Your Email:

Subject:

Message:
Entry: Buchanan, Kennan, and the "Good War" Link: http://www.takimag.com/site/article/buchanan_kennan_and_the_good_war#28481 Post contents: I share Christopher Browning's view that the Holocaust was not necessarily inevitable on the eve of the war and that the Germans were considering other, less murderous alternatives such as mass expulsion. The Germans were radicalized by the war, fearful of internal enemies, and racistly hateful against Jews, whom they blamed for the war, for Bolshevism, and for Germany's "stab in the back" in World War I. When victory became more elusive, Hitler pushed more and more for granting Europeans the historical "gift" of a Jew-free Europe. That said, the statement "the Holocaust emerging from the war itself rather as a cause for the war," could be read to mean that somehow the Germans were not chiefly responsible for the mass murder of Jewish, Polish, and Russian civilians, which is patently false. Contextualizing and explaining the Holocaust should not absolve the various players--Hitler, Heydrich, Himmler, and the SS-Totenkopf campg guards--of their share of moral responsibility. There are sins of commission, omission, and negligence in any historical event, and we should not confuse the lion's share of blame of perpetrators with those who unwittingly and unintentinoally may have provided them a pretext for their actions. PS Dan, I realize it may not have been your intention to contextualize their actions morally, but your statement stood out to me and inspired me to make this point. If my conclusion from your statement does not represent your position, I certainly would welcome a further explanation. Sent at: 2008 12 02