What did history teach us? part II

[Kropotkin]

A while ago I started a thread about what lessons that can or cannot be learned from history. This as a response to the common and lazy way of making comparisons between the current situation and the appeasment in 1938. The thread didn't became what I wanted. The points made where usually pretty lame (no insults intended) and lacked any real points beyond the obvious and the unique.

So a week ago or so the Guardian, obviously inspired by me, asked twelve historians on the same issue.

For whom it concerns, enjoy!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,898341,00.html

(note, most points of view are represented so this is hardly a one sided story)

[MRT144]

good article...lots of good incite!

[Spiffor]

Great article

Please allow me to point it whenever I'll read "appeasement" on this board again

Edit : to answer your question : history teached us many lazy ways to legitimate a policy while looking intelligent and bent to learn from the past

[Kropotkin]

No insults yet? Has there been a mass banning that I've missed?

[Kropotkin]

I thought I would bump this once as it's not really a thread for debate but others on the wrong side of the globe might want to see it.

[Japher]

If that is the case then anyone who argues that unless we learn from history it is doomed to repeat itself. Since, in the case of this article, everything has to be the same in order for history to repeat itself.


I read the first one, and got PO'd. Who does Mr Kershaw think he is fooling!? (Granted it was written just over a week ago... a long week ago)

Today, there is no self-evident threat from Iraq. There is no invasion of a sovereign territory (as in 1991) to repulse.

Wow! what about 1991, is that just getting brushed under the rug now?!

We have to take it on trust that Saddam is building weapons of mass destruction.

Or we can look at the info the Germans give us, and look at the huge missles that he stock pilling and not suppose to have.

Even if he has them, he is unlikely to use them against Britain or America - seemingly bent on war and towing Britain in its slipstream.

What a contradictory statement, when compared to the first one of this paragraph. Of course! He is not stupid enough to us them on any of us! Yet, Mr. Kershaw already tried to justify a war if Saddam had attacked another country, no one said anything about which country!

The tanks at Heathrow are not there to fend off an attack from Saddam.

This sentence confusses me. What is he talking about? and what does it have to do with the rest of the paragraph?

But we can't destroy the invisible source of that menace, which is likely to grow, not diminish - fostered by a war for which the reason is far from plain. In 1939, the reason was all too obvious.

We can't? Far from plain? Who pulled the wool over this guys eyes!? Or, better yet, who put the seemingly real "illusion" in front of mine?

This is why you never read anything that some liberal history teacher wrote with the anticipation that it would have some importance, or inspire the hot girl that sits in the front row. I have never read his two "best-sellers" but I am more than sure that are full of more propaganda based on lousy interpretations of the past. Historians should stay in the past, and stop trying to predict the future without all the facts.

O-K, rip away.

[GePap]

I think all and all, this article is too high class: it won't generate the sort of historical annalyisis you call for.

Still, top notch find!

[Comrade Tribune]

Re: What did history teach us? part II

Originally posted by Kropotkin
A while ago I started a thread about what lessons that can or cannot be learned from history. This as a response to the common and lazy way of making comparisons between the current situation and the appeasment in 1938. The thread didn't became what I wanted. The points made where usually pretty lame (no insults intended) and lacked any real points beyond the obvious and the unique.

'History teaches that people don´t learn anything from it.' -Hegel. Unfortunately, he was right.

Appeasement was not such a failure, as it is made out to be. The Brits needed more time to prepare, and appeasement gave them that time. In the final analysis, by making the War start later, it hurt Hitler more than his opponents, so Chamberlain may be under-rated.

Today, of course, everybody is trying to appease the US, since they are the aggressors, not Iraq.

[Japher]

Today, of course, everybody is trying to appease the US, since they are the aggressors, not Iraq.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

This is from the paper that some US posters have described as "no better than a supermarket tabloid".

[Starchild]

This sentence confusses me. What is he talking about? and what does it have to do with the rest of the paragraph?

Heathrow is a major, MAJOR British airport. It's by far the busiest airport in the entire United Kingdom. A few weeks back, the Government had armed tanks patrolling the airport grounds because of a warning on terrorist activity. The idea being that a tank could take out a car who had someone inside with a shoulder-to-air missile launcher before the car could get away.

And you know what? This won't be the last time there are tanks in the public in the UK. The Invasion of Iraq is going to end horribly because the Americans have shown no inclination nor aptitude for nation building. Iraq is not another Imperial Japan or Nazi Germany and such simple attempts to slap an old model on a completely inappropriate country is going to end in ruin. The fruit of your almost certain victory is going to rot in your mouth. The disruption, the anger, the hate generated by such American actions is going to be the best recruitment for al-Qaeda ever. You think that American bases in Saudi Arabia sent people flocking to Uncle Osama? Wait, just wait, until there's an American colony, vassal, and servant state in Iraq. The situation is going to swing wildly out of control because the odds of it not are so miniscule. You're going to have a lot of pissed off and angry Muslim youths willing to serve al-Qaeda.

We Brits are going to feel the burn just like the Americans. The sad bit is we haven't been brainwashed by our government. We reject the lies about the link between Iraq and terrorism. We know that not a single 9/11 hijacker was Iraqi (a fact that escapes a worrying large percentage of Americans). We don't even support this war. Yet under the orders from your government, our one is sending our people off to die. We're going to be a target of the terrorism that will result from the anarchy of Iraq.

We don't get squat out of the relationship with the Americans. We're used. I've lived in America and the UK and that's what I see. America uses. The UK has stood shoulder to shoulder to you on everything and you've disrespected every single thing that we cared out. Kyoto. The International Criminal Court. Cooperation with other nations. My god, we wept with you on 9/11 and not a month later you were slapping tariffs on our steel. Illegal tariffs. We get nothing from being friendly to you. We get stabbed in the back. And now we're going to get bombed in the face.

So yes, these won't be the last tanks at Heathrow. The Americans have lost the plot of terrorism due to Iraq and now they're gonna give Osama the biggest gift ever. Those tanks are going to be there a long time because of the American Government. That's why you're the biggest threat at present. You don't understand the concept of allies as anything beyond "people who do what we say".

[JohnT]

"This is from the paper that some US posters have described as "no better than a supermarket tabloid"."

And a number of UKers, as well, iirc.

[Kropotkin]

Originally posted by Japher
Wow! what about 1991, is that just getting brushed under the rug now?!

Haven't you read the manual? You're only allowed one super power intervention for a invasion. It's not a permanent casus belli.

No but really, that's not brushing anything under the rug. The situation is about (or is supposed to be) about Iraqi weapons, not the invasion of Kuwait in 1990.

[Spiffor]

The biggest difference between these analyses come from the different assertions of the Iraqi threat :

- To those who believe Iraq is no threat, the very point of appeasement is moot : the whole appeasement thing was driven by fear Germany would kill millions of French and Brits. To those who think Iraq is no nearly a threat like nazi Germany was, it is impossible for current French and German stance to be motivated by fear.

- To those who believe Iraq is a threat to the West, the French are simply chickening out and peeing in their pants, like they always do

For one, I don't consider appeasement has anything to do with the French/German position.

1) "Appeasement" was immediately displayed, because it was very tempting to do so. Americans have generally little knowledge for international history except during the WW2 period. Since the French did that pre-WW2, they must do appeasement always .

2) "Appeasement" was motivated by utter fear of war, and the idea war could be avoided if Hitler was satisfied. Today, the French and the Germans do not consider Iraq to be any threatening. You can call their position "imperialistic", "rabidly anti-American", "hypocrite", whatever you want, but you cannot call it "cowardly". The main factor behind appeasement doesn't exist here : France and Germany do simply not fear Iraq.

3) Appeasement had to do with complying to Hitler's demands. The only "demands" Saddam has would be to stay in power. He basically agreed to conditionless inspections, except for very small points (which of course could be critical to hide some of his WMD)
The actor exerting "demands" in our current situation is the UN, and Saddam is complying to nearly all of them in the hope it will avoid the war by sapping all support for a US-led attack.
If anyone is complying to the demands of a threatening bully, it is Saddam.


As for the Suez analogy : I don't get why they looked for such a far-stretched thing. Basically, two imperial powers went to war over their interests. The similarity ends here. The Suez thing is a shameful attempt to legitimize peace through history, exactly like the appeasement thing is a shameful attempt to legitimize war through history.
I hope the Suez thing won't stick, because I still hope the pro-peace camp is more intelligent than the pro-war camp (I doubt it more every day, even though I remain rabidly pro-peace)

[Japher]

No but really, that's not brushing anything under the rug. The situation is about (or is supposed to be) about Iraqi weapons, not the invasion of Kuwait in 1990.

The reason there is a situation with the weapons is because there was an invasion in 1990.

Starchild: Would you rather Great Britian handle this one? Oh, wait, they already had a shot and F'd it up, just like they did in India, America, and every other fricking territory they have tried to establish in the name of Imperialism... excpet for Canada of course.

Brainwashing goes both ways. You with your propaganda, and me with mine.