Resolved: Hitler deserved a nobel peace prize

Thanks to Balacafa for inviting me to debate this intriguing topic. I'll echo his sentiment that bias should not play a role in deciding this debate. I ask voters to assess this debate based on the substance we present, and not their preconceived notions. Let's be clear from the outset that we're talking about the real world with one caveat: that Hitler survived to the end of the war. His survival doesn't require anything beyond capture or surrender, though it necessarily requires that he not be immediately executed. Thus, the events of World War II proceeded exactly as we know them today. The events after World War II may be slightly altered due to his survival, but Pro will have to do quite a bit to justify any substantial butterfly effects. I may also expand on how this change affects history, if he chooses to pursue that route. Burdens: Pro carries a rather large burden in this debate. What we're discussing is an alternate history where the Norwegian Nobel Committee would award Adolf Hitler the Nobel Peace Prize. In other words, he's saying that Hitler committed acts aimed towards peace that rivaled other recipients of the time. Since he's arguing that a change to the basic facts of our history would have been warranted, it's entirely his burden to explain why history should have changed so dramatically. Only 96 Nobel Peace Prizes have been awarded over the years " that limited number clarifies that it's a rare honor that shouldn't be awarded flippantly. Nobel himself described the prizes as dedicated to "the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses". Determining who, if anyone, will receive the prize sets a very high threshold, one that should be considered in the awarding of any prize. That's why it's not awarded every year, particularly in relation to war time.[1] Hitler was actually nominated to receive the Prize in 1939 (one of those years where none was awarded). Not only was the nomination quickly withdrawn, but it was intended as a satiric criticism of Swedish parliament. No one supported it. Pro will have to explain how 6-11 years substantially altered that view in a positive direction. With that in mind, let's get into my case. 1) Hitler was a mass murdering f*ckhead I don't view this as debatable, but as this debate regards whether or not Hitler should have received an award that emphasizes peace, I feel it's worth supporting this point to explain just how ridiculous that view is. We can look to two separate and clear means by which Hitler is held responsible for mass death. The first of these is the Holocaust. It's estimated that anywhere between 15 and 20 million people were killed in the Holocaust, including more than 5 million Jews,[2, 3]. To be clear, the reason why the number of Jews matters (and, for that matter, why the killings of Romani peoples, the disabled, and homosexuals matters) is that these were attempts to eliminate these populations completely, to blot them out of existence. Thus, while the total numbers of lives lost tells a grim tale, the genocidal efforts of Nazi Germany tell an even grimmer one, as they were clearly attempting to eliminate whole peoples, religions and sexualities. However, while the numbers themselves do matter, we should be clear that simply quantifying the loss of human life doesn't tell the story well enough. A. Confiscation Those targeted during the Holocaust were deprived of any sense of ownership. This amounts to at least $8 billion worth of private property. People were deprived of businesses, and thus their livelihoods, essentially surrendering their entire independent economic existence. Even if they escaped from Germany, they paid a "Reich Flight Tax" that required them to pay substantially just to leave the country (this started at 25% of their entire wealth), making it that much more difficult to get started in any other nation. Much of these funds went to fund the very costly war effort (more on that later).[4] B. Imprisonment and Forced Labor Some 20,000 camps were built to imprison millions of people from 1933-1945. Ignoring the death camps (as that death toll has already been mentioned), these camps were built to relocate individuals who had been deprived of their belongings, including their housing. They were moved on incredibly crowded trains with little food or water to distant locations, placed in cramped confines, and forced to live under constant threat of murder at the hands of their oppressors. And that was just the beginning. Many of these people were forced to labor for the very military machine that was oppressing them, doing what they could to stave off death from exhaustion, starvation and exposure while engaging in backbreaking and dangerous labor.[5] In fact, during World War II, Germany was reliant on the weapons made in these camps, and thus used them to prolong the war effort. Prisoners were starved, beaten, deprived of water, and if the efforts of the Nazis didn't kill them, they were victims of terrible diseases that ravaged the camps.[6] C. Eugenics Remember when I mentioned genocide? Well, it went much deeper than just trying to kill whole swaths of people. The Nazis engaged in extremely painful and often deadly experiments on thousands, ignoring basic medical ethics for several purposes. One was to facilitate the survival of Axis military personnel, which were continued efforts to prolong the war effort and put the prisoners through hell, forcing them to undergo hypothermia and injected with sea water, as well as be subjected to liver or spinal cord punctures.[7, 8] Another was to produce new pharmaceuticals and treatment methods, which sounds noble, but it involved giving patients a broad assortment of infectious diseases and testing all manner of new treatments on them. Some prisoners would also be exposed to phosgene and mustard gas.[9] The third is more broadly known: the Nazis believed that there was an Aryan master race, and that anyone who had traits that didn't match to that race needed to be cleansed. In an effort to accomplish this, they exposed many to a wide variety of diseases to see how they responded, engaged in mass sterilization,[9] The Nazis were responsible for brutal efforts to try and change eye color, which blinded many.[10] What this all amounts to is dehumanization: people being treated as though they are plagues upon society. The Nazi regime saw the Jews as nothing but vermin. They were deprived of personal property because vermin don't own property, You can imprison them because they are only causing harm by scurrying around. If you put them to good use, then you're doing a public service. And, in the end, isn't it best just to eliminate them and ensure that no more vermin infest your cities? 2) World War II The war itself goes against the basic tenets on which the Prize was founded. It destroyed fraternity between nations, massively increased standing armies, and was quite literally the antithesis of a peace conference. On every level, a world war functions against the basic idea of peace. And Hitler was responsible for starting and perpetuating it. War broke out as a result of Germany's invasion of Poland, a clear violation of the latter's sovereignty. While the causes of the war are indeed complex, it cannot be reasonably argued that the war would not have begun without this invasion, or the prior efforts on Germany's part to acquire the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia and, for that matter, the rest of Czechoslovakia. Even that invasion didn't bring action from any neighboring countries, which means that Hitler had opportunities to stop and simply live with his gains. He chose not to, and defied a promise from Britain and France that invading Poland would bring military action.[11] Further efforts to expand the war effort through treaties with Japan to expand their war effort and to ally themselves with a nation that had already carried out a brutal attack on Manchuria made it clear that Hitler was more interested in expanding the war effort than contracting it.[12] Allying with other nations like Austria and Italy expanded on the problem. I've already pointed to multiple efforts to prolong the war effort through forced labor and medical testing, which further that point. While Hitler may not be held responsible for every life lost, these actions show a distinct predilection for starting, continuing and expanding the war, and thus many of the 80 million deaths can be attributed to him. At the very least, the costs to his own people and those nations that he directly invaded and battled with (which include at least England, France, Czechosolvakia, Poland, the USSR, and Belgium), he's at least partially responsible for roughly 40,000,000 deaths.[13] The death toll, as well as the general increase in instability and turn towards militarization, make Hitler's efforts a clear negative for peace. Conclusion: There's a reason that Godwin's Law exists: Hitler comparisons are extreme. While often frivolous, comparing someone to Hitler is meant to highlight support for genocide, eugenics, racial purity and totalitarian regimes. That's who Hitler was. That's what he stood for and supported, explicitly.[14, 15] That's who Pro thinks deserved the Prize. Don't bring shame to the Prize and its recipients by siding with the view that Hitler should have received it. With that, I hand the debate back over to Pro. 1. http://bit.ly... 2. http://nyti.ms... 3. http://bit.ly... 4. http://bit.ly... 5. http://bit.ly... 6. http://bit.ly... 7. http://bit.ly... 8. http://bit.ly... 9. http://bit.ly... 10. http://bit.ly... 11. http://bit.ly... 12. http://bit.ly... 13. http://bit.ly... 14. http://bit.ly... 15. http://bit.ly...