Pat Buchanan Defends Hitler

[z0sa]

No doubt about it. Buchanan doesn't defend it. nor do I.

Open a damn history book. I honestly don't know what to say, other than you don't know what the that crazy sum was going to do other than kill everything in his way or outside of his greater plan for purity.

[Winehole23]

Don't get me wrong, I think we did the right thing. But Buchanan's take isn't threadbare, as some people are making out.

[z0sa]

When it comes right down to it, we didn't care very much about the moral depravity of Hitler until we were attacked. Only then did the war become "morally" imperative.

No one knew about the Nazi death camps until we were breaking them open and finding nazi soldiers burning thousands of dead bodies they had recently gassed or shot in a desperate attempt to hide their superiors' war crimes.

And they weren't exactly 'war crimes', were they?

[Winehole23]

And I don't see anyone attacking Winston Churchill for believing much the same. He ended up thinking the declaration of war was a mistake.

[Winehole23]

No one knew about the Nazi death camps until we were breaking them open and finding nazi soldiers burning thousands of dead bodies they had recently gassed or shot in a desperate attempt to hide their superiors' war crimes.

I'll have to find a citation, but as I understand, this is not exactly true. The US government knew about it long before we did.

And as you pointed out, the extermination of undesirables and deviants started long before, and was no secret.

[z0sa]

I'll have to find a citation, but as I understand, this is not exactly true. The US government knew about it long before we did.

The Government may have been aware about Hitler's "intentions" - but could anyone have imagined the horrible extent to which he took it?

[z0sa]

I'll have to find a citation, but as I understand, this is not exactly true. The US government knew about it long before we did.

And as you pointed out, the extermination of undesirables and deviants started long before, and was no secret.

It was quite secret. In fact, Hitler only made one secretly transmitted do ent about the entire issue of murdering off disabled young Germans, despite the fact a few hundred thousand were killed over his tenure as Fuhrer.

[Winehole23]

Our record of extending asylum to German Jews in WWII during our technical neutrality, while we knew they were being persecuted, is not exactly a paragon of humane decency. The moral imperative was not yet in force.

[Winehole23]

It was quite secret. In fact, Hitler only made one secretly transmitted do ent about the entire issue of murdering off disabled young Germans, despite the fact a few hundred thousand were killed over his tenure as Fuhrer.

Thanks for the correction. I misunderstood your comment above.

[z0sa]

Our record of extending asylum to German Jews in WWII during our technical neutrality, while we knew they were being persecuted, is not exactly a paragon of humane decency. The moral imperative was not yet in force.

I guess you forget the 30's were the height of the great depression - and during a time when neutrality was favored by most Americans. And I'd like to see the piles of definitive proof about the concentration camps that the USGov withheld.

[z0sa]

Another thing is that you are not taking Hitler's ruthlessness into account. This is the same guy who burnt down the Reichstag and murdered most of his political opponents in a single night.

[Winehole23]

The Government may have been aware about Hitler's "intentions" - but could anyone have imagined the horrible extent to which he took it?

Probably not.

What happened in Russia during Stalin, in terms of the scale of death (20 million or so), was far worse. But war with them was never a moral imperative for us on account of it.

[Winehole23]

Another thing is that you are not taking Hitler's ruthlessness into account. This is the same guy who burnt down the Reichstag and then murdered most of his political opponents in a single night.

I most certainly do. I don't carry Pat Buchanan's brief. But he doesn't defend Hitler. That's all I'm saying.

[Winehole23]

I guess you forget the 30's were the height of the great depression - and during a time when neutrality was favored by most Americans.

I did not forget it. What makes you think so?

[z0sa]

I most certainly do. I don't carry Pat Buchanan's brief. But he doesn't defend Hitler. That's all I'm saying.

but all these combined together make me certain that simply regaining the Polish corridor or whatever nonsense Buchanan is spewing, is straight out wrong. We don't need to see definitive plans from before/the start of the war to be sure that the second worst murderer of all-time (behind stalin) would have carried said plans out. He was insane - and you said he wasn't "that crazy", at least compared to us. I mean, he was friggin off his rocker and rearming the nation with the most advanced military of the time.

[Winehole23]

And they weren't exactly 'war crimes', were they?

Of course they were. No less than firebombing the cities of Germany and Eastern Europe, and no less than the bombs we dropped on Japan.

[z0sa]

Of course they were. No less than firebombing the cities of Germany and Eastern Europe, and no less than the bombs we dropped on Japan.

Hiroshima/Nagasaki is comparing apples to oranges. Direct invasion of Japan would have cost over a million lives according to many accounts, most of them civilian Japanese anyway. We had already lost many tens of thousands of Americans. The Japanese were acting just as nuts as the Germans with their kamikazes and death camps and their "scorched earth" policy of leaving their soldiers to fight without supplies or food to the bitter end on whatever island. Dropping the bombs makes perfect sense. Much more death would have resulted had we not.

The firebombings is a different story, but don't discount the Germans spending most of the war bombing the out of England. On the eastern front, Germans murdered just as many if not more civilians that were not Jewish and they did were.

[Winehole23]

but all these combined together make me certain that simply regaining the Polish corridor or whatever nonsense Buchanan is spewing, is straight out wrong.

What's wrong about it? He basically lifts his take from Churchill. He says the way the war started was a mistake.

We don't need to see definitive plans from before/the start of the war to be sure that the second worst murderer of all-time (behind stalin) would have carried said plans out.

Hindsight is 20/20, and i don't think anyone is clairvoyant, or anything inevitable, in history.

He was insane - and you said he wasn't "that crazy", at least compared to us. I mean, he was friggin off his rocker and rearming the nation with the most advanced military of the time.

Actually, I said that Hitler and the Germans weren't as crazy as the hype. Crazy? Yes. Evil? No doubt. We were right to take them on, but that doesn't make us so good, or them, so unusual in essence. IMHO.

If it were really morally imperative to take on evil madmen who slaughter their own people, we would always be at war. Transatlantic relationships really had more to do with our participation in WWII than morality.

[Winehole23]

Hiroshima/Nagasaki is comparing apples to oranges. Direct invasion of Japan would have cost over a million lives according to many accounts, most of them civilian Japanese anyway. We had already lost many tens of thousands of Americans. The Japanese were acting just as nuts as the Germans with their kamikazes and death camps and their "scorched earth" policy of leaving their soldiers to fight without supplies or food to the bitter end on whatever island. Dropping the bombs makes perfect sense. Much more death would have resulted had we not.

This is an argument from expedience, not morality.

The firebombings is a different story, but don't discount the Germans spending most of the war bombing the out of England.

I don't discount it. But it doesn't make what we did right.

[z0sa]

Actually, I said that Hitler and the Germans weren't as crazy as the hype. Crazy? Yes. Evil? No doubt. We were right to take them on, but that doesn't make us so good, or them, so unusual in essence. IMHO.

I won't say we were the shining knights, because its war. No one was a shining light in WW2 - but would you classify the pilots of the AAF or RAF with say, the SS units in charge of the death camps?

The point I'm making is that you give a madman like Hitler power, and you see what comes of it. Denying he would have used said power in any different way than the way he did, is outright bull ting yourself. My opinion, I guess you could say, though I consider it much more along the lines of fact.

[Winehole23]

The point I'm making is that you give a madman like Hitler power, and you see what comes of it. Denying he would have used said power in any different way than the way he did, is outright bull ting yourself. My opinion, I guess you could say, though I consider it much more along the lines of fact.

I don't think this is knowable in advance. Like I said, I don't believe in historical inevitability. For you it is a fact, for me, an opinion. Hitler was very nearly killed on one or two occasions. There was nothing inevitable about it. In my opinion, right. I respect your opinion, but I just don't think anything is dead certain in history, except that we all live and die.

[z0sa]

This is an argument from expedience, not morality.

I don't discount it. But it doesn't make what we did right.

So you're denying the fact we would have had to commit far more atrocities without the bombs than we did with them?

[Winehole23]

What getting people's goat is that Buchanan glosses Hitler as a politician, not a madman. To be fair, he was both. But he was a politician too.

[z0sa]

I don't think this is knowable in advance. Like I said, I don't believe in historical inevitability. For you it is a fact, for me, an opinion. Hitler was very nearly killed on one or two occasions. There was nothing inevitable about it. In my opinion, right. I respect your opinion, but I just don't think anything is dead certain in history, except that we all live and die.

I agree that history is not 'inevitable', but this is one case where the evidence overwhelmingly supports the argument.

[Nbadan]

Britain tried appeasement, that didn't work out too well...