De-Nazification worked in Germany because a consensus developed that the war had been a disaster for them.

I don't see the current level of losses among the Palestinians leading them to a similar consensus.

I'd love to be wrong.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 12:44 am: Edit

There is a theory that goes something like:
1. Rank and file Palestinian citizens have been oppressed by hamass/hezbolah/fatal terrorists out of fear. (Fear of being killed or hurt by thug terrorism)

2. Remove the terror elements, and the general Palestinian citizens would revert to normal behavior.

3. This kind of program has been called “winning hearts and minds” and was the neocon operating assumptions behind the failed attempt to “save” Afghanistan from the taliban.

To be fair, the United States failed in the attempt.

The British have been successful historically in converting a couple of colonies to working democracies, but there are few other examples of any similar success.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 01:57 am: Edit

William J: You are not wrong. They are on a mission from God. Nothing will change their minds.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 03:26 am: Edit

William, it didn't work. What worked was peace, prosperity and a new constitution that made it hard to usurp power. And of course, the guilt over the holocaust.
Today they are back but in another form.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 09:32 am: Edit

Carl-Magnus Carlsson:

What factual basis do you have for concluding that de-nazification “did not work.”

The evidence that most people recognize includes:
1. The search, arrest and prosecution of war criminals in a court of law. In case you are intentionally ignoring it, you might wish to review the trials. There were a number convictions with a sentence of death for the more egregious cases.
2. Many of the more ardent pro nazi supporters died during the war. Part of this was the result of arming children of the Hitler Youth movement as a last ditch defense of the Reich.
3. An undetermined number of Nazi government and commercial people (read as industrialists) who could afford to, and had the resources, fled Germany to avoid prosecution. Places they traveled to included Argentina and certain African nations.
4. Punitive laws were put in place to make support of anything related to the Nazi movement a crime.

I could go on, but I believe the point has been made.

A benign “peace, prosperity, and a new constitution” passive program just did not happen.

What worked was an old fashioned carrot and stick program of incentives and punishments that helped the German nation recover from a cataclysmic war that could have ended their culture. (It should be pointed out that the Marshall Plan was a key part of this effort. If you are unfamiliar with the marshall plan, you should look it up. It was (and is) the standard justification for foreign assistance programs to this day.

In any event, it could have been worse.

There was a faction that actively campaigned to eliminate all german population cities greater than 10,000 people, all factories and power generating plants to be destroyed.

The idea was to make Germany an agrarian nation without any education resources above high school for a period of 100 years.

That would have changed the world significantly.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 10:41 am: Edit

Jeff Wile, sure they made an attempt but there where too many nazis, and then the cold War began.
Nazis makes good anti-communists.

That they failed is well known and it was one important factor of the rise of the left wing terrorism in the 60's. (In fact they ended the process d e l i b e r a t e l y. So "failed" is probably wrong word.)
Keyword to search for on Wikipedia "West German student movement", "Red Army Faction", "Denazification" , "Konrad Adenauer".

Most of the Germans alive under ww2 are dead now but it's not a dead and buried subject in Germany.
Now and then you can read about it in the papers.
For example search for "The Zone of Interest is a portrait of guilt. No wonder it has divided opinion in Germany"

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 11:13 am: Edit

By "worked", I didn't mean that every single Nazi was converted or killed.

I meant that the society no longer followed or in general supported Nazi ideas.

To me, that is success. It's also what I am dubious can currently be done with the Palestinians. They do not have the necessary consensus that the war they started was a catastrophe for them.

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 11:44 am: Edit

I meant that the society no longer followed or in general supported Nazi ideas.

Fact that most citizens weren't Nazi (basically only required to be in government)...
Until late in the war, actually prohibited Military Members from being in the Party....
Also, the hub of Nazism ie Berlin, was not accessible to the avg German after the war...
Since there were no elections for 10+ years, was no need or ability for an addition party to be created....

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 12:34 pm: Edit

Carl-Magnus Carlsson:
Clearly, the word “failed” is the wrong word.

To be distinct, you are not helping you position.

You stated:”…today they are back but in another form.”

So if that were true, you would have brown shirts and Gestapo police in plain sight of the public.

Perhaps not displaying a swastica, but a replacement certainly.

Where exactly do you see these supposed fascist thugs? Where are the concentration camps to eliminate undesirable persons?

You made the claim. Can you back it up?

By Jeff Anderson (Jga) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 01:52 pm: Edit

Maybe it's just me being... Me... But I've long been under the opinion (however right or wrong) that enough West German civilians felt enough of a threat from the Soviet Union that they wanted to hide behind the other Big Three "Occupiers" (Britain, France, and the United States) far more than to give support to any diehards from the former regime.

By A David Merritt (Adm) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 02:29 pm: Edit

Jeff Wile

---

Quote:

You stated:”…today they are back but in another form.”

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By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 02:38 pm: Edit

Jeff, you win.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 03:23 pm: Edit

William, what is clear from history is that neither the defeat, nor the revelation of the holocaust, necessarily made a Nazi abandon his ideology.

What I understand made Germany democratic was that the allies forced their will upon the Germans with arms, removed the old power structure, outlawing the NSDAP party (NB:and any successors!) and put a new constitution in place. The new constitution had strong protections for the new political system to make sure no new dictator could emerge.

That is basically the recipe for neutralizing one party states.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Saturday, September 14, 2024 - 06:18 pm: Edit

The Germans had been defeated and saw the Allied imposition of a new constitution as a net positive. Their obvious economic success proved it was worth the bargain. Their alternative was to see Germany divided into several small agrarian states, something they considered a fate worse than death.

Hamas and that ilk have been defeated time after time after time and (being on a mission from God) still see no reason to give up their core goals. They don't care how often they lose; they only have to win once.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Sunday, September 15, 2024 - 02:56 am: Edit

Same as the nazis then, and most of us: losing a fight doesn't make one change faith or political views.
Heck, some even cling on harder.

I have heard nothing about any Post-conflict plan except critique of Netanyahu for not having one.

There need to be one. If Hamas comes back it will have all been for nothing.

By Mike Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Sunday, September 15, 2024 - 09:29 am: Edit

It should be noted that by the time of VE Day, the Germans knew they had been defeated. No amount of rhetoric could balance the occupation and war crime trials.

And the Allies moving through Germany certainly got their attention. AND it should be noted that in the 40's, 50's, 60's and later (up until Schroder or Kohl) all of it's dominant leadership survived the WW1 or 2 as veterans (more or less). As adult men, I think all of them served (except Willy Brandt?)... Anywhoo, they knew intimately what defeat and aggressive militarism resulted in.

By Jessica Orsini (Jessica_Orsini) on Sunday, September 15, 2024 - 03:57 pm: Edit

Long Ago, in the Before Time, I stayed in Germany after leaving the USAF, and worked as a hotel electrician at the Frankfurt Sheraton. The head of the metal-working shop at the time was a grandfatherly old fellow... who also happened to be an entirely unrepentant Nazi who absolutely loathed the fact that there were two Africans working in the electrical shop. Anytime that they weren't around, he would mutter darkly about how it wouldn't have been allowed "in better times".

That being some 30+ years ago now, I suspect he has passed on. Unfortunately, as David mentioned, the AfD (Alternative für Deutschland) is doing its level best to bring those sentiments to a new generation. Given that they took the largest number of seats this month in both Thuringia and Saxony, and are currently the favorite in polls in Brandenburg, it's entirely possible that the horror of Nazism could take center stage again in Germany.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Sunday, September 15, 2024 - 09:14 pm: Edit

Shots fired near Trump, on a golf course, AK47 found, shooter’s car tracked, seems possible that this was two jerks shooting at each other, not an assassination attempt. Secret Service protection excellent. Seems no one hurt. Trump first checked on safety of others, then thanked each Secret Service agent personally.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, September 16, 2024 - 01:48 am: Edit

Apparently it WAS an assassination attempt. The two guys shooting at each other were the would be assassin and a secret service agent. It is the practice of the secret service to have one agent move one hole ahead of the hole Trump is playing. The agent saw the rifle sticking out of a bush and opened fire. The gunman dropped the rifle (AK47 style with scope) and ran to his car. A witness saw the assassin and took a photo of the car that showed the license plate. At the time the secret service opened fire, Trump was 500 yards away but would have moved much closer if the agent had not opened fire.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, September 16, 2024 - 03:21 am: Edit

Sunday morning, an Iranian ballistic missile fired from Yemen was shot down over Tel Aviv.

US intelligence says Iran is a few weeks from building a nuclear weapon.

By A David Merritt (Adm) on Monday, September 16, 2024 - 04:48 am: Edit

It is nice to see the Secret Service do their jobs a bit better this time.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, September 16, 2024 - 05:53 am: Edit

The individual agents did their jobs last time, there just weren’t enough agents. When an incumbent president plays golf, he gets four or five times as many agents.

By Mike Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Monday, September 16, 2024 - 11:25 am: Edit

SVC is right. It has always been this way. Under trump, Obama, Bush II, Clinton, Bush I, Reagan, Carter. The serving president gets the most protection, the rest of the protectees get less and less as the known threat goes down.

I'd bet Carter doesn't have a huge detail, perhaps a couple body men & a couple outside his house. Maybe a driver on duty when he says he is going somewhere.

By Jessica Orsini (Jessica_Orsini) on Monday, September 16, 2024 - 11:44 am: Edit

The would-be assassin this time was a felon (appropriately enough, his felony involved illegal possession of a fully-automatic machine gun). He's now being popped for possession of a firearm as a felon, as well as possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number; he never did get a shot off, either at the former president or at the Secret Service agents.

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Monday, September 16, 2024 - 01:00 pm: Edit

Early statement that he was from Hawaii....
As a felon, how did he get to the continent...
Shouldn't he have been on a no-fly list....