. I am not exactly a disinterested observer of the Civil War, being from a background proud of the service of our forefathers and father in the Revolutionary war and the Civil War and WWII. I take it you two gentlemen are descended from the opposing camp.

Sherman's observation that "War is Hell" means to me that all who wage it are damned, as all acts of war are evil, that a military action that shortens a war, that brings victory to the side whose moral superiority you believe in or greatly lessens the casualities your side suffers, is simply a preferrable action to the alternative, not a matter of good or evil, as all military action is inherently against Christian teaching and evil.

I'm glad we dropped our two atomic bombs and ended the war with Japan. And if the alternative was to have the Union ripped apart and slavery allowed to continue, then I have to weep, but accept Sherman's march to the sea to divide the South as a fact of war that made victory possible for the Union.

And anyone who claims my great grandfather raped anybody in the South, as was once done on another thread, is a flat out liar. He was a man of great moral probity and ideals.

[patriciaruth]

Churchill dropped from England’s history syllabus (”pandering to a P.C. agenda”) ABC News (Australia), The Sun (U.K.) ^ | July 13, 2007

As the saying goes... 'Those who are ignorant of history are condemned to repeat it.'

(Would appreciate a memory jog of who said it and a more exact quote.)

A lot of young people are on the edge of voting from ignorance of consequences, and many of them may not even live to regret it.