mike weber <fairport...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> > Ummm, didn't he pretty much stand back and allow the
> > European Powers to impose draconian terms onm
> > Germany at the end of WW1 which, at least in part,
> > contributed to the rise of the Nazis and WW2?
David Friedman
> That's a widely accepted interpretation, coming mainly
> out of Keynes' _The Economic Consequences of the
> Peace_.
>
> I was recently looking at the beginning of a book
> arguing that Keynes was wrong. I didn't get far enough
> to form an opinion on whether it was correct, but if
> you are curious, it's:
>
> =C9tienne Mantoux, _The Carthaginian Peace: Or the
> Economic Consequences of Mr Keynes_
I independently researched the matter, without being
aware of this book. I found that the Versailles
reparations were entirely insignificant, compared to
the economic costs the Germans inflicted on themselves
in the course of resisting it - for example paying
people to not work, paying people to sabotage their own
economy. Indeed, Hitler quite correctly pointed this
out, in the course of arguing that instead of economic
threats, Germans needed to use threats of violence.
The ruin suffered by Germany was a result of them
accurately perceiving weakness of will and self doubt
among the allies, much like the ruin today suffered by
the Palestinians, and Keynes's book was a major cause
and manifestation of this weakness of will and self
doubt. The successful push of the Germans against this
weakness progressively escalated, Nazism, like Hamas,
being a manifestation of this success.
Palestinian terror has been highly profitable, as Europe
and America seek to outbid each other in paying off the
terrorists. So the PLO escalate their demands, and
Hamas demands its share of the gravy. In order to get
their share of the gravy, Hamas has to prove they are
even crazier than the PLO.
The lesson we should have learned from World War II is
not only no appeasement, but that early appeasement
leads to increasingly intolerable demands and the rise
of increasingly extreme factions - that the temptation
to appeasement must be resisted when the demands are
cheap, arguably reasonable and morally justified, and
the threats modest, for yielding will lead to escalating
demands and escalating threats, will lead to the rise of
factions that are ever crazier, since craziness is
working.
We should have responded to German resistance by
substantially escalating Versailles, rather that making
concessions. This would have prevented the rise of
Hitler. Since confrontation was working, Germans
figured they should elect the most confrontational
politician of them all, and at first it worked great. Of
course, it worked at a very great risk of renewing World
War I, as Hitler and the Nazis well knew, but the Nazis
of course de-emphasized this risk, and when they told
the truth to the voters, as they sometimes did, seems
that no one listened anyway. Indeed Hitler had a long
history of speaking the truth, and not being believed.
He would tell the plain truth, then he would imply a lie
that people wanted to believe, and people would believe
the lie, and forget the truth. Again, observe the
similarity with Hamas and the PLO, both of which have
told us often enough that a two state solution is only a
step towards the total destruction of Israel - and
Hamas has from time to time told us that Tel Aviv is
only a first step towards Rome.
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