Ah yes, I heard that before. In fact, I think I read it in one of my books. Ill find the exact quote.
Because certainly, Stalin wanted to expand communism as well as the the territory of the USSR. Without Hitler in the picture. Who would have been able to stop the Red Giant? I think the first victim would have been the hated Poland. And later some other territories. Then it would come the ideological domination of the world... Stalin was an ambitious man...
I sense a lot of ifs flying around. Let me pick a cold war US President here and make an example if i could. John F. Kennedy who at first was very well respected decided to launch an attack against Russia citing that given the chance the soviet Union was going to invade europe soon as they had the chance...plus they are communist so...it's a good idea. BUT OOPS JFK decides that everybody but catholics should be in the US so he sends everybody else to concentration camps and kills 6 million of them...in that number are assorted other peoples thrown in for effect. Also the war causes millions of deaths on both sides and now the US is a smoldering mess...divided in two (the divider being the Mississippi River) Oh and the capitol is also flattened and now the US is occupied by the Russians as well as other allies of them. Of course there was no war and the defending Hitler for a chance idea that the Soviets would invade germany is not a good defense i feel. I am reading a book right now called Soldat. Not only was Hitler a sadistic leader but he was also a bad commander. After his assassination attempt he executed many innocent military officers and their families. He frequently threw away german troops in hopeless defenses when they could have been withdrawn and used more effectively. In response to an escape attempt from Berlin before the city was captured he said he would not want to risk dying in the street like a dog...even though as he said that thousands of germans were dying in the street like "dogs." and finally...in his suicide you get a glimpse into his character when in his suicide note he takes no responsibility for the war and blames the german people for the loss.
Communism is an international revolution, so just like Hitler´s idea of "lebensraum" you bet the Russians were looking for a place in Europe to land.However the communists may not have thought of doing this principally with weapons, as they thought time was on their side and sooner or later Europe would be theirs.As well as the rest of the world. Stalin himself was a dictator using the party for his own means. For instance Finland got her independence through communists, Lenin. The communists did not do it for being nice guys, but as they were busy fighting the white generals they wanted to get this one problem off their chest...later on they believed though that Finland would turn to communism and join Russia again! ( the civil war 1917-1918 ) The communism was so much admired in Finland that as many as some 30 000 people left Finland for Russia to live in the worker´s paradise.Well, we know what happened to them.Probably people from other countries moved to Russia as well, so far though I haven´t found any figures in the net. The civil war in Spain and Finland shows that in places the communists managed to start an uprising.There were volunteers from all over Europe so some sort of ideas of the kind must have been alive everywhere. From the net I found this: "The Communist Part of the Soviet Union differed from the German Nazi Party and the Italian fascist party in at least two ways. First, it achieved power by a violent revolution in 1917 whereas both the Nazi’s and the Fascists were at least nominally elected to office (the first time because they then abolished democratic elections). Second, the Communists regarded their government and their revolution not as part of a national history but as the first event in a worldwide revolution that would bring communism to the entire world. Thus, the Soviet Revolution played a central role in international politics first in Europe and then in the entire world between 1917 and 1991 (when Communism was abolished in the Soviet Union and the Union itself dissolved into fifteen separate republics). The Fascists were nationalists and the Nazis were racist. Neither attracted very much ideological support outside a few neighboring countries in Europe. The Soviets, however, posed an internal threat to the wealthy people of every other European country before World War II and many third world countries after the war. Eventually, the Americans became obsessed with the Communist threat following the defeat of the Nazis and the Fascists in World War II and this led directly to the Cold War that lasted from 1946 to 1991 or 45 years" and a site: http://www.socialistviewpoint.org/july_aug_01/sum_01_20.html If someone wants to discuss this later on we probably should have a new topic.
Andy, it's pretty easy to Russia's expansionist attitude around and following ww2. I don't think dasreich needs to clarify that one. "You have evidence that the USSR was about to install a european domination with her "war machine", do you?" And you have evidence that she was not? And if that is dasreich's personal POV, more power to him. We're all allowed to have our opinions, wether or not we have a book (someone else's opinion) to back them up. Dasreich- I see what you're getting at now. Hitler didn't directly help democracy- rather, he slowed communism. Appropriate paraphrase? (if kenny only knew how many posts his topic recieved!)
Same here, Crazy. Perhaps I should have clarified that Hitler indirectly assisted democracy. Of course he never would directly.
Now that argument makes some sense. I certainly don't think Hitler liked, believed in, or even considered democracy viable. I remember reading quotes (or at least paraphrases!) from Hitler on the Atlantic wall, talking about how the "hardened" soldiers of facism would easily defeat the "soft" American soldiers fighting for their "weak democracy". So he couldn't have personally thought much of democracy. And during the third reich- don't think we would call the nazi government democratic! But that being said, I think it's also clear that Hitler had even stronger dislike for Communism. I've never read it, but I get the idea that "Mein Kampf" has plenty of anti-communist/ anti-bolsheveik ideas. SO it becomes kind of like the lesser of evils... Hitler and his reich kind of formed a boundary... because they fought so hard against the russians, and becuase germany is sort of centrally located in Europe. If communism (Stalin) wanted to expand, they would have necessarily have had to deal with germany (Hitler), thus making a conflict very likely. The biggest thing here was the early failures of russia/successes of germany. Since Stalin had to become on of the allies, this garaunteed that germany (territorial germany) would become the "spoils of war"... By this I mean that the post-war situation of germany would be decided by ALL the allies, which would in turn limit the gains of the russians in said decision. In other words, germany's early successes against russia garaunteed that Russia would have to approve a post-war balance of power with all the allies. I think that makes sense anyway... is this kind of what you were going after as well, dasreich? (and today, I'll be playing the part of kenny as well...) BLAH BLAH BLAH CRAP CRAP CRAP sorry- just can't get over the fact that this thread is actually generating some good discussion!
I couldnt have said it better myself. As a result of being forced to join the allies, Russias possible expansion was limited.
So far I just notice that no support to the thesis was given that the uSSSR was about to roll over Europe. In fact, they _did_ roll over half of Europe _after_ Hitler attacked the USSR. It's hard to get to Berlin otherwise. USSR expansion and territorial goals between 1939-1941 were covered by the Hitler-Stalin pact. So it's hard to argue that Hitler stopped Stalin from something, in fact he "opened" Eastern Europe to Stalin (first by offering him Poland, later by invading the USSR and losing it). Come on: Please prove me that 9/11 wasn't a CIA conspirancy... You can't provide evidence for something what wasn't there. It's up to those to support the claims THEY make (like "The Soviets would have taken Europe without Hitler"). All I'm saying that I don't see any hard facts supporting this thesis. On the other hand I see - just for example, not to play the excuse song fort Uncle Joe - an aggression of the Western democratic states and Poland against the USSSR back in the 1920-ies, the same capitalist western powers giving away Czechoslovakia without even contacting the Soviets, the same Western powers asking the Soviets later to fight "with them" (GB /w 4 Divisions, France w/ 100 Division, USSR /w 300 Divisions) against Germany, but without being allowing them to march through Poland ( - how should that work?), the same western powers trying to shift Hitler's "hunger" away from them towards Eastern Europe. Yes, the USSR - as any nation at this time - had territoral interests (see Molotov's visit in 1940), but Hitler opened the door by offering the division of Poland and declaring his clear uninterest in the fate of the Baltic, States, Finnland and Bessarabia/Bukovina. A Germany w/o Hitler might not wanted to invade Poland. So _if_ Stalin wanted to get a hand on Poland, he would have had to do this all by himself, against all other European powers, hardly imaginable. Cheers, [ 10 September 2002, 09:57 AM: Message edited by: AndyW ]
Andy, these are theories... of course there will be no "hard facts" for some of them. We are theorizing about something that COULD have happened. You could have addressed your comments in more of a polite manner... And on the expansionist attitude of Stalin and early communists, come on... One of communism's central beliefs was to convert other governments into allies (a.k.a. other communists). And with the benefit of hindsight, we can see clearly that Stalin was eager to expand, even at the expense of the other allies (the partitioning of post-war germany).
Hi Andy: What other European countries were going to stop Russia? England by itself? Do you think that Russia was so weak that France would be able to stop it? Had Stalin had the opportunity to expand Russia without interference from Germany he probably would have.
If Europe let Hitler, a relatively minor threat prior to ww2, walk over them, the big powerful USSR would have no trouble securing its demands. And if they did try to resist, the USSR would have rolled over them. Remember, the Soviets had the largest army in the world; and Stalin was the type of person to use it to convert countries to communism, by force if need be. Why didnt they ever launch this attack? Hitler got the drop on them. And consequently brought the USSR into the Allied fold, limiting their future territorial prospects.
Damn, dasreich- you made that sound a lot clearer and simpler than I could! nice job... [ 10 September 2002, 03:19 PM: Message edited by: CrazyD88 ]
I think that this topic...which used to be about liking or disliking Hitler has sufficiently diverged from that! I am going to start a new topic in "Battle for Europe" specifically about Hitler and Stalin and the Conquest of Europe. Link to new topic New Topic If you want to continue the original post of liking or disliking Hitler go right ahead...but please continue the Hitler/Stalin thing in the new thread. thanks [ 10 September 2002, 09:20 PM: Message edited by: Ron ]
Well, Adolf Hitler is for sure one of the most polemic and interesting people in human History. Hitler was not as brilliant as himself though he was nor as dump as other said. He was a tremendous leader, had carisma and a tremendous intelligence. Otherwise, how could a corporal and failed-artist have conquested Europe and provoked the world's worst slaughterness? Adolf Hitler knew how to do things, in many cases he got surrounded of the adequate people, the best for the job and he knew how to exploit Germany's potential. And here is something which makes him different from many other hated leaders and politicians. He had quite a lot of personal power and did horrendous things, but his whole vision for Germany were not selfish at all. If he had succeeded he would have given the German people many things they wanted: a powerful nation, richness, prestige, lands and a nice country to live in. Göring, by example took many resources from the German people to buy-steal his art works and decorate his fancy houses. But more modest Hitler, in his twisted mind had nice ideals for the German people if we see it in some way... As a military mind mind he turned to be a great man. Perhaps it is exagerate to call him "The Greatest warlord of all time" unless it is in an ironic way... He was guilty of some of Germany's greatest victories and defeats. It is very unfair and unwise to blame him for all of it: he came up with some innovative plans which turned to be great victories and he came with orders that lead to enormous defeats. But as we have discussed here: he was also advised by many people and that influenced his decisions. One example is the "Sichelschnitt". Hitler did not like the OKH's "Gelb". Hitler liked impetous and innovative plans. He himself had already started looking at the potential of the Ardennes region in 1940, just a few days that Manstein and Runstedt's memorandums started arriving to Zossen. When he heard the plan, he loved it. And after that he came up with many weird operations like those by the Brandenburger paratroopers in Holland, dressed like Dutch Army men. It worked. Hitler also had the idea of using fast war ships ina lightning and surprise attack on Norway. It worked. These might be little details which Hitler came up with in a smooth way and that experts made it real, but some of his tactic ideas were actually very good, let's not talk about his strategies in the general picture... What it really did not work where his methods to reach those ambitious tasks. What I really dislike about him is the way he saw his own troops sometimes: just as numbers in papers. He wasted German soldiers, made them suffer and disappointed them. Hitler killed millions of people; horrible. But in any way it was a war (I am in no way approving genocide) but what is unconceabale is that he had killed his own devoted men! They would have done anything for their Führer. At least, what he should have done was to stay with them and gave them what he had promissed!
Yes, Hitler was a convincing person to many, with his talk he could persuade a whole lot of people, even von Manstein " was not at his best with Hitler ", I think said by Guderian. And the 1930 politics, like 1938 with Chamberlain were mostly won by Hitler´s attitude and his person. Somehow though Halder was not convinced, but Keitel then again had a totally new vision, and certainly "fell in love with him".Every time a soldier visited him for a medal, I always read that they received inner strength and belief in the cause in the war, even in late 1944/early 1945. He certainly had the charisma. Not talking about the mass hysteria he created. The pics tell a lot on him. After July 20th he got the final blast, and I believe he must have thought he was a God´s messenger, as if you gathered the knowledge at the time you otherwise would have realized that game was over.
