By Nick
Adolf Hitler was a lazy bastard. He slept late, often until two o'clock in the afternoon. After he dragged himself out of bed, he'd read the papers then go for a stroll. In the evening, he'd watch movies which Goebbels had selected for him. (1)
The world was at war, and somehow, this "Vienna vagabond" (2) was at the centre of the storm. An average of twenty seven thousand people died each day between September 1939 and August 1945. At least sixty million lives were lost overall. The lives of the survivors were forever touched by the events of World War II. The war went beyond anything previously experienced by humanity and the only way people could describe what happened was to say that "all hell broke loose". (3)
That's an appropriate turn of phrase, because the Satanic nature of Hitler's regime is unmistakable. Hitler, a failed artist with no formal training, created a symbol for the Nazis to follow during his rise to power. That symbol was the Hakenkreuz, the hooked cross. We know it as a black swastika on a white disc, with a red background. (4)
At the first Nazi party rally held in Nuremberg, Hitler used the Blutfahne to bless the Nazi flags carried by his followers. This flag was stained with the blood of Nazis who had been killed during the failedputsch of November 1923.
The Fuehrer demanded absolute loyalty from his followers. German soldiers had to swear an oath of allegiance to Hitler personally. (6) One Nazi party member said, "There are things one cannot explain, cannot describe. I never stopped thinking of him. Sometimes, he meets us in our dreams." (7)
An oath sworn to a man, believed by his followers to be their saviour, made under a hooked cross and consecrated with the blood of other Nazis. Historians have struggled to explain how such a regime managed to establish the camps.
Adolf Hitler may have spent most of his time lazing around at his home in the mountains, and he may not have issued an explicit order to establish a system of death camps, but an explanation of how the camps came to be an integral part of the Third Reich is certainly possible.
Hitler had stated that he intended to do away with democracy in Germany, and that's exactly what he did once he attained power. The Nazi regime has been described as chaotic, (8) but in fact the Nazis operated the Third Reich in accordance with basic evolutionary principles. Hitler was a follower of Darwin, and believed that his subordinates should compete amongst themselves, and the most devout and able Nazis would rise to positions of power. (9)
In the absence of clearly defined orders being formally issued to his subordinates, the words of the Fuehrer served to establish the goals of the Nazi regime. Hitler had declared the Jewish race to be his enemy throughout his political career, so it was natural for avowed Nazis to pursue anti-Semitic policies. The British historian Ian Kershaw explains how this worked, citing a speech by Werner Willikens, who was employed in the German Ministry of Food: "Everyone who has the opportunity to observe it knows that the Fuehrer can hardly dictate from above everything he intends to realise sooner or later. On the contrary, up till now everyone with a post in the new Germany has worked best when he has, so to speak, worked towards the Fuehrer." (10)
Nazis worked towards the Fuehrer by perpetrating crimes they thought Hitler would approve of. There was no legal or moral reason to restrict their behaviour in any way. Their enemies had from day one been treated with the utmost brutality. On the Night of The Long Knives, the Nazis had even turned against their own and murdered the leader of the SA, Ernst Roehm. (11)
The most ruthless anti-Semitic measures were taken. In accordance with the principles of Darwinism, the ongoing expression of the Nazis' hatred of the Jewish people could not evolve differently, by going back in time and choosing a path which had not been taken. The Nazis' anti-Semitic policies could only become more radical until eventually, a "final solution" was reached.
In the Third Reich, all roads led to the death camps.
Many people living in first world countries today have no personal experience of war, and they have no context in which to place the Nazis and their crimes against humanity. This limited view of reality is sometimes referred to as a "normalcy bias". It may be difficult for some people to think clearly about the Holocaust. But the question must be asked: Could it happen again?
If such a regime arose today, its disciples would not march under the swastika. That symbol is now associated with the Nazis, and the political operators of the 21st century would never permit such an overt display.
In the landmark television series The World At War, one woman who lived in Germany in the 1930s said that Adolf Hitler appeared to many people to be pursuing order and stability. By the time his real agenda became known, it was too late for anyone to oppose him. Christabel Bielenberg, who was married to a German at the time, said: "I think that everything that came to us when we were living in Germany came very gradually. That was part, perhaps, of the way Hitler managed these things. It came on us rather, drip by drip, rather like an anaesthetic, one could almost say, and it was only when a specific thing that he did hit you personally that you actually realised what was going on." (12)
We know that it is possible for a man who has done nothing, achieved nothing, and whose character and beliefs are a mystery, to manoeuvre themselves into a position of considerable political power. In an age where information is accessible to anyone, anywhere in the world, at the touch of an iPad, no one has any idea who the current American President really is.
One of the first things Obama did as President was remove a bust of Sir Winston Churchill from the Oval Office. Churchill was the man who, more than any other, recognised the danger posed by the Nazis and stood resolutely against them. (13)
After insulting the Brits, Obama did the same to the Israelis. Benjamin Netanyahu served in the IDF and fought on the front lines in the Yom Kippur war of 1973. When Netanyahu arrived at the White House for a scheduled meeting, Obama handed him a list of demands based on the false "land for peace" premise, and told him to consider that while he went off to have dinner with his wife. Obama said he'd "be around" if Netanyahu decided he was willing to bend over on behalf of the state of Israel and take it up the ass. As one of the reporters who covered the incident noted, all that Obama managed to do here was reveal himself to be ideological and vindictive.(14,15)
These two incidents are telling enough, but a further incident involving a head of state gives Obama's game away completely. When he met a real, live Muslim king, his upbringing came to the fore and the President of the United States of America bowed down before him.
As President, Obama has changed the status of Israel in the Middle East by letting her enemies know that instead of standing by Israel, his administration is backing away. As President of America, Obama has given hope to Israel's enemies. (16)
If that's what Obama meant by "hope" and "change" on the campaign trail in 2008, one shudders to think what is meant by his new slogan: "Forward!" (17)
An American President doesn't need to drop a nuke on Tel Aviv for Israel's citizens to start dying. All he needs to do is let it be known that he sympathises with the Islamic world, and that America no longer stands with Israel. There are plenty of organisations in the Middle East willing to murder Israelis. They're not satisfied killing a busload of people at a time either. They've been doing that for years, and it hasn't worked. The Star of David still flies over Israel.
The Nazis also tried to operate at that level, using "gas vans". (18) It didn't work for them either; as we know, the Nazis went on to develop a "final solution" to the Judenfrage.
Hitler may have committed suicide in April 1945, but there are still a lot of people today trying to act in ways that would have pleased him.
Whether it's politicians trying to do to Israel what Neville Chamberlain and his pals did to Czechoslovakia in 1938, a corrupt Western media failing to report the thousands of rockets fired from Gaza into the town of Sderot, or the educated, so-called "moderate" Muslims living in the West who harbour the same ancient hatred of Israel in their hearts as the so-called "exremists" who act upon it, there is no shortage of people who, almost seven decades after the collapse of the Third Reich, are still working towards the Fuehrer.
No comments:
Post a Comment