But perhaps it really is always 1939. Or, to be even more glib, what you are saying sounds to me much like:
Every time we see icebergs on the horizon, you steer around them, but the ship never actually sinks. And every time I say we should forget about icebergs, you bring up the Titanic. You paranoiacs really need to get a new routine, people aren’t falling for it anymore.
OK, let’s be serious. Let’s say that “being Hitler” means going on an ever-increasing campaign of conquest against neighbouring countries that results in a very damaging war. We could note that this kind of behaviour was very common prior to the Napoleonic Wars (Napoleon, Frederick the Great, Charles XII, Louis XIV, Wallenstein, Philip II, Suleiman I, etc etc). Since the Napoleonic Wars, there have been a number of international frameworks more-or-less explicitly devoted to prevent “Hitlers,” and which have had some success. However, IR is basically anarchy, which means that when actors fail to abide by the rules of those international framework, forcing them in line means war.
There haven’t been a lot of “Hitlers” in recent years. But at least part of the reason that the people you call “warmongers” nipped the likes of Saddam, Milosevic, Galtieri, etc in the bud. For example, Saddam was definitely on the Hitler path in 1991, and what stopped him was western military intervention. And not only did this intervention stop him, but it acted as a warning to other leaders who might be considering more bellicose action, and helped reinforce the rules and norms of our peaceful international framework.
But this commitment is forever being tested, because leaders get glory through war. Consider that the fame and popularity of American Presidents has been shown to be higher the more Americans who die in military combat in their term in office (!) and then multiply that for more bellicose societies such as Russia. A peaceful world requires constant vigilance.
In the current case, it’s clear that Putin is engaged in an aggressive campaign of conquest against his neighbours (not merely in Ukraine). It’s not clear where this will stop. It’s clear that every victory strengthens Putin’s domestic position and emboldens him for the next step. This is the classic “Hitlerian” path, and everyone from Hillary Clinton to Prince Charles has noted it. That doesn’t mean the West should necessarily intervene (maybe the costs are greater than the benefits) but it’s pretty obvious why the comparison is so widely made. I’d say the ‘routine’ that no-one is falling for is the Panglossian one that Putin isn’t a predator—with each new Russian outrage, it becomes harder and harder to sustain.
I haven’t heard the (potential) interventions against Qaddafi and Assad justified on the same grounds. There, the justification is usually a combination of (1) humanitarian and (2) preventing failed states, which is rather different.
Let’s say that “being Hitler” means going on an ever-increasing campaign of conquest against neighbouring countries that results in a very damaging war.
...AND end up on the losing side of history.
That’s an important addendum because sometimes you go on an ever-increasing campaign of conquest against neighbouring countries that results in many damaging wars, establish a successful empire, impose a Pax Romana, and, basically live happily ever after. People who succeed at this aren’t usually called Hitlers.
But you also have to remember that there is not the history between the US and these other regimes the way it is between the US and Russia. Putin is an old communist and he remembers the old days, he remembers them very well and he wants them back. Putin and his cronies chafed in the 90′s under Pax Americana and now they have their chance to shake up the international order rather than conform to the American lead way of doing things and I think he is of the opinion that if it doesn’t happen now there won’t be another chance for a generation.
1938: “Just give him the parts of Czechoslovakia he wants. Yeah, annexing a part of other country is wrong, but a minority speaking his language lives there, so, uhm, he kinda has a good reason. More importantly, we have a good reason to believe he will stop there. Just let’s not be the bad guys who fight over nothing. Everything will be fine when he gets what he wants, he is a reasonable guy.”
2014: “Just give him the parts of Ukraine he wants. Yeah, annexing a part of other country is wrong, but a minority speaking his language lives there, so, uhm, he kinda has a good reason. More importantly, we have a good reason to believe he will stop there. Just let’s not be the bad guys who fight over nothing. Everything will be fine when he gets what he wants, he is a reasonable guy.”
The analogies are much deeper here than merely “he is a guy we don’t like, therefore Hitler”. Things that happen inside Russia are also very disturbing—I am trying to ignore politics, and I usually don’t care about what happens in Russia, but some news still get to me—Putin’s supporters are openly nationalist, racist, homophobic, pretty much everything you associate with fascism, he has a strong support of the Orthodox Church, journalists who criticize him are assassinated. (Someone living in Russia would be more qualified to write about this.) The only way he could lose an election would be against someone who is even more like this. Winning a symbolic war against the West will only make him more popular.
To test how strong is this analogy, we should make bets like: Conditional on Putin successfully annexing a part of territory of Ukraine, what is the probability of Russia attacking another country within 1, 3, 5, 10 years? Which country will it be?
The analogies are much deeper here than merely “he is a guy we don’t like, therefore Hitler”. Things that happen inside Russia are also very disturbing—I am trying to ignore politics, and I usually don’t care about what happens in Russia, but some news still get to me—Putin’s supporters are openly nationalist, racist, homophobic, pretty much everything you associate with fascism, he has a strong support of the Orthodox Church, journalists who criticize him are assassinated.
All of these things also apply to the other examples I mentioned, and many other countries besides. People said the same things about Saddam, Qaddafi, Assad, etc. Putin is of course saying similar things about his Ukrainian enemies to what you are saying about him. (Admittedly, they make it easy for him.)
There is no shortage of historical examples of historical revanchism, yet the “Hitler in 1939” analogy utterly dominates. So why rely 100% on one analogy. Why insist on using the example that is the closest stand-in for “evil psychopath who cannot be reasoned with, but must be destroyed utterly?”
Probably because you’re in the midst of a media driven two-minutes hate. History begins and ends with Hitler, 1939!
(Seriously, your standard for being Hitleresque is being racist, homophobic, and nationalistic? It might be a fun exercise for you to write down a list of 100 historical leaders, determine how many were/were not racist, homophobic, or nationalistic. This will give you your Hitler/non-Hitler ratio. Do you think the ratios of Hitlers : non-Hitlers is greater or less than 1?)
Probably because you’re in the midst of a media driven two-minutes hate.
This situation is optimized for media, but exactly in the opposite way. The whole attack is divided into many incremental steps. Each small step is not enough to evoke a military response from the West. Then there is a pause, until media stop paying attention and find something else to care about. Then another small step.
(Remember the first step? Russian soldiers without uniforms in Ukraine territory, not yet openly fighting anyone, just carrying weapons and looking intimidating. So, what are you going to do about it? First, there is no war yet, and second, they even deny being Russian. Calm down, everyone, calm down, nothing to see here. -- A few steps later it’s obvious there are Russian troops there, but we already kinda knew it for months, so why the sudden overreaction today? Calm down, everyone, calm down, nothing new is happening here.)
This is how you overcome the Schelling point—by doing a calculated very small step, and then calling your opponent irrational if he wants to react.
This situation is optimized for media, but exactly in the opposite way. The whole attack is divided into many incremental steps.
Dividing something in many incremental steps that each are newsworthy generally means that the whole things gets more media attention than if you do everything at once.
Wikileaks for example didn’t release all the cables at once but purposefully spread them out over a time to give them more media attention.
I would guess that more than half of all rulers in history took others’ territory, or tried to and failed. And being nationalistic goes without saying ever since the invention of nationalism.
The specific tactic of nibbling on your neighbors one bit at a time, varying your speed depending on international reactions, was used by Hitler but also by many others. Calling a common behavior Hitleresque isn’t useful.
There are good reasons for comparing Germany in 1938 with Russia in 2014, but I don’t think these are among them.
I would guess that more than half of all rulers in history took others’ territory, or tried to and failed. And being nationalistic goes without saying ever since the invention of nationalism.
And more than half of all the rulers in history would find themselves really really out of place in the modern world if they tried to do the same things they did in their historical contexts, and we would rather not have to deal with them.
I don’t think Hitler was very unusual among rulers of, say, the post-Napoleonic epoch of 1814-1945. He was just first unusually successful (making many enemies) and then unusually thoroughly defeated and occupied (allowing those enemies to make his name particularly infamous).
But Russia still has a “democratic” political structure, everyone off course knows that it’s not like this in reality and only one party exists. But soon in 2018 there’ll be new president elections and that’s last term for Putin. Uncertainty that’s what we will get for sure
I’m living in Russia however I don’t watch TV and read newspapers, but I can say for sure, that Russian Invaders are proclaimed heroes, and NATO guys as Evil. And It’s not a surprise for me that on the other side of the Globe opinion is exactly the contrary. My personal view of the problem is that Putin and Obama are both worth each other, they are strong leaders and will they never stop if there is a chance to gain more power. Situation in Ukraine is imho this—Ukranian side completely entangled in their own problems, and they thought that it was Russia who they must blame and gone comletely nuts, then West gave them weapons and so on
To test how strong is this analogy, we should make bets like: Conditional on Putin successfully annexing a part of territory of Ukraine, what is the probability of Russia attacking another country within 1, 3, 5, 10 years? Which country will it be?
Too much globalization (russialization in this case) is hard to contol, Russia has enormous territory, we already got Crimea which is a port, and got unfriendly response from the world. I expect things to calm down for next 4 years I assume probability of 5% of the invasion to any other country
My personal view of the problem is that Putin and Obama are both worth each other, they are strong leaders and will they never stop if there is a chance to gain more power.
As someone in America, I can tell you the idea of calling Obama a “strong leader” sounds hilarious.
Putin’s supporters are openly nationalist, racist, homophobic,
Would you mind tabooing what you mean by “racist” (and possibly also “nationalist” and “homophobic”) and why your definition is bad, there is currently a long debate in another thread on this very subject.
Yes, there is the irony that Nashi is officially an “anti-fascist” movement. To understand this, it is necessary to know the connotations these words have in the former communist countries, as propaganda shaped them for decades. Shortly: anything associated with former Soviet Union and her satellites is “socialist”, and anything associated with West is “fascist”. It’s like yin and yang for everything; e.g. collectivism is “socialist” and entrepreneurship is “fascist”, but also being ethinically Russian or at least Slavic is more central to the concept of “socialist”, and the idea of human rights (other than the right to live happily and obediently under a socialist government) is kinda “fascist”, because it goes against the power of the collective.
So a person who doesn’t think about this too deeply (you know, most of the population) can identify themselves as “anti-fascist” and mean: “I hate entrepreneurs, homosexuals; and everyone who is not ethnically Russian/Slav should go away from this country”. Having read a few articles about the Nashi, this is more or less the meaning they use.
(This is a point I would like to emphasise as often as possible—though usually I don’t, respecting the LW’s attitude to politics—that the ideas of “left” or “socialism” in former Soviet countries are so completely unlike their versions in the West. It is just a result of successful propaganda and suppressing the flow of information that makes most leftists in the West believe otherwise. If you take a typical Nazi, reduce his hate of Jews by 80%, and convert him using the chronophone to a post-Soviet culture, this is what passes as “left” here.)
Looking at the article, I don’t see what specifically you’re considering “racist”. It would help if you stated your definition. Ok, it would help even more if you didn’t through around words commonly used by SJW’s to mean “anyone I disagree with”.
and laws against LGBT people.
You mean like the laws every country had until maybe a couple decades ago?
If you take a typical Nazi, reduce his hate of Jews by 80%, and convert him using the chronophone to a post-Soviet culture, this is what passes as “left” here.
To taboo the SJW-like words, here is what I mean: worship of physical power, enthusiasm about war, emphasis on reproduction of purebloods, agression against people different from the norm.
Except that in this case the police and social workers weren’t willing to enforce the law for fear of being called “racist”. More generally, the law is only as strong as the will and ability of people to enforce it.
Genghis Khan was Hitler, Julius Caesar was Hitler, Hernán Cortés was Hitler. Adverse selection in the political process often favors leaders who really enjoy taking other peoples’ stuff. Also, comparing some aspects of Putin to Hitler (as Kasparov did) doesn’t mean you think Putin=Hitler. Putin, thankfully, doesn’t seem to enjoy killing for its own sake.
Putin, thankfully, doesn’t seem to enjoy killing for its own sake.
Neither did Hitler. He always had extrinsic goals to be achieved by killing. Often those were quite admirable goals if you accepted extreme partisanship for the German people at the expense of everyone else. (Not always; he suppressed domestic opposition ruthlessly, but it was nothing in comparison to his treatment of non-Germans and no different from most other states at the time.)
Yeah, yeah. It’s always 1939, the bad guy du jour is always Hitler. Assad is Hitler, Putin is Hitler, Saddam was Hitler, Qaddafi was Hitler.
The warmongers really need to get a new routine, people aren’t falling for it anymore.
But perhaps it really is always 1939. Or, to be even more glib, what you are saying sounds to me much like:
OK, let’s be serious. Let’s say that “being Hitler” means going on an ever-increasing campaign of conquest against neighbouring countries that results in a very damaging war. We could note that this kind of behaviour was very common prior to the Napoleonic Wars (Napoleon, Frederick the Great, Charles XII, Louis XIV, Wallenstein, Philip II, Suleiman I, etc etc). Since the Napoleonic Wars, there have been a number of international frameworks more-or-less explicitly devoted to prevent “Hitlers,” and which have had some success. However, IR is basically anarchy, which means that when actors fail to abide by the rules of those international framework, forcing them in line means war.
There haven’t been a lot of “Hitlers” in recent years. But at least part of the reason that the people you call “warmongers” nipped the likes of Saddam, Milosevic, Galtieri, etc in the bud. For example, Saddam was definitely on the Hitler path in 1991, and what stopped him was western military intervention. And not only did this intervention stop him, but it acted as a warning to other leaders who might be considering more bellicose action, and helped reinforce the rules and norms of our peaceful international framework.
But this commitment is forever being tested, because leaders get glory through war. Consider that the fame and popularity of American Presidents has been shown to be higher the more Americans who die in military combat in their term in office (!) and then multiply that for more bellicose societies such as Russia. A peaceful world requires constant vigilance.
In the current case, it’s clear that Putin is engaged in an aggressive campaign of conquest against his neighbours (not merely in Ukraine). It’s not clear where this will stop. It’s clear that every victory strengthens Putin’s domestic position and emboldens him for the next step. This is the classic “Hitlerian” path, and everyone from Hillary Clinton to Prince Charles has noted it. That doesn’t mean the West should necessarily intervene (maybe the costs are greater than the benefits) but it’s pretty obvious why the comparison is so widely made. I’d say the ‘routine’ that no-one is falling for is the Panglossian one that Putin isn’t a predator—with each new Russian outrage, it becomes harder and harder to sustain.
I haven’t heard the (potential) interventions against Qaddafi and Assad justified on the same grounds. There, the justification is usually a combination of (1) humanitarian and (2) preventing failed states, which is rather different.
...AND end up on the losing side of history.
That’s an important addendum because sometimes you go on an ever-increasing campaign of conquest against neighbouring countries that results in many damaging wars, establish a successful empire, impose a Pax Romana, and, basically live happily ever after. People who succeed at this aren’t usually called Hitlers.
Okay… that has also declined a lot recently. I don’t see the result being any different.
But you also have to remember that there is not the history between the US and these other regimes the way it is between the US and Russia. Putin is an old communist and he remembers the old days, he remembers them very well and he wants them back. Putin and his cronies chafed in the 90′s under Pax Americana and now they have their chance to shake up the international order rather than conform to the American lead way of doing things and I think he is of the opinion that if it doesn’t happen now there won’t be another chance for a generation.
1938: “Just give him the parts of Czechoslovakia he wants. Yeah, annexing a part of other country is wrong, but a minority speaking his language lives there, so, uhm, he kinda has a good reason. More importantly, we have a good reason to believe he will stop there. Just let’s not be the bad guys who fight over nothing. Everything will be fine when he gets what he wants, he is a reasonable guy.”
2014: “Just give him the parts of Ukraine he wants. Yeah, annexing a part of other country is wrong, but a minority speaking his language lives there, so, uhm, he kinda has a good reason. More importantly, we have a good reason to believe he will stop there. Just let’s not be the bad guys who fight over nothing. Everything will be fine when he gets what he wants, he is a reasonable guy.”
The analogies are much deeper here than merely “he is a guy we don’t like, therefore Hitler”. Things that happen inside Russia are also very disturbing—I am trying to ignore politics, and I usually don’t care about what happens in Russia, but some news still get to me—Putin’s supporters are openly nationalist, racist, homophobic, pretty much everything you associate with fascism, he has a strong support of the Orthodox Church, journalists who criticize him are assassinated. (Someone living in Russia would be more qualified to write about this.) The only way he could lose an election would be against someone who is even more like this. Winning a symbolic war against the West will only make him more popular.
To test how strong is this analogy, we should make bets like: Conditional on Putin successfully annexing a part of territory of Ukraine, what is the probability of Russia attacking another country within 1, 3, 5, 10 years? Which country will it be?
All of these things also apply to the other examples I mentioned, and many other countries besides. People said the same things about Saddam, Qaddafi, Assad, etc. Putin is of course saying similar things about his Ukrainian enemies to what you are saying about him. (Admittedly, they make it easy for him.)
There is no shortage of historical examples of historical revanchism, yet the “Hitler in 1939” analogy utterly dominates. So why rely 100% on one analogy. Why insist on using the example that is the closest stand-in for “evil psychopath who cannot be reasoned with, but must be destroyed utterly?”
Probably because you’re in the midst of a media driven two-minutes hate. History begins and ends with Hitler, 1939!
(Seriously, your standard for being Hitleresque is being racist, homophobic, and nationalistic? It might be a fun exercise for you to write down a list of 100 historical leaders, determine how many were/were not racist, homophobic, or nationalistic. This will give you your Hitler/non-Hitler ratio. Do you think the ratios of Hitlers : non-Hitlers is greater or less than 1?)
This situation is optimized for media, but exactly in the opposite way. The whole attack is divided into many incremental steps. Each small step is not enough to evoke a military response from the West. Then there is a pause, until media stop paying attention and find something else to care about. Then another small step.
(Remember the first step? Russian soldiers without uniforms in Ukraine territory, not yet openly fighting anyone, just carrying weapons and looking intimidating. So, what are you going to do about it? First, there is no war yet, and second, they even deny being Russian. Calm down, everyone, calm down, nothing to see here. -- A few steps later it’s obvious there are Russian troops there, but we already kinda knew it for months, so why the sudden overreaction today? Calm down, everyone, calm down, nothing new is happening here.)
This is how you overcome the Schelling point—by doing a calculated very small step, and then calling your opponent irrational if he wants to react.
Dividing something in many incremental steps that each are newsworthy generally means that the whole things gets more media attention than if you do everything at once.
Wikileaks for example didn’t release all the cables at once but purposefully spread them out over a time to give them more media attention.
This Yes, Prime Minster video is relevant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IX_d_vMKswE
Not just being nationalistic, not just being expansionist, but actually taking territory.
I would guess that more than half of all rulers in history took others’ territory, or tried to and failed. And being nationalistic goes without saying ever since the invention of nationalism.
The specific tactic of nibbling on your neighbors one bit at a time, varying your speed depending on international reactions, was used by Hitler but also by many others. Calling a common behavior Hitleresque isn’t useful.
There are good reasons for comparing Germany in 1938 with Russia in 2014, but I don’t think these are among them.
And more than half of all the rulers in history would find themselves really really out of place in the modern world if they tried to do the same things they did in their historical contexts, and we would rather not have to deal with them.
A rather low bar to get over, there.
I don’t think Hitler was very unusual among rulers of, say, the post-Napoleonic epoch of 1814-1945. He was just first unusually successful (making many enemies) and then unusually thoroughly defeated and occupied (allowing those enemies to make his name particularly infamous).
But Russia still has a “democratic” political structure, everyone off course knows that it’s not like this in reality and only one party exists. But soon in 2018 there’ll be new president elections and that’s last term for Putin. Uncertainty that’s what we will get for sure
I’m living in Russia however I don’t watch TV and read newspapers, but I can say for sure, that Russian Invaders are proclaimed heroes, and NATO guys as Evil. And It’s not a surprise for me that on the other side of the Globe opinion is exactly the contrary. My personal view of the problem is that Putin and Obama are both worth each other, they are strong leaders and will they never stop if there is a chance to gain more power. Situation in Ukraine is imho this—Ukranian side completely entangled in their own problems, and they thought that it was Russia who they must blame and gone comletely nuts, then West gave them weapons and so on
Too much globalization (russialization in this case) is hard to contol, Russia has enormous territory, we already got Crimea which is a port, and got unfriendly response from the world. I expect things to calm down for next 4 years I assume probability of 5% of the invasion to any other country
As someone in America, I can tell you the idea of calling Obama a “strong leader” sounds hilarious.
Would you mind tabooing what you mean by “racist” (and possibly also “nationalist” and “homophobic”) and why your definition is bad, there is currently a long debate in another thread on this very subject.
Things like the Nashi movement, and laws against LGBT people.
Yes, there is the irony that Nashi is officially an “anti-fascist” movement. To understand this, it is necessary to know the connotations these words have in the former communist countries, as propaganda shaped them for decades. Shortly: anything associated with former Soviet Union and her satellites is “socialist”, and anything associated with West is “fascist”. It’s like yin and yang for everything; e.g. collectivism is “socialist” and entrepreneurship is “fascist”, but also being ethinically Russian or at least Slavic is more central to the concept of “socialist”, and the idea of human rights (other than the right to live happily and obediently under a socialist government) is kinda “fascist”, because it goes against the power of the collective.
So a person who doesn’t think about this too deeply (you know, most of the population) can identify themselves as “anti-fascist” and mean: “I hate entrepreneurs, homosexuals; and everyone who is not ethnically Russian/Slav should go away from this country”. Having read a few articles about the Nashi, this is more or less the meaning they use.
(This is a point I would like to emphasise as often as possible—though usually I don’t, respecting the LW’s attitude to politics—that the ideas of “left” or “socialism” in former Soviet countries are so completely unlike their versions in the West. It is just a result of successful propaganda and suppressing the flow of information that makes most leftists in the West believe otherwise. If you take a typical Nazi, reduce his hate of Jews by 80%, and convert him using the chronophone to a post-Soviet culture, this is what passes as “left” here.)
Looking at the article, I don’t see what specifically you’re considering “racist”. It would help if you stated your definition. Ok, it would help even more if you didn’t through around words commonly used by SJW’s to mean “anyone I disagree with”.
You mean like the laws every country had until maybe a couple decades ago?
So are the Russian creating an overarching recreational organization and bringing all private clubs under its control?
Better.
To taboo the SJW-like words, here is what I mean: worship of physical power, enthusiasm about war, emphasis on reproduction of purebloods, agression against people different from the norm.
Yes, Nashi is impressively scary. Kudos for reading up on them.
Britain tried embracing foreigners even ones who had no interest in assimilating. This was the result.
Those are just two different ways of judging people by their ethnicity instead of by their individual actions.
My idea would be something like: Do whatever you want as long as you follow the law. When you break the law, go to jail.
Except that in this case the police and social workers weren’t willing to enforce the law for fear of being called “racist”. More generally, the law is only as strong as the will and ability of people to enforce it.
Genghis Khan was Hitler, Julius Caesar was Hitler, Hernán Cortés was Hitler. Adverse selection in the political process often favors leaders who really enjoy taking other peoples’ stuff. Also, comparing some aspects of Putin to Hitler (as Kasparov did) doesn’t mean you think Putin=Hitler. Putin, thankfully, doesn’t seem to enjoy killing for its own sake.
Neither did Hitler. He always had extrinsic goals to be achieved by killing. Often those were quite admirable goals if you accepted extreme partisanship for the German people at the expense of everyone else. (Not always; he suppressed domestic opposition ruthlessly, but it was nothing in comparison to his treatment of non-Germans and no different from most other states at the time.)