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This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1427857
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1427857
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First.
No argument from an American perspective.
I will point out that the time between Munich and the invasion of Poland gave the British time to rearm and otherwise prepare.
IMHO, if the war in Europe had begun in 1938 the Brits would have lost.
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“America First” is fascist shorthand for “Me FIrst.”
They aren’t fooling anyone anymore.
It is personal greed, not national pride they really embody.
“They” use “Us” (America) like we are chattel and claim patriotism by it because they sign a paycheck with wealth those abused workers created.
If FOX hadn’t infected so many middle class members with manufactured social outrage, their own benefits would matter more to them and they wouldn’t support their own abusers.
But here we are.
The “America First” fascists have a new label that identifies them down to the man and woman.
“Trump Republicans.”
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“If” is for speculation and fiction.
So many “ifs”,
If only.
But your point is certainly valid, and food for thought.
Makes one wonder sometimes if Dystopia is always but a moment away.
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There had been a lot of opposition to Britain rearming, and not just among the uppa class Fascist- curious set.
And there was a mind-boggling amount of staff work involved in having civilian safety things like evacuating school children ready to roll. Air raid precautions. Food rationing. Developing Spitfires.
All that.
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On Facebook I have engaged in argument with self-avowed “leftists” (and in many ways they are) about Russia and Ukraine. Chomsky (as they interpret him), Greenwald, and Assange are chief among their gurus. Their sources of daily news are RT and many online sites I have never heard of. Just about everything wrong in the world is entirely the fault of the U.S., but these days their obsession is with Ukraine and NATO: Russia is merely responding to NATO expansionism, rescuing Ukraine from its fascist leaders, and trying to restore Ukraine to its rightful status as part of Russia. Often their views – and not just on Ukraine – align with Trump’s and the crazy Right’s, which (when I point that out) gives them no pause.
History rhymes. My mother was a grad student at NYU in the late '30’s and early '40’s, at the time a Republican but liberal and anti-isolationist. She was friendly with many leftists – in fact, with active members of the CP. While debating my FB friends in recent months, I have often thought of my mother’s descriptions of her arguments with her CP friends and acquaintances. This excellent essay helps me understand why.
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America First was mainly a white-nationalist movement in the runup to WWII and it certainly still is now but it seems the horseshoe theory is operative and the Left now meets the Right in full circle at the extremes.
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I am startled to see the author of The Wages of Destruction holding such an idiotic view now.
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Thanks for this excellent piece.
America’s war against the Fascist conquest of Europe in WWII is discussed often in context of this year’s Russian invasion of Ukraine - a term I prefer to “conflict” or “war” because it emphasizes the uneven balance of power and defines who the aggressor is. When reading criticisms of Ukraine, I often think about our own imperfections. Just yesterday, Kevin McCarthy publicly vowed revenge for the FBI and Justice Department’s legitimate investigation of Trump’s holding on to classified records in a place with questionable security.
But I also think about how we won a war that freed millions from Nazi oppression, occupation, and death. We won it with a segregated army, alongside a fading British empire that massacred Indian protestors fighting for their own independence, and also alongside Stalin, a brutal dictator and mass murderer (including of Ukrainians.)
I’m glad we made that difficult alliance. It was the imperfect but right thing to do. Millions around the world owe their lives to our victory. Many people in America - like Lindbergh - opposed our fight because they were on the side of Fascism. It’s not too different today.
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The rise of trump and trumpism made clear the power of propaganda. Fox New, Rush Limbaugh, Alex Jones and many others have been developing a loyal following for decades. Those who listened to Limbaugh’s radio show many years ago found his brand of racism “humorous”. The tropes became well-known and self-evident facts. And the vitriol slowly increased over the years. It seemed to explode in the run-up to the 2016 election. It was obvious that bots were flooding online comment forums. It worked. It all worked as intended.
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FDR is the greatest world conqueror of all time. The question is, given that FDR never wanted to be a world conqueror, what made him do it. My answer is the atomic bomb.
So while there is some discussion if in fact Hitler would have given time developed the atomic bomb, some say he dismissed it as “Jewish physics”, as far as FDR knew, Hitler was developing the atomic bomb.
That is FDR had an engineering background and had read the textbooks of the 1920s that fully laid out the atomic theory. That is developing an atomic bomb in the 1930s was like developing a “Star Wars defense” today in that the theory is there, the technology to exploit that theory is in view but the expense is exorbitant.
Furthermore, no sane person or nation wanted such technology. Enter Nazi Germany and Adolph Hitler. The thought of Hitler having the atomic bomb, and only Hitler having the atomic bomb, scared the peace out of “all we have to fear is fear itself” FDR.
Not only did FDR stop a madman but FDR also achieve world conquest for America unheard of by the likes of Julius Caesar and Genghis Khan, he it did while expending a minimum amount of his own nations blood, 400,000 dead compared with 22,000,000 Soviets, FDR made no major military mistakes.
But FDR’s biggest accomplishment as the greatest world conqueror of all time is that his conquest goes unnoticed by historians or commentators. That is the last thing people think about when they think about FDR is great world conqueror but above all else that is exactly what FDR is, the greatest world conqueror of all time. Perhaps that is because the last thing FDR wanted to be, or remembered for being, is the greatest world conqueror of all time.
FDR wanted to above all else be remembered for what he did for regular people, especially Americans. So with that I leave with what FDR is and most wanted to be remembered for, not as a world conqueror but for the quotes below:
“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
“The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little."
“This is preeminently the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly.”
“In these days of difficulty, we Americans must and shall choose the path of social justice… the path of faith, the path of hope and the path of love toward our fellow man.”
“Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.”
“A radical is a man with both feet firmly planted—in the air. A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs, who, however, has never learned to walk forward. A reactionary is a somnambulist walking backwards. A liberal is a man who uses his legs and hands at the behest of his head.”
“Men and nature must work hand in hand. The throwing out of balance of the resources of nature throws out of balance also the lives of men.”
“Among American citizens, there should be no forgotten men and no forgotten races.”
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Are you an America Frister?
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Me, too. Although I think “idiotic” might be a bit too kind:
In adopting it, Tooze says, the U.S. was “crossing the point of no return” and “unleashing . . . an apocalyptic world war.”
Perhaps Mr. Tooze is suffering from dementia foxnewsi.
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My dad was certain FDR walked on water and didn’t need crutches. Ninety years after the beginning of his legacy the rethugs still want to destroy it.
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Aye they hate it still, even more than before if possible; e.g.,
The right-wing fringe groups that attached to the GOP after World War II had their disagreements – as with the National Review people and Ayn Rand – but they also found plenty of common ground. It is almost charming to read Walter Olson on R.J. Rushdoony and his Reconstructionist loons, and how they – unaccountably, to Olson – “gained prominence in libertarian causes, ranging from hard-money economics to the defense of home schooling.” Read Max Blumenthal on the subject and you’ll see that the relationship of libertarians, Christian fundamentalists, Birchers, and other radicals was less contentious than synthetic. Think of Steve Forbes and Richard Viguerie – for that matter, think of Rudy Giuliani and Pat Robertson.
These guys can always work together, because they all came out of the same Big Bang of hatred for the New Deal and its legacy: Big Government and the coalition that sustains it -- blacks, gays, unionized workers, women, et alia. ...
– roy edroso (alicublog)
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Maybe he shares the Russian sympathies of his grandfather Arthur Wynn, a British communist also known as the KGB’s “Agent Scott.”
The photo caption is a bit misleading. The image is of Lindbergh and his wife Anne meeting with Hermann Göring, WWI ace and Blue Max recipient, Commander of the Luftwaffe, and during WWII, the highest ranking member of the German armed forces and second in command of the Third Reich.
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I’ve often heard Trump supporters described as “America Fisters”.
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Britain started rearming in the mid-30’s, with the Stanley govt, long before Churchill came to power.
Churchill was on the sidelines demanding that everything be done at once and no idea (and no interest in) how to pay for any of it.