So about the Nazis. I learned yesterday that there is indeed a militia neo nazi force with a political party inside of Ukraine who joined the Ukrainian army to fight off the Russians due to their annexation of Crimea. This party gained like 2% of the vote and is a foot note in Ukrainian population, however this is what Putin used for his nazi story as many Russians are killed in the contested Donbas area while the president of Ukraine suppressed Russian culture there.I don't often disagree but I will on the statement regarding Germany being pushed into WWII. It's one school of history that is increasingly disputed by more thorough research that showed Germans reparations were never actually particularly painful and were rarely paid. They were a trope for right wing nationalists that never accepted defeat in the first place. Payments themselves did not cause economic injury, the German economy was growing and with the exception of impacts due to the Great Depression it was decent growth and very little money was actually paid. Immediately after the fall of the German state the Prussian military leaders were organizing and conspiring to reorganize and prepare for the next war. This included a series of agreements with the USSR on aircraft development, pilot training, tank training, tank development, etc. Keeping armies in Lithuania and Latvia, sending new young officers the units to get combat experience. Germany stalled on payments for years, were forced into them by France occupying the Ruhr, and even then international banks worked to help germans with an unheard of 60 year payment process whereby the payments were a few percent of GDP. The German military, from the very end of WWI, actively worked to subvert the democratically elected government whom they blamed for the loss. Leaders moved into and out of nationalistic parties and into and out of the military. One concern the military did have was the rise of any rival organization and thus the Nazi leadership role in gutting their own armed wing to curry favor with the military.
More controversial is the role of the early armistice on the development of the next war. Germany did not suffer in WWI to the extent of France or Netherlands or Belgium. Physical infrastructure was virtually untouched except from digging up the water systems to melt lead pipes for bullets. Some historians consider that to have been the ultimate cause of WWI. If Germany had been truly occupied, crushed, as was done in WWII then you would likely never have seen the rise of the Nazi party (and other right wing parties) which was always implicitly supported by the German military, a military that railed against the democratically elected government. If the military leaders had been jailed for the war crimes they committed in WWI would you have had a WWII?
In any case, the German army leadership felt it had not been defeated at the end of the war but rather, not supported by the democratically elected government. They were planning the next war just as they planned the first (German preparations for WWI are a fascinating subject and despite the deliberate destruction of original source material it is still a good detective story). Even to the extent of cooperating with their enemy (communist govts) to develop technology and strategy, another fascinating read. German right wing (army thrown in there) were preparing for the next war as soon as the ink was dry. The payments were just a trope.
Beware any such messaging from Putin. This conflict is 100% on Putin. Ukraine was invaded. There are no Fascist (except for Russian ones). This was never about a few offshore oil platforms. There are no nuke weapons development programs (ok maybe they are? Good on Ukraine if so). Russia had no casus belli so they, as with most dictatorships have to invent one. Putin tried to invent several.
Lots of lessons here for the Ukraine conflict. Have the Ukrainians kill Russians (not NATO, no no fly zone- don't provide material to right wing russians to make excuses for their own failures). Don't make peace quickly. Take back Crimea. Don't let reparations for property damage be a long simmering boil to be used by Putin to further radicalize. Just take all the assets of Russia held overseas (Oligarchs too). Hold military leadership fully accountable. War crimes are being committed, the generals and other officers need to be held accountable. At this point, it would be hard to find a field commander whose forces had not committed war crimes. Every war may have civilian casualties. Firing rockets and artillery into residential apartments from 10 miles away is designed to cause terror, not harm the enemy. The Russian army leadership must be held accountable.
If the Ukrainians are fully committed let this bleed Russia dry. The longer it continues, the greater the local resistance, the refugee camps become your recruitment ground, weapons are provided the border is over 1000 miles long in terrain familiar to and useful for insurgency. Bleed them until Russia asks for help.
Very informative video here.
