Americanadian

No, just a bunch of blindfolded people with sticks beating on a pre-selected pinata. But hey, who needs blindfolds right? We're all adults here.

BTW...the lady on the far right in that pic doesn't look too shabby.

Volker

Sorry to hear this. For a moment I thought you were actually interested in serious debating this topic, politicians and directions in this party in the early 30ties.

Americanadian

Debating things in a serious manner is fine. However, it is difficult to debate with another human being whom hates a select group of people for reasons as he cited as "evil", and genocide is an acceptable political antidote for anyone who opposes that specific ideology.

So what were you interested in debating? I have always felt that Germany was given the ****ty end of the stick so to speak at the Treaty of Versailles. Germany did not start WWI and merely supported the country who had a legitimate and justifiable reason to declare war on Serbia. If one considers the context of events in WWI, we can easily see that Russia, Britain and France were supporting the country who committed the initial offense.

Your thoughts?

Volker

It is difficult.

The Strasser brother, Ernst Roehm and Adolf Hitler stood for very different directions within the party. The Strasser brother actually belonged to the "left" wing of the party, Ernst Roehm is somehow important for the current Nationalist movement in Germany, Adolf Hitler was the in the center or at the right wing, which was somehow the same, I guess, at least I don't know of a right opposition within the party.

The German tried to mitigate Austria-Hungary in the first place to avoid a war. Austria-Hungary had no legitimate and justifiable reason to decalre war on Serbia. This war could have been avoided, if the demands from Vienna would have been more realistic.

The alliance policy of Germany went wrong before, however, Germany missed chances to work towards a peaceful solutions and declared war to Russia and France, before they did.

Germany was not the only guilty one when starting this war, but Germany was guilty, too.

Americanadian

I once did some research on the various assassination attempts against Hitler. There were many Germans devoted to ridding Germany of the virus of Nazism. Unfortunately they failed.

If that is the case, all of the countries involved should have abstained from entering the war. Thus, Austria and Serbia could fight it out amongst themselves. However, there was more to it than what we are told in the history books.

bub

It's quite simple: France and Germany were ennemies since France lost Alsace-Lorraine in 1870.

France was allied to Russia, so that Germany was encircled, and also allied to UK since 1904 I think.

On the other side, Germany's ally was Austria.


So, when Austria declared the war against Serbia, Russia (protector of the Slavs) declared war on Austria. Austria's ally Germany had to react, and declared war on Russia and on its ally, France. France then declared war on Germany, because it wanted to reconquer Alsace. On both sides, nationalism was used to convince people that a war could be good.

Remember, they all believed the war would be short, with several fast and decisive battles, as in 1870.

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Americanadian

War is inherently pointless, other than to serve as a method of population control.

I suppose each country would be optimistic about their imperialistic endeavors. Few hesitate and think about the innocent who may be lost as a result of their inebriated malfeasance.

"To secure peace is to prepare for war" ?

RightinNYC

Germany was both spared and shafted at Versailles. The allies should have taken much more of their land, put far stricter rules on their military size (especially the officer corps), taken a much stronger stance in regards to the Rhineland, and taken a much more heavy handed approach to the Ruhr, up to and including seizing it.

On the other hand, the monetary reparations were far too high and the decision to keep Germany out of the LoN was probably in the top 5 worst decisions of all time.

Germany was not so innocent. Austria-Hungary didn't so much as spit in the balkans without approval of the Kaiser.

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People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.

Americanadian

Hmmm...interesting. This could lead even more credence to the possibility of a follow up war now that you mention this. They wanted another war. I'll be back in a bit.

jujuman13

Auftrag seems, unlike those whom he lauds, to have a very selective memory.
It is widely been proven (With NAZI records) that some 17,000,000 people died in the 167 extermination and work camps throughout Nazi occupied Europe.
These included Jews, Russians, Poles, Germans, French, Italians,Roanians, Checks, Yugoslavians, Italians, Belgians, Dutch, British etc etc. Gypsy's, insane assylum inmates in all occupied country's, those who were considered disabled, the elderly.
Whoever did not fit in with the Nazi ideal or was considered to be economically useless was murdered.
Naturally Auftrag can continue to disagree with what was essentuially murder on an industrial scale.
Has he ever visited the Museum at either the Aushwitz or dachau concentration camps, somehow I very mush doubt he has.
Perhaps he should visit such, then ask himself if he still believes it was a lie.
Incidentally,
The UK declared war on Germany after Germany invaded Poland, the UK had a Treaty with Poland stating that if either country were attacked the other would come to it's aid.
England lived up to that Treaty.