Europe

How History Repeats Itself

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I apologize in advance for the blatantly political tone of this piece but I am flabbergasted by what I see happening on the eastern periphery of Europe and the anemic reaction to state on state aggression by the rest of the world.

I read this piece by Justin Logan from the Cato Institute this morning and was struck immediately on how similar in tone this piece is to the rhetoric of the pre-WWII America Firsters.  Is Estonia Worth a War?

I just ask myself are people so blind or so willing to seek peace at any cost that they will not stand up to tyranny until the cost of stopping it is orders of magnitude greater than if they had stood up for principle at the beginning?  The same kinds of arguments against involvement in WWII were made by isolationists in the US and appeasers abroad as Hitler’s Germany slowly re-armed and swallowed its neighbors in the years prior to WWII.

Largely the same process is in action in Russia today.  Whereas Germany felt slighted and unjustly treated after WWI modern Russia feels slighted and mistreated after the unsatisfactory (from their perspective) end to the Cold War.  It is interesting that roughly a generation passed between 1918 and 1939 and roughly a generation has passed between 1989 and 2014.  Russia was stripped of large swaths of territory in the wake of the fall of communism and Germany was stripped of territory, actually split into two separate blocks by the Danzig Corridor, in the wake of Versailles.  The German people felt they were not defeated, (hence the popularity of the stab in the back myth), while many Russians today feel that they were betrayed from within by Gorbachev and Co.  Hitler was an ideologue that fed on and amplified public perceptions of being unjustly handled by the Allies and Putin has done the same in Russia.  As Germany expanded it was only weakly opposed by the Allied powers and we are seeing the same sort of reaction in the West to Putin’s actions.

History seems to be repeating itself before our eyes as yet another European ideologue and dictator forges ahead towards war and an attempt to dominate its neighbors.  Is the West going to stand idly by and allow it to happen again until the cost of stopping it is immeasurably higher?  The stakes are higher this time around because Russia is a nuclear power.  The time to stop Putin and Russia is now and a serious demonstration of Western resolve would achieve without bloodshed what will costs thousands, if not millions of lives later on.

Has the West learned nothing from history other than that War is bad?  There are things worse than war, and if the Western leadership does not find their spine soon they will see what those things are.

 

When the Tigers Broke Free – Rape in World War Two

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I am afraid that the top side is not completely satisfied with my work… They are naturally disappointed that I failed to chase the Hun out of Italy but there was no military reason why I should have been able to do so. In fact there is no military reason for “Shingle”. – Major General John P. Lucas     The Royal Fusiliers Company C were not the only men sacrificed for the imbibing hereditary duke beyond the Cliffs of Dover. The Battle of Monte Cassino and its sub theaters were a great multicultural event. The last time so many nations had uplifted and hurled themselves at an object was … More after the Jump…

Similarities Between the 1920’s and Today?

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I am currently reading The Origins of the First World War (3rd Edition), during a pause in my reading I started thinking about not the origins of WWI but its results.  To say that the peace of Versailles was flawed is an understatement.  Given the unsettled economic situation of the Euro and the recently announced renunciation of deposit guarantees by the government of Cyprus I started to wonder if there are parallels between then and now despite the lack of a just concluded titanic war on the continent.  I think that the economics are similar, even to the extent of the various crises being self-inflicted wounds. There were many things wrong with the Treaty of Versailles but … More after the Jump…

The Moral Quandary?

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Lately I have been somewhat preoccupied thinking about the geostrategic position the US and even the wider Western world find themselves in.  While I do not believe that the world is on the cusp of some massive catastrophe, it does seem to me that the rise of Militant Islam in the last ten years presents problems that are new or that at least have not been faced on such a scale by Western countries since before the rise of the modern nation state. Essentially, I think that Islam is facing the West with a crucial choice, one the West would rather not have to make as it goes against all … More after the Jump…

Europe and Modern War

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Saw an interesting piece awhile ago on the South African Business Day website called: GIDEON RACHMAN: Threat of war seems unreal in an age of peace. The essential point is that although war seems to have been eradicated in Europe, don’t count it out if the Euro crisis gets as bad as it possibly can. I think it is naive in the extreme to think that because there has not been a major war in Europe for the past 65+ years that one cannot happen.   We should keep in mind that it was 49 years between the Congress of Vienna ending the Napoleonic Wars and the Prusso-Danish war of … More after the Jump…

Book Review: The Penguin History of Europe by J.M. Roberts

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I cannot remember why I bought The Penguin History of Europe by J.M. Roberts several years ago, no doubt it was as a resource for an undergrad paper I wrote although I cannot find it used as a cite in any of my papers. It is also possible that I bought it just because I though it looked interesting since my specialty is European history. This is not a bad book, but it is also not quite what the title makes it out to be. I think the best way I an categorize this book is that it presents an eclectic view of European history. It is very well written … More after the Jump…