In what cases, historically...

[SEVERUSMAX]

....would you have been a conscientious objector.

Having hopefully resolved any issues and debate or acrimony arising from side issues from the abstract question that I raised in the Hypocrisy thread...I was thinking of a different issue...for those of us who are not generally pacifists....what wars would you have opposed and why?

In my case:

If I were German, WW2. I could not have backed Hitler, although I would not have condemned the regular soldiers of the Wehrmacht themselves. And I would have probably gone underground to subvert Hitler, not considering it treason but my duty to overthrow him.

Same with Italy in the same war.

If I were British, the American Revolution. I could not have helped out in the war to reduce colonies to a state of serfdom, which is how I would have seen it.

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

Offensive war. Non-defensive war.

I refuse to die because someone wants to misuse protection to make their political dick hard. That's what condom porn is for.

P.S. You should take a look at my abstract on hypocrisy in your poll thread.


What? I'm not a pacifist.

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

Yeah, that poll was a little mix of tongue-in-cheek, rant/tirade against a minority of a minority, and an abstract question. Same with the thread. It wasn't meant to tar and feather the majority of pacifists, who honestly, probably don't see themselves being protected by the military, though they probably don't condemn them either.

It was, admittedly, a very small group that raised my ire and acid tongue.

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

Yeah, that poll was a little mix of tongue-in-cheek, rant/tirade against a minority of a minority, and an abstract question. Same with the thread. It wasn't meant to tar and feather the majority of pacifists, who honestly, probably don't see themselves being protected by the military, though they probably don't condemn them either.

It was, admittedly, a very small group that raised my ire and acid tongue.

Yeah, but I was referring to the post wherein I tried to answer the abstract question.
But apologies are cool too.

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

Of course, if I were underground, those soldiers would be the enemy in a practical sense, but I still wouldn't hate them.

As for non-defensive war, what about the Civil War? Was it non-defensive for the North or the South? I would have been in a moral quandary, since I hate chattel slavery and involuntary servitude of that sort, but I consider it my duty to defend an invaded homeland unless it is being ruled by a tyrant like Hitler who has provoked a war of honorable liberation (such as the European Theater of the War). Of course, if I were a Russian in WW2, I'd prefer the devil I knew (Stalin) to the devil I didn't (Hitler). But back to the Civil War, I would have a hard time justifying fighting against the South, having been born in what at the time was Virginia. At the same time, I would consider the secession foolish (but legal), chattel slavery wrong, and the attack on Fort Sumter an act of needless provocation.

I honestly don't know if I would have simply stayed out of the war altogether and fled for a bit, worn a blue uniform, or taken on the gray or butternut of the Confederacy. My guess is that I would have avoided the issue of treason by moving out of Virginia as soon as it became that secession would happen. That way, I could have fought for the Union in good conscience.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

With the benefit of hindsight? I can think of twenty or thirty off hand.

Without it?

Were I eligible, I would probably have fought in any war my country of residence ended up in.

Unless you have an overrriding aversion to it, i.e. unless you would be a Co in ANY war, without the benefit of hindsight, you would probably have fought in any war. German soldiers in general, and most of the Prussian officer corps in particular, were not bad men. The party apointees, some of the Waffen SS divisions and the Hitler yourth division (12th SS panzer) were bad folks, in as much as they were fully capable of comitting atrocities without remonstrance.

You say now you would be a CO in Germany in WWII, but I question if you would have. The country, preHitler was a shambles, over a million were out of work, the Mark had reached inflationary levels so high the Reichsbank started issuing 10 Billion mark notes. For commone circulation! A national hero, no less than Paul Von hindenberg appointed Hitler Chancellor. You would not have known about the Progroms against the Jews, nor of the brutality of the fight against russia. You probably would have known of the Anshulss, the reoccupation of the Rhur, the re occupation of lands that were historically and traditionally German. And you probably would have cheered throing off the shavkles of Versallies along with your compatriots. Barring a trade, you probably joined the army during the rearmament for the steady paycheck and the prestige. Once in, you fought in Poland, but lets be realistic. Poland was a legit threat to the State of Germany and had been taking hostile, provocative actions, even threatening to enter Germany to "keep the peace".

You probably cheered a war with the poles, cheered reuniting prussia with greater Germany, and unless you ended up stationed in the Central Government in Poland, you probably heard nothing more than rumors, if that, of the treatment of the subject peoples there. You took an oath of allegience to the fuher, along with every man you called comrade and fr3eind in your unit. And by the time you saw things that disturbed you, you were inured to combat, a little more callous and you had the weight of military dicsipline and peer pressure to keep you on the straight and narrow.

It takes a very special breed of man, to swim against the tide of history. I think we would all love to believe we are that breed, but I suspect the vast majority of us, in the situation the vast majority of Germans were in, would have done precisely as they did. Up to and beyond ignoring disquieting rumors, taking solace in Mr. Geobbels assertion that such rumors were the devices of enemy propaganda and should be ignored, working in the war plant, gratefully accepting an appartment, even if you knew a jewish family had once owned it. Afterall, they were being resettled in the east and it would be a shame to let the appartment sit empty wouldn't it?

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

Perhaps, Colly, but for one issue. I am not too keen on tyrants, and Hitler was obviously one of those. Admittely, as a German, I might have had a different view of freedom, but that's questionable. I do not know that. I do know that my strong dislike of tyranny and bigotry would have made Hitler hard to stomach. If I were in the Wehrmacht, I would have been in a tight spot, admittedly, and I would have despised the Versailles Treaty, but I am also the sort who would found some good in the Weimar Republic (though I would have found flaws a plenty too). Plus, with my looks, I would have feared that the Gestapo might mistake me for a Jew. I look enough like one that such a mistake would be understandable. That alone would make me nervous. And I would have little use for brawlers like the SA, though my bisexuality might have caused me to bed a few of them now and then. Which brings up another issue. Odds are, I'd be mistaken for a homosexual and sent to a camp, which would make the whole issue kind of moot.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

Perhaps, Colly, but for one issue. I am not too keen on tyrants, and Hitler was obviously one of those. Admittely, as a German, I might have had a different view of freedom, but that's questionable. I do not know that. I do know that my strong dislike of tyranny and bigotry would have made Hitler hard to stomach. If I were in the Wehrmacht, I would have been in a tight spot, admittedly, and I would have despised the Versailles Treaty, but I am also the sort who would found some good in the Weimar Republic (though I would have found flaws a plenty too). Plus, with my looks, I would have feared that the Gestapo might mistake me for a Jew. I look enough like one that such a mistake would be understandable. That alone would make me nervous. And I would have little use for brawlers like the SA, though my bisexuality might have caused me to bed a few of them now and then. Which brings up another issue. Odds are, I'd be mistaken for a homosexual and sent to a camp, which would make the whole issue kind of moot.

Hitler wasn't a tyrant. Not to the German people. He was duly elected, duly appointed Chancellor, and was given emergency powers by a vote in the national assembly (the reichstag). If you line of argument is he was a tyrant, then you wouldn't have fought for Britian or The US or France, as their leaders were of the exact same legitimacy in the eyes of their people.

You're applying a non contemporary lens. You seem to foget that just twenty years before, this population was ruled by an absolute monarch. An excessive amount of power residing with the executive was far more familar to them, and far more comfortable to most, than the nebulous power structure of a parlimentary system. Also, they were used to order and industiousness, neither of which they had seen since the dear old Kaiser had abdicated. What's more, the Weimar government had stabbed the nation in the back, agreeing to a humiliating peace when the great Wermacht had never lost in combat. there was civil disorder, fighting in the strets, chaos, rampant inflation, unemployment, and a humiliating peace acord that left germans with no hope of ever getting out from under crushing reparations, much less rejoining the rest of Europe as an equal.

Legitimate power, voted in by a majority of the people, residing in the executive and with it's return comes order, prosperity and national pride.

That's a contemporary view. What Henirch T. Public knew. And, unless you were very priveledged, probably exactly what you would have known.


P.S. If Bigotry offends you, you wouldn't have joined the US army. A look at any wartime propaganda featureing the japanese and you would have had your stomach turned. Not would you have joined the British, as their take was hardly less influenced by the yellow peril. Of course, if Bigotry offended you that much, you would have been ineligible for the military anyway, as you would have already been an outspoken critic of Jim Crow and on a government watch list as unreliable.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

I might also point out that being a Co in the later stages of the third reich was a little difficult. See, if you refused to fight, you were a defeatist. And subject to summary execution. And by this time, conscription had already swept you up, unless you worked in one of Speer's protected industires.

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

I wouldn't have survived long in Nazi Germany and this is removing hindsight. I probably would have protested Hitler about as much I do now. We'll assume I liked living enough to sign the loyalty pledges and all that which probably would have happened. The problem would have come in the army. I don't do invasion, I don't do so hot under authority as well. That combo would have gotten me shot for insubordination. That is if I didn't just leg it and get shot somewhere in the German countryside.

It's not about right or wrong. It's about defense or offense.

I would have gladly served sniper in Stalin's troops. If I lived in the South in the Civil War I would have tried to pick off Sherman's men from the tree-line. If I somehow made it through to the end of World War 2 Germany, I'd probably have shot allied troops moving in. Defending one's home and country, that's where there is honor and in those situations, I'd be seeing only one side of atrocity close up. It's like how if Europe decided to invade our ass, I'd defend America even though our leader is pure America-hating evil. That same zeal as Colly points out would mean I'd do the same for any country regardless of leader and regardless of how much we deserved to get our asses handed to us.

 

[gauchecritic]

Of course, if I were a Russian in WW2, I'd prefer the devil I knew (Stalin) to the devil I didn't (Hitler).

Except of course that a lot of satelite states viewed German 'invasion' as 'liberation' and I can tell you from personal experience that whilst not fighting with the Germans (though some did) there were a hell of a lot of Baltic people fighting against the Russians, even if only pacifically.

 

[R. Richard]

Sometime in the 1960s a college professor tried an experiment. He/she? showed films of Hitler's speeches to non-German speaking college students. The liberal arts people were moved by the dynamic presentation as Hitler made his speeeches. He/she? tried the same experiment on engineering students. The engineers saw a funny little man jumping around a stage. [Maybe food for thought?]

Many here would not have fought for Nazi Germany, however, the same people fought for a government that interned Japanese civilians for no reason other than that they were Japanese.

I will tell you one final fact. The vast majority of US troops who opted for CO status but did not want to go to jail were put to use as combat stretcher bearers. After a few weeks as combat stretcher vearers, most of them took a rifle so that they could at least fight back.

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

I might also point out that being a Co in the later stages of the third reich was a little difficult. See, if you refused to fight, you were a defeatist. And subject to summary execution. And by this time, conscription had already swept you up, unless you worked in one of Speer's protected industires.

That would be true enough about the consequences of refusing to join. As for the election issue, well, you know as well as I do that elected leaders can be tyrannical when they step on civil liberties. Who was it that said that life, liberty, and property were not safe while the legislature was in session?

As for bigotry, I was mainly referring to anti-Semitism. And there were plenty of non-bigots in the US military. I would have found the occult aspects of Nazism attractive, but they were a perversion of the occult, and I would hope that I would realize it in time.

Now, assuming that I didn't immediately realize that Hitler's regime was permanently stepping on civil liberties and not just an emergency measure (in which I would have to have totally ignored or not read the 25 Points of the Nazi Charter and several other writings that warn of future tyranny, as well as the infamous Boxheim Papers, and of course, Mein Kampf), then perhaps I would have joined the Wehrmacht. Perhaps, if they didn't imprison or shoot me for being a "deviate" or enjoying "decadent" art or jazz first.

As for the Kaiser, yes, he was an autocrat with a rubber-stamp Reichstag and the German people were mostly given to autocratic regimes anyway at that stage in history. So, there is theoretically no guarantee that I would love liberty. But there's a chance that I might have. And I would have been rather nervous about the idea that I might be arrested and sent to a camp for being: a "sexual pervert", an anti-Nazi (which I might have been under the right circumstances and upbringing), or mistaken for a Jew (because my looks are not exactly "Nordic").

That being said, it's possible that I might have been seduced into the SA quite literally, if I were young and naive enough at the time. So many handsome young men.......but then, of course, the SA were eventually out of favor and I would have had to find a new vocation.

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

Except of course that a lot of satelite states viewed German 'invasion' as 'liberation' and I can tell you from personal experience that whilst not fighting with the Germans (though some did) there were a hell of a lot of Baltic people fighting against the Russians, even if only pacifically.

Good point, gauche. If I were a Balt or a Ukrainian, I might have been in the Waffen SS or the Ukrainian Insurgent Army. They were in a different situation than the ethnic Russian majority.

 

[oggbashan]

Before the 20th century, most armies were professional, not conscript, except in France from 1789 to 1815.

There would be no need to be a Conscientious Objector - just don't enlist, or if a sailor or fisherman in the UK keep out of the way of the Naval Press Gang.

In the UK for 1914-18 and 1939-45 it was possible to be a CO but difficult because the government made life very unpleasant unless the person was willing to be a stretcher bearer or medical corpsman. Genuine religious belief was accepted and acknowledged, especially for Quakers, and work was found for them that recognised their stand. A Conscientious Objector who didn't have pre-war evidence of their beliefs was treated as an unprincipled shirker until proven otherwise. Public opinion was against COs.

In 1940s Germany, avoiding military service would be reason enough for you and perhaps your family to disappear under the Nacht and Nebel laws. Even ethnic Germans went to concentration camps to be worked to death. Given the choice - serve in the armed forces or see your family starved and worked to death - which would you choose?

COs were only possible in democracies.

Og

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

Before the 20th century, most armies were professional, not conscript, except in France from 1789 to 1815.

There would be no need to be a Conscientious Objector - just don't enlist, or if a sailor or fisherman in the UK keep out of the way of the Naval Press Gang.

In the UK for 1914-18 and 1939-45 it was possible to be a CO but difficult because the government made life very unpleasant unless the person was willing to be a stretcher bearer or medical corpsman. Genuine religious belief was accepted and acknowledged, especially for Quakers, and work was found for them that recognised their stand. A Conscientious Objector who didn't have pre-war evidence of their beliefs was treated as an unprincipled shirker until proven otherwise. Public opinion was against COs.

In 1940s Germany, avoiding military service would be reason enough for you and perhaps your family to disappear under the Nacht and Nebel laws. Even ethnic Germans went to concentration camps to be worked to death. Given the choice - serve in the armed forces or see your family starved and worked to death - which would you choose?

COs were only possible in democracies.

Og

Valid points, Og. I guess it would be difficult for me to handle that. Although I am not sure how much of a family I would have had back then. Probably parents and siblings, which would be enough to worry about, particularly if my siblings had children. It's hard to think of one's nephews and nieces being harmed because of one's refusal to join.

So, assuming that I didn't end up in trouble due to my more "perverse" proclivities, or my previous politics, and thus end up in a camp anyway, I suppose that I was too hasty in assuming that about the CO in WW2. A point that Colly has raised in a slightly different way. I still suspect that I would have gotten on the Reich's bad side well before the war, however, for one reason or another. And exile is an option, but only if wealthy enough for travel.

Another good point about the past. I guess that I would not have had too much to worry about during the American Revolution. Just avoid the ports and the press gangs forcing people off the streets into the Royal Navy.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

That would be true enough about the consequences of refusing to join. As for the election issue, well, you know as well as I do that elected leaders can be tyrannical when they step on civil liberties. Who was it that said that life, liberty, and property were not safe while the legislature was in session?

How bout the proof of your own eyes? Unless you were very welthy or your family had strong connections you didn't have anything left protety wise when hitler came to power. you were unemployed, had been since the last war most likely. You had seen at least ten Putch attempts, and street fighting between the frigercorps and the commnists or others in virtually every metropolitin area. The weimar republic gave you no food, no work, no shelter, no security. You can't eat democratic principals. When the Kaiser was in power, you had a job and food. When Hitler came to power, you had a job and food. In between you were unemployed and straved. You are again applying a contemporary view to a situation where it would be as out of place as a cock at a dyke party. [/QUOTE]

[/QUOTE]
As for bigotry, I was mainly referring to anti-Semitism. And there were plenty of non-bigots in the US military. I would have found the occult aspects of Nazism attractive, but they were a perversion of the occult, and I would hope that I would realize it in time. [/QUOTE]

If you were not an anti-semite you would have been in the minority, not only in Germany, but in Europe and the world. Don't believe it? Heres a fact for you, Hitler's first plan was to just throw the jews out. Nobody would take them. When it was at least known in highh up places what their fate would be, countries still refused to take them. I will add, that if you came up in Germany, you had been hearing, since you were old enough to listen, that Jews had moved in and become rish by specualtion after the war. You assume you wouldn't have absorbed that, but that's a baseless assumption. It wasn't just prevelant, it was gospel.

[/QUOTE]
Now, assuming that I didn't immediately realize that Hitler's regime was permanently stepping on civil liberties and not just an emergency measure (in which I would have to have totally ignored or not read the 25 Points of the Nazi Charter and several other writings that warn of future tyranny, as well as the infamous Boxheim Papers, and of course, Mein Kampf), then perhaps I would have joined the Wehrmacht. Perhaps, if they didn't imprison or shoot me for being a "deviate" or enjoying "decadent" art or jazz first.
[/QUOTE]

Who knew? By what miracle do you assume you would have known? Or are we to assume you are a highly literate youndgman, with a comfortable living and time to persuse the political agenda of half a dozen parties? Because if your Heinrich T. Public, you got more pressing concerns, like where you're getting your next meal and where you are lyng your head.

[/QUOTE]
As for the Kaiser, yes, he was an autocrat with a rubber-stamp Reichstag and the German people were mostly given to autocratic regimes anyway at that stage in history. So, there is theoretically no guarantee that I would love liberty. But there's a chance that I might have. And I would have been rather nervous about the idea that I might be arrested and sent to a camp for being: a "sexual pervert", an anti-Nazi (which I might have been under the right circumstances and upbringing), or mistaken for a Jew (because my looks are not exactly "Nordic").
[/QUOTE]

Honey, you failing utterly to rember your Neimuller. If you were an open and practicing sexual deviant, all right, I'll say you probably wouldn't have joine dup. They wouldn't have accepted you in the army anyway. Maybe Rhoem's SA, if he liked the look of you.

[/QUOTE]
That being said, it's possible that I might have been seduced into the SA quite literally, if I were young and naive enough at the time. So many handsome young men.......but then, of course, the SA were eventually out of favor and I would have had to find a new vocation.[/QUOTE]

Unless you happened to b e in the group of favorites at the top, being in the SA wouldn't have hindered you. It was over 300K strong when it was disbanded and most of the men in it, and the frigercorps, joined the new army as soon as it began to expand.

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

How bout the proof of your own eyes? Unless you were very welthy or your family had strong connections you didn't have anything left protety wise when hitler came to power. you were unemployed, had been since the last war most likely. You had seen at least ten Putch attempts, and street fighting between the frigercorps and the commnists or others in virtually every metropolitin area. The weimar republic gave you no food, no work, no shelter, no security. You can't eat democratic principals. When the Kaiser was in power, you had a job and food. When Hitler came to power, you had a job and food. In between you were unemployed and straved. You are again applying a contemporary view to a situation where it would be as out of place as a cock at a dyke party.

[/QUOTE]
As for bigotry, I was mainly referring to anti-Semitism. And there were plenty of non-bigots in the US military. I would have found the occult aspects of Nazism attractive, but they were a perversion of the occult, and I would hope that I would realize it in time. [/QUOTE]

If you were not an anti-semite you would have been in the minority, not only in Germany, but in Europe and the world. Don't believe it? Heres a fact for you, Hitler's first plan was to just throw the jews out. Nobody would take them. When it was at least known in highh up places what their fate would be, countries still refused to take them. I will add, that if you came up in Germany, you had been hearing, since you were old enough to listen, that Jews had moved in and become rish by specualtion after the war. You assume you wouldn't have absorbed that, but that's a baseless assumption. It wasn't just prevelant, it was gospel.

[/QUOTE]
Now, assuming that I didn't immediately realize that Hitler's regime was permanently stepping on civil liberties and not just an emergency measure (in which I would have to have totally ignored or not read the 25 Points of the Nazi Charter and several other writings that warn of future tyranny, as well as the infamous Boxheim Papers, and of course, Mein Kampf), then perhaps I would have joined the Wehrmacht. Perhaps, if they didn't imprison or shoot me for being a "deviate" or enjoying "decadent" art or jazz first.
[/QUOTE]

Who knew? By what miracle do you assume you would have known? Or are we to assume you are a highly literate youndgman, with a comfortable living and time to persuse the political agenda of half a dozen parties? Because if your Heinrich T. Public, you got more pressing concerns, like where you're getting your next meal and where you are lyng your head.

[/QUOTE]
As for the Kaiser, yes, he was an autocrat with a rubber-stamp Reichstag and the German people were mostly given to autocratic regimes anyway at that stage in history. So, there is theoretically no guarantee that I would love liberty. But there's a chance that I might have. And I would have been rather nervous about the idea that I might be arrested and sent to a camp for being: a "sexual pervert", an anti-Nazi (which I might have been under the right circumstances and upbringing), or mistaken for a Jew (because my looks are not exactly "Nordic").
[/QUOTE]

Honey, you failing utterly to rember your Neimuller. If you were an open and practicing sexual deviant, all right, I'll say you probably wouldn't have joine dup. They wouldn't have accepted you in the army anyway. Maybe Rhoem's SA, if he liked the look of you.

[/QUOTE]
That being said, it's possible that I might have been seduced into the SA quite literally, if I were young and naive enough at the time. So many handsome young men.......but then, of course, the SA were eventually out of favor and I would have had to find a new vocation.[/QUOTE]

Unless you happened to b e in the group of favorites at the top, being in the SA wouldn't have hindered you. It was over 300K strong when it was disbanded and most of the men in it, and the frigercorps, joined the new army as soon as it began to expand.[/QUOTE]

Interesting points. You're right about the chances of most people being unaware o anything but the hard times. I tend to assume that I would be as political in that day and age as I am today. Which might not have happened if I had been born into a social status where my survival was at stake from one day to the next. And of course one can get jaded with democracy if the first time one sees it in action it seems proven to be a failure. Even if one is inclined toward liberalism. The mid-20s were easy enough. But every other part of the Weimar Republic's short history was plagued by disaster.

I don't really know for sure what I would have been like, however. I am not much for authority or obedience, and I am a relatively young man, so I might have been stuck with 2 choices: the Nazis and the Communists. At my age (29) I would not have been to the front, but I would have seen the aftermath and lived through the Allied naval blockade of Germany. I would have been too old for front-line service by the time that war came (unless I enlisted), but I would have been in the reserves or the Volkssturm. Assuming that I had not been a clear deviate mistaken for a homosexual, had some personal beef with a Nazi, recruited by the Communists (theoretically possible, but unlikely, as I would have found it too atheistic for my taste), or been in some way counter-culture (possible, given some of my artistic leanings), I might have ended up as a civilian reservist, eventually caught up in the fighting toward the end.

That's assuming that I was less intellectual than I am today and less repulsed by the overt anti-intellectualism of the Nazi movement.

Which brings up another question: what about you? Would you have been a member of the League of German Women, for instance?

 

[Colleen Thomas]

Well, I mangled that didn't I?

 

[Colleen Thomas]

As for bigotry, I was mainly referring to anti-Semitism. And there were plenty of non-bigots in the US military. I would have found the occult aspects of Nazism attractive, but they were a perversion of the occult, and I would hope that I would realize it in time. [/QUOTE]

If you were not an anti-semite you would have been in the minority, not only in Germany, but in Europe and the world. Don't believe it? Heres a fact for you, Hitler's first plan was to just throw the jews out. Nobody would take them. When it was at least known in highh up places what their fate would be, countries still refused to take them. I will add, that if you came up in Germany, you had been hearing, since you were old enough to listen, that Jews had moved in and become rish by specualtion after the war. You assume you wouldn't have absorbed that, but that's a baseless assumption. It wasn't just prevelant, it was gospel.

[/QUOTE]
Now, assuming that I didn't immediately realize that Hitler's regime was permanently stepping on civil liberties and not just an emergency measure (in which I would have to have totally ignored or not read the 25 Points of the Nazi Charter and several other writings that warn of future tyranny, as well as the infamous Boxheim Papers, and of course, Mein Kampf), then perhaps I would have joined the Wehrmacht. Perhaps, if they didn't imprison or shoot me for being a "deviate" or enjoying "decadent" art or jazz first.
[/QUOTE]

Who knew? By what miracle do you assume you would have known? Or are we to assume you are a highly literate youndgman, with a comfortable living and time to persuse the political agenda of half a dozen parties? Because if your Heinrich T. Public, you got more pressing concerns, like where you're getting your next meal and where you are lyng your head.

[/QUOTE]
As for the Kaiser, yes, he was an autocrat with a rubber-stamp Reichstag and the German people were mostly given to autocratic regimes anyway at that stage in history. So, there is theoretically no guarantee that I would love liberty. But there's a chance that I might have. And I would have been rather nervous about the idea that I might be arrested and sent to a camp for being: a "sexual pervert", an anti-Nazi (which I might have been under the right circumstances and upbringing), or mistaken for a Jew (because my looks are not exactly "Nordic").
[/QUOTE]

Honey, you failing utterly to rember your Neimuller. If you were an open and practicing sexual deviant, all right, I'll say you probably wouldn't have joine dup. They wouldn't have accepted you in the army anyway. Maybe Rhoem's SA, if he liked the look of you.

[/QUOTE]
That being said, it's possible that I might have been seduced into the SA quite literally, if I were young and naive enough at the time. So many handsome young men.......but then, of course, the SA were eventually out of favor and I would have had to find a new vocation.[/QUOTE]

Unless you happened to b e in the group of favorites at the top, being in the SA wouldn't have hindered you. It was over 300K strong when it was disbanded and most of the men in it, and the frigercorps, joined the new army as soon as it began to expand.[/QUOTE]

Interesting points. You're right about the chances of most people being unaware o anything but the hard times. I tend to assume that I would be as political in that day and age as I am today. Which might not have happened if I had been born into a social status where my survival was at stake from one day to the next. And of course one can get jaded with democracy if the first time one sees it in action it seems proven to be a failure. Even if one is inclined toward liberalism. The mid-20s were easy enough. But every other part of the Weimar Republic's short history was plagued by disaster.

I don't really know for sure what I would have been like, however. I am not much for authority or obedience, and I am a relatively young man, so I might have been stuck with 2 choices: the Nazis and the Communists. At my age (29) I would not have been to the front, but I would have seen the aftermath and lived through the Allied naval blockade of Germany. I would have been too old for front-line service by the time that war came (unless I enlisted), but I would have been in the reserves or the Volkssturm. Assuming that I had not been a clear deviate mistaken for a homosexual, had some personal beef with a Nazi, recruited by the Communists (theoretically possible, but unlikely, as I would have found it too atheistic for my taste), or been in some way counter-culture (possible, given some of my artistic leanings), I might have ended up as a civilian reservist, eventually caught up in the fighting toward the end.

That's assuming that I was less intellectual than I am today and less repulsed by the overt anti-intellectualism of the Nazi movement.

Which brings up another question: what about you? Would you have been a member of the League of German Women, for instance?[/QUOTE]


I would have. More than likely. Probably wouldn't have been part of the levesnborn program, but I would have been an air raid warden or whatever. If later, I would have probably gladly manned a flack gun.

As a historian, I've trained myself to filter out my preset perceptions. Objectively, I would have been about what any other german woman would have. I'm very intelligent, but since that wasn't prized or encouraged in women by the Nazi's I probably would ahve done my best to conceal it. As I would have concealed my lesbianism. I don't generally account myself a doer of great deeds and I'm by nature a conservative. So the odds greatly favor me conforming, to the best of my ability.


If I'm not carrying my current knowledgebase and ideas of right and wrong, it seems fairly reasonable that I would have absorbed the majority of the prevailing attitude. My being a sexual deviant, might have lead me to be less harsh towards Jews or it might have made me worse, in the hope of proving myself loyal by being a better hater than the next girl. I can't really say. I grew up in a prejudiced south and was for a long while a fairly prejudiced woman. That tells me I don't have any innate resistance to it. At the same time, I don't like seeing anyone hurt or humiliated. So I'd say it's a toss up.

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

Well, I have to applaud your honesty and analysis about yourself. That must have been a little unpleasant, but I was curious. Hope that wasn't too nosy, but the point of the thread had to do with a lot of specuation about oneself and some confrontation with one's own basic nature, vices, and virtues. A lot of reflection involved there, which can be tough.

I appreciate such a brave and forthright answer. And, of course, you're only human. I'm still not sure that I would have chosen the right side in the Civil War, for instance. That's only human. Realistically, my background would have led me to go with whatever my region or state went with, unless I had a stark wake-up call. And WV was a heavily divided part of Virginia. Some went North and some went South. Hard to say which side I would have favored for sure.

One of the things that I like about you. No BS, even about yourself.

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

Well, I mangled that didn't I?

Mangled what? I thought that you handled it well. I was waxing a little too overconfident in my own moral superiority, and you called me on it. Understandable and sensible. We have free will, all of us, and are thus capable of making wrong decisions for any number of reasons.

For instance, if I had an older brother killed by the French, the chances of me turning militantly Nazi would have been very strong all of the sudden. If he had been killed by stormtroopers, however, I would likely have become a Communist.

 

[Pure]

No, R. Richard. --- note to Colly

I will tell you one final fact. The vast majority of US troops who opted for CO status but did not want to go to jail were put to use as combat stretcher bearers. After a few weeks as combat stretcher vearers, most of them took a rifle so that they could at least fight back.

This list is not factual.

1) First, one generally declares one's conscience and refuses to be one of the troops. If recognized by the gov., that makes you a CO. What the gov. assigns you to do, if partly up to you, since some COs do not want to help in the war in any way. So they plant trees.

2) Some COs, including many Quakers, *wanted* to help the war effort, but NOT by picking up a rifle and killing, so they volunteered as ambulance bearers.

3) Finding yourself to be a opposed to war, AFTER joining up, creates a big problem; the army need not recognize you and may, if you're lucky, jail you in military prison. IF your discovery is on the battlefield, under fire, you may be shot, not given a free pass.

4) Some who become objectors, while in the army thus simply desert; this happened in Vietnam--i.e., you don't come back from furlough.
You are then subject to arrest and trial in a military court.

Lastly we come to the case you apparently think is common. Do you have any evidence?

5) If a CO bearing stretchers decides he's not a CO and wants to fight, he can volunteer in the army. I doubt this happened much, since it's not easy to be a CO, esp. in big wars.

HOWEVER: This is a tiny grain of truth in what you say, since
6) Many quakers and others opposed to war in principle, thought that the Japs and Germans had to be fought; hence they joined the armed forces. In any given war, if it's seen to be essential, some theoretical "COs" are going to say, "No, I must defend my county, with arms, if needed, IN THIS CASE"
---

Colly, your drift is right on. IT's very hard at the time to see one's nation is wrong, and to apply a principle like "don't invade, be defense only." After all when one enlists or is drafted, one doesn't get to say, "I'm not going to Russia, but service nearby is fine."

In WWI, VERY few persons protested, Betrand Russell being one. There were more in WWII.

In a case like Vietnam, you have to remember it was far from clear. The 'defense of freedom' and the 'fight the commies before they arrive on the beach in Calif' arguments were common. Just as they are now.
Often it is the *soldiers* who realize the absurdity first. Yet they can't just become COs. So they deserted the US army and went to Canada or Sweden. Of course then, as now, a deserter would be thought to be a traitor, by many Americans. Some felt they were: I met one, briefly, who later killed himself, though safe in Canada.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

I will tell you one final fact. The vast majority of US troops who opted for CO status but did not want to go to jail were put to use as combat stretcher bearers. After a few weeks as combat stretcher vearers, most of them took a rifle so that they could at least fight back.

This list is not factual.

1) First, one generally declares one's conscience and refuses to be one of the troops. If recognized by the gov., that makes you a CO. What the gov. assigns you to do, if partly up to you, since some COs do not want to help in the war in any way. So they plant trees.

2) Some COs, including many Quakers, *wanted* to help the war effort, but NOT by picking up a rifle and killing, so they volunteered as ambulance bearers.

3) Finding yourself to be a opposed to war, AFTER joining up, creates a big problem; the army need not recognize you and may, if you're lucky, jail you in military prison. IF your discovery is on the battlefield, under fire, you may be shot, not given a free pass.

4) Some who become objectors, while in the army thus simply desert; this happened in Vietnam--i.e., you don't come back from furlough.
You are then subject to arrest and trial in a military court.

Lastly we come to the case you apparently think is common. Do you have any evidence?

5) If a CO bearing stretchers decides he's not a CO and wants to fight, he can volunteer in the army. I doubt this happened much, since it's not easy to be a CO, esp. in big wars.

HOWEVER: This is a tiny grain of truth in what you say, since
6) Many quakers and others opposed to war in principle, thought that the Japs and Germans had to be fought; hence they joined the armed forces. In any given war, if it's seen to be essential, some theoretical "COs" are going to say, "No, I must defend my county, with arms, if needed, IN THIS CASE"
---

Colly, your drift is right on. IT's very hard at the time to see one's nation is wrong, and to apply a principle like "don't invade, be defense only." After all when one enlists or is drafted, one doesn't get to say, "I'm not going to Russia, but service nearby is fine."

In WWI, VERY few persons protested, Betrand Russell being one. There were more in WWII.

In a case like Vietnam, you have to remember it was far from clear. The 'defense of freedom' and the 'fight the commies before they arrive on the beach in Calif' arguments were common. Just as they are now.
Often it is the *soldiers* who realize the absurdity first. Yet they can't just become COs. So they deserted the US army and went to Canada or Sweden. Of course then, as now, a deserter would be thought to be a traitor, by many Americans. Some felt they were: I met one, briefly, who later killed himself, though safe in Canada.

I don't have any sympathy for desseters or draft dodgers. But that, in an of itself is probably very solid eveidence I would have been wearing the white shirt and dark skirt and waving my litle Nazi flag. Even with the knowledge that the cause was wrong, I still believe you have to answer when your country calls.

Your point on defensive is also very good. Attacking poland was done upon the pretext of responding to a manufactured incident, but the average german only knew the poles were being agressive and beligerent, when all Hitler wanted was the Danzig corridore returned. It was, after all, german territory and it cut off Prussia from the rest of the reich.We entered Austia and Checkoslovakia at the behest of their legally consititued governments to protect peace. And we had to attack France because the French and British declared war on us. See? totally defensive.

 

[3113]

Intreguing question. I like Lucifer's very clear stand. My own is a little more muddled by compare. I actually see two questions:
1) Would I ever want to be a soldier in any war, even one I felt was right?

Okay. I'm goint to assume the following--that I'm me, for the most part. Obviously, where and how one is raised gives one biases that are hard to shake, but I'm assuming that I have some of the beliefs I do now. I'll also assume that I'm young and healthy and fit and male. So, I can be soldier in any war.

First things first: I do believe that almost anyone can kill in the right circumstances--really, none of us knows how deep a pacifist's convictions are until he's watching his loved ones being hurt, maimed or killed before his eyes. But war is a bit different. You're put in a uniform, issued a gun, and sent out to start shooting or be shot by strangers usually on a battlefield. Or you could be sent up in plane and asked to drop bombs--in which case you won't see the dead bodies. Or drop depth charges on a sub (or torpedo a battleship), in which case you probably won't come face-to-face with bodies either.

Could I do any of that? I don't think so. It's not that I believe life is sacred or killing wrong. I'm not against the death penalty. I just suspect that I can't do it. Something in me says that taking a life is just, personally, wrong. And unless I see someone trying to kill, maim or hurt someone else, up close and personal, I don't know if I can kill them. Maybe. I hope I'm never in a position where I have to find out. Putting it another way, I think that there are men and women who are warriors. And I'm just not one of them. I don't know if that makes me a coward or hypocrite. We never know what we're capable of till we're put in those situations. I can only guess and surmise.

So. In any war, I'd like to opt out of being behind gun or bomb or torpedo. But I will carry the stretcher if I think the war is right and just. Which brings us to part 2:

2) Are there wars in which I would not participate no matter what? That is, the war seems so wrong to me that I won't even help out in the M.A.S.H. unit. The war so goes against my principles that participating in any way is tandamount to supporting it and I won't support it.

Hard question that one. I think, in regards to WWII Germany (assuming that I'm the person I am in the body of young, Christian, Aryan male) that I'd have no problem up until Hitler invaded France. At that point, I think I'd see so much trouble ahead, so much waste for the country that I'd object however possible (which might not be possible at all, but we just theorizing if/when we might object).

In regards to the American Civil War, I think, if I were a young, southern male, I'd object to firing on the fort, but not to succession. If the southern states are going to remain slave states and the whole argument is just succession, then I wouldn't object to the war. It's when the war becomes about slavery that I might find myself unable to continue helping out the South. Likewise, if I were Northern, I might not help if the war was about succession, but once it became about slavery, I might sign up.

As for the American Revolutionary War...I very much suspect that I'd be against the colonists. Not because what they were saying was wrong, so much as that I'd believe that differences could be worked out without a fight and that war with England would be stupid. And frankly...it was. Without France, the U.S. would have been in serious trouble.

Just my thoughts on the topic.