[Shasown]

Originally Posted by calyman

It's a well documented fact of history that Churchill was a lone voice warning about the danger of the rise of the nazis, it's clear that the Allies had the resources to stop Hitler until he began rebuilding Germany's armaments, after seizing the Rhineland, indefiance of the versailles treaty, that itself was sufficient reason for the allies to take effective action when they could.

Hitler also fed the Germans, the lie that the previous war's Government had given victory to the allies, he fuelled hatred of Jews, eastern europeans, Homosexuals, the disabled and Romany peoples.

Working class people have never had power in Government, have never decided national policy in respect of Government, had no say in deciding what to do about the bazis, though many working class people did fught for the Republican forces in Spain, this was not sanctioned by the British Government.

It was the British ruling classes who denied Jewish immigrants entry to Britain, fleeing from Nazi persecution, the ruling classes who allowed Hitler's rise unopposed, the ruling classes who by their inaction and tacit support of nazism, who are ultimately responsible, along with the nazis; for the slaughter of disabled, Jewish, Homosexual and other minorities in Germany. Also responsible for the countless deaths of young British soldiers in a conflict that need never have happened.

Lots of good facts there too, but again you are missing the point that Ben was probably trying to make.

Why did Hitler rise to power? Because of the state of Germany after World War 1. We pretty much imposed the Versaille Treaty on them and let them get on with it. If instead of punitive measures against Germany we had actually helped rebuild the country and assist them through the Depression,(like we did in the late 40's and 50's) Germany wouldnt have been such an easy country to take over for the Nazi Party.

Although he stated Britiains Foreign Policy was flawed towards Gemany through the 1930's, it was flawed far earlier than that. It was flawed from the turn of the century, and didnt change until the end of the Second World War. In the 1900's and 1910's Germany was jealous of the Empires of other countries and tried to build her own, this is what lead to the First World War.


Following their defeat in WW1 they had to make reparations and comply with certain requirements which made the proud old germans lose their national pride, along comes Hitler with his ideas of Germany being equal to any of the worlds powers, and people to blame for the German Defeat, a bit of attitude like why cant we have an army to defend ourselves, lets build one.

Of course people were going to follow him. If our foreign policy had been different after WW1 we could have possibly prevented his rise to power.