Lookie Here….Looks like Bruce Ramsey from the Seattle Times is trying to wipe away his “Hitler wasn’t Unreasonable” belief.
Her is a screen-shot of Bruce Ramsey’s Hitler “wasn’t unreasonable” screed.
The before text:
Democrats are rebuking President Bush for saying in his speech to the Knesset, here, that to “negotiate with terrorists and radicals” is “appeasement.” The Democrats took it as a slap at Barack Obama. What bothers me is the continual reference to Hitler and his National Socialists, particularly the British and French accommodation at the Munich Conference of 1938.
What Hitler was demanding was not unreasonable. He wanted the German-speaking areas of Europe under German authority. He had just annexed Austria, which was German-speaking, without bloodshed. There were two more small pieces of Germanic territory: the free city of Danzig and the Sudetenland, a border area of what is now the Czech Republic.
We live in an era when you do not change national borders for these sorts of reasons. But in 1938 it was different. Germany’s eastern and western borders had been redrawn 19 years before—and not to its benefit. In the democracies there was some sense of guilt with how Germany had been treated after World War I. Certainly there was a memory of the “Great War.” In 2008, we have entirely forgotten World War I, and how utterly unlike any conception of “The Good War” it was. When the British let Hitler have a slice of Czechoslovakia, they were following their historical wisdom: avoid war. War produces results far more horrible than you expected. War is a bad investment. It is not glorious. Don’t give anyone an excuse to start one.
In a few months, in early 1939, Hitler ordered the invasion of what is now the Czech Republic—that is, territory that was not German. Then it was obvious that a deal with him was worthless. And so when Bush recalls the unnamed senator who, in September 1939, lamented that he had not been able to talk to Hitler, he hits an easy target. But the moment of September 1939 is nothing like today.
In September 1939, when Germany started the war, it had no just claim to any more territory. But the Palestinians who fight Israel do have a just claim to territory. We can argue what it is; we can argue about the justness of their military tactics, and so on. And the same for the Israeli side, which is equally arguable.
The step that must be taken now is for the two sides to talk, so that they can make a deal that both will accept, and that each side will enforce against its radical elements. In that context, to continually bring up Hitler, the Nazis, the Munich Conference and continually use the word “appeasement,” is wrong. To use those comparisons is to assert that it is morally questionable even to talk to the Palestinians. It is to give an excuse to seal them off, cast them out, to deny that they have any just claims. And they do have just claims. To compare the Palestinians—who are occupied, oppressed, denied, stepped-on—with Hitler’s Germany in 1939 is incredible and ridiculous .
Todays Text:
Ed cetera | Bush, and His Use of “Appeasement” | Seattle Times Newspaper Blog
Democrats are rebuking President Bush for saying in his speech to the Knesset, here, that to “negotiate with terrorists and radicals” is “appeasement.” The Democrats took it as a slap at Barack Obama. What bothers me is the continual reference to Hitler and his National Socialists, particularly the British and French accommodation at the Munich Conference of 1938.
The narrative we’re given about Munich is entirely in hindsight. We know what kind of man Hitler was, and that he started World War II in Europe. But in 1938 people knew a lot less. What Hitler was demanding at Munich was not unreasonable as a national claim (though he was making it in a last-minute, unreasonable way.) Germany’s claim was that the areas of Europe that spoke German and thought of themselves as German be under German authority. In September 1938 the principal remaining area was the Sudetenland.
So the British and French let him have it. Their thought was: “Now you have your Greater Germany.” They didn’t want a war. They were not superpowers like the United States is now. They remembered the 1914-1918 war and how they almost lost it.
In a few months, in early 1939, Hitler ordered the invasion of what is now the Czech Republic—that is, territory that was not German. Then it was obvious that a deal with him was worthless–and the British and French did not appease Hitler any more. Thus the lesson of Munich: don’t appease Hitlers.
But who else is a Hitler? If you paste that label on somebody it means they are cast out. You can’t talk to them any more. And it has gotten pasted on quite a few national leaders over the years: Milosevic, Hussein, Ahmadinejad, et. al. In particular, to apply that label to the elected leaders of the Palestinians is to say that you aren’t going to listen to their claims to a homeland. I think they do have a claim. So do the Israelis. In order to get anywhere, each side has to listen to the other. To continually bring up Hitler, the Nazis, the Munich Conference and “appeasement,” is to try to prolong the stalemate.
This is the most telling quote from Bruce Ramsey and goes to the core why liberal democrats will never understand Tyrants, Terrorists, Dictators and the threats they possess.
The narrative we’re given about Munich is entirely in hindsight. We know what kind of man Hitler was, and that he started World War II in Europe. But in 1938 people knew a lot less.
Wrong ! Many knew the evil Hitler possessed and ignored it and many were oblivious due to their ignorant philosophy of appeasement.
That’s the difference between a Churchill and a Chamberlain.
lgf: Seattle Times Editor: ‘Hitler’s Demands Were Not Unreasonable’
Bruce Ramsey thinks we have the memory of an Alzheimer’s patient with a head injury
Technorati Tags: terrorism, seattle times, bruce ramsey, hitler, knesset, obama, bush, appeasment
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