Something needs to be said

[seahawk]

For me the main point is that the backing of the Austrians was seen as a defensive move by the Germans. The Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand was seen as an attack by Serbia and the following demands against Serbia and declaration fo war against Serbia by Austria was seen as just. On the 28th July Austria declared war on Serbia, Germany still stood aside. Only after Russia decided to fully mobilize on 31st July, Germany declared war on them on August 1th and France August 3rd.

That Germany then went ahead with the Schliefen Plan puts the blame for the war in the west on Germany. Especially after the "Septemberprogramm" by Hollweg clealry set aggressive targets for Germany.

But in the days leading to war, Germany´s reaction was defensive in nature imho.

[Alex - Spot-This !]

I agree Stefan, what I was trying to say is that we can't compare The role Germany had with the role England had in the Irak war. Austria's empire was nothing without Germany backing up. The domino effect is proven but things wouldn't have happened this way if Germany hadn't given the green light. In 1913 the situation went almost to war but this time Germany was really afraid of that domino effect and decided to calm things down. Then after the situation went that bad in Serbia in summer 1914 they thought it was the right moment to achieve the plan you descrieb.
Yes German warplan was a quick war in the west, quick enough so the UK wouldn't have the time to mobilize an army... And they were also very badly surprised by the first russian victories as they thought that russian army wasn't able to react so quickly.

Terry, totally agree, and yes Churchill was one of the very rare one who recognized what Hitler's regim really was early in the game.

[seahawk]

That's quiet wrong. Germany was more than an ally. Everything depended on the German reaction and they were behind every Austro-Hungary decision. The Austro-Hungarian empire wasn't crazy enough to start a conflict without the strong support of their German ally. Why did the Germans give the green light to the Austro-Hungarian empire is quiet complicated and mainly based on 2 bad assessment of the situation. They believed that :
- UK wasn't going to react.
- There were strong chances that Russia wasn't going to react neither

This way Germany thought they would be able to obtain a very quick victory over France and that if they were quick enough it wasn't going to be a generalized conflit... but yes they were wrong... and badly.

Alex

Well, this is not quite right. The German warplan foresaw a quick war in the west, before turning east, to avoid war on 2 fronts. But considering what happened on the road to war, Germany could have avoided WW2 as easily as France, England and Russia. The Austrian crown prince was killed by a Serbian nationalist with at least knowing of the Serbian secret service. After that Austria and Serbia quickly headed for war. Germany declared it would back Austria, if Russia would fully mobilize against Austria. Even after some diplomatic contacts to the Russian leader by the German side, Russia decided to fully mobilize, which then started a domino effect. Russia fully mobilizes against Austria, Germany mobilizes against Russia, France mobilizes against Germany, England mobilizes against Germany. I am nit trying to say Germany was not responsible for WW1, but every other major european power could have avoided the conflict just as easily.

[FireLight]

Giving Hitler credit for anything, I would say he was a genius of manipulation. He knew how to manipulate the German people when they were going through great difficulties after World War I. He knew how to tell them what they wanted to hear and many of them listened. He persuaded enough that he was able to take power, and once he took power he could use that power to either persuade (by fear or pride) or eliminate his enemies, using whichever method he felt would work, against whoever he believed was his enemy (jew, gypsy, slav, disabled, etc.)

He also knew what to tell his enemies. He told many stories to persuade them of his innocent intentions. The final culmination of this was Munich in which the allied powers gave up the "german" portion of Czechoslovakia without a fight. And then defenseless, and without allies, the rest of Czechoslovakia fell.

He also was a strong supporter of the Blitzkreig strategy which overpowered his enemies in short order to gain tactical victories. However, his tactical understanding of war did not match his strategic understanding, and he made many blunders in this regard. ie., attacking Yugoslavia prior to attacking the Soviet Union - therefore pretty much ensuring that the war in the east couldn't be won before winter, allowing the USSR to recover to become a major factor in his defeat.

Only a few recognized the deception in Hitler's rhetoric. One was Winston Churchill, who became the leader of Great Britain just in time - but only just. He pretty much recognized Hitler for who he was early in the game, as Hitler was coming to power, but I don't believe there were many who recognized the full horror of Hitler's rule to the end of the war or afterwards.

[Alex - Spot-This !]

Right. Germany was just an ally. (...), as Germany did in WWI, and the Allied countries did soon after.

That's quiet wrong. Germany was more than an ally. Everything depended on the German reaction and they were behind every Austro-Hungary decision. The Austro-Hungarian empire wasn't crazy enough to start a conflict without the strong support of their German ally. Why did the Germans give the green light to the Austro-Hungarian empire is quiet complicated and mainly based on 2 bad assessment of the situation. They believed that :
- UK wasn't going to react.
- There were strong chances that Russia wasn't going to react neither

This way Germany thought they would be able to obtain a very quick victory over France and that if they were quick enough it wasn't going to be a generalized conflit... but yes they were wrong... and badly.

Alex

[Mungous]

Hi everyone,
As some of you know I’m a history teacher here in Switzerland.

Ah that explains the long, but interesting post.

Apart from that I haven't a clue where this threads at

[Crunk415balla]

Why would you blame Germany for starting a WWI? It was more of a domino effect with various international thretreaties aties kicking in. Even simplyfing it, I would say it was more Austro-Hungarian empire than Prussia.

Right. Germany was just an ally. Why are there British troops in Iraq? They're just backing us up as they feel obligated to do. I remember when France had the "balls" to not come to our aide in Iraq, and everyone went all crazy here. I think it was a good decision on their part, but it must have been difficult as a country is expected to more or less "blindly" support its allies, as Germany did in WWI, and the Allied countries did soon after.

[Peter_K]

(...) In my opinion Germany got off easy considering they started two World Wars in less than 40 years resulting in millions dead and wounded. Vast occupied territories were raped and pillaged. (...)

Why would you blame Germany for starting a WWI? It was more of a domino effect with various international thretreaties aties kicking in. Even simplyfing it, I would say it was more Austro-Hungarian empire than Prussia.

[Peter_K]

Very well, I guess we've both got some thinking to do.

I was only hoping for a civilized debate on your statement from post #3, but of course since you wish not to go there, that's fine with me.

[Airbus_A320]

^^Very good post.
Basically sums up everything I was trying to say with my posts in a much better way, and from a person who teaches history for a living.

[Alex - Spot-This !]

Hi everyone,
I’m just back from a few days in the mountains and had a great time reading all your posts. This is for me one of the best debat we had here on JP for a long time…
Many of you have made very smart and mature remarks about the whole subject and I’d like to thank you all for that.

As some of you know I’m a history teacher here in Switzerland. I grew in Argentina during the “bad” years of military dictatorship, my father being part of the army during those years, then I moved to the USA and finally to Switzerland. Since living in Europe I’ve spend countless hours reading about XX century history and more important talking with my swiss gd-parents and many old people who actually lived during the 30s and who had all their memory to share which was for me great “direct” source of information.

My very 1st remark would be that we really should be careful not to see history as good or evil. Only very dumb people think this way (they do exist and even lead some countries or churches today…) and that’s something we do need to fight against. Intolerance always leads to some kind of human disaster. From Peter the Great to Hitler, Mao, Stalin or Castro and many others, history has taught us that we need to study all what they did in a very objective way.

There’s always a question that comes back to my mind when I think about the whole nazi period in Germany. “what would I have done ?” and ask yourself this question too. What would have been your reaction ? I strongly wish I would have been able to resist and even die in a Gestapo jail but… I have doubts…
It’s easy in 2008 after growing in a world where I never had to fight to have something to eat, where I got all the info I wanted, where I could read any book I wanted to read without risks, to say that nazi were just total nuts and that Hitler was pure evil but…
Growing in a ruined country, where all Europe looked as you a responsible of WW1 (which was the case in a large part but WWI was also “needed” for a lot of other countries, France included), where most of the money was used to pay the clauses of the Versaille treaty, and then supporting the Nazis is something we can and must understand.
From 1916 to 1930 there were 2 very strong opposition to the old regim who promise they will change everything. Those were the communist and the nationalists (not only the Nazis). At some points Germany wasn’t far to become a new communist country if they weren’t fought with violence by groups of paramilitary who for the most part were supported in their murders and acts by a very “comprehensive” justice system… and who later would become the main force of the SA and the Nazi party.
Unfortunately it looked like only with the Nazis, Germany was able to get out of this almost civil war situation. And remember that people love nationalism and are ready to accept the worst aspect of it (look at the situation in countries like Russia, Austria a few years ago, France, USA and Switzerland today) People love when we tell them they are the best and that their country deserves a big place in the whole picture. And even if the Nazis pushed it very far with all the race theories they were very smart the way they did it, thanks to the new technologies used by their propaganda (Radio, Cinema, huge parades). Also remember that those same theories were highly supported in many countries in Europe. Very very few people in England, France or Russia saw Hitler’s regim to be a real threat to peace, and most of all they didn’t care much about all the anti-semitism that was growing in Germany.
Yes German people elected Hitler… But at first what did he do ? Accept it or not but he brought back the hope that Germans had lost. People had something to believe in. Situation was improving every day, Other countries in Europe started to look at Germany as a country they could respect and they were PROUD of it… they were again proud to be German. Proud to be able to go to work and buy food to their kids, proud to have a whole new army with great technology, proud of their scientist and so on…
Brillant ? I don’t know if it’s really the right word but they certainly understood very well what was needed to the people at that time. For that the Nazis and their leaders were at some points brillant I guess. And like Jordan said “Brillant and smart does not always mean good.” Going back to Stalin he’s another perfect example. We all know he killed millions of people and did so many terrible things to the Russian people but… nobody can say he was dumb.
My post is now long enough so as a last note I’d like to add that we all can be considered as the evil of someone else. What would an Iraki or an Afghan think of me and my American passport ? What would I think about Israelis if I grew in a Palestinian camp ?
One thing is sure there should be no taboos about it. Chasen should have been able to create his German club at school (the school’s reaction is for me pure stupidity and intolerance) and we should all be able to talk about these subjects and learn about the mistakes that have been done so we don’t repeat them today. Sadly history shows that we, as human, have a tendency NOT to learn from our past mistakes…

Again thank you for bringing some smart conversation to this forum

Take care
Alex

[Bok269]

Where?

The whole Evil vs. Brilliant debate, etc.

[Airbus_A320]

Where?

From all the posts made by yourself and Peter_K.

[flyboy2548m]

I am glad that an intelligent debate resulted.

Where?

[Bok269]

I don't believe a thread with good natured debate should be closed, or eliminated. The other thread was nothing but mudslinging. This one started that way, but with PK's departure, has evolved into what I view as a pretty intelligent, civil debate between members.

Despite what ensued, I never intended to start this as a mudslinging thread. I don't question the decision to remove the comments from the other thread. However, I also felt that what was said needed to be addressed not in the form of an attack on a user, but rather in an attempt to educate everyone on the use of the word "Jew" as an adejective. I regret that some mudslinging resulted, but I am glad that an intelligent debate resulted.

Rob