I'm actually offended by something...wow...
McGame wrote:
I've already indicated what my view is. Most people reckon he is evil. Full stop. Buchanan tries to say he is actually a nice bloke defending his people from the rest of the world. My view is somewhere in between. Both sides of the debate have facts that support their view, so he is not outright wrong, nor is he a great guy. His actions would have been judged differently were it carried out in a different period in history. He could have been regarded a war hero, but at this time, he is regarded an evil war criminal. There is no definite right or wrong about him, he was just born in the wrong time period.
If you are capable of reading anything that doesn't have pictures or that has more than 100 pages, read The Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich by William Shirer, then form an opinion, then post about it. If you still feel the same way, I'd be surprised.
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Hitler was not the worst person in history. There were plenty of absolutely cruel emperors and rulers in history, in medieval times for example, who tortured people and killed for amusement. Check out all those medieval torture devices in the museum. Hitler is a wonderful guy compared to some of these historical figures.
I could give a hundred quotes from Hitler and many **** Party leaders and German army Generals of the time that prove otherwise. But that would take too long to do.
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The whole murdering 6 million Jews thing kinda of shoots you right to the top of "Worst person in History" list despite how many roads you build or kittens you pet.
Everyone always jumps to the "He killed a lot of jews" thing. Yes, it's absolutely terrible what he did to them, but people forget that he killed many germans, political opponents, gays, gypsies, poles, slavs, communists, pows, etc. He also ordered entire towns wiped out. He invaded Czechoslovakia, Austria, Poland, Denmark, Norway, Yugoslavia(though not as much as the others), and Russia under false pretenses all the while screaming for peace in public while giving out orders to prepare to invade in secret. From day 1, his goals were clear and no one paid any attention. And if not for some major strategic mistakes he made, the war could have ended much differently, had he waited a few more years to go after Poland, or attacked Russia even 4-6 weeks earlier, he might have caused the collapse of the Soviet Union and been able to effectively defend against the Allies on a single front.
So when Buchanan says,
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By May 1945, Red Army hordes occupied all the great capitals of Central Europe: Vienna, Prague, Budapest, Berlin. A hundred million Christians were under the heel of the most barbarous tyranny in history: the Bolshevik regime of the greatest terrorist of them all, Joseph Stalin.
What cause could justify such sacrifices?
he really needs to go **** himself.
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When did I ever imply the concentration camps were fun places? Hitler at first tried to use the able-bodied to work in factories, but decided to kill them later on. What he did not do, was torturing them for the sake of entertainment, which is commonplace in ancient times.
Ok, now I'll bust out the book quotes, WITH references to pages. Any bolded parts are my own comments or additions.
Page 949 of The Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich by William L. Shirer wrote:
Dr. Jaeger reported the situation to the directors of Krupp(the makers of Germany's Guns and Ammo) and even to the personal physician of Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach, the owner--but in vain. ... "The clothing of the Eastern workers was likewise completely inadequate. They worked and slept in the same clothing in which they had arrived from the East. Virtually all of them had no overcoats and were compelled to use their blankets as coats in cold and rainy weather. In view of the shortage of shoes many workers were forced to go to work in their bare feet, even in winter...
Sanitary conditions were atrocious. At Kramerplatz only ten children's toilets were available for 1,200 inhabitants...excretion contaminated the entire floors of these lavatories ... they collapsed like flies[from] bad housing, the poor quality and insufficient quantity of food, overwork and insufficient rest.
These workers were likewise afflicted with spotted fever. Live, the carrier of the disease, together with countless fleas, bugs and other vermin tortured the inhabitants of these camps...at times the water supply at the camps was shut off for periods of from eight to fourteen days"
And that wasn't even a concentration camp, that was just a work camp for Russian POWs and citizens from captured areas.
You say that isn't torture? I can give far more and far worse information about what people went through during Hitler's reign.
I have the book next to me now, want me to continue, or can you still easily suggest that Hitler never tortured any people?