I was a bit busy with other stuff, including coding a bit .
Thank you all for your kind words. I especially enjoyed your warm words, zerosan. I saw in the other thread how knowledgable you are.
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From my perspective, and indeed that of many Britons, coming from a military family who lost members in both wars, there is no national blame to be laid at anyones door.
Actually I think in the 2. WW the blame is quite clear: Noone apart from the germans is to blame for the war in europe.
BTW, regarding WWI, I think the question of blame is not so important, since the people from all the nations were enthusiastic and wanted a new war to be able to prove themselves. My aunt still remembered 1914, IIRC she was 4 at the time. So, before WWI europe was a powder keg and it just needed a spark. You can argue whether the assasination was the spark (and one person is responsible for WWI), or whether that could have been contained etc etc, but IMHO the bad thing was that there was a powder keg in the first place.
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Nations go to war, but it is people who propagate views and prejudices that occasion wars. People are always its casualties too, while often the politics, views and mindsets live on to corrupt again.
I agree that the Hitler and the "nation" could not have acted if many germans had sharply oposed. Unfortunately, some small human traits, that one could even say endears humans to one, can have a devastating effect in a chaotic, violent time where things can easily topple that way or that. For example, humans are "herd animals", not "loners" (sorry, no dictionary here). If some strongly go in one direction and some follow, then most of the rest will follow as well. I am sure you have seen this behaviour. Normally it's fairly harmless. From an evolution standpoint it's quite clear to see why it was an advantage. In that situation it was disastrous. And, like I said the germans are especially obedient. Off course, the german trait to be especially thorough also made the catastrophy worse.
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Is it not also the same to point out that terrible crimes were committed in Russia, in Cambodia and in Rwanda and Bosnia. That does not make all Russians or Bosnians or Rwandans guilty in the same way that it does not make all Germans guilty of Hitler and his supporters crimes.
True. If you would think all germans of the time were swines, then you would be racist as well. IMO it is chance where you were born. I once read an interview with the germany expert of the BBC during the war. The interview was long afterwards. He said, when he meets a german, say in a train, that is of his age, he is careful at first. However, should he get to kno the person deeper and see they are ok, then he has no problems with them.
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Many were motivated by bad judgement, greed or just plain cruelty. But the overwhelming majority, on both sides, did what they felt was their duty.
True.
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I hope my words mean something to you.
Absolutely. Thank you.
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There are exceptions of course, those who will not let the past rest and I expect these people exist in your country also.
Yes, unfortunately there are those as well in germany, and we need to watch them. But their number is fairly small (especially in the western part).
I think one should not read ones own messages. I wrote:
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You asked how the Germans could choose Hitler. This is off course the most important answer everyone asks himself when starting to look into this dark period of time.
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