Mary, Clark and all MOQ historians:
I can only blame myself for the misunderstanding. Its obvious that I
failed to communicate in the last post on this topic. I was in a hurry
and hoped you would read between the lines. I'd hoped it wouldn't be
necessary to spell it all out since we've been discussing this topic for
so long.
Stalin was our strongest ally. The Allied powers could not have won
without the Soviet military effort. Some people might even go so far as
to say that they could have won it alone, although I doubt it. I only
brought it up in response to Ben's assertion that the allies were
fighting for human rights and democracy. While I agree there is some
truth to that claim, it also seems obvious that our side wasn't perfect
and the lines aren't so easily drawn between the good guys and the bad
guys. There was the French resistence, but there were also plenty of
French nationals who collaborated with the NAZI's. Hitler had more
sympathizers among the Brittish aritstocracy than most of the English
would care to admit. And as the war was breaking out in Europe the was a
sizable Fascist party here in the USA. (Texaco, GM and Ford did business
with the NAZI's during the war and even profited from Germany's slave
labor camps.) Again, the point is that our alleged defense of Democracy
and human rights is only partially true. The USA was willing to ally
itself with Stalin, who was certianly no respecter of Democracy, and was
willing to violate human rights itself. (Killing a soldier is not a
violation of human rights, but killing non-combatants is.)
YOU HAD TO BE THERE. OK. OK . OK. I understand that a person's
perspective is influenced by the Zietgiest, the spirit of the times, the
national mood, etc. But you know that German citizens often minimize
their own complicity with Hitler's actions by saying the same thing.
"oh, but things were different in those days and we didn't know about
the camps.", etc. I reallly don't think that understaning the national
mood explains these things any better than it would be to understand
your personal mood at any given time. Appealing to the spirit of the
times is just like saying, "I was caught up in the moment and couldn't
see past the situation before me".
Every person and every age has their "moods" and "spirits". But that
justifies absolutely nothing. It only proves that we can be swallowed up
by the context of our lives, which is nothing to brag about.
For example, some people like to cut Thomas Jefferson a lot of slack
when it comes to the issue of his slave ownership. They say, "well, that
was a different historical period and Jefferson was only doing what many
others were doing at the time." But the truth is that England had
already outlawed slavery in Jefferson's time and some of Jefferson's
Virginia contemporaries did free their slaves. So TJ knew he had
options. He was not the prisoner of history that some of his defenders
make him out to be.
In the same way, not every young person in the sixites believed in sex,
drugs and rock-n-roll. Not every young person in the 90's sympathizes
with Tim McVeigh's anti-government views. Fashionable also means
malleable, if you know what I mean.
David B.
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