Author Topic: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?  (Read 60178 times)

De Selby

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #175 on: March 06, 2007, 01:03:22 PM »
Rabbi, I see what you're saying and I agree with your arguments.  And yeah...it's a waste of time to argue with people who would even argue the point.

I guess what's interesting to me mostly is the conclusions that these "other holocausts" arguments lead to.  Instead of concluding "We should be as shocked at Pol Pot as we are at what Hitler did!", then\y tend to conclude "We should not be as shocked with either Hitler or Pol Pot."

The endgame of this is to revise history so that people start to think that Nazism isn't as bad as we thought it was.  In that sense, the "Holocaust wasn't special" crowd are on the same page as Holocaust deniers (even if they use a slightly less ridiculous method):  to reduce the level of disgust with Nazism.

So here's my question to everyone who wants to come up with this or that argument that the holocaust wasn't special:  Are you really convinced that Nazism wasn't that bad?  Or that it's possible to overstate how bad it was?

Considering that you're making an argument to downgrade the level of evil ascribed to Nazism...could those of you who defend these points understand how others might be suspicious of your motives?
"Human existence being an hallucination containing in itself the secondary hallucinations of day and night (the latter an insanitary condition of the atmosphere due to accretions of black air) it ill becomes any man of sense to be concerned at the illusory approach of the supreme hallucination known as death."

CAnnoneer

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #176 on: March 06, 2007, 01:09:06 PM »
Excuse me if I am no longer shocked or surprised by Homo Sapiens behavior, or if I refuse to join the cloth-ripping and ash-sprinkling associated with it. Heh.

Yes, there is much use of the media to publicize the Final Solution, especially by film-makers and show hosts in exactly the false uniqueness POV others mentioned above. It is certainly abused to garner extra favor and squash political and cultural opposition, especially in cases where support for Israel or leftism is the transparent goal. To deny that is quite entertaining indeed.

It is certainly possible to overstate how bad nazism was, just as it is possible to overstate anything. Nazism was useful to western civilization as a counterweight to communism and should have been used as such. Comrade Roosevelt and a few senile elitist wankers in Britain thought otherwise, thereby delivering half of Europe to communism and ensuring internal leftist decay and a 50-year cold war. Nazism would not have lasted beyond Hitler's death and could be far more easily contained in the political arena. Instead of realizing this, we are daily fed bs about how defeating nazism was the obvious highest priority and the best move (generally by closet leftists).

De Selby

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #177 on: March 06, 2007, 01:14:15 PM »
CAnnoneer,

Even accepting your premise that Jews are controlling the media (there's a biggie),

What on earth connection does "The holocaust is used in debates about Israel" have to level of evil involved in the holocaust?

There is simply no logical relationship between the two.  The fact that Al Sharpton mentions slavery on a television program does not make slavery any more or less evil.  Likewise, the fact that the culmination of Europe's hatred for Jews comes into debates about Israel today has absolutey zero impact on a discussion about how evil the holocaust was.

The only possible reason for connecting judgments about the moral evil of the holocaust and political discussions today is if you have your own agenda....and that's what I'm point to here.

If you look at the "holocaust wasn't special" and "Jews control the media" people, usually their arguments have little to do with the holocaust and more to do with anti-semitic delusions of Jews controlling and robbing them today. 
"Human existence being an hallucination containing in itself the secondary hallucinations of day and night (the latter an insanitary condition of the atmosphere due to accretions of black air) it ill becomes any man of sense to be concerned at the illusory approach of the supreme hallucination known as death."

The Rabbi

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #178 on: March 06, 2007, 01:17:15 PM »
Shootin Student,
It's true: we really do control the media.  And the banks.  And the gov't.  Now bring me all your money and white women....
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Iain

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #179 on: March 06, 2007, 01:18:19 PM »
especially in cases where support for Israel or leftism is the transparent goal. To deny that is quite entertaining indeed.

And here I was thinking that the left was all anti-semitic and stuff.

"There was an intensity of positive hatred in those who planned the genocide, which was not matched in the Stalinist exterminations." Jonathan Glover

Mention of Stalin strikes at the crux of the issue for me. 'Uniqueness' claims for the Holocaust are seen by some as undermining to the horrors of Stalin, interpreted as deliberately doing so, interpreted as support for Stalin, an attempt to over play Hitler so as to cast a shadow over Uncle Joe.
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De Selby

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #180 on: March 06, 2007, 01:28:37 PM »
Rabbi,

Do I get a 10 percent cut for collaborating with the worldwide trilateral conspiracy?

This is really amusing.  "We're not anti-semites, we just think Jews are controlling the media and promoting the holocaust in order to perpetuate their control and theft schemes."

Translation: "I'm not an anti-semite, I just think Jews are evil."  It's a depressing absurdity.
"Human existence being an hallucination containing in itself the secondary hallucinations of day and night (the latter an insanitary condition of the atmosphere due to accretions of black air) it ill becomes any man of sense to be concerned at the illusory approach of the supreme hallucination known as death."

CAnnoneer

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #181 on: March 06, 2007, 01:29:45 PM »
Quote
If you look at the "holocaust wasn't special" and "Jews control the media" people, usually their arguments have little to do with the holocaust and more to do with anti-semitic delusions of Jews controlling and robbing them today. 

They are welcome to their own delusions. It is their right to believe it, just as it is yours to dismiss everything they say, because some of it is ridiculously nutty.

The political connection is hard to deny. The consistent portrayal of the final solution as something special is aimed at garnering pity and support of jewish groups, because they are to be considered the innocent victims and thus accorded special treatment.

In terms of foreign policy, the final solution was used as an excuse to displace arabs and help found modern Israel, while support for it is also offered on grounds of prevention of an arab version of the final solution. Every time some nitwit blows himself up in Israel, parallels are immediately drawn to the nazis on basis of hatred, so the arabs are automatically the bad guys, and we are locked into supporting Israel, whether it is to our national benefit or not.

In terms of individual behavior, many use their ethnicity as a career vehicle and an offensive tool, because if anybody dislikes them for who they are as individuals, it must be it is because they are anti-semitic. Anti-semitism is freely thrown as an accusation and discrediting attack way too often. That would not be the case if everybody cut the crap and recognized there was nothing special about it.

By simple comparison, I do not run around demanding special attention or special treatment because my European ancestors survived countless wars, horrors, injustices, and pestilence over the centuries there. Neither can I or do I whack people that dislike me for me with things like "Well, you are clearly an anti-white bigot and should be ashamed of yourself. Don't you know how much my people have suffered??"

It is all bullcrap and cheap leftist mindtricks.

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #182 on: March 06, 2007, 01:38:54 PM »
Rabbi,

Do I get a 10 percent cut for collaborating with the worldwide trilateral conspiracy?

This is really amusing.  "We're not anti-semites, we just think Jews are controlling the media and promoting the holocaust in order to perpetuate their control and theft schemes."

Translation: "I'm not an anti-semite, I just think Jews are evil."  It's a depressing absurdity.

For a small fee I could issue you a card as a fellow traveler in the conspiracy.  For a little more money we could even get you classified as a Neo-Con.

More seriously, you are right: the kinds of sentiments you are seeing expressed here, on a website founded by a Jew who lost many family members in the Holocaust no less, are classic anti-Semitism.  Attempts to dismiss this obvious truth by calling it PC-ness are laughable.  There is nothing PC about it: whether someone chooses to deny the Holocaust or deny the significance of the Holocaust or to claim that the Holocaust is used exclusively to badger other parties for special treatment of one kind or another stems, imo, from anti-Semitism and no other source.
Next I expect the "but some of my best friends" line and "I knew a Jew once" both famous old chestnuts.
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Mannlicher

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #183 on: March 06, 2007, 03:34:43 PM »
one or one million, or 6, or 14 million.  Does it make a difference?  Do you feel it necessary to quantify the exact number of dead Jews, Gypsys, Homosexuals, political dissidents and just plain unlucky folks that died in the Nazi Concentration camps?

CAnnoneer

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #184 on: March 06, 2007, 04:05:30 PM »
Quote
Translation: "I'm not an anti-semite, I just think Jews are evil."  It's a depressing absurdity.

Nice try. Nobody is fooled. Your underlying absurdity is: "If you criticize some jews, you obviously hate all jews, and for no other reason than that they are jews."

More freakalogic:"A claims B, C claims B,D,F. Therefore A=C. Don't pay attention to B."

My hat off to the Rabbi as well, for putting all that disagree with him in a nice big bin, and throwing in the personal emotional twister as well for extra effect. Masterfully done.

Thank you both for providing ample example (in the very same thread nonetheless) for the exact methods I criticized. This is absolutely priceless.

roo_ster

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #185 on: March 06, 2007, 04:13:38 PM »
Heat & light in one thread!

Wow, I have not clicked on this thread, lo these many months and I miss out on one of the more interesting discussions.

Perhaps I can help with some of the more awkard questions.

Unrequited Philosemetism
What many Christians* do not understand is that a whole lot of orthodox Jews really do not like Christians and Christianity


Interesting.  In your opinion, doies this attitude contribute to incidents such as the Lavan affair, the attack on the Liberty, expionage, etc? 
Unlikely. 

I'd say both were screwups by Israel gov't & institutions and those who comprised them.  Sure, I'd bet some of the actors had anti-christian sentiment and perhaps tried to influence policy.  In the end, Israel persued what it thought its interest in both cases, IMO.  What should be noted is that American and Israeli interests are not identical.  Sometimes they coincide, but we must always be cognizant that we pay a price in blood and dollars and influence for our moral support of Israel. 

The Lavan mess was obviously an amoral attempt to influence (US & UK) policy in Israel's favor.  I would hope that the bungled nature of the operation and the following ill effects on Israel & Egyptian jewry would put to rest the myth that Israeli intel is some sort of super-competent organization.

The Liberty mess is most easily explained as a (sort-of) friendly fire screwup.  The respective governemnts sure did their level best to reinforce that conclusion.  I have heard rumblings about it being a cover-up due to the Liberty sniffing out some elint unfavorable to Israel, but I have not seen hard data.  Unless/Until that data emerges, I will stick with the simplest solution.
Regards,

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CAnnoneer

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #186 on: March 06, 2007, 04:28:47 PM »
Quote
one or one million, or 6, or 14 million.  Does it make a difference?  Do you feel it necessary to quantify the exact number of dead Jews, Gypsys, Homosexuals, political dissidents and just plain unlucky folks that died in the Nazi Concentration camps?

Ah, young grasshoper, if we do not do skull arithmetic, how can we establish who owns the moral highground for political battles? If we recognize that all victims died equal, then even the 6 million jews are dwarfed by the 27 million soviet citizens and 11 million Germans that also perished. We are also not to discuss that more people were killed by allied bombings of Dresden and Hamburg alone than in some of the concentration camps. Somehow we do not see many Oscar-winner movies about those two groups. Oh, I know, they deserved it. Heh.

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #187 on: March 06, 2007, 04:45:11 PM »
Whew! I haven't seen that much (over) playing of the anti-semitism card in a good, long while.

Cry wolf enough times & when a real wolf comes to town, watch everyone yawn and say, "Jeez, not this **** again!"

I'm thinking that insensitivity; lack of reverence for someone else's Gods, idols, or beliefs; or resentment that one's own ethnic group got shorted in recognition of its sufferings can cover the more adversarial postings just fine without having to resort to self-discrediting accusations.
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roo_ster

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Matthew Carberry

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #188 on: March 06, 2007, 07:03:29 PM »
Quote
I mentioned both the level of civilization of Germany in the 1930s, the lack of any gain to the Nazis by their actions...


That latter claim is open to argument. 

There is a current bookn out (and it isn't a voice in the wilderness) that posits, fairly successfully according to the NYT book review, that it was the wholesale theft of Jewish businesses, homes, wealth and belongings that made Nazism economically and politically possible.  Without the wholesale theft, they couldn't maintain the welfare state that kept the German people bought and paid for with jobs, bread and circuses and thus kept them in power.  If that theory is true even in part, the cost of rolling stock is not an expense without return but rather an operating cost of the theft scheme.

Although objectively the rolling stock could have been used more efficiently to, say, win the freaking war, but the Nazi's made a lot of bad calculations like that.
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Monkeyleg

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #189 on: March 06, 2007, 08:32:41 PM »
What has always baffled me is that the Nazi's kept such meticulous paper records of their atrocities, not to mention the still and movie films they produced.

We can "guesstimate" how many people Stalin killed. But the Nazi party pretty much has solid records.

One can play the Moral Relativism card by saying "Stalin did this" or "Pol Pot did that," or the Hunu's did this to the Chunu's.

But, to the best of my knowledge, there has never been an entire industry--yes, industry--set up by a government to slaughter people. These were not drive-by shootings. These were literally factories that were built to kill. Their CEO's were judged not on profits, but upon the efficiency of the killing.

This was depravity on a scale mankind had never seen before, and hopefully will never see again.

Anyone who says that, "oh, O'l Hitler, well, he was kinda like Stalin" just doesn't get it.

It's not the numbers. It's the dedicated system, the hierarchy, the purposelfullness.

It's Henry Ford's idea of mass production combined with the most murderous regimes in world history.

If that doesn't make the Holocaust something of special meaning, I don't know what does.

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #190 on: March 07, 2007, 02:16:37 AM »
Quote
I mentioned both the level of civilization of Germany in the 1930s, the lack of any gain to the Nazis by their actions...


That latter claim is open to argument. 

There is a current bookn out (and it isn't a voice in the wilderness) that posits, fairly successfully according to the NYT book review, that it was the wholesale theft of Jewish businesses, homes, wealth and belongings that made Nazism economically and politically possible.  Without the wholesale theft, they couldn't maintain the welfare state that kept the German people bought and paid for with jobs, bread and circuses and thus kept them in power.  If that theory is true even in part, the cost of rolling stock is not an expense without return but rather an operating cost of the theft scheme.

Although objectively the rolling stock could have been used more efficiently to, say, win the freaking war, but the Nazi's made a lot of bad calculations like that.

I knew someone would play that song.
Perhaps in the short run that was true (and we're talking maybe 8 years at most).  Over the longer term, the Nazis effectively destroyed their entire culture.  If one looks at the position of Germany in say 1925 in regard to arts, mathematics, science, medicine, etc etc and then what it was at any point after the war, including today, there is no comparison.  They chased away or killed their most productive and brightest citizens, both Jews and non-Jews.  Concurrently, there isn't a single academic field in the US or Britain that did not gain immeasurably by the addition of German refugees.
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CAnnoneer

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #191 on: March 07, 2007, 04:15:28 AM »
Quote

  If one looks at the position of Germany in say 1925 in regard to arts, mathematics, science, medicine, etc etc and then what it was at any point after the war, including today, there is no comparison.  They chased away or killed their most productive and brightest citizens, both Jews and non-Jews.  Concurrently, there isn't a single academic field in the US or Britain that did not gain immeasurably by the addition of German refugees.

Let's not forget "the most productive and brightest" that perished fighting from the Atlantic to Volga and from Norway to Egypt, and those the allies murdered in their homes from above. Also let's not forget the massive post-war exodus, running away from the Soviets or just seeking a better life in Canada and the US. Finally, let's not forget Mission Alsos and the ones kidnapped, so they do not fall in Soviet hands. No worries, I have come to expect selective memory.

Quote
But, to the best of my knowledge, there has never been an entire industry--yes, industry--set up by a government to slaughter people.

Then I encourage you to read "The GULag Archipelago" by Solzhenitzin.

richyoung

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #192 on: March 07, 2007, 04:33:55 AM »
+1 on the Gulag Archipeligo - not to mention little things like "prisoner battalions", engineered famines, etc...
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Matthew Carberry

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #193 on: March 07, 2007, 08:43:06 AM »

I knew someone would play that song.
Perhaps in the short run that was true (and we're talking maybe 8 years at most).  Over the longer term, the Nazis effectively destroyed their entire culture.  If one looks at the position of Germany in say 1925 in regard to arts, mathematics, science, medicine, etc etc and then what it was at any point after the war, including today, there is no comparison.  They chased away or killed their most productive and brightest citizens, both Jews and non-Jews.  Concurrently, there isn't a single academic field in the US or Britain that did not gain immeasurably by the addition of German refugees.

I knew someone would play that song?

What the hell kind of comment is that?

Excuse the hell out of me for mentioning an apparently valid historical-economic position which appears to be supported by multiple non-anti-semetic, non-Holocaust-denying, non-axe-to-grind historians.

I'm sure the complete position contains enough nuance to differentiate short-term gains versus long-term losses, but feel free to act all supercilious.  rolleyes

Just off the top of my head and using plain old logic AND looking objectively. 

Let's say we start with the apparent Nazi  belief that the Jewish scientists, artists, doctors et al really were sub-human and had nothing to offer that the good Aryan types couldn't (eventually) provide.  If they truly had that belief (and there's no reason to believe they didn't), then they would have had no reason to predict the massive loss to their country that would result in the long term. 

Thus their short-term choices of death, theft and exile would have been internally consistant with their ethnic superiority position.  Due to the war, there's no reason to believe they even had a glimmer of what they lost, until maybe when they realized how badly they needed the Jewish physicists to work on the bomb.

The argument is that the Nazi's thought the massive theft made sense and thus explains their choices, not that it actually did make sense or was correct or wise long term.



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Ezekiel

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #194 on: March 07, 2007, 08:49:57 AM »
Quote
Whew! I haven't seen that much (over) playing of the anti-semitism card in a good, long while.

Concur.

At least they're being open about it, now.

Quote
the kinds of sentiments you are seeing expressed here, on a website founded by a Jew who lost many family members in the Holocaust no less, are classic anti-Semitism.

I don't know whether to laugh or cry...  This is a statement of such absurdity...
Zeke

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #195 on: March 07, 2007, 09:43:11 AM »

I knew someone would play that song.
Perhaps in the short run that was true (and we're talking maybe 8 years at most).  Over the longer term, the Nazis effectively destroyed their entire culture.  If one looks at the position of Germany in say 1925 in regard to arts, mathematics, science, medicine, etc etc and then what it was at any point after the war, including today, there is no comparison.  They chased away or killed their most productive and brightest citizens, both Jews and non-Jews.  Concurrently, there isn't a single academic field in the US or Britain that did not gain immeasurably by the addition of German refugees.

I knew someone would play that song?

What the hell kind of comment is that?

Excuse the hell out of me for mentioning an apparently valid historical-economic position which appears to be supported by multiple non-anti-semetic, non-Holocaust-denying, non-axe-to-grind historians.

I'm sure the complete position contains enough nuance to differentiate short-term gains versus long-term losses, but feel free to act all supercilious.  rolleyes

Just off the top of my head and using plain old logic AND looking objectively. 

Let's say we start with the apparent Nazi  belief that the Jewish scientists, artists, doctors et al really were sub-human and had nothing to offer that the good Aryan types couldn't (eventually) provide.  If they truly had that belief (and there's no reason to believe they didn't), then they would have had no reason to predict the massive loss to their country that would result in the long term. 

Thus their short-term choices of death, theft and exile would have been internally consistant with their ethnic superiority position.  Due to the war, there's no reason to believe they even had a glimmer of what they lost, until maybe when they realized how badly they needed the Jewish physicists to work on the bomb.

The argument is that the Nazi's thought the massive theft made sense and thus explains their choices, not that it actually did make sense or was correct or wise long term.





And as I thought about it more, that theory only deals with Nazi actions towards German Jews.  They only made up about 2% of the population.  They were hardly wealthy, although some members were.
It does not explain the actions towards the rest of European Jewry, most of whom were poor with little possessions.
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CAnnoneer

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #196 on: March 07, 2007, 10:10:03 AM »
Quote
I knew someone would play that song?

What the hell kind of comment is that?

It is the perfect demagogic kind - maximally emoting, baiting, insubstantive, and irrefutable. Watch and learn, young grasshoper. We have a true master here. Hehehe.

What does it matter if the jews had stuff to confiscate or not? It the eyes of the nazi state, they were a mortal enemy. If you displace or liquidate an enemy, it is natural to confiscate his property as partial reparation for damages incurred. We have no reason to believe that the nazis went after the jews because they wanted jewish property. The mentioned book at best can establish that confiscations were a profitable business, which is no surprise. My assumption would be the value of the book is that it shows the actual numbers.

I have also read that the nazis confiscated significant amounts of gold reserves from the conquered countries and laundered them through the Swiss to buy raw materials for their war machine. It is difficult to use that fact as the motivation for the nazis invading those countries.

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #197 on: March 07, 2007, 11:34:47 AM »
It matters because you have to ask what the motivation was to do something that not only did not help their war effort, but actually impeded it.  Most genocides take place when one party sees an advantage to committing genocide to another.  In the case of the Turks against the Armenians, or Stalin against the Ukrainians the purpose is to quell a troublesome minority.  Here there was no purpose beyond Nazi ideology.  That is one factor making it unique.
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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #198 on: March 07, 2007, 12:52:20 PM »
Can we agree on something? It was a horrendous atrocity as was Stalin, Pol Pot, Rwanda, Darfur, etc, etc, ad nauseum. All perpetuated by the holders of state power. We as a nation are periously close to disarming ourselves. Perhaps we should remember all of these as we forever reserve the right to shoot the bastards. Hopefully in our time we will not deny what is happening until we have no choice other than to get on the train. When in doubt, shoot a tyrant.
AKA Navy Joe   

I'm so contrarian that I didn't respond to the thread.

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Re: Just how many Jews were really murdered by Hitler and associates?
« Reply #199 on: March 07, 2007, 12:55:59 PM »
It matters because you have to ask what the motivation was to do something that not only did not help their war effort, but actually impeded it.

What effect did Stalin;s purge of his officer corps in 1937 have on the performance of his military when Germany invaded?

Quote
  Most genocides take place when one party sees an advantage to committing genocide to another.  In the case of the Turks against the Armenians, or Stalin against the Ukrainians the purpose is to quell a troublesome minority.  Here there was no purpose beyond Nazi ideology.  That is one factor making it unique.

When they stand you up against the wall, does "why?" really matter?  Is there any "good" or "less evil" reason for such madness?
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