Naturally the common people don’t want war, neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood.
But, after all, it’s the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it’s always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it’s a democracy, a fascist dictatorshp, or a prliament, or a communist dictatorship….
All you have to do is tell them that they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to greater danger. It works the same way in any country.
—Rcichsmarshall Hermann Goering
March 19, 2013 marked the tenth anniversary of the start of America’s war against Iraq. And the national news networks have been dutifully noting it.
Yet none of these networks has dared to point out there is a dark historical parallel to the events leading up to the Iraq war. A parallel that has its roots in Nazi Germany.
ADOLF HITLER
Adolf Hitler knew that Poland’s government could never accept his demands for the Polish city of Danzig.
GEORGE W. BUSH
So, too, did George W. Bush make a demand he knew could never be accepted. On the eve of launching war on Iraq, Bush issued a humiliating ultimatum to Saddam Hussein:
“Saddam Hussein and his sons must leave Iraq within 48 hours. Their refusal to do so will result in military conflict, commenced at a time of our choosing.”
ADOLF HITLER
Hitler never regretted his decision to invade Poland–-even asserting in his “final political testament” that: “It is untrue that I or anyone else in Germany wanted war in 1939.”
GEORGE W. BUSH
Similarly, Bush never regretted his decision to invade Iraq, which occurred on March 19, 2003.
Adolf Hitler
ADOLF HITLER
When he announced his attack on Poland before Germany’s rubber-stamp parliament, the Reichstag, Hitler–a decorated World War I veteran–said: “I am from now on just first soldier of the German Reich. I have once more put on that coat that was the most sacred and dear to me.”
GEORGE W. BUSH
On May 1, 2003, Bush–who hid out the Vietnam war in the Texas Air National Guard-–donned a flight suit and landed a Navy jet aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln. A banner titled “Mission Accomplished” was displayed on the aircraft carrier as Bush announced–wrongly–that the war was over.
The effect–and intent–was to portray Bush as the triumphant warrior-chieftan he never was.
George W. Bush
ADOLF HITLER
In 1970, Albert Speer, Hitler’s former architect and Minister of Aramaments, published his bestselling postwar memoirs, Inside the Third Reich. In a striking passage, he revealed how the Fuehrer really felt about German soldiers who were suffering and dying in a war he had provoked.
One evening during the middle of the war, Speer was traveling with Hitler on the Fuehrer’s private train. Late at night, they enjoyed a lavish dinner in the elegant rosewood-paneled dining car.
As they ate, Hitler’s train slowed down and passed a freight train halted on a side track.
From their open cattle car, recalled Speer, wounded German soldiers from the Russian Front–starved, their uniforms in rags–stared across the few yards to their Fuehrer’s dining-car window.
Hitler recoiled at seeing these injured men intently watching him–and he sharply ordered an adjutant to lower the window shades.
GEORGE W. BUSH
Similarly, Bush showed his contempt for the soldiers suffering and dying in his own unprovoked war.
On March 24, 2004, at a White House Correspondents dinner, he joked publicly about the absence of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs).
To Bush, the non-existent WMDs were nothing more than the butt of a joke that night. While an overhead projector displayed photos of a puzzled-looking Bush searching around the Oval Office, Bush recited a comedy routine.
“Those weapons of mass destruction have gotta be somewhere,” Bush laughed, while a photo showed him poking around the corners in the Oval Office.
“Nope-–no weapons over there! Maybe they’re under here,” he said, as a photo showed him looking under a desk.
In a scene that could have occurred under the Roman emperor Nero, an assembly of wealthy, pampered men and women–-the elite of America’s media and political classes–-laughed heartily during Bush’s performance.
Click here: Bush laughs at no WMD in Iraq – YouTube
In writing about the significance of human character, the ancient historian, Plutarch, said it best:
And the most glorious exploits do not always furnish us with the clearest discoveries of virtue or vice in men.
Sometimes a matter of less moment, an expression or a jest, informs us better of their characters and inclinations, than the most famous sieges, the greatest armaments, or the bloodiest battles whatsoever.
So add it all up:
- Two all-powerful leaders.
- Two nations lied into unprovoked wars.
- Hitler’s war costs the lives of 4.5 million German soldiers.
- Bush’s war costs the lives of 4,486 Americans.
- Germany’s war results in the deaths of millions of Europeans and Russians.
- America’s war results in the deaths of an estimated 655,000 Iraqis, according to a 2006 study in the Lancet medical journal.
- Hitler is literally driven underground by his enemies and commits suicide to avoid capture, trial and certain execution for war crimes.
- Bush retires from office with a lavish pension and full Secret Service protection. He writes his memoirs and is paid $7 million for the first 1.5 million copies.
- Hitler is branded as a symbol of demonic evil.
- Bush becomes a target of ridicule for comics.
Who says history is irrelevant? Or that it doesn’t repeat itself?
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NEGOTIATING NAZI-REPUBLICAN STYLE: PART ONE (OF SEVEN)
In Bureaucracy, History, Politics, Social commentary on August 6, 2013 at 10:00 pmAdolf Hitler, Germany’s Fuehrer for 12 years, had a favorite phrase: “So oder so.”
It meant: “One way or the other.”
That might sound innocuous. But, in Hitler’s case, it carried a sinister tone–as did nearly everything else about the dictator who ruled Germany from 1933 to 1945.
Adolf Hitler
When Hitler faced what he considered a problem, he said he would solve it “one way or another.” Which meant that if he didn’t get his way, he would apply whatever means it took until he did.
Indiana State Treasurer Richard Mourdock, who unsuccessfully campaigned in 2012 to become the Republican U.S. Senator from Indiana, had a similar view toward compromise.
Appearing on the May 9, 2012 edition of right-wing “Fox & Friends,” Mourdock said:
Richard Mourdock
“I have a mindset that says bipartisanship ought to consist of Democrats coming to the Republican point of view.”
Robert Payne, author of the bestselling biography, The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler (1973), described Hitler’s “negotiating” style thusly:
“Although Hitler prized his own talents as a negotiator, a man always capable of striking a good bargain, he was totally lacking in finesse. He was incapable of bargaining. He was like a man who goes up to a fruit peddler and threatens to blow his brains out if he does not sell his applies at the lowest possible price.”
Now, consider the similarity between Payne’s description of Hitler and Mourdock’s description of what “bipartisanship” means to him:
“I’ve said many times through this campaign that one of the things I hope to do is to help build a conservative majority in the United States Senate and continue to help the House build a Republican majority and have a Republican White House and then bipartisanship becomes having Democrats come our way.”
A classic example of Hitler’s “negotiating style” occurred in 1938, when he invited Austrian Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg to his mountaintop retreat in Obersalzberg, Germany. Hitler, an Austrian by birth, intended to annex his native land to Germany.
Schuschnigg was aware of Hitler’s desire, but nevertheless felt secure in accepting the invitation. He had been assured that the question of Austrian sovereignty would not arise.
By studying Hitler’s mindset and “negotiating” methods, we can learn much about the mindset and “negotiating” style of our own Republican party.
Shuschnigg opened the discussion with a friendly compliment. Walking over to a large window, he admired the breathtaking view of the mountains.
HITLER: We haven’t come here to talk about the lovely view or the weather!
Austria has anyway never done anything which was of help to the German Reich….I am resolutely determined to make an end to all this business. The German Reich is a great power. Nobody can and nobody will interfere if it restores order on its frontiers.
SCHUSCHNIGG: I am aware of your attitude toward the Austrian question and toward Austrian history….As we Austrians see it, the whole of our history is a very essential and valuable part of German history….And Austria’s contribution is a considerable one.
HITLER: It is absolutely zero—that I can assure you! Every national impulse has been trampled underfoot by Austria….
I could call myself an Austrian with just the same right—indeed with even more right—than you, Herr Schuschnigg. Why don’t you once try a plebiscite in Austria in which you and I run against each other? Then you would see!
SCHUSCHNIGG: Well, yes, if that were possible. But your know yourself, Herr Reich Chancellor, that it just isn’t possible. We simply have to go on living alongside one another, the little state next to the big one. We have no other choice.
And that is why I ask you to tell me what your concrete complaints are. We will do all in our power to sort things out and establish a friendly relationship, as far as it is possible to do so.
HITLER: That’s what you say, Herr Schuschnigg. And I am telling you that I intend to clear up the whole of the so-called Austrian question–one way or another. Do you think I don’t know that you are fortifying Austria’s border with the Reich?
SCHUSCHNIGG: There can be no suggestion at all of that—
HITLER: Ridiculous explosive chambers are being built under bridges and roads—
This was a lie, and Hitler knew it was a lie. But no matter. It gave him an excuse to threaten to destroy Austria—as he was to destroy so many other nations during the next seven years.
* * * * *
Lest this comparison be thought an exaggeration, consider this:
Republicans used precisely the same “negotiating” style during the summer of 2011 to threaten the United States with financial ruin unless they got their way in budget negotiations.
And they are threatening to do the same again this fall.
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