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Hitler & Stalin - 65 years later


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It certainly couldn't when it was bereft of the authority of the United States, which you apparently need reminding, whose negotiators were so big on the idea in the first place.

Wilson failed to get it done...what more do you need to know? The Americans wanted no part of the crap pie they (and now you) are selling. The Americans didn't start your empire's great World Wars, but they sure as hell ended them after it got all cocked up.

He can blame the US for its part in the disarmament quotas that basically left France completely vulnerable. It, along with Britain, can be blamed for turning their backs on Germany when it began cheating on its tonnage limits even before Hitler came to power, and in particular for the long series of failures culminating in the Rearming of the Rhineland, when Britain, France and the United States could still have, relatively easily, pushed German troops out.

Again, you are projecting American power in retrospect when no such policy existed. You may as well ask why didn't Canada intervene as well, so silly is the notion. American troops were not Churchill's playthings.

I never blamed the US solely. There was plenty of blame to spread around, but the Allies, for first imposing such severe penalties on Germany, and later the US and Britain for ignoring the penalties and letting Germany, both prior to and after Hitler's rise, do whatever it felt like, at times even seemingly justifying the breaches of the Treaty of Versailles, have to take a lot of the blame.

Utter nonsense....Imperial Japan was "limited" by the Washington Treaty, but was still able to build a one-ocean navy to challenge all others in the Pacific. There were no provisions for enforcement, and the treaty was eventually ignored by all. Absent from your opinion is the obvious nature of Britain's dwindling empire and influence (and a THREE ocean navy). Your guys blew it...not the United States, which emerged from all the crap as a superpower. Funny how that works...huh?

I know the Americans love to imagine themselves as purely saviors in WWII, but they got involved in WWI, found their way to Versailles and were as culpable as anyone else in what happened over the next 20 years.

You have just made my point for me, as the Americans wanted dick to do with your empire's wars. More Americans died in WWI than did Canadians, which was obligated to support a dying empire with (stupid) alliances that started the crapfest to begin with. God Save the Queen!

Edited by bush_cheney2004
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if you focused on russian politics and you don;t think "the great patriotic war? is a propaganda label, I assume you failed...

..here's a hint, what did the russians call the war before they were double crossed?

Of course it was. However, the title has carried on and it's a legitimate title for the war on the eastern front. If you don't like that, that's your business. However, the term great patriotic war is just as valid as world war 2 when describing the war on the eastern front.

Edited by nicky10013
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Secondly, not a propaganda label.

Of course it was.

Make up your mind.

However, the title has carried on and it's a legitimate title for the war on the eastern front.

In the west, we call the war on the eastern front, "the eastern front". Now it would be illogical for the Russians to call it that, 'cause the war was on their western border...and calling it something more accurate, like "The war we started and backfired in our faces" just doesn't have the same rallying cry...and calling it something like....ummmm..."The Second World War" might cause some people to question why the Soviet Union was involved in a war amongst capitalist imperialists...

Edited by M.Dancer
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Make up your mind.

In the west, we call the war on the eastern front, "the eastern front". Now it would be illogical for the Russians to call it that, 'cause the war was on their western border...and calling it something more accurate, like "The war we started and backfired in our faces" just doesn't have the same rallying cry...and calling it something like....ummmm..."The Second World War" might cause some people to question why the Soviet Union was involved in a war amongst capitalist imperialists...

It was at the beginning. It isn't now. The world is complicated enough that things can change. I suppose you wouldn't understand that, though.

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take my advice and read the first chapters of Churchill's History of WWII. He doesn't solely blame the US, but, in general, he blames the Allies for their outrageous reparation demands from Germany and then, after seemingly feeling guilty about it all a decade later, letting Germany do anything it wanted, while still enforcing conditions on France that left the Low Countries and the Maginot Line an open sore just waiting for the Germany army (whose General Staff had been secretly meeting under the auspices of the Weimar Republic, thus preserving that most important aspect of the might Prussian military intact).

Sound interesting, I'll have to look that one up at the local library. Thanks!

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Some say that WWII put Canada's industry on the world map...

Agreed...either because of industry relocation by Britain (e.g. Avro > Victory) or the inner workings of Lend Lease and war materials production in North America, Canada did emerge as a significant player in manufacturing, not just in raw materials supply. Canada's navy / merchant marine ballooned to become one of the world's largest.

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Russia fought WWII with its every breath, every Russian was affected, everyone, civilian and soldier, sacrificed immensely. To try to ignore this reality and instead make the claims that you are making is frankly revolting. And the part I don't understand is why. Is it really just some kind of blind ultrapatriotism that drives you to make these statements? To try to downplay the reality of how other nations struggled in WWII to glorify Canada's minor contribution?

I don't think that is what she was saying at all, but was impling that every soldiers sacrafice regardless of orgin is what defeated the Nazi's....

And while it is true the Russian people suffered terriably during the war, i find it difficult to not place alot of that suffuring at Stalins feet, along with all of his minons trying to please him and stay out of Stalins own death camps which claimed as many as Hitlers did...

As for saying Canada played a minor role is a bit unfair...Canada's minor contribution a relativly new nation of just over 11 million people manged to build from scratch a military which seen over 1.1 million Canadians serve...in almost every threater of operations in WWII, ..Not many nations can make that claim. I wonder what the outcome of WWII would have been without Canada's minor contribution....

And while Canadian soldiers where lucky enough to have bullets and rifles issued at the same time, one can not say that Canadian soldiers did not sacrifice everything on the battle field...after all dead is dead...

And just a small note that during the intial German invasion of Russia, many of the Russian people lined the streets and cheered on the German troops and treating them as if they were liberators...it was until the Germans made thier policies known to the Russian people that this all changed...It is one of those what if pionts "had the germans treated them differently what would have been the outcome"...So Stalin was not the end all be all in nation leaders.

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Oh that was such an articulate argument you now have me convinced!!!

Alright, I'll articulate the argument, I'll bet $1000 you won't buy it which is why I didn't want to waste my time in the first place, but here goes.

The term great patriotic war of course originated as a propaganda term, however, it's now an accepted substitute for the term World War 2 when discussing the war on the Eastern Front in Russia. There are of course examples of this in the west, only with privately produced products rather than government names for wars. The biggest one I can think of is tissue for blowing your nose. In a lot of places people just call it tissue. I've never called it by that, but by kleenex, the brand name. It's just out there all the time that's what people call it, even though we never really buy that brand. Same can be said in England in terms of vacuums. The vernacular there is hoover, which is the brand name of the company which introduced it. Both Kleenex and Hoover are examples of good advertising campaigns where the actual brand name of the product became the accepted cultural term for the entire line. The same has happened in Russia with Great Patriotic War.

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Alright, I'll articulate the argument, I'll bet $1000 you won't buy it which is why I didn't want to waste my time in the first place, but here goes.

The term great patriotic war of course originated as a propaganda term, however, it's now an accepted substitute for the term World War 2 when discussing the war on the Eastern Front in Russia. There are of course examples of this in the west, only with privately produced products rather than government names for wars. The biggest one I can think of is tissue for blowing your nose. In a lot of places people just call it tissue. I've never called it by that, but by kleenex, the brand name. It's just out there all the time that's what people call it, even though we never really buy that brand. Same can be said in England in terms of vacuums. The vernacular there is hoover, which is the brand name of the company which introduced it. Both Kleenex and Hoover are examples of good advertising campaigns where the actual brand name of the product became the accepted cultural term for the entire line. The same has happened in Russia with Great Patriotic War.

First you claimed that the "GPW" wasn't a propagadic name, then you said it was but not anymore, and now you are claiming it is a trademark brand name?

It's called the GPW because the truth was and still is uncomfortable....how long did it take the Russians to own up about the Polish Massacres? Which predate the GPW by 2 years, but they don't predate the second world war...

The simple fact remains, the Soviet Union was as culpable for starting the second world war as was Nazi Germany...their invasion of Poland and the Baltics ensured a quick and easy German victory in the east.

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First you claimed that the "GPW" wasn't a propagadic name, then you said it was but not anymore, and now you are claiming it is a trademark brand name?

It's called the GPW because the truth was and still is uncomfortable....how long did it take the Russians to own up about the Polish Massacres? Which predate the GPW by 2 years, but they don't predate the second world war...

The simple fact remains, the Soviet Union was as culpable for starting the second world war as was Nazi Germany...their invasion of Poland and the Baltics ensured a quick and easy German victory in the east.

Like I said, leave it to you not to understand, or purposefully be ignorant. I never called it a trademark brand, just in the fact that what the government branded the war stuck around like kleenex or hoover. That was fairly simple. You still didn't get it, so, I don't know what else to say.

Yes, Russia still hasn't come to grips with Stalinism. However, I wouldn't say that's why the name of the war is still that name. There are far more complex issues surrounding Stalin, the war, repression and democratisation than just what they named WW2. Linking the two is an example of weak thinking.

Is Russia culpable for the start of the war? No. Russia did invade Eastern Poland but by no means did that make it easier for the Germans as Russia didn't invade until 3 weeks after. The act that started the war was the invasion. Hitler had planned it before he signed the Molotov-Ribbentropp Pact. The war would've started with or without Russia's involvement. Furthermore, if we're to be honest withourselves, Poland couldn't have been much easier for the Germans. It's not like Russia's invasion prevent a German defeat. Again, yet another example of shallow thinking.

Edited by nicky10013
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Of course it was. However, the title has carried on and it's a legitimate title for the war on the eastern front. If you don't like that, that's your business. However, the term great patriotic war is just as valid as world war 2 when describing the war on the eastern front.
Nicky, I think that the significance of the term "Great Patriotic War" is that the Bolshevik Stalin was forced to resort to Tsarist terminology (motherland etc) to get Russians to fight.

They weren't fighting to defend the Revolution. They were fighting to defend the Motherland.

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Nicky, I think that the significance of the term "Great Patriotic War" is that the Bolshevik Stalin was forced to resort to Tsarist terminology (motherland etc) to get Russians to fight.

They weren't fighting to defend the Revolution. They were fighting to defend the Motherland.

I don't disagree. They also had to bring back the Orthodox Church. That doesn't change the fact that the term Great Patriotic War has stuck around and is still very much relevant today in modern Russian society whether it was at first a propaganda term or not.

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Nonsense. Realizing just how many Russians died in WWII and how that completely reshaped the USSR is certainly not irrelevant. For Canadians, life went on, with the occasional family knowing someone who got killed in the war. For Russia, it was a rupture in the fabric of history. Entire families, towns, villages, were wiped out. Of my grandmother's family, she was the only survivor out of over 10 living before the war, the rest having perished before they could be evacuated from Western areas, or starving to death in Leningrad, or freezing to death in the refugee camps in Sibera, or killed in the battles to push Germany out. To this day, the names and exact numbers of the countless millions who perished remain unknown.

Russia fought WWII with its every breath, every Russian was affected, everyone, civilian and soldier, sacrificed immensely. To try to ignore this reality and instead make the claims that you are making is frankly revolting. And the part I don't understand is why. Is it really just some kind of blind ultrapatriotism that drives you to make these statements? To try to downplay the reality of how other nations struggled in WWII to glorify Canada's minor contribution?

Bonam, your reference to your grandmother makes plain that wars are fought by individuals - how else can it be? History and life is an individual affair.

When you say, "Entire families, towns, villages, were wiped out." How was this any different in Canada when someone died in the war? Do you think that a Canadian wife accepts the death of her husband more easily than a Russian wife?

More pertinently, do you think that a Canadian soldier dies more easily than a Russian soldier?

Let me repeat: The Russian army did not defeat Nazism. Individual soldiers did this. Some soldiers accomplished more than others but I think that it's wrong to generalize more than this.

To state my opinion differently, in the 1940s, many individuals made the decision to risk their life to defeat something that was wrong. No single individual was the straw that broke the camel's back. Each individual contributed to this collective effort.

I don't disagree. They also had to bring back the Orthodox Church. That doesn't change the fact that the term Great Patriotic War has stuck around and is still very much relevant today in modern Russian society whether it was at first a propaganda term or not.
Long ago, while visiting a war museum in the UK and then in France, I realized that each country had its own perspective of the war. (Duh.) Well, the Russian's have their own name for the war.

This whole point struck home to me when I was in the Soviet Union (early 1980s) with an American and we found a brochure referring to the "Great Patriotic War 1941-1945". I showed the brochure to teh American and said, "Look at how they call the Second World War. They even get the dates wrong." The American looked at me perplexed and asked, "What's wrong with the dates?"

Edited by August1991
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When you say, "Entire families, towns, villages, were wiped out." How was this any different in Canada when someone died in the war? Do you think that a Canadian wife accepts the death of her husband more easily than a Russian wife?

How many Canadian towns and villages were wiped out? For that matter, how many Canadian families were? Most families had some people that were not soldiers, and stayed at home in Canada, and these people were not at risk of death from the war. In Russia, many did not have this luxury. There is a difference in scale here and on its impact on a nation.

Losing a member of one's family, a soldier that went off to war, is of course tragic for that family, whether in Russia or in Canada or anywhere else. But tragedy and destruction of society on the scale of what happened in Russia is something that Canada has never experienced, and I fervently hope never will.

More pertinently, do you think that a Canadian soldier dies more easily than a Russian soldier?

No, of course not, and you interpreting my post in this way can only be willful ignorance.

Let me repeat: The Russian army did not defeat Nazism. Individual soldiers did this. Some soldiers accomplished more than others but I think that it's wrong to generalize more than this.

No, there is nothing wrong in making the generalization that Canada's overall role in the war was smaller than that of Russia, or of the US. Vastly more soldiers from those countries fought in the war, and vastly more resources were expended by those countries on the war.

To state my opinion differently, in the 1940s, many individuals made the decision to risk their life to defeat something that was wrong.

Yes, many individuals in Canada made this choice. In some other countries, many individuals did not have such a choice.

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Is Russia culpable for the start of the war? No. Russia did invade Eastern Poland but by no means did that make it easier for the Germans as Russia didn't invade until 3 weeks after. The act that started the war was the invasion. Hitler had planned it before he signed the Molotov-Ribbentropp Pact. The war would've started with or without Russia's involvement. Furthermore, if we're to be honest withourselves, Poland couldn't have been much easier for the Germans. It's not like Russia's invasion prevent a German defeat.

The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact not only contained a non aggression pact which removed the possibility of Russia fighting to defend Poland, it also divided Poland between them.

Russia invaded 16 days after the Germans, not 3 weeks and the Russians captured a quarter of a million Polish soldiers, who were now prevented from fighting the Germans. Polish forces fighting both the Russains and the Germans did not finaly surrender till October 6th, 2o days after the Soviet Invasion.

On top of the active co-operation between German and Russian forces during the short war, political dealing continued with the conclusion of the German–Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Demarcation, which gave Germany more of Poland.

Yes, the start of the war can be laid squarely at the feet of Stalin and Hitler and the signing of the molotov ribbentrop pact was the catalyst that gave hitler a free hand to invade Poland.

Again, yet another example of shallow thinking

Apparently some of your best, and pretty good for a girl.

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The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact not only contained a non aggression pact which removed the possibility of Russia fighting to defend Poland, it also divided Poland between them.

Russia invaded 16 days after the Germans, not 3 weeks and the Russians captured a quarter of a million Polish soldiers, who were now prevented from fighting the Germans. Polish forces fighting both the Russains and the Germans did not finaly surrender till October 6th, 2o days after the Soviet Invasion.

On top of the active co-operation between German and Russian forces during the short war, political dealing continued with the conclusion of the German–Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Demarcation, which gave Germany more of Poland.

Yes, the start of the war can be laid squarely at the feet of Stalin and Hitler and the signing of the molotov ribbentrop pact was the catalyst that gave hitler a free hand to invade Poland.

Apparently some of your best, and pretty good for a girl.

So, the Germans wouldn't have invaded Poland and wouldn't have won if it wasn't for Russia? Gee, those 250,000 Polish soldiers sure stopped their advance before the Soviets invaded. France had millions of troops but they couldn't stop the blitzkrieg either and France fell in 6 weeks. You can throw out all the stats and friendship treaties you want. Without them, Hitler still would've invaded. HE still would've won. We still would've went to war.

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So, the Germans wouldn't have invaded Poland and wouldn't have won if it wasn't for Russia?

So you think it's just a coinicidence that the invasion took place one week after the signing of the pact, or that the Russians, being courted by France and England to conclude a treaty that would have protected Poland, made so many impossible demands that a treaty became impossible (and instead looked towards Germany and begun negotiations)...

France had millions of troops but they couldn't stop the blitzkrieg either and France fell in 6 weeks.

France capitulated while they still had the bulk of their armed troops ready to fight. France was out manouvered and France, their whole strategy depended on refighting the first world war (maginot line).

That being said....

However, with the surprise signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact on 23 August, the denouement of secret Nazi-Soviet talks held in Moscow, Germany neutralized the possibility of Soviet opposition to a campaign against Poland and war became imminent. In fact, the Soviets agreed to aid Germany in the event of France or the United Kingdom going to war with Germany over Poland and, in a secret protocol of the pact, the Germans and the Soviets agreed to divide Eastern Europe, including Poland, into two spheres of influence; the western third of the country was to go to Germany and the eastern two-thirds to the Soviet Union.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Poland

No one will ever know if Germany would have actaully invaded Poland without Russia's approval. All events previous to the invasion showed that Hitler prefered bluff and diplomacy to overt war.

On the otherhand...

By 17 September 1939, the Polish defense was already broken and the only hope was to retreat and reorganize along the Romanian Bridgehead. However, these plans were rendered obsolete nearly overnight, when the over 800,000 strong Soviet Union Red Army entered and created the Belarussian and Ukrainian fronts after invading the eastern regions of Poland in violation of the Riga Peace Treaty, the Soviet-Polish Non-Aggression Pact, and other international treaties, both bilateral and multilateral.

Polish plans were to defend for 6 months....this would have bought time for France and Britain to come to polands aid. Instead of 6 months, the war lasted 4 weeks with the material assisitance of Russia.

In otherwords, had Russia not invaded, and Hitler attacked anyway Poland could have resisted longer and instead of defeat, occupation ad the ensuing phoney war leading up to the inavsion of France, Poland would have survived and Hitler's plans would have been bobbed.

Had Russia signed a pact with France and Britain, the invasion of Poland would have never taken place with the threat of a Russian counter attack.

Edited by M.Dancer
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