Buchanan: taking on Hitler was a mistake

[Alexandre Fenelon]

At 11:15 16/09/99 -0700, you wrote:
>Buchanan: War on Hitler was mistake
>Chris Matthews, SF Examiner Washington Bureau
>
>Most Americans see the appeasement of Adolf Hitler as a catastrophe of the
20th century. Had the
>West stopped the Nazi madman when he marched into the Rhineland in 1936, or
when he seized Austria
>in 1937, or even when he demanded the break-up of Czechoslovakia in 1938,
the carnage of World War
>II might have been avoided.
>
>Patrick Buchanan now offers an opposite reading of history. In his new
book, this man who would be
>president argues that the century's greatest blunder lay not in appeasing
Hitler but in taking him
>on when he grabbed for Poland in 1939.
>
>In Buchanan's view of events, the German dictator's territorial ambitions
lay largely to the East.
>Hitler wanted the return of Danzig, lost to Poland in the Versailles Treaty
imposed on Germany after
>World War I. Beyond that, he wanted to destroy Soviet Russia.
>
>Had the West not challenged Hitler 60 years ago, Buchanan argues, the
Western democracies could have
>stood on the sidelines of this Nazi-Soviet struggle and cheered.
>
>The candidate offers this fresh perspective on the 20th century in "A
Republic Not an Empire," a
>book he dedicates to the "Buchanan Brigades" who championed his failed
attempts in 1992 and 1996 to
>win the Republican presidential nomination.
>
>It is an important book that needs to be read, especially by journalists
covering Buchanan's
>expected play for the Reform Party nomination.
>
>Let me admit my bias: I take the conventional view of World War II.
>
>I believe that the man who warned early against Hitler's rise, Britain's
Winston Churchill, was the
>greatest man of the century. I believe it was a moral, military and
political catastrophe when
>Neville Chamberlain, his predecessor as prime minister, bowed to the Nazi
mass-murderer at Munich in
>1938.
>
>Had the British, French and Russians held together in defense of
Czechoslovakia, the alliance would
>have had the upper hand against Hitler. His defeat would have been far less
painful than the
>eventual world war that cost 50 million lives.
>
>Buchanan argues that the Führer should have been allowed to grab back the
German-speaking areas of
>Czechoslovakia and Poland. What business was it to the British? Why should
people in England have
>cared if Hitler wanted some more "living space" to the east?
>
>"If Germany intended no attack on France or the Channel ports, and Hitler's
imperial ambitions were
>in the east, why was it Britain's duty to fight to the death?" he asks at
century's end. "Indeed, If
>Britain had no vital interests in the Rhineland, Austria or Czechoslovakia
worth fighting for, what
>was the vital interest in Danzig?"
>
>Buchanan ridicules the British decision in the spring of '39 to make war if
Hitler moved against
>Poland.
>
>"Many Britons have come to believe this was the greatest blunder of the
century, an act of
>precipitous and ruinous folly," he writes.
>
>"The British-French declarations of war impelled Hitler to attack in the
West to secure his rear
>before invading Russia. The democracies of the West were thus overrun and
occupied, the British army
>was thrown off the continent and the empire was ensnared in a war that led
to its dissolution as
>400,000 British went to their deaths.
>
>Were Buchanan given the chance to rewrite these events, the British and
French would have stood
>back, let Hitler march through Poland and eventually make war on Russia.
Churchill would never have
>become prime minister. By relinquishing its "finest hour," and staying out
of war, the British would
>have had the strength to protect their overseas empire in India, Africa and
Asia.
>
>As for us Americans? Buchanan assures us that Hitler had no malignant
intentions. According to the
>author, he viewed the United States as the rightful "mistress" of the
Western hemisphere.
>
>As I said, people should read this book.
>
>____________________________________________
>Alex Lantsberg, Project Coordinator
>Southeast Alliance for Environmental Justice
>744 Innes Avenue, San Francisco, CA  94124
>ph: 415/824.4102		fax: 415/824.1061
>alex at saej.org		www.saej.org

Patrick Buchanan is pathetic. Is he so naive to think that Hitler would stop
after defeating the USSR (hypotesis 1)? If (hypotesis 2) the USSR was able to
defeat the German invasion (They could had done it faster if they were not
caught by surprise and lost 50% of their industry in the first month of war?)
, Would Stalin stop in Berlin? In case of stalemate (hypotesis 3) in an even-
tual German vs. USSR war, maybe the west could gain something, but they must
deal with instability in Eastern Europe and both USSR and German could had
time to recover from the war. Both of them would had atomic bombs and the
resulting scenario would be much more dangerous.
In fact Buchanan's positions are the same that led Chamberlain to betray
Czechoeslovakia, giving him a proeminent place among the idiots from 20th
Century (Hitler, Gorbatchev and Stalin must appear in this list too, Hitler
for trying to wage war against USSR ans USA at the same time, Gorbatchev for
following policies dictated by the West and Stalin for believing in Hitler).
Churchill, on the other side had the right feeling about German ambitious
and decided to challenge him correctly. We also must remember that the Ger-
man recovery during the 30's was based in military spent. If they simply
gained some territory and stopped, they could go to bankrupt, they need 
a continuous war to gain more territory and resources to exploit. The own
NAZI ideology was militaristic and needed war to keep the hysterical climate
favorable to NAZI domination.

                                                Alexandre