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View Full Version : Alistair Cooke: Appeasing Hitler and Saddam (short article)


MMMMMM
02-22-2003, 01:03 AM
This little article is a good read. Alistair Cooke makes no pretense that the historical circumstances are the same, but he has a message which he conveys in his own inimitable style.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=6255

brad
02-22-2003, 02:17 AM
why does no one ever talk about 'appeasing stalin?'. seriously.

adios
02-22-2003, 02:29 AM
"why does no one ever talk about 'appeasing stalin?'. seriously"

Because the Chris Alger's of the world would accuse those that do as being unilateraly opposed to the legitimacy of every communist regime on the planet /forums/images/icons/smile.gif. Seriously you do bring up a good point IMO.

Zeno
02-22-2003, 02:35 AM
Enjoyed the article. Thanks for posting it. Mr. Cooke does have an interesting historical perspective.

Do you (or anyone else) know if Alistair still does his "Letter from America" radio broadcast.

-Zeno

brad
02-22-2003, 02:38 AM
i dont know i agree with almost everything C.A. says . heh

if you look at WW2 and stuff i think you have to realize propaganda that existed because we fought on side of russians instead of germans, when really they were pretty much indistinguishable.

Jimbo
02-22-2003, 03:04 AM
russians instead of germans, when really they were pretty much indistinguishable. Brad the Russians were much taller, plus I believe they spoke with a different accent. /forums/images/icons/smile.gif

brad
02-22-2003, 03:53 AM
well since jim agrees with me then i guess its unanimous. heh

Mason Malmuth
02-22-2003, 04:50 AM
Hi Brad:

Well there's a couple of reasons for this. First, England desperately needed an active ally to survive. When Hitler attacked Russia, this occurred.

Seceond, you need to look at the events at the end of WWII. I'm not talking about Europe, but Asia. Russia had attacked the Japanese in China and essentially ran over them. This left them with a large portion of China under their control. But Stalin withdrew.

Now you can argue, and I believe this has much merit, that Stalin was afraid of the US atomic bomb and didn't want Moscow to be the next target. But by withdrawing from China, even though he grabbed much of Eastern Europe, he seemed to act very opposite from the idea of appeasement.

Best wishes,
Mason

brad
02-22-2003, 05:06 AM
well i meant hitler and stalin started the war by invading poland.

ive read hitler wouldnt have minded allying with england, however pie in the sky that sounds now. it was only really germany and ussr that were gonna go to war no matter what.

MMMMMM
02-22-2003, 09:26 AM
try this link, Zeno;-)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/letter_from_america/default.stm

IrishHand
02-22-2003, 09:30 AM
The only line in that article which is persuasive is: "Now, this memory of mine may be totally irrelevant to the present crisis."

Nazi Germany took a step forward (Rhineland), and nobody did anything. They took another step forward (Austria), and nobody did anything. They took a third big step forward (Sudetenland), and not only did nobody do anything - they helped him. After he took his final unopposed step forward (the rest of Czecholovakia), Britain and England basically said that enough was enough. So, in pre-WWII, we have an aggressor nation occupying two whole countries before opposing nations decided to take a stand.

Evil-doer Iraq took a step forward (Kuwait), and was completely crippled by a retaliatory US invasion. Since then, Iraq hasn't re-armed in any substantial manner (their military is acknowledged to be relatively useless, a team of inspectors can't find even one "WMD" in many weeks - with complete access to the entire country).

How exactly are the two scenarios even remotely similar? Nazi Germany had developed the best military in the world and was clearly ready to use it. The Iraq military in it's prime (pre-Gulf War 1) was unable to even slow the American advance for a few minutes, much less actually fight a 'war'. In the past 10 years, Iraq has done nothing to indicate expansionist tendencies - they can't even "expand" within their own country. The bottom line for me is that whatever threat might be attributed to Iraq is neither immediate nor serious.

adios
02-22-2003, 09:59 AM
"ive read hitler wouldnt have minded allying with england, however pie in the sky that sounds now."

There actually is a lot of truth to that statement. That guy Churchill didn't see it the same way though. He couldn't stomach the idea of a German controlled Europe, at least western Eurupe, and leaving France under German control. At the time the USA popular sentiment was isolationist. By the time Pearl Harbor rolled around and Germany declared war on the USA, the sides had already been chosen more or less. You've got a valid point IMO though.

MMMMMM
02-22-2003, 10:26 AM
It think the point of the article is: the voices, not the setting.

IrishHand
02-22-2003, 12:25 PM
That guy Churchill didn't see it the same way though. He couldn't stomach the idea of a German controlled Europe, at least western Eurupe, and leaving France under German control.
Actually, it was the occupation of Poland and Czechoslovakia that Churchill objected to - not France. It was fairly clear from both his writings and his speeches that Hitler had no interest in controlling France. If he had had his way from the start, he'd have rolled Poland and continued on to Russia when his military might allowed it. Dealing with France and Britain wasn't something he was interested in.

However, you are accurate in that Britain also objected in principle to any country dominating the European continent, which a Greater Reich containing Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland and a huge chunk of western Russia would certainly have done.

Clarkmeister
02-22-2003, 03:15 PM
M,

You continue to ignore any arguement which points out the obvious. Namely that Saddam is not, has not been, and shows no signs of becoming a serious and realistic threat to anyone at all.

Before you respond, repeat after me: "Iraq did not bomb the WTC. Iraq had no link to al Quaeda. Iraq has done nothing in 10 years since we spanked that ass."

MMMMMM
02-23-2003, 06:42 AM
I've answered those arguments at length already, and I'm not about to repeat myself every time someone desires a rehash.

Now, before you further display the ignorance of blind conviction, please repeat after me:

I, Clarkmeister, believe that Iraq has no links to terrorist groups and al Qaeda, but I do not know this for sure.

I, Clarkmeister, believe that Iraq poses no current or developing threat, but I do not know this for sure.

I, Clarkmeister, believe that Iraq is not providing al Qaeda with biological or chemical weapons, nor with training in the use of these toxins at a secret base 150 km north of Baghdad near the town of Tikrit, but I do not know this for sure.

I, Clarkmeister, think the anthrax letters were from a domestic terrorist because the FBI says that is probably the case, but I do not know for sure that that is so, and I don't think it very significant that the anthrax was in a special, highly militarized form.

I, Clarkmeister, think that the USA, England and Australia are either flat-out wrong or lying when they state that Iraq definitely has ties with al Qaeda--but I do not know this for sure.

adios
02-23-2003, 08:16 AM
Then the inspections are a waste of time? Then the UN resolution supported by Blix; Annan; Blair; Bush; even France and Germany are totally misguided in demanding that Iraq disarm and is not necessary? That's great! How do we get the word out?

http://www.cnn.com/2002/US/11/08/iraq.resolution/

Clarkmeister
02-23-2003, 01:54 PM
That was your best post yet. Basically you reiterate how little (no) proof we have. Yet, you are willing to send our boys off to die just in case you are right, and in the process sentence likely hundreds of thousands of innocents to death as well.

This isn't a game. This isn't some theoretical roundtable discussion. These are real lives. If the evidence we have is so overwhelming why haven't we seen ANY of it? The best we can do is intimate that Iraq "might have ties to al Quaeda"??

If we have so much proof, why haven't we seen it? If Saddam has been such a serious threat, why have we waited so long? If he's so hell bent on using these alleged weapons, why hasn't he done so already?

If people in the past decided to take up this US "preemptive war" doctrine, the history books would be far bloodier than they already are. Heck, there might not be a world. It is very simple here. If we attack them first, we are in the moral wrong, and have justified ANYTHING Saddam does from that point onward in self defense. That's right, Iraq will be acting in self defense against the US attempt to take over their country. There is no such thing as a moral preemptive war.

MMMMMM
02-23-2003, 04:40 PM
You and I differently assess the likelihood of Saddam possessing and potentially using WMD; we also assign different probabilities to the existence of links between Saddam and terrorists, and apparently we also weight differently the value of a war for the Iraqi people--a war of liberation--against a true tyrant.

I don't see that we will be attacking the Iraqi people; we will be attacking the military power structure that allows the Baathist party to rule the Iraqi people with an iron fist.

You and I apparently also count potential deaths differently; included in my count are the future deaths of oppresssed Iraqis who will be tortured and murdered courtesy of Saddam if he is left in power, and I believe these deaths must be weighed against any immediate casualties of war.

In short, we assess the situation differently. I feel the preponderance of past history and current evidence/clues, combined with the risks and detriments of leaving Saddam in power, is strong enough to warrant decisive action; you don't. OK.

nicky g
02-23-2003, 05:09 PM
"I, Clarkmeister, think the anthrax letters were from a domestic terrorist because the FBI says that is probably the case, but I do not know for sure that that is so, and I don't think it very significant that the anthrax was in a special, highly militarized form. "

I can't speak for Clarkmeister, but I do think it very significant. The anthrax quite obviously came from US military stocks.

MMMMMM
02-23-2003, 05:39 PM
What makes you sure it came from US military stocks rather than Iraqi military stocks?

nicky g
02-23-2003, 06:16 PM
Because it's vastly more likely. It was described in several reports as matching known US stocks of anthrax, it would be much harder to smuggle anthrax in from Iraq than for it to find a way out of an American miltary complesx, and the only anthrax Saddam is known to have, assuming he didn't destroy it, would have been totally degraded by the time the attacks started - so assuming it was Iraqi relies on the assumption that anthrax is still being produced in Iraq, whereas we know for a fact it is being prouced in the US.

brad
02-23-2003, 06:57 PM
so obviously cia threatening congress re:patriot act. (confirmed it was passed without being read. without being read!!)

nicky g
02-23-2003, 07:42 PM
Futhermore if there was even a shadow of a hint of a possibilty of Iraqi involvement, the administration would jump on it. Don't you think it's more than a little strange that nothing has been heard about the anthrax attacks for so long, desite the fact they remain unsolved and terrorism using such materials is supposed to be the burning issue of the moment?

brad
02-23-2003, 08:08 PM
also bush and cabinet on cipro before anthrax attack. the thing is, it *may* have been a prophalactic measure in response to 9-11.

hard to say.