X-Message-Number: 18117
Date: Sat, 08 Dec 2001 19:33:45 -0800
From: Olaf Henny <>
Subject: OFF TOPIC: We need new standards
References: <>

It is difficult to avoid the consequences of September 11 and the
moral issues involved in any forum.  So here is my TCW concerning
the recent discussion on the subject:

America has never had the intellectual insights, which come with
losing a war to the extent, that the incumbent structure of
government is eliminated.  The American public has therefore
never been exposed to the assessment of their conduct as seen
from the perspective of their enemies.

I was a child in Germany during WWII and do have some perceptions
to share.

One of the finest people I have ever met was my own father.  He
was also a Captain in the German Army and a member of the NSDAP
(National Sozialistische Deutsche Arbeiter Partei) or as you all
know it, the "Nazi Party".

When those pictures from the concentration camps were published,
he was firmly convinced, that they were falsifications produced
by the Allies for propaganda purposes.  "We Germans don't commit
such atrocities".  Fact was, "we Germans" did.  I don't think,
that he had accepted this fact, by the time I left home 6 years
later at age 17, to flee to the West.  It was just too
incomprehensible.

Side bars:
-   God was of course on our side.
-   I don t know about the CIA manual, but all Nazi manuals
prescribed chivalry and respect for the enemy soldier.  - Hmm

Not all is noble in the "Land of the Brave"
Sir Arthur Harris developed the strategy to concentrate bombing
raids on civilian targets in order to demoralize the German army.
This was fully supported by Churchill and executed by all Allies.
Case in point the bombing of Dresden on February 14, 1945,
potentially, depending on which of the below figures you believe,
the biggest killing of civilian population in one night in world
history.  There were no military targets other than Hospitals
in Dresden.  German figures (still during the war) put the
casualties of indigenous Dresdeners at 225,000 with an estimated
equal number of refugees from the eastern parts of the country,
who had camped in the parks along the Elbe river for a total of
over 400,000.  Soviet reports after the war basically jibed
with those figures.  However in the western press they were
quoted at 125,000 to 150,000.-.  The truth lies probably
somewhere in between, although I see little strategic purpose for
the Germans in inflating these figures, since impact on the
morale of Germans had become an issue in those last days of
the war.

However the Soviets clearly *had* an interest in inflating the
figures, while the West had one in deflating them.

Bombing raids by the Soviets were negligible and almost
exclusively limited to support for their ground troops

It is clear, that atrocities have been committed by all parties,
and they will continue to be committed until the denial of our
own guilt ends; in history and ongoing.  Unfortunately national
fervour, as it is fostered during times of war and emergencies
contributes to the glorification of the image of  "our guys" and
to the denial that "we Germans" or "we Americans" or "we
Whoevers"do such things.

America has due to the fact, that although it can be hurt in this
"War on Terror", but not destroyed, the opportunity to take
the high road and set new standards by refraining from
"news management" and pursue a policy of openness of
reporting and civility of conduct.  A good start would be to
abolish that notion of trying anybody in the relative secrecy of
military courts, with limited due procedure.  Democracy is
difficult. But isn't that exactly what we want to export?  Don't
we purport, we are fighting for *civil* rights?  Can we deny
others those rights, when it suits us and then expect them to
respect our system?  IMOEO the Bush administration claims, that
it is fighting *international* terrorism, therefore the culprits
belong to The Hague, alongside with Slobodan Milosevic et al.
But that would run counter the American (and Bush s) passion to
kill everybody who is convicted (rightly or wrongly) of a capital
crime.  That will be interesting, when the extradition procedures
for those start, who are caught in other countries in connection
with the 9/11 atrocity  and no European country will extradite,
because the culprits would face the death penalty in the US.  But
that is another story.

Best,
Olaf

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