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Lessons from the Sudetenland - by Benjamin Netanyahu
Khouse.org ^

Posted on 02/20/2009 6:11:30 AM PST by Scythian

Their Strategic Barrier

Czechoslovakia was strategically placed in the heart of Europe, and its conquest was central to Hitler's plans for overrunning Europe. Though small, Czechoslovakia could field over 800,000 men (one of the strongest armies in Europe), and it had a highly efficient arms industry.

To complicate matters from Hitler's point of view, it possessed a formidable physical barrier to his designs in the shape of the Sudeten mountains, which bordered Germany and guarded the access to the Czech heartland and the capital city of Prague only miles away.

A system of fortifications and fortresses had been built in the mountains over many years, making passage by force a very costly proposition, perhaps even impossible. We now know from the Nuremberg trials and other sources that Hitler's generals were utterly opposed to an assault on the Czech fortifications.

Worse from Hitler's point of view, the Western powers had promised at Versailles to guarantee the Czech border against any aggressive attack. France, which in 1938 could field one hundred divisions (an army 50% larger than Germany's), had agreed in writing to come to the Czech's defense, and Britain and Russia were committed to joining in if France did so.

See how it ends HERE


TOPICS: Front Page News; Israel; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: netanyahu; sudetenland
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1 posted on 02/20/2009 6:11:30 AM PST by Scythian
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To: Scythian

He gets it...


2 posted on 02/20/2009 6:15:13 AM PST by 2banana (My common ground with terrorists - they want to die for islam and we want to kill them)
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To: Scythian

The comeback yid.


3 posted on 02/20/2009 6:16:31 AM PST by duckman (Jesus I trust in You. Mary take over)
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To: Scythian

Those who would trade land for peace will get neither. (apologies to Ben Franklin).


4 posted on 02/20/2009 6:17:40 AM PST by Izzy Dunne (Hello, I'm a TAGLINE virus. Please help me spread by copying me into YOUR tag line.)
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To: 2banana
He sure does ...

Thus the plight of the German minority in Czechoslovakia was merely a pretext ... for cooking up a stew in a land he coveted, undermining it, confusing and misleading its friends and concealing his real purpose ... to destroy the Czechoslovak state and grab its territories .... The leaders of France and Great Britain did not grasp this. All through the spring and summer, indeed almost to the end, Prime Minister Chamberlain and Premier Daladier apparently sincerely believed, along with most of the rest of the world, that all Hitler wanted was justice for his kinsfolk in Czechoslovakia.
5 posted on 02/20/2009 6:22:05 AM PST by Scythian
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To: Scythian

Churchill wrote about how he tried and tried to warn everyone about this in “The Gathering Storm.”

Nobody listened...


6 posted on 02/20/2009 6:25:05 AM PST by Sir Francis Dashwood (Arjuna, why have you have dropped your bow???)
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To: Scythian

An interesting historical note: the first German speaking university was in Czechoslovakia.


7 posted on 02/20/2009 6:27:34 AM PST by Eric in the Ozarks
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To: Scythian

I am just reading ‘Tomorrow
Will Be Better’. A personal account of a family living through the German invasion and occupation of Czechoslovakia. It is gripping reading. She writes about the phoney, made-up issue of the Germans in Czech.

One of the many personal accounts of living under the tyranny of the Germans and then the Soviets.

Published by some small company. One of the many riveting stories of those years which the mainstream publishers and Hollywood utterly ignore.


8 posted on 02/20/2009 6:32:03 AM PST by squarebarb
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To: 2banana

He’s what Israel needs at this point in time — somebody who knows what is needed, and is able to articulate it well.


9 posted on 02/20/2009 6:49:39 AM PST by PapaBear3625 (The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money -- Thatcher)
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To: Scythian

Our (UK/French) failure to come to Czechoslovakia’s defense was shameful. But it seemed so damn sensible at the time - why go to war to defend Sudetenland-Germans who wanted to be invaded? Why repeat the horrors of WWI for an effectless border?

Anyway, we were wrong. Stick by treaties, or it is “blood, blood and again blood”.


10 posted on 02/20/2009 7:20:24 AM PST by agere_contra (So ... where's the birth certificate?)
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To: Scythian
Thus the plight of the German minority in Czechoslovakia was merely a pretext

Of course Hitler didn't give a rat's hiney about the SD Germans.

That doesn't change the fact that you can make a darn good case that the SD Germans were screwed over thoroughly by the Versailles Treaty. They had been part of German (Holy Roman Empire) or at least multi-ethnic but dominated by Germans (Austrian and then Austro-Hungarian) empires for over a thousand years.

Suddenly they are removed from the German state and incorporated into a Slavic-dominated state purely for reasons of geography, not the self-determination proclaimed in Wilson's 14 Points.

IOW, the Czechs have a right to self-determination regardless of how it will affect the Viennese, but the SD Germans have no such right if it makes life difficult for the Czechs.

They had fully legitimate beefs.

11 posted on 02/20/2009 7:32:58 AM PST by Sherman Logan (Everyone has a right to his own opinion, but not to his own facts.)
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To: Scythian
My father was part of that Czech army. He has often told us how they were ready to fight to defend their nation, and how they were betrayed by their allies. I've recently seen the remnants of some of the fortifications from WWII, which are in amazingly good shape after all these years. Bunkers are sprinkled around the countryside in the middle of farmers' fields.

During the Nazi occupation, my father was arrested by the Gestapo. His university was being closed down, and students rounded up and taken to a concentration camp. He was fortunate to be released - one of a handful. Apparently the Gestapo initially rounded up more Czechs than they could accommodate, and some were released. In Dad's case, it was because he was under the age of 20. He has never fully recovered from the emotional trauma. He and mom escaped in 1950, after the communist coup. They started over in America in freedom. My brother and I have been blessed with freedom, but for many years, had very little contact with our family left behind the iron curtain.

My maternal grandfather was a wealthy man before the war, owning a lumber mill and a resort on a nearby lake. He started with nothing, deciding to go into business for himself when his widowed mother couldn't afford higher education for him after WWI. The Nazis seized his business for the war effort, and the communists seized his resort, lands and home. In his 60's he was digging ditches and my uncle forced to mine uranium. My cousins were denied university admission because of Grandfather's business success. Our family was deemed an enemy of the state.

This is the price of appeasement - illustrated by just one family.

I fear for Israel, and I fear for our great nation. We live in very troubled times.

12 posted on 02/20/2009 7:56:45 AM PST by Think free or die
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To: Scythian

He's a smart guy. He knows how to deal with threats.

If Bibi owned a search engine...


13 posted on 02/20/2009 8:09:57 AM PST by G8 Diplomat (Kafira Amrikiyyah!)
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To: dennisw; Cachelot; Nix 2; veronica; Catspaw; knighthawk; Alouette; Optimist; weikel; Lent; GregB; ..
Middle East and terrorism, occasional political and Jewish issues Ping List. High Volume

If you'd like to be on or off, please FR mail me.

..................

14 posted on 02/20/2009 8:24:29 AM PST by SJackson (a tax cut is non-targetedÂ…no guaranteeÂ…theyÂ’re free to invest anywhere that they want, J Kerry)
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To: Think free or die
Very interesting, and as the article says:

A system of fortifications and fortresses had been built in the mountains over many years, making passage by force a very costly proposition, perhaps even impossible. We now know from the Nuremberg trials and other sources that Hitler's generals were utterly opposed to an assault on the Czech fortifications

Your father would have kicked the Germans @#$#
15 posted on 02/20/2009 8:54:28 AM PST by Scythian
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To: G8 Diplomat

Brillian !!


16 posted on 02/20/2009 9:02:37 AM PST by Scythian
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To: Scythian
When Hitler finally moved into Czechoslovakia in March 1939 the real crown jewel he obtained was the Skoda Works-probably the largest arms manufacturer in Europe at the time.
Some historians are mystified by Hitler's treatment of the Czechs because compared to other countries Germany overran he treated the Czechs rather well.
17 posted on 02/20/2009 9:39:33 AM PST by Larry381 ("in the final instance civilization is always saved by a platoon of soldiers" Oswald Spengler)
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To: agere_contra
"Our (UK/French) failure to come to Czechoslovakia’s defense was shameful."

A lot of Europe is making the same mistake right now with the Israeli/Palistinean question. I only fear that this time, America may join in the folly.
18 posted on 02/20/2009 9:51:57 AM PST by Old Teufel Hunden (I)
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To: Sir Francis Dashwood

One of the reasons the Anointed One wanted Churchill’s bust removed from the White House — his views were antithetical to Saul Alinsky’s or William Ayer’s.


19 posted on 02/20/2009 10:03:24 AM PST by Dionysius (Jingoism is no vice in these troubled times.)
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To: Scythian
"Your father would have kicked the Germans @#$# "

He was sure ready to give it his best. He was active in the resistance instead. Firearms were banned, of course, but he had one for most of the war. One night he was in particular fear of arrest and hid it in a barn. Unfortunately, by the time he dared look for it, it was gone. When he came to America, he and mom barely had two nickels to rub together. Nonetheless, his first "luxury" purchase was a rifle. He cherishes his 2nd Amendment rights to this day. Dad is 88 now, but he still hunts deer and turkey.

20 posted on 02/20/2009 10:19:12 AM PST by Think free or die
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