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Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

Raskolnikov38 posted:

You should pop over to the mil history in ask/tell because Hitler was never going to win that war and going for Moscow like you say probably would have seen army group center destroyed in fall 41.

Well of course he couldn't win, he was convinced he could just say "our powerful Aryan race will crush these stupid Slavs/whatever" and that would make his poor planning work. It's a great illustration of how fascist ideals fail.

"Wait a bunch more years to build up actual resources and equipment for a serious war? Nah how could these untermenschen slow us down!"

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Captain_Maclaine
Sep 30, 2001

Every moment that I'm alive, I pray for death!

Install Windows posted:

Could have worked for Hitler if he'd listened to his military and both spent more time building up plus continued driving through to Moscow and beyond, rather than his plan based on "well the Russians are all stupid inferior Slavs and they'll soon break so we can take our time".

While I'll never contest that Generalplanost was anything other than genocidal dumbassery, I don't think that even had he listened to his generals Hitler could have won the war in the East. While yes he invaded before the army thought it was ready, the longer he waited was more time Stalin had to rebuild the Red Army from the 30s purges and debacle in Finland; indeed, Stalin had essentially been gambling on the (expected) Battle of France lasting much longer than it did to allow him to complete his modernization when he decided to go with the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact.

Raskolnikov38
Mar 3, 2007

We were somewhere around Manila when the drugs began to take hold
The nazis couldn't actually afford to wait any longer to declare war, there was no more chances for them to build up. Hitler's rearmament programs had wrecked the Germany economy to such a point that if they didn't start stealing everything in Europe that wasn't nailed down it was going to collapse, probably before 1940 was out.

Ardennes
May 12, 2002

Raskolnikov38 posted:

You should pop over to the mil history in ask/tell because Hitler was never going to win that war and going for Moscow like you say probably would have seen army group center destroyed in fall 41.

Yeah, it wasn't going to work either way, and there wasn't anything to salvage that plan. If he had until 1942 it would have been too late and there wasn't a reliable way of attacking much earlier. Similarly Napoleon was hopelessly screwed.

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

Captain_Maclaine posted:

While I'll never contest that Generalplanost was anything other than genocidal dumbassery, I don't think that even had he listened to his generals Hitler could have won the war in the East. While yes he invaded before the army thought it was ready, the longer he waited was more time Stalin had to rebuild the Red Army from the 30s purges and debacle in Finland; indeed, Stalin had essentially been gambling on the (expected) Battle of France lasting much longer than it did to allow him to complete his modernization when he decided to go with the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact.

His generals told him "actually we shouldn't invade the East until 1949 if ever, this isn't a good idea at all. Our industry is still not up to the task and the Russians could easily hold us". He told them they were going to invade anyway. And as a matter of fact. Poland was also invaded a good couple of years before his generals thought he should, etc, etc.

Nazi Germany was a history of plans being sped up just because Hitler or one of his underlings thought it would be a good idea with an essential reliance on "we're the master race so we can exceed the old plans". Almost without exception these resulted in long term problems, or would have if not for the whole thing being snuffed out.

Captain_Maclaine
Sep 30, 2001

Every moment that I'm alive, I pray for death!

Install Windows posted:

His generals told him "actually we shouldn't invade the East until 1949 if ever, this isn't a good idea at all. Our industry is still not up to the task and the Russians could easily hold us". He told them they were going to invade anyway. And as a matter of fact. Poland was also invaded a good couple of years before his generals thought he should, etc, etc.

I can't tell if you're arguing against anything I said or not, but regardless I'll point out that even having suffered the appalling destruction that they did during the war, the Soviets had nukes by 1949, and despite this being the second counterfactual road I've wandered down in as many pages, I'd hazard they'd have managed it that much sooner if they hadn't had to rebuild pretty much everything from the Polish border up to a day's drive from Moscow previously.

quote:

Nazi Germany was a history of plans being sped up just because Hitler or one of his underlings thought it would be a good idea with an essential reliance on "we're the master race so we can exceed the old plans". Almost without exception these resulted in long term problems, or would have if not for the whole thing being snuffed out.

Absolutely.

Berke Negri
Feb 15, 2012

Les Ricains tuent et moi je mue
Mao Mao
Les fous sont rois et moi je bois
Mao Mao
Les bombes tonnent et moi je sonne
Mao Mao
Les bebes fuient et moi je fuis
Mao Mao


Nazisim does seem to be this viral strain of fascism that was totally out of control. Other fascist governments in history seem largely self-contained in they want to crush dissidents/labor/left and then are content to rob the country blind and exterminate undesirables/have a failed adventure into Africa, but Germany only existed because it militarily expanded outward to seize resources and then could only survive by continuing to do so.

Ardennes
May 12, 2002

Berke Negri posted:

Nazisim does seem to be this viral strain of fascism that was totally out of control. Other fascist governments in history seem largely self-contained in they want to crush dissidents/labor/left and then are content to rob the country blind and exterminate undesirables/have a failed adventure into Africa, but Germany only existed because it militarily expanded outward to seize resources and then could only survive by continuing to do so.

Well there was also Albania, and Mussolini was pretty aggressive during the early 1920s when Italy had claims on territory all over the place (example: Corfu).

Ultimately, I think the sights set by Fascists are usually limited by their ability to project power. Mussolini obviously could only get away with what he could, likewise Franco and Salazar could only go so far. It wasn't like Portugal was going to be able boss much around except their African colonies at that point.

Granted, there are always grey areas, does Vargas count?

Grand Prize Winner
Feb 19, 2007


e: post is irrelevant, thread has moved on.

Mans
Sep 14, 2011

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

Install Windows posted:


"Wait a bunch more years to build up actual resources and equipment for a serious war? Nah how could these untermenschen slow us down!"

It would be pretty funny to see Operation Barbarossa against a fully reorganized Red Army with the T-34 and KV as main tanks and the Kiev defenses fully constructed.

Ardennes
May 12, 2002

Mans posted:

It would be pretty funny to see Operation Barbarossa against a fully reorganized Red Army with the T-34 and KV as main tanks and the Kiev defenses fully constructed.

Yeah, it wasn't like the Soviets were sitting around, and if anything the longer the Nazis waited after the late 30s purge and the Winter War, the gap was probably going to close not widen.

Stalin was also planning for a war, he was just way to arrogant to believe Hitler would attack so early with Britain still in the war.

Ardennes fucked around with this message at 07:05 on Jan 4, 2014

Mans
Sep 14, 2011

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS
Hitler also literally admited that the reason for war in 1941 didn't have to do with being ready or being "nazi irrational brute", it was because they knew pretty well that the economic and military situation of Germany was a disaster and each day that passed was a day where Germany became weaker.

They had no idea that Poland and France would crumble so fast. They were hoping they could do the same in the east. The U.K. and the U.S.S.R. would get stronger and stronger the more time it passed so rash, idiotic decisions turned out to be the only answers for them.

Raskolnikov38
Mar 3, 2007

We were somewhere around Manila when the drugs began to take hold

Mans posted:

idiotic decisions turned out to be the only answers for them.

fascism.txt

Ardennes
May 12, 2002

Mans posted:

Hitler also literally admited that the reason for war in 1941 didn't have to do with being ready or being "nazi irrational brute", it was because they knew pretty well that the economic and military situation of Germany was a disaster and each day that passed was a day where Germany became weaker.

They had no idea that Poland and France would crumble so fast. They were hoping they could do the same in the east. The U.K. and the U.S.S.R. would get stronger and stronger the more time it passed so rash, idiotic decisions turned out to be the only answers for them.

Well more or less Hitler started a war that his generals knew they couldn't get out of, and quick victories across 1940-1941 only kept the momentum going. However, at that point the situation had gone so far that Hitler had eliminated any rivals on the continent, which only left him and the USSR. It is interesting though Hitler thought of Britain as a natural ally and had hoped way or another the British would see "reason" and join the cause (with Germany in the lead obviously). He even though of letting the British keep their colonies because he was impressed about the job they were doing there.

The British weren't going to give in, and early summer 1941 was ultimately already too late to attack the Soviets.

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

Ardennes posted:

Well more or less Hitler started a war that his generals knew they couldn't get out of, and quick victories across 1940-1941 only kept the momentum going. However, at that point the situation had gone so far that Hitler had eliminated any rivals on the continent, which only left him and the USSR. It is interesting though Hitler thought of Britain as a natural ally and had hoped way or another the British would see "reason" and join the cause (with Germany in the lead obviously). He even though of letting the British keep their colonies because he was impressed about the job they were doing there.

The British weren't going to give in, and early summer 1941 was ultimately already too late to attack the Soviets.

Hitler was a passionate anglophile, on the same level as so many current internet nerds are Japanophiles. Though it wasn't helped that Von Ribbentrop had done a lot to convince Hitler Britain would join him at any time (even though the man was a drat clown if they had even considered it his antics would have derailed it anyway).

MeLKoR
Dec 23, 2004

by FactsAreUseless

Install Windows posted:

In the modern Anglosphere, the French kings are already put in the category of "generic bad guys" like most other royalty of the era and Napoleon is regarded as a murderous midget who ruined Europe.

Which only goes to show that history is written by the victors, Napoleon conquered a lot of countries that were allied against France. I guess he should have just surrendered as soon as he took power.

I'm not a fan of Napoleon but he was a huge improvement over the Directory. His worse defect was his nepotism but what he gets blamed for is waging a war that other nations started and for other nations breaking peace treaties. Someone compared him to Alexander but I don't think that was his shtick at all, I see him more as an Augustus than an Alexander, interested in ruling rather than conquering but circumstances didn't allow him much peace time to do (more of) his thing.

e: Maybe Augustus isn't that right either because Augustus lacked Napoleon's military genius. Maybe Caesar is a more apt comparison but instead of being a brilliant politician first and brilliant general second Napoleon had more emphasis as a brilliant general first and brilliant politician second.
Who knows what might have been if Britain didn't resume war in 1803.

MeLKoR fucked around with this message at 11:39 on Jan 4, 2014

visceril
Feb 24, 2008
Napoleonic France bears some cosmetic resemblances to fascism. The base of Bonaparte's support was the peasantry that were outraged at the mishandling of the revolution and the way that all involved parties didn't seem to give a shot about them--the Jacobins made it clear that they cared more about the cities with the Law of the Maximum, the monarchists were bad for them for obvious reasons, and the moderates were interested in developing capitalism which would've destroyed their way of life anyway. Napoleon's proposition to the peasantry was to put their needs first for once, and he did put his money where his mouth was in that respect. His proposition to the other parties in the cities was an end to incompetent governance and the pointless power struggles. After years of fighting itself and getting nowhere, France would unite and vanquish her enemies.

That's where the similarities to fascism end. He didn't create an enemy, he had plenty of real ones. He also didn't scapegoat any internal group as being the "true" enemy at home except for the corrupt assholes who actually were ruining France. He even went as far as reaching out to the Jews.

What it comes down to is that Bonapartism is a specific political style more so than an ideology. Napoleon did things out of necessity and had no delusions about the enemies he faced (except the weather). This is why, when defeated, he accepted Elba and Corsica instead of suicide or the lamp post.

MeLKoR
Dec 23, 2004

by FactsAreUseless

visceril posted:

His proposition to the other parties in the cities was an end to incompetent governance and the pointless power struggles. After years of fighting itself and getting nowhere, France would unite and vanquish her enemies.

Which was pretty much how Augustus ended the chaos of the Republic and became Emperor as well.

Napoleon would have looked better in my eyes if he became Emperor for real instead of keeping the charade of distinct national monarchies given to his family and generals. That would never be a stable political arrangement long run, even if he managed to keep it all together once he died the whole thing would crumble. He should have kept independent national parliaments, maybe an overarching imperial senate but he should have been the sole head of state.

Not that that made much difference in the end.

MeLKoR fucked around with this message at 14:47 on Jan 4, 2014

visceril
Feb 24, 2008
And if Charlemagne hadn't divided up his kingdom in the Frankish custom, Europe and the entire world would be a very different place. Him being a short-sighted idiot truly altered the course of history.

But that's the way it seems to go with most major world leaders, including :hitler: to stay on topic

Kurtofan
Feb 16, 2011

hon hon hon
Napoleon also reinstated slavery in the French colonies after it had been abolished in 1794 (Robespierre was a notable opponent of slavery) and tried to reconquer Haiti after its independence using the military.

Antwan3K
Mar 8, 2013

Install Windows posted:

Well of course he couldn't win, he was convinced he could just say "our powerful Aryan race will crush these stupid Slavs/whatever" and that would make his poor planning work. It's a great illustration of how fascist ideals fail.

"Wait a bunch more years to build up actual resources and equipment for a serious war? Nah how could these untermenschen slow us down!"

http://vimeo.com/74010304

This is an extremely interesting sound recording of Hitler talking about how surprised he and the other head honchos were to encouter tank factories that were far bigger than expected. I think it is one of the only non-screamspeeching Hitler recordings out there.

Flappy Bert
Dec 11, 2011

I have seen the light, and it is a string


Not only one of the only recordings, it is the only recording of Hitler speaking normally.

Orange Devil
Oct 1, 2010

Wullie's reign cannae smother the flames o' equality!

DerLeo posted:

Not only one of the only recordings, it is the only recording of Hitler speaking normally.

I think the Finnish secret service might have more in its archives but they won't be released for a while yet.

Antwan3K
Mar 8, 2013
http://wdwreview.org/desks/the-serpents-greek-lair/

quote:

Throughout the 1980s, various ultra-right organizations came and went, with fascists and Nazis jostling for position within them. They were never anything other than marginal organizations that had no chance of scoring the vote share that would have propelled them into parliament. Nevertheless, the Serpent’s DNA was preserved inside these groups, ready to sprout a myriad of snakes when the conditions permitted. In February 1983, Nazi thugs viciously attacked Yannis Evangelopoulos, an eighteen-year-old boy, the son of former partisans and civil war refugees who had recently returned to Greece from the Soviet Union. It triggered a number of attacks, one of which was caught on camera, featuring an ax-wielding student leader who is now a Conservative Party government minister. Nazi brutality was on its way back.

An insightful article by economist Yanis Varoufakis about the historical roots of the Golden Dawn party. The opening part about the Peloponnesian farmer, I think touched on a couple of important aspects of fascism's historical political position.

Demiurge4
Aug 10, 2011

Man the last 10 pages have been pretty brutal. I'm not yet willing to renounce the possibility that Fascists can't be reasoned with. They recruit from the poorest demographics with the worst futures, poo poo just look at the London riots and see how many of these exists. I have never met a rich, well educated Fascist.

I'm a socialist and I believe it starts with the smaller programs, there's tons of places in this country where troubled youths are able to meet others and feel as part of a group. These are either run by the city they are in or charities by good people. Most youths who come out of these are at least able to function in society and tend to get the worst jobs, but it's something.

We don't have to fight Fascists with violence. We do it by making sure there's no reason to be a Fascist.

Ardennes
May 12, 2002

Demiurge4 posted:

Man the last 10 pages have been pretty brutal. I'm not yet willing to renounce the possibility that Fascists can't be reasoned with. They recruit from the poorest demographics with the worst futures, poo poo just look at the London riots and see how many of these exists. I have never met a rich, well educated Fascist.

I'm a socialist and I believe it starts with the smaller programs, there's tons of places in this country where troubled youths are able to meet others and feel as part of a group. These are either run by the city they are in or charities by good people. Most youths who come out of these are at least able to function in society and tend to get the worst jobs, but it's something.

We don't have to fight Fascists with violence. We do it by making sure there's no reason to be a Fascist.

Exactly, the best way to eradicate Fascism is to make sure it can't happen in the first place. That said, if anything the system has already failed and the situation has become more desperate.

The Golden Dawn for example is slowly regaining in the polls after most of its leadership was arrested (now in the low double digits), and it is a honest question of where to go from here.

Warbadger
Jun 17, 2006

Mans posted:

Hitler also literally admited that the reason for war in 1941 didn't have to do with being ready or being "nazi irrational brute", it was because they knew pretty well that the economic and military situation of Germany was a disaster and each day that passed was a day where Germany became weaker.

They had no idea that Poland and France would crumble so fast. They were hoping they could do the same in the east. The U.K. and the U.S.S.R. would get stronger and stronger the more time it passed so rash, idiotic decisions turned out to be the only answers for them.

It also had to do with the Soviet Union's poor performance when grabbing their half of the pie during the initial stages of WWII. Nazi Germany and the USSR were cooperating during the initial stages of the war to divide up Europe. The Red Army botched Finland about as much as one can botch a military campaign and wasn't particularly impressive during the joint invasion of Poland, both of which were very visible to their allies in Nazi Germany.

^It's actually notable that during Operation Barbarossa the Soviets actually had the largest advantage in technology related to arms over the Germans. They already had fantastic equipment like the T-34 and KV-1 tanks but the Red Army was suffering from a lack of good leadership and low morale which ensured it wasn't used in an effective fashion.

Warbadger fucked around with this message at 06:16 on Jan 5, 2014

Orange Devil
Oct 1, 2010

Wullie's reign cannae smother the flames o' equality!
Lack of effective leadership is an understatement when they had the likes of Grigory Kulik around who despised tanks and armoured vehicles, personally loving up the armaments of the T34 and KV1, didn't believe in minefields nor retreats nor submachine guns nor Katyushas. His command style was "jail or medal". He was wrong about literally everything and yet hugely influential.

CeeJee
Dec 4, 2001
Oven Wrangler

Orange Devil posted:

Lack of effective leadership is an understatement when they had the likes of Grigory Kulik around who despised tanks and armoured vehicles, personally loving up the armaments of the T34 and KV1, didn't believe in minefields nor retreats nor submachine guns nor Katyushas. His command style was "jail or medal". He was wrong about literally everything and yet hugely influential.

He did save 150,000 Polish prisoners from getting executed.

Orange Devil
Oct 1, 2010

Wullie's reign cannae smother the flames o' equality!

CeeJee posted:

He did save 150,000 Polish prisoners from getting executed.

True, yet I wouldn't be surprised if he caused the deaths of at least as many Russians. The fifth column, it was him.

Cerebral Bore
Apr 21, 2010


Fun Shoe

Demiurge4 posted:

Man the last 10 pages have been pretty brutal. I'm not yet willing to renounce the possibility that Fascists can't be reasoned with. They recruit from the poorest demographics with the worst futures, poo poo just look at the London riots and see how many of these exists. I have never met a rich, well educated Fascist.

You can't "reason" with a committed fascist with any expectation of success because fascism explicitly rejects reasoning as effeminate and cowardly.

Demiurge4 posted:

I'm a socialist and I believe it starts with the smaller programs, there's tons of places in this country where troubled youths are able to meet others and feel as part of a group. These are either run by the city they are in or charities by good people. Most youths who come out of these are at least able to function in society and tend to get the worst jobs, but it's something.

You're missing the point entirely. Of course we need to attack the root causes of fascism, but the only ways to do so is either the dismantling of capitalism or the dismantling of the neoliberal ideological hegemony and a return to a strong social democratic approach.

The problems here are that the first option is a very long-term solution that's probably not going to happen anytime soon and the second option is only a temporary fix, and it too will take some time to accomplish. I'd say that it would take years at least, maybe even a decade.

Demiurge4 posted:

We don't have to fight Fascists with violence. We do it by making sure there's no reason to be a Fascist.

Actually, yes we do. Since even the dismantling of neoliberal hegemony is going to take a very long time and since the fash consequently will still have a raison d'être for years to come, the left must also employ short-term solutions in the meantime as pure damage control. This also includes violence when necessary, because in case you missed it fascism is an ideology explicitly built on the massive use of political violence against its opponents.

To be frank, you're pretty much making GBS threads on people who are engaging in legitimate self-defense and telling them that they should suck up and take it for years until your preferred solution is ready. This is a pretty rear end in a top hat thing to do.

Rutkowski
Apr 28, 2008

CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS GUY?
For the Swedes(and other neighbouring countries' citizens) reading, the Swedish Movement of Resistance or Svenska Motståndsrörelsen is planning something big in February, mid-late, and most likely in Stockholm due to Hagberg being the boss of street activities and he usually base his poo poo from his second apartment in Stockholm. I'm not certain what it is(word is they're not entirely sure yet and with heriarchy being as it is in Lund's narcisist cult) but imagine what happened at the 9th of November, or bigger.

Another reason details may be sparse is because Hagberg(and two others) are still being held for the attack on the 15th of December but he'll most likely be released by then.

In a bit more depressing news, I've gone from one or two death threats a month to two to three per week. I, err, don't really open my door for strangers anymore if we put it like that.

Rutkowski fucked around with this message at 18:27 on Jan 5, 2014

RobertKerans
Aug 25, 2006

There is a heppy lend
Fur, fur aw-a-a-ay.

MeLKoR posted:

Napoleon didn't get to invade most of Europe solely due to the superior tactics of his army, he did it because when asked to stand up and protect whatever their version of Louis XVI / Marie Antoinette from the scary foreign invaders the population rightly told them to eat poo poo and die.

That's not quite right, and this is slight derail (the article's about how Napoleon gained and retained power, and refers specifically to [url= http://rhuthmos.eu/spip.php?article951]interaction ritual chains[/url] ), but pertinent in terms of methods: the parts about manipulative use of nationalism about co-opting sections of the previous autocratic regime are worth a read - [url] http://sociological-eye.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/napoleon-as-ceo-career-of-emotional_3.html?m=1[/url].

RobertKerans fucked around with this message at 15:29 on Jan 5, 2014

Hob_Gadling
Jul 6, 2007

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS
Grimey Drawer

Rutkowski posted:

For the Swedes(and other neighbouring countries' citizens) reading,

Hi neighbor!

I would love an effortpost about where Sweden is regarding immigration, far left and neo-nazism. It's extremely hard to form a coherent picture since there are no neutral sources. I have a vague idea about neo-Nazism in Sweden post-WW2 but the last ten years have seen large demographic and societal changes. Where do you stand?

Rutkowski
Apr 28, 2008

CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS GUY?

Hob_Gadling posted:

Hi neighbor!

I would love an effortpost about where Sweden is regarding immigration, far left and neo-nazism. It's extremely hard to form a coherent picture since there are no neutral sources. I have a vague idea about neo-Nazism in Sweden post-WW2 but the last ten years have seen large demographic and societal changes. Where do you stand?
I'm a syndicalist with a long history of personal battles against nazis(encountered their violence for the first time when I was seven and a group of neo-nazis threw rocks at me and shouted anti-semitic slurs. I come from a small town and I'm of jewish heritage) who in the last twelve months have gone from someone who have mostly done small actions and information gatherings and I'm not rather involved in the anti-fascist movement in Uppsala and Stockholm by information gathering and action co-ordination. Not a big shot in any way but at least now I do something to make poo poo better.

I've been thinking of doing an effortpost about the situation today in Sweden since poo poo is about to hit the fan big-time but I'm in no way a neutral source. ;) I am, however, someone who doesn't lie and I've experienced quite a bit of poo poo personally throughout the years.

I mean, I was a main actor in SMR's favorite propaganda movie this year:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9gT5Xz4oo4

Regarde Aduck
Oct 19, 2012

c l o u d k i t t e n
Grimey Drawer

Demiurge4 posted:

Man the last 10 pages have been pretty brutal. I'm not yet willing to renounce the possibility that Fascists can't be reasoned with. They recruit from the poorest demographics with the worst futures, poo poo just look at the London riots and see how many of these exists. I have never met a rich, well educated Fascist.

I'm a socialist and I believe it starts with the smaller programs, there's tons of places in this country where troubled youths are able to meet others and feel as part of a group. These are either run by the city they are in or charities by good people. Most youths who come out of these are at least able to function in society and tend to get the worst jobs, but it's something.

We don't have to fight Fascists with violence. We do it by making sure there's no reason to be a Fascist.

The problem is if the fascists ever decide to make poo poo get real we'll all be dead before we can take the kid gloves off. That's the problem here. The fascists are the active faction. They initiate and they escalate. You're talking about using peace to combat them in the time that THEY'VE given you.

Demiurge4
Aug 10, 2011

Regarde Aduck posted:

The problem is if the fascists ever decide to make poo poo get real we'll all be dead before we can take the kid gloves off. That's the problem here. The fascists are the active faction. They initiate and they escalate. You're talking about using peace to combat them in the time that THEY'VE given you.

And yet people in this thread are advocating a first strike? I understand that Fascists are likely to use aggression and violence to take power if they feel they have the upper hand. But on the other side we don't have any competent Fascists, anywhere. The Golden Dawn are falling apart, the English Defence League is a joke and there are no significant contenders anywhere because they have all been successfully demonized. What people in this thread are advocating is violence against a bunch of poorly organized and ignorant youths being lorded around by racist old farts.

Ardennes
May 12, 2002

Demiurge4 posted:

And yet people in this thread are advocating a first strike? I understand that Fascists are likely to use aggression and violence to take power if they feel they have the upper hand. But on the other side we don't have any competent Fascists, anywhere. The Golden Dawn are falling apart, the English Defence League is a joke and there are no significant contenders anywhere because they have all been successfully demonized. What people in this thread are advocating is violence against a bunch of poorly organized and ignorant youths being lorded around by racist old farts.

Eh the Golden Dawn aren't falling apart at least in their polling, they stabilized and made some gains since September.

Rutkowski
Apr 28, 2008

CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS GUY?

Demiurge4 posted:

And yet people in this thread are advocating a first strike? I understand that Fascists are likely to use aggression and violence to take power if they feel they have the upper hand. But on the other side we don't have any competent Fascists, anywhere. The Golden Dawn are falling apart, the English Defence League is a joke and there are no significant contenders anywhere because they have all been successfully demonized. What people in this thread are advocating is violence against a bunch of poorly organized and ignorant youths being lorded around by racist old farts.
Nazis, in Sweden at least, are not a threat to society as it is. What they are, however, is a threat to minorities and other civilians and that should never be minimized.

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Darth Walrus
Feb 13, 2012

Rutkowski posted:

Nazis, in Sweden at least, are not a threat to society as it is. What they are, however, is a threat to minorities and other civilians and that should never be minimized.

True, but containment and defence seem to be sufficient direct action at those levels. Fascists are scary in how fast they can escalate, yes, but they need resources and public support to escalate, and those are mighty hard to come by when the society and economy are working OK enough for their brand of alternative not to be appealing (let's be honest, an early-stage fascist party is just a bunch of ridiculous, charmless, racist thugs, and it takes a particular kind of alchemy for them to metamorphose into a proper menace). I think it's important not to run into the very same fascist trap of fetishising violence as a universal solvent. You can't kill fascism by obliterating the gently caress out of a party or three, because you won't be killing the demand, just encouraging others to repackage the same reprehensible poo poo at its core in slightly different labels, symbols, and surface policies. Social and economic reform is the only way to make fascism truly dead (or, because human stupidity is infinite, restricted to one or two nostalgic lunatics).

Now, in the case of the Golden Dawn, which is the goddamn Nazi mafia, or similarly developed fascist parties, discarding moral scruples and using a broader range of measures to annihilate them is a much more tempting option. It isn't a long-term solution, as mentioned above, but they have enough popular support and resources that you really need to start worrying about the short-term, because what they're inches away from doing and even what they're actually doing is goddamn horrific.

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