Re:They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45
by skissane on Friday April 15, 2022 @03:29PM
(#31044686)
> If you were to simplify it, it would be nationalism on steroids with a deep hate for all other nations
That is a huge oversimplification. Nazis viewed Slavs as inferiors to be enslaved, but they saw Scandinavians much more positively. Hitler admired the British Empire, and prior to the outbreak of WW2, Nazi propaganda was pro-British - Hitler had hoped to recruit Britain as an ally, and was disappointed when it became an enemy instead. Nazi policy towards conquered nations was complex, ranging from genocidal extermination at one extreme, to promoting enhanced minority rights at the other (which they did for the Frisians in the Netherlands and the Bretons in France). Even for Slavs the policy wasn’t purely enslavement - some were to be forcibly assimilated as Germans instead (the Sorbs), and the Nazis were keen to play different Slavic groups off against each other (which is how some Ukrainian nationalists ended up volunteering to fight for the Nazis)
That is a huge oversimplification. Nazis viewed Slavs as inferiors to be enslaved, but they saw Scandinavians much more positively. Hitler admired the British Empire, and prior to the outbreak of WW2, Nazi propaganda was pro-British - Hitler had hoped to recruit Britain as an ally, and was disappointed when it became an enemy instead. Nazi policy towards conquered nations was complex, ranging from genocidal extermination at one extreme, to promoting enhanced minority rights at the other (which they did for the Frisians in the Netherlands and the Bretons in France). Even for Slavs the policy wasn’t purely enslavement - some were to be forcibly assimilated as Germans instead (the Sorbs), and the Nazis were keen to play different Slavic groups off against each other (which is how some Ukrainian nationalists ended up volunteering to fight for the Nazis)