Hitler declaring war on the USA may have provided a critical moment for the US citizen and for a beleagured British public it may have seemed like an act of stupidity which would bring them relief, but in terms of world history the only difference it would have made to Germany was, she would have been eventually over run by the USSR in totality and a greater portion of Europe would have come under Stalin's rule.
In December 1941, Britain was still suffering from the U-Boat blockade at home and was finding it almost impossible to hang onto her foreign possessions. The campaign in North Africa was not going well and added to this, domestic discontent in the colonies was threatening to destabilise the whole of the British Empire. It should not be forgtten that the likes of Ghandi were prepared to give the invading Japanese a warm welcome, seeing them as liberators from the rule of the hated British. In China the same was being felt and despite the fact that the Japanese army was killing Chinese nationals they were seen by both sides of the class conflict - the nationalists and the communists - as a force for good which would weaken the grip of the British and finally permit China's development to nationhood.
The national question loomed large in British foreign affairs and armed strength had still to be maintained in the colonies to prevent them going their own way. The revolution in Russia 1917 had given hope to millions who suffered under British rule and each colonial possession now had a large communist party to complicate the normal geography of the struggle for national liberation. That Japanese rule would not provide the happy times which the communist and nationalist leaders had origi8nally thought, alters nothing. it was the expectation of developments which would further their individual aims which was important and it paved the way for a relatively easy incursion by Japan. Both sides would learn that Revolution - natinalist and communist - is not aided by a change of dominant force. The battles for dominace will more than double the total of armed force in the country as the opposing sides fight it out and the civilian population, who would normaly provide the motor-force for change, cower in terror and their leaders become quickly isolated.
Given the above scenario it is possible to see quite clearly that Britain was not capable of carrying the fight to Germany. Hilter ruled over the whole of Western Europe and not a single British soldier stood on German territiory. Britain was being gradually pushed to the margins of world power and without defeat for Germany in the USSR, it would not now be possible to stop the German advance into the Middle East and across the oil rich lands there. Germany was going to receive a warm wlecome from the nationals who were struggling against British rule in Iran and Iraq. Palestine and Saudi Arabia would quickly follow and Rommel's hand would be strenghtened in Egypt as the German advance linked up to provide him with miltary supplies - the lack of which eventually caused his defeat.
Hitler was not fighting on two fronts in 1941. He was pillaging British possessions at the same time as expanding Germany's infleuence towards the east.
The defeat before Moscow would rob Hitler of his cutting edge, with the eventual loss of more than one million of his best troops, a loss which the British General staffs thought he would never be able to make up, in order to launch a successful summer campaign in Russia. They saw his only course for 1942 as concluding a form of peace or stalemate with Stalin, which secured at no extra cost, all the posseessions he had taken in the Ukraine and then for him to put all his weight behind a push south to scoop up the Balkans and to link up across the Middle East with the Japanese who were now advancing across Asia. Japanese carriers had been seen in the Indian Ocean and Admiral Sommervile had been forced to move his fleet out of harm's way.
Hitler thought he would prevail in Russia in 1942 and so too did the British generals still think he stood a good chance, if he stopped making such obvious mistakes. The war would swing decisively toward or away from the Germans in 1942 and the USA would play little or no part. So declaring war on the USA and for the USA to pick up the gauntlet, amounts to little more than a declaration of hostilites - a bit of international sabre rattling. The full potential of the situation would not reveal itself until the Germans had been decisivly beaten by the Russian and their army put to flight.
Whilst the allied effort was tied down in Sicily fighting hard and desperate battles - and learning to fight in - Germany was exhausting it's final effort to stop the Russian juggernaught at Kursk. The greatest tank battle in history would draw on every available ounce of Germany's reserve strength and from there the Third Reich would collapse like a piece of rotten fruit. Hilter's last chance of stopping Stalin came and went in July 1943, two months before allied troops set a foot on mainland Italy "the soft underbelly" as Churchill so mistakenly put it. The allied cross-Channel invasion would not come for a further 10 months, by which time Germany's defeat was inevitable.
In December 1941 the value of strengthening the Axis alliance was of far greater importance than diplomatic relations - or otherwise - with the USA. Hitler could invite the USA to "eat me" knowing they stood no chance of getting near. It is not possible to supreimpose developments 2 years down the line on decisions taken in 1941. Without the defeat in Russia, the USA would not have even thought of invading Europe.
Vic Dale
New Poll: critical moment for Germany
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
Vic,
Are you seriously saying the Chinese welcomed the Japanese invaders? That seems absurd to me in view of the horrible atrocities they perpetrated on the Chinese populace. The Chinese were very welcoming to Doolittle's crews and risked thier lives to help them. Long before that they welcomed the Flying Tigers. What you say is so much in opposition to everything I've read about the brutality of the Japanese invaders that I can't imagine it's true.
Are you seriously saying the Chinese welcomed the Japanese invaders? That seems absurd to me in view of the horrible atrocities they perpetrated on the Chinese populace. The Chinese were very welcoming to Doolittle's crews and risked thier lives to help them. Long before that they welcomed the Flying Tigers. What you say is so much in opposition to everything I've read about the brutality of the Japanese invaders that I can't imagine it's true.
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
l know it sounds mad, but it is a fact.
The Japanese were seen as liberators, by communists and nationalists alike. Very possibly the goal of China achieving independent national status may have seemed very far off to the majority of Chinese and it may have been felt that it could not be acheived without a helping hand of some kind. It is not uncommon for people of a particular race to favour dominance by people of their own kind instead of those from a completely alien culture, like Britain or the USA.
We could observe that the people of Africa were glad to rid themselves of the dominance of the whites, only to find themselves dominated with an even harsher hand by their black fellows. Africa today is still a continent of dominance and submission. Many Chinese felt they would fare better under the dominance of men of yellow colour. Surely they could bow before their Yellow brothers and not be treated too harshly. Big mistake.
On the question of Chinese nationals being killed by the friendly invaders, isn't that eactly what is going on in Iraq and Afgahnistan today? Britain and America have murdered without compunction, non-combatant men women and children in those two countries, yet they still pose themselves as friends and certain sectors of Iraqi and Afghani society fall for it. In Vietnam, Vietnamese nationals were napalmed on a daily basis on the pretext of friendship and we could see the desperation to which certain sectors of Vietnamese society clung to the bitter end to the belief in killing their fellow Vietnamese for the better good (what ever that is supposed to mean). The bitter end came when the last helicopter pulled out leaving them standing hlepless on the roof of the US Embassy building in Hanoi.
In the coming crisis you will hear that a dose fo stiff medicine is good for a nation's population, keep them hungry, keep them fit and keep them working, in the advanced world it will mean harsh legislation with threats of fines and imprisonment for those who resist, whereas in the udnerdeveloped world it will be enforced at gun-point if necessary. That will be alright with the majority as long as it is not them who face the bullet and the bayonet.
I think also that the Chinese communist and nationalist leaders actually believed the old adage which says that: "The enemy of my enemy is my friend." This is a theoretical error of gargantuan proportions and has led to the deaths of many millions of workers in China, India and Burma, to say nothing of Vietnam and Korea. Stalin himself seems to have taken the same road when he called upon the communists in Germany to stop fighting the nazis and help them defeat the SPD. The nazis themselves were welcomed into the Baltic States and elsewhere to destroy the "Jewish cancer" and draw them into the ever expanding and powerful third reich, to get rich quick.
You can justify anything if the price is right.
Vic Dale
The Japanese were seen as liberators, by communists and nationalists alike. Very possibly the goal of China achieving independent national status may have seemed very far off to the majority of Chinese and it may have been felt that it could not be acheived without a helping hand of some kind. It is not uncommon for people of a particular race to favour dominance by people of their own kind instead of those from a completely alien culture, like Britain or the USA.
We could observe that the people of Africa were glad to rid themselves of the dominance of the whites, only to find themselves dominated with an even harsher hand by their black fellows. Africa today is still a continent of dominance and submission. Many Chinese felt they would fare better under the dominance of men of yellow colour. Surely they could bow before their Yellow brothers and not be treated too harshly. Big mistake.
On the question of Chinese nationals being killed by the friendly invaders, isn't that eactly what is going on in Iraq and Afgahnistan today? Britain and America have murdered without compunction, non-combatant men women and children in those two countries, yet they still pose themselves as friends and certain sectors of Iraqi and Afghani society fall for it. In Vietnam, Vietnamese nationals were napalmed on a daily basis on the pretext of friendship and we could see the desperation to which certain sectors of Vietnamese society clung to the bitter end to the belief in killing their fellow Vietnamese for the better good (what ever that is supposed to mean). The bitter end came when the last helicopter pulled out leaving them standing hlepless on the roof of the US Embassy building in Hanoi.
In the coming crisis you will hear that a dose fo stiff medicine is good for a nation's population, keep them hungry, keep them fit and keep them working, in the advanced world it will mean harsh legislation with threats of fines and imprisonment for those who resist, whereas in the udnerdeveloped world it will be enforced at gun-point if necessary. That will be alright with the majority as long as it is not them who face the bullet and the bayonet.
I think also that the Chinese communist and nationalist leaders actually believed the old adage which says that: "The enemy of my enemy is my friend." This is a theoretical error of gargantuan proportions and has led to the deaths of many millions of workers in China, India and Burma, to say nothing of Vietnam and Korea. Stalin himself seems to have taken the same road when he called upon the communists in Germany to stop fighting the nazis and help them defeat the SPD. The nazis themselves were welcomed into the Baltic States and elsewhere to destroy the "Jewish cancer" and draw them into the ever expanding and powerful third reich, to get rich quick.
You can justify anything if the price is right.
Vic Dale
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
Hardly even that. Without the declaration of war the US probably has a few more months to get it's ASW plan in order before decaring war on Germany. In the mean time we would be allied with Britain in the Pacific which means the support fire hose is on.Vic Dale wrote:Hitler declaring war on the USA ..., but in terms of world history the only difference it would have made to Germany was, she would have been eventually over run by the USSR in totality and a greater portion of Europe would have come under Stalin's rule.
That's a bit or more than a bit of an exageration. Certainly Britain lost some of them but the majority were hardly even threatened.In December 1941, Britain was ...finding it almost impossible to hang onto her foreign possessions.
...
Sounds to me like you are believing the Japanese propaganda from that time period....... It should not be forgtten that the likes of Ghandi were prepared to give the invading Japanese a warm welcome, seeing them as liberators from the rule of the hated British. In China the same was being felt and despite the fact that the Japanese army was killing Chinese nationals they were seen by both sides of the class conflict - the nationalists and the communists - as a force for good which would weaken the grip of the British and finally permit China's development to nationhood.
Source PLS..... The revolution in Russia 1917 had given hope to millions who suffered under British rule and each colonial possession now had a large communist party to complicate the normal geography of the struggle for national liberation.
But the above scneario is hardly a given indeed it looks less than plausible to me.Given the above scenario it is possible to see quite clearly that Britain was not capable of carrying the fight to Germany.
Not really and most of the German soldiers on British territory were POWs.Hilter ruled over the whole of Western Europe and not a single British soldier stood on German territiory.
Logistics alone may have been enough if not it's far from clear that even without the war in the East Germany could or would have taken the Middle East....without defeat for Germany in the USSR, it would not now be possible to stop the German advance into the Middle East and across the oil rich lands there.
And just what British possessions was he pillaging?...
Hitler was not fighting on two fronts in 1941. He was pillaging British possessions at the same time as expanding Germany's infleuence towards the east.
Why do you think he had a chance of stopping Stalin then? It was already far too late....Hilter's last chance of stopping Stalin came and went in July 1943, two months before allied troops set a foot on mainland Italy "the soft underbelly" as Churchill so mistakenly put it.
??? What did he gain by "strengthening" relations with Japan? Now being able to put US ships on the target list may have been a real concern.In December 1941 the value of strengthening the Axis alliance was of far greater importance than diplomatic relations - or otherwise - with the USA.
Again that's conjecture and not very supportable. Without the USSR it would have taken longer and been bloodier but there's a very good chance the allies would still have invaded Europe.... Without the defeat in Russia, the USA would not have even thought of invading Europe...
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
Source PSL. And when and by how many. My bet is vanishinly small numbers after Nanking.Vic Dale wrote:l know it sounds mad, but it is a fact.
The Japanese were seen as liberators, by communists and nationalists alike.
But did the Chinese consider themeselves to be the same "race" as the Japanese? The Japanese didn't seam to view it that way.It is not uncommon for people of a particular race to favour dominance by people of their own kind instead of those from a completely alien culture, like Britain or the USA.
What evedence is there that the Chinese had any different evaluation of the Japanese than they did of the Germans, British, and French?
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
Vic,
The US normally goes out of it's way to prevent civilian casualties. I don't see how you can compare Japanese mass brutality to small, isolated instances of US brutality by small units in special circumstances.
The US normally goes out of it's way to prevent civilian casualties. I don't see how you can compare Japanese mass brutality to small, isolated instances of US brutality by small units in special circumstances.
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
Yes and so did we in Yemen, Aden and Borneo, but we still repressed those people and prevented their nations developing properly. Our record in Africa goes unspoken since the tortured lives of the Black African matter little in the West. Britian is as guilty as France for the Rwandan genocide. It was after all the result of battle for dominance of British or French imperialism. That the two tribes used the machetti on each other whilst their rerspective imperial, masters looked on does not absolve Britian and France from their guiltBgile wrote:Vic,
The US normally goes out of it's way to prevent civilian casualties. I don't see how you can compare Japanese mass brutality to small, isolated instances of US brutality by small units in special circumstances.
When you put your hoof in another people's country the innocent will die and all we are talking about in terms of innocence or guilt is the body count. There is no justification and there is no adequate defence.
Vic Dale
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
I refuse to accept responsibility for things which I was unable to prevent. You can show a lot of injustice over the course of human history, and much of it was outside the realm of Western Civilization. You can make the argument that attempts to help other peoples which involve military force always turn out badly ... I don't know. I think our Korean intervention was a good idea and turned out well. Viet Nam turned out badly, and in hindsight we probably didn't belong there. It's hard to imagine Iraq turning out well over the long run, and I'm afraid Afghanistan may turn out to be ill advised as well.
I guess the lesson is that you must choose foreign intervention with great care, and consider carefully whether the result is likely to be worth the cost in blood and treasure.
I guess the lesson is that you must choose foreign intervention with great care, and consider carefully whether the result is likely to be worth the cost in blood and treasure.
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
In case anyone thinks I am anti-American, I am not. My girlfireind is American and I have had long and very pleasant associations with US citizens, both military and otherwise. I don't hold the US citizen responsible for the actions of their irresponsible governments though I would urge them to be very careful when voting hawks into office. I would say the same of all nations especialy my own, which has an appalling record of trooping into other people's territory causing deaths and mayhem and then having the cheek to criticise when others do the same.
What i detest is US foreign policy which although it is no worse than anyone else's foreign policy simply helps no one. The USA is the strongest nation on the planet and as such I expect it to set an example - not act as school-bully.
You cite Korea, but the best that can be said of that debacle is that the country was partitioned. Partitioning weakens and paralyses development. Look at how cock-a-hoop everyone was when East and West Germany was reunited. Partititon a country and you have balkanised it - denying one sector access to the resources of the other and vice versa. Such an act is utterly destructive and at best boils down to an attitude which says what you can't own you will destroy.
My experience of Americans is that basically they want to be loved, yet how can you love a people who tell you they have done a good job ridding you of a hated dictator who has made your life hard, when they have destroyed your cities and your heritage, ruined your economy and killed thousands of your people - in exchange for the vote???? Can they vote themselves a square meal, a roof over their heads or vote their dead relatives back to life? Look what the vote got the US public - George W Bush god help them!
"Good ideas" hatched out in that blasted oval-office have caused upheaval around the world for 50 years and it is time it stopped. Those do-gooders in the white house can only help defenceless people drown in their own blood. That goes for republicans and democrats alike - incase anyone thinks political bias is setting in here.
MY one hope in the current climate is that the economic crisis will so impact on the American mind as to keep her attitude, her troops and her weapons firmly inside her own boundaries and her nose out of other people's business. Given my belief in the economic causes of war I doubt that that will happen, not without a major social unheval within the USA - I live in hope.
Vic Dale
What i detest is US foreign policy which although it is no worse than anyone else's foreign policy simply helps no one. The USA is the strongest nation on the planet and as such I expect it to set an example - not act as school-bully.
You cite Korea, but the best that can be said of that debacle is that the country was partitioned. Partitioning weakens and paralyses development. Look at how cock-a-hoop everyone was when East and West Germany was reunited. Partititon a country and you have balkanised it - denying one sector access to the resources of the other and vice versa. Such an act is utterly destructive and at best boils down to an attitude which says what you can't own you will destroy.
My experience of Americans is that basically they want to be loved, yet how can you love a people who tell you they have done a good job ridding you of a hated dictator who has made your life hard, when they have destroyed your cities and your heritage, ruined your economy and killed thousands of your people - in exchange for the vote???? Can they vote themselves a square meal, a roof over their heads or vote their dead relatives back to life? Look what the vote got the US public - George W Bush god help them!
"Good ideas" hatched out in that blasted oval-office have caused upheaval around the world for 50 years and it is time it stopped. Those do-gooders in the white house can only help defenceless people drown in their own blood. That goes for republicans and democrats alike - incase anyone thinks political bias is setting in here.
MY one hope in the current climate is that the economic crisis will so impact on the American mind as to keep her attitude, her troops and her weapons firmly inside her own boundaries and her nose out of other people's business. Given my belief in the economic causes of war I doubt that that will happen, not without a major social unheval within the USA - I live in hope.
Vic Dale
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
Vic,
I take it you firmly believe that if Kim Il Sung had been allowed to control the entire Korean peninsula, all the Korean people would be better off today. I would think the difference in the lives of the two populations would indicate otherwise.
Likewise, if we had allowed Germany to control all of Europe. Or Stalin.
Saddam Hussein should have been left alone to control Kuwait after looting it. And Saudi Arabia too, if he could manage it.
Basically, intervention is wrong no matter what?
I agree that US Intervention in the past few years has been ill advised, but that doesn't mean it isn't sometimes the right thing to do. Are you one of those people who thinks that if you swear off military adventurism that every dictator will do the same? That doesn't happen in the real world.
Now, what I DO believe is that if the USA did less, other nations might be forced to contribute to world order. Countries like China and Japan, both of whom get a free ride. And Germany. France has actually contributed force where they thought it worthwhile. So has Italy.
I take it you firmly believe that if Kim Il Sung had been allowed to control the entire Korean peninsula, all the Korean people would be better off today. I would think the difference in the lives of the two populations would indicate otherwise.
Likewise, if we had allowed Germany to control all of Europe. Or Stalin.
Saddam Hussein should have been left alone to control Kuwait after looting it. And Saudi Arabia too, if he could manage it.
Basically, intervention is wrong no matter what?
I agree that US Intervention in the past few years has been ill advised, but that doesn't mean it isn't sometimes the right thing to do. Are you one of those people who thinks that if you swear off military adventurism that every dictator will do the same? That doesn't happen in the real world.
Now, what I DO believe is that if the USA did less, other nations might be forced to contribute to world order. Countries like China and Japan, both of whom get a free ride. And Germany. France has actually contributed force where they thought it worthwhile. So has Italy.
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
Saddam Hussein was the result of British and US meddling in the first place, so without their intervention in Iraq full stop, the Iraqi people might well have sorted themselves out a long time ago and Saddam might now be tending sheep or running a shop.
The Shah of Iran was installed at Britain's behest and look what a mess he made of it. The ruling family of Kuwait was establshed as anti-democratic and held back that country's development toward democracy. The Ruling family of Saudi Arabia is anti-democratic, but British and US imperialism can still do business there, despite beheadings and death squad acitivity. There was no Al Queada in Iraq until Britain and the USA went in mob-handed on that pretext (or should I say subtext after they failed to find WMDs). Al Queada is well established in Saudi - Bin Laden IS Saudi - so why aren't US troops in there helping THEM acheive democracy and the education of women???
Saddam Hussein was supposed to have been permitted to take Kuwait as reward for waging war against Iran. He is only crime there was failing to see that the US administration had changed it's mind after a few presidential elections. If he had played ball with the USA he could have continued to mangle the Kurds and Marsh Arabs, without turning a hair for the Imperialist on-lookers.
Kim Il Sung and other communist dictators only manged to get a foot in the door thanks to Imperialist meddling in the affairs of small nations, which hampered and stunted their growth. Stalin played a major part in preventing revolution in the under-developed world. His meddling completely destroyed the Chinese revolution of 1925, telling the Chinese communist parties they had to work under the authority of the Kuomin Tang, to acheive the task of national liberation - with his lunatic "stage-ist" approach to world development.
Chiang Kia Shek thanked Stalin by beheading 1 million Chinese communists in Peking alone. The communists were driven into the hills and found common cause there, not with workers, but with peasents and from there leaders like Mao and Zhou Enlai rose to the top not as workers leaders (though they still carried the name) but as peasant leaders.
Largely the post war communist parties grew out of the intense struggles for national status and were based on the peasantry as opposed to workers organistaions. If they had been left alone it is possible that workers would have come to power instead of peasants, Ayatollahs, or military leaders with no more idea than that something had to change. Workers are reasonable people with an understanding of how production can be organised. They don't behead intellectuals as Pol Pot did in Cambodia and they don't support terrorist oganisations.
Hitler came to power as a result of the mess which the leading powers created after WWI. With Germany prostrate at their feet they did not know what to do with her; occupy and become responsible for her economy, or leave her alone and permit her to develop. They chose to leave her to hang yet continued to meddle, keeping the nation divided and partially paralysed through partition. Hunger and continuing poverty gave rise to intense claas battles and also provided fule to the fire which brought Hitler to power. The likes of Churchill branded everyone in Germany as Prussian upstarts, but generally the British ruling class applauded the way Hitler handled the communists and socialists, so too did the French rulers.
It seems to me that the leaders of the imperialist powers have relatively strong stomachs when dealing with ruthless dictators as long as they play ball. When they don't get their way they cry "foul!" and use the crusade for democracy (and latterly women's education) as a fig-leaf for sending the troops in to get their own way.
They really are a shabby lot.
Vic Dale
The Shah of Iran was installed at Britain's behest and look what a mess he made of it. The ruling family of Kuwait was establshed as anti-democratic and held back that country's development toward democracy. The Ruling family of Saudi Arabia is anti-democratic, but British and US imperialism can still do business there, despite beheadings and death squad acitivity. There was no Al Queada in Iraq until Britain and the USA went in mob-handed on that pretext (or should I say subtext after they failed to find WMDs). Al Queada is well established in Saudi - Bin Laden IS Saudi - so why aren't US troops in there helping THEM acheive democracy and the education of women???
Saddam Hussein was supposed to have been permitted to take Kuwait as reward for waging war against Iran. He is only crime there was failing to see that the US administration had changed it's mind after a few presidential elections. If he had played ball with the USA he could have continued to mangle the Kurds and Marsh Arabs, without turning a hair for the Imperialist on-lookers.
Kim Il Sung and other communist dictators only manged to get a foot in the door thanks to Imperialist meddling in the affairs of small nations, which hampered and stunted their growth. Stalin played a major part in preventing revolution in the under-developed world. His meddling completely destroyed the Chinese revolution of 1925, telling the Chinese communist parties they had to work under the authority of the Kuomin Tang, to acheive the task of national liberation - with his lunatic "stage-ist" approach to world development.
Chiang Kia Shek thanked Stalin by beheading 1 million Chinese communists in Peking alone. The communists were driven into the hills and found common cause there, not with workers, but with peasents and from there leaders like Mao and Zhou Enlai rose to the top not as workers leaders (though they still carried the name) but as peasant leaders.
Largely the post war communist parties grew out of the intense struggles for national status and were based on the peasantry as opposed to workers organistaions. If they had been left alone it is possible that workers would have come to power instead of peasants, Ayatollahs, or military leaders with no more idea than that something had to change. Workers are reasonable people with an understanding of how production can be organised. They don't behead intellectuals as Pol Pot did in Cambodia and they don't support terrorist oganisations.
Hitler came to power as a result of the mess which the leading powers created after WWI. With Germany prostrate at their feet they did not know what to do with her; occupy and become responsible for her economy, or leave her alone and permit her to develop. They chose to leave her to hang yet continued to meddle, keeping the nation divided and partially paralysed through partition. Hunger and continuing poverty gave rise to intense claas battles and also provided fule to the fire which brought Hitler to power. The likes of Churchill branded everyone in Germany as Prussian upstarts, but generally the British ruling class applauded the way Hitler handled the communists and socialists, so too did the French rulers.
It seems to me that the leaders of the imperialist powers have relatively strong stomachs when dealing with ruthless dictators as long as they play ball. When they don't get their way they cry "foul!" and use the crusade for democracy (and latterly women's education) as a fig-leaf for sending the troops in to get their own way.
They really are a shabby lot.
Vic Dale
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
Vic,
what exactly is an "imperialist power"? You obviously want to blame all the world's ills on "them", whoever "they" are.
I suspect an "imperialist power" is any powerful nation which attempts to look after it's own interests.
Human nature being what it is, that will always be the case.
what exactly is an "imperialist power"? You obviously want to blame all the world's ills on "them", whoever "they" are.
I suspect an "imperialist power" is any powerful nation which attempts to look after it's own interests.
Human nature being what it is, that will always be the case.
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
Imperialisn is no great mystery, it has been around for thousands of years. Britain once had an empire which she ruled by the bayonet and the bullet - bombs if necessary (Yes we gassed the Kurds too). The Romans and Greeks had empires, as did the Spanish and the French. Their rule was often enforced by the harshest of methods and they brought order to the world. Their order.
Until the end of the second world war, Britian and France still had their had empires relatively intact and they continued to rule by armed might where it was necessary. Eventually they were driven out by armed force from the enraged populations of the countries they dominated, but the process was long protracted and bloody.
As France was being driven out of Vietnam, the USA thought it would be able to scoop up that and other colonial possessions in Indo-China and sent troops into the country to restore order where the French had failed. They too failed to get what they wanted and were forced to withdraw.
This battle we can call the colonial revolution - revolutionary because although none acheived socialism, they did acheive nationhood, which is a step along the road which Trotsky indicated in his theory of "Permanent Revolution." As a socialist he recognised that although the nations might eventually acheive nationhood through national struggles and thereby become independent capitalist nations, they would still be beset by the internal conflict between the interests of capital and labour. Th weakness of the capitalist class might not be able to develop the means opf production sufficiently and where capitalism failed society great socal uphevals would give birth to the next phase of the revolutionary struggle.
Now people may not agree with revolution, but revolution has become an establsiihed fact which cannot be permanently suppressed, so the pressure for it, which does not flow from bloody minedness or destructiveness, but is an entirely productive process, becomes permanent as pressure for change develops from below. This pressure may be intense at times and more relaxed at others, but it is a permanent spectre ready to haunt the capitalists and frighten the life out of them when their system goes worng.
In the modern world, governing the servant countries who are induced to sell their nation's wealth cheaply to one major nation is not usually carried out by direct armed force, but is instead carried out by a mixture of induced instability (Israel in the Middle East) or the promise of profitable arrangements for ruthless dictators Saddam Hussein, Idi Amin etc. Mugabe would be ok if he played ball with the USA and Britain. If Morgan Tsvangirai gets the upper hand in Zimbabwe, it is pretty certain that he will rule his people with an iron hand in the same fashion as Mugabe, but then the US like him so that will be allright.
Hitler would have done a lot better if he had stuck to what the dominant powers wished. They would have continued to chuck him scraps from the plate, like Austria and Czechslovakia and who knows, if Poland did try to go it alone against Ukraine, they may have given him Poland as well. This would probably only be o9n condition that he agreed to keep a neutral geographical division between East and West Prussia. Then he would become land rich and be seen as a great dictator by his people and the imperial powers could continue to exert control over his trade.
The ultra left see imperialism as an amouphous force, as if all countries are subject to it, but that is a failure of theory. The USA is subject to the rule of none, as evidenced by their ability to ignore the UN over WMDs in Iraq.
The position of nations in the world is determined by their relationship to the USA and the pecking order goes right the way down the scale to the misbegotten, starving countries in Africa who, though they may posses immense natural wealth in the form of raw materials, cannot get the market price for it, because they are tied to aid deals and have to sell to their imperial master at the price he dictates.
Vic Dale
Until the end of the second world war, Britian and France still had their had empires relatively intact and they continued to rule by armed might where it was necessary. Eventually they were driven out by armed force from the enraged populations of the countries they dominated, but the process was long protracted and bloody.
As France was being driven out of Vietnam, the USA thought it would be able to scoop up that and other colonial possessions in Indo-China and sent troops into the country to restore order where the French had failed. They too failed to get what they wanted and were forced to withdraw.
This battle we can call the colonial revolution - revolutionary because although none acheived socialism, they did acheive nationhood, which is a step along the road which Trotsky indicated in his theory of "Permanent Revolution." As a socialist he recognised that although the nations might eventually acheive nationhood through national struggles and thereby become independent capitalist nations, they would still be beset by the internal conflict between the interests of capital and labour. Th weakness of the capitalist class might not be able to develop the means opf production sufficiently and where capitalism failed society great socal uphevals would give birth to the next phase of the revolutionary struggle.
Now people may not agree with revolution, but revolution has become an establsiihed fact which cannot be permanently suppressed, so the pressure for it, which does not flow from bloody minedness or destructiveness, but is an entirely productive process, becomes permanent as pressure for change develops from below. This pressure may be intense at times and more relaxed at others, but it is a permanent spectre ready to haunt the capitalists and frighten the life out of them when their system goes worng.
In the modern world, governing the servant countries who are induced to sell their nation's wealth cheaply to one major nation is not usually carried out by direct armed force, but is instead carried out by a mixture of induced instability (Israel in the Middle East) or the promise of profitable arrangements for ruthless dictators Saddam Hussein, Idi Amin etc. Mugabe would be ok if he played ball with the USA and Britain. If Morgan Tsvangirai gets the upper hand in Zimbabwe, it is pretty certain that he will rule his people with an iron hand in the same fashion as Mugabe, but then the US like him so that will be allright.
Hitler would have done a lot better if he had stuck to what the dominant powers wished. They would have continued to chuck him scraps from the plate, like Austria and Czechslovakia and who knows, if Poland did try to go it alone against Ukraine, they may have given him Poland as well. This would probably only be o9n condition that he agreed to keep a neutral geographical division between East and West Prussia. Then he would become land rich and be seen as a great dictator by his people and the imperial powers could continue to exert control over his trade.
The ultra left see imperialism as an amouphous force, as if all countries are subject to it, but that is a failure of theory. The USA is subject to the rule of none, as evidenced by their ability to ignore the UN over WMDs in Iraq.
The position of nations in the world is determined by their relationship to the USA and the pecking order goes right the way down the scale to the misbegotten, starving countries in Africa who, though they may posses immense natural wealth in the form of raw materials, cannot get the market price for it, because they are tied to aid deals and have to sell to their imperial master at the price he dictates.
Vic Dale
Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
Interesting. And all the time I was supporting the war in Viet Nam and corresponding with my congressperson about how we were going to stop the USSR from achieving Global Hegemony and eliminating democracy from the face of the earth ... all this time I was an evil imperialist! Amazing. I didn't even know it!
Well, I have decided I was wrong about Viet Nam and so were a lot of other people. But Vic, that war may have bee ill advised, but it wasn't about imperialism. For the most part the US population was behind it, at least in the beginning. It wasn't some evil imperialist plot. There was never any intent to control Viet Nam any more than there was to control Korea. You just can't get your head around the possibility that things can be done because people think their way of life is in danger, and not because of some "imperialistic" intent to control the world. Do you think the US controls Germany, or Japan, or Korea? Were we forced out by some worker's revolution? Nope. We left when the forces weren't needed there anymore and we needed them somewhere else or we needed the money it cost to keep them there.
Now about Iraq, there we were lied to. We were told that this guy was supporting Al Qaeda, and that he was going to give them these WMD he was making. All rubbish. That WAS an evil plot, I must admit, and I think Tony Blair believed the lie as well. There were people questioning the rationale, but few listened to them. I really think there are some "evil doers". Carl Rove. Dick Cheney. And there are others. Bush may be cynical and evil too, or he may just be kind of stupid and easily manipulated. I'm not sure about that, I think it could be either one. I can sure understand someone accusing us of Imperialism over the last few years actions.
Well, I have decided I was wrong about Viet Nam and so were a lot of other people. But Vic, that war may have bee ill advised, but it wasn't about imperialism. For the most part the US population was behind it, at least in the beginning. It wasn't some evil imperialist plot. There was never any intent to control Viet Nam any more than there was to control Korea. You just can't get your head around the possibility that things can be done because people think their way of life is in danger, and not because of some "imperialistic" intent to control the world. Do you think the US controls Germany, or Japan, or Korea? Were we forced out by some worker's revolution? Nope. We left when the forces weren't needed there anymore and we needed them somewhere else or we needed the money it cost to keep them there.
Now about Iraq, there we were lied to. We were told that this guy was supporting Al Qaeda, and that he was going to give them these WMD he was making. All rubbish. That WAS an evil plot, I must admit, and I think Tony Blair believed the lie as well. There were people questioning the rationale, but few listened to them. I really think there are some "evil doers". Carl Rove. Dick Cheney. And there are others. Bush may be cynical and evil too, or he may just be kind of stupid and easily manipulated. I'm not sure about that, I think it could be either one. I can sure understand someone accusing us of Imperialism over the last few years actions.
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José M. Rico
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Re: New Poll: critical moment for Germany
This thread has gone way off topic and until I decide what to do with it, it will remain closed.
Vic, if you want to tell us more about your theories on Capitalism, Imperialism or the Communism paradigm you can do that in the Off topic section. This one is for military history of World War II.
Vic, if you want to tell us more about your theories on Capitalism, Imperialism or the Communism paradigm you can do that in the Off topic section. This one is for military history of World War II.