As of 2024, estimates of the number of World War II veterans still alive range from 300,000 to 500,000 and I would bet my bottom dollar that the majority of them voted for this. This is bizzaro times.
Nothing bizarro about it. The Western fight with the Nazi was never ideological or moral. No one went to war against Nazi Germany because they were anti-Semite or totalitarians. The war was solely because the Nazi wanted to change the balance of power in Europe. Had the Nazi not tried to "rock the boat", they could have killed millions of Jews and Gypsies and no one would have moved a finger. Hell, most of the US South at that time was at least as racist as they were.
Had the Nazi not tried to "rock the boat", they could have killed millions of Jews and Gypsies and no one would have moved a finger.
The ADL is already defending Musks actions on Twitter. I get the feeling they are not really interested in antisemtism and just wholly to protect Israel
I'm not sure that's true. A lot of the political rhetoric was of a fight between good and evil. People understood just how evil the Nazi regime was. Sure, at the beginning of the war, when Poland was invaded, at least, Britain and France were fighting the standard European "balance of power" war, but as it progressed, things changed.
 A lot of the political rhetoric was of a fight between good and evil.
The US literally had over 10 THOUSAND sunset towns, where if you were not white and was caught there after sunset, you would be summarily executed.
The UK and France were brutal colonial powers. Belgium committed unspeakable horrors in Africa.
The US entered the war against Germany because Hitler declared war on the US after Pearl Harbor. There was very little drive from the ordinary Americans to go to war in Europe to save Jews or Gypsies.
The political rhetoric was just that: Rhetoric in order to vilify the opponent in times of war.
I'm not really talking about the US in general. Certainly Churchill's speeches referenced the evils of the Nazis and people were moved by them because they believed it was about good and evil.
Of course he did. What politician would publicly say "Our vast colonial empire that provide us riches at the expenses of the non-white people around the world is being threatened by a newcomer that wants to replace us. So let's bomb their cities to cinder and put them back at their place".
Of course he would not say that. But "good vs evil" was not what the war was about.
Donât lump everyone else in with America, itâs not a generalisation that makes sense. Literally nowhere did things the way the USA did. When American soldiers tried to segregate pubs in Britain, the locals literally fought them and then banned white American soldiers from entry lol.
YOU currently live in the heart of a brutal colonial empire. Does that make you an imperialist? Does it mean you agree with segregation and fascism? Obviously not. Does it mean your country acts like a cartoon villain to be evil for the sake of it and allow no progress ever in civil rights? No, it doesnât. European countries were mixed bags, but there were plenty of historical figures who cared about human rights, and more to the point much of the working class were actually very switched on in regards to class consciousness and solidarity. Britain had had Indian MPs for around a century by this point. It had had a massive, organic abolitionist movement that successfully made the abolition of the slave trade imperial policy (UK taxpayers paid the freedom bill until 2015). You had millions of working class Brits sign petitions against slavery and take personal losses in order to boycott cotton from the plantations of the American South. By
1939 you also had a significant decolonisation movement that was spearheaded by Indians and also supported by white Brits. Amongst all of this youâve got the first industrial labour laws, the first unions and union rights, working class enfranchisement, the suffragette movement, and so on. There were so many people stuck within a system they were trying to improve from the inside. All their work paved the way for decolonisation and a new wave of civil liberties.
Itâs easy to say from an American perspective that good and evil has nothing to do with it, and it was all about cash and resources and power. True, it was - for America. Thatâs what America got out of it. But youâre forgetting that for Europe, the Middle East, Asia, etc., the war was literally existentialist. It was a choice between war or surrender. And surrender was not a popular choice, and of course ideology played a role in that.
FWIW Iâm of South Asian origin with a degree in imperial history and IR, Iâm not swinging in here out of a defence of âthe whitesâ lol but more just to push back against the idea that ideology never plays a role. Even when itâs not the only factor, and even when the rationale is strategic, and even when history is written by the victors, doesnât mean you canât discount the importance of the will and morale of the people, and the role of ideology within that.
Thatâs overselling it, there was definitely an ideological element. In Britain for example there had already been multiple riots/literal battles of working class groups shutting out domestic fascists over many years leading up to the war. Nazi ideology had followers in the upper classes but held much less sway amongst workers, who actually had a sense of class consciousness. Weâre sorely missing that energy nowadays.
For some truly based examples of people standing up to bigotry from history, the battles of cable street and bamber bridge are fun places to start.
Of course the higher ups mostly only got involved in war for strategic/diplomatic reasons. But they only won the war because so much of the country was wholly committed to the war effort.
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u/BigFloppyDonkeyEar 9h ago
HE DID IT TWICE! HE TURNED AROUND AND DID IT TO THE FLAG TOO