WWI: What if the U.S. stayed neutral?

[Ned]

There was a special last night on the Gestapo and some of its German victims in 1944-5. At one point, the commentatory says that the Nazi's considered the Jews to be an enemy just as much as any of the allies.

Then the commentary said somethin like this:

"In fact, the Nazi's believed the Jews were behind the allies being in the war against them. But, of course, this was a lie."

But, as we have seen from this thread was some truth to the Jews being an enemy of the Nazi regime even if the origin of that status was the Nazi's own anti-Semitism and propaganda. A kind of vicious circle.

Makes one think about the current emnity between the Islamic world and Jews. Is there any way to end the hatred and break the vicious circle the two sides have gotten into? If there is one thing that WWII accomplished, it was the utter destruction of the Nazi regime and all it stood for.

I don't see something similar happening to the Jew-hating Islamic world. The problems of the ME will go on, and on, and on I expect. Long ago I had hope that there would be peace. I no longer believe it possible.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Ned
There was a special last night on the Gestapo and some of its German victims in 1944-5.

Another television programme.

Those books still proving slippery customers....

But, as we have seen from this thread was some truth to the Jews being an enemy of the Nazi regime .

If 'the Jews as enemies' of the Nazi regime was in fact just Nazi propaganda, then how can it also be 'true' from any objective standpoint ?

That's just illogical.

The Nazis knew that there wasn't a worldwide Jewish conspiracy, they were just happy to use Tsarist Russian propaganda from post-WWI and antisemitic pamphlets and writings from the 19th and early 20th Century to justify their takeover of the German state and repression of political dissent.

[Ned]

molly, I think West did not care about the Jews or was overly influence by what they wanted or did not want.

That is quite different from their not being enemies of Nazi Germany, which is the whole point of the TV comment. They were trying to suggest that the Jews were being persecuted by the Nazis for no reason other than race hatred even though they did say that the Nazis considered the Jews enemies just as much as any other member of the allied coalition.

I think the average Jew no matter where in the world hated the Nazis with a passion and for good reason. It was a vicious cycle of hate, the same thing we see today between the Muslim world and Israel.

And, just as the Nazi-Jewish cycle began as a result of WWI, so did the Muslim-Jewish hatefest.

[ElTigre]

Originally posted by Ned
molly, I think West did not care about the Jews or was overly influence by what they wanted or did not want.

Interesting. So during WW1 "the Jews" lured one nation after another into war with Germany, but before WW2 they had lost that influence. Did I summarize your position on the Jewish conspiracy correctly, Ned?

Jews were being persecuted by the Nazis for no reason other than race hatred

I agree!!

I think the average Jew no matter where in the world hated the Nazis with a passion and for good reason.

That doesn't mean they were a threat to the Nazi regime. Because someone hates you doesn't give you the right to persecute, torture and murder that person. You want to explain the Genocide with a "vicious cycle of hate", which implies that both sides bear responsibility for what happened, but only Nazis escalated this "vicious cycle". Or was there a Jewish 'insurgency' in Germany in 1933? A Jewish underground army operating in Berlin? Did Jewish terrorists systematically murder German civilians before WW2? If not, what exactly is your charge against "the Jews"? That they hated someone who vowed to exterminate them??

[Ned]

Originally posted by ElTigre


Interesting. So during WW1 "the Jews" lured one nation after another into war with Germany, but before WW2 they had lost that influence. Did I summarize your position on the Jewish conspiracy correctly, Ned?

I think you are summarizing your own and molly's propaganda about what I said.

I have always said that I doubted the statements in that anti-Semite web site and to the extent I did the research I did in fact determine it was filled with lies. I also said that I conculded that whatever the Jews thought about the war (WWI) generally, their opinion was drowned out by British propaganda in the US and the real reason we went to war had nothing to do with Jewish opinion.

As to WWII, I have consistently maintained that Britain cared not one whit about the Jews and did not go to war to save them or for any reason in any way remotely connected with the Jews. Their reasons for going to war were all about the British Empire and its own best interests.

Hitler's reasons for invading Poland had nothing to do with the Jews as well.

In no aspect, therefor, did WWI (America's entry) or WWII have anything to do with the Jews except to the extent that Germany and its allies were trying to exterminate them.

On the contrary, though, socialists in Germany did turn against the war (WWI) once the Czar was gone and did actively try to sabatoge the German war effort. This left the Jews of Germany open to blame because many, if not most, of the socialists leaders were Jewish.

[/QUOTE]

[Ned]

Armenians in Turkey, Chechans in the USSR, and the Japanese in the US all favored or were thought to favor the enemy in an active war. They were the source, or thought to be a source, of active sabotage of the war effort. In each case they were deported or confined during the term of the war. (In the case of the Armenians, very brutally.)

Now, you will admit that the Jews hated the Nazi's and for good reason. But you say that Germany had no reason to believe they would do Germany any harm and that what happened to them in WWII was totally and exclusively the result of racisim?

Nonsense.

BTW, in the case of the Japanese in America, the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire and the Chechans in the USSR, do you also thinkg that the deportations and confinements in each case had nothing to do with the war and instead was just racism?

[ElTigre]

Originally posted by Ned

Hitler's reasons for invading Poland had nothing to do with the Jews as well.

I wouldn't be too sure about that, but okay.

In no aspect, therefor, did WWI (America's entry) or WWII have anything to do with the Jews except to the extent that Germany and its allies were trying to exterminate them.

On the contrary, though, socialists in Germany did turn against the war (WWI) once the Czar was gone and did actively try to sabatoge the German war effort. This left the Jews of Germany open to blame because many, if not most, of the socialists leaders were Jewish.

The Dolchstosslegende. So is this legend true or not, Ned? Because if it isn't, I fail to see how you can blame the Jews for being slandered by right-wing propaganda. You said their actions "left them open to blame", but are they to blame? A simple 'Yes' or 'No' will suffice.

Now, you will admit that the Jews hated the Nazi's and for good reason.

I'm saying that they had good reasons to hate the Nazi's. Some were still deluded about Hitler's true aims, some even cheered when he started to dismantle the Treaty of Versailles, but they all suffered under the Nazi regime. However this doesn't turn them into terrorists. Apparently you're arguing that since Hitler persecuted the Jews, they must have been a dangerous minority. They weren't. To be honest, IMO they were far too meek and passive. But all this is besides the point. If all German Jews would have been paraplegic deaf-mutes, ergo completely harmless, Hitler would have persecuted them anyway. In fact, this would have added another reason for him to kill them all (Action T4)

But you say that Germany had no reason to believe they would do Germany any harm and that what happened to them in WWII was totally and exclusively the result of racisim?

Yes. "The Jews" were in no way a threat to Germany, and there was no reason to believe this besides right-wing propaganda. However, Hitler and his croons thought that the Jewish capitalist-communist conspiracy was a mortal threat to Germany anyway. That's why they were a bunch of imbeciles.

Nonsense.

Coming from you this is a compliment.

BTW, in the case of the Japanese in America, the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire and the Chechans in the USSR, do you also thinkg that the deportations and confinements in each case had nothing to do with the war and instead was just racism?

What does it matter? In case of Nazi Germany, it was all about racism.

[Ned]

ElTigre, no doubt the Nazi's were racists. But they and many other Germans blamed the Jews for Germany's loss in WWI. This was not true, of course, because American Jews were not that influencial and the strikes in Germany did not cripple their war effort. But still, they did damage.

But, you still contend that Germany's efforts to put Jews in concentraton camps and deport them was only about racism because the Jews, despite their hatred of the Nazi regime and their 1933 declaration of war, represented no threat to the German war effort?

You will note that the Germans also rounded up the far left (commies) and other dissendents as well. Was this about racism as well?

Indeed, anyone who had anything negative to say about Hitler was eventually rounded up.

Was all this about racisim?

No. It is more about the war and a totalitarian regime's extreme measures to win it. The USSR did the same to the Chechans. Ditto the Turks to the Armenians and FDR to the Japanese.

But, you say, the very people who hated the Nazis the most and who wanted to see her regime destroyed were not a threat and any treatment of them by Germany as enemies was not about "security" but about racism.

Nonsense and totally illogical.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Ned
molly, I think West did not care about the Jews or was overly influence by what they wanted or did not want.

None of which has anything to do with whether or not the leading Nazis believed their own propaganda.

At some point you're going to have to understand the difference between propaganda and opinion and facts.

That Goebbels could disseminate propaganda and that the Nazis could organize giant rallies and manufacture anti-Jewish and anti-Slav films and pamphlets and newspapers does not mean that all the Nazis believed them.

They were a tool- and as I've pointed out before, Bismarck knew in the Nineteenth Century the use of good propaganda- as a tool for weakening the opposition and as Otto Pflanze stated in his biography of Bismarck, an external enemy (which does bnot have to be a real, armed enemy) is mightily useful for uniting a divided people.

Thus, Bismarck could unite the aristocratic, anti-semitic, anti-Liberal Protestant Junkers with Roman Catholic Bavaria and the more liberal Rhinelanders against Napoleon III's France; or he could wage a Kulturkampf against the Catholics, or Jews, or the Liberals or the growing power of the Socialists.

This didn't mean that any of these groups were actively operating against the Kingdom of Prussia or the Kaiser or the German Confederation; it simply suited Bismarck's purposes, as Chancellor, and the then director of German unification under Prussia, to isolate his 'enemies' .

That is quite different from their not being enemies of Nazi Germany, which is the whole point of the TV comment.

I've read your comment- yet again you appear to imply that there was a degree of truth that 'TEH JOOZE' were the enemies of the Nazis.

Given the chain of communication- a television programme you watched, presumably without taking notes or getting a transcript of it, then to here on 'Poly through your 'memory', I'm afraid

Then the commentary said somethin like this

won't actually do for a verbatim record, of what was said or intended.

They were trying to suggest that the Jews were being persecuted by the Nazis for no reason other than race hatred

Oh haven't we been here before ?

I thought I'd gone into quite some detail about the growth of anti-semitism in the Nineteenth Century, in Germany and Eastern Europe.

The already existing 'race' hatred of the Jews in Europe supplanted an earlier religious hatred, and in many places went hand in hand.

The Jews were convenient scapegoats- in a financial crisis, in a civil disturbance, in a natural disaster.

The fact that the Nazis exploited race hatred for the Jews to achieve a political end and take power doesn't mean there was any substance to Nazi propaganda- which is what you fail to understand.

I think the average Jew no matter where in the world hated the Nazis with a passion and for good reason.

You can think what you like- you do seem to, despite evidence.

was a vicious cycle of hate, the same thing we see today between the Muslim world and Israel.

It was nothing of the sort.

And, just as the Nazi-Jewish cycle began as a result of WWI, so did the Muslim-Jewish hatefest.

That's news to any Jews aware of Jewish settlements attacked prior to World War I- which as I've shown elsewhere, did in fact happen, even under supposedly 'liberal' Ottoman rule.

Still, good to see you indulging in your 'fact-free assertion as history' mode again.

It's always amusing...

molly's propaganda about what I said.

My 'propaganda' ? Could you be more specific ? - after all, you're the one repeatedly going back to Holocaust denial websites in search of 'the truth', allegedly.

I have always said that I doubted the statements in that anti-Semite web site

Which 'one' would that be ?

I count at least two you've quoted from, 'Jew Watch' and the I.H.R. revisionist site.

With the Benjamin Freedman excerpt there was no appearance of doubt on your part- just a long factually unsupported passage from Freedman and unsupported assertions from you that Freedman 'negotiated' for 'TEH JOOZE' at Versailles !

Some doubt there, eh, Ned ?

I did in fact determine it was filled with lies.

Did it help that we pointed that out before you did the 'research' ?

British propaganda in the US

Oh blah blah blah, again. The way you write one might think that

a) only the British produced propaganda

b) only the British produced propaganda aimed at the United States

c) British propaganda was solely responsible for getting the United States to declare war on Imperial Germany.

What an interesting comparison your differing attitudes to British propaganda in World War I and antisemitic Nazi propaganda pre-World War II and during World War II are.

But then Nazi propaganda was German-produced, so perhaps that explains it.

As to WWII, I have consistently maintained that Britain cared not one whit about the Jews and did not go to war to save them or for any reason in any way remotely connected with the Jews.

Red herring. The British went to war for self-defence- thus managing to save Jewish refugees from Germany and elsewhere resident in Great Britain, and Great Britain's own Jewish population.

It's a little difficult to see how the British could have gone to war to ' save the Jews' since the extermination camps were not set up until after 1939, and there weren't to my knowledge British observers attached to the Einsatzgruppen in Poland and European Russia, the Baltic States and the Ukraine.

Perhaps in the Nediverse things were different...

Hitler's reasons for invading Poland had nothing to do with the Jews as well.

Really ? So there were no large numbers of Jews in the areas of Poland invaded by Nazi Germany.

And these non-existent large numbers of Jews weren't occupying buildings given over to Germans from outside Reich's boundaries who were then meant to Aryanize the new territory.

What an interesting alternate view of history.

Not what happened in our timeline of course, where Polish Jews and Christian Poles (insufficiently capable of being Aryanized) were simply ejected from their dwellings in cities and towns in Poland to make way for Germans from the Volga, the Baltic States and elsewhere.

except to the extent that Germany and its allies were trying to exterminate them.

Isn't that enough ?

After all, this is the first time in European history that the eradication of not just a people, but a people's culture and artefacts has been attempted, on a massive scale.

In no aspect, therefor, did WWI (America's entry) have anything to do with the Jews

Something we'd worked out for ourselves, but thanks for the heads up....

On the contrary, though, socialists in Germany did turn against the war (WWI) once the Czar was gone and did actively try to sabatoge the German war effort.

Yawn. Still waiting for the evidence for this.

Friedrich Ebert (Socialist) was a supporter of the monarchy, Max of Baden, last Imperial Chancellor, had said he could rely only on the Socialists to save the Kaiser, and the S.P.D. used the Army to crush the Spartacists.

Perhaps it was some other unnamed 'German Socialists' you had in mind- ones who hadn't supported the war effort and hadn't voted war credits.

This left the Jews of Germany open to blame because many, if not most, of the socialists leaders were Jewish.

Yawn x 2 .

Amazingly 'in depth' though your knowledge of domestic Imperial German politics isn't, you still haven't named any of these German Jewish Socialist leaders nor managed to say which strikes they led and where in Germany they were located, nor indeed when.


Should we all hold our breath, or is that against clinical advice ?

Now, you will admit that the Jews hated the Nazi's and for good reason.

'TEH JOOZE' or German Jews ? At which point are all of Germany's Jews or the world's Jews meant to have started hating the Nazis ?

But you say that Germany had no reason to believe they would do Germany any harm and that what happened to them in WWII was totally and exclusively the result of racisim?

I fail to see why you persist in making inaccurate comparisons between the plight of Japanese Americans in World War II and Armenians pre-1900 and post-1914 and Germany's Jews.

You seem to have all your 'facts' about the Armenian deportations and massacres (and if they were 'brutal' how does that compare with the Auschwitz death march or medical experimentation without anaesthetic ?) from a television programme you watched.

Previously you had attempted to imply that the British were somehow implicit in the Armenian massacres, unaware as you were that Armenians had been killed in the 1890s too.

I think we can treat your continued tedious and invalid comparisons between Nazi Germany's treatment of Jews and the fate of Japanese Americans and Armenians as just so much

Nonsense.

ElTigre, no doubt the Nazi's were racists.

They were ! They admitted it themselves. It's not like there's any room for doubt. They had racist science, cataloguing who 'looked' Aryan and who 'looked' Jewish and deciding that behaviour could be based or predicted by supposed 'racial' genetic features.

But they and many other Germans blamed the Jews for Germany's loss in WWI.

Yes, but only after years of propaganda and after failed attempts by Nazis to win power in elections and after the outlawing of dissent and the jailing of anti-Nazis and a worldwide depression.

So this notion that Nazi propaganda was somehow based on facts, or was immediately effective post-WWI because there was perceived to be an element of truth in it, is garbage.

and their 1933 declaration of war

Still believing antisemitic websites, eh ?

I think it has been demonstrated to any reasonable person's satifaction that a headline in one British mass market newspaper does not constitute proof that Jews as a whole in Germany or worldwide 'declared war' on the Nazi regime.

Really, you'll have to do better than recycled antisemitic trash.

Who was this 'Judea' that is supposed to have declared war ?

Who were the leaders, where were they based, what were their weapons ?

Try not to be quite so gullible or willing to be led by prejudice.

You will note that the Germans also rounded up the far left (commies) and other dissendents as well.

And Jehovah's Witnesses, priests, nuns, university students, people who told jokes the Nazis didn't like....

Was this about racism as well?

As priests and students don't constitute a 'race', no. That doesn't preclude the Nazis oppression of the Jews from being based on their supposed membership of a race.

Logic clearly not a strong point either, eh ?

totally illogical.

You have the market cornered there.

[ElTigre]

Originally posted by Ned

ElTigre, no doubt the Nazi's were racists. But they and many other Germans blamed the Jews for Germany's loss in WWI. This was not true, of course, because American Jews were not that influencial and the strikes in Germany did not cripple their war effort.

Great. Noted.

But still, they did damage.

Like all the other non-Jews who participated in these strikes.

But, you still contend that Germany's efforts to put Jews in concentraton camps and deport them was only about racism

Yes.

because the Jews, despite their hatred of the Nazi regime

Even if they all hated the Nazis (I think they were rather terrified) THAT DOES NOT MEAN THAT THEY WERE A THREAT TO THE REGIME.

and their 1933 declaration of war,

Your so-called declaration of war is utter bull****, and we already called you on that.

represented no threat to the German war effort?

Exactly.

You will note that the Germans also rounded up the far left (commies) and other dissendents as well. Was this about racism as well?[

Now here is something to note for you: Hitler also killed thousands of homosexuals.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homosexuals_in_Nazi_Germany

Hitler killed tens of thousands of people with disabilities, among them children and infants.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_T4

Were those groups threats to the regime, too?? If not, why did the Nazis kill them?

The persecution of political enemies and dissidents was not about racism, no. But the Genocide was ONLY about racism.

Indeed, anyone who had anything negative to say about Hitler was eventually rounded up.

Yes, but the Jews were special: they didn't even have to say something negative about Hitler in order to be exterminated. Their opinion didn't matter.

No. It is more about the war and a totalitarian regime's extreme measures to win it. The USSR did the same to the Chechans. Ditto the Turks to the Armenians and FDR to the Japanese.

Even if this is true for the USSR, the Turks and the USA, it is not true for Nazi Germany.

But, you say, the very people who hated the Nazis the most and who wanted to see her regime destroyed were not a threat and any treatment of them by Germany as enemies was not about "security" but about racism.

That is a good summary of my position, yes. I stand by every word I said.

Nonsense and totally illogical.

YES!!! EXACTLY!!! The Nazi ideology is complete nonsense and totally illogical! They acted like loons, and there's no way to explain their cruelty, their hatred and the sheer madness of their actions! Finally you understand.

[Ned]

El Tigre, the core of the Nazi party was lead by a bunch of thugs who only cared about themselves, not about Germany or Aryanism or anything else. They were lead by a racist, Hitler, who was bound and determined to exterminate the Jews once he could no longer simply move them out of Europe. That the German people allowed these thugs into power is shameful, but it does show blind willingness of the German people to give power to the party who most wanted to undo the Treaty of Versailles.

Had the allies been magnanimous in victory at the close of WWI, none of this would have happened. They were so caught up in their own propaganda about the "Hun" that they were consumed by hatred for Germany post war. Every ally, except the United States, was consumed by lust for getting a piece of Central Powers' domain. On top of that, they also wanted a defeated and crushed Germany to pay reparations.

This was too much even for the United States to stomach. We did not sign the treaty of Versailles and instead enacted a series of Neutrality Acts that were intended to prevent warmongers, as Wilson and Teddy Roosevelt were now thought to be, from getting America into a war where its vital interests were not at stake.

But the harsh peace had its inevitable and highly predictable consequences in Germany. The German people wanted revenge, put the Nazi's into power and supported them for that purpose.

We really need to learn from this. I thought we had, because at the end of WWII, the United States spent billions to rebuild Germany and Japan to alleviate problems caused by losing a war and having one's economy virtually destroyed. We realized the enemy was not the people of Germany (Japan), but the government which was no longer in power. The only way forward to guarantee peace was to gain the allegience and support of the defeated peoples, not their hatred.

But, as we see here from this thread, whatever lesson we should have learned from history has been lost. Germany is again the arch villain and Britain the savior of democracy in the world. Its (and its allies) actions to impose Versailles on Germany and defend it by eventually DOW on Germany in 1939 are applauded as right and just when the opposite is so clearly true.

[ElTigre]

I notice that - for no apparent reason - you have now shifted the discussion from Hitler's antisemitism to the causes of Hitler's rise to power. Also you haven't answered a single question I have asked you in my last 2 posts. Until you do so I'm not inclined to reply to your last post, which would start a completely different discussion.

For your convenience, here are the questions again:

The Dolchstosslegende. So is this legend true or not, Ned? Because if it isn't, I fail to see how you can blame the Jews for being slandered by right-wing propaganda. You said their actions "left them open to blame", but are they to blame? A simple 'Yes' or 'No' will suffice.

Now here is something to note for you: Hitler also killed thousands of homosexuals.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homose...in_Nazi_Germany

Hitler killed tens of thousands of people with disabilities, among them children and infants.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_T4

Were those groups threats to the regime, too?? If not, why did the Nazis kill them?

Alternatively, you could simply admit that there was no "vicious cycle of hate" that caused the Genocide, that "the Jews" did nothing to deserve their treatment and that their murderous persecution was a foregone conclusion when Hitler came to power in 1933.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Ned
That the German people allowed these thugs into power is shameful, but it does show blind willingness of the German people to give power to the party who most wanted to undo the Treaty of Versailles.

I believe I've already covered this; 'the German people' did not 'allow' the Nazis to take power.

Some Germans followed the Nazis. At no point did a majority of the electorate in a free election ever vote for the Nazis.

Many principled Germans were amongst the first victims of the Nazis, being detained in concentration camps from 1933 onwards- the book, 'The Nazis: A Warning From History' contains interviews with former prisoners of the Nazis as well as former Nazis.

What is most telling about the series is that instead of demonising the whole German population (which is useful for those who seek to lay the blame for Nazism on ALL Germans) it shows how 'ordinary' Germans were just like 'ordinary' British people or Americans or Russians- and that race prejudice is not confined to membership of the German Volk or nation or state.

Certainly Stalin's post-war purges of Jews in Russia and the Soviet Bloc alone indicates that.

Had the allies been magnanimous in victory at the close of WWI, none of this would have happened.

You simply have no way of proving that, but it is again an interesting ploy to shift the blame from anti-semites and failed militarists to the Allies.

There were, as I've pointed out AGAIN and AGAIN, antisemitic parties and politicians in Imperial Germany before World War I, and German and European Jews attracted blame and condemnation, across France, Germany and Russia and into Austria-Hungary.

Jews are and were convenient scapegoats, whether assimilated and members of German society and the haut monde like Ballin, Haber and Rathenau or the religious and distinctively dressed Jews in the enclaves or ghettoes or shtetls of Eastern Europe.

Antisemitism does nto require logic- people were for or against Dreyfus not based on the evidence 'against' him, but because he was Jewish.

Some of the French rightists said he was part of a German Jewish conspiracy against France.

Cossacks and Poles didn't need a logical reason to be antisemitic- their 'justification' is there in the Bible-

Then answered all the people, and said, His blood be on us, and on our children.

Matthew 27:25

Every ally, except the United States, was consumed by lust for getting a piece of Central Powers' domain.

Really ? And which parts of Austria-Hungary were France and Great Britain 'consumed by lust' for ?

This was too much even for the United States to stomach. We did not sign the treaty of Versailles

No, the United States signed the Treaty of Trianon.

You haven't read much about the deliberations at Versailles or after, have you ?

What were the exact reasons for the United States not ratifying the Treaties of Versailles or St. Germain ?

I know.

The German people wanted revenge, put the Nazi's into power and supported them for that purpose.

More nonsense. 'The German people' (sic) thirsted so badly for revenge, they waited only... 16 years ?

Very patient indeed.

We really need to learn from this.

No, you need to learn some real history, not this made-up nonsense you keep spouting.

Germany is again the arch villain and Britain the savior of democracy in the world.

Blah de blah. Sooner or later, the real Ned, Brit-despiser Ned, pops out his head just to let us know where he thinks all the blame lies.

Huzzah!

[Ned]

Originally posted by ElTigre
I notice that - for no apparent reason - you have now shifted the discussion from Hitler's antisemitism to the causes of Hitler's rise to power. Also you haven't answered a single question I have asked you in my last 2 posts. Until you do so I'm not inclined to reply to your last post, which would start a completely different discussion.

For your convenience, here are the questions again:





Alternatively, you could simply admit that there was no "vicious cycle of hate" that caused the Genocide, that "the Jews" did nothing to deserve their treatment and that their murderous persecution was a foregone conclusion when Hitler came to power in 1933.

I think it irrelevant whether the Jews caused the socialists to do what they did or not. The mere fact that jews were prominent in the socialist ranks left them open to right-wing German propaganda that was trying to shift the blame for the lost war to both the socialists and the jews.

The Nazi's targeted both during WWII, not just the Jews.

As to everyone else on your list, that was the euthanasia program go wild. It started with the terminally ill. It ended with anyone who was deemed undesirable in any fashion, including the old, the mentally ill, the homosexuals, etc.

I have started a number of threads on this topic asking just where and how we draw the line on euthanasia once we decide it is ok for society to kill innocents for the betterment of society.

[Ned]

molly, for anti-Semitism to turn into death camps, one needs a totalitarian regime and perhaps a war. I have never denied the Europeans as a whole and particularly the Germans were not anti-Semitic. I have just contended that Versailles lead to the rise of the Nazi's and to WWII. Had there been a better treaty to end WWI, there would have been no Nazi party and no WWII and no Holocaust.

FDR, it seems, actually planned for the USSR and the US to occupy Europe post WWII to put a permanent end to European imperialism which he blamed for both wars.

It seems he was right.