From: josip@src.umd.edu (Josip Loncaric)
Subject: Re: Nazi camps
Organization: Systems Research Center, Maryversity of Uniland, College Park
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 00:48:05 GMT

In article <1992Aug25.180513.1357@cbnewsl.cb.att.com> saal@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (samuel.saal) writes:
>In article <1992Aug25.171215.13718@src.umd.edu> josip@src.umd.edu
>(Josip Loncaric) writes:
>
>>In article <66791@hydra.gatech.EDU> gt6390a@prism.gatech.EDU
>>(BERNSTEIN,AVRON P) writes:
>
>>>....  What many people
>>>seem to either ignore or be simply ignorant about is just how many Poles were
>>>exterminated by the Nazis as well.  
>
>>  On August 22, 1939, [Adolf Hitler] allegedly announced to his generals:
>
>quote describing Genghis Kahn's legacy , deleted.
                  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^and Hitler's orders to kill Poles
>
>>This threat had eventually caused an enormous death toll among Poles,
>>which simply cannot be ignored in any historical analysis.
>
>What I find most amazing about this sort of Polish apologetic is that
                                             ?????????????????
>it makes the Poles look worse than had they just admited that the Jews
>were the Nazis' target.  By saying Poles were the intended victim, they
                                               ^^^ "an"
Just because the Jews were the Nazi's primary target does not mean that
nobody else was.  Do you disagree?

>portray themselves as evil+stupid because of their collaboration in the
>Nazi's antisemitism while they themselves were allegedly getting
>victimized. In an ironic sort of way, it makes their victimization
>appear as a divine punishment.

Would you please care to clarify this?  I'm not an expert on what
happened in Poland in WWII...  but I do know that the death toll
among Poles was enormous...  and that Hitler's campaign (starting in 1939)
was directed not only against Jewish but also against Slavic population
as well...  My encyclopedia says Poland lost 5,420,000 people in WWII,
including Polish Jews, Poles and others...  full 5,300,000 of these were
civilian casualties.

(While we are at this, my encyclopedia says the USSR lost 20,000,000 people 
in WWII -- this figure includes 7,000,000 civilian casualties.)

Hitler's obsession with "a Jewish-Bolshevik conspiracy" and his understanding
of history in terms of "a Social-Darwinist struggle of races" had created
the conditions for and found an expression in this mass murder.  Clearly,
all those who participated are guilty, but Hitler's rampage was not
restricted to the Jews alone.  Indeed, mass murder had started in the East,
and "Vernichtungskrieg" (unconventional war of destruction) directed
against Russia was to be "a clash of ideologies and races, not of 
nation-states."  So, Hitler's campaign for "Lebensraum" in the East has
a lot to do with the genesis of the "Final Solution" and the fate of
the European Jews.  Anti-Semitism was clearly a huge factor in this,
but do not forget the context: mass murder of the Jews is deeply
linked to Hitler's search for "Lebensraum" in the East and his campaign
of terror against Slavic populations he found in his way, including Poles.

This is how much I know.  What am I missing here?

>-- 
>Sam Saal      kingfish!saal OR saal@kingfish.att.com
>		Note new machine name
>	Vayiftach HaShem et Peah Ha`Aton

Josip

Newsgroups: soc.culture.jewish