Lee Harris, prognosticator
In 2004, Lee Harris wrote a book called Civilization and Its Enemies.
It’s a relatively short volume; only 220 pages in hardcover, and the print’s not small. But it’s dense with thought-provoking ideas. I don’t agree with everything Harris says, but I agree with a great deal of it, and everything he says is worth pondering.
Including this (and again, understand that this was written over ten years ago):
When we think of Hitler or Mussolini or Lenin, we think of them strutting grandiloquently across the stage of history, magnified many times their original size in order to fit the huge dimensions suggested by their gigantic effect on the history of the human race. From such great effects one is tempted to deduce a great cause. But such is not the case.
They all started the same way—as small clubs attended by insignificant men, an uninspiring nucleus of fanatics devoted to the same cause. What gave them their power—aside from sheer dumb luck—was their deliberate deployment of ruthlessness. They stopped at nothing, and nothing held them back. Both agents and victims of a fantasy ideology, they transformed themselves through the power of group hypnosis into men who were able to overcome all the inhibitions of their own middle-class and often prosperous and cultured backgrounds.
To permit any group of this nature to decide the next stage of history is insane, and yet this is precisely what would happen if the United States were to disengage from the world.
I might disagree with “nothing held them back” (some things did, at least for a while). I might also disagree with whether they overcame those “inhibitions of their own backgrounds,” because in sociopaths those inhibitions don’t have to be overcome, they don’t operate in the first place. But it’s that last sentence that caught my eye: “if the United States were to disengage from the world.”
Lee goes on:
Ruthlessness has no root causes. It is not engendered by poverty or illiteracy or a lack of education or the Muslim religion or the concept of jihad. It is a technique for gaining power. That is what it started as and what it will always be.
That is why we must beware of giving ruthlessness a reason to be ruthless. For the moment you have done this, for however noble a purpose, you have fallen into its own fantasy world, and you are seeing an act of catastrophic senseless killing as a legitimate expression of a political grievance. To mistake ruthlessness for desperation is the fundamental error of those whose sympathies are unclouded by judgment.
You see it all around you. It is read as a fatal weakness by the enemy (any enemy, be it Communism or jihadis). And it probably is.
[NOTE: Harris has also written a book entitled The Next American Civil War: The Populist Revolt Against the Liberal Elite. It was written in 2010, partly as a reaction to the Tea Party. I haven’t read it, but it seems prescient, too, since the title describes the 2016 campaign, at least on the Republican side.]
“You see it all around you. It is read as a fatal weakness by the enemy (any enemy, be it Communism or jihadis). And it probably is.”
And yet we see, over and over again, the fact that ruthlessness eradicates whole peoples and religious groups and populations while waiting for an equal ruthlessness to rise up and eradicate it.
The problem is not using ruthlessness on the ruthless, but in waiting so long to use it.
this is not correct… as it leaves out their connections to things that made their groups a lot more than just lucky bast-ards.
look to our modern history of groups and things tagged by various states to do things for them. just as the KGB and CIA have selected and used internal groups these groups also had such connections sometimes burning the candle at both ends in terms of playing two sides against the middle
the problem i have with such authors is that they either are very ignorant of the subjects they write, or they are very careful to remove any mention, hint, or such from their points and make some other claim.
spies and clandestine workers are not called spooks for nothing… they are ghosts, and who reports on ghosts..
his whole family was always in trouble for revolutionary actions for decades. he was not part of some rag tag coffee klatsch, or such as the author says, which is why his points on ruthlessness are quite idiotic and BACKWARDS.
the same is true of hitler as well…
ruthlessness was always there in history, and only the modern age and milqutoast edumacated people would think of it as something to discuss this way. its very silly…
the origins of the word have in it that you have no pity, and the idea that people may act without pity is not something new. not even in war, the romans, jewish wariors, pharoahs, aztecs, and on and on were all very ruthless.
You see it all around you. It is read as a fatal weakness by the enemy (any enemy, be it Communism or jihadis). And it probably is.
no, its not a fatal anyting, its a winning thing…
which is why leftist academics and people who have not studied war and all the altercations that have gone on might imagine otherwise.
in fact, the opposite of that statement is whats true… the ruthless secure a win by vanquishing enemies completely. which is why the old custom of murdering whole familial lines rather than just the guy that did something. this was the norm up until the modern age… (but even now is still practiced).
this is what happens when people accept what pacifists claim!!! and especially after things like the Geneva Convention… which is what created limits to make this seem opposite of what it is.
It was written in 2010, partly as a reaction to the Tea Party. I haven’t read it, but it seems prescient, too, since the title describes the 2016 campaign, at least on the Republican side
not very prescient.. not if ayers friends shot up a mall for a brinks trucks with the black national socialists for the purpose of funding a race war. and even helter skelter was for the purpose of starting a race war… and the points of h rap brown, is for a race war.. and farakhan promotes that same thing. and hegelian dialectics would then demonstrate that the domainant held down (whites), would be attacked by the lesser (blacks) once they were lifted up and embolden by selective prosecution and the games.
such a thing would only SEEM prescient to people who do not know what has been written in the areas where, as noted above, the journalists purposefully or in ignorance, ignore what comes from billions and billions of dollars spent every year with our idea that nothing comes of it.
Emerging in 1969 as the most militant wing of the SDS’s Revolutionary Youth Movement, the fledgling Weatherman issued a “manifesto” eschewing nonviolence and calling instead for armed opposition to U.S. policies; advocating the overthrow of capitalism; exhorting white radicals to trigger a worldwide revolution by fighting in the streets of the “mother country”; and proclaiming that the time had come to launch a race war against the “white” United States on behalf of the non-white Third World.
you only have had to read the newsletters of the undergound which even Charles manson did… and then connect that the people that wrote that, plante bombs, and are connected for nearly 100 years are in office… (which i have long said to read that stuff… then one might not give such credit to someone who did bother and writes from it)
“if the United States were to disengage from the world.”
Who would say, seriously, the United States had engaged the world? Certainly they leave a large footprint on it but otherwise? Who would say they had engaged the ruthless of the world — in a ruthless way — as they had Hitler and Tojo? The U S is too enamored of measured response. The problem with measured responses is they are measured to mollify, at minimum, a half-dozen interests other than ridding the world of ruthless tinpots. If the tinpots are indeed ruthless, if, moreover, they are indeed, evil, dispatch the evil and dispatch the message around the axis. If not, pack up the materiel and go home. There are skirmishes there already and no shortage of evil.
this is an aside and i am sorry, but i have no place else to put it to know if someone else knows anything that is happening… or not happening, or what… as these things have not been heard for as long as 14 years or so…
skyking… familiar?
Sky King was an American radio and TV series. Its lead character was Arizona rancher and aircraft pilot Schuyler “Sky” King.
but thats not the weirdness, some background first:
USAF High Frequency Global Communications System
and
so whats the odd thing?
On SKYKING (8992 or 11175 kHz USB) a call sign called “COLLAPSE” which has not been heard since 2001 has just broadcasted 4 messages to numbered stations/units in the last few minutes
“FUXEBOX” and “Reykjavik,” have also broadcast in the last few days and they haven’t been heard since 1991 (collapse of the Soviet Union).
“COLLAPSE” has sent 3 messages in the last few minutes.
1) QSWOR2 QSWOR2YQ4PZNWNO56KOPHGWWZEK64S
2) QSSFB7M3ZF2G6UGRF4KJSAIK7WWTFP
3) QSHF5J QSHF5JO2CTJBNQ4KJVF6KPNJOGZI60
Message Four from “FLATTOP!” (ANOTHER STATION NOT HEARD IN YEARS!): QSXD5OFPUOAWOHSKF7QBAX4GF5VRFK
ANYONE here know about this and other special radio broadcast messages? (these usually are one time pad communications that go one way to the listeners to recieve, and no one can tell who is the real recipient).
These are related to things like “number stations”
which some of the most famous, like the “Lincolnshire Poacher” are very well known (including where they come from), others not so much, or unknown. there are lots of others like the “Atencié³n” station or the “Russian Man” station
sorry… but since i dont know where else to ask the question where the answers may be reasonable, not wacko, i put it here…
with russia running war again, isis claiming lots of operatives in the US waiting for orders, and china this morning playing chicken with US military… anything is possible.
George Pal Says: October 15th, 2015 at 2:01 pm The U S is too enamored of measured response. The problem with measured responses is they are measured to mollify, at minimum, a half-dozen interests other than ridding the world of ruthless tinpots.
This is ALSO untrue… its a belief that is not grounded in the facts that are its source. for the US to act like russia in this, is for the US to open its president to be prosecuted for war crimes.
IE. international law is the reason, not US love
what the US has been enamoured of is following the law, and submitting themselves to that, which in the same incident but by russia, they would say, ok, come arrest me…
he International Criminal Court (ICC or ICCt) s an intergovernmental organization and international tribunal that sits in The Hague in the Netherlands. The ICC has the jurisdiction to prosecute individuals for the international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes.
the feminist ideas are what governs this but where they talk about men and women, the ICC puts stuff in terms of states and nations.
so where a feminist would say that a relationship with a superior to an inferior is one that, due to inequality, is rife with abuse… the icc would say the large country would be similar if it acted within its ability.
[i have discussed this at length before]
despite the US not ratifing it, it does follow it and its predecessor points before its creation. all under the idea of just war… (and just war theory)
The establishment of an international tribunal to judge political leaders accused of international crimes was first proposed during the Paris Peace Conference in 1919 following the First World War by the Commission of Responsibilities.
Following the Second World War, the allied powers established two ad hoc tribunals to prosecute axis power leaders accused of war crimes. The International Military Tribunal, which sat in Nuremberg, prosecuted German leaders while the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo prosecuted Japanese leaders. In 1948 the United Nations General Assembly first recognised the need for a permanent international court to deal with atrocities of the kind prosecuted after the Second World War
Article 6 defines the crime of genocide (but does not include democide)
Article 7 defines crimes against humanity as acts “committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack”
[this is where we are so afraid to have collateral damage, and then have such a leftist run tribunal then call up leaders and do a political jig over it]
Article 8 defines war crimes depending on whether an armed conflict is either international (which generally means it is fought between states) or non-international (which generally means that it is fought between non-state actors, such as rebel groups, or between a state and such non-state actors). In total there are 74 war crimes listed in article 8
if you want to know where the bush committed war crimes thing comes from, its from this. not from opinion!!!!!!
There are 11 crimes which constitute grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions and which are applicable only to international armed conflicts
1 Wilful killing
2 Torture
3 Inhuman treatment
4 Biological experiments
5 Wilfully causing great suffering
6 Destruction and appropriation of property
7 Compelling service in hostile forces
8 Denying a fair trial
9 Unlawful deportation and transfer
10 Unlawful confinement
11 Taking hostages
so waterboarding was drummed up so they could apply number 2… using full force of arms, instead of what was said to start this post, would uncure 3, 5, 6, 7 at the very least…
There are seven crimes which constitute serious violations of article 3 common to the Geneva Conventions and which are applicable only to non-international armed conflicts
1 Murder
2 Mutilation
3 Cruel treatment
4 Torture
5 Outrages upon personal dignity
6 Taking hostages
7 Sentencing or execution without due process
remember the female soldier and the images of the naked prisoners.. that was offense 5
in United Nations General Assembly Resolution 3314 of 1974 and include the following acts when committed by one state against another state
1 Invasion or attack by armed forces against territory
2 Military occupation of territory
3 Annexation of territory
4 Bombardment against territory
5 Use of any weapons against territory
6 Blockade of ports or coasts
7 Attack on the land, sea, or air forces or marine and air fleets
8 The use of armed forces which are within the territory of another state by agreement, but in contravention of the conditions of the agreement
9 Allowing territory to be used by another state to perpetrate an act of aggression against a third state
10 Sending armed bands, groups, irregulars, or mercenaries to carry out acts of armed force
yeah, russia always violates treaties… an so on, and there is no huge russian based political machine to protest and make issue of it against the state in russia, but the US is not russia.
how would you act to accomplish goals and NOT violate these things when fighting a war?
so are we enamoured, or are we handcuffed by international laws like the new obama TPP? [funny how international communists are writing international law to handcuff states that believe in lex rex, over rex lex)
oh, and the idea that ruthlessness is about gaining power is wrong too… you can be ruthless in committing an abortion… you can be ruthless against deasease (what power comes from that).
acting without pity is not just a means of power
and being ruthless is not a means TO power but a means of preserving the power you have gotten. if you use ruthlessness without the power to do so, you will find people to be quite ruthless in preventing you.
“That is why we must beware of giving ruthlessness a reason to be ruthless. For the moment you have done this, for however noble a purpose, you have fallen into its own fantasy world, …”
WW2 was quit ruthless. The subsequent wars weren’t (Korea luckily enough ending in a stalemate, Indochina being lost, …).
The quality of a civilization isn’t that it cannot be ruthless at times but the boundaries it sets to that ruthlessness. For instance, I don’t admire the USA for say a Hiroshima or a Nagasaki (I still consider them war crimes, but then in war sh*t happens but one shouldn’t be proud about it) but the nature of its occupation of Germany and Japan.
Christian European civilization didn’t survive the different onslaughts on it (islam, vikings, Magyars, mongols, islam again, …) by being nice (but what is remembered by the nitwits are things like the Crusades, …), but it had moral boundaries to its actions (it may have broken them from time to time, but they were always there).
The author doesn’t seem, at least in the quote, make a difference between being ruthless and being criminal. I would rather say that being ruthless is at times necessary for survival, but it will exact its price.
There were a lot of ruthless men in the history of Europe. But no Hitlers, Lenins, Trotskys or Stalins until, well, Hitler or Lenin or Trotsky or Stalin (Mussolini really doesn’t make the list). So what changed? Perhaps the “price” of WW1 was a moral collapse with them as a result.
The question isn’t academic. If the situation as it is today will be turned around then it will inevitably involve “ruthlessness”. Suppose the Swedish should revolt against their own government imposed suicide and fight back don’t you think that it will mean “ruthless” acts? And there may be a big penalty for that, but what is the alternative?
I pretty much disagree with Lee Harris’ entire premise. Hitler was voted into power because the German people had been steeped in the necessary philosophy for decades. The citizens of the Weimar Republic “knew” that reason was impotent, that instead they should be guided by their emotions, and that living for the State was their highest calling; They were ready and eager to elect a “strong man” like Hitler.
Of course that kind of thing can’t happen here…
Artfldgr:
for the US to act like russia in this, is for the US to open its president to be prosecuted for war crimes.
How does Russia always insinuate itself into the argument? I had not suggested the U S act as Russia does or as any one else might act. When we had been attacked by the Empire of the Sun, and NAZI Germany declared war on us we made little concession to measured response. We bombed Mannheim, Dresden, Berlin into ash and rubble — including the innocents. We fire bombed Tokyo and nuked two of the Empire’s cities — including the innocents. When an ally sought to keep secret a secret they’d uncovered, they would not spare Coventry to have the vital fact known — and innocents had been sacrificed.
My point is that we not engage in military adventurism for anything excepting the safety of the U S and its citizens in which case we are graced with the latitude given us by self-preservation. A case study:
The 9/11 murderers were almost all Saudis. While the towers were still standing and the smoke still billowed, Saudi nationals in this country had taken to bugging out. It mattered not to Mr Bush that the Royal House had been the chief, perhaps the sole financier of, and exporter of that part of Islam that is indisputably radical — Wahhabism. The Royal House may also lay claim to having partially or fully financed most of the mosques and Islamic centers across the West. But Mr Bush, as certain of the pretense of ‘religion’ of ‘peace’ as any Royal member of the House, proceeded on to Iraq and Afghanistan bypassing Saudi Arabia which ought to have been the primary target. The Kaaba, indeed, all of Mecca should have been incinerated to a glassy surface.
And what happened in Iraq and Afghanistan — how had we engaged the enemy? With rules of engagement — don’t piss, shit or fart in the direction of Mecca. Oh, and if you see someone planting IEDs — DON’T Shoot — collateral damage is unacceptable. One sees immediately the difference between self-righteous holy adventures and self-defense and justified retribution.
People like Pal like to talk about foreign policy and the world, but the actual behavior they end up creating is the Assassination of Diem. That’s how it actually turns out as when they attempt to isolate and disengage.
People on the American and foreign side won’t stop dying. They actually start dying more under these kinds of people and their policies.
Ymarsakar,
Read your comment @ 4:12 and see if you can make sense of it. I can’t
Lee Harris also wrote, in 2007, Suicide of Reason, Radical Islam’s Threat to the Enlightenment. Ayaan Hirsi Ali wrote an interesting, lengthy review of it, in which she explains that “Harris is pessimistic in a way that Enlightenment thinkers were not.” Indeed, Harris quotes Darwin in the preface, “Nothing is easier to admit in words the truth of the universal struggle for life, or more difficult – at least I have found it so – than constantly to bear this conclusion in mind.
http://antiwar.com/lind/index.php?articleid=1702
Here’s another 2004 article, by S Lind, concerning 4th G W Fare.
He’s still active, btw, but not in obvious ways. In very unobvious ways I think.
Read your comment @ 4:12 and see if you can make sense of it. I can’t
That’s natural. Only people who society views as crazy can make sense of independent crazies that operate outside society’s imagination and writ.
Are you crazy? No? Then you wouldn’t understand, now would you.
They were ready and eager to elect a “strong man” like Hitler.
As Neo’s posts have mentioned before over the years, Hitler only got a few percentage of the MP seats in the parliament of Germany at the time. What made him Chancellor is that the German powers that be decided he was a good fit to be leader, and got Hindenburg to bow out. The riots and instability at the time was creating an “emergency” which “needed a solution”. Hitler was that solution, even though his party didn’t even top 25% of the total seats, if I recall.
In other words, Germany had ‘cuckservatives’ which sold out the country to a dictator. Rather than it not happening here, it already has…
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jvdelong/2015/08/03/thinking-about-a-third-term/
People linked to that here or maybe they were just talking about this subject. Third term for Hussein Obola?
Americans would never, ever, acclaim something like that right, I mean besides FDR.
[J]ust 30% of Likely U.S. Voters say they would vote for the president if he ran for a third term. Sixty-three percent (63%) would not. . . .
Most Democrats (57%) would vote to give Obama a third term. Ninety-three percent (93%) of Republicans, 68% of voters not affiliated with either major party — and 32% of Democrats — would not.
Americans would never, ever support something like that, right.
It’s all hypothetical “craziness” right.
On another note, history of Islam is pretty vital for understanding what it means for the Leftist alliance to be allies of Islamic Jihad, for America’s domestic security.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_Qpy0mXg8Y
Why are Westerners afraid of Islam?
Hint: Why are victims of sexual torture and sex slavery, afraid of their captors…
Ruthless, thy name is Hillary.
Ymarsakar,
‘Crazy’ ehh. Someone must have hit a raw nerve and it still throbs. Don’t worry. It’ll get better; the hurt feelings will pass.
Phil D,
Two of my uncles (RIP) and my father inlaw (RIP) fought in the island campaign, including Okinawa. They were destined for the invasion of the main islands. Fortunately they never had to set foot on Kyushu, Shikoku, or Honshu.
I’ll take my 8 cousins and their children and grandchildren, and especially my wife and our children and granchildren over your war crimes.
Well Ymarsakar, history records that the NSDAP garnered 43,9% in the 1933 election the best result any party had ever had in the Republic of Weimar from 1919 to 1933. Is this wrong?
hi meo.
letme make it as simple as possible:
ALL utopianists are capable of ruthlessness and hence genocide because people who believe they can usher in a perfect age are of course willing to do whatever they deem necessary to get whatever and whoever is in their way …. OUT of their way.
Socialists and islamists are both utopianists and hence their diathesis for genocide.
Conservatives accept the imperfectability of human society because we accept the imperfect nature – the UNICITY – of each individuals; therefore we aim for limited government and limited collective goals and maximum non-antisocial individual liberty based on the Hillelian Golden Rule: “Do NOT do unto others as would not have done to you.”
Conservatives don’t want politicians or bureaucrats to have a lot of power because we believe they cannot use it perfectly. Leftists believe that they (the nomenklatura, the elite) can wield maximal power perfectly, though they also accept that the 1%, the most effective people in our economy, are not capable of wielding power properly and need to be “contained” by the state…. one way or another…
In other words: the basic clash is between collectivistic utopianists and individualistic realists.
One group commits genocide and the other fights against it.
snopercod:
The German people did not vote Hitler into power. Look it up. In a way, it would be much less frightening if they had.
Also, as I wrote in the post, I disagree with a number of things Harris says. But the points he makes are worth pondering and discussing.
George Pal,
Your comment reminds me of a piece from Neo’s Steve Beren interview:
Targeting Saudi Arabia the nation would miss the mark for several reasons, one being that the al Qaeda/ISIS terrorists are Qutbists rather than Wahhabists.
The grounds for the Afghanistan intervention, Operation Enduring Freedom, are obvious.
Again, the law and policy, fact basis of Operation Iraqi Freedom. The casus belli for OIF, Iraq’s breach of the Gulf War ceasefire, included Saddam’s terrorism.
Correction:
Your comment reminds me of a piece from Neo’s Steve Beren interview on the Left’s antiwar strategy:
Phil D Says:
October 15th, 2015 at 2:37 pm
“That is why we must beware of giving ruthlessness a reason to be ruthless. For the moment you have done this, for however noble a purpose, you have fallen into its own fantasy world, …”
WW2 was quit ruthless. The subsequent wars weren’t (Korea luckily enough ending in a stalemate, Indochina being lost, …).
%%%
Sadly your supposition about Korea could not possibly be more wrong.
1) The Reds were staggeringly ruthless. Korea saw everything this side of cannibalism.
2) While almost universally misunderstood in the West, the Korean war was actually two (2) wars:
A) The North Korean Army phase. That entire army was, essentially, destroyed by MacArthur. It never fought any significant engagements thereafter. Survivors and fresh conscripts were used to ‘image out’ the Chi Com armies.
B) The Chinese Reds counter-attacked the UN armies with SOUTHERN Chinese armies — ONLY.
This is central to the entire remainder of the, so called, Korean war. For Mao was getting rid of // liquidating entire the armies that had previously been under the command of the Nationalists. These poor fellows were unable to escape to Taiwan.
Mao did not use his loyal cadres — his Northern armies. They stayed behind the Yalu river… through the entire war. They were never committed.
(!)
The purpose of the Chinese intervention was lost upon Western military thought. There is absolutely no record of any Western general appreciating what Mao was doing… going on for years.
The ultimate result of such befuddlement was:
Pork Chop Hill (Peck, 1959)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0053183/
The film is actually a docu-drama the characters are not fictive at all.
( I saw the film in original release. My Farther started crying at one point. It was giving him flash-backs to June 6, 1944 the leading engineering wave at Omaha Beach. He was sailing ahead of all the infantry so well depicted by Spielberg. )
Lt. Joe Clemons’ befuddlement merely echoed a confusion that went all the way to Ridgway.
Even decades after the war, Western historians are too dull to figure it out. The reality is too repellent.
Mao was executing entire armies — using the UN army as the firing squad.
THIS… This was the reason for the famous suicide attacks. Attacks that crammed (Southern) Chinese troops into kill boxes for UN guns.
( BTW, this is where and when the term ‘kill boxes’ got its life.)
Artillery fire — kill boxes — became the standard UN ‘solution’ for Chinese human wave attacks.
To repeat, these were totally hopeless attacks. Lt. Joe Clemons could NOT wrap his mind around such a senseless slaughter.
But, to Mao, there was nothing senseless about it.
The blood letting was so intense, it echoed for years afterward by punishing the southern Chinese economy. This effect lasted for a generation.
Ironically, Washington feared that Peking would intervene in Vietnam. Yet, after the drubbing administered to the Reds in Korea, the LAST thing Mao wished for would be to send HIS favorite boys under American guns.
And his southern armies had never really been re-constituted. That was HIS national policy.
The North Koreans are also terrified of American guns. MacArthur utterly destroyed all of Kim’s armies in one strategic move.
THIS… This is the reason why Pyongyang is obsessed with maintaining a fanstastic, oversized, standing army.
Watching Saddam’s army fold its tent in the blink of an eye merely reinforced Pyongyang paranoia. (!)
You must revise your assertion: Korea was a real horror show.
parker Says:
October 15th, 2015 at 5:51 pm
I know the feeling. My Father was destined for the KantÅ.
It’s largely unremarked, but the American 1st Army was being redeployed from Europe to participate in Coronet.
As the single most powerful American army — it was aimed straight at Tokyo.
Lucky 1st Army !
Ymarsakar Says:
October 15th, 2015 at 5:34 pm
They were ready and eager to elect a “strong man” like Hitler.
As Neo’s posts have mentioned before over the years, Hitler only got a few percentage of the MP seats in the parliament of Germany at the time. What made him Chancellor is that the German powers that be decided he was a good fit to be leader, and got Hindenburg to bow out. The riots and instability at the time was creating an “emergency” which “needed a solution”. Hitler was that solution, even though his party didn’t even top 25% of the total seats, if I recall.
Hindenburg DIED.
Hindenburg appointed Adolf Chancellor as he had the single largest block of votes in the Reichstag. This was standard operating procedure.
Adolf ABSORBED Hindenburg’s office and entitled himself as Fé¼hrer.
( Literally : pilot — as in tug boat pilot, ship’s pilot. )
Usually translated into English as ‘Leader.’
By that time, Adolf had already prepped the stage. So his Reichstag applauded his seizure of total power. — which came in rapid stages.
The critical one: extending a hand to all others to join the Nazi Party — OR ELSE. ( Run for your life !) Naturally, all but a fleeing few switched into the Nazi Party.
THIS… This is the reason why opposition to Hitler lost its wheels. His hecklers were now feeding from his trough.
The rapid expansion of the German economy made the same go down rather sweetly.
Eric,
@ 8:15
I can see you are a devotee of Great Game playing. Men like Kissinger must fascinate you no end. Please, don’t take that as slight or criticism. You would play, I believe, the chess game that would never end and love it. My fascinations run naturally to other things. Juggling balls is what they love in the State department and the Foreign Office and the Foreign Desk. Whatever the shortcomings of human nature, they are trebled, at least, in government service. Indeed, Cuba by all means. But there was Vietnam. And their patrons. Where in the world are the Soviets, the Red Chinese. Should we interdict, blockade, support the rebels, train the rebels, equip the rebels, assist the rebels. The particulars seem almost to fade into background noise while the players take to devising how best to juggle yet one more ball without dropping one, or two (a disaster).
What happens, and I take this by what I’ve seen come to pass, all the balls are dropped. The British empire disintegrates, and the toxicity of defeat invades the Islands. France loses in Indochina and Algeria, and the toxicity spreads throughout le beau pays. America’s last success was the Berlin airlift, after which came a draw in Korea, a loss in Vietnam, a disaster in Beirut, and now the chaos of Afghanistan and Iraq.
I am a naturalized citizen (at a young age) and my formative years had processed in me a great love for this country, most especially in the stories of the men who had fought for it and what it stood for, here and abroad. Perhaps I am too sentimental, but I’d never been so moved as by the extraordinary ordinary men at Valley Forge, and those of Picket’s Charge, and the men of Belleau Wood, and the men, my God, the men of the Normandy invasion. I had never imagined myself in such light, cannot imagine how they’d done it. But I can understand a noble death and I can see no such thing presently. Who would think the Marines in Beirut had died for a noble cause. Or the dead and crippled, and depressed soldiers in Somalia, Iraq and Afghanistan. And amidst this stupid carnage comes ever more battle cries. Yemen! Syria! ISIS! Iran!
Is it real or is it speculation based on past performance?
Sen McCain wants to supply SAMs to the “rebels” so they can shoot down Russian planes.
And:
Who knows? Top Gun McCain apparently doesn’t.
And now Chris Christie wants young men to see some action. How brave, how macho, how butch — That’s the Right Stuff — let them do it.
I can understand, somewhat, that McCain still holds a grudge against the Soviets/Russians for equipping North Vietnam with the anti-aircraft battery Jane Fonda used to shoot him down. But what’s with ack-ack Christie? Has America gone completely non compos mentis? Shoot! Bomb! Attack! Invade! Kill! The Empire must strike – back.
The U S has not what it takes — no country has ever had it, not even in alliance — to rid the world of all the thugs, mass murderers, goons, and the criminally insane dear leaders. It had been proposed on this very blog, in another context, a political context, that not every battle can be won, not every battle ought be fought, but the battles must be chosen. I concur. And would add nowhere is this more critical than war.
Eric, you mention:
“Targeting Saudi Arabia the nation would miss the mark for several reasons, one being that the al Qaeda/ISIS terrorists are Qutbists rather than Wahhabists.”
You miss my point by being nestled in wonkery (wonkishness?) — is either a word? – for now, yes. In that limited construct you are correct to the dot and tittle. In wider construct, it is you who miss the mark. I was not calling for war on Saudi Arabia, on the Royal House, on Wahhabism. I was calling for a strike against Islam, and all that it incorporates, encompasses, embraces such as Qutbists, ISIS, Boko Haram, and the dozens of cadres around the world. By destroying the Kaaba and Mecca the message would have been unmistakable to all of the Islamic world. We would at once forego piecemeal pseudo-solutions, we would announce to Islam that we are aware their near fourteen hundred year old concept of dar-al-harb and dar-al-Islam was a declaration of war against non-Muslims, and that the 9/11 attack was the second assault against America (counting the Barbary pirates as the first) and we would have no more of it. To well explain it to the Muslims I would litter the ME with pamphlets. Written in Arabic it would read simply:
وقد أراد الله ذلك – waqad ‘arad alllah dhalik — God has willed it.
“President Obama announced Thursday a significant slowdown in the pace of withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, scrapping his aim of leaving only a small U.S embassy-based force in the country when he steps down from office in 2017 …
As the Taliban insurgency in the country shows signs of renewed strength, Obama said the current contingent of 9,800 U.S. troops would remain in Afghanistan through most of 2016. Their focus will be counter-terrorism and training Afghan forces. “Their mission will not change,” Obama stressed, following the ending of U.S. combat operations in 2014.
But instead of withdrawing by the end of 2016 all but a residual force to be stationed at the heavily-fortified US embassy in Kabul, Obama said 5,500 American troops will remain in the country at four locations around Afghanistan.
Calling the decision “the right thing to do,” Obama said that while Afghan government forces had stepped up and fought for their country, they were not “as strong as they need to be.”
“In key areas of the country, the security situation is still very fragile and in some places there’s risk of deterioration,” he said.
The President’s reversal reflects an increasingly troubling reality: 14 years after they were displaced by the U.S.-led invasion of the country, Taliban insurgents are staging a violent comeback. Meanwhile, against the backdrop of a much-reduced foreign troop cover–the current U.S. presence, for example, is down from a high of over 100,000 in 2011–there is little sign that Afghan forces are strong enough to defend the country from the insurgency. …”
The latest in a series of similar decisions taken by Barack Obama, as to US presence in Afghanistan, is to “effectively leave the decision of when to end America’s 14-year military involvement to his successor.”
What’s at stake this time around? The same as last time: The lives of some of the finest men this country has to offer; the prospect of being killed and crippled for naught.
– Ilana Mercer
Artfldgr: re. SKYKING – try posting over at the Belmont Club
http://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/
Blert;
“You must revise your assertion: Korea was a real horror show.”
Every war is a real horror show. I say it ended luckily in a stalemate because the communists hadn’t as yet invented the Vietnam formula. Hang in long enough and the West will pack up. Korea is also the first “wrong” war, that is declared by the left to be “wrong”. It is also the first war where leftist traitors could openly help the enemy, like visiting North-Korean prison camps and acting there like agents of the communist regime.
“Atomic bomb”
“Was Hiroshima Necessary?”
Now I don’t know the site I took the quote from, that is, whether it is tin-foil territory or not. I just found it by googling “japanese peace overtures”. But unless everything in it is a lie, especially the part of MacArthur (who wasn’t a softy I believe) then the logic would indicate that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were unnecessary.
Also, from the wiki article on the Nuremberg Trial;
I can understand American soldiers to be “glad”. That however doesn’t enter into the definition of “war crime” (but to repeat myself “but then in war sh*t happens”).
Ps. “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” The difference between being ruthless and being criminal.
Phil, if Japan was so ready to surrender in January of 1945 or earlier, why did it take two atomic bombs to convince them in August of 1945?
I and many other baby boomer Americans are here because our fathers weren’t there, so I am not exactly unbiased on the ending of the war with Japan.
Neo wrote: “The German people did not vote Hitler into power. Look it up.”
I did look it up and stand by my original comment. If you want to split hairs, it was the NSDAP [National Socialist German Workers Party – AKA Nazi) which was voted into power by 43% of the voters, but Adolph Hitler was the leader of the NSDAP and had just been appointed Chancellor by von Hindenburg. A vote for the Nazi Party was a vote for Hitler.
About that A-bomb. I wont convince you and you wont convince me.
But it was not needed in the discussion and as such I shouldn’t have mentioned it. So sorry about that.
Phil, if Japan was so ready to surrender in January of 1945 or earlier, why did it take two atomic bombs to convince them in August of 1945?
There’s a big difference between unconditional surrender and conditional surrender.
The Brits were talking about executing and trying the Emperor of Japan for war crimes, after the unconditional surrender, which was only stopped because MacArthur was in charge. If FDR had still been in charge, MacArthur might have been fired way sooner than Korea. Then Japan would have revolved and Russia would have occupied some islands there. New history under Democrats.
A lot of things are possible with American power if Democrats are in charge.
A vote for the Nazi Party was a vote for Hitler.
If you try to apply that logic to Parliamentary systems you will run into a dead end. Such as, is voting for SDP a vote for Angela Merkel? Because Grand Coalition, that’s how parliaments can work and that’s in fact what the Germans decided to do, a grand coalition. Shades of the ominous past.
Since by that logic, parliamentary systems having to hold majority seats, a vote for any party in the coalition would be a vote for the PM or leader.
They thought Hitler was playing the political game, like Americans think Hussein and Democrats were political entities first, foremost, always. Didn’t work out as people expected.
I and many other baby boomer Americans are here because our fathers weren’t there, so I am not exactly unbiased on the ending of the war with Japan.
Neither are Southerners unbiased about Sherman and Lincoln, or what people call the “War of Northern Aggression” back when the South fired on Union forts immediately after they lost an election to Lincoln. The South needed a short victorious war to prop up their agit prop propaganda keeping their white workers and black slaves in line. Far from being afraid of Northerners or abolition Republicans, Southern Democrats were scornful of the weakness of non slave owners. Southern Democrats were much more afraid of their slaves getting armed and then rebelling, so they needed a foreign enemy to prop up the agit prop.
The point is that this generational experience had consequences lasting far more than a century. WWII is not so far back as that.
**********
Pal would have left the situation as it was, with no fly zones, hoping that future leaders would recover the shot down pilots. That’s what happens when people like to talk but can’t do anything to uphold their word. They aren’t really participating, they’re more like paid agent provocateurs.
But unless everything in it is a lie, especially the part of MacArthur (who wasn’t a softy I believe) then the logic would indicate that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were unnecessary.
That was during FDR. FDR generally didn’t let Truman know much of anything, including secret deals with Stalin. Keeping the war going with Japan would allow the Russians to come in and split the difference, which I suspect was a secret deal. More flexibility once the Euro front was over.
The conditions for surrender would have changed later on.
The different factions in Japan had issues. After conditioning the civilian population to fight to the death, the leaders themselves may have started believing in the military faction’s propaganda.
Ymarsakar @ 12:07
Admit it. I’m in your head. Your psyche is mine. Not only am I a feature in your nightmares, but also your dreams, and daydreams and comments. Obsession.
The question is how much rent you’re charging.
For me, I’m rent free. For you, there’s an additional surcharge and sacrifice involved.
But because you are pretty ignorant and too Leftist Democrat centered concerning the Assassination of Diem and the no fly zones over Iraq, you don’t even know what I’m talking about. So you talk about me, because you think you can shift the subject away from your ignorance or support for crimes against humanity.
But just because I don’t always cover that, Pal, that doesn’t mean I’m unaware of your connection.