Reddit reviews The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy
We found 48 Reddit comments about The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.
Penguin Books
Hitler didn't improve the German economy in any real sense. He and his henchman artificially stimulated the economy in order to produce arms and munitions, but their tactics had the country on the economic brink by the late 1930's. Many economic historians think he had no choice but to invade Poland in 1939 to keep the whole system propped up with new resources. See Adam Tooze's "The Wages of Destruction" for a very thorough and interesting discussion of the Nazi pre-war economic system.
Read this.
The short version is that the Nazis essentially ran the German economy and infrastructure into the ground through truly epic mismanagement and faced complete collapse immediately before the war and could only barely keep it ticking over during the war years by looting and forcing "loans" off the occupied countries, their allies and their own population.
No, Hitler and the Nazis were not good for the German economy. Please read the actual history on this. The best book about it currently probably is The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy by Adam Tooze.
yeah wages of destruction by adam tooze really spells out in detail how wrong this is. highly recommend
https://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
pdf, epub, and mobi files are on libgen and also i have them, if anyone's really interested they can pm me
edit: also the last chapter in margaraet macmillan's paris 1919, which tells the story of the creation of the treaty of versailles, basically makes the case that it didn't really start wwii and the germans could easily have paid of reparations because their payments were literally scaled to their gdp or whatever. like they couldn't rearm and pay, but they could pay.
Yeah let me just finish re-reading my copy of Wages of Destruction then maybe i'll get to your Wikipedia link you fucking scrub
That was the first serious history book I loved. The rise in particular is amazing as a primary source, as Shirer was a journalist in Austria before and after the Anschluss. Just don’t put too much stock in what he has to say about teutons.
Also, my French exchange student just about had a conniption when he saw the swastika on the spine on my bookshelf.
Edit: while I’m here I’m going to recommend my current favorite history of WWII, The Wages of Destruction by Adam Tooze. I’ve never found economics so fascinating, or been more thoroughly convinced that Speer should’ve hanged.
https://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
https://www.snopes.com/news/2017/09/05/were-nazis-socialists/
https://www.reddit.com/r/JordanPeterson/comments/9jx6mb/i_thought_we_were_comrades/e6wclyf
Free market to an extent.
Skimming the wikipedia page doesn't make you an expert on the economy. The markets were not planned, but the government stepped in when the health of the nation depended on it. Ebs and flows were common and expected. Subversion of the nation/the peoples would be dealt with.
Do actual research of the economy, don't be a retarded right winger who sees "socialist" and thinks "holy fuck nazis were left wing communists".
​
https://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
https://www.amazon.com/Hitlers-Revolution-Ideology-Programs-Foreign/dp/0988368234/ref=pd_rhf_se_s_cp_0_1?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0988368234&pd_rd_r=bd9c2c5d-283b-4811-bca8-9ac222f69ce3&pd_rd_w=nxQzY&pd_rd_wg=wBgVE&psc=1&refRID=PX3VCSQPKBMYN7FV82YS
Speaking on Germany, Hitler and other leading Nazis made a big point of not having women work outside the home to assist in the war effort as well as maintaining the idea that life would "continue as normal" even when it was apparent that life was anything but during the early stages of the war.
This meant mainly that German industry was not completely focused on assisting the German war effort, and the parts that were focused on war production drew heavily upon foreign and slave labor pools in order to free up German men for military service. Even then, Germany didn't officially enter a state of Total War until early 1943, and measures were still taken to ensure German women weren't prioritized to assist in the war industry when their assistance could have been useful. Slave and foreign labor were seen as the chief sources of labor to be capitalized before women were even considered a potential source of labor. This obviously began to change as the war closed in on Germany's borders.
Whereas in WWI, the German government did not have nearly as many reservations about employing German women in the war effort. I cannot speak as specifically about German industry and output during WWI (I'm not as well read there), but I do know that women were called upon to work in the industry without nearly as many reservations than the Nazi government had during WWII.
Further reading:
Germany At War by Richard Evans
Wages of Destruction by Adam Tooze
The End by Ian Kershaw
>How did they ruin the economy?
Oh I dunno, maybe by forcing inflation on the country and then trying to shore it up by ransacking, pillaging and having many of the able bodied workers sent off to die.
>but the Weimar Republic had a torched economy.
It wasn't great, sure.
> Hitler brought unemployment from a high of 35% in 1932 to below 1% by the time Paul von Hindenburg died (1934).
Hitler and his cronies cooked the books on employment figures. That's Nazi Politics 101.
Of course, Global economic recovery was a pretty good thing for the whole world.
>. How does that qualify as 'ruining' the economy? Lol
Unsustainable industries
No ability to import goods
No ability to produce important domestic goods
Large numbers of people removed from employment record
Certain leaders, scientists and professionals barred from further work
>You have every excuse in the book.
Yes, [this book] (https://www.amazon.ca/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208)
Do your homework champ
>The Rothschilds: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rothschild_family
Where's the evidence?
>Ludwig Wittgenstein: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Wittgenstein
Where's the evidence?
>You should know the Rothschilds. They are probably the richest family the world has ever known. Trillionaires. Of course, not so much anymore, but the story was different a few decades ago.
and?
You might want to read this book and you might come to a slightly altered conclusion. Same end result yes, but the method emphasized more on absolute surprise on the German's part than the alleged French 'surrendermongering'.
Thought I would share that thought. It's quite an amazing read, especially if you believe the myth of Nazi Germany being an economic powerhouse.
>Ilman siionisteja slaavit olisi vapautettu kommunismin yöstä.
Ainoa asia mistä slaavit olisi vapautettu olisi ollut heidän omasta hengestänsä. Kannattaa myös lukea Adam Toozen kirja The Wages of Destruction jossa Tooze käsittelee sitä miksi Kolmas valtakunta oli vuonna 1939 tilanteessa jossa ainoat vaihtoehdot olivat puolustusleikkaukset tai sota ja velkaa oli suhteessa bruttokansantuotteeseen enemmän kuin Yhdysvalloilla oli sodan jälkeen vuonna 1945.
It would be impossible to study (as opposed to hypothesize), but waiting 10 years would almost certainly have been worse for Germany.
AFAIK, it's a commonly held view among historians that the Germans were only able to be as successful as they were because the timing was perfect for them. However, I am not a historian and I would love anyone who knows more than me to chime in (esp anyone from /r/askhistorians)
First, Stalin had just purged vast numbers of high ranking military officers (50% of the entire Soviet officer corps) and their replacements had not yet acquired the experience and knowledge necessary to be effective. The deep operation strategy that the Soviets used effectively later in the war had been developed by the 1930s. But almost everyone who was well versed in it was killed by Stalin and it was disregarded because no one wanted to be associated with the doctrines of people who were purged. In another ten years, the Soviet officer corps would likely have been better developed and the Soviet economy would have been stronger.
Second, the western powers were slow and late in preparing for war. The Germans had been preparing full-tilt since the mid-30s. If the UK and France had another ten years to prepare, I think their air forces would have been overwhelingly larger than Germany's (though they did overly rely on strategic bombers).
Third, the German economy would have collapsed by then. Germany went deep into debt to finance its military buildup, and it did not have the money to continue. Taking over Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland, France, and Denmark allowed it to loot those countries successively and pay for more. A top source on the Nazi economy is Adam Tooze, The Wages of Destruction
Shirer for sure, Speer should be the tenth book you read about that subject, not the first or even second. Speer is simply full of lies and omissions.
May I suggest "The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy" by Adam Tooze.
ps "Perhaps America will one day go fascist democratically." - William L. Shirer
Not a direct answer to your question, but if this is a subject you're interested in I cannot recommend Adam Tooze's Wages of Destruction enough.
This book. Read it.
>The Gross National Product had increased by ten-fold in 1938
GDP alone is hardly the measure of the health of an economy in this case. If you look at official numbers, about 10% of that GDP was tied into direct rearmament efforts. That doesn't include all the short-term borrowing that the Nazis had to do to push rearmament even further (ie: MEFO bills).
In addition to that, a lot of spending and investment was ancillary to the armament industry, for example while not counted as a direct military expenditure, the financing for expanding civilian truck factories. Or efforts in production of synthetic oil.
I also find it funny you used the GDP graph from the Economy of Nazi Germany wiki page, but clearly did not read the page. Let me help you out:
>The Nazis believed in war as the primary engine of human progress, and argued that the purpose of a country’s economy should be to enable that country to fight and win wars of expansion.[4] As such, almost immediately after coming to power, they embarked on a vast program of military rearmament, which quickly dwarfed civilian investment.[5] During the 1930s, Nazi Germany increased its military spending faster than any other state in peacetime,[6] and the military eventually came to represent the majority of the German economy in the 1940s.[7] This was funded mainly through deficit financing before the war, and the Nazis expected to cover their debt by plundering the wealth of conquered nations during and after the war.[8] Such plunder did occur, but its results fell far short of Nazi expectations.[9]
So why is this bad? Because weapons do not increase capital, they do not improve the standard of living, once they are produced, without a war, they do not create jobs. So tying a majority of your economy in military spending is really a dumb move.
Also there's a bunch of other issues like shortages of raw materials, the maintenance of the Gold Standard (lul), the terribad export policy of the Nazis, the mounting debt, the shortage of foreign exchange, etc.
If you really want to learn about the economy of Nazi Germany, read Tooze, who authored pretty much the best book on the subject, instead of a 2h30 Youtube video.
https://www.amazon.ca/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
Historical inaccuracies in a Hollywood movie? Never!
>Germany controlled some 36 percent of European wealth by 1940, while the Soviet Union possessed about 28 percent (see Table 3.3). In the spring of 1940, Germany conquered Belgium, Denmark, France, the Netherlands, and Norway and immediately began exploiting their economies, adding to its wealth advantage over the Soviet Union.^65 The Wehrmacht then invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, and within six months Germany controlled nearly all Soviet territory west of Moscow, which was prime real estate. By late 1941, the Soviet Union had lost territory that held 41 percent of its railway lines, 42 percent of its electricity-generating capacity, 71 percent of its iron ore, 63 percent of its coal, and 58 percent of its capacity to make crude steel.^66 In the spring of 1942, the Nazi war machine further extended its reach by driving deep into the oil-rich Caucasus region. The Soviet Union lost roughly 40 percent of its national income between 1940 and 1942.^67 Germany appears to have held more than a 3:1 advantage in economic might over the Soviet Union by 1942 (see Table 3.4).
>Despite Germany's profound advantage in latent power, the Soviet war economy amazingly outproduced the German war economy over the course of the war and helped shift the balance of power in the Red Army's favor. As described earlier, the Soviet Union produced 2.2 times as many tanks as Germany and 1.3 times as many airplanes between 1941 and 1945. What is most astonishing is that the Soviets even outproduced the Germans in the early years of the war, when German control of Soviet territory was at its peak and the Allied bombing campaign was having barely any effect on the German war economy. The Soviet Union, for example, produced 24,446 tanks in 1942; Germany produced 9,200. The ratio of artillery pieces for 1942 was 127,000 to 12,000 in the Soviets' favor.^68 This asymmetry in weapons production eventually led to a significant Soviet advantage in the balance of ground forces. When Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, the Soviets had a slight advantage in number of divisions - 211:199 - the key indicator of military strength. By January 1945, however, there were 473 Soviet divisions and only 276 German divisions, and the average Red Army division was far better equipped with weapons and vehicles than the average Wehrmacht division.^69
>How did the Soviet Union manage to produce so much more weaponry than a much wealthier Nazi Germany? One possible answer is that the Soviet Union spent a larger percentage of its available wealth on the military than did the Third Reich. But in fact Germany devoted a slightly larger percentage of its national income to defense than did the Soviet Union. The German advantage in defense spending over the Soviets in 1942, for example, was 63 to 61 percent; in 1943, it was 70 to 61 percent.^70 The Allies' strategic bombing campaign might well have hurt German war production in the last months of the war, but as noted above, the Soviet Union was turning out greater numbers of weapons than Germany long before the bombing campaign began to have any significant effect on German output. The Soviet effort was also helped by the U.S. Lend-Lease program, although that aid accounts for only a small percentage of Soviet output.^71 The main reason that the Soviet Union produced so many more weapons than Germany is that the Soviets did a much better job of rationalizing their economy to meet the demands of total war. In particular, the Soviet (and American) economy was far better organized than the German economy for mass producing weaponry.^72
[Source.]
(http://books.google.com/books?id=lDzCD_C_ipoC&printsec=frontcover&dq=John+Mearsheimer&hl=en&sa=X&ei=EYHYU4PyFMKPyASh5YHgBA&ved=0CB4Q6AEwAA#v=snippet&q=soviet&f=false)
See also:
Accounting for War: Soviet Production, Employment, and the Defence Burden, 1940-1945 by Mark Harrison
The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy by Adam Tooze
Read the best book on the German economy:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Wages-Destruction-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
It's a bullshit myth that the German Nazi economy was wonderfully efficient. In fact, the overlapping controls created huge inefficiencies that helped doom the nation when it went to war. Albert Speer's flair for spin during and after the war created a myth that the facts don't support.
Both Soviet Communism and USA capitalism (organized for war) probed MUCH more efficient and productive.
It's incredible how most Europeans support literally the exact same policies as the Nazis did, but without the racism, militarism, and anti-semitism. I'm reading the book Wages of Destruction right now, and the Third Reich's policies are essentially social democracy. I bet I could dig up some Hitler quotes, post them in r/BasicIncome, and people would upvote them.
> Hitler was able to build a booming economy off the back of large internal deficits. He leveraged a strong manufacturing sector to build a self sufficient state.
That's not really true
http://www.amazon.com/The-Wages-Destruction-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
> What does this book say that is different than what has gone before? Heaps. In recent years it has become clear that Germany lost the second world war because the Soviet Union was able to out produce them in the making of armored vehicles. Britain and the United States were able to produce huge numbers more aircraft. The conclusion has been that Hitler's gamble in invading the Soviet Union was the key behind the loss of the war.
>
> What this book suggests is that Germany had lost the war before it invaded the Soviet union and its success up to 1941 had been a lucky break. The author even suggests that Britain alone had some chance of over time developing a preponderance of military force. It also puts paid to what must be now seen as the myth of Munich. Previously it was thought that Britain and France failed to re-arm in time to fight Hitler effectively. What this book shows is that by 1940 Britain and France had armies that were superior in both numbers and equipment. Their navies were vastly superior to Germany's and their air forces at least equal. When France fell, although Britain lost its field army its air force was equivalent to the German in numbers and quality and its Navy vastly superior to anything the Germans and Italians could put to sea. More over the British were able to out produce the Germans in aircraft even prior to the German invasion of the Soviet Union.
>
> The success of the German armies in 1940 was due to the allied command failing to respond to the German strategy. If the allies had been a bit more aggressive they could have fought it out to at least a draw and Germany did not have the resources to fight anything more than a short war. The idea of blitzkrieg was an invention of allied generals seeking to rationalize their defeat rather than a meaningful analysis of what happened. The French never even fully committed their air force to the struggle and most of it was captured on the ground.
>
> The problem was that although Germany had access to the industrial plant of Northern Italy, France, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands they were not able to use it to match either the Soviets or the British in war production. The reasons are complex but relate to the patterns of European trade and the success of the European blockade. If we take aircraft for example the French production which flowed to Germany was miniscule. France had access to manufacturing plant and supplies of bauxite but it was not able to produce. The reason was that it used to import coal from Britain for its electricity production. With the British blockade the main source of coal became Germany. However Germany was not able to increase its production sufficiently to overcome the short fall. In addition the amount of food produced in Europe fell. Previously the production of meat and dairy products in countries such as Denmark had been dependant on the import of grain and stock feed from South America. That was not available and the amount of food available for the dairy industry collapsed as did food production. In the rest of Europe food production had been based on the widespread use of chemical fertilizer. Apart from the issues of the blockade huge amounts of the chemicals used for fertilizer production was diverted to the making of explosives. In addition to the fact that French workers were moved on to subsistence rations and there was no power available the country had been dependant on motorized transportation. Again most of its oil imports came from abroad. With the outbreak of the war the only available oil products came from Romania or from synthetic oil made in Germany. This was barely enough for the needs of the armed forces (there was in reality not enough to keep the Italian Navy operational) and France reverted to a pre-petroleum transport economy.
>
> It is this economic background that gave rise to Hitler's decision to invade the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union had the natural resources that would enable European industry to out produce Britain and America. Rather than rashly starting a two front war Hitler knew that he could never develop the naval might necessary to conquer Britain simply by the occupation of Western Europe. The conquest of the Soviets was a key step in Hitler's strategy and not irrational. Of course none of the German general staff thought that the Soviets could stand up to an invasion of over 3 million men. However the Soviets were able to do so and then they were better able to marshal their resources so that they could outlast the Germans.
>
> This is a very good book which will force everyone to re-think their attitudes to not only the second world war but the historical run up to it. It is unusual to have a book which is of such significance.
Here is the mobile version of your link
Adam Tooze Wages of Destruction. https://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
This is the magnum opus of the Nazi economics. Explaining and eye opening. If there is one book about the Nazi economy it's this. I won't be wasting your time but seriously, order it.
>Hitler's governance and focus on the development of the country is what did not leave Germany handicapped after WWII.
um, what? Hitler ran the german economy into the ground.
> The economy under Hitler prior to the war, and in the beginning years of the war was a hell of a lot better than the Weimer Republic.
Only if you believe Nazi propaganda.
Standards of living had not risen, quite the contrary, as consumer goods demand had been massively shrunk, the State was running a colossal deficit, so that by 1938, the State had defaulted on all foreign loans, and on the internal loans, it was running a pyramid scheme with IOU's, just to keep the economy going without actually putting much wealth into it, had no foreign reserves to import direly needed supplies, and no way of acquiring wealth, save from plundering it from central banks of the countries they invaded. Even before the war, there was already rationing of a number of items.
The Nazis took power in a country that was finally improving the economy and its living conditions, and managed to spiral it out of control and straight into the ground, by a combination of:
https://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
Have fun dispelling the myths you've taken to be true about Nazi Germany!
Wages of destruction by Adam Tooze
History of the Third Reich Series which include:
The Coming of the Third Reich
The Third Reich in Power
The Third Reich at War
Rise and fall of the Third Reich
Thats very good reading material right there.
From Wages of Destruction by Adam Tooze:
"Even if the war had not intervened, developments up to 1939 made clear that the entire conception of the 'people's car' was a disastrous flop."
Specifically regarding the First World War: Germany's reparations obligations to the western powers - already amended by international agreements reached in the 1920s - were abrogated entirely by the Lausanne Conference in the summer of 1932. For more on this, you might read the first couple of chapters of The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy by Adam Tooze, which deals with interwar Germany's competing economic philosophies within the context of the transatlantic political economy.
And I would tell Noam Chomsky that he is also completely off base in his economic comparison of the final years of the Weimar Republic and the United States. The German economy was suffering from extreme balance of payments problems based partly on the fact that it refused to abandon the Gold Standard. The U.S. hasn't been on a metallic standard since the Nixon Administration. Germany also had massive structural problems in that it could not provide a modern standard of living for many of its citizens (this was exacerbated when the Nazis shifted all output to military products). There were still many peasant farmers. Look at the figures of Herbert Backe and Walther Darré. Also, my points about the social problems and violence still stand; the TSA is not the SS, the Sturmabteilung (SA), or even the Gestapo. To say so is simply absurd. If you want to learn about history and make proper comparisons, don't read the opinions of a linguist and philosopher, read something by a historian. I'd recommend The Wages of Destruction by Adam Tooze as a good starting point.
> I suggest one of the reasons there was a WWII was to destroy Hitler for successfully challenging the private foreign Central Bank, for restoring economic prosperity to Germany through Germany being able to issue it's own currency.
Counter-suggestion.
There is a very informative book you might enjoy,
http://www.amazon.com/The-Wages-Destruction-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
Recommended.
But they also seized, for example, a big aircraft company. Source, The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy, very highly recommended, especially about exactly what they ended up doing.
In Economics, right wing is capitalism, left wing is a centrally planned government, and than there is mixed economy approaches which encompasses a large majority of economic systems. You said that the National Socialist Party was "inhereny right wing" economically. To anyone who studies economics and has taken beyond an introductory class, that means a capitalist system. Not a mixed economy. I have said this multiple times.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2597802?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
This is Peter Temin's original paper on the topic which led to all the pushback your papers were referring to. While I don't stand by 100% of what he says in here, he is one of the top economists in the world for a reason. This is the basis of where the socialist vs communist discussion in the academic community is founded upon.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/1830929?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
This is a good paper analyzing the leviathan state and destruction of the free market and eventual civil liberties through Nazi Germany. This paper I have not combed through myself but a colleague of mine presented it's research at a conference I was at last year and this was the link on his LinkedIn profile so I presume it is the right one. I believe it also addresses the proposed inability to seperate social atrocities (in this case the Holocaust) and macroeconomics which while you didn't bring up, some people do. If this is the wrong paper, let me know and I will send him an email and ask for a link to the correct one.
The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy https://www.amazon.com/dp/0143113208/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_QHH6CbMGJCNCQ
While Temin's paper focuses mostly on pre-war, this is the best research done into the wartime economy of Nazi Germany. It discusses in extreme depth the command economy of the party and how the seeds of the wartime command economy were planted in the centrally planned economy pre-war and how that transition came to be. It is extremely fascinating but is a slow read.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/24563068?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
This paper goes through a lot of the misconceptions that you have presented and while isn't the best written, fits your particular view point quite well. It makes a few overreaches into modern day political times but if you take it for its historical analysis it is a decent article.
Listen dude or dudette. This is something I have studied a lot. Once I get my undergraduate, I likely will shift my focus towards microeconomics (if I don't end up in Law School) but this is something I have spent a sizeable portion of my life studying. I've given an academic presentation at a conference on this topic. I've heard every arguement possible. You can accept the fields opinions or not. It isn't as cut and dry as something like vaccines, but it's an issue with little wiggle room.
While the Nazi party may have claimed to be against socialist policies, they certianly enacted them. Even in the best light possible you can only really argue it is an extremely left leaning mixed economy. Vox tried to make this arguement quite well earlier this year for what it's worth.
If research by some of the best economists in the world, that has been defended for decades at this point, doesn't convince you, than I can't conceive of what possibly could. As far as I'm concerned this conversation is over. You can remain unconvinced but these are the conclusions people much more versed than you or I have reached.
Edit: Grammar
Try:
http://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1309493214&sr=8-1
Well, "the economic crisis" that Hitler rose to power in was quite unrelated to the hyperinflation crisis. The economics behind Hitler's rise was quite complicated, but at the root, it is driven by a feedback loop of deflation. The precise mechanics of it is a bit too complicated to explain in a post, but this book:
http://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1292517108&sr=8-1
Does a pretty good job of explaining everything.
I loved The Wages of Destruction by Adam Tooze. It's a great economic history of the Reich, and the role of monetary policy is discussed there as well.
Completely agree. Surrounded in fact not just by smart people but some of the smartest on the planet, at least in the sciences and military. Here's a fantastic book by Adam Tooze regarding the ruination of the Nazi economy, that basically doomed Germany, if anyone's interested
As the blurb says 'an extraordinary mythology has grown up around the Third Reich that hovers over political and moral debate even today'. That mythology is one of competence.
Mods deleted my post, so, too briefly: Issue is whether or not the risk is worth insuring against. Re: precedents for Ps causing PROBLEMS when they perceive themselves to be imperiled:
From 2019 book Appeasement: Chamberlain, Hitler, Churchill, and the Road to War:
>Of course, the overwhelming responsibility for the Second World War rests with Adolf Hitler. Only he and his most fanatical henchmen desired it [my emphasis]. Only he willed the series of events that led to it. Yet while Hitler was uniquely responsible for the tragedy, the question remains: How was he allowed to inflict such misery? How was it that a country defeated in 1918, reduced in size, restricted in arms and surrounded by potential foes, was allowed to rise in twenty short years to a position where she was able to mount a challenge for global supremacy and almost achieve her objective?
Re: Hitler and said henchmen believed they were IMPERILED
From 2008 book The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy:
>Since 1938 Hitler had seen himself as locked in a global confrontation with world Jewry.
>
>. . . For Hitler, a war of conquest was not one policy option amongst others. Either the German race struggled for Lebensraum [i.e., territory] or its racial enemies would condemn it to extinction.
Precedent for resistance by IMPERILED Ps who have a large war chest and don’t govern a country
From a 2018 article titled “Los Extraditables, the Pablo Escobar-Led Gang That Launched a Bloody Campaign Against U.S. Extradition”:
>The terrorist group . . . claimed “we prefer a grave in Colombia to a prison in the United States . . .”
Escobar was a drug-trafficker whose net worth reached $58 billion (in 2018 dollars). The other leaders of Los Extraditables were wealthy drug-traffickers.
From 2001 book Killing Pablo: The Hunt for the World’s Greatest Outlaw (my emphases):
>“[Escobar] intended, he said, to use the public’s weariness with [Escobar-funded] violence to his benefit. He planned to turn up the violence until the public cried out for a solution, a deal.
>
>. . . A communiqué from the Extraditables not long after hammered home the point:
>
>We are declaring total and absolute war on the government, on the individual and political oligarchy, on the journalists who have attacked and insulted us, on the judges that have sold themselves to the government, on the extraditing magistrates . . . on all those who have persecuted and attacked us. We will not respect the families of those who have not respected our families. We will burn and destroy the industries, properties and mansions of the oligarchy.”
>
>“At his [Pablo’s] peak, he would threaten to usurp the Colombian state.”
>
>“Ever since Pablo’s men had blown that Avianca flight out of the sky . . .”
>
>“[A] total of 457 police had been killed since Colonel Martinez had started his hunt. Young gunmen in that city were being paid 5 million pesos for killing a cop.”
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i don't think the reich had an effective long-term strategy. it was very militaristic and essentially required the plunder of other nations.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Wages-Destruction-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
You mean the basically facade economy funded by mefo-IOU's, looting of whole peoples belongings and unsustainable and corrupt policies, and book cooking along with employment percentage scams by basically writing unemployed women out of the workforce?
https://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
Interesting. Castles of Steel is on the top of my book stack I've had it for months just haven't gotten around to and I'll read it after I finish Wages of Destruction.
If you want an even better and more easy on the eyes book take a look at The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy by Adam Tooze. You can get it used for $10 and it's good for people who want an introductory book on the subject.
See Adam Tooze's Wages of Destruction for a complete refutation of A and B.
Please educate yourself before spouting misinformation.
http://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
Read it. Its a long read, but if you are interested in the subject you will thank me later.
>The point was they wouldn’t have invested in the V2 and would have put that into the nuclear program
And that point is, in a word, wrong. The V-2 program delivered a 2000lb warhead. Early nukes weighed 10,000lb. And it's not just the weight. early nukes were finicky, not reliable enough to go on the heads of ballistic missiles. There are reasons no one was able to build a reliable nuclear ballistic missile until the late 50s.
> the German strategy was majorly flawed, they needed a different one if they were to actually succeed.
Yes, it was. the strategy you've suggested, however, is much more flawed.
>I pointed out they had the capability to do what everyone feared...they did,
No, they did not. They did not have the capability to to that, and they had even less capability to do what you suggested they do. The plan is completely unrealistic, both from a then-sight perspective and from a hindsight perspective. 3 atomic bombs in 1945 do not win the war for germany. Spending 2 billion dollars to get them does ensure they lose the war a lot sooner.
>If they had went with nukes instead of rockets they still would have had the ability to hit the eastern seaboard by plane from from Spain.
No, they would not have. Putting aside the fact that they didn't control spain, it's more than 3000 miles from the US to spain, TWICE the distance B-29s flew to bomb japan. They would have needed a plane the size of the B-36, something the US didn't have until long after the war, and something well beyond the capacity of even the paper studies the germans were doing during the war.
>They didn’t need Russia to conquer England,
Yes, they did. That need was precisely why they invaded russia. Without access to more raw materials, the germans had no hope of being able to master the air and sea around the UK, without that, they were as stuck as napoleon was.
>which under a united German front would have happened in 1941,
No, it wouldn't have. Operation sealion was utterly hopeless. I can point to any of a dozen books on the subject, all with the same conclusion.
>and without PH would have given the US a president that wasn’t FDR to deal with Germany, and likely one that would have ran on a protectionist agenda....possibly even an agenda that would have put us somewhat in line with German interest.
this is just incoherent.
>Hitler kicked them out and put them in camps.
Who is Alfried Krupp? Stop getting your ideology from memes and read a history book. Here's a start: https://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208
>(i.e. he went to prison)
Actually just a few DWIs but no prison time.
>Doesn't sound like any sort of fascist at this point.
What is a fascist? I'm afraid that's the actual bulk of the movement. It's just bigoted morons with horrible taste and their politics are just wrapped up in worshipping the brute force of the state.
>Hitler utilized some socialist policies and talking points, but he also oversaw massive privatization as well
No he didn't. this is a lie.
>as the murder of many socialists including the more socialism-inclined members of the Nazi party (the Strasserists)
Stalin murdered more socialists than hitler could shake a stick at in the purges. killing fellow socialists is a well established socialist tradition.
>The Nazi party may have had the word "socialist" in their name, but they were an explicitly anti-left party, certainly after the Night of Long Knives.
anti marxist does not mean they weren't socialist.
>That doesn't make it socialist or communist.
No, but calling your fucking party that and teaming up with other socialists does.
No, I think Germany was poor because it was poor. https://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destruction-Making-Breaking-Economy/dp/0143113208/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8 That book very thoroughly explains it. Also, Hitler's whole reason for starting the war was because Germany was poor!!!
Yeah, government spending can make a temporary boom. Duh.