We should be willing to hear from the Germans about war crimes in, oh, about 4500 AD...
They defined the genre for all time, as far as I'm concerned.
Posted on 03/04/2005 1:36:56 PM PST by Eurotwit
The US is guilty of war crimes in Iraq and Guantanamo. It's not the first time. The US also committed war crimes in World War II. But the greater legacy of American involvement in the war against Hitler was democracy in Germany. Could the same thing now be happening in Iraq and the Middle East?
George W. Bush -- and he should know -- once compared Germany's abstinence in the Iraq war with a reformed alcoholic: even one glass of beer is too much. After the Nazi Wehrmacht and the SS had left Europe in ruins, murdered nearly all European Jews, and cut a deadly swath through the Soviet Union, war as a political instrument became an unapproachable taboo in Germany. But at the same time, this country is currently flooded by memories of World War II. Sixty years after the end of the war, the bloody winter and spring of 1945 is being relived day by day in the media. In fact, no country in Europe is as obsessed with history as the Germans are. The fascination with Germany's "Downfall" knows no limits.
But this flood of images from World War II is obscuring some important lessons from that half-decade of murderous violence that still hold true today. The Nazi regime was not brought to an end by sit-ins in front of the Adolf Hitler's Chancellery. It was the Russians, Americans and British who -- through a high price paid in the currency of both military and civilian casualties -- brought Hitler's massive war machinery to its knees. Bombs and grenades brought democracy to us Germans. There was no other option; the Germans didn't want it any other way. Until the bitter end, many Germans believed and trusted in their Führer and the first steps of re-education were not taken by social workers, rather they were ordered by the US military.
Democracy being born out of violence
Sixty years ago, the brute force of the sword brought peace and democracy to Europe. Two years ago, George W. Bush began the war against Iraq for all the wrong reasons. There were good reasons to protest the war. Now it seems that true freedom of expression and democracy are evolving from that wrongful war. If that's the case, then there's good reason to cheer.
The Americans never found the weapons of mass destruction that were allegedly threatening the world -- instead, mass graves were discovered. In January, the Iraqis cast their ballots against terrorism. But terror has yet to be stopped. The followers of leading al-Qaida terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi are putting their faith in a dark, religiously fueled promise of fortune. For them, death is the pinnacle of life and only death will stop them. However, the Iraqi voters achieved something else: The virus of democracy, feared by al-Zarqawi and friends, is spreading throughout the Middle East. In February, municipal elections were held in Saudi Arabia. To Westerners, it may seem ridiculous mentioning such an event, but for the local population it was an important warm-up exercise on the road toward freedom of expression. In the past -- including recent elections -- only men were allowed to vote there. However, in an interview with Time magazine, Saudi foreign minister Prince Saud recently promised that that is set to change soon. Women, he said, were more sensible voters anyway. A brand new tone to the rhetoric coming out of Riyadh.
The events currently unfolding in Lebanon are just as astonishing. Millions of people are gaining political self-confidence, despite Syrian occupation and still-fresh memories of a bloody civil war. Whoever was behind the terror attack against former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, the murder was likely not intended as a wake-up call for the Lebanese people. It's still too early to compare these events with the "Orange Revolution" in Ukraine. But it's certainly a sign of hope for the young people there who are eager to take back their country.
How quickly can the virus of democracy spread?
We can only anticipate where Lebanon is headed. The Syrians will have to leave this oppressed country at some point, whether now or in the future. And when it happens, maybe the virus of democracy and free speech will jump across the border from Beirut to Damascus. Perhaps it will even spread into Amman, Jordan and Tehran, Iran. As Europeans, we should not be afraid of such a process. On the contrary, we should support it wherever we can. For far too long, Germany's foreign policy in the Middle East merely focused on maintaining the status quo. On the surface, the term "critical dialogue" with Tehran sounded great, and it hurt no one. And the rallying cry "no blood for oil" was a convenient lens through which to view the Iraq war.
Leaving the United States out of the big picture for a moment, an examination of Germany's export volume to Iran leads to a massive €2.7 billion per year. We may call it peace, others just call it deathly silence. We negotiate with people who like to force their own population into the corset of the Koran. Those who don't like it are locked away, tortured, thrown out of the country, or, in some cases, just killed.
A US war against Iran would be foolhardy. But no one should suggest that there's peace in Iran. There's an important reason behind the German government's pacifist convictions: big business. If the German leadership had its way, we'd still be sitting in a Tehran teahouse a hundred years from now, kicking back, talking business, while sipping some hot brew. Those who favor democracy in the Middle East surely cannot be opposed to the Americans trying to stir things up a little as a contrast to Germany's "teahouse policy." The mullahs' recent attempts to block investigations of the country's nuclear program underscore the need for such measures. The soft and friendly European-Iranian dialogue could surely use some more incisiveness. After all, former German foreign minister Klaus Kinkel engaged in this schmoozing, chit-chat diplomacy that's still prevalent today, and Kinkel achieved little. The result: In today's Iran, the conservative mullah's have more control than ever before.
US has a history with war crimes
Bush's approach -- using tanks and guns to force democracy down the world's throat -- rightly triggers some serious opposition: Abu Ghraib. Guantanamo. How can a country that tolerated torture and created legal vacuums and advocate democracy and human rights with a straight face? It's outrageous that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is still in office while Secretary of State Colin Powell had to leave his post. That said, the torture will be punished: The prosecution at first demanded that the maiden of torture, Lynndie England, be sentenced to 38 years. Now it's down to 16 years -- still a lot of time behind bars for someone who didn't murder anyone. In addition, the reality in the Middle East is somewhat more complex than the few gruesome pictures from the U.S. Army dungeons may reflect.
The people of Iraq countered this horror with hope. This pairing -- war crimes with liberation -- is not completely new: When the 7th Army of U.S. General George Patton landed in Sicily in July 1943, his men killed 150 Italian soldiers and 50 Germans -- after they had already surrendered. It was a war crime, even at that time.
Later, in April 1945, Patton's soldiers liberated the Buchenwald concentration camp. What they saw, standing on Ettersberg Mountain near Weimar, left the soldiers breathless and in utter shock: mountains of dead bodies, living skeletons. The dying didn't stop, even weeks after the liberation. Even the birds in the area fled from the Nazis' crimes, and only returned after the crematory stopped pumping out the sickly-smelling clouds of death into the skies.
During the following days, George Patton forced thousands of Weimar residents to help clean up the concentration camp. A person from each household had to climb Ettersberg Mountain and see the results of the Nazis' ghastly crimes. The approach was called "viewing the atrocities" and represented a sort of "shock-and-awe" pedagogy for a population that believed in their Führer, in his miracle weapons and in Santa Claus until the very end. "Viewing the atrocities" was one of the first ways of re-educating the Germans. And it was ordered by a US general who had brutally violated the Geneva Conventions in Sicily.
The US should stay in Iraq
But who would deny that the man who liberated Buchenwald is, in fact, a hero of history? He took the Weimar locals -- many of them very arrogant, cold, self-absorbed and engrossed in their local hero Wolfgang von Goethe -- and rubbed their nose in the Nazis' atrocities, crimes that took place on their front-door step for years and that didn't seem to bother them. Shortly afterwards, Patton and his army left the eastern German city. The region conquered by the US Army went to the Russians in a trade-off for West Berlin.
Patton's 7th Army was later merged into the V Corps, the US Army unit that shouldered the biggest load two years ago during the attack on Baghdad. Among the 42,000 soldiers is the 205th brigade of the military secret service, and some of these men and women are stationed in Abu Ghraib. Other soldiers of the V Corps are currently building schools in central Iraq, or are on patrol there. The 130th pioneer brigade built bridges and reconstructed roads. Without the V Corps' protection, elections could not have taken place in Iraq.
Iraq would be better off if the US Army stayed a little while longer -- as opposed to post-War Weimar, which it quickly left. That would allow the virus of democracy to spread as long as possible and without intervention.
I wonder if the Germans, French, Belgians, et. al. realize the extent to which they are handing over their democracies to a bunch of Eurocrats who don't really seem to be accountable to anybody?
"The US also committed war crimes in World War II."
Coming from the Germans, this is quite the judgment. I guess they should know about WWII war crimes, eh? Ridiculous.
Also, I am a WW II history addict and I do not recall reading that Patton's troops killed Italian and German POWs in Sicily after they surrendered. Where did that come from?
I takes some cheek, I'd say.
What's surprising is that this is the second week in a row that Herr Malzahn has written a relatively pro-Bush / pro-USA article published in "Spiegel" and the second week in a row they translated it over to the English site.
"Spiegel" is a magazine similar to "Time" or "Newsweek", I would hazard as a comparison. I feel they tend to lean left, but do have some insights from the conservative side at times.
If you wish, read some of the comments on the other thread for some other insights about this article, and also look at the first post of the other thread. I have a link there to Herr Malzahn's great Reagan / Bush comparison from the week before. There are some comments there about "Spiegel" that you may find useful as well.
Thanks for the ping.
longjack
It appears that the Europeans are having some sort of internal catharsis. On the one hand, they are face to face with a positive changing reality from Bush's actions in the ME. These changes cannot be denied but on the other, they must be synthesized to accommodate the accusations of the Euro left.
So we see the insistence that war crimes were committed and that the war was folly and an outrage and a grudging admission that the obvious good that has come from it should be embraced and encouraged.
Give it a few months and the Euros will come to see themselves as having been in the trenches with us along.
The Claus Christian Malzahn article from the other day has again been translated into English at the "Spiegel-Online" English site.
"Spiegel-Online"....English site....George W. Bush's Infectious Virus
longjack
"The people of Iraq countered this horror with hope. This pairing -- war crimes with liberation -- is not completely new: When the 7th Army of U.S. General George Patton landed in Sicily in July 1943, his men killed 150 Italian soldiers and 50 Germans -- after they had already surrendered. It was a war crime, even at that time. "
No its not, there is a grey area in geneva conventions on this. But it is legal to execute any man aged15-55 captured on the battle field.
I wondered that myself the other day. Take a look at henkster's answer to me in post 28.
I think that Pattton gave a speech about prisoners being in the way of a rapid advance and some soldiers may have taken that as a license to do away with them, but even that's a stretch IMHO. The advance troops fight paticulatly bitterly, and there aren't too many who come out alive.
The guy who shot the wounded Iraqi who he thought reaching for a weapon, the one that was caught on tape, was considered by some as a war criminal, too, just to gather perspective.
Things did happen in Sicily, for sure. I think Ike had to tell reporters to swallow a story about Patton punching a shell-shocked kid (this occured after the glove or hand-slapping incident). An officer hitting a enlisted man is grounds for dismissal, but Patton was too valuable to Ike.
Any info you have about Patton in Sicily that you could send my way would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
longjack
'205th brigade of the military secret service' There is no such unit in the U.S. Army, take my word for it. There may be a 205th Military Intelligence Group(a group is the brigade-size designator in military intelligence), but there is no "secret service" in the U.S. military.
Mega dittos!
We should be willing to hear from the Germans about war crimes in, oh, about 4500 AD...
They defined the genre for all time, as far as I'm concerned.
'There is no such unit in the U.S. Army, take my word for it.'
Which is why I pointed it out. The author needed something to avoid the obvious; that the Iraq war has been a good deal for humanity. Excepting of course the inhumane portion of humanity that was killed.
it's considered in Europe to be a conservative German newspaper, and Germans, likely from the Americans feeding and giving resources to them directly after the war and protecting them through the Cold War, tend to view Americans nicer than some other Europeans, i.e. the French. British are sometimes supportive because they think a special relationship exists between the U.S. and the U.K.
Now the Germans are lecturing us on beer?
It's simply a mangled translation. It's like when you translate the proverb "out of sight -- out of mind" into a foreign language and then translate that back into english and it comes out as "invisible idiot." They are probably translating "intelligence" as "secret service" (as in those in the service who seek out secrets) and it came back as it is in the article.
They also noted that US personnel who commit 'war crimes' or even misdemeanors (duly noted by the author) like Abu-Gharb WILL BE PUNISHED by the US system and not swept under the rug as might (will) happen elsewhere.
Pretty good stuff, in this example although I dislike the larger trend that makes combat decisions appear to be crimes by stepping out of context.
My only fear is that this will escalate to such a frightening level of euro-remorse that France might surrender....to us.
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