catapult magazine

GOERRING “Of course, the people don’t want war. Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece.
Naturally, the common people don’t want war — neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America; nor, for that matter, in Germany. That is understood. After all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a Fascist dictatorship or a parliament or a communist dictatorship.”

GILBERT: "There’s one difference. In a democracy, the people have some say in the matter through their elected representatives. And in the United States only Congress can declare wars.

GOERRING: “Oh, that is all well and good. But voice or no voice the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”

—From an interview during the Nuremburg trials (Goerring with psychologist Dr. Gustave Gilbert)

From Goering, major nazi leader on trial (from Nuremburg transcripts):

Goereing claims the average citizen can be easily manipulated int owar. When someone mentions that some nations are democracies, he discounts that with the following quote:

“…All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”

What I know of US history (moderate but not extensive) is that the US generally has to be shoved into war by some kind of cataclysmic or near cataclysmic event.
World War I the US hung back. Of course, other reasons, such as “Is it really our concern?” play a part too.

World War II — the League of Nations and the democracies watched Hitler build up, break his treaty terms blatantly (maybe they felt guilty because the WWI treaty was so harsh) but nonetheless…the Us was shoved into that war by
1. Pearl Harbor attack
2. Germany’s declaration of war on the US a few days later.

And the Cold War—-well, Stalin then seemed a realistic threat for various reasons, not the least of which was…shortly into the scary nuclear age, Stalin’s minions manage to steal the atomic bomb technology from the US.

The US citizenfy likes even faster results and shorter wars than in WWII and any war which looks like it will settle into a Vietnam like quagmire is feared. (That’s the way to beat the US—-drag out the conflict…)

The present fights against the more amorphous terrorist network in Iraq, Afghanistan, and in smaller ways, all around the world…will be hard for the US to sustain as persons forget about 9/11 and other terrorist attacks and also as they ask for more public proof of the terrorist network links…and the terrorist threats to our way of life.

Leaders such as Goering with the grandiose Nazi pagan ideals wanted to conquer the world. the US (whatever one may think of the wisdom of any specific conflict) has historically had few provable imperialistic designs. Teddy Roosevelt and the Panama Canal being one of the few exceptions…

Thus, I think Goering clueless to what a democracy is.

The US may not have imperialistic designs but that has nothing to do with Goerring’s statements. The point is that the current administration wanted to invade Iraq and was able to do so because it presented the already fearful American people with a worst case scenario about what weapons and intentions Saddam had (feeding the fear) and a best case scenario about how American troops and worldviews would be welcomed there (inspiring unreasonable expectations).

Democracies aren’t stable. They are always under threat. When you speak of Germany, you have to remember that Hitler came to power democratically. It’s not like he staged a coup or something. So we should take seriously the threat from a government that thinks nothing of feeding its people half-truths in justifying a war. When the allies decared war on Germany they didn’t have to tell their people big stories about weapons of mass destruction or even of death camps. The war had to be fought.

The Iraq invasion on the other hand was so questionable that it required duping citizens (last week still 70% of Americans believed that Saddam was somehow responsible for 9-11). In hindsight the American action was dubious in every way, except for good intitions.

Frankly I’m tired of the Nazi comparison. A metaphor requires at least a semblance of similarity between the two things being compared. And frankly Saddam’s Iraq and Hitler’s Germany had next to nothing in common, unless you find it remarkable that both governments killed their citizens and that both wanted to expand their territory.

There’s no doubt that public opinion has a great influence on decisions regarding war: whether to declare, continue, or cease. One reason we lost the Vietnam War, I believe, is that the North Vietnamese wanted to win more than we did. The war started taking a turn for the worst when opinions at home changed. Certainly the North Vietnamese knew the weakness of a democracy. He strategically (and effectively!) made a coordinated strike that exposed American’s weakness (Tet Offensive). Americans were shocked to see the Viet Cong had taken over an American embassy. How could this be? Some images became famous and had huge impact on the “war at home” (the self-immolation of a monk, the assassination of a Vietnamese POW, etc). Americans withdrew their support as Ho Chi Minh had hoped they would.

We could debate whether Americans made a wise decision or not to cease the war. I tend to think they did. The point is that we can too easily be swayed. If we were not so easily swayed, Ho Chi Minh would have taken a different strategy.

But also, if we were not so easily swayed, perhaps our government would deal more straightly with us. They too know the advantage of letting the right information out. It’s easy to point the finger at the US government and at “ignorant Americans,” but I think we may be missing an important point. War is gruesome, as Goerring noted. We don’t want to leave and fight abroad. I suspect most of us don’t have the stomach for war. I know I don’t. In war there are difficult decisions that I wouldn’t want to be responsible for. Many Americans don’t want to be responsible either, so media paints a picture Americans are likely to buy. There’s hardly anything more newsworthy than a good war. But to break up the monotony, they pull you one way, then the other. I’m just waiting for someone to be shocked that people are dying in war, even innocent people! I don’t relish the thought, but that’s war—why should we be surprised.

I guess that, in a sense, I’m defending the current administration. If it has lied, why be surprised? We asked for it! But I’m not yet convinced that it has lied egregiously (I’m open to proof if anyone is offering). I read the introduction to a biography of Hussein that outlined the connections between Hussein and 9-11. They weren’t strong, but they were there. They did seem, however, to support indirect involvement at best. Admittedly, though I didn’t evaluate the source. I’ll have to see if I can find it again (I’m one of those dirty people who read books at bookstores without buying them).

A discover I made may be of interest to some. I was researching terrorist activity after 9-11 for a project for school. The US government has kept public records about terrorist activity going back some time. When I started to graph the data, it seemed completely random (go figure, terrorism isn’t exaclty planned). But when I graphed the percentage of attacks against the US, I was surprised at the orderliness of the graph. While the overall number of attacks is fairly random, going back 10 or 15 years the percentage of attacks against Americans has steadily increased each year (one year was an exception).

Partial response to Dan’s interesting comments:

Quote…"When you speak of Germany, you have to remember that Hitler came to power democratically. It’s not like he staged a coup or something "
Hitler came in under the very short, ill fated Weimar republic set up in the WWI treaty.
Unlike the democratic (West) GErmany government, still functioning today, which was set up in the years (not months) after WWI, the Weimar Republic was deeply flawed.

And the people were unable to stop Hitler from almost immediately stripping their democratic freedoms away. So the democracy he came in under was a weak sister version of democracy. Note once he was in—-essentially no more elections (that had any power). And Hitler quickly changed the country to a dictatorship.

You are tired of the Nazi analogy. No it does not totally apply here, "And frankly Saddam’s Iraq and Hitler’s Germany had next to nothing in common, unless you find it remarkable that both governments killed their citizens and that both wanted to expand their territory. "

Both governments had mass graves and many murdered victims. However, Per History Channel program, Hitler & Stalin were heroes of Saddam. That should count for something.

Perhaps Saddam’s territory to be expanded is a little different from WWI Nazi Germany in that it partly fits the terrorist paradigm of bringing the US and other enemies to their knees in a different way.

Not a German blitzkrieg which literally flattens cities, but lots of sniperlike terrorist activities to destroy our economic onfrastructure and to make us afraid. Even tho every year towns may get devastated by hurricanes, tornadoes,
…note how the 9/11 attacks were so much more economically devastating??? They targeted and hit a key economic center.

I see more doubt of this President’s intentions than Saddam’s intentions and that amazes me. I think there are flaws in how the US is handling this war, but certainly not mass deceptions.

We as citizens do have a credibility problem in not being able to physically verify the governmental and scholarly claims made about the general terrorist world groups and their general alliance together. It’s less clear cut than Hitler/Nazi Germany or Stalin/ex Soviet Uniuon’s deeds of aggression..

You claim a mass, major deception concerning the Iraq war. (Somehow this is linked to the Goering quote about governments deceiving us. Do some see Bush as a Goering type of guy?)

Many of us have hashed out the differing views of this specific war so I’m not repeating them here.

But the key OVERALL concept to prove or disprove is: Is there a world terrorist archipelago (cluster of small groups united in purpose to destroy the US,
Europe—at least those countries not rworking with them, Israel and any other nations they despise)?

Or is there NOT a world terrorist organization? Just a few small groups who just happened to get a luck hit on the 2 Trade thwers and our Pentagon?

Substantially showing there is not a world terrorist network (and showing Saddam is**** not***** a significant player/supporter in it) would , for me,

make the Iraq war significantly less justifiable.

Arguing about Pres. Bush’s reputed mass deceptions concerning Iraq does not attack the killer question of terrorism organizations and breeding grounds (or the lack thereof) today.

Showing that the world terrorism threat is basically bogus would substantially show the war in Iraq to be mostly a waste of our time.

But what if there is a global terrorism threat? (Which I believe the evidence shows.) Then the question is… Is Iraq a big enough player in global terrorism growth and activities to justify our invading it?

Anton, your terrorist graph sounds fascinating. If you ever felt like posting it, I for one would find it interesting reading.

Lots of stuff there vanlee! I’ll try to stay on the subject of the Goering quote. Yes, many people do see Bush as Goering type of guy. I’m not one of them, but I can understand how one might easily be able to get that impression especially if one happens to be an Arab.

Thank you also for pointing out some of the many differences between Nazi Germany and Baathist Iraq. Can I hereby put that analogy to rest? I hope cino can be a Hitler-Hussein-comparison ‘free zone’ from now on (unless it is addressed in its own thread). I hope nobody minds. There are so many more interesting comparisons to be made.

Concerning the use of deception to justify invasion, you argue that if it was, then invading Iraq was just a waste of time. Shucks, 6 months lost. I don’t think you believe that yourself. Think about it for a second: 500 some Americans died there, thousands of Iraqis died there (I don’t know why we feel we have to do separate stats), how many hundreds of billions of dollars will this end up costing?, measured increases in hostility toward Americans throughout the world since invasion. I don’t care what your political leanings are—this war cost more than time.

If Americans and Brits were deceived by their governments, this deception had serious consequenses and should be a serious scandal. I remember hearing about another president who deceived people about something that happened in the oval office between him and another person (nobody died and it didn’t cost anyone any money) and he almost lost his job. But I guess getting a blow job is a whole lot more serious than deceiving a lot of people into killing a lot of other people.

Assuming that this was deception, of course. And I’ve been pretty consistent in arguing that it was deception for the last year. I’m still trying to withhold judgement but I’m beginning to think that if the evidence (WOM, links to 9-11, etc) hasn’t shown up by now it never will.

Hi dan. (My last long post was a bit repretitive. Tool ate at night.)
Quote from your post:
Assuming that this [accusation Pres. bush deceived us about the need to invade Iraq]was deception, of course. And I’ve been pretty consistent in arguing that it was deception for the last year. I’m still trying to withhold judgement but I’m beginning to think that if the evidence (WOM, links to 9-11, etc) hasn’t shown up by now it never will. "

We are an instant society. It took years to fight most of our other wars. Today in Iraq, Saddam & co are clearly trying to wear down the American public…since he can’t now attack in a large way. A war of nerves…And the one soldier a day sounds too Vietnamish to not be obvious.

(I remember as a kid living in the late Vietnam era. You cannot imagine the hate many had for Johnson and then for that secularized “satan incarnate” Nixon. ) Truly, Ho Chi Minh was more popular at least with many college students, who I watched with amazement.

They were **inflamed***.
Yes, some spoke against the war in an articulate way without hate. But Some spewed incredible venom from their mouths against Johnson and especially against Nixon.
You may have heard of the “peace & love” generation. It was also the generation of incredible arrogance and an unthinking automatic suspicion of authirity & hate of the establishment…

I think one thing to remember is that the media and others clamored hard on the WOM and the 9/11. The things I read, especially initially, (when questions to the administration didn’t just hit on the WOM and 0/11) discussed the general terrorist world structure. The cia site and other think tanks were some of the sites I went to. And Saddam is one head of this hydra monster…(to summarize).

(Unlike Naziz, Soviet Comminists the structure not as definable, but still definitely there, but undercover instead of a body with the head clearly in Miscow or Berlin.)

Regarding WOM - WOM were not used on 9/11—just everyday technology turned against us.

(And I do think the book is not closed on that—-Sadbam has miles of tunnels, knows his history (vietnamize this war to defeat US by dividing the public—and inflaming scollege students & others) and as we all know, most ofthe WMD weapons are tiny—easily transportable.)

I don’tsee the level of hate against a Pres. or admin as in Vietnam. But I do see a general assumption of corruption which is unwarranted.

Perhaps Pres. Bush is mistaken—-perhaps some strategies need to be retooled…But one assumes a high level pf presidential wilful massive (dare I say Hitlerlike) deceit if one would believe the extreme accusations. (Wilful mass deceit & manipulation to shove us into an unnecessary war for his own private gain. Sounds like a claim against Saddam)

And I’ve read many of the basic arguments for this view. Nothing with significant evidences…to support such a drastic claim of wilful mass deceit.

One note on using the Nazis as a comparison. I think that t hey are still valid to be used if the comparison warrants it. But I agree the name should not be used as a club for on someone we merely disagree with…and they do not apply to every historical situation.

But maybe we can pay more attention to the forsaken Soviet Communists. We know less about the Soviet mass murders. They are not taught much.

In the 1970’ss Solzhenitsyn made a big world splash & even got the Nobel Prize…for his Gulag Arpiigelago books about the horrible Soviet camps. Soviets had more concentration work camps & it is believed more millions died than in the Nazi camps. One estimate says 30-60 million. Then, Solzhenitsyn (almost like the OT prophets) started making unpopular comments about the West (see his Harvard speech online) & fell off the thought fashion stage, even tho some of his claims have significant merit.

But alas, less persons know of Communist camps and Communist governmental abuses. We hear of the Sen. McCarthy era as if there were no guilty Communists—-just extreme US govt figures. History does not substantiate that view, however.
-
And tho I hear the concept marketed abroad that Nazis were “right wing”, t hey were so only in their hatred of Communism. They had a dictatorship & control of private enterprise somewhat like communists. Socialistic top heavy control…(National socialists)

One more reason we can’t totally leave Nazis behind. …

I had to recently defend myself seriously *against the charge of being a Nazi. Why? Because I held (in part) some routine conservative views. Nothing racist or historically comparable to Nazi ideology. Thee peson knew I was a Christian with some right wing views and that made me a Nazi. Oops. Forgot to mention my biracial child.

The person also claimed some Republicans were closet Nazis. Did not submit any evidences, just made an unsubstantiated claim—-thus we can’t lay Nazis to rest as long as persons are so vilely and falsely labeled. (however we get tired of them.)

Talk about Nazis all you want. Talk about Hussein all you want. All I want is for people to stop comparing the two unless they start saying something interesting.

The crimes of the Nazis and the Soviets should not be forgotten. Neither should the crimes of Hussein. Or of Mao, Gengis Khan…. No argument here.