WW2 politics, and leading up to the War and beyond...

[Chap]

Yeah, it seems realistic that Hitler and all his generals and functionaries were caught out like that—if your understanding of World War 2 amounts to sticking a few popular books onto the assumptions of a 21st century American civilian. The German General Staff were not civilians, however. They were expert professionals at logistics who were all on at least their second large war. They were all about anticipating and planning things like this. It was their job, and they were good at it, and there were a lot of them.

There is no chance at all that they didn’t know well in advance exactly how this would work out. And the problem with taking amateur historians seriously when they tell a seemingly plausible story isn’t that the amateurs will merely fail to put all the right umlauts in their footnotes. It’s that they’ll make ridiculous howling mistakes like this one.

How right you are. The German general staff was a fearsomely efficient and far-seeing organisation. The phrase about " sticking a few popular books onto the assumptions of a 21st century American civilian" is alas too optimistic. Reading books? Naah. We're talking podcasts and videos here.

Confucius is recorded as saying 'knowing that you do not know - that is wisdom'. If only Markk had the modesty to realise that, as things stand, he just does not know enough about WWII to have an opinion about it worthy of serious attention ...

[ceeboo]

Confucius is recorded as saying 'knowing that you do not know - that is wisdom'.

That's not what Confucius said.

"To know what you know and what you do not know, that is true knowledge" is what he has been credited with saying. If you need me to explain the significant difference between knowledge and wisdom, just ask and I will expend the time to explain it to you.

If only Markk had the modesty to realise that, as things stand, he just does not know enough about WWII to have an opinion about it worthy of serious attention ...

Wondering if you will have enough modesty to realize, as things stand, that you don't know enough about Confucius to have an opinion worthy of serious attention.

[Markk]

Cakes: I find the assignment of ‘temporary’ to be an interesting choice in your part - given the end result being the same - but I’m much more interested in what the ‘solution’ part of that phrase is all about. Can you explain that?

I've discussed it, and even linked a site for it....you are going to have to read the thread.

The context is once's again, per your question, is that the ghettos were a temporary solution was troubling to you....why? It is not a hard question. If it was not a temporary solution in your opinion, then it must be more than that...answer the question.

Cakes: I haven’t made that claim.

Your lightheadness may be returning. Unless you can link to me saying this. Please do, if so.

Lol, you wrote: "A ‘temporary solution’?

Here are some problems with this opinion, as I see it:"

Cakes: I’m trying to figure out what compelled you to enter the conversation on his behalf, defending him. What did Cooper allegedly say that you felt required defending?

Lol....Read your link in the OP.....did you read what you linked? You brought Cooper into the conversation.

And, I both criticized and defended some of his positions, and TC's.

Maybe the better question is why did you link something you did not read.

Cakes: I like how whenever people ask you to clarify what you’re saying, you blame them for not understanding you and then claim that they’re being sloppy or are wrong, usually about something that they never asserted. : D

I am asking you to back up what you said... you said you problems with the idea of a temporary solution, and you claimed that Cooper said the Holocaust was an accident, and that I defended him for saying that.

Please answer my questions so we can move on. I've asked you what 4 times?

Cakes: So, what compelled you to talk about temporary solutions? And what is it that Cooper said that you felt needed to be defended, against the liberal hordes at DM?

1. You question that you asked me twice and then Morley bumped for you.

2. Getting a bit sensitive here are we? I again, right or wrong, agreed with him that Germany was not prepared to take on Millions of POW,s, Political prisoners, and Jews, in the early stages of the war. I disagree with him about Churchill, while understanding what his point never the less was....looking at what he said being as objective as I can.

Please answer my questions.

[canpakes]

<word salad snipped>

My goodness. : D

Since you cannot remember what’s happening in the thread, I guess that I’ll need to remind you.

First, I think that this post by Morley is what compelled you to talk about ‘temporary solutions’:

What was the context in which Cooper, as a historian, said "killing all those Jews was a humanitarian act?"

Seriously?

In his Tucker Carlson interview, Cooper describes the Nazis as having “…gone in with no plan for [handling prisoners]… millions ended up dead there… we don’t have the food to feed these people… one of them actually says ‘Rather than wait for them all to slowly starve this winter, wouldn’t it be more humane to just finish them off quickly now?’ “

He presents this as the motivation behind resorting to gas chambers. Gassing the Jews was more humane than letting them starve.

That you buy this stuff is incredible, Markk.

You then brought in another source to try to prop up Cooper’s words.

Here read this....

The Germans began World War II by invading Poland in September 1939. The Nazi leaders then shifted priorities in anti-Jewish policy from expulsion from German-controlled territory to concentration of European Jewish populations in locations suited to future permanent removal. It is not clear that the Nazi leaders were already envisioning mass murder as their "solution" to their so-called Jewish problem.

As a temporary measure, while the top leadership considered long-term options, German authorities established ghettos in the General gouvernement (that part of German-occupied Poland not directly annexed to Germany, attached to German East Prussia or incorporated into the German-occupied Soviet Union) and in the District Wartheland, commonly called the Warthegau (an area of western Poland directly annexed to the German Reich). From late 1939, German SS and police authorities deported Polish, German, Austrian, and Czech Jews to these ghettos.

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/ ... %20ghettos.

Your additional commentary is captured in my response below:

In 1939 the Germans were clearly persecuting the Jews, but it was not until 1941 and 1942, did the Germans start mass exterminations. Until the camps were built, again over 1000, the Nazis kept the Jews in ghettos and worked and starved them to death for the most part, when they were not beating and shooting them.

Markk, can you explain why the Nazis “kept the Jews in ghettos and worked and starved them to death for the most part, when they were not beating and shooting them”… but then felt stressed when they rounded them up and couldn’t starve them fast enough while stuffed into concentration camps?

Do you believe Cooper’s claim?

The emphasis has never been on use of the word, ‘temporary’. That just ends up being a bridge word for you to try to defend Cooper. But you end up defending intent. The intent behind what the Nazis were doing, and their longstanding plan, is not morally buoyed to a higher plane by not having facilities in place to do it on Day 1 of the war. That’s your distraction.

Or, to simplify this another way: your quote from the Holocaust Encyclopedia site and your other sources do not support Cooper’s editorializing. Simply stating the obvious - that the Nazis hadn’t built enough camps in time to concentrate all of their killing into, therefore they needed to do it within forced ghetto confinement - does not support a statement that Nazi leadership was thinking, “… rather than wait for them all to slowly starve this winter, wouldn’t it be more humane to just finish them off quickly now?”

Hence my questions to you, which you’ve tried your best to evade, across a half-dozen posts:

1. Markk, can you explain why the Nazis “kept the Jews in ghettos and worked and starved them to death for the most part, when they were not beating and shooting them”… but then felt stressed when they rounded them up and couldn’t starve them fast enough while stuffed into concentration camps?

2. Do you believe Cooper’s claim?

The subject is Cooper’s statement regarding the supposed gracious humanitarian attitudes Nazis held about Jewish genocide. That’s what I’m asking about. You can either answer, or dodge again.

[Gadianton]

Polygamy isn't that bad when you take the full context into account. When Joseph Smith began cheating on his wife with Fanny Alger, he was totally unprepared for getting caught -- he had no plan. When suddenly, he was faced with circumstances he hadn't thought through, he quickly cobbled together a solution -- his options were limited. Polygamy was the fix. A lot of people imagine Joseph Smith architected polygamy out of pre-meditated desires to have sex with lots of women. Totally false. It was the outcome of bad planning.

[canpakes]

A lot of people imagine Joseph Smith architected polygamy out of pre-meditated desires to have sex with lots of women. Totally false. It was the outcome of bad planning.

Exactly. I mean, he even had to use the temporary facilities of his barn loft to get started. Poor Joeseph was probably thinking, “… rather than make Fanny and Emma wait to slowly be exposed to the idea of multiple wives, wouldn’t it be more humane to just start taking them quickly now?”

[Gadianton]

Yes, most certainly.

if/when you become aware of Cooper ever affirming that the holocaust happened, and using the actual word "holocaust", feel free to cite it.

do you support Israel's right to be a sovereign nation and defend as such from those that want another holocaust?

Sure.

What makes/defines a person as a historian?

I can give an answer, but this is a side issue anyway, not sure it's worth it.

I will say, in my opinion, it's possible to be a bona fide historian and also a Nazi apologist. I don't know of any but it's not an area I've studied. It's possible to be a historian and a Mormon apologist. But just because a Mormon apologist likes history, doesn't make them a historian. A Mormon apologist might become really popular with Mormons and have a YouTube channel with a lot of subs, but that doesn't make the person a historian, or an archaeologist, or a theologian.

You are going the Mormon apologist route every time you declare that all history is biased and who is to say who is qualified and who isn't, as everyone has their own biases? This is FAIR, FARMS, Interpreter in virtually every interaction with them.

As Dan likes to say, Mendel was neglected. Therefore, like Mendel's work, we have good reason to expect the limited geography theory to triumph one day and the Book of Mormon will find its place in archaeologist textbooks of the future. You think the same for Cooper, that if bona fide historians weren't so biased, they'd come to respect Cooper's position if not agree with him.

Well, Dan has one advantage. So far, you've been unable to provide an example of Cooper's contributions to history. What do you know about history, thanks to Cooper, that you never learned from all those real books you read? Dan knows about the LGT thanks to Sorenson.

Cooper is a pundit for the far right. He's looking at history and making moral judgements and weaving historical situations into current politics. When I compare MAGA to Nazis, that's basically the kind of thing Cooper is doing. I don't think of myself as a historian when I do that. You didn't realize Jim Jones was into the civil rights movement and mistakenly thought that historians generally don't know this, even though it's clear as day in paragraph two of the wiki article on him. Why it was insightful for you and seemed new, is that Cooper took the time to build Jim Jones into a case of guilt-by-association between cult leaders and liberals.

[huckelberry]

1. Markk, can you explain why the Nazis “kept the Jews in ghettos and worked and starved them to death for the most part, when they were not beating and shooting them”… but then felt stressed when they rounded them up and couldn’t starve them fast enough while stuffed into concentration camps?

2. Do you believe Cooper’s claim?

The subject is Cooper’s statement regarding the supposed gracious humanitarian attitudes Nazis held about Jewish genocide. That’s what I’m asking about. You can either answer, or dodge again.

All I see in this claim is that the Nazi plan to get rid of jews presented tactical difficulties and people found killing lots of Jews emotionally distressing.
Obviously true and obviously having nothing to do with humanitarian intentions.

This is a weird argument.

[Chap]

Confucius is recorded as saying 'knowing that you do not know - that is wisdom'.

That's not what Confucius said.

"To know what you know and what you do not know, that is true knowledge" is what he has been credited with saying. If you need me to explain the significant difference between knowledge and wisdom, just ask and I will expend the time to explain it to you.

If only Markk had the modesty to realise that, as things stand, he just does not know enough about WWII to have an opinion about it worthy of serious attention ...

Wondering if you will have enough modesty to realize, as things stand, that you don't know enough about Confucius to have an opinion worthy of serious attention.

I think the right word for me to use here is ''Lol'. You are proposing to conduct a discussion about the meaning of an ancient Chinese text in terms of the distinction between the English words 'wisdom' and 'true knowledge' as used in two different translations? My apologies in advance if you have in fact looked at the original text, but I suspect you have not.

My point remains, regardless of the translation chosen: Markk would be a wiser (or more intelligent, or more truly knowing - take your pick!) person by far if he took Confucius' advice, and realised that he should steer clear of discussions of a field where all he (thinks that) he knows is based on a few online videos and podcasts. Do you dispute that?

Oh, sorry. I forgot that you don't do discussions.

[Kishkumen]

Polygamy isn't that bad when you take the full context into account. When Joseph Smith began cheating on his wife with Fanny Alger, he was totally unprepared for getting caught -- he had no plan. When suddenly, he was faced with circumstances he hadn't thought through, he quickly cobbled together a solution -- his options were limited. Polygamy was the fix. A lot of people imagine Joseph Smith architected polygamy out of pre-meditated desires to have sex with lots of women. Totally false. It was the outcome of bad planning.

I can believe that.