Posted on 06/20/2008 8:12:50 AM PDT by kellynla
So asks Newsweek's cover, which features a full-length photo of the prime minister his people voted the greatest Briton of them all.
Quite a tribute, when one realizes Churchill's career coincides with the collapse of the British empire and the fall of his nation from world pre-eminence to third-rate power.
That the Newsweek cover was sparked by my book "Churchill, Hitler and The Unnecessary War" seems apparent, as one of the three essays, by Christopher Hitchens, was a scathing review. Though in places complimentary, Hitchens charmingly concludes: This book "stinks."
Understandable. No Brit can easily concede my central thesis: The Brits kicked away their empire. Through colossal blunders, Britain twice declared war on a Germany that had not attacked her and did not want war with her, fought for 10 bloody years and lost it all.
Unable to face the truth, Hitchens seeks solace in old myths.
We had to stop Prussian militarism in 1914, says Hitchens. "The Kaiser's policy shows that Germany was looking for a chance for war all over the globe."
Nonsense. If the Kaiser were looking for a war he would have found it. But in 1914, he had been in power for 25 years, was deep into middle age but had never fought a war nor seen a battle.
From Waterloo to World War I, Prussia fought three wars, all in one seven-year period, 1864 to 1871. Out of these wars, she acquired two duchies, Schleswig and Holstein, and two provinces, Alsace and Lorraine. By 1914, Germany had not fought a war in two generations.
Does that sound like a nation out to conquer the world?
As for the Kaiser's bellicose support for the Boers, his igniting the Agadir crisis in 1905, his building of a great fleet, his seeking of colonies in Africa, he was only aping the British, whose approbation and friendship he desperately sought all his life and was ever denied.
In every crisis the Kaiser blundered into, including his foolish "blank cheque" to Austria after Serb assassins murdered the heir to the Austrian throne, the Kaiser backed down or was trying to back away when war erupted.
Even Churchill, who before 1914 was charging the Kaiser with seeking "the dominion of the world," conceded, "History should ... acquit William II of having plotted and planned the World War."
What of World War II? Surely, it was necessary to declare war to stop Adolf Hitler from conquering the world and conducting the Holocaust.
Yet consider. Before Britain declared war on him, Hitler never demanded return of any lands lost at Versailles to the West. Northern Schleswig had gone to Denmark in 1919, Eupen and Malmedy had gone to Belgium, Alsace and Lorraine to France.
Why did Hitler not demand these lands back? Because he sought an alliance, or at least friendship, with Great Britain and knew any move on France would mean war with Britain -- a war he never wanted.
If Hitler were out to conquer the world, why did he not build a great fleet? Why did he not demand the French fleet when France surrendered? Germany had to give up its High Seas Fleet in 1918.
Why did he build his own Maginot Line, the Western Wall, in the Rhineland, if he meant all along to invade France?
If he wanted war with the West, why did he offer peace after Poland and offer to end the war, again, after Dunkirk?
That Hitler was a rabid anti-Semite is undeniable. "Mein Kampf" is saturated in anti-Semitism. The Nuremberg Laws confirm it. But for the six years before Britain declared war, there was no Holocaust, and for two years after the war began, there was no Holocaust.
Not until midwinter 1942 was the Wannsee Conference held, where the Final Solution was on the table.
That conference was not convened until Hitler had been halted in Russia, was at war with America and sensed doom was inevitable. Then the trains began to roll.
And why did Hitler invade Russia? This writer quotes Hitler 10 times as saying that only by knocking out Russia could he convince Britain it could not win and must end the war.
Hitchens mocks this view, invoking the Hitler-madman theory.
"Could we have a better definition of derangement and megalomania than the case of a dictator who overrules his own generals and invades Russia in wintertime ... ?"
Christopher, Hitler invaded Russia on June 22.
The Holocaust was not a cause of the war, but a consequence of the war. No war, no Holocaust.
Britain went to war with Germany to save Poland. She did not save Poland. She did lose the empire. And Josef Stalin, whose victims outnumbered those of Hitler 1,000 to one as of September 1939, and who joined Hitler in the rape of Poland, wound up with all of Poland, and all the Christian nations from the Urals to the Elbe.
The British Empire fought, bled and died, and made Eastern and Central Europe safe for Stalinism. No wonder Winston Churchill was so melancholy in old age. No wonder Christopher rails against the book. As T.S. Eliot observed, "Mankind cannot bear much reality."
It does not say anything significant about Poles or Poland that they had no puppet government, since it was not their decision in any way.
I don’t believe I have said anything to suggest that collaboration was an Eastern European or Polish phenomenon. That is certainly not true, nor is it what I believe.
The Germans knew that the Poles hated them, a hatred intensified by very harsh treatment. However, to a substantial extent, the Poles also hated Jews.
Of course collaboration wasn’t the only reason for the low survival rate of Polish Jews. They endured the Holocaust from 1939 to 1945, longer than most other countries. Poland was governed directly by the German military.
I am also not saying that the Poles could have prevented what happened. There is no way one can know that.
There are too many incidents of Poles killing Jews during (and after) the Holocaust to count. It wasn’t a few isolated incidents. Jedwabne is only the best known.
Regrettable, but largely peaceful political conflict over resources and opportunities or simple separation between groups tended to get painted as hatred because of what happened during the war. I'm not saying everything was fine before, but conflicts that might have been peacefully resolved or superceded are seen in a different light because of the German intervention.
Moreover, Eastern Europe saw a more general war of nationalities -- not just betweem Germans and Jews, or Germans and Poles, or Poles and Jews. There was widespread warfare and killing between Poles and Ukranians and I believe Russians and Ukranians, as well as between different Russian factions, competing Polish groups (which had varying attitudes towards Jews), and conflicting Ukranian movements.
In the East, the Holocaust took place in an enviroment where warfare between different groups was general. Things never went so far in Western Europe (in spite of fighting between collaborators and the resistance in various countries).
In some contexts I think it is fair to generalize about groups “hating” each other... Palestinians & Israelis... the Sinhalese & the Tamils... N. Irish Catholics & Protestants. And so on.
A pogrom isn’t exactly what you would call a political conflict.
The Holocaust against Jews (and Gypsies) was quite distinct from whatever wars between Eastern European nationalities or nations that you are referring to.
I don’t see what point you are trying to make.
That's not entirely fair, since the war and the Germans changed the environment radically, but you do find people taking political conflicts before the war as a prelude to the Holocaust, rather than something that under other circumstances would have resolved over time.
I was also pointing out that violence against Jewish escapees who took up with partisans was often a result of political conflict between various factions, rather than ethnic violence.
I don't think you can draw quite as emphatic a line as you'd like. A guerrilla outfit that did kill Jews might have other victims as well, and many of them also quite as innocent.
Violence against Jews by partisans and other Poles wasn’t their main agenda, but nor was it “political” in nature. It was the result of an antipathy against Jews in Poland that originated long before the 1939 invasion. I never suggested that guerrillas or partisans didn’t have non-Jewish victims.
If I had lived during the civil war I’d have moved out west to chill.
In other words, you can't defend your position - you can only make unbelievably tedious personal comments.
Your measure is taken. See you around.
You would have to have moved out to California or Oregon (or Nevada, if you were a masochist). Even AZ and NM were targeted.
You have a problem with reading ? I already told you I will not redebate the Civil War in this thread. I will also certainly not engage in any discussion with a willfully ignorant and deceitful bigot who harbors a pathological hatred for the South -- in any discussion thread. Have a nice day.
They did the statehood thing during the war, that's a little too involved.
I was thinking Oregon.
For many of the soldiers the Civil War in Oregon was a monotonous, numbing assignment. In their monthly post returns, officers recorded desertions, suicides, and bouts in the brig because of drunkenness and misbehavior. The Indians were quiet on the Siletz and Grand Ronde reservations. The rain was predictable and depressing. "Nothing transpired of importance," recorded Royal A. Bensell, a soldier at Fort Yamhill. Too many days brought that refrain in his Civil War diary.
Sounds peaceful.
Nevada being admitted as a state (let alone territory) at the time it was was a bit dubious as its population was so incredibly low and prone to massive (as a percentage) fluctuations. It had only about 6,900 people at the time it was made a territory (!) in 1861 (although the Dakota Territory, also organized the same year, had about the same amount, a little less even).
When folks started flooding into the Bonanza Country (around Virginia City), Lincoln & Congress jumped the gun with admitting it as a state in ‘64. Besides the obvious intention of adding a Republican state (and 3 EV’s to Lincoln’s column), there was also the presumption it would have spectacular growth in the mining areas and that Virginia City in particular would become a large metropolis. For the first 15 years, it looked like it would... that was until the big bust came along and Virginia City was effectively looted for its wealth which was then sent down to San Francisco. Virginia City became a near ghost town (which it still is today) and in many other areas of the state other boom and bust towns sprang up, but between 1880 and 1890, NV’s population (after growing at 600% between 1860-70 and 50% between 1870-80) plummeted by nearly 25%. The state pols then embraced economic radicalism, becoming Free Silverites (and they, in turn, became Democrats after 1900 — indeed, only 5 Republicans were elected Governor from 1890 up until 1978).
Not until 1910 did the state recover its previous losses (and had a more stable population center at Reno — Las Vegas was little better than a hamlet and didn’t take off until the 1950s), but not until 1940 did the state even reach 100,000 and remained the least populous state until Alaska was admitted in 1959.
Anyway, yes, Nevada was certainly not the most ideal place to relocate to during the 1860s. The heat, the rowdy and dangerous primitive mining towns... Just getting out there could get you killed, between the Indians and unscrupulous land speculators giving you fictitious maps to get you where you were going. This was scarcely less than 15 years after the Donner Party came through, barely getting out of the area into California.
As for Oregon, it, too, was very isolated, although not nearly as hot as NV (although there are sections in the SE part of the state that are no different, but those areas then, and today, have almost no one living there). If you weren’t mining or trying to farmstead there was little to do but drink (or if you were lucky to be near a settlement such as Virginia City, you could go whoring with women that would make the ugliest FReeper “Guilty !” hag look like Adriana Lima or Miranda Kerr).
Those were definitely hardy types in those days that could just pull up stakes either alone or with family and move into a dangerous and largely unsettled territory to spread civilization. Hard to believe we’re descended from these folks, they’d be embarrassed at how good we have it these days and the things we routinely complain about... nothing like what they had to endure without a big coddling Socialist nanny-state government.
Ex 32:77 Then the LORD said to Moses, "Go down, because your people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt.
Ex 32:3535 And the LORD struck the people with a plague because of what they did with the calf Aaron had made.
You are, of course, wrong. The US and Israeli governments prosecuted this fellow as Ivan the Terrible, one of the most notorious guards in WWII. When the catastrofe of executing the wrong individual was averted, we then decided that Demaniuk was in fact someone else. So, having sent him to Israel to be executed, we were SURE that he was Ivan then decided he was someone else.
Now, he was no Solomon Morel who is now resident in Israel. Poland has been trying to extradite that war criminal for crimes against humanity. Morel was a member of the secret police who ran a concentration camp in Stalinist times. I don’t agree, but the Israeli arguement is that the statute of limitations on war crimes has run out (and Morel is in bad health), and it’s time to stop prosecuting these people.
Wow, so wrong.
Poland was not first attacked, but first to fight. You forget Austria and Czechoslovakia. The only country to fight from the first to last day of the war. You might think that meant they didn’t agree w/ the Nazi ideology, since they were not in an alliance with them (like Italy or Romania)
Poland was split, and the General Government was not incorporated into the Reich as was Western Poland, known as Wartegau. It did not have a puppet government, but rather was administered directly by the Nazis through their Gen. Hans Frank. So we see Poland was not an ally of the Nazis, and uniquely had no occupation governement. Again, clearly the Poles were enemies of the Nazis.
Poland had the only (exile) government bureau specifically set up to help the Jews (Zegota). It was a capital crime to help the Jews (if the Poles spent the war just persecuting Jews, why need that sort of law?). The largest number of “Righteous of the Gentiles’ in Israel are Polish.
Poland was the largest fighting force in the war after the USSR, USA and UK. Over six million Polish citizens died in the war. 20% of the pilots in the Battle of Britain were Polish. The German code (Enigma) was broken by Poles and given the the British even before the War began.
The Polish (exile) government sent an eye-witness to meet w/ President Roosevelt and Supreme Court Justice Morgenthau to ring the bell among the Allies. Morgenthau famously said he couldn’t believe Karski’s report. The Polish Ambassador told him the young officer was telling his eye-witness report. Morgenthau replied what he meant is that he just couldn’t comprehend the magnitude of what he just heard.
The Jewish community threw itself into the defense following September 1; check the Katyn list. Not sure why you think the Jews weren’t concerned over the Germans; I think you are confused with Jewish support for the Soviets. Read Jan T. Gross’ book “Revolution from Abroad” which has a section “A Friendly Reception” about how Jews (among other non-Polish minorities) greeted the Soviets w/ kisses, parades and bread and salt.
So yes, some Poles did collaborate w/ the Nazis; true of every society in every war. Poland’s balance is heavily positive, with over six million Polish citizens killed, 90+ percent of Warsaw and 60+ percent of Poznan destroyed among other catastrophic war losses.
You lack a balanced understanding of the post-war period. Unfortunatley, Jewish support and collaboration with the Soviets extended to the post-war period. The (Communist) Interior Minister Berman himself agreed that the leadership of the security services were almost all Jewish. His brother Albert was saved from the Ghetto by Zegota. He repaid them by arresting members of Zegota b/c they were organized by the London government.
Berman himself in an interview with Teresa Toranska (in the book “Them”) notes the extent of the collaboration, saying that there was a large concentration of Jews in certain institutions, a necesary evil ‘because the Polish intelligentsia was boycotting us’ (the Communists). Doesn’t that define collaboration?
In the same book, Stefan Staszewski (a high-ranking commuists whose parents died in Treblinka) said that following Stalin’s death and the reorganization of the party “the Jews were one group (in the party) which didn’t feel threatened at all” Roman Werfel, high ranking party figure and grandson of a rabbi, told Toranska “I can see now that there were too many Jews in the Secret Service”
The moral? Collaboration happens, sadly. No community is defined solely by its collaborators.
Hitler technically didn’t invade Austria. There was a Nazi coup in Austria shortly before the Anschluss. The Anschluss wasn’t unpopular in Austria. Not exactly a similar situation.
You are right about Czechoslavakia. They were invaded in the spring of 1939 and were not organized enough to resist, whether they would have or not. I overlooked that.
I have been saying all along that Poland was administered directly by the Nazis. Not because the Poles made some kind of decision against a collaboration government, but because the Nazis did not want Poland to be an independent polity of any kind. I don’t see how this says anything about the Poles, whose collective opinion was not taken into consideration.
Poland suffered immensely under the Nazis. I certainly do not deny that. But why would that suggest that Poland as a country was braver or more noble than any other? Because of Poland’s brief resistance in 1939 and its resistance movement under the occupation? Every Nazi-occupied country had individuals who sacrificed themselves to oppose Nazi rule. Zegota saved several thousand Jews out of several million murdered from Poland, but that doesn’t change the fact that many more Jews were not helped or were killed by their Polish neighbors during the same period. It is a very sad and mixed legacy, not a remarkably glorious one.
Every country with a substantial Jewish population has had Jewish patriots. Poland was no exception. At the same time, Poland had a long history of brutal anti-Semitism and Jewish anxiety.
One reason that some Jews were hopeful about Soviet rule is that the Soviets promised to abolish anti-Semitic policies, religion being excluded from socialism.
I am dubious that Poland’s postwar Communist security apparatus could have actually been dominated by Jews, since there was only a very small remaining Jewish population in to draw from, while Poland is a country with one of Europe’s largest populations. For that reason alone, it is absurd to blame Jews as a group for Poland’s decades under communism.
Some Jews naturally would have been grateful to the U.S.S.R. for rescuing them from the Holocaust. Collectively, the Russians clearly did much more for them at that time than the Poles did and therefore had a better claim to Jewish loyalty.
Of course I’m right and you are not. Your anti-Polonism stinks.
Poland was administered by the Germans b/c the extermination of Jews and Poles was the point. As I’m sure you know, more Polish Christian than Polish Jews were exterminated by the Germans. What’s more, the Poles would not collaborate (sadly, as my last post pointed out, the Jews collaborated with the Soviets. Comment?)
Poland’s ‘brief’ resistance was followed by having the fourth largest Allied armed force. 20% of the pilots in the Battle of Britain were Polish. It was You, YOURSELF, who said that the Poles collaborated with the Nazis!
Zegota did what it could. They even went to the President of the USA! Not enough for you!
You can doubt what you want; I guess that makes you feel better. Deal with the quotes of the Jews who ran the place and how they see it. Your opinion is — apparently — uninformed.
The Jewish community had many who collaborated with the Soviets. Gross documented it. No surprise that Poles found it a problem Wouldn’t you? You can’t believe that Jews dominated the security aparatus, even though the Jews who did talked about it freely? What’s wrong with you? You can’t deal with those who were there? You know more than the actors themsevles? Read Toranska’s book.
Poland’s Minister of the Interior was Jakub Berman, and the troika who ran the coutnry were Minc, Berman and Beirut. Kasman was in charge of propaganda. Chajn ran the SD, a Communist affiliated party. I already noted Werfel. We can argue opinion, not facts.
I appreciate your post, but it’s weak. You can’t ignore the facts (from their own mouths) that I laid out. You should give up, really, unles you can marshall facts.
Poland’s balance is quite positive. As I said, collaborators existed on all sides. Entire communities can’t be defined by the collaborationist minority.
Who’s blaming Communism on the Jews? I was simply responding the your note that some (a minority)of Poles helpled the Nazis. Guess what? Some Jews (a minority) helped the Soviets. Collaboration happens in all wars. Sadly.
I’m not sure about even your comment “poland’s brutal anti-semitism” That’s an urban myth. Let’s talk facts. Poland ceased to exits in the 18th century. Until then, it was a haven for Jews. Duh, that’s why so many Jews went there.
So let’s get to FACTS. What is the nature of your ‘brutal(hehe)” antisemitism. If you can’t give CONCRETE examples, then it’s anti-polonomism
And if you don’t reply w/ CONCRETE examples, then you are lablelling yourself a BIGOT.
Look, your lack of facts are obvious to all readers. You can’t sustain a thread w/ the lack of any solid info.
So don’t worry that you can’t respond; you will just look even weaker when you try w/o facts. No harm in just letting our thread go, and we’ll leave it at that.
First of all, it is nonsense that Poland has gone in and out of existence. As a cultural nation Poland existed under Austrian, Prussian and Russian control just as it existed under the Third Reich. It is certainly not true that many Poles of the nineteenth century would agree with you that Poland just stopped in 1795 (the Commonwealth in fact having lasted through most of the 18th c.)
I am not guilty of “anti-polononism” [sic].
A few relevant results of an easy and simple, very non-comprehensive internet search for your basic knowledge:
http://www.ejpress.org/article/10995
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Poland
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jedwabne_pogrom
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kielce_pogrom
http://www.amazon.com/Fear-Anti-Semitism-Poland-After-Auschwitz/dp/0812967461
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/vjw/Poland.html
Who is labeling himself a bigot?
I'm actually not at all - but you'll keep making this claim until the cows come home.
You say that Ivan Demjanjuk "was no Solomon Morel."
Both are criminals who did horrendously evil things. Demjanjuk's crimes are absolutely comparable to Morel's - and worse in terms of sheer numbers.
The failure of Israel's government to render justice in this matter is no excuse for Demjanjuk to evade justice.
Two wrongs do not make a right.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.