read the whole column before you post.
http://www.strike-the-root.com/3/herman/herman3.html
Achtung! Are We the New Nazis?
Soldiers, God and Empire
by Douglas Herman
Gott Mit Uns.
I felt a little shock and awe, actually disbelief, seeing the antique belt buckle for the first time. Worn by a Nazi German soldier, the aluminum, World War II era buckle carried the imperial eagle of the Third Reich above the familiar Swastika. Surrounding the eagle and Swastika was the motto, "Gott Mit Uns," or "God With Us."
Certainly the Nazi Germans, villains in history and Hollywood movies, couldn’t really have believed in God, could they? Certainly the common German soldier fought with great courage, discipline and fervor, following orders given by the High Command. Yet the Nazis fought a ruthless war against smaller countries, attacking them after planting false evidence, overpowering them with a combination of vicious air strikes and crushing armored superiority and then installed corrupt or cruel puppet leaders.
The Nazis demonized and then destroyed their enemies, after first intimidating and then liquidating their domestic opponents. The German propaganda machine cranked out misinformation and outright lies in the state-supported media, suppressing the truth and threatening anyone who dared to speak or print opposition to the war regime.
Lutheran minister and German war veteran Martin Niemoller mirrored middle-class German society of that time: “First they came for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up, because I wasn’t a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up, because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak up, because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by then there was no one left to speak up for me.”
Presently, American military veterans—rank and file former soldiers mostly--are speaking out against American Imperialism, as well as ministers, artists, reporters, scientists and educators. But the powerful alliance of media monopolies and corporate-financed political leaders sway public opinion to war. In America, as was the case in Nazi Germany, the imperceptible slide to tyranny increases in direct proportion to the number of voices of conscience that are ignored.
Is it curious or ironic how Blitzkrieg resembles Shock and Awe? Is it curious or ironic how Wolf Blitzer and Charles Krauthammer provide the running commentary for the war? Is it curious or ironic how Rumsfeld and Rommel are so similar, how each needed a desert for a dramatic stage? Yes, I know, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld stated to the “free” media our “humanitarian” method of war, but then German general Erwin Rommel or Joseph Goebbels could have said the very same thing to the German press.
Are we the New Nazis? Could it happen here? Has it already begun? Absurd, you say. God is on our side. The God of Christians and Jews.
The last time I checked, the Pope was vehemently against the unprovoked war with Iraq, as were most ministers and priests. The National Council of Churches, with 50 million members in 36 denominations, opposed the war. The Catholic Church, with nearly 64 million Americans, did not support the war. Many American Jews did not support the war. Yet according to all reports, we’ve “won” a war and the rumors are we may have another couple of other wars very soon.
God is on our side, but which one? The vengeful God, the one guiding our radioactive armor-sheathed battle tanks as they slice through families of frightened civilians? Or the merciful one, providing protection to those same civilians? Is ours the God of the Gospels and Torah--or the horrible, hydra-like god of cluster bombs? Do our coins--comparable to the Nazi belt buckles-- really carry the motto, “In God We Trust"?
Assuming the support for this war was a mile wide and an inch deep-- generally the case in polls and wars--how many Christian soldiers will continue to take up arms against the “infidel” simply on the summons of Militant Christian Bush and Uber-Zionist Paul Wolfowitz? An instructive book, A Quick And Dirty Guide To War, gives an overview of the entanglement awaiting our armies of occupation. Although the authors fail to mention the term “Islamic Jihad,” they clearly describe the Middle East morass and the fact that Afghanistan has NEVER been conquered by an outside foreign power. America, by the way, is superpower number four to try, and our influence extends only as far as the outskirts of Kabul.
In a prolonged, stepping-stone war of conquest and vendetta, thinly disguised as “liberation,” how many American soldiers will suffice? If the Russians in Afghanistan could not pacify a region at their doorstep with over 150,000 troops, using Gestapo tactics, what makes American leaders think they can do better, using twice the troops over twice the area? Yes, we have the invincible Abrams M1A2 main Battle Tank (MBT), just as the Germans had the invincible Panzer Mark VI Tiger MBT in 1943. But like the Germans, we eventually have to emerge from our tanks, and what then? How many patriotic sons and daughters, heroically fighting for so many American lost causes, will emerge from the backwoods, single-stoplight towns, kids like Jessica Lynch, to serve as very vulnerable yet heavily-armed overseers in impoverished Mesopotamia?
"Do we have ten million men willing to fight and save petroleum resources?" asks Anthony Gancarski in a recent Counterpunch column. "How many millions would it take to provide an occupation force sufficient to pacify the region? Is there any hope of attaining such a fighting force without conscription?"
The answer is NO.
The draft is a done deal if the war spreads. The New York Times recently reported that America’s military power, measured in military spending, exceeded that of all NATO countries combined--plus China, Russia, Japan, Iraq and North Korea--but the need for military men will surpass the capacity of the all-volunteer army if “liberation” spreads to Syria and Iran, as our chief Chickenhawks intend. Former CIA director James Woolsey, handpicked by the Pentagon for the role of Pasha in post-war Iraq, publicly stated to a group of avid young Republicans at UCLA, "This Fourth World War [starting with Iraq and leading God knows where], I think, will last considerably longer than either World Wars I or II did for us." Hopefully the students who weren’t scared shitless listening to Woolsey--a name apropos to the imperial designs of this obscene military machine--already have their student deferments ready to file, following the example of our current leaders, many of whom happily avoided the Vietnam War.
Behind this Middle East escapade lurks a cadre of militant Christians, Zionist Jews, and brazen corporate opportunists, all equally embedded in the idea of an Imperialist Grand Design. Yet such Imperial hubris wrecked Napoleon’s France, destroyed Hitler’s Germany and recently ruined the Soviet Union--bled white in Afghanistan—a dissection ably assisted by our recent Mujahadeen ally, Osama bin Laden.
This recent preemptive strike precedent for America is a page taken from the Third Reich playbook. In 1939, the Germans attacked Poland, a fourth-rate military power, having used a phony excursion by Polish soldiers as a ploy for invasion. Our excuse for attacking another fourth-rate power--the search for weapons of mass destruction--worked wonderfully well in Iraq, yet not even Hitler was so draconian as to expose his own troops to the risk of chemical attack or the exposure of depleted uranium. Thus far more than 10,000 American troops who fought in the first Gulf War have died from Gulf War Syndrome, while the House of Representatives voted recently to cut $25 billion from assistance to disabled veterans, according to Veterans For Common Sense. Truly, the pride over our recent “victory” in Iraq--while cause for celebration in shortening the war and ridding the world of one dictator--does not lessen but increases the possibility of other preemptive attacks against far more dangerous foes. Hitler pulverized Poland and Belgium but wrecked half the world when he continued his mad designs against stronger opponents.
The barbarism of conquered Baghdad mirrors the Nazi blueprint for dealing with foreign art and culture: Loot the art and burn the culture. Yet even The German High command never allowed or conspired in the wholesale eradication of French culture to the degree the American Army appeared to do in Baghdad. Reporter Robert Fisk stated in an interview, “We claim that we want to preserve the national heritage of the Iraqi people, and yet my own count of government buildings burning in Baghdad before I left was 158, of which the only building protected by the United States Army and the Marines were the Ministry of Interior . . . and the Ministry of Oil.”
Fisk also noted, “The looting was on a most detailed, precise and coordinated scale . . . and within a few days those priceless heritage items of Iraq’s history (those not destroyed by systematic arson) were on sale in Europe and in America. I don’t believe that happened by chance.”
The Nazis, great plunderers of European art, would have been envious of the speed and cohesion of the entire operation. Understandably, they would have been aghast at the waste, however.
Will our soldiers soon be sporting “God With Us” belt buckles over protective, Darth Vader body armor, wielding depleted uranium weapons in the Cradle of Civilization? How many My Lai-style atrocities—already occurring as I write this--or Beirut-type barracks bombings will we accept before we realize our occupation in Iraq is West Bank supersized? Before we commit too many more American troops to the Middle East--future victims of suicide shock and awe bombings or civilian slaughters like the one that happened in al-Fallujah--God-fearing American citizens should ask whether this Bush administration plans to continue expanding this empire at the point of a gun.
Truthfully, to the rest of the world, we already are the New Nazis.
Douglas Herman, a USAF veteran, served in the Vietnam era. Captain James Herman, the author's father, fought the Nazis during World War II.
achtung!
i was thinking something much like this, and when i say it i'm not starting a fight or attacking the common populus of america, i believe many of you are good hearted hardworking men and women, but when Propaganda and Patritism come into effect it can turn even the best of people into "Nazis". I'm sure much of Germany was in the situation. This is a shame to all of Germany and many would change there history if they could, it is not a proud moment for them, it is a moment of shame. Now you as a nation are given the choice to learn from Germany's mistake. Please take the road of Peace, Aid, and Understanding. Not War, Hate, and Ignorance.
"How can we justify spending so much on destruction and so little on life?" Matthew Good
"The white dove is gone, the one world has come down hard, so why not share the pain of our problems, when all around are wrong ways, when all around is hurt, i'll roll up in an odd shape and wait, untill the tide has turned.....with anger, i'm dead weight, i'm anchored"- IME, God Rocket (Into the Heart of Las Vegas) ^ Some say this song is about a terrorists thoughts before 911
"Pray for the sheep" Matt Good
"But it's alright, take the world and make it yours again" Matt Good
I felt it in the wind, and i saw it in the sky, i thought it was the end, i thought it was the 4th of July.
"Hold on, hold on children, your mother and father are leaving, hold on, hold on children your best freind's parents are leaving, leaving,.......*AHHH*! " - Death From Above - Black History Month
"The white dove is gone, the one world has come down hard, so why not share the pain of our problems, when all around are wrong ways, when all around is hurt, i'll roll up in an odd shape and wait, untill the tide has turned.....with anger, i'm dead weight, i'm anchored"- IME, God Rocket (Into the Heart of Las Vegas) ^ Some say this song is about a terrorists thoughts before 911
"Pray for the sheep" Matt Good
"But it's alright, take the world and make it yours again" Matt Good
I felt it in the wind, and i saw it in the sky, i thought it was the end, i thought it was the 4th of July.
"Hold on, hold on children, your mother and father are leaving, hold on, hold on children your best freind's parents are leaving, leaving,.......*AHHH*! " - Death From Above - Black History Month
God? Who is this God? You don't believe in god do you? According to many observers, I'm a horrible catholic. Then again the Islamic militant calls you, me, and anyone else in the U.S. The Great Satan. Christians call innocent Islamic followers suspected terrorists. So where is god? Who’s side is he on? And why do you and me and others around this fucking earth find it necessary to kill in the name of THEIR god?! It’s stupid, and by this phrase I really fucking mean this for everyone, Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, and Hindis, to allow the killing of anyone because they don't believe the same shit you do, or because your fucking god told you so. The Nazis had a little slogan on their belt buckles and now all of a sudden they are fighting for their god? I think not my friend, though let's face it, they were fucking assholes anyway. But if this is the case, then Islamic militants are Nazis too, since after all they kill for their god. Same goes for the British, GOD bless the queen. In fact, Mexicans are nazis because:
De la Paz el arcángel divino,
Que en el cielo tu eterno destino
Por el dedo de Dios se escribió.
By the divine archangel of peace
For in heaven your eternal destiny
Has been written by the hand of GOD.
This article has no real claim that the US = Nazi Germany. If you seriously think religion is this link, you’re sadly mistaken. Every country on this planet has incorporated their majority's god into their country in some way shape and form. Sure the Nazis believed in a Christian god, the hijackers of a few planes believed in Islam, does this make every Islamic follower a terrorist? Fuck no! And the people who think this way are morons and they shouldn't be allowed opinions.
"Presently, American military veterans—rank and file former soldiers mostly--are speaking out against American Imperialism, as well as ministers, artists, reporters, scientists and educators. But the powerful alliance of media monopolies and corporate-financed political leaders sway public opinion to war. In America, as was the case in Nazi Germany, the imperceptible slide to tyranny increases in direct proportion to the number of voices of conscience that are ignored."
I find it ironic that when a person says something anti-war, and they get boycotted, they claim they are being black listed. Yet when the "controlled media" say something pro-war.....where's the boycott? Where are the black listings? Anti-war sentiment has the RIGHT to boycott products, media, and what ever they feel necessary, in fact I would think that would be something they would do, hit the corporate peoples and their puppets where they hurt in the pocket. But you don't. You have the right to disagree with someone, and if you disagree with someone anti-war, and refuse to support them your automatically black listing them. Same goes with disagreeing with pro-war folks, you’re anti-American all of a sudden. Quit calling people names and do something, boycott the fenders of "the corrupt media" and let them know what you stand for. I’m sure they'll take a different stand when they're missing millions of dollars from their pockets.
Just because the US uses a MILITARY tactic that was used by the nazi MILITARY, it's the same thing as being a nazi? Where’s the logic here? That’s like saying because you’re using a trebuchet to hurl dead diseased corpses at your enemy, you’re using BIO-Weapons. Sure there MIGHT be a bio-component in this attack, but seriously, the armies that used to do this only did it to rid their areas of horse corpses. It’s absurd. I’m sure every country with an air force is more than willing to use this tactic. It’s smart, not nazi.
The truth is an argument that compares your enemy as a nazi should work, but in all actuality, your claims are way off. Just because you pseudo-believe in god (or your country has a slogan incorporated with god) doesn't make you a nazi. If someone boycotts you because of your views, your not black listed. It's very simple, you and I both have the right to boycott products, be sure to tell all your anti-war buddies, and be sure to tell them to stop complaining about being censored or black listed, the public just doesn't want to hear you; you can just as easily tune them out as well. And just because you use a traditional military strategy doesn't make you a nazi.
this is my formal reply to this article, sent to the source. what a fool.
Whenever death may surprise us,
let it be welcome
if our battle cry has reached even one receptive ear
and another hand reaches out to take up our arms.
Nobody's gonna miss me, no tears will fall, no ones gonna weap, when i hit that road.
my boots are broken my brain is sore, fer keepin' up with thier little world, i got a heavy load.
gonna leave 'em all just like before, i'm big city bound, your always 17 in your hometown
let it be welcome
if our battle cry has reached even one receptive ear
and another hand reaches out to take up our arms.
Nobody's gonna miss me, no tears will fall, no ones gonna weap, when i hit that road.
my boots are broken my brain is sore, fer keepin' up with thier little world, i got a heavy load.
gonna leave 'em all just like before, i'm big city bound, your always 17 in your hometown
