A nuanced attempt by Sen. Linsey Graham (R-SC) to assert that the U.S. should never have been in the position to have to launch the Normandy invasion 80 years ago fell with a thud on Sunday morning after he told a CBS host that D-Day was a "failure."Discussing battling Russian President Vladimir Put...
Bad choice of words, but this reads to me like we should have acted earlier with Hitler. And we should now with Putin as well.
Even though he says it’s not about NATO, he’s trying to lay groundwork for anti NATO posturing. Anything that makes it more cozy for pro Putin sentiment his guy is championing.
How? I read it as “What’s happening in Ukraine has nothing to do with NATO expansion but is about a megalomaniac trying to recreate the Russian Empire”… Basically, it would have happened even if NATO expansion hadn’t.
Yeah that what I’m reading from it as well, I don’t know how much I believe the chode, but if he’s suggesting we put our foot up putins ass, then I’m all for it.
The Neville Chamberlain of our time is Angela Merkel. Her softballing of any and all reactions to the 2014 invasion (more or less the Anschluss of our time) was categorically inexcusable and deeply wrongheaded.
I thought the modern view of Chamberlain had evolved. Chamberlain knew that the UK wasn’t prepared for war. If the UK had instead went head to head with the Axis powers in Europe the UK armed forces would have been quickly been overwhelmed. Instead, with the “appeasement” doctrine, it bought time for the UK to prepare to be on the front lines of war, as well as turn up the war machine of USA industry.
I didn’t think the old thought that Chamberlain didn’t think think Hitler was a threat was still the common idea.
Wait, what?
As far as I am aware, Chamberlain was central to the UK (and their allies at the time) following an appeasement policy instead of intervening in Czechoslovakia (which, crucially at the time, had arguably the most advanced defense industry in the world, which Nazi Germany co-opted to substantially augment their own defense industry), Austria, or Poland. Add that to the fact that his defense policy was much more along the lines of bluster and bravado, instead of actually trying to gear the UK up for an obviously imminent (so long as one didn’t subscribe to the “appeasement” point of view) major conflict. This materially negatively affected the BEF’s combat ability during the UK’s attempt to help the French push back the Germans (TL;DR Dunkirk), and overall, gave the Third Reich the breathing room they needed to significantly strengthen their military industry, and as a direct consequence, their military.
All that said, if you have some sources regarding the “modern reinterpretation” of Chamberlain’s policies and actions vis a vis WW2, I would be quite interested to check them out.
“Therefore, British military intervention on the continent might be necessary “at any time within the next, say, three to ªve years.” Under these circumstances, the report concluded, the British military was woe- fully underfunded and unprepared, which necessitated a signiªcant rearma- ment campaign. 43”
“The rearmament campaign would be a slow one, particularly given the eco- nomic constraints imposed by the world economic crisis and British war debts to the United States. Consequently, the government needed to buy time and became obsessed with “the importance of not giving Germany any excuse to re-arm without further parley.” 44 Thus was born the policy of accommodating German demands in the face of increasing German perªdy, in an attempt to slow the pace of German challenges.”
“Their idea was that if Hitler were to begin open, full-scale rearma- ment in violation of part 5 of the Versailles treaty, Britain would be powerless to oppose the fait accompli; therefore, they were better off acknowledging Ger- many’s covert rearmament and permitting it, in exchange for freely agreed- upon limits on German armed forces.”
“This hardly refects a belief that appeasement would bring lasting peace. Instead, the documents reveal a wide- spread pessimism and feeling of powerlessness to stop the German challenges until Britain fully rearmed. 53”
source
You can also read the notes from Chamberlain on his meeting with Hitler, as well as UK General Ismay to the British Cabinet.
"(b) So far as air power is concerned, Germany may be able to maintain her lead over the Franco-British Air Forces in air striking power. On the other hand, it is open to us, provided that we make the necessary effort, to catch her up, or at least greatly reduce her lead, in the matter of defence (both active and passive) against air attack. By so doing we shall have heavily insured ourselves against the greatest danger to which we are present exposed: indeed by substantially reducing Germany’s only chance of a rapid decision, we shall have provided a strong deterrent against her making the attempt.
© It follows, therefore, that, from the military point of view, time is in our favour, and that, if war with Germany has to come, it would be better to fight her in say 6-12 months’ time, than to accept the present challenge.
source
Fascinating.
While I agree that the UK had few options at the time - and none of them great - the fact remains that Germany was subject to largely the same economic constraints: global economic recession, and (more onerous even than the UK’s war debts) war reparations that further crippled their economy. It’s just that Hitler and the Nazi Party simply built their military industry and armed forces up anyways.
One of the approaches Chamberlain could have taken would have been to open talks with the US government to discuss extensions on their repayment schedule, due to the disturbingly escalating tensions in mainland Europe (and don’t forget that the Soviets were also a significant threat at the time, ultimately culminating with their invasions of Finland and Poland). All that said… there were significant fascistic elements in the US at the time, many of which pushed for outright alliance with Germany, so unfortunately, that may have ended up as a non-starter.
TL;DR: while I appreciate the data and context, I still don’t think I agree with the characterization that Chamberlain did all that was possible at the time. Though, to be fair, fascism itself was a new and novel political system at the time, and not many people outside of fascist political leaders themselves really fully understood the full implications of a fascist world power (Italy; Germany). Also to be fair, Stanley Baldwin (Chamberlain’s predecessor) and Ramsay MacDonald (Baldwin’s predecessor) absolutely set the stage for the difficulties that Chamberlain faced. And, to again be fair, almost every single world power at that point was kinda also preoccupied with the Great Depression.
Edit: all of which is creepily similar in a lot of ways to the situation the world finds itself in now.
And the continued softballing. Even economically.
For sure. Her ceaseless push for rapprochement with Russia in the face of their incredibly obvious territorial ambitions - not to mention, the fact that she outright ignored and disparaged pretty much all of Eastern Europe’s concerns about Russia (which, by the way, largely turned out to be spot on) was so deeply imbecilic that I have a hard time wrapping my head around it. The history, the signs, and the evidence were all there; she just refused to see it.
Bad choice of words? Either he’s so far-gone that he doesn’t realize that the second half of what he says contradicts the first half or he’s a master troll, but to so artfully undermine one’s own argument so succinctly is, I dare say, an excellent choice of words.
It’s as if there’s a reasonable person trapped deep down inside of him, struggling to break free, so we get kinda disjointed utterances from him like this occasionally. He used to be very good at being anti-Trump. It’s funny how he is sometimes very bad at being pro Trump.
I could see an argument suggesting we should have intervened long before it got to the point of the D-day beach invasion. Considering waiting that long to be a “failure”.
But also dude is a spineless moron so who knows what he intended to say.
Right. Like, by what he appears to be suggesting, we should have actively joined the war in Europe earlier, instead of just supplying aid and intel to the Allies for so long before committing troops. Like somehow squash Hitler before he got very far.
So it seems like he’s advocating for us going to war with Russia immediately.
But in reality, he’s a Putin bitch boy, so that’s obviously not what he’s suggesting.
Edit - Re-reading, I can’t come to any other conclusion than he thinks we shouldn’t have joined the fight at all. But we joined only when forced by Pearl Harbor, which was a result of our aid to the Allies. And IIRC, the US wasn’t really ready to mobilize our military for a campaign in Europe for we did anyway, which is why we were sending aid in the meantime.
So the only logical conclusion I can draw is that he thinks the US should have stayed neutral. That it was out participation that was unnecessary. Particularly when he says we shouldn’t be sending Ukraine aid.
I don’t know how you can read it this way honestly…
Well, I explained my reasoning in great detail. Do you disagree with any specific point?
It’s clear that what he’s saying is that reaching the point where D-Day was necessary is a failure on our part because Hitler should have been stopped much sooner and that what’s happening now in Russia has nothing to do with NATO’s expansion and is all because of Putin that would have pushed to expand Russia’s territory no matter what because he dreams of recreating the Russian Empire.
What he’s implying is that the lessons from WW2 should apply here and we shouldn’t wait for a second D-day to be necessary before acting on that front.
I’m not a WW2 buff, but I painted my understanding of the USA’s pre-D day readiness and why we didn’t jump in directly until forced.
If that’s inaccurate, I’m interested in hearing a counter argument.
So if your interpretation of his words are correct, it seems like it’s counter to what historians believe WRT to US’s readiness to mobilize our forces at the time. At least as I understand it.
So either I understand this history here in correctly (very possible), or Lindsay is talking out his ass in a surprisingly specific way (also very possible), or he’s dog whistling for Nazis in that the US should have stayed out of it.
Given the rewriting of Nazi history that the GOP has been practicing for years, I’m going with dog whistling.
Edit - Just wanted to address the NATO point. I don’t think anyone’s disagreeing with that. No one but Russian propagandists even claim that Russia attacked because of the NATO application.
Did you read the quote?
Churchill didn’t think the war was unnecessary because the Germans should have been allowed to do what they wanted
https://scottmanning.com/content/what-did-churchill-mean-by-unnecessary-war/
The “we” in the quote isn’t the USA only either.
Soviet soldiers joked opening canned meats the US sent, saying they were opening the second front.
Wait, he’s saying D-Day was a failure of appeasement?
The way I understand it is that reaching the point where D-Day was necessary shows our failure because it should never have been allowed to happen in the first place.
But I might be too optimistic
I mean, the guy is just falling over himself to demonstrate his ignorance of the war. British high command had loads of very easy opportunities to kill Hitler but chose not to incase someone who wasn’t a speedball addicted, half crazed walking liability took over instead.
British high command always viewed commies and sympathizers as the bigger threat, wrt both the Soviet Union and Germany. Hitler was doing their work for them
Yeah, you’re thinking of America for the first part.
I mean, it would make sense, if The UK hadn’t been at war with Germany and Italy for years before the Axis powers invaded the soviet Union. The day they invaded the soviet union, Britain started buying up all the wool in the world they could lay their hands on, to get at the nazis in every way possible. Despite being nearly starved into surrender and on rations nationally, the UK still sent huge amounts of aid, weapons and materials to the soviet Union, with the Arctic convoys.
Nazi Germany also gave the UK the chance to sit it out and keep their empire, as they wanted to go east and would rather use their resources on that, instead of fighting the royal navy.
The UK chose to fight the Nazis. They were drawn in by an alliance but who could have done anything about the UK changing their mind? No one could have done a thing.
So no, the reason was that Hitler was a cracked out junkie and he was preferable to one of Germany’s many capable field marshals being in charge instead.
And the head of the republican party.
deleted by creator
The US didn’t enter the war until well after the battles at Stalingrad. The reason is, the US was hoping that the Nazis would destroy the USSR. Once it was clear that the USSR was actually winning, the USA and GB swooped in to clean up the Western Front so that the USSR couldn’t take credit, despite losing 20 million people to the Nazi invasion.