I'm all for giving Churchill due credit for his forthright stand against Nazi aggression in WW II. But outside of WW II (and even in it), he was a forthright defender of British imperialism in its most exaggerated form. Furthermore his performance in WW I was nothing to write home about, as all the dead Ozzies and Kiwis from his botched campaign at the Dardenelles can attest to. Barkley Rosser -----Original Message----- From: Alexandre Fenelon <sfenelon at africanet.com.br> To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Date: Thursday, September 16, 1999 8:08 PM Subject: Re: Buchanan: taking on Hitler was a mistake
>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
>
>