Tuesday, October 24, 2017

Book Review: Moral Combat: Good and Evil in World War II, by Michael Burleigh.

Synopsis: The Nazis were bad people who did bad things for bad reasons. The Soviets under Stalin were bad people who did bad things for one good reason. The Japanese did a lot of bad things, but since the legal definition of conspiracy is unfathomable, those things just happened – and some of them were good people who loved their families, so there's that. The Americans were good people who did good things but were too naive and unsophisticated to know why they did what they did. The British are good people who did good things for good reasons, except when they did bad things for good reasons, so those were good things too, really. The Italians changed sides so that 99% of the Fascists could escape punishment for the not so terribly bad things they did. The Croatian Ustashe are beneath notice, and while Polish and French resistance is remarkable, the Yugoslav Partisans turned out to be Commies, so there is no reason to acknowledge them.
Reinhold Neibuhr and Martin Niemöller can't hold a candle to CoE (Church of England) clergy when it comes to the theological implications of morality in wartime, so are justly ignored. Also, lawyers, and moral philosophers, the political “left,” the New York Times, and all other historians are ignorant. And you can tell whether someone is morally virtuous by their appearance and personal habits. Lastly, apparently there is no problem with using terms like “Apache-like” and Gypsy.
TL, DR: Hitler bad, Churchill good.

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