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WHAT IS WAR?
In our conventional way of thinking, war is driven by motives
like the wish for conquest or territorial expansion, the defense of
boundaries, and the pursuit of national interests. Standard
historical accounts of the Second World War state that Hitler sought
"living space," that he dreamt of building a "vast German Empire
sprawling across Central and Eastern Europe," that his aim was to
"wage a war of conquest against the Soviet Union" and to make
Germany the "most powerful state in all of Europe." But careful
study of Hitler's speeches and writings show a startling pattern
that belies these interpretations: War was prompted by Hitler's
deeper wish for the annihilation of himself, his nation and the
German people.
Hitler stated: "We do not want to have any other God, only
Germany." He glorified warfare as an activity that required his
soldiers and people to sacrifice their lives in the name of the
object that they worshipped in common--their own nation. Writing
about the First World War (in which two million German soldiers were
killed), Hitler said: "When in the long war years Death snatched so
many dear comrades and friends from our ranks, it would have seemed
to me almost a sin to complain-after all, were they not dying for
Germany?"
Hitler asserted that "Any man who loves his people proves it
solely by the sacrifices which he is prepared to make for it." He
stated that National Socialism meant acting with a "boundless and
all embracing love for the people, and if necessary to die for it."
He proclaimed that giving one's life for the community constituted
the "crown of all sacrifice."
Tens of thousands of books have been written about Nazism,
the Holocaust and World War II. However few scholars take the
trouble to listen carefully to Hitler's words, which reveal what he
thought he was doing. Here is what Hitler said on September 1, 1939,
speaking before the Reichstag as German planes and troops crossed
the Polish borders in a devastating Blitzkrieg:
As a National Socialist and a German soldier, I enter upon
this fight with a stout heart! My whole life has been but one
continuous struggle for my people, and that whole struggle has
been inspired by one single conviction: Faith in my people! I ask
of every German what I myself am prepared to do at any moment: to
be ready to lay down his life for his people and for his country.
If anyone thinks that he can evade this national duty directly or
indirectly, he will perish.
In this passage, Hitler articulates his thinking about the
war that is about to begin and provides a preview of what is going
to occur. He asks every German to do what he was prepared to do (and
eventually did). Hitler goes on to say that if anyone thinks he can
"evade this national duty"--the obligation to lay down one's life
for his people and country--he will "perish." In short, Hitler
stated: Either die for Germany, or Germany will kill you.
To read Richard Koenigsberg's papers listed below,
PLEASE
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- AS THE SOLDIER DIES, SO DOES THE NATION COME ALIVE: The
Sacrificial Meaning of Warfare
- DYING FOR ONE'S COUNTRY: The Logic of War and Genocide
- THE LOGIC OF THE HOLOCAUST: Why the Nazi's Killed the Jews
- THE SACRIFICIAL MEANING OF THE HOLOCAUST
- AZTEC WARFARE, WESTERN WARFARE: The Soldier as Sacrificial
Victim
As the Second World War progressed with the invasion of
Russia, Joseph Goebbels, Hitler's Minister of Propaganda, noted with
satisfaction that "the German soldiers go into battle with devotion,
like congregations going into service." General von Runstedt
admonished the soldiers of World War II to emulate the example of
their brothers in the First World War: "The heroic death of a German
soldier is not something to be forgotten. Instead, it should inspire
everyone who remembers it to die in the same way, to be as strong,
unswerving and obedient, to go happily and as a matter of course to
his death."
Hitler declared war on September 1, 1939 by asking every German
to lay down his life for his people. World War II was the vehicle
through which Hitler acted out this sacrificial fantasy. While the
history books observe and portray the scene as quintessentially
aggressive, beneath the will to power was the will toward abject
submission. Hitler felt compelled to-and clearly did--ask his own
people to submit absolutely to the nation-state; to die for Germany.
War represents an activity in which the self is cast off in the
name of the collective. When Hitler proclaimed to the German people,
"You are nothing, your nation is everything," he meant it. Nazism
sought to obliterate individuality. As the nation was exalted to
become "everything," so were human beings degraded to become
"nothing."
To bring Hitler's ideology to fruition, everyone would have to
become a sacrificial victim. No one was exempt. Toward the end when
the war was lost, Germany could have surrendered; many German lives
could have been saved. But Hitler could not bear the idea that some
might escape the sacrificial obligation. He refused to abandon his
dream. His fantasy required total participation. The sacrificial
offering had to be complete.
Stephen Fritz, after studying the action on the Eastern front,
noted that German soldiers suspected of desertion were often
executed and left dangling from trees or poles with placards around
their necks. Sixteen-year-old Hans-Rudolf Vilter never forgot the
deserters hanging on lampposts and trees in Berlin in 1945, marked
with the sign proclaiming, "I hang here because I am too cowardly to
defend my fatherland."
Hitler refused to allow his people to acknowledge that the war
was lost. He continued to require that they "lay down their lives,"
thereby fulfilling his prophecy that one would either die in the
process of fighting for Germany, or perish. One soldier recalled
with bitterness the fall of 1944, when armed German officers gave
his unit no choice but to attack enemy lines. The other option was
clear: be shot by your own leaders. Units established special
formations whose instructions were to "make immediate use of their
weapons in order to enforce obedience and discipline." As Helmut
Altner wrote caustically, the soldiers' situation was devilishly
simple: "There were only two possibilities: Death by a bullet from
the enemy or by the 'thugs' of the SS." Thus did Hitler fulfill his
dream of war and enforce the sacrificial fantasy: Either die for
Germany, or be killed.
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