Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2001/02/15
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]At 01:19 AM 2/16/2001 -0000, Hugo Lopes wrote: >Morale: Before 39, Hitler was not regarded such a bad guy by the allies. >He hated communists and left-wingers which suited the west's views fine. >It was the allies fault as much as the German people fault for what >happened. Hush your mouth, boy, or, better yet, come over to the WWII Lists and repeat this tripe there. Before 1939, Hitler was regarded as a monster by every Western leader, from Franco to Chamberlain. They simply didn't know how to deal with him. Franco was relatively safe, due to geography, as was Chamberlain, but the French and Czechs and Poles and Roumanians and Hungarians and Belgians and Dutch and Danes and Norwegians and Swedes and Swiss and Bulgarians and Greeks and Yugoslavians, und so weiter, had to deal with him at full frontal nudity, and the prospect terrified them all. No national leader like the New German State worth a damn, but the query was whether they could do business with the Reich: what was its price, and would it stay bought. After Munich, all questions were removed. Yes, there were Nazi followers, such as Sir Oswald Moseley and the German-American Bund and Quisling and even the Irish Blueshirts. Yes, there were Nazi apologists, from Lord Halifax (though Harold Wilson told me once that Halifax was really NOT a Nazi apologist, just a Britain-Firster and a pacifist) to Charles Lindberg to Father Coughlin to Laval. Yes, there were those so scared of the Germans that they would go to any length to preserve peace. Yes, there were government officials and businessmen who wished to pursue "business as usual" with the Nazis. But to blame the West for Hitler and his evils -- something on the order of 20 million Soviet citizens killed, six million or many more Jews, Gypsies, Socialists, &c, done in by noose and gas chamber, the destruction of an entire nation and a continent -- this is insufferable, and shame on you for the suggestion of it. To counter every Vidkun Quisling and Charles Lindberg there was a Harold Ickes and a Winston Churchill, for every Oswald Moseley a Paul Reynaud. Now, let us get back to Good German Culture, be this schmeirkase or Leicas, gut rotwein or Mozart. Marc msmall@roanoke.infi.net FAX: +540/343-7315 Cha robh bas fir gun ghras fir!