Arguing with Stupid Leftists

[techumseh]

Originally posted by GePap:

That may have been your point, yes. I have every right to point out how that quote supports my contention. And my contention is that you can;t label Pinochet a fascist because Pinochet was not a fascist.

Hey, that's the tightest circular argument I've ever seen. Way to go, GePap!

[Mr. Harley]

Techmseh, thank you for that quote - it was one of two meetings I wanted to cite, that and one earlier one back in roughly 1929 where a small cadre of wealthy and industrialist types who genuinely supported Hitler gave him that initial seed money.

Gepap and Techmseh, thanks for actually making my point about the Hitler state and Barbarrosa - any State with Hitler as dictator was going to war, and going to invade the Slavic states, including the Soviet Union. Che, you are simply wrong. As both Gepap and Techumseh show, and as I made the point, the actions of the other actor's in Hitler's Germany (after 1938) are moot (unless you kill Hitler, then you can go back to having a genuine Facist State unless Himler gets control, that could be even worse). The Hitler state after 1938 was no longer facist, per se, but a cult of personality sharing more with today's North Korea.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by shawnmmcc
Molly - if you have read that book (it's on my to-do list) what does it say about ancillery groups supporting German facism/the Hitler state encouraging Barbarossa, versus simply supporting the Fuhrer's decision (as if after 1938 anyone else's opinion made a rat's *ss difference?

They have a mixture of motivations- but underpinning most of them seemed to be a desire to restore order, and a nostalgia for a mythic German past (which of course never existed)- even after the war, Adenauer is quoted as coming round from a slumber in a railway carriage as his train crosses the Elbe, and saying 'Ah, Asia' .

The fear of Jewish-Asian Bolshevismus (and Jewish capitalism as distinct from Henry Ford capitalism) could be combined into a renewal of patriotic volkisch feeling.

It didn't stop the aristocracy and many conservatives from despising Hitler, but there were plenty of dispossessed Junkers waiting to get their estates back in the East, and non-Nazi ideas of a Greater Germany stretching into Western and Eastern Europe and the Balkans had been around since the days of Bismarck.

Purging Rohm's faction with its dangerous ideas of proletarian enfranchisement attracted a lot of conservatives.

[Mr. Harley]

OK - so the book doesn't really deal with much that is new if you have already read some of the books concerning the Nazi military-industrial complex and how both French and US companies helped them out. What you just posted matched everything I've read.

However, from my understanding the purge of Rohm was primarily due to Hitler consolidating power, and also making the Wehrmacht happy (which with hindsight we know was appalling short-sighted and stupid on their part.). Would you agree that after Hitler replaced Blomberg and General Fritsch that Hitler had consolidated all power? I'm wondering if anyone esle agrees with my 1938 date, even if they disagree with my conclusion that was the point Germany ceased to be a Facist state and instead became a cult centered around Hitler.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Guynemer
Imagine my surprise as I check this thread for the first time and find a debate about Hitler.

Well, it is the subject of my OP.

[techumseh]

There's no doubt that Hitler had enormous power. He aquired this power because he had the support of 3 key groups. His hold on the first - the Nazi Party - was unquestioned. The second, big business and the German capitalists, he won over by promising to save them from Communism (as above). The army was won over by implementing a massive rearmament program.

What your theory fails to take into account is that Hitler needed to continue to satisfy the interests of these groups if he was to retain their support, and hence, the basis of his power. So almost all of what he did corresponded to the interests of these groups. Destroying world communism was HUGE with all three. Eliminating the Soviet military threat was important to the army. Aquiring more land, cheap labor and looting the capital wealth of other European countries, including the Soviet Union, was particularly beneficial to German industrialists.

So quibbling about whether Hitler forced the army or German business into attacking the Soviet Union is not relevent. They went willingly, for the most part, because they perceived it was in their interests to do so.

Was it a cult? Sure. In what way did that change the result, is the question. One thing I know is that this theory is very convenient for those amoung the army and German elite who enthusiastically supported Hitler and his plans. And that's MOST of them, BTW. It allows them to say, "he made us do it". "We had no choice." And that was the refrain of literally thousands of them after the war was lost. Hey - west of the Elbe at least - they got to keep their factories.

[chequita guevara]

I would put it much later. When the assassination attempt failed, is when everyone else who had any power lost it.

[BeBMan]

Originally posted by shawnmmcc
I'm wondering if anyone esle agrees with my 1938 date, even if they disagree with my conclusion that was the point Germany ceased to be a Facist state and instead became a cult centered around Hitler.

I think it is problematic to define it that way like "fascism vs. cult". "Cult" is not something like an accepted category for political systems in 20th century societies.

That doesn't mean that there was no cult centered around Hitler - of course there was. The question is if that helps defining the political system. I mean you can say cult of personality was characteristical for Stalin's Soviet Union as well, yet its system wasn't the same as Hitler's.

[Mr. Harley]

Techumseh - I'm about to go to sleep but you deserve a response. BTW, I have been enjoying your disagrement with GePap on the actual definitiion of Facism, it's made me reexamine my own definition. That's why I've avoided your argument on that, it's been very interesting.

I will however disagree with you on the Hitler state. That is an illusion many people have about the Hitler state needing the support of anyone after 1938. It may have been nice, but between Goering, Heydrich, and Himmler it was moot. They had utter control of the mechanisms of the state, opposition was both futile and fatal, and those three men (along with Goebels, the other power broker) were disciples of Hitler. Che, that's why I choose 1938, after that point the fangs of the military were pulled, and IMHO Hilter has consolidated power.

There was no "axis of power." All power was vested in Hitler, through those priests, if you wish, of his beliefs. That is why talking about the Nazi regime as a facist state, versus something much more akin to North Korea, produces a series of bad models. There was no way for anyone to challenge Hitler's power except through Hitler himself, in which case one could "redirect" his attention. One could not "challenge" his power, that was fatal.

BeBro - the difference between Hitler and Stalin is that Stalin had no "cult" worshipping him, he reigned almost solely through terror. North Korea today is the closest state we have to Nazi Germany. You could also make an argument for Mao's China, where he become the new God(philosopher)-King. And that is why so much of modern analysis of the Hitler state fails, like you they argue cult is not an accepted category for political systems in 20th century societies. But that is exactly what is was, and not accepting that has produced some of the more macabre assertions like the German people could have stopped Hitler after 1933 (which they couldn't have). Many tried, and ended up in the camps. In fact for some reason, as fatigued as I am, I am thinking of the Inca and their god-kings. I think they were much closer to the Hitler-state than Mussolini's Facism - at least we ALL agree that was a facist state.

[BeBMan]

Originally posted by shawnmmcc


BeBro - the difference between Hitler and Stalin is that Stalin had no "cult" worshipping him, he reigned almost solely through terror.

I strongly disagree. IMO there was absolutely this cult for Stalin too. There are contemporary quotes from media and people in Russia about Stalin which are absolutely on the same level of craziness with the stuff you can see today in NK, and there is no reason to assume that everything was made just due to fear of Stalin (in part may be). This is mentioned in literature about Stalin as well. It's a while since I read about him, but I just remember a part from a book by Robert Conquest about Stalin which stated many grotesque things: not only that newspapers published all kinds of exaggerated praises about Stalin, even intelectuals like Tolstoi wrote the most absurd hymns about him. There were also reports about party members falling into hysteria similar to the scenes we know from Hitler's public speeches in Germany. One story I particularly found absurd was how a speech of Stalin was recorded, and the entire last record contained only the applause.

Edit: Generally speaking it can also be doubted that any rule can rely exclusively on terror without any consensual elements at least in certain parts of the society.

[chequita guevara]

Millions of people even today look back with reverence at Stalin in Russia. Stalin was most definately a cult leader. I don't think that takes away from the USSR being a socialist state or Germany being a fascist state. That just means you have some other weirdness going on.

[Pekka]

Stalin was DEFINITELY cult leader, and even more so today. Not like Hitler, but close.

[techumseh]

Stalin had established his 'cult of personality' before Hitler had even taken power. Here's an excerpt from Kruschev's secret speech to the XX Communist Party Congress in 1956, in which he denounced Stalin:

Comrades, the cult of the individual acquired such monstrous size chiefly because Stalin himself, using all conceivable methods, supported the glorification of his own person. This is supported by numerous facts. One of the most characteristic examples of Stalin's self -glorification and of his lack of even elementary modesty is the edition of his Short Biography, which was published in 1948.

This book is an expression of the most dissolute flattery, an example of making a man into a godhead, of transforming him into an infallible sage, "the greatest leader," "sublime strategist of all times and nations." Finally no other words could be found with which to lift Stalin up to the heavens.

We need not give here examples of the loathsome adulation filling this book. All we need to add is that they all were approved and edited by Stalin personally and some of them were added in his own handwriting to the draft text of the book. . . .

Comrades, if we sharply criticize today the cult of the individual which was so widespread during Stalin's life and if we speak about the many negative phenomena generated by this cult which is so alien to the spirit of Marxism-Leninism, various persons may ask: How could it be? Stalin headed the party and the country for 30 years and many victories were gained during his lifetime. Can we deny this? In my opinion, the question can be asked in this manner only by those who are blinded and hopelessly hypnotized by the cult of the individual, only by those who do not understand the essence of the revolution and of the Soviet State, only by those who do not understand, in a Leninist manner, the role of the party and of the nation in the development of the Soviet society. . . .

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1956khrushchev-secret1.html

[techumseh]

As I interpret Kruschev's criticism in the (whole) speech, the 'cult of the individual' under Stalin did not fundamentally betray socialism, ie. Stalin did not attempt to reintroduce private enterprise, or sell out the USSR to foreign powers, etc. It did, however betray the spirit of socialism, with the following effects:

1. All defered to Stalin's 'wisdom' with the results that decisons were poorer due to lack of all round debate.

2. Scientifically, culturally and intellectually, the society was poorer. Critical thinking was severely weakened, and culture became a Soviet version of 'happy days'.

3. Lack of due process lead to the arbitrary arrest, detention and/or execution of hundreds of thousands of real and imagined 'enemies of the people'.

4. As a result of the purges, the armed forces and the Party became greatly weakened.

I suspect that the effect of Hitler's 'cult of personality' was much the same on Nazi Germany. It did not change the essence of the regime, or it's nature. It remained fundamentally a fascist regime. But it probably made Nazi rule even more arbitrary, dogmatic, irrational and error prone.

[Mr. Harley]

OK - I said I would get myself in trouble if I tried to discuss Marxism.